Good morning. Let us pray.

Prayers.

Resuming the debate adjourned on February 28, 2024, on the motion for third reading of the following bill:

Bill 149, An Act to amend various statutes with respect to employment and labour and other matters / Projet de loi 149, Loi modifiant diverses lois en ce qui concerne l’emploi, le travail et d’autres questions.

Good morning, everybody. I’m not usually on House duty Monday morning, but it’s always a pleasure to come in and talk about any bill that has to do with workers. We’re debating this morning Bill 149, which is a schedule of a variety of bills, and frankly, Speaker, there’s a couple of pretty substantial flaws in this bill. During debate last time, I talked very clearly about the support for the presumptive WSIB coverage for urban firefighters. I think that’s the highlight of this bill. The rest of the bill is a little bit downhill from there.

I think, as well, it’s good to underscore that the Digital Platform Workers’ Rights Act is a bit of a misnomer. It should really be called the “digital app company rights act.” Basically what it does is it allows these billion-dollar companies—the Ubers, the Lyfts, the food delivery services that people work by their phones—to misclassify workers as independent contractors. And by doing this, they end up basically working for 12 to 14 hours a day and making less than minimum wage—and a lot less; about $7 or $6-something an hour, and $2-something if you take away what it costs them for their expenses on their vehicles. It’s a really terrible idea here. When you think, at the end of the day, that one of the data we’ve got here is $6.37 an hour for somebody working for a company that’s making billions of dollars a year, it’s a slap in the face to the workers of Ontario, Speaker—just a slap in the face to these workers.

The Conservative government shouldn’t be enshrining this right and this ability. What they say in DPWRA is that you can make a complaint. That’s what they’re flagging, that you could file a complaint, but also, in the Digital Platform Workers’ Rights Act, the company has the right to misclassify you. So you could make a complaint, but nothing will happen. No one’s listening; no one will pick up the phone, or they’ll pick up the phone and then say, “Yes, that’s right. That’s what you’re entitled to.” So that’s one of the biggest flaws in this bill: What it’s going to do to these workers who work for these app companies.

And we know, Speaker, that more and more workers are working these gig jobs, this precarious work. When I graduated a million years ago, it was the first time we had this recession and there were all these short-term contracts. I remember that my parents were very confused and my friends’ parents were very confused because they said once you graduate from college or university, you get a job and you have a career. And there were these little piecemeal things. This has become the norm for so many people in our province—that you’re on these short-term contracts, that you’re a gig worker, that you’re going to be living with several roommates for what feels like the rest of your life. That’s the frustration that we’re seeing. Instead of helping these people, helping them get ahead, helping them ensure that they make at least minimum wage, what this schedule of this act does is it enshrines the ability for billion-dollar companies to underpay their workers, underpay them less than minimum wage. That’s a slap in the face to those workers.

I want to move on to other things in this bill. I want to talk about pay transparency. So in the bill, they talk about pay transparency. We, in fact, didn’t even have to have this as part of the bill, as a schedule. This was already an existing bill. The idea for this pay transparency was to close the gender wage gap so we have clarity about what people were making. So you can find out if indeed the men in your workplace were making more than the women in the workplace, people could understand what the pay was.

So in 2018, there was the Pay Transparency Act that had been passed by the previous Liberal government, just before the election. It was supposed to come into effect in November 2018. This is a little frustrating, I think, for a lot of people, when a sitting government, prior to an election, passes something that workers would like to have, but schedules it to be passed only if they’re re-elected, only in the future. So this went into limbo. Instead of clawing it back the way the Conservatives did with paid sick days and the other benefits that were passed for workers, instead of passing a bill to remove this, basically what they did, the Conservative government, is they amended it so that it would come into effect on an undefined date, proclaimed by government. So, basically, they took it and put it on a shelf. It was going to sit there probably indefinitely.

They may argue, Speaker, that, well, this is them bringing it back, but this is a very watered down version of this bill. So where the original one would actually have real pay transparency, this one is one of the weakest pay transparency laws in Canada. In fact, you can meet the definition of this schedule simply by saying that pay ranges anywhere from $1 to $1 million. Now, I don’t think unscrupulous companies are going to do that, but it isn’t true pay transparency. So all the stakeholders who previously came forward and talked about why pay transparency is so important, all of the people of Ontario who spoke about the need for this—civil rights groups and women’s groups who spoke about how important this was—all of that has been washed aside as a checkbox.

And as I said before, there’s a disturbing trend with the Conservative government that a lot of this becomes headlines; it’s about fluff and photo ops—pay transparency. The number of people who came to deputations where I had to explain to them that this was not the bill that they had championed in the past, that this was a watered down, lesser version, of what already existed. It was difficult for me, as I was breaking people’s hearts. They thought the thing they were fighting for since before 2018 was finally coming true. The Conservative government was finally listening to them, and I had to tell them, “No, it’s not at all what you’re getting. What you’re getting here is the title. You’re going to get the exact same title, but none of the teeth”—all sizzle, no steak. That’s a disturbing trend.

So in the Checklist for True Pay Transparency from the Ontario Equal Pay Coalition—I want to give them proper credit—what to look for in pay transparency legislation, these are all yes or no questions: “Is there a clear purpose statement linking pay transparency to the elimination of discrimination in pay?” That doesn’t apply here.

“Does the law apply to both private sector and public sector employers?

“Does the law apply to all employers with 10+ workers to ensure it is consistent with the Ontario Pay Equity Act?

“Does the law apply to require pay transparency for all jobs at all income levels in the workplace?

“Does the law require an annual report to the Ministry of Labour detailing wage structure, gender pay gaps, gender distribution across income levels, and gender distribution by job security?” This schedule doesn’t do that at all.

“Does the law require the employers’ annual pay transparency reports be publicly posted and accessible on a government website?” It doesn’t require that at all.

Like I said earlier, Speaker, if you really want to be in compliance, all you have to do is say that the pay range for this position is between $1 an hour and $1 million an hour. I absolutely don’t think that companies are going to do that—that would actually make the paper, I think, if they did. But you could very clearly put a range that has a gap of $20,000, $30,000, $40,000 within that range. All you’re doing, really, is following the legislation, but not the spirit of the legislation, and by doing that, you’re not helping people get ahead in life. You’re not helping close the gender wage gap at all. You’re actually allowing people to say, “Yes, there’s a wage gap. We’re not going to tell you who gets what, but there’s a $20,000 or $30,000 gap between different employees.”

I’m going to read a quote from the Equal Pay Coalition on this:

“Pay transparency laws can be drafted and provide weaker or stronger protections.

“Ontario’s statements to date indicate its proposed law would be one of the weakest pay transparency laws in Canada.

“And its proposal significantly undercuts the rights enacted in Ontario’s Pay Transparency Act, 2018. That pay transparency law was never repealed, but the government blocked it from coming into force after the 2018 provincial election.” They’re talking about the Conservative government.

And so—this will just repeat what I was saying earlier—instead of having this act, this act that was already debated, that was already passed, that already went to a vote, come into effect and have the real teeth to enforce what’s going into it, it was put on a shelf to be proclaimed on a later date, which is basically going to be never, Speaker. And then this schedule was brought in so if someone were to criticize them and say, “Well, when are you going to bring back pay transparency?”, they can say, “We did. We did. We brought back the title of it”—but not the spirit of it at all, which is really, really unfortunate.

I’m going to switch topics here. One of things that we heard a lot during deputations was about WSIB, and two things that we heard a lot were—number one, I’d say, was the deeming of workers. My colleague from Niagara Falls, MPP Wayne Gates, has had this bill that he’s tabled a couple of times because it is dissolved every time there’s an election. But what happens with this bill, Speaker, is that you have workers who are injured at work—and if you’ve never been injured at work, you probably believe the WSIB works really, really well. But if you have a significant injury, a long-lasting injury, it’s a fight. It’s a real fight. I can’t remember the stats off the top of my head; I’m sure my colleague knows them, our critic for WSIB, but there’s a high percentage of cases that are automatically dismissed, so you have to fight to stay in there. And if you’re sick, if you’re not feeling well, if you’re badly injured—the mental stress and the financial struggle—it’s hard to keep up that fight.

And then what happens as part of this process is you could be deemed fit to jobs that don’t exist—literally jobs that don’t exist. A doctor who may have never seen you, just reads your case files, can deem you fit to do certain jobs, and then that affects the pay that you get because technically you should be working at these phantom jobs. The reality, though, is if you’re told that you could work as a parking lot attendant, even though there’s not a lot of parking lot attendant jobs anymore—even if you’re told you could be working in an office, but you can’t find a job working in an office and they deem you able to do that, it affects your pay. The only way that this deeming of phantom work works is if you are paid in phantom dollars to pay your phantom bills. It is an insult to injured people and working people that you’re deemed able to do work for work that may not exist in your area.

It’s one thing if you had a job and you refused to go; if they found work for you and you said, “I’m not doing this.” And I’m not talking about not doing it because I’m injured and my doctor’s list of what I’m able to do precludes me from performing this work. But basically, they just say, “You could get a job doing this.” And so, let’s say you live in a city, and they tell you that you could get a job working at a farm and there’s no farm near you, right—but the most obvious one is, you could be a parking lot attendant. We’ve heard this from people in the past, where I can’t remember the last time I actually saw a parking lot attendant. I’ve seen people who give out tickets, but most of that work is automated now. You push a button and a sticker comes out or a little piece of paper comes out, and then on the way out, you put the strip back in and you pay. That’s a whole different thing from what’s going on with this with the deeming bill.

A really loud and strong request from people was just to restore WSIB benefits to 90%. And I was surprised how many people deputed and how many people came into committee saying what changes they wanted and brought this up on a regular basis. Because they’re currently at 85%, and I really thought that people would want a much larger increase. The WSIB—typically for people with severe injuries, long-lasting injuries and workplace cancers—tends to be a ticket to poverty. And so, when I heard people talking about how important this 5% increase was, it really stood out to me as surprising. But what they told me again and again, these injured workers, is that they’re in such deep poverty from being on WSIB, because WSIB is so broken for them, it creates such deep poverty that this 5% would mean the world to them. The 5% was clawed back, I think, by the Mike Harris government; I can’t quite remember—I’m going by the dates. But there was a promise prior to the last election to restore this. Well, it’s been almost two years. Let’s fulfill that promise.

Imagine the difference you could make, especially with the cost-of-living financial crisis we’re in where everyone is feeling that pinch. Imagine the difference you could make for really, really poor people living in poverty who are injured, who are in pain, who have mental health issues because of the stress of trying to deal with their finances and not being able to make the money they did when they were working. Imagine the difference you could make, the relief you could provide by giving that 5%. That 5% would mean the world to them.

Something else I hadn’t really considered—and it makes sense when you hear it; this is one of the reasons we have committees, as people will bring these voices forward and talk to us—is how difficult things are for WSIB when you’re racialized. Ontario is becoming a chosen place more and more for people from different countries. I’m loving in Sudbury, for example, just two weeks ago, we had an event that is called Akwaba that was put together to welcome Africans to Sudbury into the francophone community. There were little certificates that were created for them and a shared meal together and just an amazing change to how Sudbury is changing. We have always been a francophone community, but primarily not an African francophone community, and seeing our culture change and our workplaces and schools change is a wonderful thing.

But when we heard from people talking to us about what it meant to be racialized and on WSIB and the difficulty there, even though we’re in a country where it is bilingual, it’s difficult sometimes to get service in French. And then if your primary language isn’t English or French, it’s that much more difficult. If you think about how difficult it is for someone whose primary language is English to get services and help in WSIB, imagine trying to work through translation or when you’re not able to understand as effectively, and the frustration of being on hold for so long or people not returning your calls for several days. It’s very, very difficult. And for immigrant workers, once you’re injured and you return back home, you’re basically out of luck and that’s a sad state of affairs because we have a lot of migrant workers who come in to help with agriculture who are very important to these industries. If they’re injured and they’re sent home and there’s no compensation or help or support for them, even though they’re injured doing work that people would be doing here in Ontario, they should get the same support. And basically what I was told is, if you’re injured as a worker and sent back to your home country, you basically have no help at all, which is not something any of us would want for any worker here.

I want to go through some of the amendments that we had, and this brings us back to the Digital Platform Workers’ Rights Act. All of our amendments, Speaker, were voted down. Now, some of them were marked out of order because they don’t speak primarily to this bill, but even then, we’d asked for unanimous consent to at least discuss it—then you can have debate; you can talk about why you think it should be part of the bill, and it could still be voted down afterwards. None of us are naive enough to think that the Conservative government wouldn’t be able to vote them down; they have a majority government and they have more seats than we do as New Democrats, even if we have the independents join us. It’s basically 6 to 3 when it comes to a vote, so very easily they could vote this down, and they could hear about why these amendments would be good. This one about the Digital Platform Workers’ Rights Act was voted down—it was ruled in order, but it was voted down. I think that’s interesting.

I want to read this quote from the steelworkers:

“Given the fact that it will likely be over two years since Bill 88 received royal assent and the DPWRA”—Digital Platform Workers’ Rights Act—“commencement was delayed with it now being tied to Bill 149 receiving royal assent before it came into force, then perhaps the short title of Bill 149 should be ‘Delaying Working for Workers Act.’ Amending regulations for an act, when the act is yet to be in effect and the regulations simply do not exist because they have yet to be written, renders those proposed amendments meaningless.” This is the part I like about this: “We submit to you that if workers provide this level of quality in their worker or took over two years to have a task remain incomplete, then they would be unemployed.” Basically, our amendment for this was that, as a default, app workers would be employees, so the employer would have to prove that they are contractors.

Now, I spent about a decade in contracting. I spent about two decades in mining where we use contractors on a regular basis. There’s a world of difference between a true contractor and a worker on an app. Basically what’s happening more and more by companies is that they are telling their employees that they are contractors. You don’t have much control the way contractors do. You’re not actually bidding on the jobs, or specific jobs, but they’re telling you that you are now a contractor. The reason they do this is to get around the Employment Standards Act legislation, to get around LRA, Labour Relations Act, legislation—basically to bypass anything that a normal employee would have. So the reason we’re saying this is that with the Conservatives enshrining the Digital Platform Workers’ Rights Act, this ability to pay workers less than minimum wage, this ability to sidestep the protections they have—what we’re saying in this amendment is let’s have these companies prove that they’re independent contractors, instead of the workers having to fight the other way. Because, typically, what happens is when the workers do prove that they’re not, those companies disappear. That’s why Foodora doesn’t exist anymore in Ontario, because those companies proved that they weren’t independent contractors.

Our amendment was very clear: Let’s just make these app workers employees. Then, this was an amendment that was requested by the Interfaith Social Assistance Reform Coalition and the Workers’ Action Centre. We tried moving that forward. That was voted down. In fact, it was voted down with only debate coming from New Democrats and the independent members. The Conservative government didn’t even want to talk about why they wanted to—I said I’m going to share this. I did share it already online. I’m going to share this vote. I’m going to ask very clearly: Why are you standing with these billion-dollar companies while we’re hearing from several members of our community locally in Toronto? Because, people don’t have the resources, when you’re making less than minimum wage, to travel down from across Ontario to speak to the committee. But we had digital workers, these app workers, food delivery service workers come in and talk about how they were working in snowstorms, how they were waiting for work, but they’re only paid for the work while they’re engaged. Because of that, they work many, many hours and they don’t make ends meet, and they make less than minimum wage—less than seven bucks an hour.

If any of us, if any of our kids had a job where they made less than $7 an hour, we would go down and we would talk to that employer. We would call a Ministry of Labour inspector with a complaint, because they would be breaking the law. Instead of realizing and recognizing—which I’m sure the Conservative government does—that they are ripping off these workers, they wrote a law so that these billion-dollar companies can continue to do it. That’s disgraceful. That’s something I would be ashamed of as an MPP, and I’m glad that we don’t support that.

We had an amendment to replicate—the member from London West had the Stay Home If You Are Sick Act. This is basically about paid sick days when people are sick. We just came through a pandemic, but we know when people are sick, they go to work sick and they get other people sick.

New York has had this in effect for a much longer time; I think more than a decade. All the studies have shown that not much changes, except that fewer people are sick in the workplace and fewer people in the workplace get sick afterwards. If you think about if I had a really bad cold and I’m speaking for about 25 minutes for this part of the debate, perhaps the people around me could get the cold too, because I’m breathing out my germs on them. That’s not good for people. So if you’re able to stay home when you’re sick, like all of us are as MPPs able to stay home, you’re less likely to spread that illness around and get others sick.

It also means that parents are able to stay home with their kids when their kids are sick. That’s a reality for a lot of parents. And I talked many times about growing up a little over the poverty line, and I went to school no matter what. The only time I got to stay home was if the school sent me back or if I was physically visual-evidence sick. I don’t want to gross everyone out early this morning, but that was the reality. And that’s the reality for a lot of people, especially these low wage workers, these minimum wage workers and these workers who are gig workers making less than minimum wage. And so, having the ability to have paid sick days—this was also not accepted by the Conservative government.

We tried bringing forward the anti-scab bill. We talked about how important this was, how it would help people. This would really help, for example, the ACTRA workers who are coming up on two years of being locked out. The ACTRA commercial workers have asked, I think three times here, for the Conservative government to stop buying advertising from these ad industries that are using replacement scab workers for these ACTRA commercial workers. They continue to do this. They continue it on a regular basis—not only not passing anti-scab, not only choosing to support companies that aren’t using the scab replacement workers, but very happily buying commercial advertising from companies that are providing advertising made by replacement scab workers.

I don’t know how you say you’re working for workers if people are literally doing without for two years, standing up for their rights, standing up for fair contracts, standing up for retirement benefits and pensions, and the Conservative government is saying, “No, in fact, what we’re going to do is put a little bit of the money in the pockets of the people who are using replacement workers to do your job.” They didn’t support that, as well.

I talked earlier about my colleague Jeff Burch from Niagara Centre who had a bill about including wildland firefighters. I’ve talked in the past about the Captain Craig Bowman Act and was 100% complimentary the previous time that I was speaking. This was a non-partisan thing. My colleague from Niagara Centre brought it forward and it got adopted into this bill. This is the cornerstone of this bill. This is the reason that, more than likely, we’ll be supporting this bill. As much as there’s a bunch of garbage in here, we can fix that in other legislation. But we want to support this family.

But why don’t we include the wildland firefighters as well? They deal with fires as well. They’re workers as well. In fact, they have less protections than urban firefighters. One of the first things you think about for an urban firefighter, a firefighter in the city, is the full-face respirator they wear over their mask with oxygen on their back. That’s one of the first things you think about for their uniform, is the distinctive hard hat they have, the firefighter’s helmet, and then it’s that respirator with the pack on the back.

Do you know what wildland firefighters have, Speaker—a wet handkerchief—when they’re out fighting fires, and no presumptive coverage. They can provide the data that their members are also getting sick, but the Conservative government, when it comes to this amendment protecting these wildland firefighters—“No, we’re not going to do that.” I’m hopeful they’re going to bring it forward at another time, but I think that we shouldn’t be holding our breath, and I also think these wildland firefighters shouldn’t have to hold their breath either when it comes to protecting themselves in these conditions.

I think, to wrap up, I’m just going to say that the Captain Craig Bowman Act that was brought into this, with the support of the minister and the previous Minister of Labour, is the highlight of this bill. Everything else needs a lot of work.

The member who just spoke made reference to job creation, and it made me recall the job creation record of the previous government, which eliminated 300,000 jobs in the province of Ontario, including wiping out General Motors in the region of Essex county and losing the wonderful jobs that that provided. In comparison, this present government has created 700,000 jobs, including more manufacturing jobs than every US state put together.

So my question to the member is this: In reference to job creation strategies, does he prefer the strategy of the previous Liberal government, which his party supported, or does he prefer the strategies implemented by this government, which have created 700,000 jobs, including more manufacturing jobs than all the US states combined?

I don’t appreciate being told how much I supported the previous government, because I don’t want to be told that we supported this government, for all their flaws, as well.

What I do know about job creation is that in Ontario, we have lost 230,000 jobs in the last six months. That’s not something to brag about. I also think that as politicians, when you’re talking about jobs, we have to get away from that, talking about jobs. We have to talk about careers.

I talked in depth on this bill about gig workers and how little they make. That’s a job. Do you know what a career is? It’s one where you have money at the end of the day to put money in the bank and to bring your kids to the movies; when you make more than enough to pay your rent and bills and just barely survive. It has a pension and benefits. Let’s talk about careers as politicians and stop talking about jobs.

Questions?

Next question?

I’ll be sharing my time with the member from Mississauga–Erin Mills.

It gives me a lot of pleasure to stand up in the House and speak to this bill this morning. I want to begin by thanking our great minister and the team at his ministry for putting together this bill and for continuing this work.

I also want to, frankly, give a shout-out to our wonderful previous minister, Monte McNaughton, for the work that he did over the course of our Working for Workers bills. I remember reading an article about him where the author wrote that he had taken the unusual step of travelling Ontario and actually listening to people, and I think that these Working for Workers bills that our government has been issuing really show that, and I know that our current minister has really latched onto that constant consultation and open-mindedness, and we’re really seeing that now.

My cousin’s partner is a tattoo artist. She worked at a tattoo parlour in London, and she was really hoping to open her own tattoo parlour. We didn’t know each other super well at the time, but we ended up having a conversation where she explained this to me. It turned out, for over a year, she had put off that step to open her own parlour because the agreement that she had signed as part of her work with the existing tattoo parlour had a non-compete clause in it that said that she couldn’t open a tattoo parlour within something absurd like 500 kilometres of the existing parlour.

I don’t have any background in employment law, but even hearing that, I was like, “I’m pretty sure that’s not okay,” and then I did two seconds of research and was like, “Yes, that’s definitely not okay.” But that’s something that had prevented her for over a year from actually manifesting her dream, which was to open her own tattoo parlour, which she now has, and it’s doing wonderfully.

But again, my cousin’s partner, Mel, is not the type of person that is going to, generally speaking, be able to come to Queen’s Park; she just happened to have a boyfriend whose cousin was a lawyer. And yet it’s people like her, people who rent stylist chairs, people who work in salons, who frequently had these types of clauses in their contracts who are now going to be benefited by this.

I also really, really appreciate the care that this bill shows to workers in the restaurant and service industry. People who work in that industry are really the ones that make our lives worth living. We go to work, but a lot of our fun, our relaxation is going for meals, going shopping, experiencing things in the service industry, and without those individuals performing those jobs, we really wouldn’t have access to that.

I personally believe that every single person should have to work as a server at some point in their life to know what it’s like. I have a long history of working in the service industry, as a younger individual, I started off cleaning floors in a vet clinic, ended up as a baker at Tim Hortons for several years and then a bartender at Holiday Inn and eventually working my way up to fine dining. Sometimes I say I’m not sure if this means I was either a really terrible server or a really terrible crown and politician, because I have never had a day as a crown attorney or a member of provincial Parliament that had as much stress and terror in it as an average day as a Tim Hortons baker or working in fine dining. I have never had a work nightmare about being a crown attorney or an MPP, whereas I have had multiple work nightmares about abandoning my tables mid-shift. It’s really, in many ways, the closest thing I can think of to door-knocking: Every table you approach, you have absolutely no idea how the interaction is going to go, but you have to keep smiling the entire time.

I remember when I first started these positions, many of the places that I worked had me do unpaid trial shifts and also told me that I was responsible for dine-and-dash, so if I failed to make sure that a customer had paid, that was going to be docked from my tips or my wages. I was probably smart enough and cantankerous enough even as a young person to know—I was like, “That’s essentially just loss that you incur as a business. It’s similar to shoplifting. There’s no way I should be responsible for that.” And I think the only time it ever happened to me, I revolted somewhat and ended up not having to pay. But, again, many people that are in this industry are young, are naive, are vulnerable, are not in a position to go up against their employer and say, “I’m not going to do this.” So by addressing this dine-and-dash issue as well as the issue of gas drive-offs by specifically including gas stations, that’s incredibly important. I believe it’s the member for Mississauga–Malton who is particularly passionate about the issue of gas drive-offs, because there have been people who have been injured and died trying to stop people from leaving a gas station without paying because they in no way can possibly afford the cost of that person’s fuel, essentially, and their employers have told them they were responsible. Again, these are workers who do not have the ability to come to Queen’s Park en masse with a union representative to strike, to picket, and yet they have been heard and their issues have been addressed.

Moving forward a little bit as far as my own feelings about this bill, from being a server and then onwards, I also really noticed and appreciated the requirement that salary information be posted, and the reason for this, I think, goes beyond simply the idea of having clear expectations. As we discussed quite a bit two weeks ago, we are still not at wage parity. Women are still earning approximately 87 cents to the dollar as men do. And when you are looking at salary negotiations, negotiation research shows that women are still, I think it’s less than half as likely as men to actually negotiate their salaries, to negotiate what they’ll be compensated for.

When you look into the research of salary negotiation, one of the things that is identified as specifically empowering women is having some objective information available about what colleagues or peers in the industry are making, because it gives you a set point to build off of. Generally speaking, women still end up 30% lower than men simply because they go in asking for less.

By posting an actual salary, we are eliminating in many ways that—anyone that has ever interviewed somebody, even for our executive assistants, who has asked that sort of cruel question: “So what do you expect to be paid?” What kind of question is that to ask somebody? Particularly, somebody young or entering a job for the first time, somebody that is desperate to have this job. It’s really just juggling on a tightrope to be able to identify in a split second what you think you are worth.

Again, when you look at negotiation research, men tend to refer to negotiations about salary as sort of like a fight or a wrestling match; whereas, the most common thing that women compared it to was going to the dentist. When you look at that attitude that they have towards it, you can really see how we can continue to lose the battle as far as wage parity between the genders.

So in doing this, I believe that we are going to significantly impact, in a slow but still important fashion, women’s ability to negotiate their salaries because we’re giving everybody—but I’m particularly talking about women—that little bit of objective information about this, and that is the range or the starting point. And I can actually have an objective point in order to base my own negotiation off of.

As I said, I really do believe that what this bill is and what all of the Working for Workers bills have been is a cumulative effort of travelling Ontario, of listening to people, of listening to people that may not have union representation as well as people that do and of trying slowly, gradually and carefully, with the balancing of interest that any government must always do, to address those needs and to make sure that our workers in all industries—but particularly service industries, which is about 6%—are being represented.

So I will certainly be supporting this bill with a great deal of excitement. I appreciate the opportunity to speak to it. I will hand off the remainder of my time to the member opposite.

I enjoyed listening to my colleague the member from Sudbury.

I do want to remind the member from Essex that from 2013 to 2018, this province led the G7 in jobs and growth, and we were in the top three for foreign direct investment for those five years as well, so we can throw that stuff back and forth.

The reality is that the Working for Workers Four Act isn’t working that hard for workers. There are good things in it, but they are watered down. One of the things I think we have to grapple with in here, as the member mentioned, is the fact that the nature of work is changing. We’re now having a second class of employees who are employee contractors. It’s not just going to happen with delivery people. They’re traditional jobs. They’re the same jobs. They’re not new jobs. It’s going to happen all across our economy, so we actually have to watch how corporations are treating people who will be doing this work for them. It’s just starting now.

But the question that’s really on my mind this morning is: How often did the member from Sudbury get sent home from school?

The member is talking about how I made a comment during debate about going to school when I was sick, and only being able to stay home if I was sent home. I think the statute of limitations has passed, so if I went home—I was a latchkey kid. I would go home and nobody was home. I had a key in my pocket, and I was told not to answer the door if someone knocked on the door. I did not say my parents weren’t home. That’s the reality for kids of my generation and that’s the reality for a lot of kids today.

I was only sent home twice—and once, I had gone in a blizzard and the school was closed, and they sent me home for that as well, so it would be three times.

The purpose of debate is to improve what’s in the bill, to make the bill more effective and to talk about what’s in the bill. Also, in committee, when people come and say, “This is what should be in the bill,” it’s our role as legislators—not just the opposition—to say, “That’s a good point. This should be in the bill.” That’s what we did in committee and that’s what we’re doing in debate.

The other part is when you’re deemed as a contractor when you’re not. There is a difference between when someone decides it’s going to be Jamie West and Sons Trucking, which is typical—probably Jamie West and Sons and Daughters would be more typical of the times now—when we decide to be independent truckers. That’s one thing, when you make that decision. But when a company for transportation says, “You’re no longer my employee; now you’re an independent contractor. We’re going to pay you the same amount, but we’re going to remove your benefits,” that really is not about taking care of employees or having that independence for employees. It’s about exploiting them for the benefit of unscrupulous employers.

I was at Cambrian College, and I met somebody who was a dentist who ran 10 dental labs and was taking his dental cleaning program here locally. That doesn’t make sense to us. Teeth don’t change that much from India to here. There’s some upgrading, of course; you’ve got to make sure that standards are the same, but as New Democrats, we’ve been pushing for the recognition of these credentials to fill those jobs for a long time, and that’s something I invite the member to join us on.

Good morning, and thank you to my colleague for his remarks this morning. He mentioned newcomers to our province. Even in my rural communities in rural southern Ontario, we’re seeing a lot of newcomers—which is wonderful—in our communities, contributing to our economy, coming to work in our province. Newcomers are essential, obviously, to ensuring Ontario continues to grow.

Does the member opposite believe opposing this bill means that the members who are supporting existing practices that keep newcomers from being able to work in the fields that they are trained in—does he believe this is the right decision on their part?

As much as I enjoyed the deputation from my colleague in opposition, he is talking about the stuff which is not included in the bill as much as discussing what is included in the bill. Of course, there are unlimited possibilities to include things, but we are discussing the things which are already included in this bill.

Part of that bill is talking about some of the steps we are taking to protect individuals who have suffered at the hands of bad actors and abusers, and eliminating the use of NDAs in workplace misconduct. Do you think that the members opposite are doing the right thing by opposing those meaningful changes?

I want to thank the member from Sudbury for really pointing out the many, many ways that this government is actually working against workers, and certainly working against those who have permanent injuries, where we have seen people living in poverty on the one hand and not able to access benefits, and on the other hand we hear a government that brags about how much money they’re giving back to employers.

The question I wanted to ask about is really about misclassification and wage theft. I’m thinking about the trucking industry. We’re seeing this misclassification with Uber drivers and so on, but in the trucking industry, I’m aware of a great deal of wage theft that’s not being addressed. Also, this classification of drivers as “Driver Inc.”, which was supposed to be banned, is still very much taking place. Those workers have no benefits whatsoever if they get into an accident. They’re kind of high and dry.

I would like to thank my colleague from Kitchener South–Hespeler. I’m very happy to stand today to support this bill, which is actually one of a series of bills, Working for Workers, which I was so proud to be supporting since Working for Workers 1, Working for Workers 2 and Working for Workers 3.

We know that when given the opportunity, Ontarians will work hard and achieve much. That’s why this government is obligated to protect workers and open up opportunities so that every dream can be fulfilled. Already, the first three pieces of legislation, Working for Workers 1, 2 and 3, are helping millions of people by extending economic opportunities, increasing protections and supporting newcomers. Now, Working for Workers Four will continue this hard work by opening up opportunities and increasing transparency in the workplace.

To start, we are ending the use of non-disclosure agreements in cases of workplace harassment and violence. I’m glad to hear that this government is consulting to end the unscrupulous practices that shield and protect abusers. Our government’s proposal will protect victims from being pressured into bad agreements and settlements. There must be accountability for any abuse that takes place in the workplace. We are committed to supporting victims, ensuring their rights are preserved and restored.

The goal of this bill is to have a fair treatment in the hiring process as well. Our government is increasing transparency for workers, making sure that they are being treated fairly and respectfully. This is being achieved in multiple ways.

Firstly, we are mandating that inclusion of the salary range is in the job posting. Workers want transparency when applying for a new job. The changes would require lawyers to post information about compensation on the job posting. This is a common-sense solution that has been implemented in many other provinces. It is preventing employers from taking advantage of employees and wasting their time keeping everything for negotiation or a specific judgment of the employer when he already does the interview.

So prior, for me as an employee applying for a job, to walk into this interview, I would have preferred to know if that job’s range of negotiation is meeting my requirements. Is it the range I’m looking for? And then, the negotiation would start from the minimum range to the upper wage, not from nowhere, from zero to whatever.

The Employment Standards Act is already very clear that employers cannot pay workers less based on their gender, but there is still more work to do to ensure gender equality.

By forcing employers to be transparent about salaries, Ontario will be levelling the playground. This will ensure fairness and equality is being applied before a job application is even posted.

Secondly, we are requiring employers to disclose the use of artificial intelligence in the recruitment process. In the old days, job applications would be manually reviewed by an employer to find the best fit. Now, artificial intelligence can automatically sort hundreds of job applications in a minute. When used fairly and respectfully, this technology can be used effectively to help both employers and employees, helping employers to cut the time for sorting through those applications and helping the employees by finding the right skill set for the job. I’m very supportive of all the different technologies, especially new technologies, given my background in technology for 38 years, but we need to make sure that we are cautious of the ethical, legal and privacy implications of this new technology. This bill would set the ground rules for the ethical use of AI.

The bill would also provide access to employment opportunities for all workers by providing more oversight for regulated third parties. The amendments for the Fair Access to Regulated Professions and Compulsory Trades Act would improve accountability and transparency. Certification, licensing and high-end processes should be standardized, formally written and subject to documented oversight. This will have a positive impact for foreign-trained professionals like newly immigrated professionals, like me—I am an internationally trained engineer—removing barriers that are preventing highly qualified, internationally trained individuals from having their qualifications assessed and approved.

Last spring, I was very proud to stand alongside the then Minister of Labour as the Professional Engineers of Ontario announced that they were the first regulators to remove Canadian experience requirements from the credential system. Last month, I was attending one of the PEO events, and I was told that almost 50% of the new applications are very well-trained professionals and engineers who are actually new immigrants, that don’t have the Canadian experience. So they now can apply. They were prevented from applying before.

I’m happy to hear that now, a high percentage of those applicants are those with foreign experience and new immigrants. That shows that this piece of legislation is working. More than 50% of the applications—this is huge.

Now, we are continuing to remove Canadian experience requirements from all the provincial requirements and from job postings. Highly qualified individuals deserve to have an opportunity to work here in Canada without discrimination.

Canada is accepting many new immigrants who are highly qualified. Before entering this country, prospective immigrants must submit their certifications, degrees and diplomas—documents to prove that they are highly skilled, highly trained professionals—because they get points for that. Canada accepted these immigrants because we have a need for those skilled professionals.

However, once they arrive in Canada, immigrants often are shocked to face the reality that they are not able to practise their profession. In some cases, they are actually not able to apply to get their professional credentials. Canadian experience requirements are stopping people from getting the jobs they are trained to do. Many immigrants end up working for minimum wage jobs for years because the barriers are preventing them from getting a job in their industry.

Trust what I’m saying, because I was there; I was one of them. I hit that wall before. I know it. I too also have a very personal experience of the impact that Canadian experience requirements can have on delaying career advancements—both me and my wife as well, as a foreign-trained doctor, IMG, international medical graduate.

It’s a win-win situation when highly qualified immigrants get a chance to work in their field and contribute to the province’s economy. It is a win-win situation. They need a job. They came to this country to start their new life based on the qualifications they have and they were accepted based on. We put that upfront as a requirement because we needed those professionals but, when they arrive and they can’t work, none of the two sides achieved anything: not the professional who arrived here to start the new job or the province who accepted them to do the job but didn’t give them the licence or the credentials to do the job. Neither of the sides achieved anything. By those changes we are proposing in this legislation, it’s actually a win-win situation for the newly immigrated professionals and for the province who needed these professionals; they needed them in the job. Immigrants can provide for their families. Businesses have access to the talented, skilled workers they need and we accepted.

I’m very happy to be standing here today to support this piece of legislation as part of this series. I know that there is more to be done. I hope we have Working for Workers 5, Working for Workers 6—hopefully soon. Thank you.

The member from Mississauga–Erin Mills.

I want to thank the member for Mississauga–Erin Mills for your comments, and also the member for Kitchener—

Interjection.

This is the Working for Workers bill. I was at a protest recently at city hall with gig workers, and they were talking about how they’re making $6.37 an hour because this government passed another Working for Workers bill that stripped them of their protections under the Employment Standards Act. In fact, it actually makes them—gig workers—a separate category of workers that are not entitled to the protections, such as minimum wage protections. Some of these gig workers are making $6.37 an hour.

My question to the member is, should this government repeal that legislation and allow gig workers protections under the Employment Standards Act? I’ll ask it to the member from Mississauga–Erin Mills.

Questions?

I really thank my colleague for the good question.

Again, I’m not saying that this bill will solve all the issues we have. We have some issues come, as your colleague was talking about earlier about the change in the working environment. There’s a lot of contract work, not full-time jobs. There are a lot of new job descriptions, even job nature, which weren’t there, that maybe are not covered under some of the bills. Definitely it’s fair to look into every situation and try to make sure everybody is protected.

This part of the bill protects what we can protect, but if there’s any need for more, I think there will be a Working for Workers 5 coming.

I want to thank both my colleagues for their comments this morning.

My question is to my colleague from Kitchener South–Hespeler. I appreciated her comments about her front-line experience as a server in the hospitality industry, but I know she’s also a lawyer. My question is: There’s an obligation in Ontario for employers to provide a workplace that is safe and free from harassment, and I’m wondering if my colleague could please comment on the regulation of the use of NDAs in the case of workplace sexual harassment, misconduct or violence and how that’s going to further protect our workers across Ontario.

Next question?

My question is for either member. I’m still trying to wrap my head around super-indexing in this bill and why that’s more important than a couple of things, like some workers, pre-1988 or -1985, who are really disadvantaged, who are on WSIB—the 13% of cases that are complex and get dragged out and create hardship for people.

I also mentioned I have a private member’s bill that talks about protecting workers in group homes and retirement centres. The challenge is, they’re not covered by WSIB simply because of their employer. They’re doing the same work as other people are in long-term-care homes, but they don’t have the same employer, so they don’t have coverage, and many of them have multiple jobs. It’s a big risk for them. I’ve talked to this minister and the previous minister about it and they’re supportive of it. I’m encouraged by that.

I guess my question for either member is: Do you think that there’s some things that we could do at the WSIB to actually alleviate some of the risks and suffering, in some cases, that are happening to people out there who don’t have coverage or who have coverage but aren’t getting satisfaction?