Alberta Labour 2016/17 Annual Report

Alberta Labour released its 2016/17 annual report earlier this year. Here are some highlights that touch on safe, fair and healthy workplaces

Labour Relations
Both Labour Board hearings and certification applications have dropped by 20% or more over the past two years. It will be interesting to see if card-check certification results in a reversal of this trend in organizing.

Despite this decline, wait times for hearings are rising, averaging 66 days (the target is 70). Decision times are also lagging, with only 63% of decisions being rendered in 90 days or less (target is 85%). This is explained as reflecting (in part) the temporary unavailability of adjudicators.

Employment Standards
Complaint numbers held steady this year but there was a significant increase in the number of files closed (addressing a backlog). While the government recovered $4.61 million in unpaid wages, it is unclear what percentage of owed wages this comprises.



Only 49% of ES complaints were completed within 180 days of receipt. The target is 65% and ES has failed to meet the target in each of the last 5 years. This may reflect staffing levels, as there are only 45 ES inspectors and 8 other staff in Alberta, which has a non-union workforce of about 1.8 million.

Over 670 inspections were conducted this year (focusing on youth and temporary foreign workers). This is up significantly from the 108 inspections conducted in 2014/15.

Most inspections uncovered multiple violations about overtime, holiday pay and record keeping. That most inspections found violations is a good indication of widespread non-compliance with the law and suggests additional enforcement is required to deter employers from violating the law.

Occupational Health and Safety
It appears there was about a 40% jump in OHS inspections this past year to 8648 inspections (and 3618 re-inspections). About 1600 of these (re)inspections occurred around the Fort McMurray fire clean-up and rebuilding. Given this, it is unclear if this increase in inspections is permanent or just reflects an one-time bump. It is also unclear what proportion of employers these inspections affected but the usual number is about 2%. 

There were slight increases in prosecutions (13, up 2) and fines ($1.6m, up $100k) and 23 charges were laid. The court put three employers on corporate probation and also sentenced on employer to community service. There were 129 tickets issued for minor violations (54 to employers, 75 to workers). There were also 9 administrative penalties issued to employers.

Give that there were 44,543 disabling injuries reported in 2016, these numbers seem pretty low. Clearly OHS is still trying to soft-sell compliance by writing 7848 compliance orders rather than using sanctions. That employers are consistently found to be violating the Act and Code suggests that this soft approach does not appear to deter violations.

There was an inspection blitz of gas stations and convenience stores. This is likely related to concern over the safety of workers prompted by gas-and-dash deaths and violence-related fatalities. There were 378 (re)inspections between February and May 2016 with 463 orders written.

The ministry is also claiming partial credit for prior inspection blitz in the residential construction sector falls from roofs (from 20 to 9). I’m pretty skeptical of this claim. Most injuries are not reported, construction activity has been off due to the downturn (so there are fewer roofers working), and my (admittedly casual) observations of activity in west Edmonton shows no real change in the incidence of fall protection being used (almost never).

Vulnerable Workers
A joint OHS-employment standards blitz was undertaken focused on vulnerable workers employed by employers previously demonstrating chronic non-compliance (it is a bit hard to tell if this includes the ES and OHS inspections noted above—I expect so). Not surprisingly, the 287 inspections (and 201 re-inspections) yielded 472 compliance orders (mostly addressing hazard assessment, emergency preparedness, first aid and violence). This blitz continues this year. It will be interesting to see if chronic violators experience escalating sanctions.

Injury Rates and Safety Perceptions
The number and rate of lost-time claims continues to decline in Alberta. The (more expansive) disabling injury rate is also declining. That said, we should be cautious of this data. A recent study I’m currently writing up surveyed 2000 Alberta workers about their injury reporting practices and confirmed earlier studies that 69% of disabling injuries are never reported.

The government routinely surveys Albertans about their perceptions. Regarding safety, 90% of Albertans felt their workplaces were safe. It is important to note that this measure has three answers (very safe somewhat safe, and not safe). The two positive answers are combined to get the final result. This answer set certainly raises the question of biasing the results (two positive and one negative) and the government will be dropping this measure in the next business cycle.

Financing and Measurement Changes
Overall, the government spent about $61m on safe, fair and healthy workforce activities ($3m less than budgeted). It looks like about $45.3m of this came from transfers from the Workers’ Compensation Board to offset the entire cost of Occupational Health and Safety programming. There was a $2.4 million increase in the Safe, Fair and Healthy Workplaces budget, most of which was aimed at occupational health and safety (p.12).

An interesting and encouraging pattern in the report is mentioning that the performance measures will change next year. For example, instead of measuring the number of collective agreements that settle without a work stoppage, the government will measures days lost per 1000 employees (p.19). This provides a finer measure and also attributes work stoppage effects to the year in which they occurred, rather than the year in which the agreement settled.

Overall, the quality of the information in the Alberta Labour annual report continues to improve. The performance it records continues to be mixed, with staffing issues (which is basically a matter of funding) negatively affecting the ability of the government to ensure that employers comply with their statutory obligations.

-- Bob Barnetson

Labour & Pop Culture: Working on the highway

This week’s installment of Labour & Pop Culture is “Working on the Highway” by Bruce Springsteen. Originally entitled “Child bride”, the song chronicles the story of a unionized highway worker who… well, turns out to be a pedophile. It is slightly less creepy than that (the technical term is child marriage) but that is basically the gist.

The interesting "work" aspect of the song is that, after going to jail, the worker ends up doing highway work for the warden. Prison labour is a growing phenomenon is the United States. It follows a long tradition of prison operators seeking to recoup the costs of incarceration by leasing prisoners to private companies. You can read a brief synopsis here. If you have ever bought a paint brush, you've likely bought the work of a prisoner.

Often this work is framed as rehabilitative (e.g., teaching skills). In practice, the work prisoners do is rarely skilled. What it does is tire out prisoners and give them some pocket money (usually a pittance) thus making them more manageable. The profits of their labour go to the corporations that operate the jails.

These corporations have, in turn, struck deals with several states for a continuous supply of labour (regardless of the level of crime). This incentivizes incarceration and helps explain why America has 2 million prisoners (often members of visible minorities)



Friday nights pay night guys fresh out of work
Talking about the weekend scrubbing off the dirt
Some heading home to their families some looking to get hurt
Some going down to stovell wearing trouble on their shirts

I work for the county out on 95
All day I hold a red flag and watch the traffic pass me by
In my head I keep a picture of a pretty little miss
Someday mister I’m gonna lead a better life than this

Working on the highway laying down the blacktop
Working on the highway all day long I don't stop
Working on the highway blasting through the bedrock
Working on the highway, working on the highway

I met her at a dance down at the union hall
She was standing with her brothers back up against the wall
Sometimes we’d go walking down the union tracks
One day I looked straight at her and she looked straight back

Working on the highway...

I saved up my money and I put it all away
I went to see her daddy but we didn't have much to say
Son can't you see that she's just a little girl
She don't know nothing about this cruel cruel world

We lit out down to Florida we got along all right
One day her brothers came and got her and they took me in a black and white
The prosecutor kept the promise that he made on that day
And the judge got mad and he put me straight away
I wake up every morning to the work bell clang
Me and the warden go swinging on the charlotte county road gang

Working on the highway...

-- Bob Barnetson

Free lecture: Farm worker rights in Alberta.

On Saturday, November 4, the University of Calgary Faculty of Law is hosting a free public lecture entitled "The rights of farm workers in Alberta: Past, present and future" from 10 to noon in room 3360 Murray Fraser Hall. You can registered here. The lecture description is:

This session will discuss the historical exclusion of farm workers in Alberta from labour and employment protections, including the impact of those exclusions on farm workers and the constitutionality of the exclusions under the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms. 

Recent changes to Alberta laws have extended some protections to farm workers, but those changes were contested, leading to the exemption of farm workers on family farms, as well as some other gaps in protections. What does the future hold for the protection of farm workers' rights in Alberta? 

Professor Jennifer Koshan will be the presenter, along with special guests Darlene A. Dunlop and Eric Musekamp of the Farmworkers Union of Alberta.

Earlier this year, the Faculty of Law hosted a book launch for Farm workers in western Canada.

-- Bob Barnetson

Research: Exit, voice, loyalty and neglect

I’ve been reading about employee reactions to deteriorating working conditions as a part of an ongoing research project about how fear affects workers' willingness to report health and safety problems. Back in 1970, Albert Hirshman posited that members of organizations have two basic responses when things start to go badly: exit or voice. Exit is self explanatory; voice is action workers take with an eye to improving conditions (e.g., speaking out, whistleblowing).

Over time, this typology has been refined to include loyalty and neglect. Loyalty (sometimes called patience) happens when workers choose to ride out a bad patch (often in silence, but not always). Neglect is essentially workers giving up and can result in non-compliance, obstruction, and disengagement.

The exist-voice-loyalty-neglect (EVLN) model has been applied to any different situations (e.g., consumer behaviour, romantic relationships, employee turnover) and often yields interesting insights and explanations. One aspect of a good social science theory is that it has high face validity: basically it sounds plausible to an informed ear.

In reading EVLN, I was struck by how much of my own experiences I can see in this model. My first reaction to organizational troubles at Athabasca University (back in 2004-2006) was loyalty: basically I assumed that those in charge knew what they were doing and the few problems that I could see were aberrations that would be corrected or just accepted.

By 2009, it was becoming increasingly obvious to me that there were deeper issues (specifically incompetent leadership and looming financial woes) and I chose various forms of voice to try and resolve them. As it became apparent that internal governance processes were ignored (about 2011?), my use of voice escalated and turned to using external venues to generate additional pressure.

As things worsened (e.g., layoffs, constant threat of closure, non-stop violations of the collective agreement), I then turned to neglect (around 2013) where my strategy was to obstruct the employer until circumstances changed. An alternative would have been exit but, as a middle-aged guy 10+ years into a pension plan, exit wasn’t a good option.

While things are (at least superficially) better (because the employer is keeping the club behind its back instead of waving it in our face), objectively, not much has changed. A difference for me is that, absent a crisis, I’m now mostly disengaged. I still do my job but I try to limit my interactions with my employer as much as possible (increasingly I'm spending my time on my research and engaging with community partners).

For example, I don't attend optional meetings and I don't read much of the institutional email. When I have to attend a meeting, I usually do it by teleconference because that is way less emotionally demanding. Basically, I am counting down the days to retirement (just under 2900 calendar days, if you were interested) and using neglect to bridge to exit.

My colleagues have exhibited different pathways through the last 10 years. This reflects that workers select among the EVLN options based upon their level of satisfaction with, investment in, and alternatives to their current job. I see a lot of neglect these days—mostly in the form of silence—as well as moments of voice (often defensive and occurring when something threatens a core term or condition of employment—but not always).

Whether the university can re-engage its staff in constructive voice activities remains to be seen. Some of that will likely turn on the strategic plan put forward by the university and the degree to which the university can operationalize that.

-- Bob Barnetson

Labour & Pop Culture: Navigator

This week’s installment of Labour & Pop culture is “Navigator” by the Pogues. This song is about the workers who built the English railway system, often dying in the process. Navigator (often “navvy”) is an unskilled labourer building canals, railways and other public worker

Canada has a similar history. The canal system in central and eastern Canada was mostly built by Irish and French-Canadian labourers. Much of the difficult western stretches of the Canadian Pacific railways were built by Chinese labourers. These projects saw workers die in droves.

Even today, racialized labour remains a key feature of some industries. Approximately 20,000 workers from Mexico and the Caribbean come to Canada to harvest crops (primarily fruit and vegetables in Ontario and BC). They work and live here for up to 8 months, often in very difficult conditions, and then they return to their home countries. A recurring issue affecting migrant farm workers is their treatment by the workers; compensation system.

A recent Toronto Star report revealed that Ontario’s Workplace Safety and Insurance Board has been slashing injured workers’ benefits by deeming them capable of finding work in Ontario even though they have been returned to their home country (where there are no jobs for them) and barred from re-entry. In this case, the worker was deemed to be employable as a cashier even though he was illiterate and there were no cashier (or other) jobs he can perform near his home in Jamaica.

An appeal panel finally found this process of wage “deeming” (wherein workers are deemed to be employed if they are employable) is an abrogation of the workers’ rights and he is owed nine years in back compensation. This migrant worker is just one of many who have been injured and then put on a plane home, with Canada washing its hands of its obligations.



The canals and the bridges, the embankments and cuts,
They blasted and dug with their sweat and their guts
They never drank water but whiskey by pints
And the shanty towns rang with their songs and their fights.

Navigator, navigator rise up and be strong
The morning is here and there's work to be done.
Take your pick and your shovel and the bold dynamite
For to shift a few tons of this earthly delight
Yes to shift a few tons of this earthly delight.

They died in their hundreds with no sign to mark where
Save the brass in the pocket of the entrepreneur.
By landslide and rockblast they got buried so deep
That in death if not life they'll have peace while they sleep.

Navigator, navigator rise up and be strong
The morning is here and there's work to be done.
Take your pick and your shovel and the bold dynamite
For to shift a few tons of this earthly delight
Yes to shift a few tons of this earthly delight.

Their mark on this land is still seen and still laid
The way for a commerce where vast fortunes were made
The supply of an empire where the sun never set
Which is now deep in darkness, but the railway's there yet.

Navigator, navigator rise up and be strong
The morning is here and there's work to be done.
Take your pick and your shovel and the bold dynamite
For to shift a few tons of this earthly delight
Yes to shift a few tons of this earthly delight.

-- Bob Barnetson

Excluding domestic servants and home workers from safety laws

The public consultation period for suggestions about changes to the Occupational Health and Safety Act closed yesterday. An issue that did not get much discussion is the household servant exemption set out in Section 1(s)(ii) of the Act. 

The Act currently defines occupation in a way that excludes household servants from its ambit:

1(s) “occupation” means every occupation, employment, business, calling or pursuit over which the Legislature has jurisdiction, except

(ii) work in, to or around a private dwelling or any land use in connection with the dwelling that is performed by an occupant or owner who lives in the private dwelling or a household servant of the occupant or owner;

In practice, this means workers hired by individual homeowners to perform household duties (regardless of whether they live in the home or not) have none of the health-and-safety rights accorded to virtually every other Alberta worker, such as the right to know about the hazards of their work or refuse unsafe work. And, if they are face hazardous working conditions or are injured on the job, they cannot seek assistance from occupational health and safety (OHS) officers.

By contrast, workers hired through an agency to perform the exact same household duties in a private dwelling are considered within the ambit of the Act. It is difficult to explain this double standard except as a political decision (made in 1976) to privilege homeowners (by exempting them from OHS requirements) at the expense of household servants. The changes flowing from the Enhanced Protection for Farm and Ranch Workers Act suggest that the present government no longer views as appropriate denying basic OHS protections to whole categories of workers.

The number of workers employed as household servants in Alberta is unknown. The absence of data about this population reflects that these workers span several occupational categories, including caregivers (of varying qualifications), cleaners, and maintenance personnel. And these workers have a variety of employment arrangements (e.g., some are agency workers while others are hired individually). Anecdotal reports suggest that the majority of these workers are female.

A significant identifiable group of household servants are foreign nationals who provide caregiving to children, seniors and adults with disabilities. These workers have entered Canada through the caregiver stream of the Temporary Foreign Worker program or, previously, through the Live-In Caregiver program. As of December 31, 2016, there were approximately 2145 foreign caregivers in Alberta.

The literature identifies several hazards common to household servants, including repetitive motions, lifting heavy objects, and exposures to various chemical and biological agents. Live-in caregivers are also exposed to fatigue (due to lengthy shifts) and various forms of abuse (in part, due to their social isolation).

Eliminating the exclusion of household servants from the ambit of the OHS Act will provide much needed workplace protections. Alberta already provides these workers with basic workplace rights under the Employment Standards Code (excepting around overtime and maximum hours of work. By contrast, maintaining the exclusion will disadvantage a predominantly female and often vulnerable group of workers.

If such a change were to take place, it would be important for the government to provide resources to homeowners to assist them with complying with their obligations under the Act (e.g., conducting a hazard assessment). It will also be necessary to provide workers (particularly foreign caregivers) with information about their rights and support in exercising those rights.

A second group denied OHS rights under s.1(s)(ii) are employees who work from home. Currently, the government interprets "working... in a private dwelling... that is performed by an occupant or owner who lives in the private dwelling" to include workers employed by others working out of the worker's home.

This reading of the legislation again creates the situation where two workers doing the same work (one at home and one in an office) have different rights. The home worker has no OHS rights while the office worker has a full suite of rights. 

This discrepancy also offloads the cost of remediating hazards onto the home worker. My employer, for example, has set out certain safety requirements for home workers as part of our employment (e.g., smoke detectors, CO2 detectors, fire extinguishers in our home office, first aid kits) but refuses to pay for any of these materials. The result is that most home workers have ignored this requirement.

Amending s.1(s)(ii) of the OHS Act to exclude employees performing work in their homes would remedy this situation.

 -- Bob Barnetson

Labour & Pop Culture: Making Thunderbirds

This week’s installment of Labour & Pop Culture is “Making Thunderbirds” by Bob Seger. Release in 1982, this song is part of the heartland rock tradition, which valorized (mostly male) blue-collar work.

Seger drew upon his Detroit roots in writing this song, which looks at auto-workers employed by Ford (his dad worked for Ford). When Seger wrote this song, their (difficult) jobs were being automated to the detriment of the workers.

We filled conveyors
We met production
Foremen didn't waste words

and

Now the years have flown and the plants have changed
And you're lucky if you work

I could not find a video for this (it was not released as a single) but you can listen to the audio below:



The big line moved one mile an hour
So loud it really hurt
The big line moved so loud
It really hurt
Back in '55

We were makin' thunderbirds
We filled conveyors
We met production
Foremen didn't waste words
We met production
Foremen didn't waste words
We were young and proud
We were makin' thunderbirds

We were makin' thunderbirds
We were makin' thunderbirds
They were long and low and sleek and fast
They were all you ever heard
Back in '55

We were makin' thunderbirds
Now the years have flown and the plants have changed
And you're lucky if you work
The big line moves but you're lucky if you work
Back in '55
We were makin' thunderbirds

-- Bob Barnetson