Howard Epstein on Interprovincial Labour Mobility

Excerpt from Hansard: November 9, 2006
Bill No. 67, Apprenticeship and Trades Qualifications Act
The honourable member for Halifax Chebucto

Subject: Interprovincial Labour Mobility

…We in this Chamber ought to turn our minds to what this bill represents along with others that essentially invite us to think about transnational standards … we’re being invited to pass a system that would allow people who are in the securities business to move around amongst the different jurisdictions in Canada. This issue of labour mobility is an interesting one and I’m not saying that the answers are obvious. What I am worried about is any move that might harmonize at a low level… I’m worried about them if, as often will happen, what they can agree to is something at the lowest possible level. If that becomes, then, the harmonized law, where does that leave us with legitimate provincial jurisdiction to exercise in order to raise standards? Are we going to be able to raise standards on environmental matters or will we have to harmonize to the lowest level that the ministers were capable of agreeing to? When it comes to workplace health and safety, will we be able to raise standards or will we have to have standards that represent a harmonization to lower standards? When it comes to education, will we be able to raise standards or are we being asked to harmonize at a low level that ministers in 10 provinces and three territories were able to agree to?

A decade ago, the provinces all agreed to something known as the Agreement on Internal Trade. There were lots of exemptions from it. It wasn’t law. It was, to use the term used in the drafters’ notes in Bill No. 75, a memorandum of understanding. But the idea was to try to harmonize trade rules and now there are lots of initiatives to try to harmonize trade rules as they apply to labour mobility. What does that mean for regulation of professions? What does that mean, in this case, for regulation of trades? … I’m a little worried that what we’re being asked to do here is to move in a direction that would tend to lower standards. If this is in response to an understanding amongst ministers in similar portfolios, then I think we should be told this. Even if it isn’t, is one of the consequences of this going to be that if we end up with lower standards here … When I see something that suggests there is something about the lowering of standards, I don’t feel comfortable doing that. I want to hear that we’re raising standards and I want to see it in the legislation.

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