[ Page 4843 ]

CONTENTS

Routine Proceedings

Tabling Documents –– 4843

Metro Transit Collective Bargaining Assistance Act (Bill 34). Hon. Mr. McClelland

Introduction and first reading –– 4843

Metro Transit Collective Bargaining Assistance Act (Bill 34) — Second reading. (Hon.

Mr. McClelland)

Hon. Mr. McClelland –– 4844

Mr. Skelly –– 4846

Mr. Lea –– 4849

Mr. Parks –– 4850

Mr. Gabelmann –– 4852

Tabling Documents –– 4852

THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 13, 1984

The House met at 10:10 a.m.

Prayers.

HON. MR. GARDOM: Mr. Speaker, we're all saddened to return to this assembly without the presence and very good company of our colleague and fine friend, the former hon. member for Okanagan North. The Hon. Mr. Campbell was with us, in the elected service of his riding and this province, regretfully for only a little over a year. However, during that short period of time he made lasting impressions by his candour and his abundant capacity for powerful, understandable and fair-minded expression. He was never shy with his views. He was generous of heart, and extremely well liked and well regarded by all members of this House. We will all miss him, but we're all richer for our experience with him.

It would be greatly appreciated, Mr. Speaker, if you would extend to Mrs. Campbell, his family and his many friends our most sincere sympathy.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Thank you. The appropriate message will be sent.

The leader of the official opposition.... Pardon me, the House Leader.

MR. HOWARD: Thank you for the elevation.

Mr. Speaker, Her Majesty's Loyal Opposition wants to join with the government House Leader and the government in formally expressing here in the chamber our regrets at the passing of Mr. Campbell. We got to know him, in the short period of time he was here, as a very generous, very friendly and helpful human being. We have already expressed our regrets to the family, but want to join with the government in saying to Mrs. Campbell and members of the family how much we enjoyed the brief moments that we had with him here. We will remember him and honour him as the days go by.

HON. MR. BENNETT: Mr. Speaker, since last we met, the New Democratic Party has had an election for a new leader. They've chosen the member for Alberni (Mr. Skelly), and I know all members wish to join me in congratulating the new leader of the official opposition on taking his place in that capacity for the first time during a sitting. I might say on a personal note that I wish the Leader of the Opposition well in his deliberations and in those many times that we will meet, and not always agree, for the capacity and wisdom that he may show in assisting the public debate that must take place in this province, through this Legislature. He has my every best wish for every event, except elections.

MR, SKELLY: Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker, and thank you very much to the Premier.

As an experienced back-bencher, I can recall the first day that the Premier came into this House and the butterflies he felt when he first came in as Leader of the Opposition. So I hope the House will extend me a bit of leeway as I suffer through those first few hours myself. I very much appreciate the Premier's kind words and his offer of best wishes on my limited success. I also convey to him my best wishes. He was only able to spend a short time as Leader of the Opposition before he managed to get the Premier's job, and I think, Mr. Speaker, that it's time he had a refresher course.

MR. GABELMANN: Mr. Speaker, I have a series of introductions that I would like to make this morning. First of all, in the public galleries are a number of members of the Independent Canadian Transit Union. I would like to welcome them and identify them by name: Colin Kelly, Gerry Krantz, John Wright, Bill Evans, Doug Newman, Eric Scott, Terry Knight, Bob Jones, Gale Jones, Brian Swanson and Patricia Lane. While I'm at it, ML Speaker, I would like to introduce to them members of management that they now have an opportunity to meet on that side of the House and, in particular. back in this corner of the House.

I also have other introductions, Mr. Speaker. In the gallery today — and I won't name the individuals — are a number of representatives of various groups in British Columbia representing Seniors Without Any Transit, the Lower Mainland Solidarity Coalition, unemployment action centres, tenants' rights groups, the Canadian Federation of Students, the First United Church and the College-Institute Educators' Association. They are here today to watch this debate.

[10:15]

HON. MR. McGEER: Mr. Speaker, I don't think the introductions this morning should pass without appropriate recognition being given to another change in status in our House, in which we have an independent member for the first time since the Minister of Intergovernmental Relations (Hon. Mr. Gardom) and I sat as independent members. We two, if not others in the House, appreciate the circumstance of the member for Prince Rupert (Mr. Lea). We wish him well and, of course, we should remind him of the precedent which has been set in recent years by independent members in this House.

Hon. Mr. Phillips tabled the financial statement for the B.C. Railway for the fiscal year ended December 30, 1983, and the tenth annual report of the B.C. Development Corporation.

Hon. Mr. Curtis tabled the statement of assets and liabilities of the B.C. Educational Institutions Capital Financing Authority as at March 31, 1984; the statement of assets and liabilities for the B.C. Housing and Employment Development Financing Authority as at March 31, 1984; the statement of Crown proceeding payments pursuant to the provisions of the Crown Proceeding Act, chapter 86, for 1983-84; and the annual report for the B.C. Systems Corporation for 1983-84.

Hon. Mr. Chabot tabled the annual report for the B.C. Buildings Corporation for 1984, and the fifteenth annual report of the business done in pursuance of the Pension (College) Act for the year ended August 31, 1983.

Introduction of Bills

METRO TRANSIT COLLECTIVE
BARGAINING ASSISTANCE ACT

Hon. Mr McClelland presented a message from His Honour the Lieutenant-Governor: a bill intituled Metro Transit Collective Bargaining Assistance Act.

Bill 34 introduced and read a first time.

[ Page 4844 ]

HON. MR. McCLELLAND: Mr. Speaker, in order that all members may have the opportunity to have a look at the bill and study it before debate continues, I would ask if you would accept a recommendation for a one-hour recess.

The House took recess at 10:20 a.m.

The House resumed at 11:34 a.m.

HON. MR. McCLELLAND: Mr. Speaker, before going into the regular order of business, I wish to rise under standing order 81 to request a ruling from you that the legislation about which this House was called back into session is urgent and extraordinary and should proceed through all the stages of legislative procedure this day. I would like briefly to set out some of the reasons why I believe that that ruling should be made.

As you know, it was decided to recall members of the House in order to deal with a situation that has seen our major urban areas deprived of bus service for three months. This decision was made only because every avenue and procedure which was available under the normal bargaining process, including the use of a skilled mediator and an industrial inquiry commissioner — both individuals of unquestioned skill and repute — was explored and tried without success. All members are aware that the parties had available to them the expertise of Mr. Clark Gilmour, our chief mediation officer, and later that of Mr. Joe Morris, a distinguished labour statesman, who served as the industrial inquiry commission. Both of these individuals applied their years of experience and knowledge to the dispute without avail.

This legislation is designed to bring about a speedy resumption of transit service to the general public and those who, through no fault of their own, have undergone an uncomfortable and very difficult situation over the past three months. It is imperative at this point that service to the public be restored.

The legislation which I have tabled does not alter the normal bargaining rights of the parties. It does contain a way to resolve the dispute while normal service is provided. It does, however, contain a provision that will allow the government to act in a settlement in the event the parties again fail to reach agreement on their own. In this respect the legislation closely resembles legislation introduced and passed earlier this year to deal with the pulp dispute. The bill will require that the buses be back on the streets by Monday, and there will be no strike or lockout action while this bill is in place.

This special session of the House to deal with the labour dispute breaks no new ground; nor does the request to you, Mr. Speaker, that I'm making now: that this legislation undergo an expedited debate-and-approval process by members of the House.

Our government reconvened the House to resolve a strike-lockout involving non-teaching school employees in the West Kootenays. In 1974, the then NDP government had a special session to resolve a dispute involving greater Vancouver firefighters. The following year, again under the NDP administration, members of the opposition, of which some of us in this House were a part, agreed and complied with a request from the government for a one-day sitting to pass legislation which sent forest workers back to the job, along with propane gas delivery workers, and which prevented a shutdown of B.C. Rail. Those particular instances were of an urgent and extraordinary nature, and so, too, is this dispute and this proposed method of solution.

So, Mr. Speaker, I would ask you for a positive ruling on my request to exercise your discretion under standing order 81.

MR. HOWARD: Mr. Speaker, standing order 81 is that standing order which permits a variance from the normal course of giving separate readings to bills on separate days, and permits a bill to receive, if necessary, all three readings on one day if the situation is, as the minister pointed out, urgent or extraordinary. There is no question in our minds that it is an urgent and an extraordinary situation. The recitation by the minister of the events this summer since the dispute started shows that the urgency is one created by the laziness of the government in dealing with this situation. It's that kind of aloofness and disinterest and casual approach by that minister and this government that has got the people in Vancouver and the lower mainland and here into the situation that they are in. That doesn't obviate the fact that it is urgent and extraordinary; it's just regretful that it's an urgency created by the person who is now claiming that it's urgent.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Thank you, Standing order 81 will apply for this session.

METRO TRANSIT COLLECTIVE
BARGAINING ASSISTANCE ACT

HON. MR. McCLELLAND: Mr. Speaker, I would now like to take my place and move second reading of Bill 34, and I would like to make a few comments again on second reading. One quick remark. The Leader of the Opposition talked about aloofness and laziness. It's just one more recognition by the NDP that that party does not believe, as was mentioned once in this House by the member for Vancouver Centre, in the collective bargaining process. I thank the member for Skeena and House Leader for once again reassuring this side of the House that the NDP does not and never has believed in the true collective bargaining process.

I want to again emphasize that the priority issue here, of course, is to get the buses rolling again in our major urban areas and to provide the kind of service in terms of transportation that the public has come to expect and to which it is entitled. That is the key thrust of the legislation, and why we're here today.

There is no doubt that we recognize that the past three months have been difficult for the hundreds of thousands of bus users who depend on public transport to get to work, to go shopping, to make visits, to keep doctors' appointments or to simply get around for a whole variety of other reasons. As with every labour dispute, people suffer. In the public sector it is perhaps too often the person who has no direct stake in the dispute itself who bears the major brunt of the dispute, and somehow that's unfair.

I want to stress again that the collective bargaining process has been allowed to take its full course under the laws of this province. Mediation was employed, as was the most unusual step of appointing an industrial inquiry commission. All of the steps which have evolved and developed through the labour relations system here in British Columbia were tried and explored, and in this instance, for a variety of reasons, were found wanting. The opportunities for a labour

[ Page 4845 ]

relations solution were simply exhausted, and the government has now had no choice but to act.

During committee stage of this bill, of course, the House will have an opportunity to debate the bill in detail, but I would first just like to list the main points of the legislation and what it is designed to do. I believe it is fair and evenhanded. It will solve the most pressing and urgent problem, that of getting our public transit systems on the lower mainland and here in the Victoria area up and running again.

The bill will require, as I said earlier, that the buses be back on the streets by Monday. There can be no strike or lockout action while this bill is in effect. It will extend the last collective agreement until a new agreement comes into force through direct bargaining, with a special mediator to be assigned by the government to help resolve the dispute, or, if a voluntary settlement cannot be reached, to have the government determine the terms. It will require the resumption of collective bargaining within 72 hours of enactment with the assistance of our special mediator, Mr. Clark Gilmour, the executive director of the government's mediation services branch, who has been involved in previous efforts to resolve the dispute. This dispute will be resolved with a collective agreement reached either by the parties themselves, with the aid of the special mediator, or, if necessary, by government action. Obviously the former is the preferable route to go.

The best and most enduring settlements are the ones which the union and employer negotiate themselves in responsible and meaningful face-to-face sessions across the bargaining table. I suppose it could he said that this dispute has had no beneficial effects for anyone either directly or indirectly involved. The company has lost revenue; the drivers have lost three months of pay, and of course the public has been the biggest loser of all. Their interests and rights as innocent third parties were consigned, without consultation or consideration, to the back burner, In the end, the procedures we relied on in our labour relations process just didn't work. Perhaps the time is overdue for a re-evaluation of the bargaining process and how it works or fails when we talk about the public sector as opposed to the private sector. Certainly the two systems are different. The pressures and the impetus to resolve differences to reach settlements also differ. In general, strikes and lockouts in the private sector tend to have their most direct and telling impact on the union membership and the company involved. Of course, there are spinoff side effects in terms of other unions, other employees, and sometimes on the public as well. But the bleeding is usually done by the employer and union members. The loss of revenue and wages can often, if a dispute drags on long enough, force the parties to reach an accommodation in their own vested interests. On the other hand, public sector disputes always affect and hurt the public at large.

[11:45]

So I think the time is right, Mr. Speaker, to focus on labour relations in the public sector and try and determine whether we can answer a number of questions related to collective bargaining for people paid from the public purse at all levels of government. It has become clear during the term of this dispute that the public is asking us a lot of questions. Strong views have been expressed on both sides of this issue. Should stoppages be avoided through some other kind of system of binding arbitration or a formula be developed of finding ways to index public sector wage levels to productivity or other factors? I don't know the answers to those questions, Mr. Speaker, and I don't think any individual or group right now has all of the answers to the questions, but I believe we are at a point in time where we should start finding them,

I want to inform the House that it is my intention to establish a public-hearing process with sessions to be held all over British Columbia just as soon as terms of reference can be established, through which we can hear from a broad section of society on the whole range of issues inherent in public sector labour relations. It isn't my intention merely to ask for opinions and submissions from labour and manage merit groups. I want to hear from individual citizens about their feelings and their views, and I want full-scale public input into the issues surrounding public sector labour relations.

1 believe that if we simply pass this legislation today to bring this particular dispute to an end, without taking a broader look at labour relations in the public sector, we leave ourselves and the general public — our citizens — open to future situations where again their interests will be most damaged and we will find ourselves crippled in protecting those interests. There has to be — there must be — a better way. If, through these public meetings which will be established, we can develop an acceptable consensus, we will have gone a long way toward ensuring that the public interest will be protected further down the road. I don't believe that we can leave this issue alone any longer and merely hope that in the next public sector dispute the traditional methods of settlement will work and that a stoppage of services will not occur. The community demands that we do something and will condemn us all as legislators if we do nothing.

Public sector services are paid for from the public's purse, and there is an expectation among the people whose tax dollars fund those services that they will continue without interruption. To my mind that's not such an unreasonable expectation.

At the same time, there must be a strong commitment to fairness for those who work in the public service. The scales cannot be tipped only one way. That would simply create a new set of problems and inevitably lead to situations involving public sector employees where intervention would probably become the norm rather than the exception.

I want to say again, as I have said on many occasions, that I, as Minister of Labour, and this government are committed to a free collective bargaining system. That commitment is unshaken and the challenge before us is to seek out and foster new approaches and new alternatives for the public sector.

I do regret that this legislation had to be introduced, but unfortunately there was no alternative. All of the avenues available to us were used without success. I am hopeful, however, that with the transit system back in operation and with the immediate pressures lifted from them, the parties can reach a settlement which avoids the necessity of our government becoming involved in establishing the terms of an agreement.

In closing, our philosophy of non-intervention — save in the most essential and urgent cases — remains intact. Equally intact is our determination that when all else fails we will take whatever measures are necessary to protect the public interest now and in the future. Mr. Speaker, I now move second reading of the bill.

Before taking my seat I would like to ask the House for leave to file two documents pertinent to the legislation which is before the House.

Leave granted.

[ Page 4846 ]

Hon. Mr. McClelland tabled the report and recommendations of the industrial inquiry commissioner, Mr. Joe Morris.

HON- MR. McCLELLAND: Secondly, Mr. Speaker, mention is made in the legislation of the minister being able to vary the terms of the collective agreement in place in order to ensure that transit operations are resumed, and that will be done by ministerial order, So that members of the opposition will know the way in which that will be achieved, I would like to file a copy of the proposed order which will be going to the parties following passage of the legislation.

Hon. Mr. McClelland tabled a copy of the proposed ministerial order.

MR. GABELMANN: Give us the Cameron report too.

HON. MR. McCLELLAND: You file it.

MR. SKELLY: Mr. Speaker, it's with some regret that I rise in the Legislature this first time as the Leader of the Opposition, and with some regret and disappointment that it has to be around this type of issue. I first of all regret that we have been called here into a session of the Legislature after a long absence in order to deal with only one single bill, when there are serious problems facing this province that relate to many issues which this Legislature should be meeting full-time to deal with.

We hear that there are 194,000 people out of work in this province because of the economic policies of this government. There are thousands of people seeking work; hundreds of thousands of people on welfare, a greater number than at any time in the past; a shrinking workforce and an increasing number of people unemployed. There is demoralization throughout the province, Mr Speaker, among teachers who are facing increased class sizes. I talked to one yesterday facing a grade 4-5 split with 39 kids in the class. Students are concerned because they don't have the money to go back to school; they're unable to work, and the government has cut off their student grants. Social workers and financial assistance workers are dealing with caseloads of up to 400 people per worker.

The Premier, when he was expressing his concern about the 12- and 13-week bus strike, was saying that he was concerned about these students, concerned about elderly people, concerned about the handicapped. What a hollow statement! If the Premier were concerned about those people, he would have taken action to make sure that those people have a decent standard and quality of life in this province, and that services aren't continually being cut back from those people — We should be sitting here in the Legislature continuously and developing programs that assist those people to have a decent standard and quality of life in this province.

I feel disappointment also to be called here to use the power of government as a force for compulsion rather than for conciliation and to consider legislation which can only further poison the labour relations climate both in the transit industry and in the province of British Columbia.

Mr. Speaker, what we're dealing with here is not an emergency that arose as a result of the failure of certain procedures along the way. What we're dealing with here is an emergency that results from the failure of the government to get involved in a dispute and to use the many facilities available through the Ministry of Labour and the cabinet to assist in the resolution of this dispute. In fact, Mr. Speaker, it appears that the government has delayed as long as possible and has refused to provide the full range of services available to the government in a timely way in order to avoid the disruption that we've had in transit service in this province. Where was the government 18 months ago? Where was the government when MTOC and its drivers were unable to arrive at a settlement of their contract when it expired in March 1983? What assistance was the government providing at that time to make sure that we weren't in a situation which would have required a strike or lockout? It appears that the, government was doing nothing. What happened when the bus drivers themselves got involved in an "unstrike," when they did everything they possibly could, short of shutting down the service, to demonstrate to the public that there was no contract in effect, that they were having some difficulty in dealing with Metro Transit Operating Company in order to obtain a contract, and that it appeared to them that bargaining was not taking place successfully?

The minister talks about allowing the collective bargaining process to proceed. Yet it was not proceeding satisfactorily, Mr. Speaker. Otherwise we wouldn't have seen these long delays between March 1983, when that contract expired, and today, when we are back in the Legislature forcing another group of people back to work in British Columbia, after depriving hundreds of thousands of people in this province from the transit service that they have a right to because they've paid for it. The Premier expressed his concern. when he said he had to call the Legislature back. Where was his concern six months ago? Where was his concern a year ago? Where was his concern 18 months ago when these problems began to address themselves to us? The Premier obviously didn't have concerns, or his wits about him, at that point, and that's why we've reached a crisis stage now. We haven't reached a crisis in collective bargaining. What we have reached, Mr. Speaker, is a crisis in the government's failure to act in a timely way and competently in order to resolve this dispute. That's the problem we're dealing with here right now.

It's interesting; as the Minister of Forests (Hon. Mr. Waterland) says, what we're here dealing with is the problem of the government's delay. There is probably some other government agenda behind this, because we know the government's approach to organized labour, and their approach to the whole concern they have about working people in this province. Why did the government not strike an independent, impartial inquiry commission at the time when it was first requested by the drivers — or by the drivers in association with the company, although that apparently fell through? The minister has the power. Around June or July 1984 — I wrote to the minister on July 10, 1984 — I wrote to the Premier, to the minister, and to the minister responsible for transit, and asked that they appoint an impartial inquiry commission under, I believe, section 122 of the Labour Code. On the strength of the appointment of that inquiry commission at that time the drivers had agreed to resume their duties and to get the transit system going again. The minister refused to act; he refused to appoint an inquiry commission. That was before the summer, before people were coming to Vancouver as tourists, before the PNE was started.

When people needed that transit service during the summer, where was the Premier? Where was the Premier taking action in order to facilitate collective bargaining in this dispute? The Premier wasn't there. The Premier failed to act, the

[ Page 4847 ]

Minister of Labour failed to act, and the minister responsible for transit failed to act. Why wasn't collective bargaining taking place? After all, this contract had expired in March 1983. The bus drivers had bent over backwards to keep that service operating in spite of the fact that they didn't have a contract. They put on the unstrike, they got fake tokens, and they dressed up in funny uniforms to try to draw people's attention to the fact that a collective agreement had not been arrived at. Why did the government not act then? Why did they not consult with the drivers? Why did they not consult with the company to find out how this thing could be resolved?

[12:00]

In May of this year, when I was talking to the Victoria Chamber of Commerce, I suggested that the way the NDP did these things when they were in government was that they used the offices and services of the Ministry of Labour to bring these people together, often in the minister's office, to identify the points at issue and in dispute, to get people focused on those issues and to make sure that collective bargaining took place in a manner that focused that bargaining on the outstanding issues. I don't believe the minister or the government took the issues seriously enough to do that.

I wonder what the government's response was to the Ross Cameron report. Surely the government had access to it. Needless to say, the Labour Relations Board issued an order suppressing it so that the drivers and the company could not release it or make it available to the public. Anybody who had access to this report was enjoined from disclosing it to anybody. But reports like that get out occasionally. The report was damning to the way the Metro Transit Operating Company was being managed — absolutely damning. From the excerpts from the Cameron report that we've seen, we know that the management of that company had severe problems, interfering at the lowest levels of the company. We know that the management's interference was resulting in problems with labour relations. We know that Mr. Cameron himself blamed the problems of labour relations on a number of issues.

I'd like to read some of the excerpts from the Cameron report that are important to this debate today and for the reasons we're debating this legislation in the House today. I'll readjust three excerpts, because those are what I have before me. Quoting Mr. Cameron: "A review of B.C. Transit's sphere of influence shows the lack of a provincial plan. There are therefore no policies and procedures in place necessary to carry out an effective industrial relations function." Here we have a transit authority in the province that has no policies in place, according to Mr. Cameron, to carry out an effective industrial relations function, The government should have identified that problem immediately. The bargaining had been going on for a year at this point. The government should have identified that problem, seen it as an impediment to collective bargaining and taken steps to correct it as soon as possible so that bargaining could have proceeded normally.

The report also dealt with the chief executive officer or the chairman of Metro Transit Operating Company, I'd like to read a few selections from the Cameron report that describe his activities.

"The level of involvement of the chairman in the day-to-day operation of MTOC has a very clear industrial relations impact, and I would be remiss if I did not make the principals aware of my thoughts on this matter."

On page 6 Mr. Cameron says:

"My comments with reference to the chairman of the board's unusual involvement in the day-to-day operations are generally valid with reference to the present practices of the CEO. The reason for the CEO's involvement outside of normally accepted practice may have been originally valid, but his present understanding of the function of MTOC and the transit industry voids that reason. I suggest that the CEO review his present practices with the idea of removing himself from detailed involvement at all levels of the corporation."

To go back to the original quotation, the involvement of the chairman has a very clear industrial relations impact, according to Mr. Cameron. What was the chairman of the Metro Transit Operating Company doing within that corporation that interfered with the effective pursuit of its industrial relations policy? It appears from the Cameron report that one of the executive officers of that corporation had been interfering with the effective conduct of employee relations within Metro Transit Operating Company.

One final quote from page 9 of the Cameron report, Mr. Speaker "I am not uncomfortable with the pure technical skills of the labour relations personnel. Certain of the interviews lead me to believe that the communications and attitudinal skills of these individuals have been compromised through either interference, specific instruction or individual interpretation of a mandate that is not specific in its intent." Clearly, according to Mr. Cameron's report, the problem in collective bargaining between the ICTU and the MTOC is not one that relates to the ordinary problems of collective bargaining. There appears to have been some interference by appointed political management of this company — interference at the lowest levels of the company, interference at the level of the company that has to do with collective bargaining and industrial relations. It appears that the ability of MTCC to operate and to bargain collectively with its employees has been interfered with by a government representative who answers to the cabinet of this government and who answers to people in this Legislature,

We should have an explanation from the people in this Legislature as to what interference was taking place, what lines of communication existed between this government and its chief executive officer on the Metro Transit Operating Company, and how that individual interfered with or impacted on industrial relations within Metro Transit Operating Company to delay a settlement of this dispute for an unconscionably long period of time, causing a tremendous amount of suffering for those very people that the Premier, at this very late date, expressed some concern about: those students, those senior citizens, those handicapped individuals. The Premier expresses his concern about them but obviously had no concern for them through all of that period of time that this transit dispute was going on.

Mr. Speaker, we are concerned about the delays that took place. We are concerned about the interference of this government in the labour relations policy of a Crown corporation. What type of agenda did this government have when it interfered with the industrial relations functions of Metro Transit Operating Company? What was it trying to achieve?

Over the months that this dispute has been going on this government has been directly and intimately involved. They like to come to the Legislature here and suggest that they are kind of impartial referees in this game. They're not impartial

[ Page 4848 ]

referees, Mr. Speaker. This government appointed the chief executive officer of Metro Transit Operating Company, who is in fact a member of this Legislature. This government has a minister who sits in this Legislature as the person who is responsible for Metro Transit Operating Company and for B.C. Transit. Are they denying that they knew what was in the Cameron report? Are they denying that they were aware that interference was taking place with the industrial relations function of that corporation? Were they unaware that it was taking place within a corporation that has responsibility to this Legislature through a minister of the Crown?

Mr. Speaker, there is much more in this issue than the Minister of Labour has been willing to tell us. There is much more information than the Minister of Labour has been willing to release to this assembly. We will have difficulty accepting the minister's concerns about those who have suffered as a result of the transit stoppage when the Minister of Labour refuses to table in this House a copy of the Cameron report, which shows what kind of interference took place between government members and the Metro Transit Operating Company to prevent an agreement from being arrived at in the first place in a timely way and in a way that wouldn't have interfered with the services in Vancouver and Victoria. This government has a lot to answer for because of their interference with labour negotiations in that area, and this government has a lot to answer for to the people of the province of British Columbia, who were denied their transit service because of government interference in labour negotiations.

I challenge those responsible for transit and those responsible for labour relations administration to stand up and explain those statements made in the Cameron report and explain why the Cameron report was suppressed and not made public so the people of British Columbia could find out who is truly at fault in this dispute. The people who are at fault here are MTOC's executive officers and the government of British Columbia, which has the sole authority to direct what MTOC does.

We realize here that there is a serious problem, that there is a crisis in transit in Vancouver and Victoria. But we want the people of this province to know that the government brought that crisis to this point. It is the government, and the government only, that must bear responsibility for the crisis we're now facing. They generated this crisis in order to serve their own particular agenda with respect to labour management relations in this province.

We as a political party would like to see the transit services in this province restored as quickly as possible, but in a way that represents fairness to both sides. When I talk about both sides, I'm not talking about both sides as the Premier does, as if MTOC was some company operating at arm's length in the private sector. You are the company. You are responsible for the company and for the way that company has been bargaining with its employees. It's your attitudes, your prejudices and your failure to bargain in good faith with your employees that has brought us to the situation we face right now. It's your incompetence.

Here you are in the Legislature expressing regret that it has come to this. You've planned it to come to this. As the minister suggested, he has some other more long-term agenda in view, something he's going to have to look at because of the way this situation in collective bargaining has failed — has been promoted to failure by his ministry and by his cabinet. He has this long-term agenda in view as to whether public employees should have the right to bargain collectively at all. This is his agenda. This is what he wants to be looking at. This is what he suggested in his opening comments: that he's going to be holding public hearings around the province to determine whether public employees should have the right to strike at all. This is his long-term agenda.

HON. MR. McCLELLAND: Now he's against public hearings.

MR. SKELLY: I'm not against public hearings, Mr. Speaker. I have indicated to the members of my party and to the public that I would be willing to see more public hearings in this province. This is a government that has failed to listen over the last several years. Try to get to a minister's office, and you'll find the door closed. I'm just wondering who is going to conduct this public inquiry. Is it the minister who is going to receive all of these documents? Who will be approached to submit documents and submissions to this commission?

I would be very pleased to see a royal commission struck into labour relations in this province.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh.

MR. SKELLY: Oh, Mr, Speaker, the suggestion of a royal commission seems to have hit a sour chord on the government side. When we're talking about public hearings we should be talking about public hearings impartially conducted, where every citizen has, a right to present evidence and to cross-examine the evidence submitted by other citizens. If we're talking about public hearings, you're right: I challenge the Minister of Labour to do a complete public inquiry — a royal commission — into the conduct of labour relations in the province of British Columbia. I challenge the minister to do that very thing and to announce today an impartial inquiry into the Social Credit performance in years past and into the current situation with respect to the administration of labour relations in this province.

[12:15]

Interjections.

MR, SKELLY: Now he's a little less reluctant to talk about public inquiries.

What we're dealing with here is the product of the government's attitude toward people who work for a living. We're also dealing here with the government's approach to the economics of the labour market. They believe that everybody should go into the labour market as individuals and offer their labour for whatever they can get for it, for whatever people are willing to pay. They're willing to go back — and I think this is the basis of the part-time-operator proposal.... My father was a bus driver, so I can remember how part-time operators worked when he first came into the system. They used to have drivers who would come down to the bus depot and hang around there all day waiting to see if there was any work. Some of them would spend 10 or 12 hours a day waiting at the bus depot to see if there was work for them. If there wasn't, they went home. If one was hired, he may have a job that week, but he may not have another job for three weeks. He had to wait there for nine or ten hours a day without any pay whatsoever. Now they want to turn the whole system around to part-time drivers. That shows that this government has absolutely no respect and concern for the

[ Page 4849 ]

needs of those working people. It is treating them as if they were some type of spare part that can be kept in a box on a shelf somewhere and then brought on when they're needed and discarded when they're no longer needed. These are human beings that we're talking about, Mr. Speaker, but this government does not look at participants in the labour force as human beings; they look at them as spare parts — things to be used and thrown away when they're no longer usable. That's the attitude they have toward the labour market.

They believe that everybody should go into the market and bid to employers for whatever price the employers are willing to pay. We can go back in history and see how that system worked before trade unions were formed. I can remember construction workers telling me that they'd go down on a job where someone was working at their trade, and after offering the foreman 20 cents an hour less than that guy was getting, he would be thrown off the job and the new guy hired because he was able to underbid the labourer by 20 cents an hour. Nobody's job was secure. Nobody was treated like a human being.

I was told on several occasions of another way to get a guy's job, and it even applied to some Social Credit highway contracts a few years ago. If you went in and offered the supervisor a few bucks, you got the job simply by doing that. That's why clauses were enclosed in trade union agreements which protected people's jobs and made sure that somebody who had either given a kickback to the foreman or supervisor, or who was willing to offer his services at 20 cents an hour less than the worker on the site.... That's why we developed those protective clauses in union contracts, and that's the main concern of part-time workers.

Interjection.

MR. SKELLY: But you have that attitude toward the labour force, and this is one of the reasons why this government cannot arrive at a collective agreement with its workers, whether in the bus dispute or other disputes that are currently going on around the province.

Mr. Speaker, I've talked to the people involved in the ICTU and others, and I can recall my own father's involvement in the transit industry. These were people who were intensely loyal to their fellow workers and to the companies they worked for. They were able to arrive at collective agreements because the companies weren't entering into those agreements with some preconceived economic notion — blinkers that prevented them from seeing workers as human beings. For years and years they were successful in maintaining a continuous transit service with very few stoppages. It has only been in the last few years in this province, when we now have a government that is economically, philosophically and ideologically blinkered, that we are getting involved in serious problems with trade unions and individual workers. What we are dealing with now is the incompetence of government to resolve problems with its own trade unions and workers. What we are dealing with now is unconscionable delay on the part of the government in resolving this dispute in the public interest, because of all those people who haven't been served over the last 13 or 14 weeks by the shutdown in transit. We are dealing here with a question of ideological blinkering of this government.

What is happening is that as a result of that incompetence and the failure of that company to account to this government and this Legislature for its many deficiencies and inefficiencies, especially in the field of labour relations, those failures in reporting their inefficiencies are failures of the Premier to make certain that that company is operating properly and negotiating in good faith with its members, and that failure is documented in the Cameron report. What we have, and why we're here today after such a long delay, is a failure of the government to demonstrate its competence. We have a failure of the government to treat workers as individual human beings who have a right to some certainty and security of employment and who have a right to be respected and consulted when changes are taking place. This government doesn't recognize those rights on the part of workers and on the part of the public, and that's why we're faced with this problem today.

It is unfortunate, Mr. Speaker, but we intend to vote against this legislation, in part because of the legislation and in part because of this government's failure to act quickly and competently over the last 18 months.

MR. LEA: Mr. Speaker, I should inform all members of the Legislature that I had a meeting with my caucus this morning, and they are absolutely united behind me on my approach to this legislation. [Laughter.]

We are here to talk about the principle of the legislation, and the details will come up in the next reading. There are a number of principles involved with this bill in this reading. One principle is the resumption of transit services for the lower mainland and Victoria; the clauses in the bill make it mandatory that that service resume. On that principle I will be voting for the legislation. But as in all readings, it is very difficult because there are other principles involved. The other principle involved is: how does the legislation lay out the resolution to the dispute itself? I am not in agreement with the method the government has chosen to resolve the dispute.

[Mr. Pelton in the chair.]

Once again the government is taking the powers into cabinet of how to resolve the dispute. There are other more creative ways that a dispute such as this can be resolved. In talking to the principle, I would like to talk about some of the other ways that it could be done. The government could possibly amend the bill, although you'd almost have to amend the entire bill in order to come around to a different principle in that area. I believe that government, as much as possible, should not be the final and deciding factor in these disputes, that it should be at arm's length. The government must always not only appear to be but in fact be the mediator between all groups in society. I don't think that has taken place in this case, because the government has put itself in a position not to appear and in fact not to be at arm's length from the dispute.

It seems to me that a much better way, or one other way, to have dealt with this problem would have been to appoint a mediator, after the resumption of work, to act for a specific period of time, be it 30 days, where the mediator appointed by government would go in and help both parts of the dispute to try to resolve the issues still not resolved. Only in one case would the mediator be an arbitrator: that would be deciding the sheets and how they would be used to get the workers back on the job, because there is dispute around that area. As I understand it, it's part of the old collective agreement that the sheets were done on a seniority basis and filled out by the

[ Page 4850 ]

drivers. If we go back to the system that was in place when this dispute broke into a lockout, then we're going by company sheets and not union sheets as described by the collective agreement. So I would have appointed an arbitrator to deal with that particular issue and to resolve that, but in all other areas that person would be a mediator for a period of 30 days. At the end of 30 days, if there were any outstanding issues that had not been resolved, then those issues would go to the mediator who turns into an arbitrator. There are many methods that can be used at that point. One that I would like to throw out for the government's consideration is the last-offer arbitration, where the arbitrator will ask for and receive, laid out by legislation, the final position after the mediation, if it does fail to resolve the dispute and there are outstanding issues, where those outstanding issues would be required by both of the people in the dispute to lay out their final offer. Then the arbitrator would choose one or the other — either the union's position or management's position in terms of what they are putting forward as their final position. In effect that would force both management and union to be very thoughtful when putting forward their final position for arbitration that would be binding. The arbitrator in this case must have binding powers.

But the government hasn't done that, Mr. Speaker. The minister and the cabinet have taken that power unto themselves. I think that over a period of time that makes people very suspicious that they're not being treated fairly, that they're being treated politically instead of in an industrial relations sense. So as much as possible get it out of government and put it over to someone who does not have a stake in the outcome.

I'd like to deal with a few remarks that the minister made about looking at collective bargaining within the public sector. I think this legislation points out the need for a creative approach. There is no doubt in my mind that bargaining in the private sector has different variants than in the private sector. In the private sector, if there is a lockout or a strike, then there is a very good reason for both of those parties wanting to get back to. the table to resolve that dispute. In the one case the company is losing profits, in the other the union members are losing wages, and both would like to end that situation. So the forces that keep taking them back to the collective bargaining table to try to find a solution are to maintain profits and to maintain wages. In the public sector those same forces are not always in play. On management's side there is money to be saved in continuing a dispute. I would suspect that in this dispute the company has saved $25 million to $30 million in wages.

Interjections.

MR. LEA: Not a penny? I'd like to hear them explain that. I'm sure that the company is saving money in wages during the lockout.

AN HON. MEMBER: The taxpayers.

[12:30]

MR. LEA: I'm sure glad they drew that fine point to my attention, Mr. Speaker. I'd have missed that.

In this case the company is owned by the taxpayers, so when we're talking about the company, I don't think we have to go into who the shareholders are. The fact is that there is good reason for the company not to want to settle a strike or a lockout, because they can save budgetary money in the end. So there is no great desire on their part, like there always is in the private sector, to end the dispute, On the other hand, in the public sector the employees, whether they like to admit it or not, always have in the back of their minds the fact that.... In the private sector the trade union does have to take into account the profitability of the company, the viability of the company, and make their demands around that, but always in the back of the mind in public sector disputes is the thought that all we have to do is raise taxes or borrow, and there will be enough money.

So there are problems in collective bargaining in the public sector, but rather than do away with the right to strike, rather than do away with collective bargaining, a more creative approach should be taken. You don't throw the baby out with the bathwater. What you do is try to find a creative approach that will make collective bargaining work better in the public sector. That's what you have to strive for. So when the minister says he's going to set up a commission, an inquiry, to go out into the community to ask for more ideas, you can't be against that. because that's what we should be doing. We should, as legislators, travel a great deal more than we do. There wouldn't be very much wrong in having a legislative committee go out and do some travelling around the province, because we may learn something too, as legislators.

Interjection.

MR. LEA: But you're just going to do it for the expense money. I'm only kidding.

As well as possibly a public inquiry or a royal commission looking at the issue, I think it would be a good idea for legislators and a legislative committee, either in conjunction with or separately, to go out and listen to what the public has to say. There should be an educational process both for us and for the kind of education that we can help to give to the public on the kind of job we have to do.

I'll be voting for this bill in principle on this reading, Mr. Speaker. I do it with misgivings. I do it because the service has to be put back in place in the community, but I am not in agreement with the method that the government is using to resolve the dispute. When the time comes to vote on individual clauses in the next reading, I will be voting against those on principle. I don't think it's the way to go. I think there are better ways to resolve the dispute itself than is laid out in this legislation. For the government to take these powers into the cabinet room, as opposed to an appointed arbitrator that both the union and management see as fair, is the wrong way to go, Down the road this kind of resolve to a dispute will only lead to more problems in industrial relations, not only within this company and this union, but in all companies and all unions. This is not the way to do it. I'd like to see another resolve to the dispute. I want to see services rendered back to the publi,c and I'll be voting for that in this bill, but we'll deal with the areas that I disagree with, the manner of resolving the dispute, when we get to the next reading of this bill.

MR. PARKS: Mr. Speaker. I rise to take my place in this debate on this extraordinary legislation with mixed emotions. Clearly I'm very pleased to have seen the leadership exhibited by our Premier and the Minister of Labour in taking the necessary action to bring the hardship that has been experienced in B.C.'s two major metropolitan areas to an end,

[ Page 4851 ]

to see that disruption brought to a halt. However, I am greatly disappointed that this legislation has been necessitated because the parties could not resolve their dispute through the unfettered collective bargaining process. I think it's fair to conclude that our government has agreed with the NDP — the loyal opposition — that free collective bargaining is the way for the parties in labour matters to govern themselves. However, there are moments when the rights of the individual or when the rights of a small group have to give way to the rights of the entire community — in this case the rights of, as I say, the two major metropolitan areas of our province.

This government did not wildly rush in and take away the rights of either party. In fact, it has clearly shown extreme patience and allowed the collective bargaining process to run its course. Initially, when it became clear that the collective bargaining process was making no headway, the minister, through his mediation services, offered counsel. But that got nowhere.

[Mr. Strachan in the chair.]

The minister then moved on to the next step and offered up, to assist the parties, the province's most senior, most experienced mediator. Where did that get us? Nowhere — both parties still meshed in total deadlock.

Recognizing that impasse, the Minister of Labour called upon a former president of the CLC, a very well-respected former labour leader — not a "Socred axeman, " not "a friend of government" or "a friend of management," but a former labour leader. And what happened when that industrial inquiry commission brought down its report? It was summarily — almost totally — rejected by the union.

All the steps that reasonably could be taken have been taken. The necessity has culminated in today's action, and I think the government is to be applauded. I'm surprised when I hear that the opposition is not prepared to support this legislation — surely in principle. They may have some concerns as to the manner in which the back-to-work legislation is coming, but the two main concepts in that piece of legislation are, I think, unassailable.

First, we have a bill that says: "Enough of the hardship to the community. Resume operations; go back to work." Who can criticize that? Why should it be criticized? We want the transit system back up and running.

The second main tenet of this legislation is that collective bargaining will continue. A contract is not being imposed on the union or on the company. The parties are being directed to go back and negotiate within 72 hours. Surely every member of this House should be supporting that in principle.

1 represent a suburb of metropolitan Vancouver and I have many constituents who have truly felt the hardship of this dispute. It's not that they just expect the public transit system to serve them on a convenience basis — and really they are entitled to expect that — but much more importantly, my constituents rely on our system of public transportation to get them to and from work, to get them to and from shopping, to get them to and from the doctor and other needs that we all have. Why are they being held to ransom in this dispute?

I understand that back-to-work legislation, emergency labour legislation, is not a new occurrence in this House. I thought it would be wise to research Hansard and look to the experience of this House when other similar pieces of legislation have been introduced in the House. I refer to a former Minister of Labour and his introductory remarks in bringing back-to-work legislation before this House. He set out what, in my opinion, is an unassailable rationale when he stated:

"We have never stated…that there is an absolute right to indulge in economic warfare which, in many cases, threatens and jeopardizes the basic safety, comfort and health of citizens of this province."

AN HON. MEMBER: Who said that?

MR. PARKS: That was stated by the former Minister of Labour, Bill King, in one NDP government. He then went on — and I think it's very important to remember these words:

"Government is elected to represent the interests of all citizens of this province. We must make day-to-day judgments on the effectiveness of the collective bargaining system and on the effectiveness of any other device that governs and regulates the conduct of society. We are not prepared to stand idly by and watch disputes of this nature wreak unjustified hardship on those directly involved as well as those indirectly involved."

Clearly, those who are not directly involved are experiencing tremendous hardship. What about those who are directly involved? What about the workers, the bus drivers? I read in this morning's newspaper some very disturbing comments attributed to our bus drivers. I think one in particular illustrates what must be a degree of frustration that I guess is understandable. Mr. Mike Crocker, apparently a bus driver, is reported as saying: "Slaves are legislated back to work. This is supposed to be a free society, and you just don't legislate free people in that way." As I stated before reading that passage, I can understand the frustration. The system has been shut down for 90 days, and there has been no perceivable progress in the negotiations.

AN HON. MEMBER: Why?

MR. PARKS: Well, that's not an issue. With all due respect, why there has not been progress is not the issue. The issue today is the fact that for 90 days the system of public transit has been down and the citizens of those two major communities have suffered hardship, and that hardship has got to stop. That is the issue today.

Interjection.

MR. PARKS: You're right, offering up the chief mediation officer of this province is not assisting. You're right, offering up an industrial inquiry commission headed by a former CLC president is not doing anything to expedite and assist. This government has lent every bit of assistance that any two parties could hope for, but the time has now come, this morning and this afternoon, that the hardship must be terminated and the parties must be compelled to go back to the table and negotiate in good faith.

As I was stating, the frustration of that particular bus driver, and surely of all the bus drivers involved in this dispute, is very understandable. I'm wondering if — again referring to our history, to Hansard — the words of a senior member of this House might well serve as counsel for these bus drivers. It was only nine years ago, when we had, I would suggest, a similar degree of frustration with a number of workers in this province, that the hon. member for Vancouver East, at that time sitting in government and at that time supporting back-to-work legislation, made these comments:

"We have to remember that our rights are founded upon duties; that the exercise of power without responsibility is tyranny; that the cost we must pay for our freedom in a social democracy is a

[ Page 4852 ]

certain measure of social discipline and respect for the rights of the other person.

"We have to remember that the provincial wealth of the province is like an apple that can only be divided in so many ways. There are obligations toward the old, the infirm, the people without bargaining power, those in hospitals and those who require roads for access. All these many other demands are upon one source of total provincial wealth, and that can only be divvied up in so many ways. We can grow a bigger apple through cooperative endeavour, but there is only so much to divide up."

[12:45]

It so happens that the hardship this bill is aimed at alleviating has affected the old, the infirm and certainly the people without the bargaining powers. They're the ones who are being irreparably harmed by this dispute.

I understand the hesitancy with respect to a labour-oriented party in not wishing to support back-to-work legislation, but as I said earlier, with the two basic tenets of this legislation, I cannot appreciate why the opposition is already stating that they're opposed to the bill in principle. We have just seen another province have to take extraordinary, exceptional legislative steps to put transit workers back to work — in fact, not back to work; they had to prevent a transit strike from materializing. In that province — it was Ontario, of course — the only party to vote against that preventive action was the NDP. The Liberals didn't vote against it, except Mr. Sweeney. In any event, the NDP voted against it. I was looking for some indication of what I could expect our opposition to do by way of taking a posture on this bill, so I reviewed Hansard on the debate on that legislation. I found a rationale for why the opposition in Ontario would not support the legislation in principle, but I don't think it applies here. In Ontario you had preventive legislation, if you will, preventing them from exercising their rights, rights that have long been associated with workers. They'd been given the right to withdraw their services in order to enhance their ability to bring about a good collective agreement from their particular point of view. However, in Ontario it was somewhat different. I think their position was well summarized in a statement by one Mr. McClellan. I'm sure he's not a relative of our Minister of Labour. During this recent debate Mr. McClellan of the NDP in Ontario stated:

"We should be ashamed that this is happening in our community We should have done everything possible to make sure that a settlement was achieved as a result of collective bargaining, rather than through this kind of draconian, arbitrary, unfair and undemocratic imposition of a sanction of the state against the workers. Let us not kid ourselves. If we look at the penalty sections of Bill 125, all the coercive powers of state are employed against the TTC workers, including daily fines of $1,000 per individual and daily fines of $ 10,000 against the corporation and trade union if they violate the law."

We don't have any of that in this legislation. This isn't draconian legislation. This isn't unfair legislation. This legislation is saying: "Stop the hardship, reinstate the service, go back to the bargaining table." There are no threats of wild penalties. There is no big club being brought out of the closet. Yes, this House has the same powers as the Ontario House had. We could have taken that route, but we haven't. This is a fair, even-handed, essential piece of legislation for this moment in time. I trust the NDP opposition will recognize that fact. Trusting that this legislation will be proclaimed in short order, I trust both parties to this dispute will recognize the even-handedness with which this legislation is entered.

Before I close, Mr. Speaker, I'd like to comment on the minister's remarks with respect to looking for a better way of resolving public sector disputes. When discussing the principle of this bill I do not think it's appropriate to discuss various alternatives. But I welcome the minister's comment that it's time to look for an alternate way of resolving these disputes. I encourage that action, and I'm looking forward to the input which I'm sure will be forthcoming from all citizens of this province.

I believe this legislation has been necessary because of the totally unequivocal frustration of the collective bargaining process. Both parties are to blame. Both parties deserve to be chastised. The public need not, should not, will not suffer any longer. I, of course, will be voting in support of this reading.

MR. GABELMANN: I understand from a nod from the government House Leader that a motion to adjourn this debate until the next sitting would be received with some support. I so move.

Motion approved.

Hon. Mr. Fraser tabled the annual report of B.C. Ferries for the year ending March 1984, and the annual report of the B.C. Steamship Company for the year ending December 31, 1983.

Hon. Mr. Gardo. moved adjournment of the House.

Motion approved.

The House adjourned at 12:53 p.m.