Debates of August 16, 2007 (day 11)

Yes, Madam Chair, please.

Thank you, Minister Dent. Does the committee agree?

Agreed.

Thank you. I will ask the Sergeant-at-Arms, please, if he would escort the witnesses to the witness table.

Minister Dent, for the record, could you please introduce your witnesses?

Thank you, Madam Chair. To my left I have Janis Cooper, legislative counsel for the Department of Justice; and on my right, Blair Barbour, who is legislative policy advisor, policy and planning, Education, Culture and Employment.

Thank you, Minister Dent. General comments. General comments on the Employment Standards Act. Mr. Ramsay.

Thank you, Madam Chair. I am just wondering if the Minister could provide us with a definition of construction. If you look at plumbers, for example, some work in construction sites and then there are some who do service work. They are both plumbers but only one works in construction. I am just wondering if the Minister could provide us with a definition of construction.

Thank you, Mr. Ramsay. Mr. Dent.

Thank you, Madam Chair. The intention is to make that sort of definition in the regulations. That will happen after consultation after the act is passed and before it is brought into force.

Thank you, Minister Dent. Mr. Ramsay.

Thank you, Madam Chair. I am just wondering if the Minister could just provide who he is going to be consulting with when he talks about consultation.

Thank you, Mr. Ramsay. Mr. Dent.

Thank you, Madam Chair. There will have to be a broad consultative process before the act is brought into force. It will include the trade organizations, employers' organizations, and there will be an opportunity for the public to comment as well.

Thank you, Mr. Dent. Mr. Ramsay.

I have just one further question, Madam Chair. In the definitions, there is a definition of work of construction but not specifically of construction. I am just wondering why you wouldn’t have a definition for construction in the legislation itself.

Thank you, Mr. Ramsay. Mr. Dent.

Perhaps, Madam Chair, I could have Mr. Barbour answer that question.

Thank you. Mr. Barbour.

Thank you. What we are planning on doing is defining construction in a context of the notice of termination exemptions. Currently, we define the notice of termination exemption requirements in the regulations and the idea would be to define it just with respect to the issue of the requirement to provide notice of termination. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Barbour. Mr. Ramsay.

Thank you.

Ms. Lee.

Thank you, Madam Chair. This legislation is quite substantive and it's packaged nice and neat now, but it went through lots of discussions and reviews and amendments in the public process and the committee process. As the Minister mentioned in his statement, I think it was a very good productive working process. I just want to ask a question following up on the questions from the Member from Kam Lake. I’m glad he raised that here, because it’s something that he raised I believe during the committee process as well. We have received communications from the Construction Association on that. I believe we had a presentation from an individual who is associated with the Construction Association, as well, about the definition of construction. So just to put it on record, could I ask the Minister or his officials whether or not, in his opinion, that the changes that they’re making with respect to the definition of construction, whether it’s worker construction or construction or however they’re doing it, that that will address, then, some of the concerns that they had. I think that the Minister is aware of the fact that we have had recent examples of where an employer of a plumber who went to work at a construction site got caught up in that cross-jurisdiction situation. Thank you.

Thank you, Ms. Lee. Minister Dent.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I’m advised that the department was aware of the original submission put in by the Construction Association. The intention is to make sure that the definitions are clarified and not substantively changed over what is currently understood by the definitions.

Thank you, Mr. Dent. Ms. Lee.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Could I ask the Minister or his officials whether there has been any consultation with the Construction Association to make sure that this approach is acceptable to them?

Thank you, Ms. Lee. Mr. Dent.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. One of the reasons that it’s being left to regulations is that it allows that consultation to take place, but the Construction Association will be involved in the consultative process, yes.

Thank you, Mr. Dent. Ms. Lee.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. That has been my understanding. So could I ask the Minister just to get some information on when that consultation on the regulatory wording and the meaning of that will take place? Thank you.

Thank you, Ms. Lee. Mr. Dent.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. After the bill is passed, the intention is to bring it into force as quickly as possible. So the consultation is planned for this fall.

Thank you. General comments. Mr. Braden.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. There are a couple of provisions here that I wanted to see a bit more information on this otherwise very progressive bill. Mr. Chairman, the bill brings in a couple of areas that provides for more clarification. This is specifically in the areas of compassionate and bereavement leave. The question that I wanted to pose regarded the definition of family, as these two provisions would allow and there is contained in the act a definition of it and I understand also that this is consistent with federal labour legislation. Of course, it’s spouses and children of employees and other persons. There was a member of a class of persons described by federal enactment, etcetera, but provision (e) in the definition says any other person who is a member of a class of persons described by regulation. Regulations, Mr. Chairman, as we know, tend to be written after an act is passed or a bill is passed by this Assembly. So I was wondering if the Minister is contemplating that there will be additional definitions of family allowed in this area in terms of bereavement and compassionate leave. I know that this has some special application here in the North, Mr. Chairman, where our definition or our consideration of family has different cultural circumstances attached to it. So how does the Minister propose to be handling a definition of family as regards to the regulations, Mr. Chairman?

Thank you, Mr. Braden. Mr. Dent.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. The reason this has been written this way is to recognize that the definition of family may be different in the North than what you might find elsewhere and while the family has been defined under compassionate leave pretty much along the way that it is now recognized by the federal government, that’s been done just to ensure that where employment insurance would kick in, it’s a consistent definition here for us; but under bereavement leave, the expectation is that we will have a definition that is much broader, recognizing the northern reality or a broader understanding of what makes up a family and ensuring the people are a broader range of family members then able to take bereavement leave that might be the case for compassionate leave.

Thank you, Mr. Dent. Mr. Braden.

The department engaged in quite a considerable consultation process already leading up to this bill and from everything I saw, it was a pretty good process, Mr. Chairman. Will there be further consultation or attempts to see what the general public thinks should be brought in for defining family for this bereavement leave aspect? Is there going to be another round of discussions, Mr. Chairman?

Thank you, Mr. Braden. Mr. Dent.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Yes, the expectation was that there would be some public discussion about that issue. One manner might be, for instance, to take a stab at a draft of what the regulation might look like and then go out and ask people have we got it right. That process is not dissimilar from what was undertaken in the first place and I think worked fairly well to stimulate discussion.

Thank you, Mr. Dent. Mr. Braden.

Mr. Chairman, I wanted to ask in another area a little bit about the minimum wage provisions. This bill proposes that minimum wage from now on could be set by the Minister in regulation, which is a change. It takes it out of the legislative realm. On occasion, legislatures do go in and amend minimum wage to accommodate for things like the activity or lack of it in the economy or rates of inflation. It’s not done very often. I think I remember in the last eight years, I don’t know that it’s come up more than once in my term here, but I wanted to, and I have no objection to it becoming more or less than an administrative change rather than a political one, but I wanted to ask what kind of indicators or triggers or thresholds the department would use in deciding when it was time to go in and change the minimum wage? What would be the indicators that would bring this about in this closed process, Mr. Chairman?

Thank you, Mr. Braden. Mr. Dent.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Just on one of the points that Mr. Braden was making, or just to provide some clarification perhaps, Nunavut is the only other jurisdiction in Canada that still uses legislation to set minimum wage. So in this change we are expecting that we are making it easier for the government to make smaller changes more regularly, which we think is a more appropriate way in which to handle this. I would expect that the government would annually take a look at what has been happening across the board with wages and embark on a process of consulting with chambers of commerce and trade unions about potentially changing the minimum wage.

Thank you, Mr. Dent. Mr. Braden.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Finally, in the area of the appeals process under this bill, we are proposing a fairly substantive change there and that is going from a panel to a sole adjudicator model. I wanted to ask the Minister of our ability or intention to ask those people who are currently serving on the appeals panel to gauge their interest in taking on the job as a sole adjudicator and, more specifically, Mr. Chairman, what kinds of training and expertise we would be offering or expecting these people to have before taking them on as sole adjudicators. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Thank you, Mr. Braden. Mr. Dent.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. The existing members of the Labour Standards Board will be considered adjudicators by the terms of this bill. So their appointments continue automatically as sole adjudicators. We are hoping that they are prepared to continue to act as adjudicators so that we can take advantage of the experience and knowledge that they have already gained on the job. The expectation will be that there will be regular training sessions for adjudicators, offering them a chance to come together so they get to know each other and meet face to face at least annually for training sessions and that would facilitate not only the training that they would be expected to get, but for them to get to know each other so that they are comfortable in cases where they may want to seek another opinion of an adjudicator; they’re comfortable phoning or meeting with another adjudicator to discuss the case. I mean there’s no reason that that couldn’t happen, should an adjudicator wish to seek counsel from somebody else who is also an adjudicator in our system. So we expect that through collegial contact, through training, that we will ensure that people still have the ability to work together, if necessary, in order to get the job done better.

Thank you, Mr. Dent. Mr. Braden, thank you. General comments. Does committee agree to go into detail? Clause by clause?