Wynnetario to reverse Tories Draconian Labour Laws

Amazing what can happen when you are last in polling........


Mandatory sick pay, shifting the threshold for overtime, boosting the minimum paid vacation, advance scheduling, and making it easier to join a union are all under consideration.

Premier Kathleen Wynne ordered the review of the province's labour and employment laws in 2015, with a focus on precarious employment and vulnerable workers.

Businesses have been buzzing about the potential reforms since the government's hand-picked special advisers released an interim report last summer, listing more than 200 proposals under consideration. Their final report is to be handed to Flynn in the coming days.

Some of the reforms being considered include banning replacement workers during strikes and lockouts, allowing domestic workers to join unions, and changing the rules about how unions are formed in certain industries that tend to be non-unionized.

"We're hopeful that the government takes serious measures to help all workers, whether they belong to a union or not," said Ontario Federation of Labour president Chris Buckley.

"There's such a host of issues that are wrong," Buckley said in an interview with CBC News. "You have workers sitting at home waiting for the phone to ring, they don't have their schedules in advance. You have workers who don't have paid sick days."

Ontario's Employment Standards Act currently does not require employers to give any paid sick days. The law requires a minimum of two weeks annual paid vacation, and the government's advisers are considering whether to recommend boosting that to three weeks.

The advisers are also considering whether to recommend a law that would force employers to give workers advance notice of their schedules.

Business, labour brace for changes to Ontario's workplace laws - Toronto - CBC News

Later this month, Premier Kathleen Wynne's government will release a report expected to recommend sweeping reforms to the province's employment laws. Sick pay is one of the items being reviewed, and advocacy groups are urging the Liberals to mandate seven paid sick days per year for all full-time employees.

"There's clear health evidence that paid sick days are good for workers," said Dr. Kate Hayman, a Toronto emergency room physician and a member of an advocacy group called the Decent Work and Health Network. "Right now in Ontario, so many people don't have access to them."

Hayman says she sees people every night who come to the emergency room for treatment of ongoing illnesses because they would lose pay if they took time off during the work day.

"People can't look after their health because we don't have the employment legislation in place to make sure that they can get the care they need," said Hayman in an interview with CBC News.

Studies by the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives and the Poverty and Employment Precarity in Southern Ontario research group suggest 40 to 50 per cent of all workers in Ontario — at least three million people — are not entitled to paid sick days.

The union represents personal trainers at 47 GoodLife clubs in Toronto, Peterborough and Ajax. In negotiations for a first contract, the union is proposing five paid sick days per year and the company is proposing zero, said Naylor.

Officials with GoodLife Fitness declined CBC's request for an interview on Wednesday but sent responses to questions by email.

"The compensation package that our personal trainers receive is very competitive, and on average they are the highest-paid trainers in the Canadian fitness industry," Adam Roberts, a public relations specialist with the company, said in the email. "As with many employers, paid sick days don't form part of the compensation package."

"It shouldn't be too much to ask for a paid sick day," said Love. "​We're Canadian. It should be our right."

Millions of Ontario workers get no sick pay, but that could change - Toronto - CBC News

So the Wynners had 11 years to fix what the Mike Harris PC'ers destroyed but now they decide to go for the gold. Their internal polling must not be looking good for them.........


Sweeping labour reforms — and a dramatic rise in the minimum wage up to $15 an hour — could soon target companies relying unfairly on part-time or contract work that deprives many Ontarians of decent wages from steady employment.

Ontario’s Liberal government is debating a comprehensive update to labour laws that would boost private sector unionization, which has been declining at the same time as so-called precarious employment has left more and more people — middle class and working class — bouncing from one job to the next.

The provincial cabinet will decide next week how far to take the package of reforms spearheaded by Labour Minister Kevin Flynn after a two-year review, Changing Workplaces, headed by outside experts. But it could have far-reaching effects for people of all ages and all walks of life who worry about vacation time, job security and wage transparency as temporary workers are increasingly treated like second-class citizens.

Government sources say most elements are falling into place after public hearings and private lobbying that has pitted union demands against a backlash from the corporate sector — with the governing Liberals caught in the middle. The sources spoke on condition of anonymity because cabinet deliberations are supposed to remain confidential.

In an interview, Flynn hinted strongly at the direction he is taking if he can win support from his cabinet colleagues. And with an election looming next year, the Liberals are also laying the groundwork for a campaign battle against the Opposition Progressive Conservatives, who have previously derided unions and opposed a higher minimum wage.

But as more workers face a future of instability and unpredictability, the government’s goal is “to rebalance what has become an unbalanced relationship where the employer holds all the cards,” Flynn told me.

“You can’t justify treating that part-time worker any differently than a full-time worker.”

Among the major proposals going to cabinet before a public announcement later this month are:

https://www.thestar.com/news/queens...ost-to-minimum-wage-work-conditions-cohn.html