UCP’S employment survey designed to cut workplace rules: labour leader

The provincial government is exploring potential changes to provincial employment standards — including vacation time, holiday pay, youth employment and termination notices — by launching a public engagement survey, it announced in a Thursday news release.

“We are committed to getting Albertans back to work,” said Labour and Immigration Minister Jason Copping in the news release. “Now we want to hear from the public on how we can continue to make Alberta’s employment rules simpler and more efficient.”

But one of Alberta’ most prominent unions is raising concerns that changes to employment standards, the rules and regulations governing employer-worker relations in the province, could roll back protections for workers.

“Employment standards are the rules that underpin the relationship that workers have with their employers,” said Gil Mcgowan, president of the Alberta Federation of Labour, in a Thursday news release.

“The way the current government has framed this survey shows that they intend to reduce these benefits and loosen workplace rules.”

The UCP’S campaign platform promises a variety of labour changes, including reversing a 2018 policy and allowing employers to use straight-time banked hours. This change would mean banked overtime could be translated to time off at a 1:1 ratio, instead of banked or paid at a 1:1.5 ratio, and raised concerns about employers pressuring workers out of getting extra hours paid out.

The party also promised to make it mandatory for union certification votes to use secret ballots, a measure which the AFL has criticized as increasing the barriers to unionizing.

“The current government seems intent on taking Alberta’s workplace rules backwards,” said Mcgowan. “This government is not sincerely trying to get the views of ordinary working Albertans because it’s already made up its mind.”

Copping said in an emailed statement that a number of suggestions for changes from a variety of stakeholders have already been suggested through the government’s Red Tape Reduction Initiative, adding that the survey aims to “hear from employers and employees from all sectors and all parts of the province.”

“What’s important is that we get a range of perspectives that reflect the views of Albertans,” said Copping.

The survey runs until Nov. 28.