Submission to the Standing Committee on Justice Policy at the public hearing on Bill 175
December 3, 2009
We are Canada’s largest citizen advocacy organization with 70 000 members across the country and over 70 volunteer chapters that organize in their communities to protect Canada’s health and social programs, public services, water and natural resources.
As the Regional Organizer I work with hundreds of your constituents, who in turn work with thousands more. We encourage elected officials to take actions that strengthen communities and their local economies and preserve the high standards in regulation that Ontario has traditionally enjoyed.
Since our founding in 1985, we have pressured government to live up to its responsibility to protect the rights of Canadians. In 1998, the Council of Canadians helped defeat the Multilateral Agreement on Investment, and we have been at the forefront of citizen opposition to similar trade and investment deals at the WTO and elsewhere. Our national chairperson, Maude Barlow, is internationally recognized for her social justice campaigning, her critique of service privatization, and for championing the public sector.
The Council of Canadians has just finished a nine city speaking tour and community forum in Ontario to discuss Bill 175 as well as the Ontario Quebec Trade and Cooperation Agreement and the proposed Canada EU trade agreement.
Hundreds of participants in these events expressed concern over the impact of the deregulation that will result from these initiatives.
They were shocked that the Ontario government had not made public the Ontario Quebec Trade and Cooperation Agreement before it came into effect.
They understand that the Canada EU Agreement will open our public services to privatization.
At the time of the tour, we had no idea that the government would be forcing Bill 175 through this month. Given the wide-ranging public impacts, we do not believe that one day of hearings is sufficient.
This committee must hear the broad, genuine public concern that exists when people learn of the impacts of Bill 175.
We are forced to question the urgency with which the government is moving on Bill 175. Policy implemented without public input is bad policy.
On behalf of our membership, we testify to you today, that Bill 175 is a serious threat to good regulation that currently works in the public interest.
Furthermore, that the process of consultation on this bill has fundamentally excluded those most impacted by its proposed changes – the public at large. We suggest that one day of hearings is inadequate and we question the government’s commitment to democratic transparency in implementing Bill 175.
We participated in a conference call with the Ministry of Training yesterday where we heard the government’s claim of having undertaken wide-ranging consultations this year with the associations that regulate occupational certification. This process was flawed in that it entirely excluded the most important stakeholder – the public at large.
Certification standards and regulations exist to protect our society. The people of Ontario want to have a say in any attempt at lowering these standards in order to comply with those in other provinces. Deregulation in Ontario always raises memories of the tragedy at Walkerton.
We question the existence of a labour mobility “problem” in Canada. Labour mobility issues are easily addressed through interprovincial cooperation and voluntary initiatives such as the Red Seal program for skilled trades.
It is not broken, so don’t fix it.
The Ontario government’s closed door approach to Bill 175 is worrisome in the context of upcoming AIT modifications and the federal government’s pledge to exercise its authority if provinces don’t eliminate perceived trade barriers by 2010. This causes us great concern about the Canada EU Agreement negotiations.
We offer that the true purpose of closing out public consultation on Bill 175 is to make it easier to impose broad constraints on the exercise of governmental and public authority under the rubric of addressing trade barriers. At its core, this is an agenda to promote further privatization and deregulation, precisely the policies that have been ruinous for domestic and global economies, and which have also frustrated efforts to deal with pressing environmental challenges such as climate change.
For more information about inter-provincial trade agreements, and for ideas on how to fight them, contact the Council of Canadians at 1-800-387-7177 or email inquiries@canadians.org.
