March break is on. A planned strike by Air Canada baggage handlers and machinists would have disrupted many a vacation.
But at the same time, the decision — nominally made by Labour Minister Lisa Raitt — is a clear abuse of the law.
Raitt took advantage of a section in the Canada Labour Code designed “to prevent an immediate and serious danger to the safety and health of the public.”
That section gives Ottawa the right to have a federal tribunal determine which, if any, services affected by a proposed labour disruption are essential.
The very act of making such a request prevents workers from striking and employers from imposing a lockout.
This part of the law is usually interpreted in a sensible fashion. It’s been used, for instance, to limit strikes affecting ferry service to Newfoundland.
But over the past year, in a series of labour disputes involving Air Canada, Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s Conservative government has stretched the law to breathtaking extremes.
In October, Raitt used the health and safety wheeze to head off a planned strike by 6,800 Air Canada flight attendants. She did the same this week to prevent a planned strike by 8,600 baggage handlers and mechanics.
Crafty Air Canada also managed to get its disgruntled pilots into the mix by suddenly announcing its plans to lock them out effective Monday.
True to form, Raitt rolled the company’s 3,000 pilots into her dubious health and safety order, thus ensuring that, even if they want to, they can’t exercise their legal right to strike.
How would a strike by private carrier Air Canada endanger health and safety? Raitt was asked that question Thursday. She didn’t have much of an answer.
“Air Canada can carry some cargo that is related to the health industry, related to pharmaceuticals, and certainly those kinds of things related to remote communities that, simply put, nobody else flies to because Air Canada has jurisdictional responsibility to fly to certain remote areas,” Raitt told CBC.
In fact, Air Canada is not the only option. Bigger centres are served by other airlines, like WestJet. Most places in Canada are accessible by rail or road.
As for remote areas, Raitt is simply wrong. Air Canada flies into few isolated communities. Settlements like Attawapiskat on Ontario’s Hudson Bay coast rely on Air Creebec. In the Arctic, where First Air is a dominant player, Air Canada does little.
But then health and safety is just the latest excuse. When the Harper government first began interfering in Air Canada labour disputes last June, Raitt cited “the economy.” That was her justification for threatening back-to-work legislation that would have prevented a looming strike by customer service agents.
Given that Air Canada almost certainly could have kept flying during a strike by non-essential ground staff, that reason was truly ludicrous.
The Conservatives have long been good friends to privately owned Air Canada. In 2010, they refused to let the national airline of the United Arab Emirates compete with Air Canada on key international routes. Even when the U.A.E. responded by expelling Canadian troops from what had been their forward operating base for the Afghan war, Ottawa wouldn’t budge.
Such constancy in love may be admirable. But surely it would be better if Harper were more open about his ardor for this particular company. He could, for instance, have compliant Conservative MPs pass a new Air Canada Workers Must Always Accept Lower Wages law. That would at least avoid the health and safety farce.
Original Article
Source: Star
Author: Thomas Walkom
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