New Ontario law allows less pay for overtime | ThePeterboroughExaminer.com

But Pam Frache, co-ordinator of the Ontario Fight for $15 & Fairness campaign, said the new law gives “the green light to employers to demand that workers work more but get paid less.”

For example, an employee who works 30 hours in weeks one and two and 60 hours in weeks three and four would normally be entitled to 32 hours of overtime pay that month. With the month-long averaging agreements that Bill 66 allows, they would get just four hours of overtime pay.

Frache said the new measures will encourage employers to assign erratic schedules to workers in order to minimize overtime payments.

“It can really introduce precarity and uncertainty and fluctuating hours,” she said.

Previously, employers required permission from the Ministry of Labour to use an averaging agreement.

“Requiring Ministry of Labour approval of overtime-averaging agreements is an essential safeguard for employees’ basic overtime protections and ensuring there are bona fide reasons for overtime averaging,” said Joshua Mandryk, a lawyer with Toronto-based labour law firm Goldblatt Partners.

via New Ontario law allows less pay for overtime | ThePeterboroughExaminer.com

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Defining the Enemy | The Holocaust Encyclopedia

A number of groups were targeted as enemies or outsiders. They included Jews, Roma (Gypsies), homosexuals, and political dissidents. Also targeted were Germans viewed as genetically inferior and harmful to “national health,” such as people with mental illness and intellectual or physical disabilities.

2
The use of  propaganda and laws to define the enemy as a cohesive group was a key factor in achieving the goals of the Nazi regime.

3
These campaigns incited hatred or cultivated indifference to it. They were particularly effective in creating an atmosphere tolerant of violence against Jews.

via Defining the Enemy | The Holocaust Encyclopedia

Although not targeting specific races the Donald Trump Presidency with the continuing use of “Fake News” and “Lies” is NO LESS DANGEROUS TO THE FREEDOM OF THE PEOPLE, unless we recognize it for what it is we could be doomed to repeat a very DARK TIME in the past century!

Ontario’s War on “Red Tape” Continues: PC’s Table Bill 66 | Canadian Labour and Employment Law

Proposed changes to the Employment Standards Act (“ESA”)

If Bill 66 is implemented in its current form, the ESA would be amended such that employers would no longer be required to obtain the Director of Employment Standards’s approval to make agreements to:

permit their employees to exceed 48 hours of work in a work week; or
allow averaging of an employee’s hours of work for the purpose of determining the employee’s entitlement to overtime pay.
Under Bill 66, the employer would be able to average the employee’s hours of work over a period not exceeding four weeks in accordance with the terms of an averaging agreement between the employer and the employee. Existing overtime averaging agreements in unionized workplaces would continue to be effective until a subsequent collective agreement comes into effect.

The current requirement to obtain the Director’s approval for excess hours and overtime averaging agreements came into effect in 2005 under the Liberal government. The provisions were controversial at the time due to the administrative burden placed on employers to obtain these approvals.

In addition, Bill 66 contemplates that employers would no longer be required to post a poster in their workplaces to provide information to employees about the ESA and its regulations.

via Ontario’s War on “Red Tape” Continues: PC’s Table Bill 66 | Canadian Labour and Employment Law

Power Workers’ Union Rejects OPG’s Final Offer

“Our members’ first choice is always to reach an agreement through negotiating in good faith,” says president of the Power Workers’ Union Mel Hyatt. “We are disappointed that OPG provided a final offer that remained unchanged from the previous offer that had already been rejected. We need to reach an agreement that will strengthen the reliability of Ontario’s energy sector.”

A majority of PWU members voted in favour of job action in response to OPG’s refusal to reconsider its stance to deny over 300 highly trained, skilled term workers the rights of full-time employees. Currently, 300 Pickering and Darlington power plants employees fit in the ‘term’ worker category.

“OPG’s treatment of highly trained workers must be addressed. These employees are relied upon to ensure the reliability of Ontario’s electricity sector, and therefore should not be treated as a disposable resource,” says president of the Power Workers’ Union Mel Hyatt.

via Power Workers’ Union Rejects OPG’s Final Offer

Procurement Perspectives: Value for money: Bill 66 and union versus non-union – constructconnect.com

“My research has suggested that it would be difficult to come to a definitive conclusion at this time as to how this new Bill 66 will affect the government procurement process.

On one hand, I have said that when you restrict bids, the price goes up.

I have also said that if too many contractors pick up bids (over seven for example), it is less likely that those contractors will take the time to compete with such a large pool of bidders.

I have not seen any undisputed, factual, information that the cost of using union contractors on large construction projects borders on a 40 per cent premium.

It has been my observation that the main reason for over-priced projects can be directly attributed to the procurement process, not labour rates.”

via Procurement Perspectives: Value for money: Bill 66 and union versus non-union – constructconnect.com

UFCW is first to unionize cannabis retailers in Quebec – UFCW Canada – Canada’s Private Sector Union

Montreal – December 10, 2018 – UFCW Canada is proud to announce that applications to represent employees at SQDC cannabis retail locations in both Rosemont and Rimouski, Quebec have been certified by Quebec’s Administrative Labour Tribunal (Tribunal administratif du travail, or TAT). The two new bargaining units make UFCW the first union to represent workers in Quebec’s emerging cannabis sector. Rosemont was certified on December 7, and Rimouski on November 26.

Workers at the SQDC cannabis retail locations look to UFCW as the union for cannabis workers and its proven record to negotiate collective agreements in the sector that:

via UFCW is first to unionize cannabis retailers in Quebec – UFCW Canada – Canada’s Private Sector Union

GM closing all operations in Oshawa, Ont.: sources | CTV News

Numerous sources have told CTV Toronto that General Motors is planning to close all operations in Oshawa, Ont., affecting thousands of high-paying jobs.

The announcement is expected to be made on Monday, in the city of about 159,000 people located roughly 60 kilometres east of Toronto.

Sources said they believe the Oshawa closures are part of a global restructuring.

PHOTOS

General Motors in Oshawa, Ont., on Wednesday, Jan. 24, 2018. (The Canadian Press / Frank Gunn)

There are currently about 2,500 union positions and roughly 300 salaried employees in the Oshawa area. GM employs many more in Ingersoll, Markham and St. Catharines. It’s unclear if those positions are affected.

Outgoing Oshawa Mayor John Henry told CTV Toronto’s Miranda Anthistle that he’s “hoping it’s just a rumour” because GM is a “huge economic engine to the community.”

via GM closing all operations in Oshawa, Ont.: sources | CTV News

Trump’s Mar-a-Lago Wants to Hire Foreign Workers as Servers and Cooks – Eater

President Donald Trump, whose policies have consistently (and inaccurately) cast immigrants as a group that “takes jobs and benefits away from hardworking Americans” (his most recent tweet, using this exact phrasing, went out a scant 17 hours ago), has filed a request with the Department of Labor asking permission to hire 61 foreign workers as temporary cooks and front-of-house servers at his for-profit, Palm Beach, Florida Mar-a-Lago resort.

The request for 21 cooks and 40 front-of-house employees, for an employment window of October 2018 to May 2019, is under the controversial H-2 visa for temporary workers, which allows employers to fill non-agricultural roles for which there “are not enough U.S. workers who are able, willing, qualified, and available to do the temporary work.” (Framed another way, application for said visa suggests that the Trump Organization, which runs Mar-a-Lago and other Trump properties, believes that there are no local American citizens “able, willing, and qualified” for the seasonal cook and server jobs.)

According to Department of Labor filings, servers in that temporary role would be paid $12.68 per hour, with cooks receiving $13.31 per hour. Annual membership to Mar-a-Lago costs $14,000 per year, not counting a $200,000 initiation fee.

via Trump’s Mar-a-Lago Wants to Hire Foreign Workers as Servers and Cooks – Eater

If You Work in a Dangerous Job, You Should Be Worried About Brett Kavanaugh – National Employment Law Project

“When should we as a society paternalistically decide [that employees should be protected from] the risk of significant physical injury?” Kavanagh wrote in his dissent. Not only was this an extreme position—one few have espoused on the bench—but it completely contravenes Congress’s intent when it passed the workplace safety law more than four decades ago.

A bipartisan Congress passed the Occupational Safety and Health Act in 1970, and President Richard Nixon signed the legislation into law. It provided workers with the fundamental right to go to work and come home every day; workers should not have to sacrifice their lives for a paycheck. The law is clear that it is the employer’s responsibility to provide a safe workplace.

via If You Work in a Dangerous Job, You Should Be Worried About Brett Kavanaugh – National Employment Law Project

From my Facebook Post:-

Copy of a post I put up on my Union Group page:-

“Hello Brothers/Sisters, just wondering about the details of the Labour Day parade on Sept 3rd. Has anyone heard anything?

I know the normal route is along Queen down Dufferin St. where the parade enters the CNE grounds through the Dufferin Gates, given the fact that IATSE LOCAL 58 Toronto Stagehand Workers have been LOCKED OUT and will most likely have a picket line WHAT ARE THE PLANS FOR THIS?

Honour the picket line and NOT CROSS, or CROSS the picket line AND DIS-HONOUR THE REASON FOR THE PARADE!”

https://www.58lockedout.com/

via (1) Norm Swaebe