Country Rating: 3

  • Regular violation of rights

  • Government and/or companies are regularly interfering in collective labour rights or are failling to fully guarantee important aspects of these rights. There are deficiencies in laws and/or certain practices which make frequent violations possible.

Crown Holdings uses strikebreakers: Even though Crown Holdings doubled its profits in 2012, the company demanded major concessions from workers employed at its Toronto plant, including two-tier wage rates and pension freezes. Workers protested against this decision with a strike on 6 September 2013. However, on 8 October 2013 the company tried to break the strike with replacement workers from a non-union plant in Calgary.

The Public Sector Services Continuation Act (Bill 45) in Alberta places further restrictions on some 200,000 unionised public sector workers in the province who already are denied their right to strike. It denies individuals the fundamental right to freedom of expression by introducing for the first time in Canada, a vague legal concept of "strike threat" which makes it illegal to canvass the opinion of "employees to determine whether they wish to strike," or for an individual to freely express a view which calls for or supports strike action. The legislation also imposes huge punitive financial penalties on unions, their members and even unrelated citizens who encourage or support an "illegal strike" or "strike threat."

In Nova Scotia, the Essential Home-support Services (2014) Act (Bill 30, March) ended a two-day strike of some 500 home care workers and forced the workers' unions and their employers to negotiate an essential services agreement prior to the commencement of a strike or lock-out. In alberta, the Public Service Salary Restraint Act (Bill 46) retroactively eliminated a scheduled arbitration process, giving government employees and their union no real input in determining their wages, benefits and working conditions for this round of bargaining. The only "choices" they have been given under Bill 46 are, to either accept the employer's last offer, or have that offer legislated on them.

Bill 86 averted a pending strike by ambulance workers taking away their right to strike and forcing the dispute to final selection offer arbitration.

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