The Employment Standards Act and the Labour Relations Act are currently being reviewed in Ontario. The two Special Advisors leading this review issued an Interim Report on July 27, 2016.
The Interim Report includes a number of different options for changes government could make to these two important pieces of legislation, which set out the minimum standards for workplace rights and protections in Ontario that can’t legally be breached.
The Special Advisors have asked for interested groups, organizations and individuals to provide feedback on the Interim Report to help inform their Final Report to the government.
ISAC has now made a submission on the Interim Report.
Our submission makes recommendations about:
- Expanding the definition of both “employee” and “employer”
- Ending exemptions from the Employment Standards Act
- Reducing hours of work and ensuring workers have the right to refuse overtime
- Ending the precarity of part-time and temporary work
- Increasing “Termination Pay” and ensuring more workings are entitled to it
- Extending the right to “Severance Pay”
- Extending “Just Cause for Dismissal” protection to non-unionized employees
- Regulating migrant worker recruiters
- Effective enforcement of the rights protected by the Employment Standards Act
- Ending the exclusions of migrant worker-dominated sectors from the Labour Relations Act
Our submission supports and draws on the work of the Workers’ Action Centre and Parkdale Community Legal Services, and the Migrant Workers’ Alliance for Change.
ISAC has already made a submission on the Personal Emergency Leave provisions of the Employment Standards Act. The Special Advisors asked for that feedback by August 31.
This review is very important as it’s widely recognized that the current standards don’t provide enough protection for precarious and vulnerable workers, especially given that the number of precarious jobs in the labour market is growing.
You can read our submission in PDF here or in Word here.
Read the Changing Workplaces Review Interim Report and learn more about the review here:
https://www.labour.gov.on.ca/english/about/workplace/.
Read the Workers’ Action Centre / Parkdale Community Legal Services submissions here:
http://www.workersactioncentre.org/updates/new-report-building-decent-jobs-from-the-ground-up/.
Read the Migrant Workers’ Alliance for Change submissions here:
http://www.migrantworkersalliance.org/ensuring-migrant-worker-fairness/