Assemblée législative de l'Ontario

MINISTRY OF LABOUR

CONTENTS

Wednesday 6 October 1993

Ministry of Labour

Hon Bob Mackenzie, minister

James R. Thomas, deputy minister

Gerry Stuart, manager, financial planning and budgeting

Peter Inokai, director, financial and administration services branch

Mary Tate, director, occupational health and safety branch

STANDING COMMITTEE ON ESTIMATES

*Chair / Président: Jackson, Cameron (Burlington South/-Sud PC)

Vice-Chair / Vice-Présidente: Arnott, Ted (Wellington PC)

*Abel, Donald (Wentworth North/-Nord ND

*Bisson, Gilles (Cochrane South/-Sud N)

Carr, Gary (Oakville South/-Sud PC)

Elston, Murray J. (Bruce L)

Haeck, Christel (St Catharines-Brock ND)

Hayes, Pat (Essex-Kent ND)

Lessard, Wayne (Windsor-Walkerville ND)

*Mahoney, Steven W. (Mississauga West/-Ouest L)

Ramsay, David (Timiskaming L)

*Wiseman, Jim (Durham West/-Ouest ND)

*In attendance / présents

Substitutions present/ Membres remplaçants présents:

Cooper, Mike (Kitchener-Wilmot ND) for Ms Haeck

Fletcher, Derek (Guelph ND) for Mr Hayes

Murdock, Sharon (Sudbury ND) for Mr Lessard

Witmer, Elizabeth (Waterloo North/-Nord PC) for Mr Carr

Clerk / Greffière: Grannum, Tonia

The committee met at 1536 in committee room 2.

MINISTRY OF LABOUR

The Chair (Mr Cameron Jackson): I call to order the standing committee of estimates. I'd like to welcome the Minister of Labour, the Honourable Bob Mackenzie. The committee has requested and the House has concurred with five hours of hearings for the estimates of the Ministry of Labour. In accordance with our standing rules, I'll invite the minister to begin his opening comments of up to 30 minutes and he might, at the outset, introduce his deputy. Welcome, Minister.

Hon Bob Mackenzie (Minister of Labour): Thank you very much. First, Jim Thomas, whom most of you probably know, is the Deputy Minister of Labour, and there are some other Ministry of Labour staff here. Jim, if you'd just go through their names quickly, and their positions, we may want to use them if we don't have all the answers.

Mr James R. Thomas: Sure. Why don't I just ask the staff at the back to introduce themselves?

The Chair: Deputy, they won't be picked up on Hansard, but perhaps you can just read it into the record.

Mr Thomas: Thea Herman is the assistant deputy minister of policy. Adam Starkman is in the policy branch. Peter Inokai and Gerry Stuart, behind him, are in the finance branch. Donna Brown is from human resources. Carola Lane is the ADM of corporate services, and behind them is Paul Gardner, who is the director of mediation in labour management services. Lorraine Carroll is also here, from the minister's office.

Hon Mr Mackenzie: Mr Chair and members of the committee, I appreciate this opportunity as the Labour minister to review with you the major operating and financial issues facing my ministry.

Speaking personally, my three years so far as the Labour minister have been both interesting and challenging. The working world is being swept by breathtaking changes on a scope not seen since the 1930s.

In Ontario, all of us -- government, employers and workers -- are struggling to make sense of these changes in planning for future prosperity. While many questions remain to be answered, it is clear that increased labour-management cooperation is going to be the key to that prosperity.

We believe that when you have workers who are fully involved and committed in workplace decisions, you have better workplaces, and better workplaces are invariably more productive workplaces.

Since our election in the fall of 1990, we've been putting that belief in better workplaces into practice. The Labour ministry has become the vehicle for a large part of the government's progressive agenda, a fact of which I am proud.

We have already passed major amendments to several ministry acts and there is further legislation pending. We've strengthened and expanded the Pay Equity Act of 1987, bringing the benefits of pay equity to another 420,000 working women in the broader public sector.

We've established the most comprehensive employee wage protection program in North America. As of this morning, we've paid out more than $113 million to over 48,000 workers since the program's inception in the fall of 1991. Those are the up-to-date figures as of this morning. This amount is a fraction of the total wages, vacation pay, severance and termination pay owed to these workers by their employers, but the point has been made that working people must be treated fairly.

Occupational health and safety remains central to our role as a ministry. The strengthened Occupational Health and Safety Act has made a new era in workplace health and safety. Gone is much of the adversarial relationship so often present between management and labour. Both parties are now coequals when it comes to health and safety matters.

Fatalities and accidents are still too high, but they are declining. We've continued to put pressure on wayward employers to conform with the new act. Prosecutions and fines are increasing, and we are finding that they are having a deterrent effect.

The Workplace Health and Safety Agency has launched its certification training program for labour and management representatives on the joint safety committees in each workplace, and the agency is acting as an educational and informational link for health and safety across the province.

The provisions of Bill 208 call for a mandatory review of the agency beginning in January 1994. The terms and conditions of this review are at this moment being finalized, and it will commence on schedule.

Members will also remember Bill 40, our package of amendments to the Labour Relations Act. The bill became law on January 1 of this year and we are tracking its impact with great interest.

Labour and management are especially pleased with the one-day turnaround on construction industry jurisdictional disputes, and the board has made several interim orders which have enabled it to respond quickly and effectively to some serious complaints. So far there have been 65 applications to the board for consolidation of bargaining units from both employers and staff. In the nine months since the bill became law certifications are up somewhat, although it is still too early to determine a trend.

The board's field staff has been successful about 80% of the time in helping to settle differences between labour and management without the necessity of formal litigation before the board.

All in all, it would appear that the implementation of Bill 40 is proceeding a lot more smoothly than its passage, and I think we're all thankful for that.

Turning to the ministry's legislative agenda for the rest of the fiscal year, we have several bills before the House.

Our amendments to the Crown Employees Collective Bargaining Act, otherwise known as CECBA, received first reading last June. Both the public service unions and the government have longed desired reform of this important statute, which governs labour relations for almost 100,000 working men and women in the Ontario public service and its affiliated agencies. Compared with the Labour Relations Act and labour laws in many other provinces, CECBA is a restrictive and outdated piece of labour legislation.

We're proposing to broaden access to collective bargaining for excluded classifications, allow classification grievances and lessen the reliance on binding arbitration by requiring the mutual consent of both parties beforehand. Lastly, we propose to remove crown agencies from CECBA's jurisdiction and place them under the Labour Relations Act.

The public service will also have the right to strike, but it will be contingent on both parties' prior agreement on essential service designations. The public can be assured that essential public services will always be protected in the event of a strike or lockout.

Our CECBA proposals will give working men and women in the public sector rights and opportunities they have requested for many years. They will allow the government to conduct its labour relations in a system that is fairer, less cumbersome and certainly less expensive.

The government's final major piece of worker reform legislation is also before the House. The agricultural labour relations bill will establish, for the first time ever, a system of labour relations in the province's agricultural and horticultural sectors.

Together with farm owners and farm workers, we have developed a package of proposals that is agreeable to all parties. Workers will gain rights and benefits they have long been denied, farm owners will be protected against work stoppages and there will be virtually no impact on the family farm. The bill is an important achievement. It's proof that reasonable, progressive labour law reform is possible when all parties approach the issue in good faith and partnership.

Before concluding this morning with a look at some important internal changes that have taken place in the ministry, I'd like to give members of the committee an update on the Workers' Compensation Board.

It seems there is no shortage of opinions or ideas for reform at the board. In fact, it's hard to think of an agency that has been the subject of more formal public inquiry and scrutiny. As the Labour minister, I am the first to concede that the board is facing some real pressures, and nobody is underestimating those pressures. In the midst of these pressures, however, the pace of positive change and achievement continues to pick up steam.

Just last month, the operations of the board were the subject of a week-long review at the standing committee on government agencies. The chair and vice-chair made detailed presentations summarizing actions the board is taking to contain costs, improve service and get workers back on the job as soon as possible.

As well, ministry and board officials are already working to comply with the recommendations made in the recent Provincial Auditor's report concerning the board. Members will also know that the Premier has asked the Premier's Labour-Management Advisory Committee for its help in guiding the government and the board on an agenda for workers' compensation reform.

In particular, the Premier has asked this group of business and labour leaders to undertake their work without any preconceived notions of what that reform should entail. This, I think, is a necessary first step to developing a compensation system that is, above all, less adversarial. These are just a few developments that perhaps have been lost in the general noise and clamour regarding the board.

Our government remains committed to the principle of fair and just compensation for workplace injuries and occupational illnesses. That commitment means working through rough patches with the board, supporting its agenda for reform and, above all, taking the message to every workplace that injuries can be prevented in the first place.

I began my remarks today by commenting on the incredible changes that have occurred in Ontario workplaces as a result of the recession and restructuring. That comment can apply equally to the public sector as well. With one million employees and a huge payroll, the broader public sector is a major player in the Ontario economy. Right now, we're going through the same painful period of readjustment that occurred in the private sector a few years ago.

In the case of the Ministry of Labour, that has meant re-examining the way we provide services to our clients, the workers and employers of Ontario. The result has been some major changes and I think improvements in the ministry's relations with clients and its own employees. But the situation is far from perfect, as any private sector employer would tell you about workplace conditions in the last few years.

We faced sizeable budget pressures this year that led to severe constraints, layoffs and a general lowering of employee morale. The total impact of all government restraint programs, the multi-year expenditure reduction plan, MYERP, the executive compensation plan, ECP, and other required operating reductions on the ministry's budget this year will amount to $43.4 million.

As a result, we have reduced our transfer payments by $17.7 million and our operating base by the balance, $25.7 million. This represents a decrease of 18% of our base resources and we face further MYERP reductions in each of the next two years.

Our situation was compounded by the fact that we did not have a great deal of leeway in implementing these mandated cuts to avoid internal layoffs. Some ministries were able to apply the bulk of their cuts to transfer payments, thus avoiding the need to lay off their own employees. Because transfer payments are a much smaller percentage of our base budget, that is an option we did not enjoy.

After exhausting all other avenues, we were forced to eliminate 208 positions in the current fiscal year, which, when vacancies and other variables were taken into effect, resulted in actual layoff notices being issued to 113 classified staff.

As the Labour minister I personally regretted having to authorize these cutbacks in personnel, but we are making every effort to redeploy our affected staff elsewhere in the public service. Of the original 113 who I said received notices, 63 have either been redeployed elsewhere in the public service, found new employment outside the government or retired. We will continue to work hard to place the remaining 50 affected staff who want to continue their careers in the Ontario government.

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The ministry's reorganization has successfully served a short-term desire to better meet the needs of our clients. Over the long term, however, the Ministry of Labour faces some major questions about how it should best go about meeting its mandate of promoting better workplaces and fairer workplace practices.

Given the pace of change in the workplace today, we need to know if our programs and approaches in such diverse workplaces as occupational health and safety, employment practices, labour relations and policy development are the most efficient way to achieve the results I think we are all seeking. Conversely, we need to know from those we serve and those agencies also involved in workplace issues their ideas on the most productive ways to deliver services.

Certain features of the ministry are indispensable to its mandate, our enforcement powers for one. I can't imagine a situation where we would surrender the power to bring wayward employers into line, especially in life-and-death health and safety situations. We'll continue to need professional and trained staff to carry out inspections and assess individual situations. There are other areas of our operations, though, which may not be as relevant to our future role. It's these areas we want to clarify.

As a result, we are about to enter with our stakeholders and our own staff a discussion on the ministry's future role. It will be a very important exercise and it could result in some major changes in the way we go about business.

As a point of departure we have recently widely distributed a discussion paper entitled Strategic Directions. This document is one of the tangible fruits of the new working relationship within the ministry in that it was developed in close consultation with representatives of our bargaining unit employees. The paper is a provocative and interesting document intended to focus the consultation phase now under way with our staff and our clients. The feedback we receive this fall will help determine the ministry's general direction and core operations in the coming years.

As Ontario's first New Democratic Minister of Labour I remain committed to fair and progressive workplace standards. These days, we are told that such standards are incompatible with the lean and mean global marketplace. We're told that we must give up almost all we have worked for and strived for in order to remain competitive. Our government disagrees. I think one of the reasons we have been so successful in bringing forth fair and reasonable workplace reform is because we have worked extra hard to balance the need of both employers and workers. We have a number of forums now where business can gain input to policy development at the ministry in its earliest stages. I am confident that the business community will continue to take full advantage of these opportunities to make its views known.

In the critical years ahead, our economy will continue to be seriously tested and the Ministry of Labour stands ready to continue helping labour and management meet this test and usher in a new wave of prosperity for worker and employer alike. I want to thank you very much for your hearing and attention here today.

The Chair: Did you have any additional comments? If not, we'll proceed with the rotation.

Hon Mr Mackenzie: I think we'll proceed with the rotation.

The Chair: Very good. Mr Mahoney.

Mr Steven W. Mahoney (Mississauga West): I think I'll just ask a series of questions rather than wasting your time and giving my viewpoint on some of your comments, because you probably would expect we wouldn't agree on much of that. So I think much more the purpose here from my perspective would be to get some questions as to some of the things that are going on.

First of all, I don't know if there's a document out. You used the term "stakeholders." Could you give me a list of whom the ministry consider to be the stakeholders, either broadly or specifically? Either way I'm happy.

Hon Mr Mackenzie: I should say, just before Jim responds, that there is consultation with the stakeholders in all the various areas of the ministry when we're looking at legislation. Jim can better outline --

Mr Mahoney: Yes, I just want to know who they are specifically, who you would include in your definition of the Labour ministry's stakeholders.

Mr Thomas: I would say that our stakeholders consist of a variety of people, organizations. I would certainly think that it is workers; it is organized labour; it is employer associations; it is employers; it is academia; it is a variety of people who come across our doorstep; and it is other kinds of interest groups, community groups. Those were the kinds of stakeholders that we think of when we, for example, organized policy advisory groups into three sections and I think we have a very effective consultation process whereby on a regular basis, every two or three months, we invite the community groups in to talk to us about what they think we're doing right and doing wrong and what our policies should be and where we should be going in certain areas. Similarly, we do the same thing with unions and employers and employer associations.

Mr Mahoney: How do you develop a mechanism to get input to the ministry to -- for example, over 60% of the workers whom you mention would be non-union workers. How do you get any assurance that those people whom you've listed as stakeholders would have input into things and that it wouldn't be dominated by big unions or big employers?

There could be a criticism of things like a Premier's Council, for example, being dominated by General Motors and not taking into account small business or people who are unorganized. The same fear could be expressed about labour being dominated by steel or by auto; that type of thing. How do you actively go out and involve people in unorganized labour?

Mr Thomas: Well, you're right; it's really hard to engage a consultation process that captures the opinions of four million workers or 300,000 workplaces. So that's definitely a challenge that I think both employers and workers and unions face.

On the Premier's labour-management group, for instance, very clearly I think the business leaders that you're talking about recognized that and set in place a fairly sophisticated process of involving as best they could employer associations, other employers. I know they've got something in the order of 14 working groups looking at various issues within workers' compensation reform. There is a steering committee consisting of 16 or 18 people. But would they say that they represent all 300,000 or even a large portion of those employers in the province of Ontario? I don't know; you'd have to ask them. I'd be surprised if they would claim to be totally representative.

Organized labour, for example, has worked very hard and has recommended as part of the way they would want to approach workers' compensation governance -- as well as the Ontario Federation of Labour representing organized labour, they also feel that they need to be involving the networks of injured workers. So they, for example, have set up a process whereby as part of their consultation they engage the Ontario network of injured workers.

I don't know that similar situations exist in the non-workers' compensation community, so I think the challenge of trying to get the inputs from the unrepresented in terms of organized labour is a very real challenge. It's a challenge that's been around for a very long time and will continue to be around.

Mr Mahoney: Jim, the minister referred to better relations between labour and management in the province. Of course, we hear different information from people who contact us. Are you familiar with the task force on work organization service that's been ongoing?

Mr Thomas: Yes.

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Mr Mahoney: Could you tell me, first of all, how much money has been spent so far by the task force in arriving at the point they're at, and maybe tell me what point they're at? Is it a cabinet submission? What's going on with this task force?

Mr Thomas: The task force on the organization of work is a subcommittee of the Premier's Council on Economic Renewal that has been in existence for a bit more than a year and a half, because when I became deputy and found myself on it, it had been around for a few months at that point. It has looked at the ways in which we can achieve higher-performing workplaces. I think that's an oversimplification of what it's been doing, but it's been co-chaired and still is co-chaired by Mr Curlook of Inco and Mr Pomeroy of the Communications and Electrical Workers. Under the leadership of those two people, it has developed a number of products that were presented to the Premier's Council in May of this year.

There was, for example, a vision statement put forward around what good-performing workplaces would look like. There was a document to help organizations and companies assess where they are on the continuum of organizational change. There was a strong cry from the task force for there to be some kind of ongoing institution or organization or way of disseminating information to the workplaces that haven't yet become higher-performing workplaces, which, according to the literature, are as many as 80% of the workplaces in the province. So we're talking about a way to improve productivity and effectiveness.

Mr Mahoney: We're talking about a committee in every workplace like the health and safety agency committee?

Mr Thomas: No, I don't think that's been decided, Mr Mahoney. That was not one of the conclusions that was reached. But when you ask about the cost of it, first of all, I can find that out for you. I don't have the information at my fingertips, but I can say to you that it was an extraordinarily low cost because the 50-plus people who participated from business, from labour, from academia, from consulting and from government did it on a voluntary basis, and so I would think that the cost would be extremely modest.

We in the ministry have taken some of the information from that task force and are out consulting now on whether and how to establish a work organization service. That consultation is concluding and we have not formulated final opinions or recommendations yet, but certainly we are hearing that there's a very strong cry out there, a very strong wish out there, for there to be some mechanism for sharing best practices, for helping people to move to higher-performing workplaces.

No one has suggested at this point that that will be accomplished by having a work organization bipartite committee in every workplace. People haven't said that isn't possible, but all I'm saying is, that has not reached that degree of specificity yet.

Hon Mr Mackenzie: I think it's probably worth pointing out, too, that we went through, as is obviously knowledge, a fairly difficult period through the process of Bill 40.

One of the arguments that we made from the beginning on that, which was difficult for some people to accept, quite frankly, was that we simply had to find a way, that we tried to shift as much as we could the confrontational approach, which certainly in my experience has been what has built the labour movement in Ontario, to a more cooperative approach. That led immediately to what could be done and where we could get cooperation between both business and labour in terms of workplace practices. So that's --

Mr Mahoney: What do you mean, Minister -- sorry, but maybe you could help me. What do you mean by "built the labour movement in the province of Ontario"?

Hon Mr Mackenzie: I think the development of the labour movement in the province of Ontario was based on confrontation, not based on a cooperative mode of doing business.

Mr Mahoney: Do you find that, oh, take the last five or six years, that statement would hold water? Or are you referring to the 1950s and 1960s or even the 1970s? Today, do you find that in most modern industry there's confrontation between labour and management?

Hon Mr Mackenzie: I think that's been a fact of life and, incidentally, accepted by both sides when you discuss it with them, because we got a lot of comments on it during the Bill 40 hearings -- up until very recently. I think the message that's finally sunk in loud and clear to both sides of the issue is that some of the old ways of doing business have got to change.

You still have the distrust, to some extent, between some of the parties as to whether we can operate on a level playing field if we give up on what I have called in some of the hearings, rightly or wrongly, some of the sacred cows in terms of the labour movement; and on the management side whether there's an acceptance that they should be probably going to the workers on the shop floor who, in many cases, have ideas that are very effective in terms of improving productivity or improving their competitive picture in business.

Mr Thomas: Could I just make a follow-up comment to that? Over the last couple of years, I think you've seen a shift in many workplaces from the kind of adversarial situation that the minister described as characteristic, perhaps, of workplaces a few years back, recognizing that there is a need to try to find some ways to relate to each other differently. I think one needs to look no further away than the Ontario public service for a good example of that.

When I joined the Ontario public service in 1988 and was responsible for collective bargaining on behalf of the government with the Ontario Public Service Employees Union, the relationship was extremely adversarial: We met each other at the bargaining table and we met each other in grievance hearings. In 1993 that situation has moved a long way. We have productivity committees that are working together jointly. The strategic planning document that the minister talked about in the Ministry of Labour was a joint document. We have joint committees on a variety of things and we're trying to find ways to work with each other, and we are finding ways to work with each other, that are very different from the ones that I think characterized the relationship between the government and OPSEU between 1972 and, say, the late 1980s. I think that probably is being reflected in many workplaces in both the public and the private sector.

Mr Mahoney: It's interesting that you use the example of the public service, because that would not be the public image out there, that the public service and the government are pals; far from it, as a result of the many demonstrations and activities we've seen lately. I wonder if there's a difference between working at the staff level, Jim, where you work, versus the political level where the minister works.

Mr Thomas: But your question was very much directed at what's happening in the workplaces, and I would argue that my position as deputy minister and my staff is comparable to the management in a corporation. The kinds of things I'm seeing happen in my ministry and that I see happening in government at the staff levels, at the management and union levels, I would think are fairly typical of what's happening in the private sector. Whether or not this particular government is having a particularly difficult time with unions on a political level is a different question.

Hon Mr Mackenzie: I won't delay this, but Jim referred to the public sector. I want to give you some observations that have been made in the private sector in an area that I know and you at least have some awareness of as well: the situation at Stelco, which, I am well aware, for years has been one of real difficulty and real confrontation. I've had comments at meetings I've been at within the last six months from the president and several executive members of the local at Stelco that -- I don't want to give the impression that all is sweetness and light; they're still two tough parties when it comes to negotiating -- there is now an openness and degree of cooperation they have never seen before. I want to tell you cleary that from Sandy Adams and some of the other vice-presidents and officers at Stelco, I've had exactly the same comment made to me, that discussions that just were unthinkable two and three and four years ago between the union and the company are now regular fare. I've had similar comments from GM, and there are a number of examples of this. We don't mean it's all sweetness and light --

Mr Mahoney: What do you attribute that to?

Hon Mr Mackenzie: I think what I started out with: We've reached a stage where there's an understanding -- in my opinion at least, and that's why I have no difficulty, in spite of the opposition, in proceeding with Bill 40 -- where the parties are ready to change the ways they've done business in terms of labour relations in the province of Ontario. I think it's essential for us to try to continue that trend and improve it wherever we can, because I don't think we're going to compete in the world markets today in the situation we have if we're operating from the old confrontational approach.

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Mr Mahoney: Do I understand, then, that you attribute this new-found harmony between management and labour to Bill 40?

Hon Mr Mackenzie: I don't think I would ever be that simplistic, but Bill 40 was the effort to get the two parties together, and the reason they wouldn't get together in much of the past, not just those parties but many of the parties that were involved in labour-management negotiations and disputes, was that there was not a trust or a belief that they were operating on a -- I hate the doggone term -- level playing field out there. We had to make sure that both sides understood there was some ability to respond on either side; that the response was probably going to be better, though, if they could do it cooperatively.

Mr Mahoney: How much time do I have left?

The Chair: Ten more minutes.

Mr Mahoney: Can you tell me if it's been decided that there will be 10 employees in whatever agency? I know there's a number of options here for the work organization service project, either an Ontario agency, an external advisory board or some kind of interim arrangement, but I'm told there are going to be 10 people hired on staff to run whatever system is set up. Is that accurate?

Mr Thomas: That hasn't been decided yet.

Mr Mahoney: There will be full-time staff, though, I assume.

Mr Thomas: That hasn't been decided yet.

Mr Mahoney: I see. Do you, either one of you, the deputy or the minister, think that part of the mandate or part of the role of the Ministry of Labour is to intervene in business to the point of getting them to sit down and talk to one another? Do we really want to get into -- I don't mean to dramatize it -- an Orwellian type of situation where we're setting up an agency to try to get workers and management talking to one another in the workplace?

Mr Thomas: That's a really good question and that's a question that we don't know the answer to. It's a question that we are consulting on. In the consultations that are taking place this month around strategic planning, we're asking people what role they think the Ministry of Labour should play.

I should indicate that we've been extraordinarily welcome on the labour-management services end of it in the Relationships by Objectives program. There have been over 130 RBO programs, in which business and labour have engaged mediators to come in and help them improve the relationship in the workplaces. That's been applauded. It's been done in the private sector; it's been done in the public sector. It's a successful program.

The question I think we're asking is, how much further, if at all, ought the Ministry of Labour, ought government to go beyond simply responding to invitations? I think you're asking an extraordinarily good question, and it's a question we don't know the answer to. It's a question we're going to be hoping that people out there will give us some answers to.

Mr Mahoney: One of my concerns, and I say this directly to the minister, is that there is a fear that an issue like the work organization service program has not been conducted in a public way. It's not clandestine, but it's certainly not something that has come, or appears will come, to the floor of the Legislature, to a legislative committee such as this, to give an opportunity for people to make presentations to maybe answer those questions.

My opening question to the deputy was, how do you identify the stakeholders? Are people co-opted? We hear every day that people in the Workplace Health and Safety Agency have been co-opted. Well, we hear that, and you hear it from us. We don't dream these things up in the middle of the night. People actually call us and write us and say that's their belief. You can call that noise and clamour, Minister; I call that information and stuff that should be put forward in a public agenda in some way.

On the surface, anything that puts forward good ideas and that generates an opportunity for workers and management to work more closely, in a general sense I think makes sense. I'm concerned, however, that I don't think agencies and interest groups, stakeholders, even unorganized stakeholders, have an opportunity for input into this. I don't know who's driving the agenda. You know there is a constant fear that big organized labour drives the agenda of the current government. Is organized labour driving the agenda?

Mr Jim Wiseman (Durham West): That's not what you said the other day in the Legislature.

Mr Mahoney: Well, there is a fear out there that might be happening. When a Tory government is in power, there's a fear that big business is driving the agenda. Those fears are there, and perception is reality in politics.

Interjections.

Mr Mahoney: I'm sorry; I didn't mean to tease the bears, Mr Chairman.

But I sense either a wandering committee or committees being set up in every workplace to sit around. Who's going to be working if everybody's in committee meetings on health and safety, on employment equity, on work organization service? Are we nest-poking, going around looking for problems here?

Hon Mr Mackenzie: I think there is a point that should be made here, and I have no hesitation in making it as openly and bluntly as I can. One of the agencies that you folks and others have raised is the health and safety agency. We had a situation there or have a situation there where it was one of the first areas where we tried a genuine bipartite approach. I might tell you that in the last few days, with a large number of people graduating from the course, there are a lot of good comments coming in just over the last few days.

But one of the things we ran into, and probably to be expected, is that in a bipartite type of approach, where we had an equal number of labour and an equal number of management people, there was a much tighter ship, if you like -- I'm not sure that's the expression you use -- on the labour side, and most of them who were there knew what they thought were the best training programs and so on. We found a much more divided approach on the management side. That led to some problems, which I personally think have been largely dealt with now. That's something we'll find out over the next few days as things go on.

But there was a recognition, I can tell you as well, very clearly on the management side of what the strength was in terms of trying to set up these new programs on the labour side; that they had to find some way they could get their act together and operating so that they were speaking with a more united, combined voice when they did come up to issues on which they may not have agreed with the labour approach. That's one of the growing pains we've suffered through, operating on a bipartite basis. I can tell you that both sides are very aware of it and, as strange as it may seem, there's an understanding on both sides that they've got to respond to the other side's concerns.

Mr Mahoney: People accuse politicians of telling them what they want to hear. I think sometimes the people tell the politicians what they think we want to hear, because we clearly get different messages in relation to health and safety. The bipartite situation does not appear, to a number of groups who have come to us, whether they're groups that have an axe to grind sometimes because they don't want to have their authority or their position taken away or whatever -- but clearly there is a strong feeling that labour has more than dominated health and safety, that the management co-chair has been co-opted. Again, these are words that have come from many, many people who I would think, to the deputy, you would consider stakeholders, the people who are making these comments. They're concerned about that kind of thing.

Hon Mr Mackenzie: I think that's exactly why I outlined some of the growing pains we've gone through.

Mr Mahoney: Can someone tell me how much extra money the ministry would be spending in 1993-94 as a result of changes to the OLRA?

The Chair: Does the deputy wish to invite someone to come forward?

Mr Thomas: There was an increased allocation of funding for the labour board and for some ancillary services in the Ministry of Labour. Gerry?

Mr Gerry Stuart: My name is Gerry Stuart. I'm the manager of financial planning and budgeting for the Ministry of Labour.

Currently, our expenditure planning forecast for 1993-94 is showing Bill 40 at a total of $4.7 million. This includes $2 million in salaries and wages, for a total of 39 FTEs, full-time equivalent staff.

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Mr Mahoney: How much of that would be what you would call additional expense? Is $4 million the additional expense relating to the OLRA specifically?

Mr Stuart: I don't have that. I've just got in front of me here what we're spending this year, but we can get that information for you.

Mr Mahoney: Could you? And I don't want to lose the question that I asked --

Hon Mr Mackenzie: That, I think, would be an increase in that particular area and we'll get the figures for you, but it's a direct --

Mr Mahoney: Yes, and I don't want to lose the question I asked about the cost so far of the work services organization. I think you said you could provide that.

Mr Thomas: Can I just go further on that, Mr Mahoney? I am a member of the task force on the organization of work. I have overseen the development of the consultation paper on the work organization service. I've been informed about what the results of that consultation so far have been. I can honestly say to you that I have not heard anyone, that you're the first person who's suggested --

Mr Mahoney: Well, that's good.

Mr Thomas: -- that one of the ideas might be the establishment of committees in all the workplaces or in a number of workplaces. That's not been on in terms of the task force's recommendations; that's not been on in terms of the consultations; that's not any of the ideas that have been contained in our paper. Our paper is far more general. I would go back to the words you use, the notion of we're looking in general for some ways to help workplace parties move to higher-involvement workplaces, and certainly our interest at this point is those who want to do so.

The question becomes, what is the role of government and the ministry, if any, in trying to encourage more of them to want to do it? And there's the ancillary question of whether we try to encourage ones who don't want to do it to do it. We haven't gotten that far and there is no intention of creating the kind of machinery that I think is the worry behind your question.

Mr Mahoney: But let me give you some right from your own document: "Discussion themes: What governance in housing arrangement would best deliver services?" I don't know what that -- what that means is a board with a chair, $200- to $400-a-day per diems, an office structure of some kind, some kind of a policing agency along the lines of either health and safety or pay equity or any number of agencies that have been set up. What should the functions of the governing body or advisory board be? Who should sit on it? How large should it be? What must be done to ensure a role for and representation -- my point again -- of the unorganized sector, small business etc? How should appointments be made? How should it be chaired?

If you follow the pattern that's been established, we're talking about a bipartite board with co-chairs from management and labour. We're possibly talking about an independent chair. It could be another $125,000-a-year chair position. We could have agency people; again, the rumour is that there will be 10 full-time staff people hired to set this function going. I recognize that not all of these questions have been answered, but I don't have a forum in which to even ask them, other than this situation, and nobody yet has had that forum. It's been a group of people who have good intentions, sitting around a boardroom discussing all of these ideas.

I just have, in my limited six years in this place, the experience -- and this is not a partisan comment, because I think all three parties have contributed to this -- that government ideas turn into government agencies that go from zero to $9 million a year in about 60 seconds flat. I am very concerned that we're talking potentially about an agency being created here to go around telling everyone to be nice to one another at an incredible cost, with another bureaucratic level of red tape that business does not need.

Then, of course, the question is, is it funded directly out of the general reserves? Is it funded out of the black hole? Is it funded out of payroll taxes? Is it funded through a workers' compensation type of system, where companies pay for this? You've got to pay for this stuff. When we're slashing the heck out of the civil service, we're slashing the heck out of all kinds of services in the community, one of the things people tell us all the time, Minister, is "Prioritize your government duties." I just question very strongly, and as I say, I don't see a forum where I'm going to have an opportunity to really effectively ask questions, debate this thing, get into the meat of it, before it's going to be up and running and created and going around interfering in business. My view is that when you interfere in business, you potentially interfere in labour because you could hurt business, which would hurt jobs.

I want to really flag this on the only opportunity I have in a place like this to say, "Slow down here," or, "Come to us," or, "Bring it" -- I mean, can this just go through cabinet, and boom, we've got a decision made with no input by the people who are elected to represent the people of this province? I get the feeling it can. There's a question in there somewhere. Don't you agree?

Hon Mr Mackenzie: No, I don't, and I'll tell you why.

One, when we started the whole exercise in labour law reform and some of the things we're now trying to do in terms of the board and so on, it was a recognition that we had to find a better -- and I stress again, because it's one point that even my detractors admit, whether they believe me or not: I've always stressed that we've simply got to find a more cooperative way of doing things. If we come up with some good ideas in this exercise that's there in a general way -- the intent wasn't to set up committees in every workplace, I can tell you; it was, in terms of health and safety over a certain figure, but not in terms of this project.

But apart from that, one of the first comments I made when I made my presentation today was the difficulty I have found in taking $43.5 million out of the Ministry of Labour budget. Looking at the next two years under the MYERP as well, I can tell you, whether you accept it or not, that you'd have to have one awfully God-damned good argument to get any major financial incentive through on almost any program unless you really could show what appeared to be a very definite payoff. So we've got to come up with ways and means that don't mean adding to the bureaucracy. We've been working at cutting back on that and, in doing so, trying not to cut out the front-line services.

The Chair: Thank you, Minister. I would like to --

Mr Mahoney: The deputy wants a public forum. You're going to bring this to a public forum for debate, right?

The Chair: In the interests of time and according to the standing rules and with the full support of this committee, I'd like to recognize Mrs Witmer to proceed with her allocated time on behalf of the Progressive Conservative Party.

Mrs Elizabeth Witmer (Waterloo North): Thank you. I'd like to deal with the entire area of employment law. I'd like to just preface my remarks by saying that certainly recent legislative initiatives have imposed a very significant administrative and financial cost on the employers in this province. Not only has there been a financial and administrative cost, but I think if you take a look at what's happening in the province, there has also perhaps been a cost in terms of the jobs lost.

I understand there was a report submitted on Friday by a Professor Horvath at one of the Premier's committees. During that presentation he indicated that we're not going to be seeing any new investment in this province in the near future. Our job is going to be to make sure that those who are here remain in this province and that we somehow encourage the growth of small business and new entrepreneurs. So I am very concerned that what we have happening in this province, although we see all this change taking place, is not necessarily in the best interests of the employees in this province. What it's doing is really contributing to significant job loss and loss of job opportunity.

We know that we have in this province a huge network of legislation in the employment law field. We can take a look at the Employment Standards Act, the Occupational Health and Safety Act, the Workers' Compensation Act, the Ontario Human Rights Code, the Pay Equity Act, the Labour Relations Act, and pretty soon we're going to have the Employment Equity Act. These are all designed to protect and enhance employees' rights in the workplace.

However, we do need to recognize that in each case, Ontario is in the forefront. We are ahead of every other Canadian province, we are ahead of the northern United States, and we have to recognize these are the provinces and the states that we compete with. As a result, as I indicated before, we now have much more of an administrative and financial burden on employers in this province.

Certainly it's this type of legislative environment, which is very onerous, that has made this province a less attractive jurisdiction for investment and reinvestment. That is being confirmed now in studies that are being done. People simply don't see Ontario as a place in which they wish to invest. That's being confirmed.

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We need to recognize that capital does not observe geographic boundaries and therefore we need to recognize that, in whatever we're doing, if we really are concerned about the employees in this province, we need to make sure that our employment law legislation keeps pace with our neighbouring jurisdictions.

I guess I could say on a positive note that it's a wonderful time to be a consultant in this province or to be a labour law practitioner. There's all sorts of money to be made interpreting the laws and taking clients to court to test the laws. Business is booming in this province because of all the new legislation we've seen in recent years.

However, there's a trend I find very unsettling: We're seeing in this province people turn towards self-employment. They don't want to have employees because they don't need this burden of red tape, regulation and what have you. We're also seeing a trend towards part-time work.

I guess the question I ask, and I hope someone will answer for me at some time, is: Is Ontario's myriad of employment legislation a disincentive to the creation of new full-time jobs? I would say to you, I think there is some impact and I think this government needs to consider some of the implications of what is happening in this province.

I'd like to deal with employment regulation in the workplace because it's like taxation; it's a question of balance. If you have too much it can be more damaging than any of the benefits. I also have to wonder if we're achieving our objectives. If you apply this test to workplace regulation in Ontario today, there's no question in my mind that we're headed in the wrong direction.

We all agree there's a need for regulation in principle, but in recent years we have had far too much new government regulation. I don't have to remind you what's been happening in recent years. You take a look at the Bill 40 debate; you take a look at the Ontario health and safety bill; it's part of this huge network and in each case that legislation was passed with a view to achieving a desired social, economic and even political objective. In each case, unfortunately, some of this legislation has been amended to a greater extent with a view to expanding its scope and its impact, and we've seen that at the WCB. We see the scope; we see the impact change.

The two concerns I have about all this legislation are, number one, the cost. There is a cost to business; there is a cost to the government -- and Mr Mahoney has pointed out the cost to the government -- there is a cost to our economy and there's a cost to society. There are direct costs and there are compliance costs.

The second question and the concern I have is, is it working? In the case of anti-discrimination legislation, we know it's needed and certainly we can't debate the value because it is absolutely necessary, but whenever you apply legislation to the marketplace there's always a tradeoff.

We need to recognize, first of all, that it does increase the cost of doing business. We know that the contentious Bill 40 has been a barrier to private sector investment from outside the province. We also know now there are people in this province who tell us, because of the new implications of the workplace health and safety, they'll never have 10 employees. I'm hearing from people that because of employment equity, "My workforce will never get past 49."

Those are jobs that are never going to be created because there are going to be higher business costs and, as a result, we have to take a look at the impact of this type of legislation on our economy, particularly today when we've got this increasingly competitive global economic environment. As I pointed out to you in the introduction, we know that new investment just is not coming to Ontario.

Ultimately, then, the tradeoff for this legislation is fewer jobs. I know people don't want to hear that, but you know, it's the truth, it's a fact, because the cost of private sector compliance increases the cost of doing business. Have you ever taken a look at the paper burden that small business is facing at the present time? It's totally unbelievable. Higher costs mean fewer jobs, and therefore this excessive regulation we've got in this province today really is contributing to excessive unemployment.

For example, when we introduced Bill 40, we never had an independent impact analysis conducted. I believe if any government introduces new legislation, you need to take a look at the impact and you need to make that information available up front so that everybody knows what's going to result. As a result, we had a very contentious bill that created a tremendous amount of hardship.

You take a look at the pay equity legislation that was introduced in 1987. Again, there was no cost-benefit analysis that was ever done prior to 1987, nor to my knowledge has the government done any analysis since. We do know that the cost of compliance included hundreds of millions of dollars for consultants.

That is money employers were not able to make available to their employees. They weren't able to increase the wages of the working women. In fact, in some cases they had to let employees go because they were forced to pay other people more money. In some cases, they ended up paying more for the consultant than they did in the way of pay equity. An example is that a Falconbridge executive told us that Kidd Creek Mines spent $216,000 to identify pay equity adjustments of just $215,000 company-wide.

So pay equity didn't necessarily increase the wages of working women, nor did it increase job opportunities. It actually contributed to the loss of some jobs for working women.

In a similar vein, we know that you want to hike the minimum wage. You've not done a cost-benefit analysis. According to the University of Toronto study, if you raise the minimum wage to 60% of the average industrial wage, it's going to cost some 53,000 jobs, or 1% of the labour force.

If I talk to employers across this province about the minimum wage increase, this is what they tell me: They tell me that if they have to increase the minimum wage, they're going to have to reduce the number of their employees; for example, from 10 to 8 because they don't have the dollars. We now have young people in college, university and high school who can't get part-time jobs. Also, if you eliminate the wage gap between the student and the adult, students will never get jobs at a time when they're struggling more than ever before and need the money. So you are eliminating some of the job opportunities by the very rules and regulations and legislation that you are introducing.

To me, I think what you need to do is to start to study the issue first and then you need to start using the findings to develop alternatives. That is not happening at the present time.

I'll give you an example of what they've done in the United States. The 1992 economic report of the President puts the compliance cost of worker safety standards at $100 million for each life saved. I don't think any one of us ever wants to put an employee in jeopardy, but I don't believe we've ever done an analysis in Ontario as far as our occupational health and safety standards are concerned, and I think we do have a responsibility to determine here, as in all the other areas, the extent and the nature of the compliance costs. We have an obligation to use the information to reduce the regulations and to reduce the costs when they don't contribute to worker safety, and there are things we could be doing differently that would not detract from that.

Right now, Ontario's workplace regulation is among the most onerous in the developed world. It's made us a much less attractive jurisdiction for investment and reinvestment and yet we have absolutely no handle on the cost of compliance. It's sad because it is the working men and women in this province who are really paying the price.

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Even sadder still is the fact that some of these laws are not working. They're simply not working. If you take a look at the proposed employment equity legislation, it can well mean that it will drive business and private sector investment out of this province. It could well mean fewer jobs, which means that here's a bill intended to help the four designated groups, but it could mean less job opportunity in the future.

I think it's time we put all of this government regulation to a competitive test. We need to get a handle on the compliance costs. What we need to do is quantify the tradeoffs, identify the compliance cost and test the legislative and other remedies on the basis of performance, because if we do that we are going to have more safety, we're going to have more fairness and we're going to have equity in the workplace. Furthermore, we're going to have more workplaces. If we have more workplaces, we're going to have more jobs and we're going to have more opportunities for people in this province.

I suggest that this is the direction this government needs to go in. I hope they will take a look at what I've suggested because I believe it will have a positive impact on employers and employees alike, and that it will contribute to a more safe and secure workplace environment if we take a look at that regulatory framework and put it to the competitive test.

Because I know the time is short and I don't have an opportunity to get all the information I want today, I'm going to put my questions to you and I will table them. I hope that if we have time you can give me responses, but if not, I hope those responses will be provided to me.

I want to deal with the wage protection program because that was the area the minister spoke to. Since that program was introduced, I've had quite a few individuals write or phone me regarding cases where they've experienced a very lengthy delay in the processing of claims. I think on two occasions this spring I raised this matter in the Legislature. When I made inquiries, I was told it was not unusual for cases to take one year to 18 months to be processed and paid. The deputy minister reassured me that these cases were isolated examples and also indicated that there was a problem in the Kitchener-Waterloo area.

However, my questions are these: What at the present time is the average time it takes to process claims? Why do we continue to receive complaints that ministry officials are telling people it will take one year or more to process claims?

I have a letter attached here from a Mr Dan Boettger in Waterloo who writes to me, "When I brought this matter before the Ministry of Labour, I was told it would be better if I could get things cleared up on my own since they have a 12-month backlog." He writes, "I find this totally unacceptable from an organization that was designed to protect the employees' rights."

Also, I'd like to know how many claims have been submitted. How many claims have been processed? How much money has been paid out? How much will it cost to pay all of the outstanding claims? Finally, how much is the average amount of claim and the average amount of award? This is an area I am extremely concerned about. I've had a lot of employees who have suffered loss of jobs and then unfortunately been put in a position where they haven't been able to access the money they feel was owed to them, and it certainly created some hardships for themselves and also for their families. I'd appreciate some responses to those.

In the area of workers' compensation, I had written to the Treasurer asking him what is happening with the social contract savings. I've not had a response. I'd like to know when a decision is going to be made. I'd like to know why the government is even considering taking this money and what its justification might be for this hidden tax on the employer community.

The Treasurer, by the way, has indicated to the municipal utilities that they can keep their social contract savings. However, as I say, I don't believe that I've ever received a response to my letter to him asking him the status of the social contract savings that were achieved by the WCB.

I'd like to take a look at the area of the Workplace Health and Safety Agency. I think we all know that this issue of health and safety certification is a very contentious issue. It is causing grave concerns for the business community. They are very concerned because there is a perception that some very unfair decisions are being made by the Workplace Health and Safety Agency.

As I indicated to you today, the management co-chair, Mr McMurdo, does not have the confidence of the business community and it is most concerned. They see him as a puppet of the labour community and they are looking for the minister to certainly consider other candidates for this position. That's a very serious concern.

This is an agency that has a very difficult task and obviously it's critical that there be confidence on both sides. I hope that you will give this very serious consideration. I can tell you that this is an issue I've been receiving letters and phone calls on for a long time now. It's one that I've hesitated to get involved in because I hoped that the ministry could resolve this issue to the satisfaction of the business community, but that appears not to have happened.

I had a question in the House today and it regarded the fact that this questionnaire had been sent out and we had an arbitrary time line for a response of September 30, 1993. As you know, there are grave concerns because the business community feels there are some unanswered questions. They're very concerned, because as a result of how they respond to the questionnaire, it's going to have an impact on the length and cost of training.

What they're trying to do is make some written submissions, get some answers to their questions from the WHSA. Why are the employers being forced to meet what they perceive to be this unreasonable deadline, and also, will you undertake to put a hold on the certification process until the outstanding questions of the business community have been worked out in cooperation with all the parties? If this agency is to have success, we need to really be assured that all the partners have their questions answered.

In looking forward at this agency, we know there have been some replacements of the members on the board. One concern the business people have is the fact that most of the new representatives represent big business. That is one of the issues that I think the Ministry of Labour needs to be concerned about. Much of the legislation and many of the happenings in this province involve the big business community. There seems to be a lack of recognition that small business is increasingly playing a very important part in this province and yet it doesn't seem to have adequate input into the decision-making or into the commissions or into the agencies. They seem to be underrepresented.

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If you take a look at the Premier's committee on workers' compensation, again you will see that it is dominated by big business. So the small and medium business sectors in this province feel very, very unrepresented in the decision-making. I think this ministry needs to deal with that issue, how you make those people feel part of the process, because they certainly feel that their needs and concerns are being neglected at the present time.

I think a good example of that is the Workplace Health and Safety Agency. They do not believe that the program that has been set up responds to the needs of the small business community and the fact that they have a very low-hazard workplace. What they believe to be happening is that the criteria that are to be used are biased in assuming that all workplaces should be required to provide the highest possible number of hours for training candidates. At present, as I say, they feel that their needs are being totally neglected.

The other thing they are very concerned about is the cost that is going to be incurred, because they all have to participate in the same program whether or not it is a low-hazard workplace or a high-hazard workplace. They are really wondering why you aren't using methods that would be more appropriate for 1993 as far as education is concerned; for example, taking a look at long-distance education. Instead of forcing the employer community to pay the costs of transportation and accommodation and sending all of these individuals to a centralized location, why are you not making it available through TVO, videos? It would be less costly. Why are you not doing some of it onsite? There doesn't seem to have been any response to the needs and also the need to reduce cost at the present time. I hope you will give some consideration to that.

I'm going to conclude by reading a letter. I think it summarizes very well the displeasure and the disappointment that people in the business community have regarding the content of the certification program and the manner in which it's to be presented. It is written to Mr McMurdo and Mr Forder -- a copy did go to the minister -- and it is from Mr Mann at Placer Dome Inc.

He writes: "I watched two videos which were blatantly anti-business, anti-management and clearly pro-union. It was patently evident that the intent of the videos was to present management with little or no values, little or no concern for their employees, little or no regard for safety and health issues and who viewed management-employee relations in a reactive, confrontational manner."

Then he went on to say that the methods used are of concern because "little regard has been given to proven principles of adult education, and there are few opportunities for participation and discussion by the trainees."

He is most concerned and he says, "I urge you to seriously examine the direction the WHSA has taken in this manner. It is imperative that management and labour work together in today's very competitive global economy for jobs to be created, wealth to be generated for all Canadians and existing jobs maintained. The program does not reflect the philosophy and practice of the vast majority of the mining industry in Ontario but presents a tone that is divisive, confrontational and likely to give rise to suspicion, discontent and acrimony.

"This is not the purpose or mandate of the WHSA and this is not why the WHSA was established. These will be the results, however, unless you shift your approach to recognize that the WHSA is both the servant of management and labour, that safety and health is the joint concern of all the parties in the workplace and that problems can best be solved by the parties working proactively together."

These are the concerns I think that reflect -- in fact I know they reflect very well, because they've been expressed by other people. I would hope the ministry can address them. I think the most serious issue you have right now is resolving the problems of the Workplace Health and Safety Agency, and I hope I will get a written response to the concerns I've raised.

Hon Mr Mackenzie: The deputy has some responses. I have a few that are a little more generic, I guess. These are not necessarily in the order in which they were raised by you, Ms Witmer.

The hundreds of millions, the figure you quoted that we have spent on consultants in terms of the pay equity process --

Mrs Witmer: I didn't say you; I said the employer community.

Hon Mr Mackenzie: Certainly the inference is that somehow or other we're spending hundreds of millions on a program that I think is beginning to work. We've gone from 63% in the last few years, for full-time women at least, to 70% of men's wages. I would like to have seen it a lot further and a lot more, but I think it's an indication at least that the program is starting to work.

In terms of what we're doing and how we want to train workers in the province of Ontario, once again I may have the wrong impression from your remarks. Are you suggesting, when you say that these programs we're putting in place should not be there, in health and safety, for example, that we should not be proceeding down the program of trained committees and the health and safety investment? That is clearly seen, I can tell you, by both sides as being one of the success stories and one of the approaches we should be taking in terms of workers in the workplace. Should we not be looking for programs that involve workers in the decisions when it comes to productivity in their plants or their ability to compete in world markets? I think we'd be nuts not to go the road that we're going down now.

I have some real difficulties with the premise which, it seems to me, is that we're going to compete, and if we're going to compete it's going to be on the basis of what we can save in the workplace and among our workers. I don't think that's the approach this country wants or is ready to buy. Certainly we would differ there. Maybe that's where there's a really obvious political difference; it's certainly not the approach I want to buy. I think we are going to achieve one heck of a lot more in terms of involving workers in the decisions and building safer and healthier workplaces.

I want to tell you also that I am not one who has said the answer is in yet on some of the results of Bill 40. But I will remind you that I was the target of some of the barbs and billboards and posters and "Wanted" posters in restaurants and what not, which I thought an extremely negative and unfair campaign around this province. The evidence to date is that the bill is working. We are seeing a faster turnaround time. We are getting as many comments from business, I can tell you, about less cost and faster solving of some problems as we are from the labour movement.

There is nothing to indicate the charge that was there, simply, "You are going to destroy investment in the province of Ontario." I can tell you that's not what we're seeing so far in terms of the legislation. As a matter of fact, I think it's adding to what is an improvement over the last short period of time in investment in the province of Ontario.

There were two other very useful documents at the Premier's Council that I'll make a point of seeing you get that will give you some indication of what's happening in that particular field.

I had one other point that has left my mind at the moment. I may get back to it, but I'll turn it over for a moment to the deputy minister.

Mr Mahoney: Did they spell your name right and use a current picture?

Hon Mr Mackenzie: Yes, they spelled my name right and they used a current picture.

Mr Mahoney: We should be so famous.

Mr Thomas: I'll try to respond to the questions; I don't think I have answers for all of them, but the ones I do have. Can we get back to you, Ms Witmer, on the others?

On the wage protection program, the average time to process a wage protection claim: We do all of our employment standards claims together, so one employment standards officer will be doing not just wage protection claims but other kinds of employment claims, so we only have statistics that deal with: What is the backlog of wage protection work remaining to be done? How long is it taking from the time the claim comes in till it gets processed?

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At the end of August, we had the turnaround time reduced to 157 days. When I say reduced, it had reached a high in February 1992, a year and a half ago, of 191 days. We're talking something like five and a half months, and we think we'll be able to continue to make progress in bringing that down, not because we're adding more people but because we think we'll be able to find more effective ways of doing employment standards work. We've been doing a lot of things like self-help kits and people getting together and having their own mediation, if you will, to try to cut that down.

As to the question of why we continue to receive complaints that it takes a year or more, I think it's fair to say that the problem in the Kitchener-Waterloo area is still a problem and we're still trying to find ways to deal with that. Therefore, it would not surprise me if there would be some complaints continuing to come in about a year or more, but I still stand by the figure that we're in the range of five and a half to six months on average.

In terms of how many claims submitted, I think the minister gave that figure in his opening comments. It was $113 million paid out since the program began in October 1991. That's been paid out to 48,000 workers since the program started up in October 1991.

Hon Mr Mackenzie: As I asked for an update on that, I understand those were the figures as of yesterday. Those figures, to the best of my knowledge, are right up to date.

Mr Thomas: On the still to be paid out, I don't know that I can answer that, because the program is an ongoing program and we continue to receive employment wage protection program claims. That might be a difficult one to get. I think the average amount of the claim is something in the order of $3,500. I'll confirm that, but that's just for your information at this point. Subject to confirmation, I think it's in the range of $3,500.

The Workers' Compensation Board social contract savings: The Treasurer has indicated to us and has notified the chair of the Workers' Compensation Board that the social contract savings can be applied to the WCB's unfunded liability. It is not being claimed back, if you will, by government, is the answer to that question. That's a recent event I think, as of the beginning of this week.

On the Workplace Health and Safety Agency, I continue to be very close to this issue, perhaps closer to it than I sometimes wish to be, but I gather not as close as some would like me to be. My sense of this is that, first of all, the composition of the board at the Workplace Health and Safety Agency substantially came from recommendations from the management advisory committee. They are the ones who came up with the nominees, who were substantially large business. There has been the appointment of a small business individual.

Mrs Witmer: Is that the Canadian Tire rep?

Mr Thomas: Yes. Mr Reeves, I think it is, from Barrie, and the agency recently announced the formation of the small business committee of the board.

I take your point that we've got to do a lot more work in thinking about how we can better represent small business's interests, because small business does represent a very substantial percentage of the employer stakeholders. That continues to be an ongoing challenge, as Mr Mahoney's question about how we capture the interests of unorganized workers continues to be an ongoing challenge.

As to the questions you raise around why employers are being forced to meet deadlines and the questionnaire and all of that, I think I have to respond reasonably directly with a worry. A lot of us spent a lot of time earlier this year putting the Workplace Health and Safety Agency's employer board back together again, if you will, and we have, again, an extraordinarily high-calibre board. We've got senior people from companies who have been on boards of directors of other organizations, and I think the real challenge is not so much whether Mr McMurdo gets replaced; I think the real challenge is, can the employer side get a structure in place that allows it to be as effective as the organized labour side?

If they don't do that, replacing McMurdo with somebody else doesn't move the yardsticks an inch. It simply means that we're going to continue to get requests from you, from employers, from everyone, saying: "Intervene. Don't make them do the deadlines. Put a hold on certification." Do these kinds of things that sound as though somehow we've created a board that has unequal numbers of people on it. I mean, that's the appearance that I get when I get the mail, when I hear the complaints from the employers' side.

They've got to find a way. I've had some discussions with people on the employer caucus, and I will continue to have those over the next few weeks, about how they can put in place a structure, an organization, on their side that allows these kinds of things that are driving them crazy to stop happening. So I think it's not a question of McMurdo or not; I think it's a question of the right structure or not.

The certification training that is happening is working extraordinarily well, as judged by the responses from people who have been through the course. I was just checking with the agency today. They say something in the order of 500-plus people, management and workers, have gone through the various training programs. They're really up and running now. It's not just the worker centre doing it; it's the IAPA. They're expecting 200 and 300 people a week will be trained from now on, and maybe more. And when they've gone to the graduation ceremonies, and some of my staff in fact have gone to the graduation ceremonies, their view is that both sides are extraordinarily pleased with the training they've gotten.

Mrs Witmer: Are they large workplaces, though? Are they, you know, from the manufacturing --

Mr Thomas: I would think that most of them would be at this point, yes. So it isn't tested, if you will.

Mrs Witmer: That's right.

Mr Thomas: That response that I'm giving you is not tested perhaps yet on the small business part of it, and of course there are some real questions about whether small business can have a bit more time to be part of it.

If I can come back to your general set of questions around the agency, and you preface them that McMurdo has lost the confidence of the employer community, I have to say that my very close-in working with it suggests that to simply replace McMurdo is to not solve the problem. To solve the problem we have to figure out a way to make bipartism work, in which the business side, the employer side, is as effective as the organized labour side. I think there are some ways to do that, and we're working on trying to make that happen.

Your comments about more effective ways to do the training are really appropriate comments. I know the agency has looked at, for example, whether there are ways to get more health and safety training through other means, whether it be OTAB or part of a curriculum in a school. I mean, why do we have to wait till someone has been in the job for 10 years or come out of school before he gets training in health and safety for the first time? There's been nothing substantially done there yet, but I just want you to know that people are having the kinds of conversations that you would want them to have around more cost-effective and different ways to do health and safety training.

I think I've answered most of your questions.

Hon Mr Mackenzie: I think there's one point that can be a little controversial but also has to be put on record in terms of the bipartite approach that's being tried here, and nobody has forsaken it yet, although it went through, as I say, a bumpy first year.

If people are going to feel or want to feel a part of the process -- because a lot of decisions were made and then not followed through on that would have thrown the schedule all to hell in a handbasket earlier on at the agency level -- they've got to be part of the process. At the moment I think there's a relatively good board there now. How much that can be broadened or widened or whether it can include other people, one of the things that has to be clearly understood there is that if it's going to be changed, they've got to be part of the process, not just feel part of it.

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Mr Thomas: Could I also make one final point? You didn't raise it, but I think it's important to make the observation that I can say to you that the agency's board has been trying to come to grips with coming up with the recommendation for a neutral part-time chair. That's been a matter of ongoing concern that I know both of you have expressed to me through people who have come and talked to you about it, and I believe that we are getting a recommendation from the board for a neutral chair. What we do with it remains to be seen, but I should say to you that I think that is not something that has fallen through the cracks.

The Chair: Has the minister completed his responses?

Hon Mr Mackenzie: At the moment.

The Chair: Do we have any follow-up ones from Mr Mahoney?

Mr Thomas: Can I just come back to your one other point?

The Chair: It's not that we come back. The half-hour allotted to the minister and the deputy are to respond to anything they wish that flowed from the deputations of both the official opposition and the PC critics. So if you were just responding to Mrs Witmer or --

Mr Thomas: Mrs Witmer.

Mr Mahoney: Or they could answer that last question that really wasn't answered when I was finished.

Mr Thomas: I've forgotten what it was.

Mr Mahoney: I'll tell you.

Mr Thomas: Mrs Witmer, on your opening comments around, "Why do we regulate so much?" I think what's behind that question is something we are looking at in the Ministry of Labour in strategic planning in one respect, not so much as to whether we should be passing more or less legislation, but we aren't able to do the kind of job that I would like us to do in enforcing employment standards legislation. There's a real challenge to us about how we do that.

There are a lot of people out there who are not getting the workplace terms and conditions of employment that we say they ought to be getting in law and we're not able to police that, to enforce that. We'll probably never be able to do a complete job on that because of how many people are out there. Two thirds of the workforce is unorganized, and that's millions of people out there who are difficult to get to. That's a challenge, and we're asking questions around how we can do a better job on that.

I think I have to come back and give you an example of an interesting area where we're not exactly sure how your concerns would be captured, and that's in the area of domestics and home workers. These are people who are extraordinarily vulnerable, very often immigrants, very often have limited language skills in English and certainly don't know what their rights are. If they did know what their rights were, it wouldn't make a lot of difference because they wouldn't know what to do about them.

What do we do with that industry? It is a growth industry because it also has, on the other hand, the attractiveness of being an industry that people can do at home and so it has a flexibility to it. People are crying out for us to pass regulations and laws that would protect home workers, and I guess the question that comes to my mind when I hear what you are saying is, so what do we do with those people? Do we say, "We've just got enough laws on the books"?

How do we handle ongoing situations in which people are saying, "My rights are not being protected"? Do we simply say, "We have enough laws now and we can't handle the ones we've got," or do we try in some ways to respond and hopefully find some innovative ways to enforce?

What's implicit in what you're saying is that we sort of have enough laws and we've got to stop and try to figure out how to make what we've got more competitive. I don't think that we have in every sense the greatest set of rights in the workplace. I go to meetings for deputies of labour across the country, and certainly I would say that we may be the only jurisdiction doing something in here, but over there we're not. Someone else has gone further on home workers and vice versa. So I would say we're probably in the top third, but I would not say that we are way out in front in every single area.

Mrs Witmer: When you're talking about that, the question I did ask that you didn't answer and perhaps you can't answer is, you're aware of the fact, as am I, that we are seeing a growing trend towards self-employment. People are working out of their homes. Instead of having three employees somewhere, they're simply working at home. Also, we're seeing a trend towards part-time work.

The question has been raised: Is all of this legislation that's being introduced, all of this government red tape -- you've got your OHIP payments too that employers are forced to pay on behalf of employees; it's red tape -- really becoming a disincentive to the creation of or the continuation of full-time jobs? I think that's a very serious concern for people in this province and that's why I say I think we really have to take a look at the impact of the legislation. Perhaps it's having a more negative impact on job creation and retention of jobs than it should.

Mr Thomas: Yes. I guess what we're debating here -- I think it's a healthy debate -- is the tension point between how many more regulations do we need versus, when you do more regulations, what effect does that have on the competitive edge? I think that's a fair issue.

Hon Mr Mackenzie: I think there are also some real questions in terms of the home work issue. For professionals, for some people, being able to work out of the home is a real advantage.

Mrs Witmer: It's great.

Hon Mr Mackenzie: They want it and they can be as efficient and effective that way and the companies they're dealing with, the firms, are willing to accept that.

But we also have a real problem that surfaces more in the Toronto area than in any other area of the province: new citizens, immigrants, people who can't speak English well. So far it's centred -- but we're now seeing it in Pizza Pizza and other operations -- on the garment workers' trade, where they have to buy the machine themselves -- I'm talking about sewers, basically; it's about $3,000 they've got invested and that's their cost from this point on -- and get orders or are given a number of garments that they're to finish the sewing process on.

They are not covered under the hours of work, overtime or vacations and are very fearful of phoning in when they feel they're not getting the proper treatment. They can sew up or produce -- we've had a number of them into the office talking to us in recent days -- 75 garments and then be paid only for 50. There's really no way of checking it unless we have a beefed-up employment standards staff and can get them to start raising the issues with us.

There's no way of enforcing them. Are they entitled to a different minimum wage or something to take on the costs of the machines they're using? What do we do to allow us to be able to enforce for one of the most vulnerable groups in our society today?

You don't have to go far with the women's groups, the intercede groups, some of the church groups, to realize that there is a real concern and a real problem here. That immediately raises issues also in terms of how involved we want to get and what it means to our employment standards staff.

One of the questions I ask at almost every briefing we have with the ministry people is, what's our current time frame on employment standards?

We saw quite a jump, even though we added staff when the wage protection program went in. We're now starting to bring that down substantially. As Jim says, we're about five and a half months and we think we can get it down considerably below that.

But if we opened up and decided to take on as well an area where people really are -- I'm not talking about those who want it and those companies where it's beneficial -- being exploited; there are certainly examples of it.

We would probably have to have a considerable increase in our employment standards staff. You've got to make some hard choices on what you're going to do and what you spend and how you're going to decide where you can or where you can't protect people.

Mrs Witmer: I guess our member for Wellington made the comment yesterday that instead of bringing forward Bill 80, which certainly isn't a priority for these particular women, you did make a commitment to these women that you would bring in some legislation. He expressed his concern and disappointment that this had not occurred, because he does see that as more important than this Bill 80 we're dealing with at the present time.

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Hon Mr Mackenzie: Bill 80, of course, as you also know, was part of the whole Bill 40 package, and I think you'll find as the process goes on that there are an awful lot of people who are interested in it as well as those who aren't.

Mrs Witmer: Yes. It's also created tremendous division.

Mr Mahoney: Could I ask for clarification of a comment the minister made, just regarding the comment about Pizza Pizza? Has your ministry been involved in some way in the dispute?

Mr Gilles Bisson (Cochrane South): Every second night.

Mr Mahoney: Every second night. Double cheese, pepperoni?

Hon Mr Mackenzie: No, I'm simply saying that's just another example where we have really seen most of the home work, in the garment workers' trade, but it's obvious that there are a number of trades -- marketing and phoning as well as the work of the sewers in the garment trade -- that are now entering into home work rather than operating out of some location.

The Chair: If there are no further comments from the minister, that completes the first round in accordance with our standing orders.

I must take my direction from the committee. On the first point, do you wish to have the votes stacked till the completion of estimates, which will allow the members to move freely among each of the six ballot items?

Secondly, would you like to go in rotation or would you like to just have the dialogue, which it appears the minister is comfortable with and has been doing for the last 15 minutes, which is his right to do? I'm in your hands.

Mrs Witmer: How much time do we have left?

The Chair: You have three hours and 15 minutes, but that's just off the top of my head.

Mrs Witmer: Are we going till 6 o'clock tonight?

The Chair: We can.

Hon Mr Mackenzie: I think that's what's scheduled, at least what we were told, but it's entirely up to you.

The Chair: We cannot continue past the hour of 6.

Mr Bisson: I would really stack the votes. It makes sense.

The Chair: Okay.

Mr Bisson: If the rest of the committee wants to just basically rotate around --

Mr Mahoney: Do you have a copy of the ballot items?

The Chair: In the estimates book. The clerk will get you a copy. Do you want to do rotations? Then with 40 minutes remaining before the adjournment period, why don't we do --

Hon Mr Mackenzie: I understand there may be a vote tonight too, which may cut into it by a few minutes, unless that's changed.

Mrs Witmer: I guess that's what I was talking about.

The Chair: Let's do 10-minute rotations and see how far we get. Mr Mahoney, we can start with you.

Mr Mahoney: Just to follow up on some of the issues with the health and safety agency, the deputy talked about how replacing the business representative wouldn't necessarily resolve the problem. I certainly wouldn't want to make this any kind of a personal attack on him, because I think he's a decent individual, but clearly he doesn't have the confidence of the business community. That's what we're hearing. Example: the letter that was done that was sent out throughout the province. All of a sudden everybody got upset about the letter and the tone of the letter, so the letter was -- I have this here.

The Chair: I'll find you the actual votes.

Mr Mahoney: No, it's okay, I'll find them. But the letter was redone -- I thought they might have been printed separately, Mr Chair, that's all. So the letter was redone or they backed off that position.

I hear that these videos Mrs Witmer referred to just outraged people, and there are some 20 or 21 of them that have been done and they're looking at redoing them. There's just daily -- I mean, it doesn't go away. We stand up and ask questions in the Legislature and we get the standard answer for the standard question, but it doesn't go away.

The fact that graduates are coming out of a training process with some sense of accomplishment really doesn't surprise me. You put someone in industry through a training program on something that's of interest and value to them in their everyday life and of course they're going to come out, I would think, with positive comments.

I don't think the problem is Bill 208. I don't think the problem is the concept. We all agree, business agrees today, and this is where I think I disagree somewhat with the minister's statements earlier, and even the deputy's, that for what I took as the last couple of years, there's been some miraculous improvement in labour relations.

I saw it years ago, many years ago, but even in more recent times, where the business community, whether it's represented by the Canadian Federation of Independent Business or the chamber of commerce and sort of the broad representations or the individual companies -- when I spent a year at the Ministry of Industry, Trade and Technology as a small business advocate, I travelled virtually every week to some part of the province to meet with businesses, and I came away with a really strong feeling that the successful businesses were the ones that recognized that good health and safety saved them money in the end. It cut down on losses that solved the problems and that led to high morale. It did all those things.

I chaired a small committee for Minister Kwinter at the time on Bill 208 to get some changes, to put in the independent, hopefully non-partisan chair and do some other things. The committee was made up of industry representatives, whether it was from the retail sector -- and there are some who just won't accept it.

When you get criticisms of the health and safety issue, particularly from the party that delivered Bill 208 to the province, then I think those criticisms are founded more on the fact -- not on the issue of health and safety training; some of them are on the methodology, the fact that there appears to be a strong leaning towards the training taking place in the union halls or with the predominance of a union slant, and the video seems to indicate that.

I think what's happened with Bob McMurdo is that he's been put into an advocate's position with a whole bunch of really strong advocates for the other side. I wonder if bipartisanship works at all in an agency like this and if we shouldn't look at complete non-partisanship. That may be impossible, but I would hope it would be the minister's view that Odoardo Di Santo administers the Workers' Compensation Board in a non-partisan way. He may be a partisan appointment of the Premier, and Brian King may be a partisan appointment of the Premier, but you would hope they would be attempting to administer it in a non-partisan way. I have real concerns about the bipartisan approach that seems to sort of be the buzzword of the day.

Your point, I think, Deputy, about business generally not being as well organized on a broad scale just is a reality of life and I don't know that we're ever going to change that. I have real concerns about the effectiveness and the fact that we may find ourselves, over however many years in the future, always having these kinds of fights, having people quit subcommittees and walk out in anger because somebody's predominant in a particular area.

Just comments: I don't know if you want to react to them or if you have any comments, but I guess my question would be, you say you're going to put in a part-time, independent chair. I understood Vic Pathe was originally a full-time chair. Now, am I wrong in that?

Mr Thomas: He was part-time.

Mr Mahoney: He was part-time; okay. So the chair of that has always been envisioned as a part-time job. I would urge you to get on with appointing that chair and to reviewing very carefully the appointments, which I understand are coming up in the very near future, of both the labour representative and the management representative. I don't say that as a personal slap at either one of them -- I somewhat facetiously referred to them as Batman and Robin -- they're dedicated, hardworking people. I don't think there's --

Mr Bisson: Who's Batman and who's Robin?

Mr Mahoney: Batman is labour; trust me. Robin just does what Batman tells him. The fact that we take a good idea that business and labour have come to support and we put a sense of partisanship in there at all in my view may be the ultimate problem. Maybe we've got to find a way to get rid of the partisanship on either side and put an independent individual in there. They are available. They are around. Not everybody carries a card for one of our parties, thank goodness --

Mrs Witmer: I certainly don't.

Mr Mahoney: -- and get them to do it in a non-partisan way.

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Mr Thomas: I'm reasonably optimistic that business could do a lot of things on its side that would redress the imbalance. I get back to the point that Ms Witmer made, for example, the questionnaire and the concerns around a questionnaire going out. I would have thought that these are all big people, that these are all grown-ups, and that these are all people who ought to have the capacity to figure out a way to establish a leash between the vice-chair of the employers' side and the employer caucus.

This is not rocket science; this is a fairly straightforward question of how you put in place a process that makes sure that before questionnaires and things like that go out, the employer caucus is satisfied that those are the kinds of things its constituency would want to see go out.

Mr Mahoney: But the fact that there have been some mergers in some of the agencies that deliver the training and some people are sort of losing ground in that area -- clearly there's no consensus being developed, and in fact the management side on those committees feel it's not being listened to at all.

Now it's fine, as I said before, for me to ask a question in the House, for the minister to stand up, and then there's the politics of it. The reality of it is that you've got an awful lot of unhappiness within the governance structure of the health and safety agency. The letter that Ms Witmer read is not someone, as I understand it, who's part of that governance but is simply an independent voice from business expressing those concerns. I think you're setting up a structure that is doomed to be in a quagmire on a consistent basis.

Mr Thomas: The structure is Bill 208. The structure is business and labour, and the person in the middle is supposed to be a helper, is supposed to be someone who will facilitate the board being able to work properly. So the structure is the structure in --

Mr Mahoney: But the structure calls for a strong independent chair, and you haven't had that. That was clearly one of the main concerns that was expressed by business during the debate on Bill 208, and it was a change that was made not without some blood on the floor. So if the two co-chairs are going to be left to their own devices on this thing, with partisanship in either one of their interests, I think you've really got a problem and maybe putting in an independent chair will help.

Have I got a little bit of time left?

The Chair: A minute and a half.

Mr Mahoney: Let me ask another question. I understand that Management Board is currently involved in a process of accepting tenders for relocation of 170,000 square feet of Ministry of Labour office space.

I want a couple of things. I want some assurance that you're not moving into the Workers' Compensation Board building, number one. I want some assurance that there will be some form of public discussion about the tenders. I understand you're going down in mid-October, which is almost where we are, to a short list of five bidders from a long list of 38 or 37 that were originally considered in the proposal. I'd like to know why the current landlord isn't coming back and negotiating. I can't understand why a landlord would allow a tenant like the Ministry of Labour to just wander off into the night to another building. It just doesn't make any sense to me. So I'd like some answers on some of that stuff, before the decision.

The Chair: Deputy, please.

Hon Mr Mackenzie: The deputy can take the last one. I want to make a very quick comment on the opening comments that you made as to whether or not this attempt to reach a more cooperative approach was just a recent situation or something that's been going on, as you indicate, for a lot longer.

I don't think there's any question that there's been an effort to change some things. Part of what we're doing, including the health and safety agency and the bipartite approach, is a result of some real successes in the mining industry over the last few years in changing what was never a very friendly relationship in earlier days there, but where the two parties are working together and have made some of the ground-breaking progress in terms of health and safety.

But generally speaking, the perception that things have got to change, I think, on a broader scale is much more recent. The best example, once again, I can give you of that is the experience at Stelco, from both sides, over the last couple of years.

Mr Thomas: We aren't planning on moving into Simcoe Place.

Mr Mahoney: You are not?

Mr Thomas: We are not.

Mr Mahoney: It's too expensive. We couldn't afford the rent.

The Chair: Peter Inokai is here from the ministry.

Mr Peter Inokai: My name is Peter Inokai and I'm the acting director of finance in the administrative services branch. In response to the question concerning the tender on head office relocation, you're right, there is a tender out and it will be short-listed following October 21.

I'd like to inform you that initially the landlord was not interested in having the Ministry of Labour stay as a tenant in the building because of the confusing circumstances around the Windsor relocation and their own plans for the use of the building. However, we have been advised by the landlord that they are interested and we have received a proposal from them. We will be studying that proposal together with Management Board secretariat, the leasing services agent, and we will be reviewing that before we proceed with the tendering process.

Mrs Witmer: I'm still surprised that there doesn't seem to be recognition. I guess, Mr Thomas, you expressed confidence that the Workplace Health and Safety Agency could continue with the present vice-chair, Mr McMurdo. I have to tell you that if you take a look at the communication we receive on a regular basis, there is tremendous concern throughout the management side about Mr McMurdo and I really believe that as a result, the entire agency is being put in a position where nobody trusts what's being done. They have no confidence in the program and they really see it as a vehicle that is pro-union and anti-business. I think if you're going to make a change, you really do need to take a serious look at putting someone in there who does have the confidence of the management side.

I'd like to ask you about the questionnaires that were distributed. We know there was a September 30 deadline. How many questionnaires had been returned to the agency by September 30?

Mr Thomas: I think it's 5,000.

Mrs Witmer: You think it's 5,000. How many responses do they anticipate are still to come?

Mr Thomas: I don't know. I can find out.

Mrs Witmer: Okay. It's obvious, then, that the majority of businesses in the province have not yet responded. That's a very small number of the whole --

Mr Thomas: I'm not sure what the size of their mailing was, Ms Witmer.

Hon Mr Mackenzie: Just before you leave it, I want to make it clear that my background doesn't come out of the business community, but I think there is a bit of an unfair attack here. There is support there, I can tell you, from the business community as well, in terms of Mr McMurdo. I haven't tried to make any final assessment on that at all as yet, but I think it's also unfair, because there's an obvious effort by some people who had some difficulty after accepting and buying the whole certification process, which resulted in some resignations from the board, and I don't think that battle we had to get over a year ago has ever been fully resolved in some of those people's minds.

Mr Thomas: Perhaps I can try to make my point just one other way. My understanding is that Mr McMurdo was originally recommended by the management advisory committee and that's significant. In other words, we put into the Workplace Health and Safety Agency as an employer/vice-chair the person the employers wanted. My point is simply that to take Mr McMurdo out -- and following on the minister's comments about being a scapegoat -- and putting someone else in and not doing anything else is to repeat it. I am not satisfied that McMurdo was anywhere near as big a problem as the need to think more carefully about the structure.

Mrs Witmer: Just in response to the Minister of Labour, I don't come from a business background either, Minister.

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Hon Mr Mackenzie: I just was raising this because I thought there's some unfairness here in terms of that person.

Mrs Witmer: In fact, I come from a very blue-collar, labour background, so I certainly am quite open to looking at both sides of the issue, and I have to tell you, I often agree with many of the concerns that you express.

I'd like to know what the cost of developing the certification program for the agency was. Do you have any figures?

Mr Thomas: No, I don't. But I can find out.

Mrs Witmer: Yes, I'd appreciate that. I guess as a follow-up question to you, I would ask you: As a result of the fees that are going to be charged for the program, will the agency, or the government or whoever, be making money?

Mr Thomas: What do you mean by that?

Mrs Witmer: Is there going to be profit for the agency? This is the employer community that is going to be paying for the training, and I would be interested whether this is break-even or whether there's some plan to make money off the employers.

Mr Thomas: I don't know how you define "break-even." I'm not trying to be argumentative; I'm just trying to understand the question, because the agency gets money from the Workers' Compensation Board's fund, and the agency will be getting some additional revenue from the certification training. It will be up to the board of directors of the Workplace Health and Safety Agency to decide, if it is generating more revenue, what it will do with it.

For example, you probably know that in our expenditure reduction activities earlier this year we stopped the funding of the agency, about $3 million, for research funding, and that's created some concerns out there in research land from people who have been concerned about having lost their grants. Those would be the kinds of activities that one might hope some of the revenue might end up going to restart. But that again is the kind of decision that I would hope the board would be able to make.

Mrs Witmer: Do you know how the board arrived at the costing?

Mr Thomas: The amount per week? The $525 and whatever the figures are for the one week, two weeks, three weeks?

Mrs Witmer: Yes.

Mr Thomas: No, I don't.

The Chair: Ms Witmer, if you wish to have somebody from the board before the committee, that's a legitimate request if there's sufficient notice and they are able to attend. That's part of the normal requests that can be made of anybody within the ministry, provided they can be here. We are going to be scheduled for tomorrow.

Mrs Witmer: Okay. I guess I would trust that the deputy minister would endeavour to get that information. I'm not saying that someone needs to be here, but I would certainly be interested in receiving that type of information.

Mr Thomas: We'll find that information.

Mrs Witmer: As I say, there's a great deal of interest in the agency at the present time, and I think it's extremely important that some of these issues are resolved. I think, as Mr Mahoney pointed out, it's sometimes very difficult for us to access this type of information. We seem to hear everything via the back door, or somebody sends us a letter or makes a phone call. Sometimes, if some of this information could be shared a little more readily, perhaps there wouldn't be the uncertainty that there is at the present time.

Hon Mr Mackenzie: Ms Witmer, it seems to me -- and this obviously was not adequate -- that there have been requests for information from the board members. I know I personally asked them -- I'm not sure that I have the authority to direct them -- to contact your office and I think Mr Mahoney's office, and I believe they've done that. Now, they may not have covered the things that you wanted, and it may need another visit; I don't know. But I just wanted to make a point that I have tried to get them to respond to some of the questions you've raised with me, and I do believe they did contact you.

Mrs Witmer: Thank you.

Mr Mahoney: For the record, they have been in to see me a couple of times and they get madder and madder every time they come.

Hon Mr Mackenzie: That I can't answer for, but I would just make the point that I have tried to have them there to give you some answers.

Mr Wiseman: Fan the flames.

Hon Mr Mackenzie: I get madder and madder too.

The Chair: In the interests of order, I'd like to recognize Mr Bisson.

Mr Bisson: Thank you very much. I take it there are other members from my caucus who are on the list. I just don't want to take all the time.

The Chair: Yes; Ms Murdock.

Mr Bisson: Thank you. First of all, I guess, being that this is the first time I think I've participated on estimates with the Ministry of Labour here, I just wanted to put on the record the appreciation of some within the community of Ontario for probably some of the most progressive legislation that's been passed in this province in years when it comes to labour relations; namely, Bill 40, Bill 80 and other things that are being worked on. I know there's a strong recognition on the part of the people of my constituency, which is mainly blue collar, of the attempts the minister has made and the government has made in order to address some of the issues of concern that labour has had for a number of years within the province. I think there's a deep appreciation.

Although I must say, to be fair to others, there is also a sense that there's more to be done and that more should have been done and, "We didn't get enough." But I think there is a recognition that we've gone a certain amount of the way.

Now, switching to my other subject, which is the question of the WCB, there is not as much of a concerted message out there on the part of employees, injured workers, employers and every other stakeholder when it comes to the Workers' Compensation Board.

The Workers' Compensation Board is seen, by a lot of people who deal with it, to be an extremely bureaucratic board that is very difficult to deal with. I guess there is this real expectation now in regard to what you've announced as minister in regard to getting the Premier's Council on labour-management to deal with the question of WCB.

People in my community are wondering, and it's not very well known yet, but some of the people who know of the move are saying, "Can we expect, Gilles, any concrete proposals coming forward to government having to do with concrete changes to the act that governs the Workers' Compensation Board to address questions of injured workers, and also addressing some of the concerns of employers?"

Can you maybe tell us where you think this is going to go. I know that you're trying to get them to take a look at it in an unbiased way, but are we really looking at the end of having something to happen with this?

Mr Thomas: The process that has been under way since I think around June, Mr Bisson, has been a very effective process to date. Business and labour have tried to work extremely well on some very, very difficult issues such as the governance of the Workers' Compensation Board, such as how to build in more financial accountability and how to tackle some of the very real problems facing the board: the unfunded liability, the fact that there are a number of workers on low pensions who haven't had those issues addressed. There are a number of important issues on both the employer and the worker side that are being looked at.

There is a strong urge by the Premier I think to bring the matter to a head over the next few weeks, and he would like to see this matter resolved by as close to the end of October as possible. He's obviously hopeful that there'll be consensus recommendations coming forward, and those would obviously be the ones that he would want to act on.

I'm very close to it because I'm chairing a secretariat of people who are putting the materials together for the Premier's labour-management group. I can say that everyone is making a real effort to reach a consensus but I can't tell you whether or not I think it's likely that we will get there. There is every effort being made to do it, but these are very, very difficult issues. They're very complicated, and we're asking business and labour to reach some agreements.

Mr Bisson: To be fair in my statement, I do want to say that I've heard from both sides who are involved in that process that they do feel as if it's moving along. It's gone a heck of a long way over the past, and there is a recognition that it is going somewhere.

What I would want to bring is probably what we hear in every riding across the province of Ontario. There's such an anxiety for something to happen at the WCB that it's very hard to hold it back.

Mr Thomas: Yes.

Mr Bisson: That is the concern.

On the other thing very quickly, and I will pass over to my colleague and leave her about five minutes, I am curious as to the question about the social contract as related to the WCB. There was some discussion a while back about some $10 million being utilized in order to deal with the social contract obligations of the Workers' Compensation Board from the accident fund and transferring that to consolidated revenue. Maybe you just can comment on that.

Mr Thomas: Yes. Just to be very clear on that, there was a legitimate worry in the workers' compensation community up until this week that the money that came out of the social contract savings at the Workers' Compensation Board and other workers' compensation agencies would have to be given over to the consolidated revenue fund. The decision of the Treasurer, which was communicated to the chair of the Workers' Compensation Board this week, is that this is not the case. What is the case is that the $10 million can be kept within the workers' compensation system to help pay down the unfunded liability. It is good news from a workers' compensation perspective.

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Ms Sharon Murdock (Sudbury): My question has more to do with the restructuring process. I'm on the seventh floor of the building, as you know, and we used to share it with occupational disease. The restructuring process which went on right after we got elected was just beginning. It had been discussed briefly, I guess, and booklets had been put out and the committees had been working. One of the restructuring things was that the expertise that had been gathered together on the seventh floor in terms of occupational disease was going to be moved into the regional offices.

I did not like that idea, and the previous deputy and I had many conversations on the subject. He promised me faithfully that there would be a review at the end of a year and that they would monitor the situation in terms of my concern being that we would lose the expertise that had been developed in terms of specialties of occupational disease. I've been busy with workers' comps, as you know, so I haven't been paying much attention to it. I was just wondering where it's at, if it has been monitored and how it's going.

The Chair: What's the latest promise, Deputy?

Mr Thomas: Mary Tate is here from operations.

The Chair: Welcome, Mary. Please introduce yourself by your position in the ministry. Maybe you have some promises for Ms Murdock.

Ms Murdock: It just proves, though, Mr Chair, since you're going to make these pointed comments, that none of our questions is preplanned. Go ahead.

The Chair: Nor does this ministry discriminate with respect to giving answers.

Ms Mary Tate: I'm Mary Tate. I'm the director of the occupational health and safety branch in the operations division of the ministry. I think the answer to your question is twofold. First of all, in terms of the professional and specialized staff in the field areas, all of the field areas have active professional and specialized services sections with a manager who is responsible to ensure that support is available to the front-line officers on an ongoing basis and as it's needed. All of the disciplines are represented in the area offices.

In terms of the main office structure that supports the field, we also have a section of professional and specialized services which has members of all of the disciplines represented, although some of them in the main office do it in conjunction with field delivery jobs as well.

The answer to your question is that the availability of all the disciplines remains and the expertise remains. I would have to say that in the executive compensation plan process some of the very difficult decisions that we had to make did relate to a reduction in the size of the professional staff, but it is our belief that we have maintained that resource at an adequate level to meet the needs of the field delivery.

Ms Murdock: In terms of the last part of what you just said, that means we use a consultancy basis? Is that how we are doing it if the spill or whatever has been in an area where we have no longer got that expertise?

Ms Tate: Each of the areas has expertise in occupational medicine, occupational hygiene and ergonomics. They still have the capacity to do air sampling in every one of the areas, plus we have some expertise, either on a full-time or part-time basis, to coordinate and lead those disciplines in the head office branch.

Ms Murdock: I have no other questions.

The Chair: I have a question from Mr Wiseman.

Mr Wiseman: It's really a quick question to do with the Workers' Compensation Board as well. The biggest claim at workers' compensation, at least from my constituency, is back injuries. I'm just wondering who sets the rules with respect to equipment that has to be worn or should be worn. In some jurisdictions you can't even lift up a toothpick without wearing a special back harness, and yet it doesn't happen here. I'm just wondering who makes the rules and how would a rule like that be brought into effect so that the number of back injuries in various sectors could be reduced.

Mr Thomas: That's a good question. I don't think we have the kinds of rules that you're talking about available. I think that, for example, under the health care regulations, not the phase that we've implemented but the phase that is still waiting to happen, there would be some recommendations around how to handle things like patient lifting. That would be one of the areas where we would be able to minimize the kind of strain on the backs of people who are lifting patients in the health care sector. But we don't have a general set of rules that covers the kinds of concerns you're expressing.

Hon Mr Mackenzie: We didn't proceed in that area in the last round. We did the health care regs that dealt with a number of important items, but essentially non-cost items. One of the areas that is not off the burner but was not proceeded with were the issues of violent patients and lifting, which are the causes of an awful lot of the injuries and two of the reasons why you see some question as to the rates in some of the occupations. That, because of the costs involved, was hived off from the rest of the regs and is now in the process of some discussion with the various ministries to see just exactly what we can or can't do because of the costs involved. There will be a process of setting some kind of standards, but that may be a little piece down the road as yet.

Mr Wiseman: I know that in some industries people are lifting weights that are quite heavy. They're doing it all day long. If a weight lifter were to do that in a gym, he would be wearing a special belt. It just doesn't make any sense that somebody in an industry doing that kind of lifting wouldn't also want to on their own, let alone have somebody else incur the cost.

Mr Bisson: It's not much.

Mr Wiseman: In Florida, you can't lift anything without wearing a special belt. I know that.

The Chair: Any other questions from the governing party?

Mr Bisson: I just want a short question. I was just curious in regard to the hardrock mining policy, if you know where that's at. The Industrial Disease Standards Panel was supposed to be, I think, bringing back to the central board at one point a recommendation on the hardrock mining policy, and it related gold to lung cancer.

Mr Thomas: I don't have an answer. I can undertake to get back to you on that one.

Mr Bisson: No, it's okay. I was just curious.

The Chair: If there are no further questions, then this committee --

Mr Wiseman: We have these resolutions we'd like to pass.

The Chair: Why don't we just rush to challenge the Chair immediately? Could I suggest to committee members that we have two hours and 35 minutes remaining, that we will reconvene on Tuesday, October 12, and that if we start at 4:30, we'll have a full and complete approach by day's end.

Interjection: At 3:30. You're an hour behind.

The Chair: I'm on Pacific standard time. I must be a New York Giants fan or something.

This committee stands adjourned to reconvene on Tuesday, October 12.

The committee adjourned at 1758.