THE STANDING SENATE COMMITTEE ON TRANSPORT AND COMMUNICATIONS
EVIDENCE
OTTAWA, Wednesday, October 29, 2025
The Standing Senate Committee on Transport and Communications met with videoconference this day at 6:46 p.m. [ET] to examine and report on maintenance of activities or essential services in the federally regulated rail and marine sectors in the case of labour disruptions.
Senator Larry W. Smith (Chair) in the chair.
[English]
The Chair: Colleagues, welcome. My name is Larry Smith. I am a senator from Quebec and chair of the committee.
[Translation]
Now, I would like to ask my colleagues to introduce themselves.
[English]
Senator Simons: Senator Paula Simons, Alberta, Treaty 6 territory.
Senator Wilson: Duncan Wilson, British Columbia.
[Translation]
Senator Oudar: Manuelle Oudar, Quebec. I’m replacing Senator Mohamed today.
Senator Cormier: René Cormier, New Brunswick.
Senator Arnold: Dawn Arnold, New Brunswick.
[English]
Senator Lewis: Todd Lewis, Saskatchewan.
[Translation]
Senator Aucoin: Réjean Aucoin, Nova Scotia.
[English]
Senator Dasko: Donna Dasko, senator from Ontario.
The Chair: Welcome to everyone with us today, as well as those listening to us online at sencanada.ca. We are meeting today to continue our study on the maintenance of transportation services in the case of labour disruptions.
I introduce our first panel of witnesses. We have, from the Railway Association of Canada, Eric Harvey, President and Chief Executive Officer; from the Canadian National Railway Company, Stephanie McGuire, Assistant Vice-President, Labour Relations; and from the Canadian Pacific Kansas City, Nathan Cato, Assistant Vice-President, Government Affairs Canada; and from the Federally Regulated Employers —Transportation and Communications, Daniel Safayeni, President and Chief Executive Officer, and Christopher D. Pigott, Partner, Fasken Martineau DuMoulin LLP. Thank you all for joining us today.
Witnesses will provide opening remarks of approximately five minutes, which will be followed by a question-and-answer session with the senators.
I now invite Mr. Harvey to give his opening remarks.
[Translation]
Eric Harvey, President and Chief Executive Officer, Railway Association of Canada: Thank you, honourable senators.
The Railway Association of Canada would like to thank the committee for the opportunity to appear on this important subject of labour stability in Canada’s supply chains.
We represent close to 50 freight and passenger railway companies that employ 37,000 workers and operate 42,000 kilometres of railway tracks. Canadian railway companies transport approximately $380 billion worth of goods each year, or more than $1 billion a day. Half of Canada’s exports are transported by rail, either to the U.S. border or to a port.
The economic importance of maintaining a smooth supply chain in an exporting country like Canada cannot be overstated. Over the last few decades, numerous disruptions have had serious economic consequences and undermined global confidence in Canada’s reputation as a reliable trading partner.
[English]
These disruptions have also hurt Canada’s domestic economy and importers. The situation has not improved in recent years. In fact, it has worsened.
Simply put, labour disputes, particularly those involving federally regulated industries, continue to undermine Canada’s competitiveness. For decades, Canada has ranked near the bottom of the OECD respecting days of work lost to work stoppages, about 5 more than other OECD members and 10 more than the U.S.
Earlier this year, the Railway Association of Canada, or RAC, published a report entitled The Significant Impacts of Work Stoppages in Canada’s Transportation Sector. Prior to this meeting, we provided a copy to the clerk of this committee to inform your deliberations.
Employment and Social Development Canada data shows that over the past several decades, Canada’s transportation sector has faced thousands of work stoppages involving nearly 2 million workers, resulting in over 19 million lost workdays. From 2023 to 2024, there was a sharp increase in work stoppages in the transportation sector, numbering 62 occurrences. These stoppages resulted in 230,000 lost workdays in 2023 alone, and 1.3 million lost workdays in 2024, marking the highest number of person days lost in the sector since 1966.
Using data published by government agencies, our report established that GDP losses from rail work stoppages are roughly 10 times greater than those from trucking and about 20 times greater than in aviation. Importantly, the report also showed that nearly two thirds of the unrecoverable GDP losses from rail work stoppages occur in other sectors. In other words, rail work stoppages leave lasting gaps in the entire economy that cannot be regained.
This is not a surprising conclusion. Halting railway operations is a complex process that requires careful planning and several days to complete to ensure that no trains or shipments are left stranded. Similarly, restarting operations demands the proper sequencing of equipment and activities, taking weeks before the entire network returns to full capacity.
Successive governments have recognized the critical role of supply chains to Canada’s economy by restoring services in the event of work stoppages. While such interventions were warranted, they also involved significant delays and uncertainty tied to political and procedural factors. Earlier this week, one witness confirmed that the Canadian government has intervened 38 times in the transportation sector since 1950, or once every two years.
A more predictable and durable framework respecting the interventions is needed to ensure long-term labour stability in Canada’s supply chains and eliminate the negative impacts of work stoppages to our economy.
Industry is doing its part, and 10 national associations, including the RAC, representing a broad cross-section of Canadian industries, from the ag sector, mining, forestry and automotive, have united under the banner movingeconomies.ca. This coalition is calling for new, effective mechanisms to protect industries from the economic harm caused by labour disruptions in Canada’s supply chains.
The rail industry fully supports collective bargaining and the negotiated agreements that provide our employees with strong benefits, competitive wages and safe working conditions. However, Canada needs a balanced and effective labour dispute resolution system that ensures stability and predictability for our supply chains and the customers who depend on them. The current regime does not achieve that.
Thank you.
[Translation]
The Chair: Thank you, Mr. Harvey. I now invite Ms. McGuire to give her opening remarks.
[English]
Please go ahead.
[Translation]
Stephanie McGuire, Assistant Vice-President, Labour Relations, Canadian National Railway Company: Thank you, senators, for giving us this opportunity to appear today on behalf of Canadian National, or CN.
We applaud the essential work that your committee is doing to examine ways to maintain essential services in the federally regulated transportation sector in the case of labour disruptions. CN is an important part of Canada’s infrastructure. Every day, we move goods that Canadians depend on, including critical minerals, timber, oil, grain and medical supplies.
The CN network spans three coasts, connecting communities, industries, and international markets. CN is not just a railway company. It is a vital lifeline for Canada’s economy.
[English]
CN recognizes and respects the right of employees to bargain collectively and the role of unions in representing workers. In fact, as an employer, we want to reach negotiated deals. We believe that this is in the best interest of unions, employees and employers. At the same time, it is essential that we strike a balance between labour rights and the public interest, particularly when disruptions threaten the Canadian supply chain and economy, which the country is working tirelessly to diversify and strengthen.
This goal cannot be achieved without a mechanism to compel parties to remain at the bargaining table and negotiate in good faith, while minimizing disruptions that harm the economy. CN believes that a neutral third-party mediation process, with the ability to determine the terms of an agreement, and giving the Minister of Labour the authority to implement such terms if they are deemed in the national interest, is a practical solution.
The recently amended maintenance of activities regime under the Canada Labour Code empowers the Minister of Labour to refer questions to the Canada Industrial Relations Board, or CIRB, regarding maintenance of activities during a labour disruption, if they deem it necessary.
In 2024, the minister referred this very question for the freight rail sector, specifically CN and Canadian Pacific Kansas City, or CPKC. After three months of review, during which bargaining was paused, the CIRB concluded that under the current code, the rail industry is not an essential service. It also ruled that no specific commodities, such as chlorine or grain, should be designated as essential.
That decision, we believe, was appropriate. If the opposite had occurred, CN could have had to locate and isolate certain commodities deemed essential and maintain movement of these products in the event of a labour disruption. In practical terms, locating the correct railcars scattered across the country, forming multiple short trains, creating many bullet-like trains that are going through our communities across the country.
Cherry-picking commodities to move during a strike is so impractical that it is impossible.
[Translation]
CN does not believe that the designation of essential service is the right answer. While we agree that rail may not be “essential” under the code, it’s still critical to Canada’s economy. The real question is therefore as follows: How do we protect vital economic sectors during labour disputes?
[English]
Canada must modernize its collective bargaining framework. Work stoppages are becoming longer and more frequent, threatening productivity and Canada’s reputation as a reliable trading partner.
Since 2023, in these sectors, we’ve seen repeated disruptions: the two B.C. port strikes that shut down West Coast ports; the CPKC and CN labour disruption in 2024; the WestJet maintenance workers’ strike over the Canada Day long weekend in 2024; and, as we know, the most recent Air Canada flight attendants’ strike this past September.
Prolonged strikes in the transportation sector — marine and rail — undermine supply chain reliability and global competitiveness. Without stronger mechanisms to keep parties at the table, the current framework remains fragile.
If we are not going to use section 107, then what is the solution? We believe Canada needs a modern, enforceable dispute resolution process, one that allows a neutral third party to make recommendations to the parties and the Minister of Labour before they can earn the right to strike or lock out.
For sectors like rail, the minister should have the authority to adopt those recommendations if necessary to protect Canadians and the economy. There is a sense of urgency around this topic as over the next two years, we will see significant rounds of bargaining at both the East Coast and West Coast ports, and again with CN and CPKC.
[Translation]
Mr. Chair and members of the committee, CN is deeply committed to maintaining constructive labour relations and to working with the government, unions and industry partners to limit the impacts of disruptions on Canadians.
We support your committee’s work and wish to contribute to a modern framework that protects both the rights of workers and public interest.
[English]
Thank you. I will be pleased to take any questions you may have.
[Translation]
The Chair: Thank you, Ms. McGuire. I now invite Mr. Cato to give his opening remarks.
Nathan Cato, Assistant Vice-President, Government Affairs Canada, Canadian Pacific Kansas City: Thank you. Good evening, honourable senators.
Canadian Pacific Kansas City, or CPKC, has a strong record of successful collective bargaining with our unions. The best deals are reached at the bargaining table. That is always the outcome we want.
[English]
We arrive at negotiated agreements in the vast majority of cases. In fact, earlier this year, we reached new four-year collective agreements with three unions representing thousands of mechanical, engineering, clerical and intermodal employees in Canada.
Unfortunately, in our industry, we have one union in Canada with whom it is difficult to reach a negotiated agreement, typically resulting in a work stoppage. In contrast, excluding that one union, we have had approximately 40 rounds of collective bargaining with our other unions in Canada since 1993 with only one work stoppage.
In our view, the key policy question to be explored in your study is this: Does the federal government have the most effective legal tools to protect Canada’s national interest when collective bargaining fails in economic sectors critical to supply chain functions, like railways and ports?
[Translation]
A labour disruption at a railway or port is bigger than a dispute between an employer and union: All Canadians are impacted, either directly or indirectly.
[English]
When a labour dispute occurs in these sectors, the national interest is unquestionably at stake. Union leaders representing a few hundred or a few thousand employees should not be permitted to hold hostage 41 million Canadians and the national economic fabric of the country. Canada’s reputation as a reliable trading partner is also damaged when the country’s supply chains grind to a halt due to frequent and recurring labour disruptions. Such reputational damage undermines Canada’s competitiveness.
Major international customers have asked in recent years how they can do business with Canada when its critical supply chains are shut down or facing a threat of shut down so often. The federal government’s ambitious trade diversification agenda cannot be achieved without supply chain labour stability.
[Translation]
In the case of railways and ports, the national interest demands that the government have the ability to effectively intervene — in appropriate circumstances — to resolve a dispute.
[English]
As Carleton University professor Ian Lee has pointed out to this committee, every government, regardless of partisan stripe, in every Parliament since 1950, has intervened to protect the national interest at railways and ports when collective bargaining has failed. In the key transportation sectors essential to the functioning of Canada’s economic union, the question for the federal government regarding intervention is not if, but how. It is simply not an option for any government to leave critical supply chain functions shut down.
In our view, Parliament should amend the Canada Labour Code to provide an explicit, purpose-built statutory authority for the Governor-in-Council — the cabinet — to directly and efficiently compel binding arbitration as the final resolution to a labour dispute and prevent or rapidly terminate a strike or lockout when collective bargaining fails in key transportation sectors critical to supply chain functions.
[Translation]
This authority should not be carte blanche. Parliament could establish three clear tests for its use.
[English]
First, collective bargaining must have occurred and be failing. Second, there should be no reasonable prospect for a negotiated settlement, including with the assistance of federal mediators and conciliators. Third, a strike or lockout must rise to the level of significant economic harm to the broader Canadian economy. These tests would be safeguards protecting the constitutional validity of the intervention.
While the 2015 Supreme Court of Canada decision recognizes a constitutional right to strike, the courts have made it clear that this right is not absolute, contrary to what some would have you believe. There are legitimate, appropriate and constitutionally valid limitations on the right to strike, especially when the national interest is at stake.
Federal intervention, regardless of the mechanism, is typically challenged by unions, ostensibly on constitutional grounds. The courts have routinely upheld interventions where the government is clearly acting to protect the national interest.
This proposed authority would allow the cabinet to act swiftly including, importantly, when Parliament is not in session. Such an authority would also give the government improved moral persuasion. A credible threat of swift intervention would help create a powerful incentive for the parties to reach a negotiated agreement.
In the current trade context, Prime Minister Carney frequently says that we must control what we can control. Honourable senators, how we as a country choose to resolve labour disputes that cause significant economic harm and jeopardize our national interest is something that we can control. These are choices.
We urge you to make recommendations through your study that will help Canada’s national interest prevail. Thank you.
Daniel Safayeni, President and Chief Executive Officer, Federally Regulated Employers —Transportation and Communications: Good evening, Mr. Chair and other members of the committee.
I am with the Federally Regulated Employers —Transportation and Communication, or FETCO, and I’m joined by Christopher Pigott, Partner at Fasken and counsel to FETCO, who will speak shortly to the legal dimensions of essential-service and maintenance-of-activities agreements.
I want to start by thanking you all for the invitation to appear before you today. FETCO, by way of background, represents private sector employers in Canada’s federally regulated industries, including major railways, ports, courier companies, airlines and financial institutions, all of whom fall under the Canada Labour Code.
Collectively, these sectors generate over $543 billion annually, directly to the GDP. That’s roughly 17% of Canada’s GDP. They employ more than 2.1 million Canadians — roughly 12% of the national workforce — with wages that are on average 45% higher than the national average.
These employers are the kinetic pillars of Canada’s economy. They move our goods, people, capital, energy and information. Together, they form the backbone of our domestic and international supply chains. In short, every other sector of the economy in one way or another depends on their reliability. Yet reliability is exactly what’s at risk here.
Over the past two years, Canada has endured over 60 transportation-related work stoppages. These erode investor confidence. They drive up costs. They fray public trust, particularly as Canadians grow increasingly fatigued by labour strife. Pressure is mounting. As my colleague Stephanie mentioned, over the next year, several major collective agreements are set to expire in critical industries such as rail, air, ports, integrated logistics and delivery networks, which together form the connective tissue of Canada’s supply chains as well as personal and business travel.
All of this is unfolding against a backdrop of an unsettled geopolitical and trade environment where stability and reliability are prerequisites for investment in partnership and prolonged uncertainty threatens not openly our domestic operations but Canada’s credibility as a trusted economic partner.
The federal government has set out an ambitious nation-building and economic reform agenda, one that depends heavily on the federally regulated sectors. Yet these very sectors remain constrained by a collective bargaining framework that hasn’t kept pace with the times. Reforms have largely been reactive, piecemeal and politically driven, resulting in rigidity, operational efficiencies and higher costs that ultimately dampen investment and job creation.
That’s why I want to genuinely thank this committee for today’s discussion and for examining these important issues.
To be clear, employers are not asking government to pick sides. We are asking for a principled, modern framework that helps keep parties bargaining in good faith, one that recognizes and protects the right to strike while also acknowledging the broader public interest when prolonged work stoppages threaten national supply chains.
We all agree the current system isn’t working and that there is a legitimate role for government, not to impose outcomes but to facilitate fair and timely resolutions while keeping both parties meaningfully engaged in the process. The goal here is not to weaken workers’ rights but to build a balanced, modern process that protects both the integrity of bargaining and the stability of the national economy.
With that, I will turn things over to my colleague Christopher Pigott.
Christopher D. Pigott, Partner, Fasken Martineau DuMoulin LLP, Federally Regulated Employers —Transportation and Communications: Thank you. Mr. Chair, the essential services or maintenance of activities requirements in the Canada Labour Code currently provide that an employer, union and employees must continue services during a work stoppage in certain circumstances but only to the extent necessary to prevent an immediate and serious danger to the safety or health of the public.
The Canada Industrial Relations Board, or CIRB, the federal labour board, has consistently limited the application of these provisions to what is strictly necessary to prevent an immediate and serious danger to health and safety. Any other risks or interests, no matter how serious, will not trigger the essential services provisions.
On that note, the board has repeatedly found that the requirements do not apply to economic or financial risks. That includes where the risk is to the economic well-being and financial stability of Canada or the national supply chain itself.
Even where the maintenance of activities provisions do apply, so even where an immediate or serious danger to health and safety arises in a particular workplace, there are serious challenges to implementing the provisions. I will highlight two of them.
First, in practice, employers and unions are almost never able to agree on which services must be continued during a work stoppage. As a result, these disputes are invariably litigated before the federal labour board. This litigation requires extensive evidence, often from expert witnesses, and often takes months, and in many cases years, before a decision on maintenance of activities is rendered.
Second, even where the parties or the board do identify that particular services are essential, determining how to continue those services during work stoppages and which employees will provide those services presents an additional large hurdle. For many operations, it is simply not possible to turn the light switch halfway on. Either the operation, including with respect to transportation, is operating at full capacity or it turns off, and that’s a result of the network nature and regulatory requirements that apply in Canada’s transportation sector. So in the context of a labour dispute, there are obvious implementation challenges, even where an essential service has been identified.
I would be pleased to provide more detail during the question-and-answer period.
The Chair: Thank you, Mr. Safayeni and Mr. Pigott.
I invite our deputy chair, Senator Dasko, to ask the first question.
Senator Dasko: Thank you, witnesses, for being here today. My first question is directed at Mr. Harvey as well as Ms. McGuire and Mr. Cato.
You talked about the losses of workdays and the stoppages, the volume of stoppages and the interventions by government. Why are there so many in this industry?
It sounds as if work stoppages are part of the culture of work. Part of the work is to stop the work. That’s the way I see it.
Why is the situation so bad in this industry? I really want to understand.
Mr. Harvey: First, I think it was Mr. Cato who commented on the fact that there are many agreements made in our industry with many unions. I think what you are referring to is the big impact of those stoppages in the economy that lead to the profile of the issue to be raised, coming to Parliament and seeking interventions.
In our view, we don’t believe that the current structure of the Canada Labour Code provides the proper framework to deal with work stoppages and labour negotiations for some sectors of the activity that are critical for the economy and that lead to this repetition of special statutes. In other words, regarding the experience we have, the numbers are clear. There have been 38 government interventions in the transportation sector alone since 1950, or once every two years.
If we don’t accept that, notwithstanding the goodwill of everybody and the commitment to negotiate, it remains that we are facing those challenges. It is because, perhaps, we need to look at the framework that exists for this. It essentially leads to a logic of a strike or lockout as the only means to bring a solution to the problem under the Canada Labour Code. Hence the need for Parliament to subsequently intervene.
In our view, as to the question why, the current structure of the Canada Labour Code doesn’t provide the right framework to address these kinds of stoppages.
Senator Dasko: So it is related to the structures that we have in place. It is not related to the culture of the industry and how it has evolved. You said we ranked at the bottom of the world in terms of how this plays out here. This is serious, right?
Mr. Harvey: It is very serious. To some degree, this is where we see that there is need for action. In other words, we cannot continue to perpetuate this environment where Parliament needs to intervene. We could also provide the proper framework that would support negotiations instead of leading to stoppages, while maintaining service in the meantime and providing fair compensation to our employees as well as safe working conditions and so on.
No one disputes that this should be the end goal of everyone, but sometimes this message is confused by the dire situation that this framework puts us in regarding the economic impacts.
Senator Dasko: Ms. McGuire, you’ve suggested a new third‑party solution, and, Mr. Cato, you suggested some variation on arbitration. How do those two proposals fit together, or are they different? Is it the same idea or quite a different solution between those two ideas?
Ms. McGuire: I would say they are similar ideas. In response to your previous question, because it ties together, in the Canada Labour Code right now, in that process that has been in place for a long time, probably three decades, there is no incentive for the parties to stay at the table and negotiate a deal. Surface bargaining can happen easily because there is a timeline, and you can achieve the right to strike within a 96-day timeline.
We are suggesting that before you can earn the right to strike or lock out — it applies to employers and unions — there be a third party, a mediator or arbitrator, who will come in, look at the issues that are in dispute and recommend to the parties, but also the Minister of Labour, what the terms of the collective agreement should be.
We are suggesting there should be some teeth to that, so that there is an incentive for the parties to try to work hard towards a deal, as opposed to just riding the timeline until they can earn the right to strike or lock out and have maximum power or influence on the other party. In this case, that obviously impacts the Canadian economy.
In that sense, we believe there should be a place for the Minister of Labour. When it is of national interest and the parties will not adopt the recommendations, they should be able to impose them, almost like an interest arbitration process that happens today already.
Mr. Cato: In response to the first question, senator, when you look at the numbers, we have a very strong record of collective bargaining. By and large, with the majority of our unions, we reach collective agreements. You don’t see a spotlight put on that in Parliament because there isn’t a problem.
There is one union in Canada where there is an exception. There is a history over many decades of it being very difficult to reach a negotiated outcome with that one union.
What we’re asking with our proposal is this: What happens at the end of the process? If you go through conciliation and mediation, we very much want a negotiated outcome. The best outcome is always a negotiated agreement at the bargaining table. But with all of that assistance to help the parties reach that negotiated outcome, if the process has still failed, we are saying that the federal cabinet needs a new authority in order to impose binding arbitration as the responsible process to arrive at an agreement in order to protect the national interests.
Senator Lewis: Thank you to all the witnesses here this evening.
My question is for everybody, but Mr. Harvey specifically. You mentioned when a railway stops how hard is it to restart it. And it’s not just about a railway strike either; it’s also about a major port like Vancouver and how that affects certain parts of the country disproportionately depending on what commodity you’re talking about moving.
Can you give the senators an idea, for every day of delay in a strike situation, how that backs up the operational resumption for the railroads?
Mr. Harvey: Thank you for your question, senator.
Railways move all kinds of traffic — automotive, lumber, minerals, et cetera. It is a large volume. They also move dangerous goods.
There are strict regulations about the movement of dangerous goods, for valid reasons. You cannot leave an unattended train moving dangerous goods anywhere in the country. If you leave it there, you have to ensure that it’s fenced, protected and security is provided so that no one can tamper with anything.
All this is to say that in anticipation of a strike, railways will typically take at least a week, if not more, to organize the stoppage of the entire operation such that, as in my example, dangerous goods will be where they should be, protected, and there will be no traffic left anywhere that is exposed to any risks.
Then, when you start that engine, we’re talking here about hundreds of trains that are located all across the country, you equally need many days, if not weeks, just to put things in motion in a structured way.
In other words, you don’t just say, “Well, this train goes here,” and so on. It must be a structured approach so that everything starts again in a way that is efficient. There’s a logic, so that each train that leaves will have a place to land, so to speak, at its destination.
What I just described means that even for one day of stoppage, everything before and after happens. Therefore, even if you have only one or two days, the impact on our customers is huge, because you’re talking weeks of stoppages for their businesses, even though the railways only stop for a couple of days.
Mr. Cato: If I may add quickly to that, the railroad is a complex system, but it’s only one part of a supply chain. You have port terminals and customer facilities, and the whole thing has to work in synchronization.
When you bring the whole system to a stop — which, as Eric described, will usually take many days in advance of a work stoppage because we need to do that safely and in a very orderly way — on the other side of that, the whole system needs to work together in sync to bring that velocity back up in a balanced way, balancing commodities, balancing different parts of the network, so you can get that rhythm back to your full operational performance. It’s very complex.
Mr. Safayeni: I would add to what my colleagues were saying and make a broader comment on work stoppages and what they mean in today’s interconnected economy.
Quite literally, shipping grinds to a halt. Packages go undelivered; travel is disrupted; and access to internet, telecom and banking services could be jeopardized.
These are not mere inconveniences. They strain supply chains, stall critical infrastructure and erode Canada’s global competitiveness at a time that we’re confronting declining productivity and GDP and protectionism from the United States.
I just want to make the point here that businesses that are not able to maintain operations lose contracts, market share and consumer trust. Those losses don’t simply reverse when work resumes; many of them linger permanently.
And while these labour disputes are often covered as an employer-versus-labour issue, what you’re actually hearing Eric, Nathan and Stephanie describe is a labour-versus-labour issue.
If the ports go down, if a railway is halted, that impacts labour across the country; that impacts small businesses with much smaller margins to withstand these types of disruptions.
That point is often lost in this discussion, because really what’s happening here is workers, consumers and Canadians across the country lose when these types of disruptions occur.
Senator Wilson: We’ve heard a couple of different proposals for what a new dispute resolution process could look like, or something similar. One of the things that I’m interested to understand is how you could set those kinds of processes up in order to minimize the perceived risk of a labour disruption. What I’m getting at here is, from my experience working in the sector, I know what a terrible reputation we have internationally — unfortunately — for our labour reliability.
I also know that cargo gets diverted at the mere threat of a strike, and that has very real impacts.
If we were to design something better, how do we do it in a way that will allow a sufficient amount of notice so we don’t see those cargo diversions as we’re going through the process?
Because as we all know, in the Port of Vancouver, there are 100 collective agreements that relate to the port, and many of them can shut the place down. With so many threats of strike coming all the time, what could you do for a dispute resolution process to address that?
Mr. Cato: I would say, senator, the proposal that we’ve made is this new authority for what happens at the end of the process for the federal government to intervene more effectively.
I think if Parliament created such an authority, that would send a powerful signal to the world that Canada is taking this problem seriously and creating the tools to deal with it more effectively.
The fact that it would be there in the law would be quite powerful. That’s the kind of message that we need to send in this current context as we prioritize trade diversification.
Ms. McGuire: If I may just add — in support of the comment that you made — as a labour relations practitioner who is at these bargaining tables, this is a big question from both shippers and customers well in advance of when we go to bargaining with the teamsters, who represent these employees who tend to be on strike regularly.
Yes, they will make decisions well in advance of a potential timeline. The code outlines that the moment that you file for conciliation, you know 96 days later there’s a potential labour disruption, whether that be a strike or a lockout.
Just to Nathan’s point, the code needs to have some teeth in there — before you get to day 96 — that protects the supply chain and gives some comfort to international suppliers and customers, so they know there’s a path to resolution that will not rely on a labour disruption; otherwise, they’re making decisions weeks in advance of that timeline, and that timeline is well‑known. They know about it. They’re asking about it. It’s something we have to give account to as a railroad, and I’m sure that CPKC is similar to that.
Mr. Pigott: I would add that one of the big challenges we have with the current structure of the code is after the period Stephanie just referenced, the end of conciliation and the cooling-off period, which really is the Wild West in terms of the ability to strike and lock out.
In other words, there are no meaningful guardrails, other than back-to-work legislation or ministerial intervention, under section 107, to curtail the use of strike or lockout.
The challenge there is that both back-to-work legislation and section 107 are completely ad hoc. The outside world — really, everyone — has no idea when a labour dispute or a work stoppage could start and when it could end. The addition of a structured process, whether mediation and arbitration or one or the other that precludes the right to strike or lock out, at least for a period of time while those processes are ongoing, would have a meaningful effect in giving the outside world guidance as to when a strike or lockout could occur and could be ended.
Senator Simons: In 1926, almost 100 years ago, the United States passed the Railway Labor Act, which was designed to minimize strikes by sort of front-loading the process with more arbitration and mediation.
I want to start by asking Mr. Cato this question and then maybe the other witnesses. CPKC obviously operates in both Canada and the United States. I wondered if you could talk to us about whether the Railway Labor Act is, in fact, as good as some have suggested. Is it a model we should look to or does it create its own set of problems?
Mr. Cato: Thank you, senator, for the question. You’re quite right that 1926 was when the Railway Labor Act came into effect in the U.S. One comment I would make about it is that this statute certainly recognizes the very special role that the rail industry plays in supporting the economy, that there is a very special framework that applies to it. The whole purpose of this statute is to avoid disruptions to interstate commerce.
I think the number of disruptions that you’ve seen in the rail sector in the U.S. speaks for itself. There are very infrequent strikes or lockouts in the rail sector in the U.S. It’s been many years. I think it was in the early 1990s — 1992 was the last actual strike that took place in the rail sector. There was a threat of one just a few years ago, in December 2022. In that case, it went through the process.
The framework under the U.S. act encourages mediation and conciliation, all of those kinds of processes, with mediators making recommendations to the parties under Presidential Emergency Boards, that sort of thing, but at the end of the day, you still have Congress, which needs to decide what to do if there is no voluntary agreement.
In December 2022, we saw the U.S. Congress and President Biden intervene in advance of a potential strike. They intervened to avoid the significant economic harm that would have occurred if that strike had been allowed to proceed.
No framework is perfect. There are pros and cons to any framework, but certainly, there are elements of the U.S. model that we could take inspiration from in Canada.
Senator Simons: I have heard some people critique that it takes far too long to get any outcome — that it’s a very drawn‑out process.
Mr. Cato: It is. That is certainly an observation of the U.S. model that’s valid.
Ms. McGuire: If I may add, CN has a third of its operations in the United States, and we are currently in national bargaining under the Railway Labor Act. That also applies to the aviation industry.
The comment is true — it could be prolonged — but I can say that we have been very successful. The collective agreement reopened on July 1, 2025, and we have successfully negotiated 9 collective agreements of the 12 covering 78% of our workforce. We have been successful in not prolonging the process this round.
I will also say that the model we’ve presented is very much based on the Railway Labor Act model, which is very successful. It allows the parties to negotiate. There is a lot of mediation, as you mentioned, senator, in that process. Where there is interstate commerce at risk, there is a mechanism for a panel of experts to come in like an interest arbitration process and make some recommendations. It has been very successful, as Mr. Cato has shared.
Senator Simons: In terms of essential service, the bar for that is extremely high in this country. I think, Mr. Harvey, you said that you don’t agree that rail should be an essential service, just a vital one, I guess.
Mr. Harvey: I did not make that comment in so many words. The challenge we have with this conversation is that with the current definition of “essential service,” we understand we have at least two decisions saying that railways do not meet that standard.
I suppose you can debate this forever. Should it be or should it not? Should we amend the code to make it so? In our view, that would not be doing the trick in the sense of really getting into an environment that would support and favour collective bargaining. This is why we say that, in our view, models like the U.S. model, for example, are something interesting to consider.
If I may add with regard to your question, particularly on the time, it may be true that it takes time, but the main benefit of that long period of time is, unlike our environment, where a strike is almost the logical outcome of any negotiations, in the U.S., that’s not the case. Therefore, shipping lines and trade partners will not take the same immediate action as they take vis-à-vis the Canadian jurisdiction or the Canadian environment when they hear about potential negotiations. That benefit is significant. Economically, for our country, this benefit would be huge.
[Translation]
Senator Aucoin: Thank you to our guests.
Mr. Harvey, to continue in the same vein, can you expand on how Canada would benefit from having that option? I’ll talk about the different unions after that.
Mr. Harvey: Thank you for your question, Senator Aucoin.
I’ll use the example from last year where initially the CN and CP unions were in a position to trigger a strike in May. The matter was referred to the Canada Industrial Relations Board and put off until August, and in the end, the use of section 107 meant that there was no strike. During the period before May, the mere talk of the possibility of a strike in Canada was enough for a number of shipping companies to reroute their traffic to other jurisdictions, and the U.S. in particular.
Ports and railway lines lost a lot of transportation opportunities. The climate of persistent uncertainty endured throughout the year, up until August when the situation was resolved through the board’s intervention. The consequences were swift and very substantial. However, in the U.S. context, negotiations take place over a long period, but typically result in resolution. Shipping lines in the U.S. therefore don’t face this type of uncertainty. Their immediate response is not to reroute traffic.
This is something that can be quantified. We looked into this with our businesses. Projected losses in terms of GDP could amount to several million dollars, potentially reaching billions of dollars.
Senator Aucoin: If I have understood correctly, the mere threat of a strike creates all sorts of inconveniences and job losses across Canada?
Mr. Harvey: Yes.
Senator Aucoin: However, that’s not my question. You mentioned a number of unions earlier, but I don’t recall the exact number. Some of them are evidently linked to the rail, aviation and port sectors. Would it be better to have a smaller number of unions, rather than hundreds of them?
Ms. McGuire stated they had negotiated with 75% of the unions. You didn’t talk about the remaining unions, and I would presume some of them are planning to strike.
Mr. Harvey: As you know, the unions representing our employees have been part of our industry for many years. Our industry has had unions for ages, because the industry has been part of this country for a long time. I don’t know if our role or position is to comment on this type of question. I think we generally respect our employees’ right to be represented by a union of their choosing. They have a democratic process for electing their leaders. They can change bargaining units if they so choose. This structure is not part of what we’re asking for. While we can assume that our employees are going to be represented by a union, whatever union it may be, we’re aiming for a framework for the bargaining process with unions to mitigate harm that exceeds what is necessary to secure decent wages and good working conditions.
Ms. McGuire: I’d like to make a comment. Negotiations in the U.S. take place in a very different environment. Employers and railways negotiate as a group. Unions also negotiate as a group. It’s very different in Canada. That aspect is very different. We need to keep that in mind.
Senator Oudar: I’d like to welcome all our witnesses.
I’ll continue with Mr. Harvey.
You talked about the right to organize. However, Supreme Court case law has also recognized the right to strike as a constitutional right since the Saskatchewan Federation of Labour v. Saskatchewan decision. The right to strike is enshrined and is now recognized by the court. It’s embedded in and protected by the Constitution. It’s essential to collective bargaining. The principle of jurisprudence must be preserved. I’m sure you’re familiar with this ruling. It limits restrictions on the right to strike solely to situations involving essential services. This concept must be interpreted narrowly, because it restricts the right to strike.
I’d like to hear your thoughts on how to reconcile this and adherence to case law in relation to the solutions you have put forward. In what ways do these solutions ensure compliance with jurisprudence, including the Saskatchewan Federation of Labour v. Saskatchewan decision?
Additionally, in May 2025, the Quebec National Assembly passed a new piece of legislation, An Act to give greater consideration to the needs of the population in the event of a strike or a lockout. My next question will focus on that act, but first, I’d like to hear your thoughts on this need and this obligation to respect international instruments and our Constitution.
Mr. Harvey: Thank you for your question, Senator Oudar.
First, when it comes to case law, I believe there are some nuances to consider on the issue of the right to strike. I’ll let Mr. Pigott elaborate on that.
Oddly enough, the discussion often centres on the right to strike, instead of focusing on providing our workers with competitive wages and safe, reasonable working conditions. Our question is as follows: Is it absolutely necessary to have a strike to achieve that goal? Aren’t there better ways to set fair wages and working conditions for workers in 2025, besides strikes, which hurt all sectors of Canada’s economy?
There are people who specialize in labour relations. Wage levels are known to everyone. This information is in the public domain. Most of our collective agreements are public. There must be other mechanisms, besides strikes as the last resort, to resolve issues around employee wages and working conditions. That’s how we see it.
It’s no exaggeration to say that no right should be absolute, nor should it empower a small group of people have such a big impact on all the other groups or economic sectors that are equally affected. We understand the right to strike serves as a tool for leverage, but it’s also clear that excessive government interventions suggest a prevailing perception that certain employers possess too much leverage. This leverage has the effect of slowing economic momentum and bringing some industries to a standstill. We need to expand this line of thought beyond the Supreme Court decision and ask some hard questions to rule out other options, instead of saying that the right to strike must prevail over everything else.
Senator Oudar: There is an alternative that Quebec presented in new legislation. I don’t know if any of you has looked at this new legislation that the National Assembly adopted in May 2025. It adds a new category of services that must be maintained in the event of a labour dispute. This concept has expanded the number and type of essential services that must be maintained beyond those we have just talked about. It creates a new concept of “services ensuring the well-being of the population,” which the law has defined as:
…the services minimally required to prevent the population’s social, economic or environmental security from being disproportionally affected…
In practical terms, the government will designate, by order, the sectors that are likely to provide these services. I think one of you has reviewed the new legislation. I can see one hand up. Could you give the floor to Mr. Pigott? Unless you would like to add something about this bill, Mr. Harvey?
Mr. Harvey: I’ll defer to Mr. Pigott.
Senator Oudar: Passing the buck?
Mr. Harvey: I’ll comment afterwards if I have something to add.
Senator Oudar: Okay. Thank you.
[English]
The Chair: Mr. Pigott, do you have something to add?
Mr. Pigott: Yes, I do. To clarify the impact of the 2015 Supreme Court ruling in the Saskatchewan Federation of Labour, the Supreme Court in that decision expressly stated that there is a constitutional right to strike, but it can be limited so long as the government replaces the right to strike with a fair and balanced alternative dispute resolution mechanism such as a balanced interest arbitration system.
In the other Canadian court decisions that have, for example, considered the constitutionality of back-to-work legislation, the courts have focused on the question of whether the terms of the interest arbitration process are fair and balanced so as to try to facilitate continued collective bargaining, and if not, to reach a fair outcome through the arbitration process.
So it’s absolutely possible to impose limitations on the right to strike and to impose mediation or interest arbitration systems that limit the right to strike and remain constitutionally compliant. I think that is in part what the Quebec government has tried to do with Bill C-89, which is akin to the section 107 power currently in the Canada Labour Code.
Senator Hay: My colleagues had excellent questions. The answers were robust. I will pass my time back. Mine was around the U.S. Railway Act and your opinions on it. I think it’s been well discussed. So back to you, Mr. Chair.
[Translation]
Senator Cormier: I don’t want to repeat what’s been said, but I’d like to make sure I understood it clearly.
The current system is not working. It’s hard to define essential services, vital economic services, etc. The impact of the use of section 107 on workers is underassessed or not easily measurable. Back-to-work legislation doesn’t seem to be the answer.
How can we support a bargaining process that upholds workers’ right to strike while safeguarding economic stability and your sector? What I’m hearing is that the Canada Labour Code needs to be amended.
I know that you gave a few examples, but which three areas should be prioritized if the Canada Labour Code is amended, for example?
Ms. McGuire: Thank you for that question, Senator Cormier. I’d like to respond in English so that I convey my point as clearly as possible.
[English]
What we believe is critical is that there be changes to the Canada Labour Code that will incentivize the parties to reach a negotiated settlement without relying on the deadline of a strike or a lockout to create maximum pressure and impact. To do that, we’re suggesting that the code needs to change to include an interest arbitration, as Mr. Pigott has referred to it, but a process where a third party looks at the issues and makes a recommendation — and that there be some teeth to that recommendation.
What I mean by that is the current code already allows the minister to have someone come in and look at it and make a recommendation, but that recommendation goes to the minister and no one hears about it, so that’s not an incentive to reach a deal. In some way, those recommendations need to be made public to keep both the union and the employer honest and stay at the table and negotiate an agreement and avoid what we refer to as surface bargaining, which just means waiting out the clock.
That’s the change we’re suggesting needs to happen in the code.
[Translation]
Mr. Harvey: I would add on that and say that it’s important to look at all the options, meaning that we’re trying to balance the issue to ensure the bargaining parties have all the tools and the time they need to do their bargaining work so that ultimately, workers have adequate working conditions and they are well paid.
The issue that affects our sector is that strikes have an impact on our sector and all other sectors. As such, because the impact of a strike is felt across all other sectors, the new framework must also ensure our operations remain stable, instead of just recommending swift stoppage. This aspect is critical.
A collective change in mindset is needed among all our partners to prioritize stability and operational continuity to alleviate the economic impacts we’re seeing now.
Senator Cormier: There are power dynamics in negotiation.
Mr. Harvey: Yes.
Senator Cormier: You’ve just alluded to the impact on the entire economic sector. Obviously, there’s the impact on workers themselves and the unions that represent them. How can we strike a fair balance between the interests of workers and the Canadian economy?
Mr. Harvey: That’s an important point. We agree that our workers must be well paid, and indeed, they are. Employees in Canada’s rail sector are well paid, and they receive higher wages than the Canadian average. There’s no doubt about that. We’re very comfortable with the working conditions provided to our employees.
The question is whether it’s absolutely necessary to have a strike to give them these conditions. Aren’t there other options that are as good in other jurisdictions? Your colleagues have told us about the U.S. system, and Senator Oudar has talked about Quebec’s act to give greater consideration to the needs of the population in the event of a strike or a lockout, and these avenues offer suggestions that must be considered.
One thing is certain: The uncertainty that a strike is necessarily the logical outcome of negotiations must be eliminated.
Senator Cormier: Thank you.
[English]
The Chair: I have a question for Mr. Cato before we wrap up this panel. You called for a new authority that would replace section 107 and grant cabinet the power to compel binding arbitration. Could you expand on how this proposed authority would work in practice? How would it balance the need for swift resolutions in bargaining rights?
Mr. Cato: Thank you, Mr. Chair, for the question. To be clear, CPKC is an active party in the ongoing litigation about section 107, so I don’t want to make any comments specifically about 107. That wouldn’t be appropriate here. What I will say about our proposed new authority is that the word you used, “balance,” is really foundational. In the right circumstances, when the national interest is at stake in a labour disruption, the federal government needs the tools to defend the national interest. I don’t think anyone would argue that the current regime achieves that, just based on the frequency of disruptions that we’ve seen in the federally regulated space over the past number of years.
This authority would empower the cabinet to balance the rights and interests and policy considerations of the entire country, not just the right to strike that exists for the workers, not just the rights of the employer, but it would empower them to more effectively and efficiently defend the national interest, the interest of all Canadians, in that situation.
The Chair: Just a little supplementary. The obvious concern with this approach is for Parliament to be bypassed as this authority would be implemented by way of legislation. What safeguards and accountability mechanisms should be built in? If you can’t answer that in 60 seconds, you could write something to us. We would love to have a written response.
Mr. Cato: I think I can do it. Parliament would be involved at the front end. Parliament would be creating the authority, and it would establish the very clear criteria, conditions and parameters around its use, so what conditions need to exist before the cabinet could exercise that authority. Parliament would have a very important role to play up front in defining when it would be appropriate for the federal government to exercise a judgment about when the level of economic harm is endangering the national economy and therefore, in order to protect the national interest, intervention in the form of compelling binding arbitration as an alternative dispute resolution process is the right course of action.
The other thing I think would be important for Parliament to consider is some kind of reporting mechanism, perhaps. After the authority is used, you could compel the cabinet to table reports in the House of Commons and the Senate, essentially describing the justification for why it exercised that judgment and used the authority, pointing to the specific economic harms, the specific facts in that situation that the government relied upon to use the authority.
There is a way to build in a role, obviously for Parliament at the beginning when it would be creating the authority, and a way to build in a role for Parliament after the executive branch uses the authority.
The Chair: Thank you. Unfortunately, our time is limited. I know we’d like to continue on for as much as we can, but we have to recognize we have tech support people with their time frame also. I’d like to end our first panel on that note and thank you all for your time and for appearing today. It’s most appreciated. I will advise the witnesses that if there is anything you’d like to write us as an update regarding any of the questions asked by our senators, you can do so in writing and deliver it to us by November 12, 2025.
For our next panel, we will hear from the Montreal Port Authority, Julie Gascon, Chief Executive Officer, and Marie-Claude Galarneau, Chief Human Resources and Strategy Officer; from the National Maritime Group, Derrick Hynes, Chief Executive Officer; and, as an individual, from the Department of Sociology at McGill University — and a weightlifter, which is quite interesting to learn — Professor Barry Eidlin.
Welcome. Thank you for joining us today. Witnesses will provide opening remarks of approximately five minutes each, which will be followed by a question-and-answer session with senators.
[Translation]
I will now ask Ms. Gascon to deliver her opening remarks.
Julie Gascon, Chief Executive Officer, Montreal Port Authority: Good evening, Mr. Chair and members of the committee. Thank you for your invitation.
I’m here today with Ms. Marie-Claude Galarneau, Chief Human Resources and Strategy Officer.
I’m speaking to you today on behalf of the Montreal Port Authority, a key player in Canada’s trade and the St. Lawrence Seaway and Great Lakes network. The Port of Montreal is the largest container port in Eastern Canada and the second largest in the country. Approximately 65% of the Canadian population and 75% of the country’s manufacturing capacity are located within 12 hours of our facilities.
Our operations support close to 600,000 jobs across the country and generate $98.5 billion in economic spinoffs, or 3.5% of Canada’s GDP. Thousands of businesses depend on the smooth flow of our operations directly, be it to ship auto parts to Ontario or export containerized grain from the Prairies. These businesses move $400 million worth of goods on our docks every day. Since 2020, we have experienced recurring instability in terms of labour relations. The negative impacts are felt as soon as the first signs of tension appear and well before job action is triggered.
A notice period of only just 72 hours is incompatible with a ship that takes 12, 14 or 20 days to cross the ocean, depending on the port of departure or destination.
Our analysis shows that in the fall of 2024, despite limited job action, the average volume of container cargo handled fell by 65% from the five-year average.
More broadly, we’re seeing some of our trade volume leaving the port, largely due to operational relocation to U.S. ports. This situation is compromising our economic sovereignty directly.
Let me be clear: In the current geopolitical context, every time a Canadian company chooses a U.S. port, our food, economic and manufacturing security, and more broadly, our national resilience, are put at risk.
Indeed, when a labour dispute arises, we lose trade-wise when Canadian cargo relocates to the U.S. and also because Americans are aware of these issues, and they’ve taken a proactive approach to attract cargo. They’re also considering introducing port fees and administrative charges on American containers transiting through Canadian ports.
In contrast, Canada does not impose any measures on Canadian cargo entering or leaving through U.S. ports.
This lack of reciprocity has potential to seriously undermine our economic sovereignty.
Other Canadian ports like Halifax and Saint John do not necessarily benefit when a dispute breaks out in Montreal. Far too often, an American port benefits, and when this happens, goods take longer to arrive, they generate more carbon emissions and they end up costing more for Canadians.
Companies that make this choice often prefer to pay more for predictability, which shows that market confidence is based on stability.
I’d like to point out that Montreal Port Authority is neither the employer nor the union. We manage a collective facility that serves the public interest. Our role is to ensure the continuity, performance and safety of a port that serves Canada and to do so with respect for workers, partners and communities.
However, three disputes in four years have had disproportionate impacts and have resulted in costly and unwarranted stress for Canadians, businesses, hospitals, farmers and factories, and unfortunately, they have undermined Canada’s reputation as a reliable trading partner.
If Canada wants to double its exports by 2030, our exporting businesses must be able to depend on our export capabilities to ensure that their customers receive their goods.
Canada can build the best infrastructure and promote market diversification as much as it wants, but the success of these initiatives depends on predictable labour relations.
We share this committee’s goal of ensuring that essential services continue when public safety or economic continuity are at stake.
We believe that a clear and predictable framework should guide the interpretation of the concept of “immediate and serious danger to the safety or health of the public” set out in section 87.4(1) of the Canada Labour Code.
We concur with the conclusions of the final report of the Industrial Inquiry Commission on West Coast Ports, which emphasize the importance of a transparent and predictable bargaining process based on shared responsibility. We believe that the recommendations contained in this report, which were developed for Western Canada, should also apply to the eastern part of the country. These principles should inspire future Canadian policies on the continuity of essential services.
We don’t represent the employer or the employees, but as a port authority, we’re committed to ensuring both parties have a successful partnership. We support shipping companies and their workers as they search for sustainable solutions and renewed dialogue, but if this is impossible, I believe the final report of the Industrial Inquiry Commission on West Coast Ports has possible solutions that we need to look into for the good of the Canadian economy.
In conclusion, the stability of port operations is not just an issue for one port. It’s a matter of national responsibility. It has to do with market confidence, the safety of Canadians, and Canada’s competitiveness.
Thank you. My team and I would be happy to answer your questions.
[English]
Derrick Hynes, Chief Executive Officer, National Maritime Group, National Maritime Group: Good evening, honourable senators. I am the CEO of the National Maritime Group, or NMG, an organization that represents nearly 100 private sector maritime employers and operators from coast to coast and through the St. Lawrence.
NMG member companies work 24 hours a day to keep the flow of goods moving in and out of the country. These port operations serve as key linkages in critical national and international supply chains, moving over a quarter of Canada’s total traded goods. It should be clear, given what was heard in the first panel this evening, that the employer community generally feels that the collective bargaining rules, as they stand, are not currently working in all situations.
Current processes around essential services, maintenance of activities and replacement workers, for example, are further exacerbating challenges. We believe more and better tools are needed. I’d like to start tonight with a series of assumptions.
First, employers and unions believe in free and fair collective bargaining. Across the federally regulated private sector, with some exceptions, we have decades of experience in negotiating collective agreements. The parties also recognize that the right to strike is constitutionally protected, but as we discussed earlier, there are some limits to this right.
Second, bargaining, as of late, has become strained, and the system is not fully working. This is not to say that evidence of strikes or lockouts means that the system is failing. However, we have seen a disturbing pattern in recent years with major work stoppages in vital industries that are affecting Canadians in a disproportionate manner.
Third, there are times in the bargaining process when government assistance is required. Such government intervention is appropriate for the benefit of not only the system but of Canadians in general.
Fourth, government intervention should be built around the objective of keeping the parties at the bargaining table working towards finding solutions towards a collective agreement. No one wants a third party outside the process writing their contracts.
Finally, where all else has been tried and has failed, and bargaining has broken down seemingly beyond repair, meaningful dispute resolution mechanisms may be required.
Let’s look at a recent example. In July 2023, a 13-day strike at ports along Canada’s West Coast resulted in an estimated $10‑billion cost to Canada in disrupted trade. In practical terms, it ground the economy to a standstill. Canadians, as consumers, but also as workers and business owners, felt a near-immediate impact. Following this dispute, the Minister of Labour announced the Industrial Inquiry Commission, or IIC, on West Coast Ports to examine longshore bargaining structures and processes.
Earlier this year, after extensive consultation, the IIC, which was led by well-respected experts, released its report, concluding that the current bargaining structure “. . . is broken but not beyond repair.”
Two key recommendations emerged from the report that are relevant tonight.
First, that the Canada Labour Code should be updated to allow for a single geographic certification along West Coast ports that appoints one employer organization and one trade union to negotiate on behalf of their respective organizations. This type of structure would align the West Coast with all other major ports around the country and contribute to greater bargaining certainty.
Second, the Canada Labour Code should be updated to include ministerial access to a special mediator in circumstances where bargaining has truly been bogged down. A special mediator could be empowered beyond standard mediation processes to keep the parties at the bargaining table. During this process, strikes and lockouts would be paused.
Both of these changes could and, we believe, should be made immediately. They both constitute meaningful steps in the right direction towards the goal of keeping parties at the bargaining table. These changes would not remove the right to strike, but they might help avoid unnecessary work stoppages.
This is just the beginning. At the NMG, we believe the time is now to engage in a comprehensive discussion on the future of collective bargaining under the Canada Labour Code — which is why your study here tonight is so encouraging to us. But the only way to do this properly is via genuine tripartite consultation involving government, business and labour.
The Prime Minister speaks of his desire to transform the Canadian economy, particularly as it relates to our place in the global order. Increasing trade, for example, with non-U.S. countries inevitably means increased activities at Canada’s ports. Without labour stability, these efforts are futile. In real terms, our brand as a place to do business is at stake when our supply chains are unstable due to labour unrest.
Our recommendations are therefore two-pronged: First, where solutions have already been comprehensively studied and recommendations presented — for example, in the Industrial Inquiry Commission Report on West Coast Ports — we believe now is the time for government to act. Of note, bargaining along the West Coast begins again in just over a year.
Second, we would support a broader, longer-term tripartite consultation about the future of the system of collective bargaining under Part I of the Canada Labour Code. Thank you.
Barry Eidlin, Associate Professor, Department of Sociology, McGill University, As an individual: Thank you, senators, for inviting me here tonight to speak with you about labour relations in the rail and marine sectors.
[Translation]
I’m an associate professor of sociology at McGill University, where I’ve been teaching since 2015. I specialize is the study of labour movements, policy and public policy and have published a number of articles on training and the development of labour relations frameworks in Canada and the U.S.
Although I’ll deliver my presentation in English, I’d be happy to answer questions in English or French.
[English]
I have two points to make today. First, Charter-protected rights must not be violated systematically if the Charter is to have any meaning. Second, back-to-work orders are an ineffective means to achieve industrial peace.
First is the Charter. As we have discussed, the Supreme Court of Canada ruled in 2015, in Saskatchewan Federation of Labour v. Saskatchewan, that the right to strike is integral to Canadians’ freedom of association.
I will read it; it is worth reading. The court held that:
The right to strike is not merely derivative of collective bargaining, it is an indispensable component of that right . . . .
And they further held that:
This collective action at the moment of impasse is an affirmation of the dignity and autonomy of employees in their working lives.
The Supreme Court’s ruling recognized two things: First, the right to strike is the foundation of collective bargaining; and, second, the right to strike is integral to human freedom in the workplace. Ordering workers back to work compels them to work against their will, under conditions to which they have not agreed and under penalty of sanction or loss of livelihood.
Simply put, Charter rights are important. They are not absolute, as several others have mentioned today, but there must be stringent rules specifying when they can be violated. This has generally not been the case for the right to strike. Instead, in recent years, federal governments have invoked section 107 of the Canada Labour Code to order workers back to work, not only in the marine and rail sectors but also at Canada Post and at Air Canada. This dispenses with governments having to invoke the “notwithstanding” clause, as we saw earlier this week in Alberta.
The use of section 107 is novel, but it is part of a tradition that labour scholars Leo Panitch and Donald Swartz have called “permanent exceptionalism.” That is that Canadian governments and employers declare their support for collective bargaining rights and even the right to strike while repeatedly finding reasons to circumvent those rights “just this once.”
As a result, between 2002 and 2019, Canada accounted for 54% of all complaints of violations of labour rights filed with the International Labour Organization’s Committee on Freedom of Association against G7 countries. Those would be similar countries.
But to my second point, Charter rights aside, restricting workers’ right to strike through back-to-work orders or expanded definitions of what counts as “essential workers” is an ineffective means to achieve industrial peace.
Previous Canadian governments have learned this the hard way. In the 1940s, repeated restrictions on strikes stoked further class conflict, leading then-Prime Minister William Lyon Mackenzie King to realize that a stable industrial relations system required compelling employers to recognize and negotiate with unions. The foundation of that compulsion was workers’ right to strike. Restricting workers’ ability to strike too much eliminated employers’ incentive to bargain and stoked worker resentment, which generated further conflict. Employers had to face sanctions to get them to the table and to tamp down labour conflict.
A few decades later, faced with a similar rise in militancy among public sector workers in the 1960s, then-Prime Minister Lester B. Pearson advised against strike bans, reasoning that:
. . . if public servants are to be told that under law they can never strike, one may be precipitating the very thing one is trying to prevent.
As labour militancy has returned in recent years — and you’ve heard this from other panellists tonight — I am concerned that our current government is forgetting or ignoring the hard-learned lessons of its predecessors. Repeated back-to-work orders have reduced employers’ incentive to bargain and left Canadian workers wondering if the Charter even applies to them. Meanwhile, workplace grievances have continued to fester and bubble up time and again. The predictable result — we’ve seen this most notably in the marine sector — has been repeated labour disputes.
A robust system of collective bargaining relies on strong incentives to reach negotiated agreements, which must be backed by a meaningful right to strike. Trying to solve labour disputes through ad hoc government intervention may solve the short‑term problem but creates bigger problems down the road. Thank you for your time.
The Chair: Thank you, professor. We now move on to questions from our senators. I remind senators that you have a maximum of five minutes of time for this round. We have our building reserved for another 32 minutes.
I invite our deputy chair, Senator Dasko, to ask the first question.
Senator Dasko: Thank you, witnesses, for being here. Professor Eidlin, there was a private member’s bill presented, Bill C-247, An Act to amend the Canada Labour Code, which would repeal section 107 of the Code. Do you support that?
Mr. Eidlin: Absolutely.
Senator Dasko: You do?
Mr. Eidlin: Yes. Well, it’s important to recognize that section 107 has been on the books for many decades now, but it has only been with the recent series of Liberal governments that we’ve seen this novel interpretation of it.
I called up a quote from a former Conservative minister of labour, Lisa Raitt, who is the first one who actually developed the provision in section 107 that would allow referral to the CIRB around investigating labour disputes. When she was asked about the Liberals’ use of section 107, she said:
If you find a lawyer who can tell you that it’s possible [for the minister to order the parties into arbitration], then I wish I had their advice 15 years ago. But as far as I’m concerned, you aren’t able to do that.
It’s really how we interpret section 107, but I think it does provide too much leeway. At least with a back-to-work order, you have to get the legislature together. You can have a debate on it. It basically allows the government in power to order workers back to work essentially by email, and I think that is an overstep of governmental power.
Senator Dasko: Mr. Hynes, do you support this private member’s bill, the repeal of section 107?
Mr. Hynes: The use of section 107 is novel. I don’t disagree with that. My sense is it came about in the past few years because the three Ministers of Labour who have invoked it have viewed the circumstances of the labour dispute in question to be so extraordinary that they felt it necessary to interpret this provision in such a way as to get the parties back to the negotiating table, back to work, through a process of binding arbitration.
We are going to see all three of those circumstances make their way through the court system. I would be interested in seeing these things through to see how the courts interpret the use of this provision before we wholeheartedly and wholesale remove it from the Canada Labour Code.
It was put there for a reason. It is a broad clause that gives the minister some authority in these extraordinary circumstances. There are other tools we could use, which I talked about a little in my comments, but to remove it without going through that process would be premature.
Senator Dasko: There is litigation right now.
Mr. Hynes: There is. In all three cases, that has been used.
Senator Dasko: It is on this section.
Mr. Hynes: That is correct.
Senator Dasko: Is it with respect to repealing this section?
Mr. Hynes: No, it is around its use. Its use has been challenged by the unions in all three cases.
Senator Dasko: Ms. Gascon, I want to say that our committee visited the Port of Montreal last year, and it was a very productive visit. We were very impressed with the port. Thank you very much for hosting us at that time.
Do you have any suggestions or proposals for changing legislation or regulation with respect to the Canada Labour Code? I wasn’t quite sure from your comments.
Ms. Gascon: I appreciate Mr. Hynes and the professor talking about their views, but from our perspective, we receive the impact of a strike. The port gets shut down. At one point, the Port of Prince Rupert, the Port of Vancouver and the Port of Montreal were shut down. The goods we move propel the economy. In those containers you have medical equipment, agriculture equipment, the entire collection for Christmas for a small store somewhere and so on. There are all kinds of goods. It creates a lot of disruption and a lot of hardship.
In 2023, former Minister O’Regan launched an inquiry under section 108. This inquiry yielded a report that was tabled in 2025, and this is what Mr. Hynes spoke about, I believe.
This report contains eight recommendations. You may like the recommendations or you may feel that they’re not good enough or could be stronger, but they are somewhere to start from.
From where we’re sitting, could we look at those recommendations, see their value and whether there’s an implementation plan that could be looked at? I believe they offer some path to resolving this in a manner that preserves, as the professor mentioned, the employees’ right to strike and their Charter rights.
Senator Dasko: Thank you.
Senator Wilson: My question is for Ms. Gascon and, potentially, for Mr. Hynes.
First, Ms. Gascon, it’s great to see you again, in very different roles. Thank you for flagging the issue of sovereignty, because I don’t think that’s something that’s come up so far. It is germane to part of the rationale for us trying to solve this.
I want to specifically ask about the Ready and Rogers report. Both you and Mr. Hynes spoke about it. We’ve looked at the report. I’ve met with people about the report.
While I agree it appears to represent, if you will, some low‑hanging fruit in terms of something that could be done fairly quickly, one of the concerns I have is around the special mediator process and whether that is going to help us with this constant threat of strike. It seems to me there needs to be a time frame or something that allows us to do what we’re seeing in the U.S., where it really takes the temperature down. I’m interested in your thoughts on how we might be able to do that with a special mediator process.
Ms. Gascon: It’s nice to see you as well, senator.
You talked about economic sovereignty, and this is something that I talk about on all of the platforms where I’m given the opportunity to speak.
When the commodities don’t pass by a Canadian port and they pass by a U.S. port, let’s face it, commodities start moving out the moment there is a threat. You know, as I do, senator, that the shipping lines don’t wait. They are a creature of finding the path of least resistance to move their goods, and resilience is key. They need to have stability and resilience. You see the cargo moving very rapidly. This is Canadian cargo destined for Canadian companies or Canadian importers or exporters that goes through a U.S. port, and in the current geopolitical context, I don’t think this is acceptable.
On that, the Vince Ready report speaks about the special mediation process. As I said, it may not be the strongest recommendation, but it is a place where we need to explore whether this can work.
What we are seeing in our situation, and this is particular to Montreal, is long-term grievance between the parties that cannot seem to move forward. At least having someone new look at things and accompanying both parties could offer a way forward.
Vancouver is a year away from negotiation. I’m not sure where we will be following the arbitration process. I don’t think doing another full inquiry would give us the time. We need to move forward.
Senator Lewis: Thank you to all the witnesses for being here this evening.
With the people we’ve heard prior to this panel, it’s 75 years of unrest, to what you said as well, professor. As we go forward with this, we talk about $10 billion worth of losses at the West Coast and opportunity loss as well within the Port of Montreal every time one of these labour disruptions happens. That doesn’t just affect the companies. It affects the union workers as well, and other union workers.
Professor, what’s the solution to get into something new? The same old, same old hasn’t worked since 1950.
We heard yesterday about how disproportionate these strike actions are related to transport. It’s a huge issue, it’s getting worse all the time and all of our customers recognize it as we try to export. Where do we go from here? That’s what we’re trying to do as a committee.
Mr. Eidlin: You heard Mr. Harvey from the Railway Association of Canada talk in the first panel about the need to shape expectations among shippers, that we need a stable labour relations system to shape expectations among shippers so that they don’t divert their shipments.
What we need to do here is to shape expectations among employers that government intervention is not coming to the rescue in the negotiations process. This isn’t port and rail, but at Air Canada, you saw this clearly when the CEO just said outright that they didn’t really negotiate because they assumed that the government was going to issue a section 107 order. We see how employers are essentially trained now to rely on government intervention in labour disputes. I talked about the hard-learned lessons that governments have acquired, but this is only after repeated efforts at government intervention at clamping down.
The solution, to my mind, is essentially a more robust to right to strike, because we’ve heard from the employer representatives about the tremendously disruptive effects of those strikes, which is absolutely correct, but that is precisely the point of a strike. It is the threat of disruption that creates a pressure-cooker environment that creates the conditions necessary to bring parties together to reach agreement. If you reduce that pressure, it reduces the incentive to reach an agreement.
We need to understand collective bargaining and the right to strike as the fulcrum on which a stable collective bargaining system can rely.
Senator Lewis: Mr. Hynes, do you have a comment on that?
Mr. Hynes: I don’t want to turn this into a debate club, but I take enormous exception with what my colleague said.
Employers are not begging for the government to bail them out. Employers want to negotiate freely and fairly with their labour unions and come to agreement at the end of the day. We are having real challenges getting that done, and we are seeing it across various industries. I don’t need to repeat all the reasons why this is causing an enormous impact on Canadians. We need to find tools that keep the parties at the bargaining table to avoid the lever that some parties want to quickly pull, which is saying, “Let’s withdraw our services and exact some pain on the employer and the public,” to perhaps get a better deal. What we want are the tools.
The Vince Ready report lays out some options. It threads the needle, a difficult one, between balancing the right to strike with not letting somebody exact this kind of economic harm on our country. A special mediator is not a silver bullet, but we think this is a good step in the right direction: a mediator with more powers than the current mediator has to keep at the table to get deals. No one wants an arbitrator to write their collective agreements, full stop.
Senator Simons: I was the star of my high school debate club. I always love a good debate club.
Professor Eidlin, as you may have heard when I introduced myself, I’m from Alberta. This week, the premier of my province not only ordered striking teachers back to work, but she also invoked the “notwithstanding” clause, stripping from them any capacity to challenge that. To my mind, the most egregious layer of that cake is that she imposed upon them the same contract they had rejected by a vote of almost 90%.
Mr. Eidlin: Yes.
Senator Simons: I’m wondering if you could speak to us about the precedent that sets for other jurisdictions and the consequences to the mood of organized labour in this country. I know what the mood is in my province, but can you speak about what the ripple effect of these actions in Alberta might be for other jurisdictions and labour sectors?
Mr. Eidlin: Generally, it’s quite concerning. The problem that we’re running into is the extent of government’s ability to enact laws and have them respected ultimately lies on their being perceived as legitimate. When you have a situation like you saw in Alberta this week, where the government is invoking the “notwithstanding” clause — so basically publicly stating they are violating workers’ Charter rights to ram through an agreement that they had rejected — it’s not just a problem that it forces that group of workers back to work against their will and the lack of goodwill and the rancour that is going to occur. It chips away at the legitimacy of government action. It really speaks to the importance of avoiding those kinds of situations.
It goes back to that quote from Lester B. Pearson. First, at a practical level, in trying to prohibit the actions we don’t want to see, we might be provoking them. If we care about a stable labour relations regime, we need to have a regime that everyone recognizes as legitimate. We may not always agree with everything, but we at least understand that it’s a regime in which we can get a fair hearing: We might not always win, but at least the rules are fair.
Senator Simons: Mr. Hynes, the point of a strike is, in fact, to inflict suffering on the employer and the general public. That is the weapon the workers have. I understand why we don’t like that, but that is the function of a strike.
I wanted to come back to what you said, and I need to understand this because I was bothering Senator Wilson. He says there are more than 100 different unions involved at the Port of Vancouver, and you mentioned that this is a particular problem on the West Coast, so why is it a problem with the West Coast ports and not with others?
Mr. Hynes: They’re organized differently. In the rest of the country, the unions are organized under a geographic certification, which means all the unions in that particular area working with those employers will negotiate with one voice. Along the West Coast, this has always been done on a voluntary basis. So the British Columbia Maritime Employers Association, or BCMEA, represents all of the employers that do business on the ports, and the International Longshore and Warehouse Union, or ILWU, represents all the local unions that are present on the ports. This has been voluntary for decades.
There are concerns that in the next round of bargaining one year from now, the union might choose not to continue with that voluntary arrangement. They may end up trying to negotiate, I think, up to 39 separate collective agreements with the various employers who do business. To us, that would be catastrophic.
One of the key recommendations of the IIC report is that the government provide an opportunity, which does not currently exist under the Canada Labour Code, for the employer to request the geographic certification, a process that would go through the Canada Industrial Relations Board, to then obtain geographic certification along the entire West Coast, so BCMEA represents all of those employers and the ILWU represents all of those locals, so we have one table for the entire collective bargaining process.
Senator Simons: Thank you.
[Translation]
Senator Aucoin: I’m going to change the subject a little bit. Ms. Gascon, following all the interesting comments we’ve heard tonight, would it be useful to order that ports are an essential service, with all the ramifications this would entail for workers and employers? The other witnesses can also respond if they so wish. Thank you.
Ms. Gascon: Thank you, Senator Aucoin.
That’s certainly not what I’m asking of your committee this evening. I’m calling for collaborative effort to find solutions because repeated strikes are extremely difficult to manage for the national interest. That’s really the issue you’re studying, balancing national interest with the right to strike, which is a constitutional right. It’s not easy. That’s why the final report of the Industrial Inquiry Commission on West Coast Ports has difficult wording. It tried to thread a needle, as my colleague Mr. Hynes put it.
I think that it provides possible solutions. Both parties need to be kept at the table. They need to understand each other. Negotiations should be based on shared interests on both sides of the table. What we’re seeing now is that the two parties can no longer sit at a table because they have long-standing issues that have not been resolved. They have a different world view. This report offers some possible solutions, and with the upcoming negotiations, it would be inappropriate to come up with another report.
Professor Eidlin has done a great job of explaining what former prime ministers and other administrations who looked into this issue did. I think that the final report of the Industrial Inquiry Commission on West Coast Ports can offer possible solutions to address this issue.
While it’s not my intention, strikes hurt Canadians, the Port of Montreal, the economy and small businesses. As your colleague Senator Simons explained earlier, I do understand that the point of strikes is to cause pain. However, how much pain is too much? Are we going to get to a point where we won’t have food on our tables? A point where farm animals start dying of hunger? A point where we can’t move oil to heat homes in the north? How far is too far? That is the question.
I propose that we look at the final report of the Industrial Inquiry Commission on West Coast Ports and develop a plan for implementation. When Minister O’Regan launched this commission of inquiry, I asked whether it would look into the Canadian context, and I was told that the report and its recommendations would be taken into consideration in the Canadian context. That is what I’m calling for this evening, senator.
Senator Oudar: I’d like to continue in the same vein on the impact of strikes. I don’t think the goal of a strike is to inflict hardship or cause pain. The right to strike is protected by our Constitution. Professor Eidlin talked about Supreme Court case law that we need to consider. We need to find solutions that respect that principle because that is part of collective bargaining and it’s now enshrined in our constitutional law. In fact, I’d like to thank Professor Eidlin for bringing up the Saskatchewan Federation of Labour v. Saskatchewan decision. Nevertheless, it’s important for me to remind the committee that we need to keep lessons from Supreme Court rulings in mind.
Both of you have spoken about some overlapping areas, and I think one key to any possible solution would perhaps consist in not attacking the right to strike, but looking at the whole bargaining approach. You talked about keeping people at the bargaining table and about respecting the right to strike. Ms. Gascon has once again spoken about the need to maintain social dialogue. The key then is probably to develop the tools that would keep the parties at the table and not to always have to negotiate with the sword of Damocles hanging over their heads. That applies to both unions and employers. I’ve done a lot of negotiations most of my life, and I can say that these tools are useful for employers and workers.
We haven’t touched on lockouts, even though employers can use this mechanism to end temporarily labour disputes, just as employees have their own right. That’s the counterpart to the right to strike. It has the same impacts, so there’s a balance that needs to be found there.
You overlap at the reconfiguration of negotiations between the parties — and I commend you for that — and the need to keep people around the table, the right to strike and the obligation to maintain social dialogue.
I think there are potential solutions. Several aspects have been put on the table tonight. I wanted to thank all four witnesses for your testimony and for the consensus that I believe will emerge at the end of this study.
[English]
The Chair: Witnesses, if there is anything that you would like to write and submit to us in terms of cultural leadership — having spent my life in sport and business with big organizations and small organizations, the culture of leadership and the culture of people’s capacity to demonstrate flexibility always seems to be one of the good and key elements of negotiation. If you have an opportunity to continue that process that we opened up with tonight and give us something in writing, we would really appreciate it, just to add value to the already valuable testimony that you’ve already given us.
Does that make sense?
[Translation]
Thank you again, Ms. Gascon, for your testimony on behalf of the Port of Montreal.
Ms. Gascon: Thank you.
[English]
The Chair: Thank you all for your participation. It has been a fascinating discussion. I wish we had another two hours to continue it, but I guess we will find a way to get you back again to develop the conversation, so we can come up with some results that make sense and, hopefully, help our government move forward. Thank you all.
Thank you to our staff in front and in back for doing a magnificent job. I recognize that you had to make amends to give us more time.
(The committee adjourned.)