Ontario public-sector wage freeze sets stage for nasty showdown with unions

The minority Ontario Liberal government is headed for a major confrontation with its public-sector unions in a gamble that voter concern over the province's $14.8-billion deficit will outweigh the kind of political grief an energized labour movement can bring.

But if the B.C. Liberal government's experience of trying to strong-arm its unions is anything to go by, Premier Dalton McGuinty's Liberals are in for a nasty and perhaps unsuccessful legal fight.

According to The Canadian Press, proposed legislation announced Wednesday by Finance Minister Dwight Duncan would freeze wages for almost 500,000 pubic servants, including hospital workers, college staff, long-term care homes and Crown-owned hydro companies.

It doesn't apply to municipalities, so police, fire, ambulance, public transit and other civic employees are exempt.

The proposed legislation, which hasn't been introduced yet, freezes pay and benefits for two years but allows for some increases on existing salary grids.

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The finance minister would have to approve all collective agreements — there are some 2,300 union contracts — and could also opt to impose a settlement if the proposed deal is unsatisfactory, CP reported.

McGuinty warned previously that his government would impose a wage freeze if it can't be achieved at the bargaining table.

The bill, which would cover bargaining until 2017, is very similar to one passed earlier this month imposing a contract on Ontario teachers but stops short of the two-year ban on strikes that the teachers face.

However, CP noted Duncan said his power to impose a contract effectively gives him the power to end a strike.

The earlier legislation only riled up the teachers, who have been holding strike votes regardless of the ban. For instance, the Oshawa Express reported Wednesday that Durham elementary teachers voted 97.5 per cent in favour of a strike, while their high-school colleagues voted 94 per cent in favour.

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The province's three major unions for teachers and school support workers have promised to challenge the law in court, CityNews reported.

The Ontario Federation of Labour scheduled an emergency meeting for Wednesday to come up with plans to oppose what it sees as an attempt to strip the province's 1.3 million public sector workers of their rights.

Federation president Sid Ryan said the bill does take away the right to strike and to bargain collectively.

"(Former premier) Mike Harris tried to take away the right to strike and right to negotiate for a two year period, and we did exactly what we're probably going to do today, call an emergency convention of the entire labour movement," Ryan said, according to CP.

"We're saying to McGuinty: remove the threats to take away the right to strike, allow people to go to the bargaining table."

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Both the new bill and the law targeting teachers are bound to end up in court, where the unions have some strong case law in their favour.

In 2002, the B.C. Liberal government rammed through three pieces of legislation that imposed a settlement on the province's combative teachers' union and gutted provisions of the existing contract that gave teachers a say in things like class size. One bill also weakened collective agreements covering health-care workers on issues such as contracting out. A later law unilaterally imposed a wage cut on hospital workers.

The bills triggered a five-year legal fight that went to the Supreme Court of Canada, which ruled in 2007, in a case brought by the Hospital Employees Union, that the collective-bargaining process was protected under the Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

According to a CBC News report at the time, the court found there was little evidence the B.C. government meaningfully consulted with unions before bringing in the legislation.

The decision forced the government to negotiate a costly settlement for hospital workers' back pay.

Ontario's finance minister said Wednesday he's confident his legislation can withstand court challenges but admitted it's a serious risk to the government, CP said.