Submission

Dear Dr. Arthurs

I would like to point out to you some major flaws in the Federal Labour Standards as it applies to truck drivers, and also to the enforcement of labour standards upon companies. This is applicable to city and regional drivers more-so than to long-haul truck drivers.

First of all, I consider it to be discriminatory and downright unjust, that a secretary, receptionist, or just about any other worker, receives overtime after 8 hours/day, or 40 hours/week; while a truck driver receives it only after 9hrs/day, 45 hrs/week in the city, or after 60 hrs/week if he/she goes more than 16km out of the city limits. Truck driving (not long-haul), is physically demanding and stressful work as we are expected to load and unload our trucks, and have to deal with traffic and weather conditions on a constant basis. Many companies already pay overtime after 8 hours, but many also use the labour code to their advantage not to pay.

Second, due to the labour code, truck drivers are being forced to work up to 15 hours per day without any overtime at all. Companies do this by having a driver work for 9 hours in the city, and then sending them on a regional run for up to 6 hours, and because of the labour code, they are not required to pay any overtime. This applies to drivers that are paid by the hour. Another way that they do this if their collective agreement states that overtime is paid after 8, is that they will work a driver in the city for 8 hours, and then send them on a regional run for 7 hours, but pay by the mile travelled for the regional run. Another company I know of, has their city drivers on a salary based on 45 hours per week of $2400 / month, and anything over 9 hrs/day is paid out at $12/hr, which is the same rate as the salary, once again, the driver is out of luck!

Third, regional drivers that are paid by the mile. A long-haul driver can make good money being paid by the mile, provided he can get in his truck and drive steady for 10/13 hrs per day, a regional driver, drives from say Calgary to Edmonton, has to find his destination, unload, find another destination, reload, and return to Calgary. Mileage is based on the 7 hours driving time return trip, however, a run such as this can take up to 13 hours. All regional work should be paid by the hour only.

Next, we get into the enforcement of labour standards. Up until recently, I worked for a company that does not adhere to the federal labour standards. The company was formed in 1985, and only in July of 2004, did they ever pay any overtime at all. Then in July, they agreed to pay overtime after 10 hrs/day to their hourly drivers regardless of the work involved. As I had just started working for this company, I chose to make a "confidential" complaint to labour standards. This means that labour standards cannot disclose my name to the company while investigating. I was told that because my complaint was confidential, it would take up to a year to investigate, at which time, they would go to the company, request a random sampling of payroll documents for drivers (of which mine, may or may not be included), and if any violations are found, they would force the company to pay the outstanding amounts for the last year, as they are only allowed to go back one year. It is Labour Standard's hope, that if discrepancies were found, that the company would go back and correct them for all employees affected, however there is nothing forcing them to. Also, if my name was not among the random sampling, I would be totally out of luck and have to start over from the beginning if the company did not voluntarily comply to fix all employee's earnings. Furthermore, why would the company voluntarily comply? Regardless of the number of complaints received by the Labour Board, they cannot issue fines or penalties of any kind against an unscrupulous company. This fact in itself, creates problems; backlogs are created at Labour Standards, because problems are never fixed, they are only dealt with on an individual basis, only to have the company take advantage of the next employee that does not have the knowledge or where-with-all to stand up for his rights. If the first offence against a company came with a warning, the second imposed a $5000 fine, and the third a $10000 fine, this problem would be alleviated very rapidly. This lack of deterrents, not only hurts the drivers of the company flaunting the law, but for other companies that are competing in a competitive market, because the first company has an unfair advantage in setting rates as opposed to a company that is meeting or exceeding Labour Standard's guidelines.

Another problem is, that the only one's that can file a complaint against a company, are employees or ex-employees of said company. I know of 3 trucking companies in Calgary alone, that I have not worked for, that do not adhere to the labour code as far as payment of overtime, as stated previously, this is hurting companies that do. Anyone should be able to make a request to Labour Standard's for an investigation into a company's pay policy. If the Labour Standard office was able to impose fines to prevent recidivism, they would have the manpower to investigate these complaints without additional staffing. Companies that do not pay according to the guidelines set by Labour Standard's , are stealing from their employees, we would not catch a thief numerous times, and tell them that as long as they gave what they took, back to the person they took it from, we would not press charges! We might do that once, then if the behaviour continues, we press charges to prevent re-occurrence.

There is a great hue and cry from the industry that there is a shortage of professional drivers, this shortage is in part caused by drivers that are tired of being taken advantage of, and have thusly got out of the business. Many will return when wages and working conditions improve. I hope that you have found this helpful in your review, and please feel free to contact me if you have any questions. In the event of a federal election, will your review be terminated?

Dave Kovach