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GUEST EDITORIAL
ROD MICKLEBURGH

Labor Minister Bob McClelland pro-
fesses bewilderment over criticisms
leveled at his long-promised labor code
amendments.

In a recent interview, McClelland
observed: ‘“‘I don’t understand why
people think certification is (now) more
difficult. I wonder why they would
worry about the outcome of a free
vote.”

A close examination of the amend-
ments, however, reveals they go well
beyond the mere requirement of auto-
matic certification votes.

The charges clearly favor non-union
employers and underscore the govern-
ment’s philosophy that successful
union organizing is a bad thing.

For example, it would be hard to
argue against the concept of automatic
certification votes, provided votes
were held the moment a union applied.

In Nova Scotia (the only other pro-
vince where votes are compulsory),
certification votes must be held within
a week of a union’s application.

But there is no time restriction in the
B.C. amendments. The Labor Relations
Board may order a vote only “after
investigations it requires” to deter-
mine that the unit is appropriate for
collective bargaining.

Conceivably, non-union employers
may drag out legal arguments for
months before a vote is ordered, leav-
ing employees open to all sorts of
subtle, anti-union campaigning.

A further amendment, giving the
labor board discretion to allow em-
ployees who are hired after a union’s
application to vote , certainly appears
to contemplate some passage of time
before a vote occurs.

In the United States, where similar
rules exist, unions have often had to
wait years before winning certifica-

tion rights. And figures show about
10,000 workers a year are fired in the
U.S. during union organizing drives,
despite laws against such tactics.

No one knows for sure exactly how it
will work here, but a lot more seems to
be involved than the simple “free vote”
trumpeted by the labor minister.

Another example of the govern-
ment’s philosophy at work is the
change to Section 5 of the code which
prohibited both employers and trade
unions from using “coercion or intimi-
dation’”’ that could “reasonably have
the effect” of influencing an individual
about union membership.

The amendment wipes out any em-
ployer obligation under this section
and substitutes a long series of union
obligations.

One of the new obligations forbids a
union from charging an abnormally-
low initiation fee to new members dur-
ing an organizing drive. When unions

could be certified automatically by
signing up 55 per cent of the bargaining
unit, the change might be justified. But
now that secret ballot votes are com-
pulsory, what’s the point? ... other
than to simply make it more difficult
for unions to organize.

Paul Weiler, the respected first chair-
man of the B.C. Labor Relations Board
who favors compulsory certification
votes if held immediately, concludes:
“IT’S OBVIOUS THE INTENT OF THE
AMENDMENTS IS TO MAKE B.C. AS
UNION-FREE AN ENVIRONMENT
AS POSSIBLE.

“THE GOVERNMENT HAS ALSO
WIPED OUT ITS OWN ABILITY TO
PLAY A CONSTRUCTIVE ROLE IN
RESOLVING LABOR DISPUTES,
BECAUSE ITIS NO LONGER ACTING
IN A NON-PARTISAN WAY IN
LABOR RELATIONS.”

CANADIAN
MANAGERS LOUSY

— European Management Forum —

By RICHARD GWYN
Toronto Star

The less good news is that Canadian
managers are lousy managers. They don’t
know ‘how to delegate and they are
incapable of allowing employees to
participate in decision making. In sum-
mary, the quality of industrial relations in
Canada is the worst in the western world but
for France and Portugal.

Highly regarded

Each year, the Geneva-based European
Management Forum surveys the compara-
tive state of industrial competitiveness of
the 22 member countries of the Organiza-
tion for Economic Co-operation and Devel-
opment — thatis, all of Western Europe, the
U.S., Canada, Japan and Australia. The
survey is done in great detail, with each
country rated in 10 broad categories, from
industrial efficiency to economic dynamism

_ and from human resources to the role of the

state.

Overall, the survey ranks Canada 11th in
1983, or halfway down, or up, the pack. It’s
decidedly worrisome that we have slipped
from sixth place in 1982 and from fifth place
in 1981.

Far more encouragingly, we also come in
fourth in the category of “human
resources.” Our labor force is youthful;
participation by women is high; only in the
United States and Sweden do propor-
tionately more young people receive higher
education; our workers are highly mobile,
We do badly only in the sub-categories of
“availability of skilled workers” (17) and of
Con a drive and entrepreneurship”

19).

Here, at least according to the EMF, is the
source of what could be called, “the Cana-
dian disease.” Unlike in Britain, where the
phrase was coined, Canada’s relative lack of
industrial competitiveness cannot be
blamed on bloody-minded and stupid trade
unions. Instead it’s our managers who are
stupid.

They are also bloody-minded. In over-all
industrial relatons, we rank 19th; in labor
unrest, or strikes, 17th; in worker
participations, 19th; and in management
readiness to delegate, 15th.

Canadian managers can’t blame their
poor performance on poor pay. The average
take-home pay of a Canadian manager,
adjusted for local buying power, was $29,643
(U.S.) in 1983. Only managers of an equival-
ent rank in the U.S. and in Switzerland did
better.

MUNRO ON THE
FEDERAL

ELECTION

Working Canadians have no real
choice in the upcoming Federal elec-
tion. They should vote NDP.

For full employment, for sane inter-
est rates, for relief from the tax burden
imposed upon them by successive Lib-
eral and Conservative governments,
for a real Federal forestry program,

they should vote NDP.

Ed Broadbent is a great guy, but
that’s not the point. The point is that
both John Turner and Brian Mulroney
are corporate lawyers, and that they
and the political parties they lead long
ago decided who they wanted to
represent.

It wasn’t forest industry workers.

THESE ARE HARD
IMs WEALLHAVE
TO’MAKE SACRIFICES.

4/Lumber Worker/Summer, 1984