Alberta Conservative MP takes surprising swipe at Canada Post back-to-work law

With locked-out postal workers being forced back to their jobs last night by the Harper Conservatives, I was surprised and interested to learn that Brent Rathgeber, the usually well-behaved Conservative Member of Parliament for Edmonton-St. Albert, recently used his blog to criticize his own party for its approach to resolving labour disputes.

Does this indicate a sudden epiphany by Rathgeber that as an Alberta MP who isn't one of Prime Minister Stephen Harper's closest cronies he's unlikely ever to be considered cabinet material, or is he merely showing a slightly independent streak now that he's been comfortably re-elected?

Regardless, Rathgeber stated in the June 22 edition of his blog that he is philosophically troubled by back-to-work legislation. "As a former Labour Lawyer (Management Side), I do actually subscribe to the concepts of the right to collective bargaining and the right to withdraw services after the expiration of a collective agreement to demonstrate one's resolve,"  Rathgeber stated.

Perhaps I am reading too much into a simple comment, but in the context of Harper's Ottawa, Rathgeber's turn of phrase is interesting: "…I do actually subscribe to the concepts of the right to collective bargaining…." It almost sounds as if Rathgeber is acknowledging that such a sentiment is unusual, perhaps even unique, among the current unprogressive Conservative caucus in Ottawa.

And I can tell you that whatever he is, Rathgeber is no dummy. He's a pretty sharp guy who knows how to parse a sentence for specific meaning as well as any of us. He is also, it should be noted, the MP for the riding in which I reside.

"At a more practical level," Rathgeber went on, "I am leery of Back to Work Legislation because I cynically suspect that many unions favour such legislation, believing they will fare better under binding arbitration than they would at the bargaining table."

While Rathgeber's suspicion is by no means warranted in all circumstances and with all unions -- especially here in Alberta, where the dice are usually loaded against working people in such processes -- it must be conceded that there is enough truth to what he says to make it dangerous.

It is true at least that if the arbitration process is fair, and an employer is particularly unreasonable and intransigent, the process can be made to defend the interests of working people. Alas, unmentioned in Rathgeber's blog, the arbitration process set out in the government of Canada's back-to-work legislation, which was passed Saturday night, cannot be described as fair.

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Source: Rabble.ca