Submission

Poverty and Labour: Improving Part III of the Canada Labour Code

The National Anti-Poverty Organization
2212 Gladwin Crescent, Unit C7
Ottawa, ON
K1B 5N1
(613) 789-0096
napo@napo-onap.ca

Submission to the Federal Labour Standards Review 2005

The National Anti-Poverty Organization (NAPO) is a non-profit organization representing 4.7 million Canadians currently living in poverty. Our mandate is to eradicate poverty in this country. We are referred to as a national "voice of the poor" because our 19-member board is made up of people who live or have lived in poverty at some time in their lives. Our membership is made up of low-income individuals, organizations that provide direct and indirect services to the poor and other concerned Canadians.

Why we need strong and comprehensive standards

1. The Rise of Precarious Employment

There are many reasons to strengthen and enforce comprehensive labour standards in Canada. Perhaps the most important is the great number of changes that have occurred in the work place over the last 20 years. As the nature of work has changed, it has become increasingly difficult for working Canadians to avoid poverty. Even households with two low-wage workers cannot earn sufficient income to escape poverty. These changes increase the need for minimum labour standards rather than decrease it. For example, one of the marked shifts in the nature of employment is the growth of precarious work.

There is a rising number of workers who are self employed or employed in part time, temporary, low-wage work that falls outside the boundaries of current standards. One in seven adult full time workers have held their job for less than one year. More than 11% of all workers are in explicitly temporary jobs up from 7% in the 1980's.¹ Nationally, 25.3% of workers occupy low-wage jobs.² In 2003, 57% of youth earned less than $10 an hour, 16.2% of women aged 25 to 54 and 11.2% of men aged 25-54 earned less than $10 an hour.³ Of particular concern is the fact that there is a much higher percentage of low wage employment among visible minority and immigrant workers.

Lack of coverage leaves these workers vulnerable to poverty, abuse, injury and exploitation. This is particularly true for women and immigrant and visible minority workers as well as youth who are overrepresented in these types of jobs. They are either poor or are at great risk of becoming poor due to low wages, unstable employment, and lack of access to income support programs, benefits and work rights.

2. Poverty and Minimum Wages

Current standards for minimum wages contribute significantly to poverty. Not one province or territory has a minimum wage that allows a worker to live above the poverty line. In many cases, wages fall well below all of Canada's poverty measures. Minimum wages have been allowed to fall in real terms from a high point of an average of $8.58 (in inflation-adjusted 2001 dollars) to $6.76 in 2001; a decline in purchasing power of over 20%. In 2000, 30% of all low-wage workers lived in low-income families (households earning incomes below Statistics Canada's Low Income Cut-Offs). Anywhere in this country, a minimum-wage worker working full time for a full year is still from $5000 to $9000 below even the most conservative poverty measure.

Minimum wages (provincial and territorial) must be set at a level that is adequate to live on. This means they should be set at a rate of $10 an hour and indexed to growth of the average hourly wage. In addition, a federal minimum wage must be reinstated at the same $10 an hour rate and indexed. These measures would reduce poverty without negatively affecting jobs. Experience in the UK, where minimum wages have been raised significantly in the past few years, has shown that as many new jobs are created as lost because of the increased purchasing power of low-wage workers.

3. Compliance and Enforcement

Coupled with the increasing vulnerability of workers in precarious employment is the reality that many employers are not in compliance with current minimum labour standards. Improvements are needed to provide maximum protection for workers while ensuring maximum compliance by employers. As an example, youth working in low-wage part time jobs often arrive at work to do a previously scheduled shift only to be told by their employer that the shift has been cancelled. They are not compensated the mandatory amount of wages and many feel powerless to speak out for fear of losing their job, as precarious and inadequate as it may be. In addition, workers, particularly youth and visible minority employees, may not be paid for work that has been done. As a result, employees earning poverty wages are denied even those earnings through employer non-compliance.

4. Workers with Disabilities

Employees with disabilities are also at greater risk of poverty if standards fail to recognize their circumstances. Only 45.7% of youth with disabilities have employment; those in the core working ages have an employment rate of 51.2% while older workers with disabilities have an employment rate of 27.3%.⁴ Despite the fact that human rights statutes require employers to take steps to accommodate workers with disabilities, compliance is a long way from adequate.⁵ Greater coverage for these workers under labour legislation is required while employer compliance needs improvement.

NAPO supports the Canadian Labour Congress call for explicit coverage for workers with disabilities beyond job protection for workers injured on the job.

Additional Concerns

NAPO also supports the following recommendations to improve current labour standards:

• Provide the right to unpaid educational/training leave and to training on the job (in days per year or proportion of payroll year).
• Link employment standards to human rights protections contained in the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, International Labour Organization standards and the International Covenant on Ending Discrimination Against Women.
• Work with the Ministry of Justice to implement pay equity provisions to be enshrined in law under the Ministry of Justice rather than the Ministry of Labour and Housing.

Conclusion

Workers need better more comprehensive protection under Federal labour standards. This is particularly true for employees in jobs that leave them vulnerable to poverty such as women, youth, Aboriginals, immigrant and visible minority groups and individuals with disabilities. NAPO believes that the review of current labour standards must recognize and address the significant changes occurring in the work place as well as their connection to poverty among workers. More specifically, it must increase coverage for workers in precarious employment, ensure minimum wages are living wages by setting them at a level where an individual working full time full year can escape poverty, adequately protect the growing number of vulnerable workers, and ensure compliance by employers.

Endnotes

¹ Richard Chaykowski, Non-standard Work and Economic Vulnerability. Vulnerable Workers Series - No/3/. Work Network, March 2005.

² Andrew Jackson, "Paul Martin's Economic Record: Living Standards of Working Families and Prospects for Future Prosperity." Hell and High Water. ed. Todd Scarth, 2004.

³ Ron Saunders, Does a Rising Tide Lift All Boats? Low-paid Workers in Canada. Document No 4, Vulnerable Workers Series, CPRN. May 2005.

⁴ Law Reform Commission of Canada, "Is Work Working? Work Laws that do a Better Job." December 2004.

⁵Ibid.