Legislative Assembly of Ontario

EMPLOYMENT EQUITY ACT, 1993 / LOI DE 1993 SUR L'ÉQUITÉ EN MATIÈRE D'EMPLOI

STELCO INC
JANNOCK LTD
HUDSON'S BAY CO
EMCO LTD
NORANDA INC

ONTARIO CONFEDERATION OF UNIVERSITY FACULTY ASSOCIATIONS

CANADIAN HEARING SOCIETY

NORTH BAY IMMIGRANT AND VISIBLE MINORITY WOMEN'S ORGANIZATION

UNITED FOOD AND COMMERCIAL WORKERS

ONTARIO FEDERATION OF LABOUR

EPILEPSY ASSOCIATION, METRO TORONTO

COUNCIL ON HUMAN RIGHTS AND RACE RELATIONS

KARANJA M. NJOROGE

JANAKI BALAKRISHNAN

VIETNAMESE ASSOCIATION OF TORONTO

CONTENTS

Monday 23 August 1993

Employment Equity Act, 1993, Bill 79

Stelco Inc; Jannock Ltd; Hudson's Bay Co; Emco Ltd; Noranda Inc

Sandra Stewart, director, corporate affairs, Stelco

Dale Kerry, vice-president, human resources, Jannock

David Crisp, vice-president, human resources, Hudson's Bay Co

Walter LeGrow, vice-president, human resources, Emco

Ken Hughes, senior counsel, human resources, Noranda

Ontario Confederation of University Faculty Associations

Dr Emily Carasco, vice-president

Canadian Hearing Society

Gordon Ryall, executive director

North Bay Immigrant and Visible Minority Women's Organization

Tolou Rouhani, president

United Food and Commercial Workers

Thomas Kukovica, Canadian director

Ralph Ortlieb, international representative

Pearl MacKay, executive assistant to president, Local 1000A

Ontario Federation of Labour

Julie Davis, secretary-treasurer

June Veecock, representative

Epilepsy Association, Metro Toronto

Marty Rapson, chairman, community advisory committee

Council on Human Rights and Race Relations

Hasanat Ahmad Syed, president

Karanja M. Njoroge

Janaki Balakrishnan

Vietnamese Association of Toronto

Linh Tran, vice-president

Continued overleaf

Continued from overleaf

STANDING COMMITTEE ON ADMINISTRATION OF JUSTICE

*Chair / Président: Marchese, Rosario (Fort York ND)

*Vice-Chair / Vice-Président: Harrington, Margaret H. (Niagara Falls ND)

*Akande, Zanana L. (St Andrew-St Patrick ND)

Chiarelli, Robert (Ottawa West/-Ouest L)

*Curling, Alvin (Scarborough North/-Nord L)

Duignan, Noel (Halton North/-Nord ND)

Harnick, Charles (Willowdale PC)

Malkowski, Gary (York East/-Est ND)

*Mills, Gordon (Durham East/-Est ND)

*Murphy, Tim (St George-St David L)

*Tilson, David (Dufferin-Peel PC)

*Winninger, David (London South/-Sud ND)

*In attendance / présents

Substitutions present/ Membres remplaçants présents:

Callahan, Robert V. (Brampton South/-Sud L) for Mr Chiarelli

Carter, Jenny (Peterborough ND) for Mr Malkowski

Fletcher, Derek (Guelph ND) for Mr Duignan

Frankford, Robert (Scarborough East/-Est ND) for Ms Harrington

Witmer, Elizabeth (Waterloo North/-Nord PC) for Mr Harnick

Clerk pro tem / Greffière par intérim: Bryce, Donna

Staff / Personnel:

Campbell, Elaine, research officer, Legislative Research Service

Kaye, Philip, research officer, Legislative Research Service

The committee met at 1000 in room 151.

EMPLOYMENT EQUITY ACT, 1993 / LOI DE 1993 SUR L'ÉQUITÉ EN MATIÈRE D'EMPLOI

Consideration of Bill 79, An Act to provide for Employment Equity for Aboriginal People, People with Disabilities, Members of Racial Minorities and Women / Loi prévoyant l'équité en matière d'emploi pour les autochtones, les personnes handicapées, les membres des minorités raciales et les femmes.

The Chair (Mr Rosario Marchese): I'd like to call the meeting to order. Given that we have plenty of members, we can begin.

STELCO INC
JANNOCK LTD
HUDSON'S BAY CO
EMCO LTD
NORANDA INC

The Chair: I'd like to welcome the delegation from Stelco. Perhaps, Ms Stewart, you can introduce everybody else. You have half an hour for your presentation. You may decide to take 15, possibly longer, and allow four or five minutes for each caucus to ask questions.

Ms Sandra Stewart: Fine. First of all, I'd like to make one point of clarification. I understand the notice didn't necessarily get received on Friday. This is not a Stelco delegation exclusively. There are five organizations represented here today, so I will start and then I'll ask my colleagues to introduce themselves.

My name is Sandra Stewart and I'm here on behalf of Stelco.

Mr Ken Hughes: I'm Ken Hughes and I'm here on behalf of Noranda Inc.

Mr Walter LeGrow: I'm Walt LeGrow and I'm here on behalf of Emco Ltd.

Mr Dale Kerry: I'm Dale Kerry and I'm here on behalf of Jannock Ltd.

Mr David Crisp: I'm Dave Crisp, here on behalf of Hudson's Bay Co.

Ms Stewart: We're going to share in the presentations this morning. I'll begin.

Basically, our five organizations represent a total of 207 separate businesses or workplaces across the province.

Stelco, for example, has eight different business units in the steel industry, including some secondary manufacturing facilities in the wire, pipe and fastener businesses.

Hudson's Bay Co represents 30 Bay stores and 110 Zellers stores.

Jannock represents 20 business units in three different industries, specifically printing, vinyl manufacturing and brick-making industries.

Emco represents seven manufacturing businesses in two different industries. It also represents 15 distribution centres across the province.

Noranda Inc represents 17 businesses or workplaces in the mining, forestry, manufacturing and oil and gas industries.

In total, our 207 businesses employ over 45,000 employees.

We support the overall concept of equity in the workplace and we're not here to argue the principles of equity or employment equity specifically. Rather, we're here to talk to you about several operational concerns that we have associated with the bill, and we may make some references to the regulations as well.

Specifically, we have four concerns. Three of them are all very similar in that they essentially relate to the definition of "employer," and the fourth one, as you'll see from the document, has to do with the role of the commission itself.

I'm going to turn the podium over to my colleague.

Mr Kerry: The matter that I'd like to take up with the committee is the definition and application of employer which is contained in the regulations. We believe that the definition of the employer is a very key part of Bill 79 in that it requires all employers to register a province-wide employment equity plan. We believe, as multi-employer companies within the province, that the definition is too broad and is likely to create more problems than it solves.

Many of the businesses and workplaces in Ontario that are connected in any way to or are owned by a larger corporate entity would not be recognized under Bill 79 as individual employers. The regulations partly recognize the individual status of workplaces by allowing an employer to divide a province-wide plan into chapters with their own numerical goals. However, the recognition does not go far enough in that it fails to empower employees to be full and effective participants in their own relevant workplaces.

The decision-making power whether or not to divide a plan into chapters seems to rest with an umbrella coordinating committee, a group comprised of individuals from all locations across the province which may not have any knowledge, understanding or appreciation for the local characteristics of other workplaces; that is, workplaces other than their own. Furthermore, combining all of the chapters into one plan will not necessarily, in our opinion, lead to better employment equity plans for the individual workplaces.

The definition of employer, in our view, should reflect who the employees consider their employers to be. It should be consistent with other employment-related legislation in Ontario. The Ontario Labour Relations Act, the Workers' Compensation Act and the Ontario Occupational Health and Safety Act, for example, all recognize distinct business units as individual employers.

The new organizational model in business today tends towards flatter corporate structures with separate and autonomous business units. Many corporations have business units which operate independently. These should be recognized as individual employers for the purpose of employment equity.

My own company, Jannock Ltd, for example, is the common owner of a number of companies which are not related one to another, although they may be clustered in the same geographical area. In Mississauga, for example, Jannock owns a printing company, a vinyl manufacturing company and several brick-making companies. Employees consider themselves employees of the business where they work. They are not related to employees of the other Jannock companies in the same area and they have nothing in common with them. Each of these companies operates autonomously and has its own human resources practices, policies and personnel. Under the proposed "related employer" provision, Jannock would be required to prepare one employment equity plan with a representative on the umbrella coordinating committee from each of its companies.

Stelco's another example. It's essentially a holding company of 10 separate business units, eight of which are Ontario-based and several of which have been separately incorporated as wholly owned subsidiaries.

For a comparison, part II, section 3(3) of Bill 79 recognizes that those agencies, boards and commissions whose employees are not appointed under the Public Service Act are individual and distinct employers for the purpose of employment equity, although those agencies, boards and commissions are arm's-length branches of, and ultimately report to, the Ontario government. The analogy with the private sector is very close and we believe that private sector employers with distinct business units should be treated in the same fashion.

We have some solutions to propose under this section of Bill 79. The first of these is that distinct employers need to be able to prepare separate employment equity plans to reflect the specific characteristics of their workplaces and of their individual workforces. This would reinforce the growing trend to increasing local autonomy in labour-management and human resource matters. Where it makes sense to establish a plan that encompasses more than one location, employers should have the flexibility to establish a larger plan which would be in keeping with the flexibility of other employment-related legislation.

Last, the definition of employer should be modified to permit these options.

I'll now pass.

Mr Crisp: To pick up on point number 2, the possible inclusion of a related employer provision, which we understand is under serious consideration, just extends the problem of an already too broad definition of employer, whether it be one similar to that in the Ontario Labour Relations Act for organized workforces or the Employment Standards Act for unorganized workforces. With a modified and proper definition of employer, a related employer definition is not only unnecessary, but would add to the level of confusion that is undesirable.

A related employer provision would do nothing to benefit the development of an effective employment equity plan. We can give a number of examples of that. In businesses that are commonly owned, employees usually do not consider the common owner or holding company to be their employer. Rather, those employees relate to their individual workplace or business unit and will look to that unit as the employer responsible for achieving the goals of employment equity.

1010

For example, if a trust company, a pension plan or a holding company owns, say, 40% of a publicly traded company, that does not affect the day-to-day employment decisions of the subcompany, nor would it affect the implementation of an employment equity plan.

Broadening the definition of employer to include related employer provisions may actually undermine employment equity. We have an example, and there are others. It's important to understand that often the larger the employee base that you have, the easier it is, eventually, to achieve the desired representation of designated groups. In statistics, if a sample size is so large that all designated groups will be represented in the sample, the goals of employment equity may not be achieved in the individual businesses.

To try and focus that, I wanted to give you the example of Zellers and the Bay, which have about 10,000 employees each, owned by Hudson's Bay Co. In two respects, regarding these as a single employer for the purposes of employment equity will not help employment equity principles. The Bay, right now, is becoming predominantly a female workforce at the executive level, which is often the target that is set out for employment equity, while Zellers is, and evidently continues to wish to be, predominantly male. If you lump them together in a single plan, it will be very convenient for Zellers to use the employment equity that's arriving at the Bay to meet the demands of its plan. They will not have to make steps on their own in order to address the problem to the same extent they would if they were regarded as an individual unit.

There's nothing here to indicate, in any sense, that having a slightly smaller block for the plan is an attempt to skirt employment equity, and having a smaller block works exactly opposite from what it would in the pay equity situation where, taking a smaller group, you may exclude male comparisons that are necessary in order to drive pay equity. But in employment equity, the comparison is external to the group; it's in the community. Therefore, it doesn't matter what size of group you're comparing to the community comparator. That's my example.

The proposed solution is simple, and that is that a more appropriate definition of employer be created so that a related employer provision would not be necessary in the legislation.

I'll turn it over to Walt LeGrow.

Mr LeGrow: Bill 79 requires that all employers prepare and register a province-wide employment equity plan. This approach assumes two things: first, that organizations are all similarly structured and, second, that it will make employment equity easier to achieve.

The draft regulations require that in cases where there is more than one bargaining unit in the employer's workforce, an umbrella coordinating committee must be established with representatives of the employer and each of the bargaining agents. The committee would decide whether and how the workforce will be divided into chapters and which responsibilities will be carried out for the whole workforce or on a chapter basis.

We support the concept of employee empowerment and we recognize the value of employees' input into many issues that affect the respective workplaces, such as employment equity. We also recognize the importance of involving labour in the decision-making process at the work sites where the union members are located. An employee's input should be focused on the employee's own workplace, where the employee best understands the unique characteristics of his or her workplace and where the employee has a direct stake in the outcome of the process.

For example, at Emco we have two major parts to our company: manufacturing and distribution. In Ontario, we have seven individual manufacturing companies and 15 distribution centres or branches operating as separate and distinct businesses. By design, each of the two parts needs to apply employment equity in its own way. The manufacturing companies, all of which operate individually and have more than 50 employees, should be recognized as individual employers and be able to prepare their own employment equity plans. On the other hand, the distribution centres are managed centrally and should be combined into one employment equity plan.

Local work sites are usually the most appropriate units at the local level because they are the organizational units which employees and designated groups focus on and identify with. For example, a native person in Cornwall is not interested in how many members of designated groups are hired in Toronto.

The requirement that all employees set up a province-wide plan will affect single-unit organizations differently than multi-unit organizations. For example, according to the regulations, a Zellers store in Windsor would be required to be part of a consistent Zellers province-wide plan and treat employment equity differently from an independent competing retail operation located in the same area. The competing company, as the only location in the province, would set its own employment equity plan. Under the current bill and regulations, however, the Zellers store would not have this flexibility.

What we propose is that Bill 79 and the draft regulations recognize that separate business units should be allowed to set their own numerical goals and timetables as chapters of a province-wide employment equity plan. They do not take the necessary next step, however, and should allow those separate business units to establish and implement their own plans.

We understand that the government is concerned that some employers will try to circumvent employment equity legislation. However, we believe that such situations will be few based on the number of safeguards in Bill 79 and the regulations which ensure ongoing compliance. Once again, an improved definition of employer becomes key. It would make it clear which organizations or businesses employ 50 or more people.

Ms Stewart: I'd like to turn to the fourth part of our presentation, which is related to the role of the Employment Equity Commission itself.

We believe that the commission's role should continue to be education and that should be the primary focus; knowing, of course, that the plans have to be registered somewhere, it would also serve the role of being the repository for the employment equity plans that are registered.

The current proposal that the Human Rights Commission hear complaints of individual workplace discrimination and the Employment Equity Commission hear complaints of systemic discrimination in the workplace would require that parallel systems be established to determine which commission will hear which complaint. We recommend that all complaints regarding employment equity be handled by a streamlined Human Rights Commission. It already deals with discrimination in the workplace and should be the machinery that, within the existing tribunal, enforces employment equity rather than setting up separate, costly machinery solely for employment equity.

Our proposed solution is that the current role of the Employment Equity Commission not change and that all complaints about employment equity be heard by the Human Rights Commission. We also recommend that, in a broad scheme, a single, streamlined enforcement agency for all equity issues in Ontario be established.

In conclusion, I'd like to say that we appreciate the opportunity to be here and to present our views collectively this morning to the standing committee. We will continue to work with the Ministry of Citizenship and others in this room to provide information, recommendations, develop any ideas that may be requested of us. Thank you for your time.

The Chair: Thank you. We'll begin with the official opposition. There are four minutes per caucus.

1020

Mr Alvin Curling (Scarborough North): I want to thank you very much for your presentation. Giving us a preview of some of your concerns is also very helpful to us. But, again, once you've done that, it raises many, many questions that we'd like to ask you, but within our four minutes I'll try to target just one or two areas. They don't come with ranking of importance. I think they all are very important, the questions that I would like to ask, but we are limited in the time we have.

One of the concerns that you have, of course, is that a separate plan for each location be established, because then it will be more focused in the sense of a more effective employment equity plan. The NDP government feels that employment equity -- and it makes that statement -- is not a numbers game; it's about managing change. I hear them keep saying that and suggesting that. Do you find that the way it is set up would be quite adversarial in nature, if we do have that plan in which you -- the employment equity plan, as already stated, becomes rather adversarial in nature?

Ms Stewart: I'm not sure that we fully understand your question. You're asking if it would be adversarial to -- perhaps you could elaborate.

Mr Curling: Yes. I just want to elaborate a little bit more. You said that separate plans are much more effective than an overall plan itself, and you use the example of Zellers, that the plan that could be effective in a certain location here as a company would not be effective employment equity the other way.

Mr Crisp: I think I can probably that. I think it does create an adversarial situation in one sense and somewhat defeats the purpose of employment equity in another. If, for instance, the Bay and Zellers are in a single plan -- they are very different companies and their managements notoriously internally don't cooperate terribly effectively -- there will be a tendency for each one to shift the problem to the other and try and avoid it to some extent. I think anything which takes away from the people themselves addressing the problem at the lowest level is going to delay addressing the problem altogether. Anything which discourages people at the low level from trying to resolve the plan in the local area -- it simply throws it up to a larger group and doesn't get the job done.

The Chair: One last quick question, because we're running out of time.

Mr Curling: Another last quick question: While the plan is being drafted by the union representatives and employers, there are suggestions made that the non-union people, who are really not at the drawing board doing the employment equity plan, are not there but will be consulted. Do you feel the non-union people just being consulted is adequate enough to participate fully in drafting the employment equity plan?

Mr Crisp: No, we're not particularly satisfied with that approach. There are only eight unionized units out of 140 of ours in Ontario and it leaves out a substantial number of people.

Mrs Elizabeth Witmer (Waterloo North): First of all, I'd like to congratulate you on your presentation. You've indicated you support the overall concept of equity in the workplace and the principles, and I think what you've presented to us today are some very valid concerns regarding the operational aspects. I think you've pointed out where some of the difficulties could arise, and certainly some of them are very similar to those we've heard from employees and designated groups, as well as from the employer community.

I kind of get the impression here that your greatest concern probably is with the whole definition of employer. Is that true?

Ms Stewart: Yes, that would certainly be true. Really what we're looking for is the flexibility to do what makes sense for each of the businesses in the province. Not everybody is structured the same way. At Emco the example was given how employment equity would be, if they had their wishes, applied in two separate ways within the organization, and I can't think of a better example than that.

Mrs Witmer: I guess I would ask you, is it your understanding that in the introduction of Bill 79, employment equity, that the merit principle would always be present? Is that a given?

Mr Kerry: I'll try to handle that one, Ms Witmer. Bill 79, whether it's written this way or whether it's just practised this way, is going to have to find some sort of a balance, because at the end of the day the merit principle always has to be present in any organization. The days, I think, are past when organizations could not worry about merit, not worry about competency and not worry about the contribution of their employees.

But you can take the notion of merit, I think, too far. We have said here that we support the notion, we support the concept and we support the application of employment equity in workplaces throughout the province. Merit doesn't necessarily, in our view, collide head-on with that. It may mean that in the hiring of people, employers have to make extra effort to find people within the designated groups who do bring merit to the situation. It may mean employers may have to put more resources into making sure that they have trained their people so that the designated groups are not excluded.

I wouldn't like to sit here and say to you that this is all just going to be a piece of cake; it isn't going to be a piece of cake. But I don't think and none of us think that those two concepts, employment equity and merit, are mutually exclusive. We don't have 50 years of history in figuring out how to solve the problem so it's going to take some real work to get it solved, but I don't see any practical difficulties in getting it resolved.

The Chair: Two speakers on the government side: Ms Carter and then Mr Fletcher.

Ms Jenny Carter (Peterborough): I'd like to thank you very much for your very constructive brief, which has, I think, already answered a lot of the questions that might have been asked. You have discussed this question of adding a related employer provision to the bill, but I still have a query about that.

The reasons given for possibly adding that are first of all to ensure that there is consistency between who is certified as the bargaining agent for collective bargaining purposes and who has responsibility for developing the employment equity plan. The other one is to make sure that employers can't evade the employment equity plan by organizing their business into components that would be below 50 workers. So can you suggest ways in which these two particular problems could be met that would be acceptable?

Mr Kerry: We are multi-unit employers, as you've seen from our brief. We're in, even within our own companies, totally disparate businesses, and we can read the act and say: "This act isn't going to work very efficiently. In fact, it's going to make life a whole lot more difficult than it otherwise needs to be." That's why we've concentrated on the employer definition.

We realize, at least it's our belief, that the related employer definition is put in there primarily to get at the question of being able to reconfigure workforces so as to evade responsibility under the act -- cheating, in blunt terms. We believe, and we are quite prepared to submit to this committee, at another date, wording which we think will streamline and simplify the definition of employer and which we believe will, on its face, persuade you that the requirement of a related employer provision is not necessary. So we make you that offer. We have taken some runs at it ourselves and we're not finished, but we think that we're well on the way to having something that would improve your bill.

The Chair: Mr Fletcher, one last question.

Mr Derek Fletcher (Guelph): It's nice to see some faces that are familiar from other committees on other bills that have been before this government, before these committees.

The concept of different equity plans throughout the province at different workplaces, I think that's going in the right direction because of the autonomy which should be kept in each workplace and each geographical area. I think that's a good idea. Is there a way of having, for each of your enterprises, an equity plan that could be formed and formulated around different areas, such as a plan that would encompass everything but then when you go to North Bay, it's a little different because of the geographic area? Is that something that could happen, where you've had a plan that was big and then broken down, sort of?

Ms Stewart: I'm not sure I understand your question.

1030

Mr Fletcher: Okay, it's like a collective agreement. The Auto Workers will sign a collective agreement that covers General Motors, Ford and Chrysler, but at each plant, at each different company, it's a little different.

Ms Stewart: It would seem to me, the way I read the bill and the regulations now, that is precisely what it is suggesting and that is not providing the flexibility that is required to multi-unit organizations that are in different kinds of businesses.

Mr Fletcher: I want to know why it doesn't give the flexibility because of the differences in the different areas.

Ms Stewart: It takes the focus away from the local environment, where the employees relate to a scale that's province-wide that has no relevance.

Mr LeGrow: I gave the example of Emco. I have said, on the one hand, we'd want to do it on a company-by-company basis within Emco and, on the other hand, we'd like to do it on a province-wide basis. That's based on how we managed the business. Each of our manufacturing companies, seven in Ontario, are in a discrete market. They have their own sales force, their own manufacturing, their own product development and so on, and they're run like a discrete business within the company. I should add that all but one of our manufacturing companies is organized, but each has a separate union.

We're looking at this and saying, how can you bring together six different unions on behalf of seven different manufacturing companies when they really don't know much about each other? Each manufacturing company is like a separate company. On the other hand, our distribution business, where there are 15 branches across the province, we run like a single business. It's separate from manufacturing, but distribution is distinct on its own and we run it as a single business.

The difficulty we have is how do you pull together a representative body, coordinating committee, that knows anything or knows very much about the other workplaces in the province in a situation like that? If you were asking me, how would you construct this to get the best out of employment equity and yet be consistent with the way you run the business, I'd say let me have an employment equity plan for each of my manufacturing businesses, and I would like one for my distribution business in total for the province.

The Chair: Thank you. We've run out of time. I want to thank all of you for coming today to participate in these hearings.

ONTARIO CONFEDERATION OF UNIVERSITY FACULTY ASSOCIATIONS

The Chair: The next delegation is the Ontario Confederation of University Faculty Associations. Welcome to this committee this morning, Dr Carasco. If you'd like to perhaps introduce the others, you have a half-hour for your presentation. You've seen how it works. You'll want to consider what kind of time you want to leave for the caucuses to ask you questions.

Dr Emily Carasco: My name is Emily Carasco. I'm the vice-president of the Ontario Confederation of University Faculty Associations. On my right is Marion Perrin, our executive director, and on my left, Glen Brown, our communications officer.

OCUFA, the Ontario Confederation of University Faculty Associations, represents 12,000 faculty members and academic librarians at Ontario's universities. We are pleased to be here this morning to speak with the standing committee on administration of justice about Bill 79, the Employment Equity Act, 1993.

OCUFA is a long-time supporter of employment equity, and we welcome the introduction of employment equity legislation. In this brief, we make two points. The first is that certain aspects of the legislation need to be strengthened and the second is that the lack of consideration given to educational equity in the legislation is detrimental to the achievement of employment equity. We'll expand on these two points, but I'll begin with the latter, that is, with educational equity.

The university as an institution is a somewhat unusual place in that it trains its own labour force. Without extensive amounts of university education, one simply cannot become a member of the faculty or an academic librarian. But universities also perform the very important task of educating people from many other occupations and professions, both through professional faculties and through a variety of arts and science programs. The simple fact is that there will be no employment equity in professions such as law, medicine, engineering and business, as examples, if members of the designated groups are not adequately represented in the student populations of the universities. Thus, access to universities, one component of educational equity, is vital to the achievement of employment equity in society as a whole.

Access to universities, furthermore, must include access to the whole spectrum of university programs by a whole spectrum of designated groups. The proportion of women in undergraduate students has increased dramatically in recent years, so women now comprise more than 50% of the undergraduate student population. They remain, however, only a very small fraction of the undergraduates: in engineering programs 16% and in math and physical science programs 30%. Aboriginal women, women with disabilities and visible minority women from some groups, in particular the Afro-Canadian women, are barely represented at all in the undergraduate student population.

The participation of all women drops off at each successive degree level, bachelor's, master's and doctorate, so that women comprise only 37% of the doctoral students and 34% of those who obtain doctoral degrees. Only 21% of the full-time university faculty in Ontario are women.

These are examples of problems with another component of educational equity. The first component that we focused on was access. The second one is retention of students who are members of the designated groups, both during and between programs.

To retain students, their experiences while at university, both outside and inside the classroom, must be improved. Services have to be available to meet the special needs of these students. Curriculum and pedagogical practices have to be scrutinized and revamped where necessary, to ensure that they incorporate multicultural, multiracial, multi-abled issues and do not contribute to sexist, racist, ablist or homophobic stereotypes.

Recognizing that educational equity is a vital part of employment equity, OCUFA has made some substantive suggestions in its Brief to the Employment Equity Commissioner on Educational and Employment Equity in February 1992. We provided a rationale for having a separate section of the employment equity legislation dealing with educational equity. We identified measures from which an educational equity plan could be developed, discussed the importance of the role of teachers in implementing educational equity, outlined compliance and enforcement mechanisms and argued that a separate unit on educational equity be established as a part of the Employment Equity Commission.

We still think that those were good ideas and are sorry they were not taken up and included in the employment equity legislation. Their spirit was, however, taken up by Stephen Lewis in his June 1992 report on anti-racism. Educational equity was a very important part of his vision for a better Ontario, and many of his recommendations either have been or are in the process of being implemented.

Educational equity in primary and secondary schools has received much attention through the implementation of employment equity in school boards, in kindergarten to grade 12 curriculum revision, in destreaming, in round table meetings with principals, superintendents and community groups, in special attention to ESL and AFL programs, in numerous initiatives affecting teacher education and in the impending appointment of an assistant deputy minister in the Ministry of Education and Training responsible for anti-racism, equity and access. The newly appointed Royal Commission on Learning has within its mandate an examination of educational equity in the primary and secondary school systems.

1040

It would seem important to note here, however, that there is still much to be done in the primary and secondary school fronts. Gender stereotyping, for example, is so much a taken-for-granted part of our culture that the schools face enormous challenges in dealing with it. Math and science anxiety and the avoidance of technical courses by girls begins early in their school years. The underrepresentation of women in the university science and engineering programs follows from practices and behaviours exercised at much earlier ages.

Educational equity in the post-secondary system, and particularly in the universities, has received far less attention than it has at the earlier stages of the educational system. Lewis's recommendations consisted of applying employment equity legislation in the universities as employers, increasing the representative nature of governing boards and adopting harassment and discrimination policies. The first of these is now before you. The Ministry of Education and Training initiatives with respect to the latter two are still pending.

Although these are important matters and are related to educational equity in the universities, they are not sufficient to significantly increase access and retention of members of the underrepresented designated groups as students in the universities of this province. Members of governing boards can serve as role models and can certainly influence trends within universities. But action on the part of all other members of the university community is also necessary. Harassment and discrimination policies are vital to the provision of environments in which women and men of all groups can feel safe, welcome and at home. But they are just a part of the environment.

In fact we want to emphasize to you today that educational equity in Ontario's universities is in imminent danger of falling through the cracks. If it does, a large part of employment equity will follow it down. We feel strongly that this should not be allowed to happen.

We are not suggesting that the kinds of initiatives appropriate at the primary and secondary levels are appropriate for the universities. Increasing access and facilitating retention of students in Ontario universities are matters of public policy and are thus in the purview of governments. Academic matters, such as setting curriculum in universities, must remain in the hands of academics. Government can, however, play a role in facilitating these processes.

It is OCUFA's position that the government's tuition fee policies hinder rather then help increase access to Ontario universities. They are a hindrance both to members of designated groups who have been underrepresented in the past, as well as groups not yet designated, such as the economically disadvantaged. Compounding this problem is the continued underfunding of Ontario's universities. This thwarts the retention of such students by making it difficult if not impossible to provide the services necessary to support them when they do gain access. Adequate funding of students in universities does not guarantee the access and retention of students from the designated groups, but its absence undoubtedly impacts negatively upon equity.

As we engage in the implementation of employment equity, moreover, we must continue to give priority to related important issues such as education and training support for women, the availability of child care, policies about sexual harassment, the balancing of paid work and family. These are not only elements of employment equity or workplace accommodation; they are also crucial elements of educational equity. Supports must remain available for women in order that they can devote themselves to university study. Such supports must not become the responsibility solely of employers. Government must continue to play an active role in providing and supporting these issues through structures such as the Ontario women's directorate as well as through the work of the Ministry of Education and Training and other ministries.

Government can provide incentives to universities that would assist in furthering educational equity in other ways. Opportunities can be made available for continuing education for faculty members and librarians so they can make curriculum and resource materials more inclusive and representative of a more diverse student body. Opportunities to learn more about inclusive pedagogical techniques must also be made available on a larger scale. Recognition, both monetary and symbolic, must be given to efforts to change the university.

OCUFA's earlier briefs contain many suggestions for ways to promote educational equity in the universities. We append the list taken from our brief to the Employment Equity Commissioner referred to above. Some of these can be done by the universities themselves, some can only be done with the monetary and non-monetary assistance of government. We urge the committee during its deliberations to explore ways to help salvage educational equity in our universities as a vital part of employment equity in this province. Post-secondary education must not be overlooked when public policy dictates that our education systems must be made more equitable.

I am now going to move to the legislation specifically. On September 4, 1990, the OCUFA board of directors unanimously approved a motion calling on the government to "develop and adopt comprehensive employment equity legislation which includes mandatory goals and timetables." It is almost three years since that call, and since the current government has been in power. Employment equity legislation is finally before this committee and we welcome it.

The committee has already heard from and will no doubt continue to hear from groups such as the Alliance for Employment Equity, who will suggest very specific changes to Bill 79 concerning such issues as coverage, standards of progress and enforcement mechanisms that will help make the legislation a more effective tool to achieve employment equity in society as a whole. We limit our remarks to some general observations about its effects on the academic staff of Ontario's universities.

Employment equity for university faculty and librarians is important in order to make universities as workplaces more representative of society as a whole. Employment equity is also central to the success of educational equity. Faculty members and librarians from the designated groups must participate in the development and implementation of programs and serve as role models and supports for students from the designated groups.

We have already noted that women of all groups make up only 21% of the full-time faculty, and that figure includes women faculty on contractually limited appointments. Although the available statistics are meagre, observation is sufficient to indicate that female and male aboriginals, people with disabilities and visible minorities from some groups are represented in very small numbers among the full-time faculty of Ontario universities. Members of more than one designated group, for example, disabled women or aboriginal women, are even more scarce, and the representation of women and women and men of all designated groups in senior administrative positions in universities is minute.

Our major regret about and criticism of Bill 79 is that it is not strong enough. You have, in the short course of these hearings to date, already seen evidence of resistance to employment equity. We fear that the weakness of the legislation combined with its lack of enforcement provisions will make the actual achievement of employment equity as elusive as it has been under voluntary programs.

Both the bill and draft regulations made public earlier this summer prescribe in great details how employers are to go about planning for employment equity. Sanctions can be imposed if this planning process does not proceed apace. This is laudable, but a plan must not be an end in itself; it must lead somewhere. Members of designated groups must actually be hired, retained and promoted for employment equity to occur. There do not seem to be any available sanctions for employers whose plans are in order but whose workforces remain unrepresentative. The lack of time lines by which accomplishments other than planning must take place weakens the entire enterprise.

In the universities, hiring, tenure and promotion processes for university faculty are very decentralized. This makes it more difficult, although by no means impossible, both to conduct employment systems reviews and to develop guidelines to eliminate barriers. Incentives for so doing are in scarce supply in institutions that have been starved for funds for so long.

One reason why OCUFA endorses the legislation of employment equity is that the elimination of such barriers would be greatly facilitated if goals and timetables were made mandatory. Although there are some who would argue against it, we also believe that in the final analysis the peer review process by which hiring, tenure and promotion are accomplished by and for university faculty will be aided and strengthened by such requirements.

To abide by the terms of the legislation, faculty will need to take a much closer look at the step-by-step procedures used in their search and review processes associated with hiring, tenure and promotion. It will be necessary to make those steps more explicit, more standardized and better understood. This can only result in better and fairer procedures.

1050

Furthermore, by strengthening these procedures, faculty members will be able to abide by the terms of the legislation within the framework of the peer-review process they have always used. This will help to forestall temptation on the part of academic administrators to usurp some or all of that process in the name of employment equity.

Many collective agreements and other documents outlining the terms and conditions of employment for university faculty already contain statements, provisions and plans about employment equity. Many faculty associations and administrations have been cooperating to develop procedures by which these very variable and very decentralized processes can be described and assessed in order to identify and weed out barriers. Strong legislation with attendant enforcement mechanisms is necessary to assist those who seek to firmly establish the principles of employment equity in the processes of hiring, tenure and promotion.

We have argued that employment and educational equity are inextricably intertwined and that both, augmented by existing and future public policy initiatives with respect to issues such as child care, are needed to make Ontario's universities more inclusive and representative of Canadian society. Our universities' graduates go on to make decisions about the future of the country. Such decisions have to be made by everyone. Making Ontario's universities more inclusive is a prerequisite to making Ontario a more just society.

The Chair: Thank you very much. There are three minutes left per caucus. Ms Witmer.

Mrs Witmer: Thank you very much for your presentation. I particularly enjoyed it. I have two universities, Waterloo and Wilfrid Laurier, within in my riding and I know that they have taken some initiatives, but I also know that there are certainly more initiatives that could be taken.

I want to compliment you. I took a look here, I read ahead on your specific structural changes and the need to increase the availability of part-time degree programs, continuing education etc, the recognition of women's differential educational career paths.

Do you see this happening within many universities? If we focus specifically on women, I guess, or individuals who have taken time out in their career path, are the universities attempting to accommodate these women?

Dr Carasco: The universities have increased the number of part-time programs and systems that make it possible for people to do that, but it's really important for us to emphasize that while that is happening we want to be able to continue to encourage women and members of the other designated groups to take part in the full-time educational processes that universities have. That is, we want to ensure that women in minorities do not get ghettoized in part-time programs. The system as a whole must accommodate these groups, so we want to see an increase in those types of programs but not at the expense of the general educational full-time program.

Mrs Witmer: You indicate, I think, in here the abolition of the tuition fee. Would you explain why you feel that is necessary and should occur?

Dr Carasco: The tuition?

Mrs Witmer: Yes, the tuition fee is a barrier, you feel, to the designated group access to the universities.

Dr Carasco: We want to ensure that tuition is not a reason for members of the designated groups and for generally economically disadvantaged people not going to universities. If tuition is the barrier, then that's something the government can do something about, whereas some of these other things are within the control of the university. Tuition is a barrier for many individuals and to say that these people can take out loans is particularly insensitive to cultures and members of designated groups that are not that comfortable with the notion of funding their university education through long-time loans.

Mrs Witmer: I would agree. You made the point that there's work to be done in the elementary and secondary schools. That's the area where I come from myself, and I would certainly indicate recently I was in a classroom and I was surprised at the lack of self-esteem that some of the senior female students had and the fact that they still didn't feel today that they had access to some of the areas that were traditionally male. There's a lot that needs to be done, and that's going to be key if we're really going to see a change in this province.

Ms Zanana L. Akande (St Andrew-St Patrick): I was particularly interested in your idea of educational equity, which is unfortunately beyond the scope of the bill but, nevertheless, an extremely interesting one and an important one, which I would support.

Can I draw your attention to one of the areas that you pinpoint, suggesting that compliance be tied to special grants or contracts which in fact would promote the idea that only if and when -- am I interpreting this correctly? Perhaps I should ask for your interpretation of exactly what that means so that it would be on the record.

Dr Carasco: I think the suggestion that we have in here is that those who are doing well should certainly be rewarded and commended for what they are doing.

Ms Akande: And your interpretation of "doing well"?

Dr Carasco: In terms of meeting actual goals and following timetables that are set ahead of time. One of our concerns is that the emphasis on planning -- and we saw this with the federal contractors program that most universities are under -- that the emphasis was on creating a good employment equity plan. Most of our universities already have employment equity plans in place. So we're ahead, we have a plan. But that doesn't necessarily mean we have employment equity on our campuses. We have a plan on paper. Not much has happened since then. What we would like to see is a system where the university administrations are encouraged in ways that are meaningful to them to make sure that those plans are carried out.

Ms Akande: And you are suggesting that ways that are meaningful to them are through the grants?

Dr Carasco: I would not say through basic funding of universities. Obviously, all universities should get as much as they can to carry out their regular programs, but there are ways of rewarding those who meet their goals and timetables.

Ms Akande: Can you tell me, has OCUFA gathered statistics which would support the fact that many of those in the target groups are employed, when they are employed, on a part-time or a contractual basis? Do you have any statistics which would support that fact?

Dr Carasco: For members of the designated groups? We have on women. We have less statistics on members of the designated groups, but I've now taught in the university system for 13 years and have visited most universities in Canada. It doesn't require a genius; you can just look around at the faculties and you see where they are. They are at the assistant professor level or on contract.

Ms Akande: I suppose that's why I've been able to manage it, because I'm not a genius.

Mr Robert V. Callahan (Brampton South): I'm just new on this committee, but do I gather from what you're saying that these people in the designated groups that are within this bill will have to meet the very challenging rate of marks required today to get into almost any university? Is that going to be a continued requirement of these groups?

Dr Carasco: I have never seen a contradiction between any equity initiative and the whole issue of merit or qualifications.

Mr Callahan: No, but that doesn't answer my question. Does this bill encompass the fact that these people who are to be helped by this bill will be required to compete with those people who are not in the group on the basis of marks, as has been the case of every person trying to get into university over the history of the last 10 years?

Dr Carasco: I guess I had just taken for granted that, yes, they would meet the requirements of any university for entrance. But things like tuition, things like the relevance of their educational experience when they come in should not be the barriers.

Mr Callahan: So what you're saying is that these groups that are included in this legislation will be required to have the same type of marks; in some universities it's an 85%, some of them 75%, to get into law school, 80%. They're going to have to have these, and that's what you're espousing, that these groups that are about to be designated under this bill are not going to be given any extra leg up over those people?

Ms Akande: Yes.

Dr Carasco: Yes. I guess I thought that was so clear that I didn't state that.

The Chair: One last question.

Mr Callahan: The other thing is I notice that obviously you're university-oriented, but you did refer to primary and secondary education. I find it passing strange that this government is about to remove the provisions of the hard-to-serve in the Education Act and at the same time it is trying to give these people a leg up. That's just a statement. I find that a contradiction in terms, trying to help kids with disabilities by removing, on the one hand, as I say, the hard-to-serve provisions and, on the other side of the coin, espousing that they should be given a leg-up in university. I just find it incredible.

1100

The Chair: Dr Carasco? It may have been a statement. I don't know whether -- okay, no reply to that. Thank you for your presentation and your participation here today.

Ms Akande: I'm terribly sorry, but I'm wondering if I may be indulged just to make a comment or to clarify the last speaker's comment. Could I?

The Chair: Just simply to make a point that what he stated was not clear?

Ms Akande: It's a point that relates directly to the hard-to-serve.

The Chair: I'd rather leave it. If the member has made a point that is incorrect, it's on the record and that could be corrected at some other point. But I'd rather not do that at this point. Thanks very much for your participation.

CANADIAN HEARING SOCIETY

The Chair: The Canadian Hearing Society. Welcome, Mr Ryall. You have half an hour for your presentation and I hope you leave enough time for questions and answers.

Mr Gordon Ryall: Just for informational purposes, I'd like to explain a little bit about who the Canadian Hearing Society is. We're a non-profit organization providing services to deaf, late deafened and hard-of-hearing people, mostly within Ontario.

The Canadian Hearing Society last year did submit a brief outlining our concerns with employment equity. That was in February 1992. I have included a copy in your handouts. That would be the third, fourth and fifth pages of your handouts. What I'd like to do is focus on Bill 79 itself today. The first section of that is the workforce survey.

Overall, we're satisfied with the plan but we have noticed that it appears that each employee has the right to refuse to answer the questions within the questionnaire. The Canadian Hearing Society believes that self-identification is the best method, but we also need to make sure we have complete workforce information or data in order to make sure that the employment equity plan works out effectively. For example, if 30% of the employees within a large workplace refuse to answer those questionnaires, then how are we to make sure that the employment equity plan is appropriate?

I believe that there should be some kind of standard -- for example, a minimum of 90% of the workforce must respond to those questionnaires in order to make sure we have enough data to base the plan on. That's just a general suggestion we have. I'm afraid that a lot of important information may be missed if the employees are not filling out the questionnaire.

Another area is employment policies and practices. Within Bill 79, in general we feel the plan is good, with the exception of the area of identification of barriers. The bill suggests that the employer will make the decisions as to which policies and procedures present barriers to members of the various designated groups. Quite often, deaf, late deafened and hard-of-hearing adults feel left out of this process. Most often, the employers and the union bargaining agents do not recognize some of the barriers for deaf, late deafened and hard-of-hearing people. We feel that when the employers do their review of the policies and practices, they must ensure that they consult with consumers.

As for the qualitative measures, the Canadian Hearing Society in general is satisfied with that section of the bill.

As far as the numerical goals listed, the Canadian Hearing Society would very much like to have a breakdown of people with various disabilities. This will enable us to identify whether or not the employment equity plan is working well for deaf, deafened and hard-of-hearing people. We have found there are some difficulties for us without having that breakdown to measure the success for our communities.

The next section is on employee participation. We believe that an employment equity plan must include employees and we are pleased to see this within the bill itself. Employers must be reminded of the right of access to all information for deaf, deafened and hard-of-hearing people. We have a concern that the employment equity plan process will be held back by the lack of interpreting services.

We've also noticed, as far as information and communication, that employers must submit annual reports, and we hope that a breakdown of the various disability groups, including deaf, deafened and hard-of-hearing people, can be recognized within those annual reports. That will again show whether the employment equity plan is successful for the communities that we serve.

The Canadian Hearing Society sees a solid framework in Bill 79 which does support changes in Ontario's workplaces. This cannot be successful without government and public support in other areas, such as the areas of equity in education, access to trades and professions and access to information as it pertains to deaf, deafened and hard-of-hearing people. We would like to emphasize the importance of developing standards for measuring the success of each employment equity plan as well as to assist the employers in understanding what accommodations deaf, deafened and hard-of-hearing people expect to be included within those employment equity plans.

I have nothing further to add at this point, so I would be open to questions from the committee.

The Chair: There are approximately six members per caucus. The government members, we have Mr Winninger and Mr Mills.

Mr Callahan: Six members or six minutes?

The Chair: We have six minutes per caucus. I apologize for any utterance I made that confused all these people.

Mr David Winninger (London South): Thank you, Mr Ryall, for your presentation. I notice in the attachment to your written presentation, the Response to the Employment Equity Consultations dated February 10, 1992, under "Workers' Participation in Employment Equity Planning," you indicate that it's the belief of your organization "that the employment equity plan should be negotiated by management and union outside of the process of collective bargaining and then the collective agreement changed...to integrate aspects of the employment equity plan that require changes."

We heard a number of presentations last week supporting the view that seniority rights in collective agreements are sacrosanct and shouldn't be in any way diminished by employment equity initiatives. I wonder if you could comment on how seniority rights might be balanced with employment equity initiatives.

1110

Mr Ryall: I believe that we do need to strike a balance, which means looking at each situation. For example, it may be possible that one company or large corporation may have no hard-of-hearing people working at its company and it has not ever hired anyone within that group for the last 10 or 20 years. Obviously, I think that seniority should be widened somewhat so that we can make sure that we are able to accommodate the recruitment of deaf and hard-of-hearing people. In the short term, I do believe that we are going to have to give up some of those seniority rights for the long-term benefit. I think in the long term they should be maintained.

Mr Winninger: Thank you.

Mr Gordon Mills (Durham East): Thank you, Mr Ryall, for appearing here this morning. I must say that I got thrown a little bit, first off, because I am used to seeing the signer with my colleague Gary Malkowski. I looked around for him and it kind of threw me a bit.

However, that aside, Bill 79 refers to persons and people with disabilities and I'd just like to know, sir, from you if you have a position on what you would see to be more appropriate to use in this bill.

Mr Ryall: I'm sorry. Could you explain it a little bit more of what -- are you looking for a change in the wording?

Mr Mills: Yes. I'm asking which you would prefer, "persons" or "people," or if you have a position on the appropriateness of using either one in the bill. We have both of them in there at the moment.

Mr Ryall: Right now I believe that the words are interchangeable but I do know that there are some deaf and hard-of-hearing people who have very strong feelings about the exact wording of persons with disabilities. Some of them feel that being labelled disabled doesn't make sense. They identify themselves as deaf or hard-of-hearing, and for that reason they feel that it's important to have a breakdown of deaf and hard-of-hearing people, which is what I talked about earlier about the measures, having the breakdown in each disabled group. Deaf and hard-of-hearing people should be counted within the employment equity plan.

Mr Mills: Thank you very much.

The Chair: Ms Carter, a quick question.

Ms Carter: Okay. Yes. You raised the question of self-identification. You agree with it but you point out that there might be problems with people not identifying themselves. Can you suggest some way in which this problem could be overcome by somehow protecting the rights of individuals to privacy although they are self-identifying?

Mr Ryall: I think the best thing that we could do would be to give some sensitivity training to supervisors to make sure that they approach the individuals in the workplaces in an appropriate manner, that they're able to explain what the point of self-identification is and why they are looking at counting these numbers, to explain the purpose of it and how employment equity will have an impact on that individual person. I'm sure that if it is explained in a positive manner, the individual deaf or hard-of-hearing person would be willing to provide that identification and be counted within that questionnaire.

Ms Carter: Yes, it is within the act that people be given information before they fill in these forms.

Mr Ryall: But we feel that the statement must be put into Bill 79 in a stronger manner. It says very strongly in there that the employee has the right not to answer. That's a pretty strong statement. I think we need to make sure that there are reasonable data before going ahead to implement those employment equity plans, and that's where our concern lies.

Mr Curling: Thank you for your presentation. It was extremely focused. One of the things that jumped out at me when you made comments about the forms to be completed by the employees. You mentioned that at least 90% of the forms should be completed before we even proceed with the employment equity plan. My question then is, is there any penalty that could be levelled on the employee or the employer if this is not done?

Mr Ryall: If, for example, the individual's supervisor goes to the employee several times and they're still feeling reluctant to fill out the survey, then I think there should be some measures to force them to come up with the information within the corporation, but I don't know exactly how we would do that.

Mr Curling: My other question, which you touched on and which I think has been quite a concern to many of the designated groups, is that you spoke about subgroups; you didn't use the word "subgroups," but you feel that it should be broken down in a way that if we have a disabled community, you may have, I think you stated here, deaf, late-deafened and hard-of-hearing persons. I got two messages there, whether or not the disabled group should be designated and then the subgroup as being deaf, and then there's a sub-subgroup, if there's such a term, of hardened deaf beneath those subgroups. Is that what you're saying, that there should be subgroups and a further breakdown of other subgroups within that group?

Mr Ryall: In general, I feel that some deaf people and hard-of-hearing people, or even late-deafened people, would label themselves as deaf or hard of hearing; it depends on how they communicate and what their communication needs are. I think by breakdown we mean that we're looking at the total overall disabled community, but then under that there would be some kind of breakdown statistically of, for example, how many blind people are being employed, how many are using wheelchairs, how many are deaf or hard of hearing. Does that clarify it for you?

Mr Curling: Yes, you answered it. But as you answered that I wondered about the bureaucracy and the paperwork that would be involved there and who would be asking those questions about how severely deafened or late-deafened that person would be. Let me go back a little bit. You said that you would need that they would say "disabled" and under that "deaf," and under that, again, one should state whether they're late-deafened. Now, taking that to other disabilities which are in there, should they also be broken down? Would you recommend that breakdown in other disabled groups?

1120

Mr Ryall: I am recommending a breakdown in the subgroups, but I believe it's up to the individuals to decide whether they would list themselves as deaf or hard of hearing. I do realize that yes, it would create more paperwork, but for us, we feel it's very important to be able to measure that, because quite often deaf adults aren't able to get job promotions, are unable to become managers, and it's harder to be employed to begin with. I think the bottom line is jobs. We need to be able to measure that and if the employment equity plan is meeting the needs of that community. So we would support the concept of a more specific breakdown.

Mr Curling: Did I hear you right when you said that seniority rights conflict with employment equity principles?

Mr Ryall: I think there will be times when there are conflicts, yes, but I also believe that we need to look at the individual situation; for example, if it's a large corporation. I can think of one company that has not yet ever hired a deaf or hard-of-hearing person over many, many years. I think that because they don't have any deaf people in their employ, it's obvious that employment equity should take them into consideration to a higher degree than specifically seniority, because it's been such a long time that they've never hired anyone from that category.

I am sure that in most cases the priority will be okay to follow the normal standard of seniority and employment equity will gradually get the designated groups into those corporations. It would be the exception that employment equity would have to be given higher points than seniority. You'd have to look at the individual situation.

Mrs Witmer: Thank you very much for your presentation; I enjoyed it. I notice here in your original presentation to the commission that you indicated the need for sensitivity training in the workplace. I guess that obviously also needs to occur even within the wider community, because certainly I think if people were aware of the barriers that you face and were more sensitive, they would be more apt to employ people from your community at a later time.

You mention here that resources should be made available to the employer to pay for technical devices and interpreters. Are you looking for government support here?

Mr Ryall: I believe it goes hand in hand, that there has to be a cooperative effort. I'm sure if we look at the larger employers, they may be able to afford the support services that would be required. If it's a very small company, maybe 10 to 50 employees, it's possible that there may be some financial difficulties in doing that. Therefore, I think we should be looking at some kind of assistance, some kind of standards for the workplace, in those situations or some kind of tax credit to encourage them to hire people within those designated groups where the company may require some ongoing funding to do that.

Mrs Witmer: You also mention that there is a shortage of interpreters, and I've personally become aware of that. How could the government be helping to encourage that this be dealt with? What can be done? That's a very serious problem.

Mr Ryall: I think it would be nice if the government would seriously consider funding the interpreter apprenticeship programs. The funding was cut last spring for our interpreter apprenticeship program. We are trying to come up with some creative ways, such as getting interpreter training provided under the jobs shortage list. I believe we need help in order to escalate the increase in the number of trained interpreters in Ontario.

Mrs Witmer: You've indicated here that there is a need to consult with the designated groups around the area of identification of barriers, and I would certainly agree with you. I don't think there's any way that an employer can thoroughly understand the type of barriers, whether it's disabled people or people from the racial minority groups, face. You are, I guess, recommending that quite strongly.

Mr Ryall: Yes, I am.

Mrs Witmer: If there were one thing that you would say to the government that you would like to see changed within the bill, what is that? Is there one area of greatest concern to you?

Mr Ryall: I think the biggest concern I have about Bill 79 is just making sure that in those annual reports, or whatever is to be presented, there are statistics that show the number of deaf and hard-of-hearing people. That is what we would like to see the most, because I think we do need to come up with a way of measuring that. I think you need to remember that we're talking about almost 10% of Ontario's population being deaf or hard of hearing, and that's a very large number.

Mrs Witmer: So you're definitely looking for subgroupings within the disability designation?

Mr Ryall: Yes, I am.

Mrs Witmer: Obviously, that's going to create a few problems, because there are so many different groups which perceive themselves to be within that category. I know we're going to hear today from the Epilepsy Association; we've heard from the learning disabilities. It could become very complicated. That's an issue the government will need to wrestle with.

The Chair: Thank you, Mr Ryall, for coming and participating in these hearings today.

Mr Ryall: Good luck.

NORTH BAY IMMIGRANT AND VISIBLE MINORITY WOMEN'S ORGANIZATION

The Chair: North Bay Immigrant and Visible Minorities Women's Organization, Ms Tolou Rouhani. You have half an hour for the presentation. Did you bring a prepared brief, by any chance?

Ms Tolou Rouhani: Yes, I have for myself, but I didn't have the time or the resources to make 25 copies for the other members.

The Chair: That's fine.

Ms Rouhani: If you like, later I can hand it over and you can make copies for everyone.

The Chair: Wonderful.

Ms Rouhani: Would you like me to go ahead?

The Chair: Yes, please, at any moment.

Ms Rouhani: I'm delighted to be sitting here today expressing my feelings and sharing my ideas with you on such an important piece of legislation.

Employment equity is about justice and equality; it's about fairness and equity; it's about access and removing barriers. I'm here today to tell you how dismayed I got on the day I was watching the discussions in the House on the second reading of this bill. Watching and listening to our government representatives saying that this province does not need an act which will ensure social justice and equality shocked me.

Ladies and gentlemen, there is no good or bad time for justice and equity. You, the elected government representatives of this province, are responsible to every citizen in this province for the same reason.

I came to Canada 10 years ago as a government-sponsored refugee, because my own country of birth did not want me. The only reason I'm here is that I had to flee an unjust, inequitable government which did not recognize basic human rights principles. But this beautiful country gave me refuge. Your government, a government that strives hard to listen to the voice of its people with a democratic political system, is very unique. When you stand on any one point on this planet and want to choose a place to raise your children and breathe the air of freedom, your only choice is Canada. I'm proud of my choice.

This country is viewed by the people of the world as the most advanced country, both materially and spiritually. I know the reason why: It's because of the fact that this nation was built on the skills and talents of immigrants and refugees. It is the diversity of cultures and visions which has led to such a progression. Canada, in particular Ontario, is approaching a reflection of the world's proportional racial population, and this should be reflected in Ontario's workplace. In particular, we must tap into our native human resources, which are the foundation of our country.

Bill 79 is just what you need to make Ontario the most prosperous province in Canada. Your most valuable resource is your human resources. Can you just imagine an hour or a day of that going to waste? I can, because only 12% of the women of Canada are working in the jobs of higher category and because close to a million and a half of your human resources in Ontario, most of them women, are on social assistance.

1130

I have seen and talked to hundreds of immigrants and refugees: the chemical lab technician who is cleaning the washrooms of this very building, the engineers who are driving cabs, the teachers who are changing the beds at the Delta Chelsea hotel. It is extremely unfortunate to open the door of the country and then let people go to waste. It is not only your responsibility to ensure that this act gets passed with many more teeth, but it is to your advantage. It only makes good business sense as we are approaching a globalized consumer economy. Multinational companies which have hired people of diverse cultures are making a hundredfold higher profit than others.

Here I would like to mention what made me feel hopeful while watching all of you on my TV screen. It was listening to Mr Alvin Curling, who spoke so eloquently on this bill. You, Mr Curling, were the only member of the opposition who spoke in a non-partisan manner. Your recommendations should be taken seriously, as I hope ours will be. You talked about the absolute importance of education and training equity and its connection to employment equity. Employment equity cannot be fully achieved without education and training equity. You made a number of other recommendations. I really enjoyed you. Thank you.

I would like to share with you some of my recommendations to ensure a truly equitable Employment Equity Act.

(1) The government should use some of the valuable recommendations made by the Alliance for Employment Equity and the Women's Coalition for Employment Equity and continue ongoing consultations with these groups.

(2) Define words and make them part of the law and not the regulations, because this is the only way standards and objectives become clear and are not subject to different interpretations which further discriminate. The wording used in this bill is extremely weak; for example, "reasonable effort." What is reasonable to me is not to you.

(3) The recommendations in the report of the Task Force on Access to Trades and Professions in Ontario should be implemented, as certification and equivalency issues have been barriers to immigrants. That's why they clean the floors instead of working in the labs.

(4) Racism and employment equity are connected. I recommend that this government pool the resources of the Ontario Anti-Racism Secretariat and the Employment Equity Commission together for the purpose of broader public education and not spend millions of dollars creating different levels of bureaucracy dealing with these issues. This public education to me is one of the most fundamental and challenging jobs.

Thank you for your time and your ears listening to me. I welcome any questions you may have now.

The Chair: We'll begin with the official opposition. Mr Curling, seven minutes.

Mr Curling: In anticipation, I know that my colleagues' feeling --

Ms Rouhani: I don't belong to any political party, by the way.

Mr Curling: Well, that's good and may be healthier this time with employment equity. I fully agree with you.

Ms Akande: I'll bet. You can't get your head into the room.

Mr Curling: I'm sure that my colleagues on the government side would agree with me too that employment equity legislation must have teeth in it. That's why they do agree with me and with you in that respect. To have employment equity legislation that is weak, or even a regulation that attempts to define it that is not very clear and is vague, can be much more damaging in that sense.

Ms Rouhani: Absolutely.

Mr Curling: I would then ask you, do you feel some of the things in the regulations -- some are rather vague somehow -- could be placed in the legislation?

Ms Rouhani: You know what? I am full-time mother and a full-time welfare worker and 10 million other things, so I didn't have a chance to read the totality of the regulations, but having skimmed through them and just finding them so laissez-faire, I felt that a lot of the things were subject to interpretation. They should be put in the act to avoid any kind of -- I mean, the supervisor of my welfare department says that's part of regulations; we're not supposed to do it; we're not obliged to do it. But the act says we have to do it. We have to abide by that.

I have to tell you all that I'm really happy. It's progressive to be coming up with something. It's better than nothing. But I would like that something to be more perfect than imperfect. Mr Curling, you have read that like every member here and you must know which areas. Would you like to tell me which areas you think, and then I can --

Interjections.

The Chair: Order.

Mr Curling: I think very much so -- that's what the whole purpose is about. One of the things about hearing here is to listen to you and also, in the meantime, to take the opportunity, as we listen, to advise the government that these are concerns that we have; for instance, first, to start with, that we feel that employment equity legislation is necessary.

Ms Rouhani: Absolutely.

Mr Curling: We made that very plain here in the Liberal Party, and forget about the partisan; I want that and I will fight to get that. So that is established.

Some of the suggestions we give we hope that the government will listen to and take that advice. So there are many things. For instance -- and I'll use one -- we believe very strongly that all the designated groups that are qualified can compete at the level. They need that access in there, and the merit principle should be a part enshrined in legislation.

That is only one. I won't take your time with your presentation. Because I know you're a quite capable woman, whatever definition they give you -- a woman and a woman of colour, what have you -- you're qualified, and we hope that that merit principle -- that's only one, and I have many, many more.

Ms Rouhani: Is there a doubt that the designated groups would be unqualified? Is there a doubt? I always assumed that that would be the --

Interjection.

Ms Rouhani: You know what? I think people misinterpret. I think Mr Curling is correct here. I think that's subject to misinterpretation, and that's why there is so much fear out there and the white male is telling me, "You're going to come up and take my job because you are a female and you're a visible minority." I think you're correct there, because the ignorance still exists that people of colour are going to get the job just because they're coloured. So I think that has to be clear in there, saying you have to qualify and compete with the rest of the world, but in addition you're a woman and/or coloured or disabled or whatever.

Mr Curling: I'm just glad you said it, because I couldn't have said it as good as you said it.

Ms Rouhani: Thank you. I think the other groups have done well. I know the government is not too pleased with them, the other two women's groups and the Alliance for Employment Equity, but I think they have quite a few good recommendations and they should be used.

Mrs Witmer: Thank you very much for your presentation. I certainly did appreciate it and I was really pleased to hear you mention that you felt one of the greatest obstacles that individuals presently face is the lack of education and training, because on July 13, 1993, in the House, I indicated that the key barriers to the lack of employment opportunity in this province are education and training. Unless we provide all individuals with the appropriate access to education and training, we're never going to have employment equity.

So, personally, that's the key. I guess that needs cooperation. There's a lot that the government needs to do, the employer community has a job to do, and obviously, we need to work together. I hear you saying that you also recognize the merit factor --

Ms Rouhani: Absolutely.

Mrs Witmer: -- and that, given that people have the same employment and training opportunities, they can then compete equally for the jobs, regardless of who they are.

Ms Rouhani: Regardless. Absolutely.

Mrs Witmer: Okay, I would support that. But let's go back and look at some of the pre-market conditions that prevent people from accessing employment opportunities. Some of the things I've talked to in the past are, for example, English as a second language, child care, student loans. What are you seeing? You represent a women's organization. I know we have Focus For Ethnic Women in my community. These are some of the obstacles that individuals do face. How can we eliminate some of those problems?

Ms Rouhani: What I gathered from your question is, are we going to open up spaces for people who are not qualified to fill them through the employment equity? I'm just trying to repeat you so I understand you better. Is that what you just said?

Mrs Witmer: No. I'm simply saying --

Ms Rouhani: Because the gap in education exists in immigrant women, the literacy problems and other equivalency issues and stuff?

Mrs Witmer: That's right.

1140

Ms Rouhani: So when we are bringing in an act now, how are we going to fill those seats up? I understand you.

Mrs Witmer: That's right. How do we prepare people so that they can compete equally?

Ms Rouhani: I understand you now. I think this province has, at the moment, tons of qualified people. I have my MBA, specialized in marketing. I am doing nothing compared to what I should be doing, and there are thousands of others like me who could be in the right place doing the right jobs. So I don't think we are lacking at this time -- once employment equity becomes the law, whatever people are competing, I don't think we lack human bodies to fill the jobs, from the racial minorities, from the disabled, from women, whatever.

The next concern is to address education and training, so the newcomers into Canada and the people who are just coming in could be accessing, so they can remove their barriers. That's where I recommended the report on access to trades and professions in Ontario. Those recommendations, that report came from the commission three years ago, four years ago. We love doing things and shelving them. Those are wonderful recommendations in there.

Mr Callahan: It's called OTAB by whatever stripe.

Ms Rouhani: Through OTAB, what you just mentioned, I believe that OTAB should encompass the totality of the population, and as you know, the representatives are going to be there so they're going to ensure that those programs are going to offered in every community. So I would say that literacy and the rest of it would be addressed with the rest, but I would hate to ghettoize it and say that this is just because of isolation, and in the past it was isolated, different programs and different levels of government offering -- but I would hope OTAB would address right from lifelong learning to the rest of it.

Mrs Witmer: It certainly has the potential to. I know in my own community I have many professionals and people in trades who have the qualifications but they simply can't access those, and as a result, they're forced into jobs that they're certainly overqualified for. So there seems to be a problem, and it's unfortunate that we haven't taken some steps forward regarding the report that was done. We seem to be on hold.

Thank you for your presentation. How many women do you represent in North Bay? I was interested.

Ms Rouhani: There's about 70 to 80 women who are part of this organization, but there is much more. We have a lot of Vietnamese. In fact, we just had a little mini-conference the other day regarding OTAB -- I just wanted to bring that information back to the committee -- and there were about 30 different nationalities represented in that little committee.

North Bay is not Thunder Bay, by the way. People in Toronto think North Bay is Thunder Bay. It's North Bay, 52,000 people, a little town close to Sudbury.

Mrs Witmer: So, 30.

Ms Rouhani: No, 70 in totality but 30 different cultures.

Mrs Witmer: Cultures represented there.

Ms Rouhani: Yes, it's really exciting. It's not everybody in Toronto; we have people up north too.

Mrs Witmer: I was going to say that, and I think that's important. Sometimes we think that it's all concentrated in the Metropolitan Toronto area and so that's why I wanted to ask you that question.

You would say that the women within your organization certainly share the same principles and goals that you would be committed to.

Ms Rouhani: Absolutely.

Mrs Witmer: Thank you.

Mr Fletcher: Thank you for your presentation. You drove all the way from North Bay?

Ms Rouhani: Yes. I woke up at 5:30 this morning.

Mr Fletcher: That's too bad. The government side did want to travel to the northern communities, but the opposition said no.

Ms Rouhani: I understand.

Mr Fletcher: I understand also.

Ms Rouhani: I think you guys have to stop being so miserable. Get on with it.

Mr Fletcher: Yes, I agree. I think if you look at the employment equity and what you were saying about the access to the trades and professions, OTAB is a good program. In fact, OTAB is going to incorporate access-related considerations in its apprenticeship training program. The ministry of skills and development is going to translate and distribute promotional materials, outlining trades certification processes in different languages so that people can understand them. The ministry of industry and trade and technology, labour and skills is going to ensure that access to the professions and the trades issues is addressed in federal and provincial immigration designation processes. So there is work going on.

If we look at the education part and what this government has done as far as education is concerned, we have introduced an anti-racism curriculum in the public school system so that we can start knocking down barriers in that sense.

Ms Rouhani: That's new to me. What anti-racism curriculum?

Mr Fletcher: A curriculum for schools.

Ms Rouhani: When was this introduced?

Mr Fletcher: It's being developed and it's going to be introduced into the schools.

Ms Rouhani: Oh, it's not introduced; it's developing. But you haven't done any consultations --

Mr Fletcher: Oh, yes. Also, with the destreaming issue. Destreaming is another way that we can begin to knock down barriers that have always been put in place. If you look at the stats, if you look at what's happened over the past where we've come to realize people of colour, people with disabilities, people from low socioeconomic backgrounds have been streamed into certain areas which are dead-end areas or low-paying-job areas, and this is a practice that has to end -- this government has started to move in that direction and we do have a policy that's in place.

Employment equity becomes part and parcel of a lot of different packages that are being introduced, and I listen to the opposition saying, "Well, we all see a need for employment equity, we all see that we want employment equity," and yet when you ask for specifics about employment equity, the only thing is that, "This one is too weak." "What are your suggestions?" "Well, this one's too weak," and that's what we keep hearing, but there are no specifics coming from other people except for groups such as yourself, and I appreciate your groups coming in.

As far as your experience and the experience of some of the people that you liaise with, when people come to Ontario, to Canada, and they're looking for employment, are they getting in the door for an interview? Is that happening?

Ms Rouhani: People are not getting anywhere. As I mentioned, I did a report for Comsoc, for the Ministry of Community and Social Services, three years ago looking into the refugees and the immigrants and their job categories and what they were doing at the moment. Qualified people -- there are barriers upon barriers. If it is not their accent, it's something else. If it's not their clothing, it's their smell. It breeds, it's just ongoing, and I think that it is internal and it is the system that has to look at that. That's why I talked about the education process and what an important and enormous task you guys have to educate the larger public. I think that's absolutely essential. I think part of the education process has to be the total acceptance of different human beings as part of this global civilization and not just "Bear with me because I'm black." It's reprogramming human brains --

Mr Fletcher: I understand that. One of my comments was that it's quite simple to introduce legislation that says you must hire or you must do this, but one of the biggest barriers to employment equity is here --

Ms Rouhani: Absolutely.

Mr Fletcher: -- and that's one of the most difficult things to change. But what you said about what other people think about Canada, if we started to look at ourselves as Canadians, if we started to look at ourselves as being, yes, that's exactly what we are, then we can start changing --

Ms Rouhani: I have two recommendations for the government. I think one would be a good marketing strategy for this act in terms of being really global in its strategy, not regional, not local. Let's share this pie. The more we share the larger it gets; the more we plant the more will we get flowers out. Let's get a global vision to the marketing of this.

The other thing is, I know several ministries have combined their resources to create jobs and economic development through a Jobs Ontario community program, but I really think you want to get rid of some of the fears that exist in this province at the moment -- not some; that's a lot of fear. Every day in my office, 20 people apply for social assistance alone in a little town called North Bay.

You have to look at job creation. Maybe while you're working at this Employment Equity Act, you will be -- maybe this is the wrong committee I'm talking to, but economic development should be your priority --

Mr Fletcher: That is a priority.

Ms Rouhani: I know, but, Jobs Ontario, the training stuff, is not solving anything. You have to really look at it very proactively and go ahead gung ho. Bring some businessmen from China, for God's sake, or some investments into this province so we get rid of the fear and encourage business, because business feeds into that. While you're doing that --

The Chair: Ms Rouhani, I don't want to disconnect you, but I do want to ask Ms Akande to ask her final question and perhaps you can weave your answer into it.

Ms Akande: Thank you, Ms Rouhani. I'm very interested in your presentation. I do, however, identify some contradictions and I'm hoping you will help me to understand them. In a general, overall way, and please correct me if I misinterpret, one of the things you've emphasized is that the bill doesn't go far enough and that you are more supportive of the approach that has been espoused by one member as part of his party.

The reality of it is that one of the things that was most criticized by the opposition is the fact that the numerical goals we recommend in the legislation were interpreted as quotas and seen as being negative rather than positive. It would be my belief that numerical goals would provide a basis by which we could evaluate whether people had achieved or moved along the continuum. Are you in agreement with numerical goals?

Ms Rouhani: Absolutely. I don't think that's a deterrent at all. Definitely. How else will you be able to evaluate?

Ms Akande: The other --

The Chair: One final question.

Ms Akande: I'm sorry, I just wanted to be clear --

Ms Rouhani: No, I want to hear it from her. Just one more question.

The Chair: Ms Rouhani, I'm the Chair, in case you forgot that.

Ms Rouhani: I drove all the way here and --

Interjections.

Ms Akande: One more question. The other thing that I wanted to clarify in your presentation is that you do support, as we do, that education is extremely important in ensuring that people are not opposing the legislation out of ignorance, though both of us must recognize that some people demonstrate selective understanding. We also do support education. Are you of the opinion, because I am not, that education should proceed instead of the legislation or along with it?

Ms Rouhani: I think education should start right now because this is an inevitable piece of legislation; it's going to be there.

Ms Akande: And so proceed with it?

Ms Rouhani: Absolutely.

The Chair: Ms Rouhani, thank you for coming from North Bay to make your presentation to us today.

Ms Rouhani: It was a real pleasure. Thank you very much for this opportunity.

The Chair: This committee will resume at 1:30 pm.

The committee recessed from 1154 to 1330.

UNITED FOOD AND COMMERCIAL WORKERS

The Chair: I'd like to call this meeting to order. I'd like to welcome the United Food and Commercial Workers here to these hearings. Who do we have here now? I would allow you to introduce yourselves and then whoever the main speaker is can begin, with a half-hour presentation and questions and answers.

Mr Thomas Kukovica: My name is Tom Kukovica, and I'm the Canadian director of UFCW Canada. Let me present the people with me: on my right, Jay Nair, who is a business representative of UFCW, Locals 175 and 633 here from Toronto; at my far left, Pearl MacKay, who is an executive assistant to the president of UFCW Local 1000A, representing Loblaws and other employers in the province, and an OFL vice-president; and Ralph Ortlieb, who is one of our international representatives. We have also Louisette Hinton in the back, one of our international representatives.

Thank you very much for the opportunity to appear before your standing committee on Bill 79. Let me just tell you who UFCW is. UFCW Canada is the largest private sector union in Canada, representing over 170,000 members. In Ontario we represent 70,000 men and women, mostly in the retail food and packing houses, but we do represent more than 20 sectors of the Ontario economy, being the meat packing, brewing and beverage production. We are probably the largest union that represents more part-time people in the private sector and represents more women, because of being in the service industry and in the retail food especially.

UFCW Canada strongly supports implementation of employment equity legislation in Ontario and we wish to commend the Minister of Citizenship and the government for developing what will hopefully become a model for the rest of Canada.

I'm not going to read all my presentation. I'll bore you with some of the stats that you see in front of you, which really point out to you, I guess, the changing workforce that we live in and the world we live in, which is in constant and rapid change. I think major shifts have occurred and are taking place within Canada and globally. They have a great impact in the workforce, and Canada has always had a diverse population, but the trend is more pronounced today than ever before.

The largest percentage of Canadians are now of neither French nor English descent, nor a combination of both, I guess. I guess among industrialized countries, Canada has one of the largest foreign-born populations, with fully 16% from outside the country. That is the diversity of the Canadian population and the rapid change that has occurred.

I just want to point out to you that aboriginal people are the fastest-growing population in Canada. They also have the highest percentage of young people. That's why those factors bring together a new political impact among the aboriginal people.

Women: we know quite a lot about that in our union. They now comprise more than 50% of our membership, and in the year 2000 probably more than 60% of the workforce will be women and will be part-time.

The presentation we're making to you on Bill 79 is only on the act; it doesn't address the regulations. We want to turn your focus on really four issues that we want to address to you.

First, on page 1, is the seniority provisions; that's seniority, subsection 5(2). We would like to see an amendment to subsection 5(2) adding at the end of 5(2), after "designated groups," "and are deemed to be part of any employment equity plan prepared in accordance with this act and its accompanying regulations." The purpose of this is very simple: We don't want any changes to occur through regulations; we want it to be in the act.

The second amendment we would like to see in section 5 is an addition, subsection 5(3), which speaks to, "Employee seniority rights that are acquired through a collective agreement or an established practice of an employer with respect to any term or condition of employment other than those enumerated in subsection (2) above," which is layoff and recall, "are deemed not to be barriers to the hiring, retention, promotion or treatment of members of designated groups, unless such seniority rights are found to be contrary to the Ontario Human Rights Code, or as decided by the Human Rights Commission."

The next section that we would like to see any amendments or changes to is section 19, where it talks about exemptions. Subsections 19(2) and 19(4) give us great concern. As you probably know very clearly from the Ontario economy, the proliferation of small businesses in Ontario is where all the jobs are created. By exempting 100 employees from employment equity requirements, it gives a great concern to us. We would like to see that changed, because it wouldn't reflect the workforce in the particular geographical area and the population that it serves. So we would like to see that changed, and the bill should include a statement in section 19 that the measurable and enforceable composition goals and timetables approved by the commission cannot be modified by regulation or otherwise. That's the change we would like to see in 19.

Subsection 28(2) describes the power of the tribunal, and it says it may "make any order it considers just." We believe that under the complaint-based model, the tribunal's power should be restricted to dealing with specific issues brought before it, not anything else, and the tribunal should not interfere with the contents of the collective agreement or collective agreements unless as a last resort, where it considers that other remedies will not counter the effects of the contravention. For that amendment, we would like you to look at language that was put in Bill 40, the Ontario Labour Relations Act that was amended, clause 91(4)(d).

The last point we would like to make on employment equity is to section 46, which is the appointment of the Employment Equity Tribunal. We believe that it's an important part of Bill 79. The structure, composition, powers and functions of the tribunal should be defined in Bill 79 and not in the regulations. That's why we believe that subsections 46(2) and (4) should be amended, and on page 3 we give you the amendments that we'd like to see, that "The Lieutenant Governor in Council, after consulting with representatives of management, trade unions, organizations representing each of the designated groups and the commission, shall appoint the members of the tribunal." We say that "The members of the tribunal shall select one or more of their members as vice-chairs."

1340

In addition, the composition of the tribunal should be specified in Bill 79 as follows: "The tribunal shall be composed of 18 members who shall represent one or more of the following; at least nine of whom are women or at least nine of whom are members of designated groups other than women or at least nine of whom shall be representatives of trade unions." We're looking for a mix, and that's what we're looking for.

That is our presentation, our submission to the committee.

The last part, on the panels of the tribunal in section 47, we believe that the panels appointed by the chair must be of at least one representing business and one representing labour, and it shouldn't be only a one-chair panel.

The Chair: Okay?

Mr Kukovica: That's it. We're ready for questions.

The Chair: Very well. Thank you, Mr Kukovica. Ms Witmer, six minutes.

Mrs Witmer: Thank you very much for your presentation. You've indicated here that the composition of the tribunal should be nine women, nine members from the designated groups other than women and nine people from trade unions. I guess what I don't see mentioned here is the fact that the majority of workers in this province are not represented by trade unions. Do you not see them as having an important role in the process whereby we would determine employment equity?

Mr Kukovica: Well, it goes back I guess to the same problem: Do trade unions represent not only organized workers but workers in general? We believe that trade unions do represent all of the workers in the province.

Mrs Witmer: I would disagree with you. We've certainly had individuals appear before us who are not members of unions and feel that they would like to be represented and have the opportunity for some consultation as well. I think if we're going to be indeed fair and equitable, we need to really be sure that there is a role for those people who are not represented by trade unions, and I would hope you'd give that some consideration.

You've also mentioned here --

Mr Kukovica: Just on that area, it always boils down to the same problem: If a person comes here and he's not a representative of an association or of a profession, then he's representing himself; he's not representing any constituency. That's what we believe. So we believe that the labour movement can represent all workers, be it unionized or non-unionized.

Mrs Witmer: I think if you were to talk to employees, you would find that many of them have found a mechanism whereby they can negotiate with the employer outside of the trade union movement. We keep using that as an excuse, but I think it's quite unfair to do so.

Do you believe that merit should be a principle which we should be supporting within the employment equity legislation? Should it be given primacy and included?

Mr Kukovica: I'll have Ralph answer that question.

Mr Ralph Ortlieb: I don't see anything in the act that talks about taking merit away. We think in the trade union movement that we deal with the question of qualifications, and we think that's prime in the act. We don't expect employers or trade unions or anyone else to be forced to hire people who don't have the qualifications. Qualifications are merit; I don't know why you're talking about merit.

Mrs Witmer: Do you know what? It's one and the same.

Mr Ortlieb: It's one and the same, right?

Mrs Witmer: That's right.

Mr Ortlieb: So finally, when we get down to it, the trade union movement, even in our seniority, key to our seniority problem in any instance is qualification. People don't get jobs just because they have seniority; you have to have all the functions of seniority. The key point in that is the question of qualifications, ability, merit, whatever you want to talk about. What we are opposed to is the employers or any other group saying they should have the inalienable right to determine qualifications based on their subjective opinions. That we don't find.

To answer your question about merit, yes, we think merit should be in it. Whether it should be a prime function of employment equity -- we don't think so. There are a whole bunch of other things. But we should have some sort of way -- and there's never been any, at least from the trade union movement, to my knowledge and I've been in it from the start -- of taking qualifications out of the competition, where the best person, whether black, a woman, white, aboriginal, whatever, if he's got the equal qualifications, then he should have a shot at it. If he's got better qualifications, he should be hired.

Mrs Witmer: I guess the comfort level of people throughout the province probably would be increased if the government was willing to publicly state that. That's been a concern that's been expressed.

Mr Ortlieb: Just let me add one more. In all of my dealings with the government and with the commission, in fact, they've always said that one of the primary responsibilities of this is to make sure the best person got the chance for the job: merit, qualifications, ability, whatever you want to call it. I've seen nothing out there where the commission or the government says you just hire anybody off the street. I haven't seen that.

Mrs Witmer: No, but there is something else going on that certainly leads to some fear.

The Chair: There's time for one quick question.

Mr David Tilson (Dufferin-Peel): The issue of seniority rights has been raised by various members of the union movement at these proceedings and yours is similar to most of them. The comments by the NDP and those supporting the legislation say that, of course, notwithstanding what they say about collective rights or collective bargaining, by following what you're suggesting, the seniority philosophy will be attacking the position of women and visible minorities and aboriginals and disabled -- their very chance for promotion. In other words, the seniority-rights clause that you're talking about is in itself discriminatory.

Mr Ortlieb: Let me tell you, there is no question that there are some seniority clauses that are a bar to advancement. There's no question about that. Where they are, they should be taken away. There's no question.

I know seniority clauses where the employer has the exclusive right to determine physical ability, mental ability, and unions have not been able to negotiate that away. I say if they can't negotiate it away, legislation should take that away. No employer or anyone should have those rights. But we have done a tremendous amount of discussion with our local unions across the province of Ontario, and we have the four target groups in our membership. We talked to them and very few, if any, of them would want to do away with seniority. It protects the rights they've earned with the employer.

Mr Tilson: They say that fact alone is discriminatory.

The Chair: Mr Tilson, sorry, but we've run over time.

Mr Fletcher: I thank you for your brief and I know the hard work that UFCW has put into employment equity in their own places. I have basically two questions and one is on seniority. Mr Ortlieb has already answered that part of it about there being some times when seniority does become a barrier to employment equity and to the promotion and hiring of people. Other than the Human Rights Commission, which could be a long, drawn-out process, I was just wondering if there's another way we can get around it, other than going through the human rights? Is there something we can put into the act that would do something about seniority?

Mr Ortlieb: Once again, I'm going to ask my colleague to make a comment on that too.

It appears to us that the Human Rights Commission is now developing some precedents, some jurisprudence, in relation to collective agreements and in relation to human rights generally.

We support the human rights dealing with these issues. I say that with maybe one or two reservations. Generally, the decisions of the Human Rights Commission in its dealings with trade union movements have been right on the mark, from our opinion, in the question of religious freedom and seniority and all of the other things.

We don't know whether we need to have another bureaucracy built. We understand the commission. We want a commission with strong powers, good, well-trained people to go out and do much of the work that should be done. On the other hand, to create another tribunal which would in most instances be, we would think -- we would be able to appeal to the Ontario Human Rights Commission in any event. The one thing that concerns us about the Human Rights Commission is that you get a long beard before you get a decision. It takes a long time. They have some problems; I understand that they're trying to be rectified. But it has to be done a lot faster.

1350

Pearl may have some comments on the human rights.

Ms Pearl MacKay: I'd just like to say, just on the whole issue of seniority in particular and being one of the members of the designated groups under employment equity and having experience in the labour movement, one of the things I have benefited from as an individual in my workplace has been having seniority. The problem is getting the foot in the door. Once you have the foot in the door, what's essential is that we all have the rights to seniority so that there is fair and equal treatment.

The benefit of that is essential, so that people who don't get promotions etc for "preferences" or based on who you know or who you may be related to -- what's essential is that your time served is counted for something, no matter what target group you're in.

Mr Fletcher: Let me put a question to you, Pearl, as direct as possible. Were you hired because you're a woman?

Ms MacKay: No.

Mr Fletcher: It was because you can do the job?

Ms MacKay: Are you talking about the job I'm in now?

Mr Fletcher: The one you're in now -- your advancement through the union.

Ms MacKay: I was hired for my abilities. There may have been some, in terms of the labour movement -- this is a full-time labour movement position -- to increase the representation of women. I've been on staff, though, for 10 years.

Mr Fletcher: The reason I asked that is because I know that, through the labour movement -- and you look at collective agreements -- long before there were rules and regulations saying things about discrimination or anything else, collective agreements contained these articles long before governments even began to act. I know how far ahead of what is going on is where the union movement has been.

Mr Callahan: From the sounds of what you're saying -- and I hope I'm not misinterpreting this. I'm getting the impression that you're saying that within the union movement this bill is not necessary because this is the practice that you've followed throughout your history in organized labour. If that is the case, can you tell me how many people within your particular union are women, disabled, aboriginals and visible minorities who are in senior positions within the union?

Mr Kukovica: You would have to understand, I guess, the way we operate UFCW of Canada. We have over 130 local unions where we have presidents, chief stewards and so on, and we probably have more chief stewards in the local unions who are women.

Mr Callahan: What I'm looking for is, do you have anybody in a presidential capacity in that union who is either a woman, an aboriginal, a visible minority or a disabled person?

Mr Fletcher: They're elected; they're not hired.

Mr Kukovica: That's right. We do have full-time representatives who are women, no question about it. I wouldn't be able to tell you --

Mr Callahan: But nobody in a top category thus far, I gather; that's your answer to my question.

Mr Kukovica: No, I'm saying to you that in our local unions we do have presidents of local unions who are women because, again, our structure is that they have to be elected by the membership. So whatever the composition of their membership is, we do have women who are presidents or secretary treasurers of local unions.

Mr Callahan: The way I understand the purpose of this legislation is that this government is saying that women, disabled, visible minorities and aboriginals have been denied access, even though they have the ability, to those positions, or an opportunity to move up the ladder to a position of authority.

On the other side of the coin, you tell me in the unions that seniority is sacrosanct. That tells me, and maybe I'm wrong, that because of seniority, particularly with your suggestion of enlarging this definition, there's an immediate block there because people, as competent as they may be, although they get a foot in the door, are not going to move up the ladder until they have had a longer period of service than the person ahead of them who may not be more competent than they are. Is that correct?

Mr Kukovica: That may be correct in your view. What we are saying is that it's not going to change tomorrow morning. The composition of the workforce, because you are introducing Bill 79, is not going to change tomorrow morning. It's going to take at least 10 or more years to change that. We don't have hiring halls. UFCW does not have hiring halls. We don't hire; it's the employers that hire.

Mr Curling: But the purpose of it --

Mr Kukovica: And the purpose of it is, through the hiring process, to reflect the workforce and the community it services. Go to a retail food store that we represent and look for yourself how many you have; how many women. Sure, they're all women. It's almost a ghetto. That's one of the things we're working to try to get them out of the cash and get them into more meaningful jobs through training, retraining, upgrading of their skills so they can move on to being a baker, a meat-cutter or something else.

It's going to take time to change that. We don't hire, so it has to be a joint venture between the employer and the union to be able to hire people according to the composition of the community that you want to service and the workforce. So it'll be a very slow process.

Mr Callahan: Is there more time left?

The Chair: One last question.

Mr Callahan: You better do it then.

Mr Curling: The purpose of legislation, of course, is that some of the voluntary procedures have not worked; the whole reason we're here. You have articulated very well that there are people who are being excluded out of the workforce. If we only deal with employment equity as access to the workplace, we haven't solved a thing. We must have access coming up.

Mr Callahan: Seniority isn't one of them.

Mr Curling: You can put the word "seniority" in there afterwards if you want. My question to you, though, is completely different.

I want you to comment on the fact that those companies that are having 50 and under are excluded from this. Do you think this is right, or was that a recommendation? You said you sat on this consultation committee with the minister etc. Was that in there and it was taken out? Do you feel it is right that they've excluded that?

Mr Kukovica: No, we feel it's wrong. That's why we are making a recommendation to change it. We're saying specifically that we don't agree with that and if it were only for us, we would recommend 10; any workplace that has 10 or more should be included in employment equity because we feel that's where most of the new jobs are created -- in a small business.

The Chair: Mr Kukovica, we have run out of time. I want to thank you and the other members of UFCW for taking the time to participate today.

ONTARIO FEDERATION OF LABOUR

The Chair: Ontario Federation of Labour: Welcome, Ms Davis and Ms Veecock. You have half an hour. You may want to leave plenty of time for questions and answers. We feel that is the best way we can communicate with each other, so you can leave as much time as you like for that.

Ms Julie Davis: What I'd like to do is just read the opening seven pages of our submission, leaving the more extensive recommendations to be dealt with during the question and answer period. I want to thank you for the opportunity to appear here today.

The Ontario Federation of Labour, representing over 700,000 working people in Ontario, appreciates this opportunity to appear before this committee to present our position on Bill 79, An Act to provide for Employment Equity for Aboriginal People, People with Disabilities, Members of Racial Minorities and Women.

In this submission we will tell you why we support employment equity legislation, give you a sense of how long we have been lobbying for legislation and, finally, make recommendations which we believe will strengthen Bill 79.

First, we want to commend the government for putting this issue on its agenda. We are fully aware of the strong opposition to legislation to remedy systemic discrimination. Indeed, some of our members, due to a lack of information and the prevailing myths of employment equity, are opposed to Bill 79.

1400

We have observed also that employment equity myths and irresponsible scaremongering are often perpetrated by those who should be better informed. We disagree with the tone and the information and the arguments presented by some members of the opposition during the employment equity debate. We hope that this process will better inform not only the members of this committee but all who attend or read transcripts from these hearings.

Why we support employment equity legislation: There are two very fundamental principles of the labour movement. These are fair shares and solidarity. But we know that many in our society are denied their fair share. We know also that when workers are divided by race or gender, all workers lose. As representatives of working people, we feel strongly that we have a responsibility not to condone nor to ignore the discrimination that some of our members and potential members experience.

There are laws today in Ontario to protect people from discrimination, yet some people continue to deny that we live in a society that condones racist, sexist, homophobic and discriminatory conduct. It ought to be recognized that we live in a society that places a premium on white skin and the male gender. Routinely, we make assumptions about the ability of others even as we deny them opportunities to demonstrate their competence. We talk about reverse discrimination while we ignore nepotism and favouritism, and we talk about a lowering of standards, mainly in reference to visible minorities, while we ignore government and other statistics to the contrary.

We reject the notion that employment equity is reverse discrimination and ipso facto that standards will be lowered because of legislation. These assertions often shield racist and sexist views, and they fail to take into account employment data available to the contrary.

The OFL supports employment equity because it is a systematic approach to a systemic problem. We believe that effective employment equity legislation will ensure to some extent that workers are hired on their ability to do the job without regard for skin colour, gender or disability. Legislation will allow those to whom doors have traditionally been closed to demonstrate their competence.

We have a long history of support for employment equity legislation. Generally, our federation has a history of lobbying for legislation for the protection of workers and their families in Ontario. In reviewing our files and policies for this presentation, we have noted that since the early 1970s, several briefs and oral presentations have been made to governments in Ontario regarding improvements to the Human Rights Code and to the Employment Standards Act. Our support for effective employment equity legislation is part of our tradition of struggle to protect the rights of workers and their families.

As early as 1963, OFL convention delegates passed a resolution which called on the Ontario government to "enact legislation to encourage industry and other employers to hire part of their labour force from the handicapped group of workers, including people with epilepsy."

Since then, a number of resolutions and policy papers have been endorsed. In 1982, or just over a decade ago, delegates to our 1982 convention passed a comprehensive policy paper, Women and Affirmative Action. This paper outlined in detail the historical discrimination of women, discrimination which has kept women out of certain sectors of the labour force, marginalized them in others and trapped them in job ghettoes. The plan of action of this policy paper included a demand for legislation to end gender segregation in the workplace.

By 1987, the OFL had extended its support for legislation to include aboriginal people, people with disabilities and visible minorities. That year another policy paper, Equal Action in Employment, was endorsed by delegates to our convention. Again we called on the government to introduce legislation to remedy systemic discrimination.

During the 1988-89 period, the OFL and several of our largest affiliates plus community groups worked with Bob Rae, who was at that time leader of the official opposition, to develop Bill 172. Through an often difficult process, a process where community and labour compromised and negotiated, there was in the end consensus that Bill 172 would be an effective piece of legislation to remedy and ameliorate systemic discrimination.

In 1991, the OFL was one of the first presenters to the consultations held by the Employment Equity Commissioner. We informed the commissioner of the work we had done around Bill 172 and indicated that our vision of effective legislation had not changed. Indeed, we said we would like to see the legislation be similar to Bill 172.

While we have been actively lobbying for legislation, we have not neglected to work with our affiliates to build support for employment equity at the shop floor level. The OFL has organized several employment equity conferences, we've had forums and educationals across the provinces, and while I would say that much has been done, I would also agree that much still remains to be done.

But without effective legislation, workers and potential workers will continue to experience racism, sexism on the job and severe discrimination in hiring if you are disabled because employers are generally reluctant to accommodate people with disabilities.

While we commend the Ontario government for bringing forward legislation, we also want to go on record by saying that it is not enough to enact legislation; legislation with mandatory teeth is the key to real change.

In essence, the bill is a statement of aspirations which provides a framework for the legislation while it leaves the essentials of employment equity and implementation details to be addressed by regulations.

For instance, two fundamental principles of employment equity are numerical goals and timetables in which to achieve those goals. But while subsection 50(2) of the bill contemplates numerical goals determined by commission-approved percentages, regulations that we have seen would allow employers to set goals and only require them to make "reasonable progress" towards representation of designated group members, and these goals must be "reasonably" achieved in good faith.

As well, while section 11 of the bill provides for timetables both for the elimination of barriers and the composition of the workforce, there is no mention of timetables in the regulations.

Surely this is not mandatory employment equity. This is another voluntary approach, and our very real concern is that it will not ameliorate systemic discrimination in employment. In order to achieve the objective of equality in employment, Bill 79 must be amended.

In particular, it must be amended to require employers to negotiate plans with goals and timetables for achieving the goals. The commission must be charged with the development of standards for these goals and timetables. And, as I commented earlier, we have attached other recommendations to amend Bill 79.

In conclusion, we're here today to say it's time for justice. We have had the studies and the consultations. The evidence is irrefutable. People are not hired solely on the basis of ability; other discriminatory factors such as gender, race and perceived limitations are still given far too much weight. Now it is time to act responsibly.

We know that some have raised concerns regarding the state of the economy and employment equity. Our response cannot be that we fight discrimination only in good times. Indeed, some in our society never, ever experience the good times. We must prepare now so that when the economy turns around, employers will be required to hire fairly.

In addition, it should be understood that even in times of recession, with a shrinking job market, gender or race ought not to determine who gets hired.

Employers no doubt have argued how costly implementing employment equity will be. Indeed, this is an old refrain of business. This argument has been used to protest the introduction of every piece of legislation to protect the interests and rights of working people and their families. They must be reminded that we need legislation precisely because they have not hired fairly, and we must respond back by asking the question, how much does it cost to hire fairly?

This government must accept the challenge of making amendments to Bill 79 if the groups targeted for employment equity are to receive justice under this legislation. We believe profoundly that if this government does not strengthen this legislation to make it meaningful, no other government will.

We support this legislation, but it must be amended to achieve its objectives. At stake is justice: justice for aboriginal people, justice for people with disabilities, justice for visible minorities, justice for women and the right for all of those groups not to be discriminated against in employment. Bill 79, if amended, we believe can ensure that justice.

Then in our brief you will see our recommendations along with our rationale under each recommendation and an outline of the bill with our recommendations on the right-hand side.

The Chair: Thank you. We'll begin with the government members. There are two speakers, Ms Carter to begin.

Mr Callahan: How much --

The Chair: Seven minutes.

Ms Carter: I appreciate your strong support for this legislation and your explanation of why it's necessary. We have had presenters who have claimed that there was no need for this and that things would automatically put themselves right and were in fact doing so.

Specifically, I'd like to raise the question of small businesses. I think we all want this legislation to be as thorough as possible and to eliminate unfairness to the greatest possible degree, but I think when you're looking at small employers there are some very real problems. For example, these employers would not have the resources a large company would have to research what their representation should be and so on, and also I think from a sheer mathematical point of view there are problems. You would find that the statistical representation of a given group was zero and where do you go from there, or you can't hire a fraction of an employee, and in any case, if the turnover is fairly slow, then it becomes difficult to see how some employers could implement these provisions. Also, I believe there's a growing number of small ventures which are in fact initiated by women or by members of minorities or the other groups which might make it a little less urgent. I just wonder what your comments on that would be.

1410

Ms Davis: I think we have an understanding of the problems of small business, but on the other hand we also know that small business is where jobs are going to be created in the future, and if they're excluded, we're very concerned that the kind of systemic discrimination that exists now will continue. We believe that ways can be found to overcome those problems and allow us to move forward, and one of our recommendations is in fact that the bill be extended farther down the chain so as to make the workplaces of Ontario, both today and into the future, more representative of the population as a whole.

Ms Carter: Can you give any details as to how you would apply that to small businesses?

Ms Davis: You would do it in the same way that you would do it for a large business. It's like pay equity. Pay equity was a lot simpler for small business than it was for a large business because you had fewer classifications to deal with, and the same thing would be true here.

Again, in talking to our affiliates, and I know the Steelworkers have already been here, they feel very strongly about this. A lot of the companies they have organized and are continuing to organize are in fact small businesses, and they believe that with the commonsense approach, sitting down with the bargaining agent and the employer, solutions can be found to these problems.

Mr Winninger: In your presentation and recommendations you suggest that employment equity plans should be developed on a bargaining unit basis, so I'm wanting to ask you how that approach --

Ms Davis: That's not one of our recommendations.

Mr Winninger: Oh, I thought it was. It's not?

Ms Davis: No, I think that was a recommendation from one of our affiliates, but that isn't part of our --

Mr Winninger: So you don't adopt that as your own?

Ms Davis: That isn't one of our recommendations.

Mr Winninger: Maybe I could pursue this one with you anyway. We have situations where there are barriers between bargaining units, such as the CUPE situation where you have the inside workers and the outside workers and a complaint to the Human Rights Commission by women who were excluded from hiring in the outside local. Is that the kind of situation that might have led you not to adopt that recommendation of the affiliate as your own?

Ms Davis: The way the federation works is that the things that all our affiliates can agree to are the presentations that we put forward. There are differences of opinion in the labour movement around that particular issue, but I think it gets dealt with in any event using the Human Rights Code question. If it's a seniority system that's responsible for that, if the seniority system violates the provisions of the Ontario Human Rights Code, then our position is it needs to be looked at and the parties need to sit down and find ways to deal with it.

Mr Winninger: Is there time for one more question?

The Chair: There is, in fact. Ms Akande wanted to ask a question as well.

Ms Akande: One of the points that you make very well in this presentation is that there is a great deal left to be done and that the legislation should be stronger. The argument has been put by some, though it's not the side that I'd be on, that if in fact this legislation -- when this legislation -- passes, it will act as a base for the improvement and perhaps the strengthening of the legislation at some later time by some later government. What would be your response to that?

Mr Callahan: They've said in the brief no other government --

Ms Davis: It said in the brief actually that we believe that if this government doesn't do it, no other government --

Mr Callahan: That's rhetorical --

Ms Davis: No other government that might come into play here in this province would make it any stronger is our belief.

Mr Callahan: I'm just newly on this, so you'll have to bear with me, but as I see this, an employer is required to put together a plan that will open the door to the people who are in the designated categories. What I want to know is, if in the course of that plan someone who was brought in in that way retires or whatever, does that require the employer to bring in someone of the same designated category to take that person's job? If that is the way it works, that flies right in the face, in my view, of the unions' whole concern about seniority, because it means that somebody's going to sort of jump up the ladder to fit into that category that has been vacated by that person resigning. Have you thought about that?

Ms Davis: Well, I think the answer to your question is not necessarily that -- the employer should be required to maintain employment equity within the composition of the workforce. It doesn't mean every single time that somebody retires, because there may have been hirings in other classifications or in other jurisdictions that deal with that particular target group, so it's not a question of any one particular of the target groups having the exclusive right in perpetuity to a particular job. What would be and should be required is that the employer maintain employment equity, meaning that the mix of the jobs in that particular workplace is reflective of their numbers in that geographic area.

Mr Callahan: But you'll agree with me that it is certainly conceivable that this could be the case, and what I say to you is, what impact does that have on the question of seniority? In fact, I find the argument of seniority is as much an impediment to access by these groups as has been the suggestion, and perhaps in many cases a realistic suggestion, that these people have been denied access or promotion up through the ranks, particularly women and visible minorities, to a senior position. But it seems to me that seniority -- if I understand seniority correctly, it means if I'm hired tomorrow and you were hired yesterday, you should have a better chance of not getting bumped, or of my getting bumped before you. That's seniority, isn't it?

Ms Davis: Well, yes, but I would argue that if seniority was the barrier that some people try to make it out to be, we would see much greater representation from target group members in unorganized workplaces than we do. The reality is that a strong seniority system can in fact help advance target group members, and at least two of the target groups anyway, visible minorities and women, are oft-times in the workplace, but if they had stronger seniority systems they could in fact move up. The problem of aboriginal people and people with disabilities is that they're not there to begin with, so it's a question of hiring. Seniority doesn't enter into the hiring practices of employers, or in very few cases. I suppose one could argue that the building trades, which have hiring halls, are an exception to that, but in the vast majority of workplaces in the province of Ontario, seniority has nothing to do with hiring.

Emergency alarm sounded.

Mr Callahan: A fire. That means we have to get out.

The Chair: It's not us.

Mr Callahan: You mean this part won't burn if the other does, eh?

The Chair: We'll finish the deputation.

Ms Davis: June wants to add to this.

Ms June Veecock: I'd like to remind the committee that seniority's not for whites only. You have large numbers of visible minorities with seniority provisions and even with seniority don't have access to higher positions. So we have argued in the past that what we need at times is the strengthening of seniority so that when the racial minorities train white, able-bodied males, they don't see them get the position while they remain where they are. So just keep in mind that seniority is not the problem; it is the discriminatory hiring practices of employers. That's the problem.

The Chair: One further question.

Mr Curling: First, I want to say that I really enjoyed your presentation and you're quite focused in some of the concerns that I have too in this employment equity. I don't agree with everything here that you say. I still am not convinced that employment equity --

Emergency alarm sounded.

Mr Callahan: The fire is catching up to us, I think.

Mr Curling: I'm still not convinced that seniority doesn't play as an impediment. As a matter of fact, almost a bit of systemic discrimination could happen. That's what the bill is all about itself, whether it protects blacks or it protects women or so on, the law must be fair that it does not block the fair process of people moving up in their area.

I just wonder, could you comment a bit more, because I have a concern about this, on The Human Rights Commission and the duplication that happens within employment equity, and whether or not we should make sure that the role that the Human Rights Commission plays or the role that the Employment Equity Commission plays -- or whether we should have a tribunal of equity commission to deal with inequities that are happening in our society?

1420

Ms Davis: I think that's an issue that's under active discussion. I certainly am aware of the Cornish report to the government which proposed exactly that, that there be an equity tribunal, if you like, that deals with all of the issues. We haven't taken a position on that, but it's certainly one that we're quite willing to have a discussion on.

Emergency alarm sounded.

The Chair: It's still on the third floor.

Mr Tilson: We've got another floor to go.

Ms Davis: We're close to the west doors so we'll be okay.

The Chair: Continue, Mr Tilson.

Mr Tilson: I have one question with respect to the self-identification, but I will say my dismay at your comments, Ms -- sorry, I forget your last name.

The Chair: Veecock.

Mr Tilson: Ms Veecock. The comments that are made by the preamble in the bill and particularly your statement on the bottom of page 2 which says, "It ought to be recognized that we live in a society that places a premium on white skin and the male gender": I will say that I find that very offensive and I find it very inflammatory, as it suggests things about our society that I simply say are not true.

The question that I have for you with respect to self-identification is that there's no question that we're into a recession, jobs are hard to come by, people are losing jobs, businesses are closing down. This bill of course ensures that the workforce matches the workers in their workforce with respect to gender, with respect to race and with respect to disability, and of course the aboriginal. In the Metro area, the employer would have to make sure that about half of all employees are women, 15% are visible minorities and 3% are disabled.

My question, of course, has to do with self-identification, because the pressure is going to be on a great number of people. Specifically, there are groups that have not considered themselves to be non-white in the past -- Greeks, Arabs, Israelis and maybe other groups -- who now, because of the pressure to maintain those jobs, will be ticking off that box that says that they are non-white.

The same goes with disability. The criticism has been that we don't know what disability is. And I've made the comment in these hearings before that the Human Rights Commission says that the three of us who all wear glasses are disabled. That's what the Human Rights Commission says.

My question is -- and of course there's no appeal --

Emergency alarm sounded.

Mr Tilson: -- are we to the second floor yet? -- there's no appeal to that by the employer.

My question is that I would like you to comment on those criticisms of this bill by the people who have said those things.

Ms Veecock: I don't understand why there would be pressure to maintain their jobs. My understanding of Bill 79 is that it doesn't contemplate laying off employees to make room for other employees, so I don't know why there would be pressure to maintain their jobs.

Mr Tilson: Well, because they're going to have to put a plan forward, and if they don't have that plan, if they don't match that percentage -- and section 50 doesn't even tell us what it is; it's going to be set some time in the future as to the regulations. We don't even know what those percentages are. But some time in the future the commission is going to say, "Sorry, your plan doesn't meet what the percentage is in that particular area."

Ms Davis: And if there's been no hiring during the period of time that the plan has been in effect because of the recession or whatever else is going on in that particular sector or industry, then that's the answer. I mean, it isn't contemplated, I don't believe, by the government, and it certainly isn't contemplated by the labour movement, that this legislation should be used to displace existing workers. We have never said that, never supported that and never would support that.

Mr Tilson: My question is on self-identification, the fact that people can say they're something when they're not. That's the criticism that's been given to this bill. And there's no appeal from that.

Ms Davis: I think that makes light of a very serious problem. To suggest that people would do that, I find as offensive as you find our earlier comments. To suggest that somehow people would trivialize their race or their disabilities by pretending that they're something they are not -- the logic of that escapes me completely, I must tell you.

Mr Tilson: Well, we'll talk about glasses. If I can't get a job and I want to get a job and I know that the law says that my wearing glasses -- if your wearing glasses makes you disabled, you're going to tick off the box "disabled."

Ms Davis: I don't know that there's any indication to say that the commission is going to establish that wearing glasses means that you're disabled.

Mr Tilson: Check with the provisions of the Human Rights Commission, because it has said that.

Ms Davis: I believe for some jobs wearing glasses would be a disability, absolutely: hockey players or something like that. But that isn't what we're talking about here.

Mr Tilson: I don't mean to trivialize. This whole subject is very serious because of the uncertainty, and that has been made by all groups. The uncertainty of this legislation is terrible. People don't know how to interpret what is being said by this legislation or has yet to be defined by this legislation. Those are my questions.

Ms Veecock: I just wanted to say also that I'm not surprised that you would be offended by the term "premium on white skin" in the agenda. I'm not at all surprised.

Mr Callahan: He fits the category.

The Chair: If you have one question and it's short, we can take it.

Mrs Witmer: I think it's become quite apparent that this is a very contentious piece of legislation, and I think there needs to be a genuine commitment by all of the partners to ensure that there is fairness and equity in the hiring and promotional practices in this province. But I think we have to be very careful, because what we're seeing, it seems, on a regular basis is we seem to be in confrontation one with the other. I think that's what's creating the uncertainty throughout the province.

Certainly, if you take a look at the preamble here, it indicates that all discrimination is the result of intentional and systemic discrimination by employers. It fails to totally acknowledge that underrepresentation of the designated groups in the workplace results from the historical, the social and the demographic factors as well. I guess I would ask you, do you acknowledge that there is underrepresentation as a result of those factors?

Ms Davis: Yes, because of some of those factors, but overwhelmingly the evidence shows that systemic discrimination is the major factor.

Mrs Witmer: By who?

Ms Davis: Who does the hiring? Employers do the hiring. Ever since, as my friend Gord Wilson says, the Bible was a 10-page flyer, they do the hiring. With very few exceptions in this province or anywhere else in this country do unions or anyone else have any say over who gets hired. In fact, despite seniority clauses, there are very few workplaces and very few collective agreements where seniority is the only grounds for advancement or for promotion. In most cases, seniority is a factor and not the factor. So, again, there's no evidence to support that seniority is anywhere near the problem that some people would make it out to be.

Mrs Witmer: I think it's unfortunate to put all the blame on the employers --

The Chair: Thank you. We've run out of time, Ms Witmer. Sorry. Ms Davis and Ms Veecock, thank you for your presentation and your participation here today.

1430

EPILEPSY ASSOCIATION, METRO TORONTO

The Chair: The Epilepsy Association of Metropolitan Toronto. Welcome, Mr Rapson. You have seen the previous delegation in terms of the process. It's half an hour. Leave as much time as you like for questions and answers. You can begin as soon as you're ready.

Mr Marty Rapson: Thank you very much, members of the committee. My name is Marty Rapson. I'm a member of the Epilepsy Association, Metro Toronto, and the chairman of its community advisory committee.

We commend the present government on the current progress of Bill 79, especially in regard to soliciting the consumer input that is going on especially today and this past week. The passage of this bill and its effective implementation are critical if we're going to achieve equality in employment in Ontario.

People with epilepsy face rampant discrimination in employment. My community advisory committee has some comments that we feel are going to aid in the success of Bill 79 and hopefully restore some of the employment opportunities that have been lost to us through this discrimination. I'll start with the definitions, so you might want to keep your pen handy, Mr Tilson.

The Chair: Poised.

Mr Rapson: Entrenching the definition into Bill 79 is, we feel, essential in order not to place it in jeopardy through court challenges by employers. Time delays for resolving these cases could prevent effective work being done by employers in the meantime. Having the definition within the bill itself could be significant in strengthening the interpretation of the other areas of the act. As well, entrenchment would be considered an important milestone for persons with disabilities.

We endorse the wording of the definition as set out in the regulations currently and would add that there will be a need to provide education to persons with disabilities themselves in the community regarding the actual meaning of the definition and how to determine if it applies to their particular circumstances. This responsibility should not fall solely upon the shoulders of the employers who are performing the workforce surveys. This is a responsibility also of the commission and community groups such as our own.

Moderate to severe disabilities: We note that the provisions of the current act particularly leave untouched the employment needs of those persons with moderate to severe disabilities. The situation of persons with moderate to severe disabilities creates a special need above and beyond those addressed by these principles, and while it would be our preference to have those needs addressed in this act, we support the concept of an Ontarians with disabilities act which would directly address those needs. We would like to see some support in principle for an ODA written into Bill 79.

Accommodation: Clarification and inclusion are required in the act that makes it clear that the "reasonable efforts" the employer is required to take are equivalent to that of the "undue hardship" standard that is required under the Ontario Human Rights Code. Otherwise, there exists the significant potential for the weakening of protection for persons with disabilities.

Public access to plans: It is important that plans be public, beyond just posting within the workplace. Of course, the relevant communities are not within those workplaces. If needed, the commission could provide guidelines on what is permitted to be disclosed for confidentiality or for competitiveness purposes, and these cases could be addressed on a case-by-case basis.

We feel that this access would take some of the burden of policing the act off the commission and perhaps save a little bit of money. I'm sure Premier Rae would like that idea.

The commission itself: It is important that the commission be properly funded and mandated in order to ensure that significant positive changes are achieved with respect to employment opportunities for persons who have, until now, been deprived of the quality of life which comes from participating in the workforce.

In conclusion, I would like you to know that these comments were put together by people on our community advisory committee, people who have a seizure disorder, people who at one time or another have lost a promotion, lost a job, lost the opportunity for employment because of their disability. It is up to you, as legislators, to make Bill 79 a strong one and to make equality in employment a reality. Thank you. Any questions?

The Chair: Thank you, Mr Rapson. Seven and a half minutes or so, Mr Callahan to begin.

Mr Callahan: I didn't have your written brief right at the outset but I now have it. Are you saying that the definition of "epilepsy" should be definitively defined in the act, is that what you're saying?

Mr Rapson: What we're saying is that now it's in the regulations, and the definition that is proposed for the regulations is that of the federal Employment Equity Act.

Mr Callahan: Okay. I guess the reason for that is the same as a person who, let's say, has a learning disability and is not about to go in to the employer while he's applying for the job and say, "Well, I've got a learning disability; would you please hire me?" or this person is not going to go in and say, "I've got epilepsy and I'd like you to hire me."

Mr Rapson: Actually, we weren't even considering that sort of scenario. The reason we wanted the definition entrenched in the bill itself was to actually make it law. When something is just in regulations it can be changed without having to go through the House.

Mr Callahan: Right.

Mr Rapson: Also, I said the symbolic gesture of entrenching it.

Mr Callahan: But you would agree with me that in this province we have freedom of information legislation that doesn't allow anybody to reveal anything about you, and we have tremendous ads on television about people who have suffered a psychiatric problem and are being sort of shunned by the public and we try to educate people not to do that, and yet here we're requiring people, if they're to take advantage of this legislation and are to have the benefit of it, to actually come out of the closet, as it were, and say, "I've got a learning disability or I'm receiving psychiatric treatment or I'm an epileptic" or whatever.

That to me is offensive, and in reality I don't think people will do that. The net result is that they won't get any benefit, at least within that definition, and I'm sure it's broader than that, from being able to take advantage of this legislation.

The thing that really bothers me, and I'm going to say this and it's probably going to get me in a lot of trouble: I'm old enough to remember when, in this province, Jewish people couldn't join golf clubs. There wasn't a government of the day that passed legislation to say you've got to join the golf clubs. That was resolved through court decisions. I can remember when, to be a policeman in this community, you had to be six-feet-two, white, Anglo-Saxon and Protestant, and that again is no longer the case. I can remember when the question of religion was also a significant thing.

I think that governments have a responsibility to act, and the United States is a clear example of it. When you've got a history of black people being burned, murdered and everything else -- the United States took far too long as a government to bring in civil rights legislation. But I really find it somewhat frightening to see legislation where a government is going to say, "You've got to do this."

I notice that this is going to be reviewed in five years. I'd hate to see what impact that's going to have on our whole segment of society, because I have a feeling there are going to be people this legislation is supposed to help whom it's not going to help at all. I just mentioned that some of the disabled will not get the benefits of this legislation because they're not going to tell people that this is their problem.

I can see people as well -- I come from a glorious, multicultural community in my riding where we hold things like Carabram to have people get to know one another and understand one another.

Mr Mills: This is a speech.

Mr Callahan: Sure, it's a speech; it's my views. But I find it passing strange that these people, who perhaps are quite capable people and would love to get the jobs on their own hook, are going to find that the rest of the community is going to be pointing their finger at them and saying, "Well, you got the job because you belong to this particular group."

I've had people come up to me from the multicultural community, I've had women come up to me, I've had disabled people come up to me and say, "I don't want the job because I'm disabled, I don't want the job because I'm a woman, I don't want the job because I'm a member of a visible minority; I want to get the job on my own skill and ability."

You've obviously looked at this legislation and you've determined, contrary to what the government says -- the government says it's not a quota system. If that's the case, I would like to see them put their money where their mouth is and write that into the bill, because that will certainly go a long way towards the eventual -- maybe the group before will accuse me of being a fear-mongerer, but it will eventually prevent the backlash that will in fact ensue from young white males out there who are struggling, are on welfare, perhaps collecting unemployment insurance, can't get jobs and see this as a significant --

The Chair: Allow me to take a point of order.

1440

Mr Mills: On a point of order: Isn't the whole intent of these hearings to listen to the presentations and to ask questions relevant to that? I don't really buy into this speech. I think it's embarrassing to the presenter. He doesn't want to hear that.

The Chair: I understand what you're saying. The member has that kind of flexibility, as indeed all members do. We encourage members, obviously, to direct their questions to the deputant and be as focused as they can, but beyond that, it's hard to restrain them.

Mr Callahan: As the member for Durham East well knows, that's not a point of order and he knows I have that right, so he should perhaps refrain from the speeches.

Mr Mills: I heard you last week in Windsor.

Mr Callahan: You've already told us you don't like it in regulation. I can understand that because it's done in the cabinet as opposed to coming through the House. Would you like to see the legislation clearly define that the opportunities this bill is going to bring forward for those people in the designated groups will be based on merit, not on it being some sort of a special deal for these people?

Mr Rapson: That's actually what this legislation is going to do. As I mentioned, the area of moderate to severe disabilities is where you're going to run into wanting to get those people employed and having to use some extra measures, possibly some subsidies and so on. The employment equity bill we're talking about right now, Bill 79, is going to address more exactly that issue you're talking about, and that is allowing people to compete on an even footing to get jobs and to get promotions.

By having the bill in there, by getting people hired, we're going to have more people in the workforce who are disabled, who are black, who are women, who are aboriginal, and those very young white males you're talking about whom you're fearing the backlash from are going to see that these are people who can do a job just like anyone can, and it's going to become accepted. Then this whole piece of legislation hopefully is just going to be history and it will run by itself.

The Chair: We've run out of time, Mr Callahan.

Mr Tilson: I am interested in definitions because that's how the acts work, and I am interested in your comments about moderate to severe disabilities. There are different ranges of disabilities, and some people may be disabled and they may not think they are and vice versa. The same goes with racial minorities. There are all kinds of shades under the sun. It's a really difficult problem, and these definitions, I would submit, simply make it almost impossible to deal with those things. How much native blood should one have to be an aboriginal? Who's a racial minority? Who's ethnic?

Mr Rapson: Excuse me, Mr Tilson, since we're dealing with disabilities, I'd like to deal strictly with disabilities. I don't have it in front of me. Would anyone have the regulations that has the definition?

Mr Tilson: Yes. It says, "`Person with a disability' means a person who has a persistent physical, mental, psychiatric, sensory or learning impairment and" -- this is the part that I have problems with -- "(a) who considers himself or herself" -- in other words, it's in the self-identification issue -- "to be disadvantaged in employment by reason of that impairment, or (b) who believes that an employer or potential employer is likely to consider him or her to be disadvantaged in employment by reason of that impairment."

In other words, it's at the sole discretion of the employee who may say things; again, I will look at the disabled, and I'll admit it's a frivolous example and I do it for that very reason, the individual wearing glasses. You're about the third or fourth person I've made that comment to, but there could be others I that can't think of. My point in making it is that it is a frivolous comment simply to get a job. People say, "We're insulted that this is being done," but I say we're in tough times and people will do anything to get a job.

Mr Rapson: I understand your feelings. It's simply because of those types of feelings that those in the disability community have regarding classifying people with glasses, say, as has been done in a lot of cases, as being disabled. But look at section (b) in that definition: someone who believes an employer or potential employer is likely to consider him or her to be disadvantaged in employment by reason of that impairment.

Mr Tilson: But it's the employee who believes.

Mr Rapson: That's right.

Mr Tilson: That's my point. Someone may think they're disabled but they're not.

Mr Rapson: I really have to agree with the previous person who was presenting. I don't think people --

Mr Tilson: You think people would be scoundrels to do that and there are very few scoundrels out there?

Mr Rapson: There are a lot of scoundrels out there, but I don't think people are going to take advantage of it that way, not the way it has been taken advantage of.

Mr Tilson: I hope you're right. I quite frankly think the visible minority section -- sorry, a member of a racial minority. I think the definitions are so vague that people are going to abuse the system.

Mr Rapson: To be honest with you, Mr Tilson, the problem that we have more, which is why I was talking about the area of definition, education of persons with disabilities, is because you're more likely to have people who actually have disabilities who consider themselves not to have a disability. It's those people who need to be educated that yes, they do have a disability so that we get them into the workforce on this one.

Mrs Witmer: Thank you for your presentation, Mr Rapson. We did hear from one employer -- I think it was IBM -- who indicated that when they first did a survey of their workplace, there was a reluctance of individuals to self-identify and, obviously, it's going to take a lot of education on the part of the employer community and hopefully the government as well, and it will be an issue which needs to be addressed.

You've indicated here that individuals need accommodation. I guess my question to you is, what type of accommodation, what barriers are there presently to individuals such as the members of the Epilepsy Association that need to be dealt with?

Mr Rapson: Some of the barriers that one might face as a person with a seizure disorder -- just to give you an example, some people have seizures first thing in the morning. They might get up and they wouldn't be able to get to work for 8 or 8:30 -- so simply the employer making the accommodation that the person starts at 10 o'clock. Others are geographic circumstances, allowing a person maybe to work from home, that sort of thing, because they can't drive and would need to drive to get to the office. Those are a couple.

Mrs Witmer: They shouldn't be too difficult to overcome if people work together to ensure that happens.

Mr Rapson: The thing is that most of these accommodations, as I'm sure you've heard so far in this last week, take very little effort and also take very little capital for an employer to achieve. In fact, for most of them, I believe it's under $500.

Mrs Witmer: It's just a better understanding of one another and what our needs are.

Mr Rapson: Exactly, and a level of acceptance.

Mrs Witmer: Thank you very much. I appreciated your presentation.

Mr Fletcher: Thank you for your presentation. My sister suffers with epilepsy, petit mal, and she's lied all her life on job applications because when it came to an application and the medical part, she put down no. She's never had a driver's licence -- a lot of jobs that she could have done. Medication was fine. Her seizures are controlled, yet she never did consider herself as a disabled person, a person with a disability; she considered herself as someone who could do any job at any time, given the chance, and she was never given the chance because she couldn't get past that barrier. She stopped identifying.

I'm just wondering, with epileptics, whether the self-identification is going to be a problem. Is this legislation going to remove that barrier, where you can finally identify as someone with a disability and still get in the door?

Mr Rapson: It is going to help and it's very important. I know a lot of people who won't disclose until after, say, a probationary period for all those same reasons that you're talking about with this acquaintance of yours. By making this law, especially if there are quotas, people know that they have the protection. They have the protection to say, "Yes, I have a disability."

1450

Mr Fletcher: People in your organization who are young white males, was the barrier to them the disability or the fact that they're young white males?

Mr Rapson: I'm sorry. I'm not sure I understand your question.

Mr Fletcher: Okay. Every organization -- a lot of organizations have young white males. We hear a lot about young white males not being considered for job opportunities. But you take a young white male who has epilepsy, what is the overriding factor for not getting in the door for a job? Is it the epilepsy or is it being a young white male? With this legislation, what do you see as the turnaround?

Mr Rapson: You're asking me, is this reverse discrimination? Is that what you're saying?

Mr Fletcher: Yes.

Mr Rapson: Okay. You might have had this quoted to you over the last few days, or you might not have or you might be familiar with it, but I'm sure you are familiar with Judge Rosalie Abella.

Mr Fletcher: Yes.

Mr Rapson: She said: "The end of exclusivity is not reverse discrimination. It is the beginning of equality." That's exactly the way I feel.

Ms Carter: I just want to make a couple of comments before I ask my question. I'd like to ask Mr Beer opposite whether it occurs to him that for centuries people have been getting jobs because they were white males. I wonder if they felt ashamed, as you're saying that people should now feel ashamed because they get a job because they're black or whatever. Also, white males have been getting the special deals. Just think about that.

Also, as regards what Mr Tilson was saying, nobody gets a job because they're designated disabled; they get a job because they're qualified. So you`re not going to get a job just because you say you're wearing spectacles or whatever else it might happen to be.

Okay. Now I'd like to ask you -- there seems to be a problem with words. The bill refers in different places, I believe, to "persons" and "people" with disabilities. Do you have any feelings as to which is the better word to use, "persons" or "people"?

Mr Rapson: To be honest with you, no.

Ms Carter: No, because there has been some suggestion that the word "people" somehow lumps people together, rather than seeing them all as separate individuals. But that hasn't been an issue.

Mr Rapson: That hasn't been an issue with us.

Ms Carter: Okay, another question: Bargaining agents presumably will have to have access to workforce information, since they have responsibilities for the development of employment equity and unionized work forces. Do you see any problems with that?

Mr Rapson: I don't see any problems with that because the way this should happen is that people are not going to disclose on a job application form that is available to whatever manager wants it. They're going to disclose on an employment equity form, which is going to go to the employment equity officer or whoever the people are, and that's going to address that problem and keep it to a small group.

Ms Carter: Just one final comment. You talked about educating people as to how they stood in regard to this legislation before they fill in forms and so on. It is my understanding that the bill provides for the Employment Equity Commission to have that function.

Mr Rapson: Yes.

Ms Carter: So I think that is taken care of.

Mr Rapson: Yes, it is. What we wanted to do is reinforce that and also to have the Employment Equity Commission give community groups like ourselves, for example, a larger part in that education.

Ms Carter: Okay, thanks.

The Chair: Ms Harrington, one last question.

Ms Margaret H. Harrington (Niagara Falls): Thank you, Mr Rapson, for coming. I too am quite concerned about the self-identification. I have a friend from many years who has had lupus and has applied for various jobs. I know what she has gone through, agonizing on whether or not to identify. Hopefully, these changes are not going -- we realize these are not going to be immediate or quick, but we're talking about changing attitudes towards people and between people and this is going to take some time and education and part of this process. But, as you say, I hope it will be a significant step forward for people.

My question is with regard to small employers. You talked about strengthening the bill and one way of doing that is looking at the question of small employers, those with less than 100; there are modified requirements. Then we're talking about a concern about employers who have less than 50 people. We realize in future more businesses are going to be smaller; that's the way our economy seems to be going, so it is going to be a concern. Would you feel it would be a hardship to extend some of the requirements of the bill to those with less than 50 employees?

Mr Rapson: No, I don't feel it would be a hardship at all. As a matter of fact, in the paper written by our association when the commission was first put together we had talked about that and had talked about a limit of 20 instead of 50 or 100. As a matter of fact, I know in my own company, which is a very small one, there is a representation that would fit the way the bill is right now. It was a conscious decision and it was done within the last 18 months. Obviously, I've seen it work in a very small company and I know it can work.

I probably read the same article you did in the business section today about small businesses and the percentage of small businesses as opposed to large businesses going up so rapidly that it is going to be an overwhelming part of the market.

Ms Harrington: So you would direct the government to look in that direction?

Mr Rapson: Yes, certainly.

The Chair: We've run out of time. Mr Rapson, thanks for coming and participating in these committee hearings.

Mr Rapson: Thank you all very much.

The Chair: Peterborough Psychiatric Survivors is the next group; they have cancelled. I want to explain briefly that as cancellations happen, we try to go through the list of the people who are on a waiting list who want to appear before us. More often than not, some of them have a very short period in which to prepare themselves. So we apologize, but we're doing our best to have as many people as possible present their cases to us.

COUNCIL ON HUMAN RIGHTS AND RACE RELATIONS

The Chair: We have today in their place the Council on Human Rights and Race Relations, Mr Syed. Welcome, Mr Syed. You've seen the previous speaker in terms of process. You have half an hour and hopefully you'll leave time for questions and answers.

Mr Hasanat Ahmad Syed: Yes, I have a little bit of understanding of what is happening here. As I indicated in my written presentation, it was phoned in at about 1 o'clock that I may make the presentation. I was working on it, but I could have brought a number of facts and figures which I couldn't bring at this juncture, so I'll just read this brief written presentation.

I appear on behalf of the Council on Human Rights and Race Relations. First of all, I would like to compliment the government of Ontario for bringing the employment equity bill and the standing committee for giving me an opportunity to appear before the committee. The bill does make a beginning, even though small, in the areas of making provisions for Ontarians of visible minorities to look for opportunities in employment.

I can recall my own example: When I moved in 1979 to Ontario, I must have applied for at least a hundred vacancies, and the response was invariably that I was either overqualified or had a lot of qualifications but did not meet the specific needs of the specific job, or they informed me that they were keeping my application in their files for the next three months.

Mr Callahan: It sounds like you applied to the government. That's their stock letter.

The Chair: Continue, please.

Mr Syed: The point that I wish to make is that the employers have a host of stock responses which it is difficult to challenge, and they are so legally worded that it is very difficult to maintain that the rejection has been made on the basis of the fact that the colour of the skin of the candidates is different from the colour of the employer. There are excellent provisions in the bill, which the council hopes would forestall all such attempts by the employers.

1500

What, however, the council is now concerned about is another type of discrimination. While it was Bob Rae who, while he was in opposition, drafted an excellent private bill on the issue, unfortunately it is also Bob Rae, for whom we have a great deal of respect and recognition of the fact that he had done some wonderful things, who, when his government took over, a certain group of people from visible minorities flooded the corridors of Queen's Park.

This is not fair and proper. The term "visible minority" does not apply to one group of people, and the recruitment of one group of people at the expense of the other visible minorities, especially those Ontarians who are from India, Pakistan and Bangladesh -- as a matter of fact, this group of visible minorities, according to Statscan, outnumbers the group of the minorities which the NDP government is very fond of.

The government of Ontario, as one of the biggest employers in Ontario, should set models, should be a role model for other employers. The continuous recruitment of one group of visible minorities in the government sector would indicate to the employers in the private sector that by visible minorities only one group of Canadians is meant.

The standing committee should set the record straight that the term "visible minority" means not one group of people but all sections of the visible minorities. If it is necessary, a rough percentage should be set up among the major groups of visible minorities: Chinese, the black and Canadians of India, Pakistan and Bangladesh origin.

The standing committee should also direct the Management Board of Cabinet to develop initiatives to remove the imbalance in the government of Ontario by appointing Ontarians from other sections. The government should not send the message that a minority can attract attention by breaking windows and vandalism in downtown. The council does not begrudge the recruitment of one group of people, but it would wage a war if necessary if proper balance is not maintained.

That's the small presentation, and if there is any question, I am open.

The Chair: Thank you, Mr Syed. Seven minutes per caucus. Mr Tilson, to begin questions.

Mr Tilson: I don't know how much experience you've had with the Human Rights Commission. Have you had any?

Mr Syed: Yes, actually I met the previous one.

Mr Tilson: Well, you've had a lot more than I have.

Mr Syed: Well, I'm not telling you --

Mr Tilson: My point is that we've had people come to this committee, and it's been in the media, people complaining about the operation of the Human Rights Commission. It's taking too long, it's bogged down, they're going nowhere etc. I must confess that does trouble me as to the whole subject of discrimination.

I've raised this question in the past, that now we're going to have another commission. In the 1993-94 estimates, the budget for the Employment Equity Commission is going to be $6 million, and beyond that commission I don't know what other costs there are going to be in this whole operation of employment equity.

My question has been, and I give it to you, whether there's a certain amount of duplication. Both pieces of legislation are dealing with discrimination, whether you're one of the four groups or whether you're any other type of group, and we've had other groups come here. My concern is that we're setting up another bureaucracy, and the track record of the first commission isn't very good. I hope that if this comes to fruition, this second commission will be a little better or we're going to be in a real mess; it's going to be a complete sham.

Mr Syed: There's no question I'm in the picture. I didn't appoint the commissioner, either of them.

Mr Tilson: Sir, I don't know that. All I'm saying is, if the Human Rights Commission was tightened up, if the laws with respect to the Human Rights Commission or the requirements of the Human Rights Commission were made a little tighter and perhaps expanded into other areas, could the work of the Human Rights Commission do the work of the Employment Equity Commission?

Mr Syed: We are at the moment discussing the employment equity bill and I'm prepared to respond to those questions. Now you're raising another entirely different thing of the Human Rights Commission and this work and all this load, but I'm not going to answer the question because I'm prepared to discuss the employment equity bill.

Mr Tilson: Well, sir, I guess I'm asking you the question as to whether or not you feel --

Mr Syed: I believe it is irrelevant.

Mr Tilson: Okay, that's fine. I have a fear that that's what this government thinks too, that it's adding just another bureaucracy and the cost is going to be astronomical. There's no question there's discrimination in this province of all kinds, of not just the groups that are in this bill but aged, youth. I mean, there are suggestions of discrimination against young women in different hiring practices. They're not being referred to. There are all kinds of discrimination that aren't referred to, and yet it may be the subject of the Human Rights Commission.

So my question -- and again, if you're not prepared to or don't wish to answer the question, that's fine, but it's a concern that I have -- is that we're setting up another level of bureaucracy that's going to cost at least $6 million and may in fact not perform the job that this group hopes it will. So, thank you, sir.

Mr Syed: There is no need for setting up another commission at all.

Mr Tilson: I don't think so either. I agree with you.

Mr Syed: It would probably be the safest way to amend the bill or shape the bill in a way that can envisage these safeguards in the bill. As a representative from the visible minority, I'm very much satisfied with various provisions of the bill. They are a good beginning. The only thing is that at the time of political appointments or things like that, there has been a certain weight given to a particular group. Now, I believe, and Statscan says, that the group to which India, Pakistan and Bangladesh people belong outnumbers the other group, the group that is probably at the moment very much flooding the government of Ontario.

Mr Tilson: The Human Rights Commission of course does deal with those matters.

Mr Syed: Well, you have to go to the Human Rights Commission on an individual basis.

Mr Tilson: On an individual basis?

Mr Syed: Yes. But here I'm talking about a particular group. So either the whole group goes before the commission and says this has been done -- and I believe this is the appropriate forum where you can raise this question and where the things can be spelled out that this is not the way to tackle the thing.

Mr Tilson: You don't think a particular group could go to the Human Rights Commission?

Mr Syed: No. That is again a very laborious process.

Mr Tilson: Oh, I'll say it is.

Mr Syed: It's a very laborious process, and again, as you indicated, it is weighed down with bureaucracy.

Mr Tilson: Sir, I quite concur. People have said over and over the system that's in existence isn't working, and yet we're going to create another system, knowing full well the first system doesn't work.

Mr Syed: I'm not in favour of creating any other system. I believe the system that has been envisaged in the bill is good enough. The only thing is that it should be provided more teeth. That's it. I mean, there is no need for creating another bureaucracy at all.

Mr Tilson: Thank you, sir.

Mr Mills: Thank you, sir, for coming this afternoon. I read your brief here in the beginning where you said that you came here in 1957 and you applied for at least 100 jobs.

Mr Syed: More than that.

Mr Mills: I can tell you that I came to Canada almost 40 years ago, and I thought the biggest hindrance to me getting employment was I wish I could have got rid of my accent but I couldn't. I've still got it now, you see. It just won't go away.

Mr Syed: So you endorse what I said.

Mr Mills: Now I'm an old white male, you see. Anyway, enough of that humour.

Interjection: That's presuming an awful lot.

The Chair: Continue, Mr Mills; you're doing fine.

Interjection: We didn't find it very funny, Gordon,

Mr Mills: I listened to the exchange that you had with my colleague Mr Tilson, and what I'm worried about is that you say on page 2 the council is now concerned about another type of discrimination.

Mr Syed: Yes.

Mr Mills: Tell me why you think that. Why is this?

Mr Syed: Because I find the people, the Ontarians, from the origin of India, Pakistan and Bangladesh have been ignored, actually, have been ignored repeatedly. For instance, recently the NDP government appointed three or four people, senior people: the Employment Equity Commissioner, then the chairman of the Ontario Human Rights Commission. They belong to one group. I can name a number of people.

See, what I'm saying is, I'm not blaming the government. I don't know what fascination they have that they are staying away from the people who belong to this particular region. This has been made clear to the Premier a number of times and he acknowledges that in that there has been some partiality, but the thing's being done. I need some safeguards in this bill since the government of Ontario is the biggest employer and the other employers in the private sector say: "Look at it. This is being done by the government of Ontario, and they are the role model for us."

1510

Mr Mills: So you're not satisfied with -- at all.

Mr Syed: No, I'm not satisfied with any percentage of the thing. Of course there has been a recruitment of the visible minorities. "Visible minority" doesn't apply to one group of people.

Mr Mills: But I know there are some who are employed by the government of Ontario. But you say that that's not enough.

Mr Syed: No, I'm not saying that. What I'm saying is that they are appointing; all appointments have gone to one group of visible minorities.

Mr Mills: I see.

Mr Syed: There are three distinct major groups: one is black, the other is Chinese, the other is from India, Pakistan and Bangladesh. The people from the origin of India, Pakistan and Bangladesh are totally ignored. Either we should go and break the windows downtown in order to attract the attention -- that's the only way.

Mr Mills: I have a colleague who needs to ask a question, so I'll defer that.

Ms Akande: Thank you, Mr Syed, for coming and for your presentation. It's nice to meet you.

First of all, though I do take exception with the premise upon which your presentation is based in terms of the breaking of windows, vandalism downtown, you know that there's considerable discussion even at this point about the fact that those things in fact were not the purview of one particular group.

However, am I to understand from your presentation that what you would prefer to see is some collection of information or data by subgroups of visible minorities, in other words, not just one particular category but you would have visible minority information broken down into the various groups within that group so that you would have information?

Mr Syed: That would greatly help. You're right. I think that's the best way.

Ms Akande: Is that what you would want?

Mr Syed: Because then there is no feeling of any grudge or any complaint because they say you are only this much and they are this much so they are getting that much. That's fair enough. That's what I'm saying, that you have to rely on Statistics Canada. Statistics Canada has released the figures. I believe, and according to the figures, the Canadians from the group of India, Pakistan and Bangladesh far outnumber the other groups, excepting Chinese. Chinese of course are very much larger in number. So in order to give a sense of participation to everyone, all the sections of the people should participate in the government. It is not left to one group that should go and participate in the government.

Ms Akande: I understand. All right, then. There are a couple of things. It hurts me to see us argue over the crumbs while the real meal is being eaten by the majority. However, there are employers who in fact respond rather negatively to the collection of information as the bill now stands. What would be your response to them if in fact we are requiring them to collect even more information on the basis of the subgroups which exist below or within each of the main designated groups of which we speak?

Mr Syed: I think you have to add some more teeth to the bill, because this is not really a confidential thing. You simply are asking for a fair representation of the people living in Ontario.

Ms Akande: So you would ask the employers to continue to collect that information, even in spite of their complaint? Is that what you're telling me?

Mr Syed: I couldn't understand the question.

Ms Akande: They're saying that you're asking them to collect even too much information now in terms of their time and the cost etc. Given that you want the information about each subgroup recorded under the designated groups, your feeling is that it is valuable enough to insist that employers collect that also?

Mr Syed: Well, if it serves the purposes of justice, there is no harm in it. You see, it is a question, basically, of ensuring proper and fair representation to do justice to all groups, and in that process, if the employers collect more information, so be it.

Mr Callahan: Mr Syed, your letter is very interesting but it also causes me anguish. Here we are sitting in a committee, on television, sort of talking about the citizens of Ontario, be they of whatever race, religion, creed or whatever, and I find that very difficult to do.

In any event, you've said in your letter that you were told you're overqualified. I can tell you there are a lot of people out there 40, 45 years of age who have lost their jobs due to the downturn in the economy who have major qualifications, and they go out to the employer and the employer says, "You're overqualified." They're applying for a job. They just want any job. They don't care what it is. They've got to feed their families so they're prepared to take anything and the employer says, "You're overqualified." Really, what he's telling the person probably is, "You know, you're getting on to the stage where we can't put you on the company pension, or we haven't got a place for you." Those are the people who are struggling for jobs and they're getting the same kind of response. I don't see anything in here in this bill to deal with them.

I also find the subgroups, with all due respect, that you've suggested, and if you're going to make it a subgroup, then please put on there "Irish, Italian" -- we are all Ontarians and if what you're suggesting is a quota, which is what I think the government is suggesting -- it's not based on the ability of the people but a quota -- then I want to get on the list --

Ms Akande: Those with disabilities or those on the quota?

Mr Callahan: Well, without being on that list, I'm not going to be able to have a job. Maybe some people will say we probably would like to get you out of that job, I don't know, but I really find it difficult to sort of hear this crap. You're upset because, from what I gather from what you're saying, the Rae government and its Lieutenant Governor appointments have been people from a certain visible minority as opposed to the ones you've just discussed. That's your argument, isn't it?

Mr Syed: Should I respond to your thing? Number one, you made a particular reference to my era, the era relating to me. You missed the year, 1979, and you are talking about things which are currently taking place. In 1979, the situation was entirely different. I mention that in order to indicate the reasoning or mentality that was existing at that point in time.

Since you have mentioned this thing, I'll probably have to relate an incident. The time that I'm talking about was the day of the Bill Davis government. The Liberals were in opposition. I went to my member -- Margaret was her name.

Mr Curling: Margaret Scrivener?

Mr Syed: No, Margaret --

Ms Akande: Margaret Marland?

Mr Syed: The point I am making is that I went to her and I indicated to her that the amount of applications that I'm making, I'm not even getting calls for interviews, and she wrote letters to four or five ministers personally to at least give a man a chance to appear, and I was able to get hold of one deputy minister who said: "Look here, Mr Syed, I know you are qualified. I have only the recommendations from five other MPs and people. Now, what should I do? Should I ignore them?"

Then I understood that the conditions over here were similar to what used to happen in my country, so I stopped bothering about that. I never applied after 1979 because I knew the game was the same. You must have one or two MPs in your pocket so that you get a job.

1520

Mr Callahan: A lot of people watching this could be disappointed. I've never been able to get anybody a job.

Mr Curling: Mr Syed, I just wanted, before the time runs out, to get a little question in here. What I'm hearing you saying is that there are qualified visible minorities like yourself who just don't get the opportunity to get a job. There was a report. A task force was set up and a report was done called Access to Trades and Professions in Ontario --

Mr Syed: I did appear before that --

Mr Curling: Yes. Do you feel that, if the government of the day would act on those recommendations and release up most of those people who are qualified, like yourself, you said, there would not be any resistance? These are barriers in itself to access.

Mr Syed: There are barriers.

Mr Curling: I won't be long. You've been very generous with me to give me a question in. But the fact is that the minister stated that she will have a pilot project. Don't you feel it's time that the recommendations go full blast and implement those recommendations so we can have qualified people like yourself --

Mr Syed: This is all politics. I don't want to get involved in the political thing here.

Mr Curling: I'm asking about the task force.

Mr Syed: The thing is that the report has made recommendations, and I met the minister, Elaine Ziemba, put the same question and she said, "I'm going to bring some legislation in the assembly." That's the assurance she gave to me. I am very much concerned about the outcome of that report also, because there are barriers put up by so many different things.

The Chair: Questions have ended and our time is over. Mr Syed, thank you very much for coming today.

KARANJA M. NJOROGE

The Chair: Trent University, international programs. Welcome, Mr Njoroge. We have half an hour for the presentation. You've seen the time element in terms of questions and answers at the end. Begin any time.

Mr Karanja Njoroge: Thank you very much. My name is Karanja Njoroge. I work for Trent University as an administrator and I've also been involved in various other community organizations, both in Peterborough, where Trent is situated, but also across this province. Recently I have been a member of the Ontario Racial Minorities' Organizing Committee for Training and recently also have been nominated to the proposed new Ontario Training and Adjustment Board as one of the members of the board of directors.

I come to you this afternoon in my own personal capacity, although I've had extensive consultations with my colleagues in the university system and also those concerned especially about the involvement of racial minorities in training and education programs in this province.

I am also happy to note that I am accompanied today by two students from South Africa, Zenzele and Selloane, who are here to witness some of the profound changes that are continuing to happen in our so-called First World, while they are struggling with initial problems of eliminating racism from the overt positions of apartheid, and in the future, of eliminating racism, for the provision of the kinds of opportunities that each and every citizen requires to earn a living. I'm very fortunate to have them with me just to witness the proceedings, if you will.

Let me first express my appreciation that you've allowed me to speak. I know there are many who would have loved to be here and to be heard, and for this reason I'm very appreciative of the time given to me.

From the beginning, I want to declare my profound admiration for the government of the day in bringing forth an historic bill which I believe will be the proud legacy of the NDP government in the years to come, even long after maybe you're gone.

Two hundred years ago, Lord Simcoe, the governor of Upper Canada, proclaimed a piece of legislation that I believe was as significant as Bill 79 will be for the Ontario people these coming decades. He signed an act outlawing the trading and possession of slaves. At that time, many were sceptical about the usefulness of such legislation and, regrettably, there were even many who were opposed outright to the legislation, arguing that it was bad for business. Have you had that comment?

Interjection: Yes.

Mr Njoroge: You have? Lord Simcoe was also told that this is a do-gooder act. "You're trying to be good for everyone and it's not good for the community." Even, I dare say, there were people who were worried about the costs of administering such an act back in the days of Lord Simcoe.

Today, you will hear similar arguments by those who would prefer to have the status quo, by those who will not tell you that they prefer to see women and minorities ghettoized in low-paying, deadend jobs in our economy. They will not tell you they would rather have persons with disabilities continue to be wards of the state for their survival, unable to fend for themselves, not because of their inability to do so but because of our own bigoted ways with which we look at persons. You will continue to hear from these people that they would rather have their status quo.

None of these critics of this bill will come to you with an alternative vision or a suggestion of how to get out of our current quagmire, both socially and economically. They will talk to you about reverse discrimination, they will talk to you about lowering standards, they will talk to you about the cost of establishing this Employment Equity Commission, but none of them will tell you how we get out of the current quagmire of our society, and that is what the bill speaks about.

In this century, the cost of systemic discrimination and racism, especially -- and I want to repeat that for my friend here -- anti-African racism in Ontario, cannot be quantified by a presentation like this one. It is as pernicious and as punitive as slavery was in the time of the 19th century.

I want to tell you that the people I have talked to would like me to say categorically that they register their support for this legislation for two reasons: One, we believe in the importance of equity, justice and fairness in the development of our communities. The second thing is that it's vital for Ontario and for all of us in this province to enter an era of major economic changes around the world with an understanding that we must utilize all the assets and resources available to us in order to be more productive and more competitive in a very competitive global economy.

Some of those resources, or in fact a significant part of our assets, is the human resources that Ontario has. If we are underutilizing them, then in fact we are putting ourselves on a very steady slope down to the economic ghettos of this world.

Ontario's economic prosperity depends on how globally competitive our labour force becomes, how the skills of our people are utilized and how we adapt ourselves to the realities of the global economy. When you walk down Toronto streets, you will notice the composition of our own population. When you go to the boardrooms and the executive offices of Bay Street, you will not see that reflected in the decision-making of what makes this economy tick. That is the heart of the problem. If you really want Ontario to go into the 21st century with a people who are recognized the world over as being defenders of justice, equal pay and fairness and who can reach out to the people who can invest their dollars in our own economy, then we must begin to speak to the need of utilizing those skills that are still walking the streets of Toronto.

I am disgusted when I go to buy little things from vendors on the streets, and after talking to some of them, I then become aware that they are trained radiologists who are selling jewellery on Yonge Street, trained radiologists from Pakistan, trained nurses from Ethiopia making beds in hotels in Toronto. We must ask ourselves, why are we misusing the skills of these people?

1530

Some of you have stayed in hotels. The next time you see the maids come to make your bed, ask them who they are. Chances are, they are all people of colour. Chances are they are recent immigrants. Chances are they are very educated. Let us ask, why are we utilizing these people in this manner?

For me, the single overriding challenge faced by not just ourselves in this province, but the entire North American economy, especially our inner cities, the large metropolises, is the social policies and attitudes that marginalize groups of people. The marginalization of individuals and communities creates unsafe living conditions which, in turn, impoverish families and adversely affect the values on which a community is built and thrives on. Once that deteriorates, then I'm sorry to say, even the foreign investor and, in fact, the internal investor become very wary of investing their dollars in a community that is heightened by tension and violence and lawlessness.

When you open today's newspaper and you see that someone shot at a taxicab driver three times for $25, you must ask yourself, what kind of an Ontario do you want to leave for the 21st century? Will you be able to identify the problems of that person, both the victim and the potential inflictor of this? I would suggest to you that the employment equity bill as proposed may in fact be part of an answer to that problem, that when our people can see the glimmer of hope in terms of developing their future, once the young people on the streets can believe that there is a chance for them to grow and to thrive in our own community, then it becomes good for us. It's good for you and it's good for me.

I have a child too. I have an eight-year-old who's going to be nine in September and I want her to grow up thinking that Ontario is a place which she must call home and where all avenues of her own ability -- that the sky indeed is the limit and that she will not be judged by her skin colour but by her intellect, and therefore the dream must continue.

Finally, I want to mention some of the suggestions that I'm making to make this bill a better bill. I am suggesting, for example, that the preamble, which should be the main thrust of the ethos behind the bill, must be changed. It must speak about the benefit of this bill to the larger Ontario community. Our people, the coloured people, the visible minorities, are tired of being told, "We are doing this for you." I don't believe the employment equity bill is being done for me. That's not true. It's being done for you too; you, the white male, the so-called white male who is complaining about this. This bill is actually articulating a future for that white male. If you continue with the status quo, this place will be a battlefield worse than Sarajevo, and if we can give opportunities for everyone, I am prepared to tell you that we can then look forward to a better and equitable and fair Ontario.

Another recommendation that I will be suggesting to you is a change by way of classification. If you will, the definition of the groups clearly identified as target groups must be made much clearer. This is really an interpretation. I'm not a lawyer, but I would bet that the current definition of "designated group" is left too wide and too open. What I would suggest be done is that we say exactly what we mean by "designated group" or "disabled persons." I think that is very, very good. If we can say that the designated group is as identified by the Ontario Human Rights Code, then we know where to refer when we want to really ask ourselves, "Who can I count as a racial minority in my community?" or when people have chosen not to self-disclose or to self-identify themselves as being one or the other.

There are a few other things that are primarily technical and I suggest you read my presentation for you to know what it is that I'm suggesting be changed.

Finally, I believe the only way that Ontario can get ahead in a world that is so full of difficulties, and difficulties not just in managing the government as it is with getting enough money to do everything that the citizens want done, but also difficulties in the sense that we are no longer operating in a world that allows us to think only about Ontario -- we must begin to think about what is happening beyond the confines of our community. Ontario does require visionary leadership and that leadership, I think, may be sitting around this table -- that visionary leadership of men and women who must look beyond the short-term political discomforts of talking about anti-racism, the short-term political discomfort of standing up for those on the lowest end of the ladder. If we can be able to rise above party politics in this one, I think we will see ourselves becoming visionary, becoming a leadership that speaks to us, but also becoming a leadership that calls upon our community to nurture humanity in all its diversity, and to nurture our communities with integrity and the commitment that it deserves.

I would want a leadership from you that will bestow a sense of hope to the hopeless and offer a supporting hand to the disadvantaged; a leadership that will challenge all our peoples in Ontario to celebrate and accentuate the positive in all of us; a leadership that will actively seek to empower the marginalized, to give confidence to the weak and to encourage excellence in all of us. Only then can I believe that my daughter has a future in Ontario. Only then can I keep both my feet on the ground in Ontario.

I can assure you that the majority of the people who will look at this bill, not primarily as an act by itself but as a step in the right direction; not as a finality of resolving the problems that it addresses but as a small step towards that goal eventually, I think they will all support you and support the bill.

Ms Carter: Welcome, Karanja and your friends, to Queen's Park. Of course, I know very well how active you are in Peterborough, both in the Trent international program and the race relations committee and I congratulate you on your appointment to OTAB.

Since you are so involved in so many different ways, I wonder if you could give us more details as to the kind of problem you come across. We have had some presenters to this committee who've told us there isn't a problem, that things are improving, that some groups are even overrepresented in the workforce already; no legislation is needed. I remember when the minister came to Peterborough we had two meetings; one was with, I guess, a business-oriented group, all white. They said there was no problem. Then we had a meeting with the race relations committee and it was quite a different story. Could you highlight some of the particular problems that you come across?

Mr Njoroge: There are many problems out there. If anyone says there is no problem, they are really not serious about Ontario; they are neither leaders nor real serious about what is ailing our economy. I really refuse to see this as a social agenda. There is something wrong with the way our economy is being run.

I forgot to tell you that I am also a founding member of the Friends of Black Inmates and in that capacity have visited many provincial correctional centres as well as federal correctional centres, penitentiaries, and more often than one, when I speak to black inmates, and there are many of them inside, many of those, 16-, 17-, 18-, 20-year-old black people inside the jail system in this province -- when I speak to them, the pattern that comes out is overfrustrated young persons who have actually never been given one sentence of positive feedback. They have never had an opportunity to sit across from someone, or to hear something from leaders or from teachers or from their own parents, by the way, which says: "Hey, you can do something. You can do this or the other and so on."

1540

The constant barrage of information they get is how negative they are, how awful these particular communities are and, "You are destined to sell drugs anyway," or "Why are you hanging out, listening to this loud music?" and so on. So they internalize all these things and they have absolutely no avenue to believe in themselves. Therefore, I am shocked that someone can tell you there are no problems.

In Peterborough, where I have been for five years, almost every month I'm dealing with a crisis of a young, minority person who is facing real, serious problems of finding space for themselves and believing in them. We work with their parents, we work with their teachers, we work with other government departments and counselling services and so on. The real problem is that no one believes they have a chance in Ontario from our community and the few that do, really work very hard and eventually find some way. You cannot turn that around unless you have programs and policies in place that actually assure people there is a chance. This bill is one such legislation.

It's not the only one that is needed. We need the Human Rights Code; it does not replace that. We need other bills too, and we need active government involvement in anti-racist education. That is key to the challenges of our time. But if you prefer to bury your head in the sand, yes, there's no problem.

Ms Carter: Some of the people on the opposition side have told us that the problem is that there aren't enough qualified people from the designated group so the problem is education and training. But I think from what you're saying, that is a separate issue from the question of employment equity.

Mr Njoroge: Correct.

Ms Carter: You're telling us that there are people with very good qualifications who can't get access to the careers they're qualified for. I believe the government is already taking some steps to make sure that these access problems are diminished. That is separate from this act.

Mr Njoroge: It's separate from the employment act, the bill before us. But I think it's very crucial, I must state to you, that unless the access to professions and trades is also changed, this bill may be fruitless in the long run. So I want to underscore that this thing by itself may not be sufficient.

Anti-racist education in our schools must be in place. Our teachers must be sensitized so that kids are being given the skills for which they will be given employment. Access to professions and trades must be changed and harnessed. The way we certify our trades and professions, the way we recognize credits and accreditation from foreign countries, must also be changed. That's important.

Mr Curling: Thank you very much. An excellent presentation. What I've learned over time, Mr Njoroge, is that after the speeches and the emotion and the pain, there must be some legislation that can make those changes that are enforceable and not patronizing the groups or so, because I always find who gets the benefit from all this are lawyers anyhow. When we put the cases to the court, it's the lawyers who have to define these rather vague definitions and all that.

Yes, on this side, this party, especially myself -- I am a strong believer in employment equity and we must have legislation, mandatory employment equity in place. But to do so, we must have good legislation, because weak legislation, I continue to say, is worse than no legislation. Simcoe made his move and we are making our move now. But we are more informed. The people in place who are making decisions should understand what this struggle is all about.

Would you agree that at this juncture we have reached in this life, making legislation, we should exempt those employers with under 50 employees? Do you feel this legislation should do that?

Mr Njoroge: I believe it should. I mean, I agree with the current legislation stipulating 50 employees or more for this reason: The Employment Equity Act, as defined in the current bill, seeks to address the issue of employment from the point of view of numbers. If you go to a firm that employs only five people and say, "We want you to have a representative sample in your employ," it's going to be meaningless in most cases.

Therefore, where I come from in Peterborough there will be even larger institutions which have 50 employees for which to determine the configurations of the representativeness might be difficult. What is 1.5% of 50? Do you understand what I'm trying to get at here, that we have to have legislation that is feasible? To me, 50 is a good number to start with.

Mr Curling: Are you saying in the public sector it makes sense, but in the private sector it doesn't?

Mr Njoroge: No, no. Far from it, Alvin. I'm telling you that the very important bill that is in front of us is speaking to the question of representativeness. If you go the majority of small employers with 10 or fewer employees, it becomes difficult to apportion these configurations of percentages of the larger community.

What I'm suggesting to you is that it's easier for the commission to be able to police and enforce the act for the larger employers. After all, this act is really not the end of the road. This act, in my view, is for the community to see, to have an exposure to the need to get in the best minds irrespective of colour and sex and so on and so forth. When you have more and more people employed by the larger corporations who are primarily the people who'll be more visible, then the smaller employers will almost invariably follow suit, because they will say: "Hey, you know, it's not bad to hire a black person. They do really in fact work. They are not all hopeless people." I think that's what we want to do.

I hope that this legislation will be useless 25 years from now, that we will have such an equal situation that there will be no need for it. That's what I would hope.

Mr Curling: But that's Utopia.

Mr Njoroge: Correct.

Mr Curling: Do you feel that any changes --

The Chair: Sorry; we're out of time, Mr Curling.

Mr Tilson: Sir, I appreciate some of the thoughts that you've given to us today. You've obviously spent some time preparing for this and articulating on it. I thank you for that.

There has obviously been substantial criticism about this bill, particularly in the media. One of the areas of criticism has said that we have a Human Rights Code which is supposed to prevent hiring discrimination based on race, gender etc, a whole slew of things, that Canadians have traditionally supported the principle of a Human Rights Code and in fact believe that citizens are entitled to equal employment opportunities.

Mr Njoroge: They don't practise that, believe me.

Mr Tilson: Well, sir, I'm telling you that's what the Human Rights Code is supposed to do, unless you're telling me the Human Rights Code doesn't do that. These same Canadians have been and are profoundly offended by the notion that some citizens have more rights than others based on gender, race, ancestry or handicap. I guess my question --

Mr Njoroge: Do you want me to respond to that?

Mr Tilson: Yes, I would.

Mr Njoroge: You've read Animal Farm?

Mr Tilson: I have indeed.

1550

Emergency alarm sounded.

Mr Callahan: We've got another fire.

Mr Tilson: That must be a heck of a fire.

The Chair: We've heard it before. Continue, please.

Mr Njoroge: To me, it's revisiting Animal Farm. You have one particular species of the animal family that has everything and then, suddenly, you visit that and say, "How do we change the situation so that everyone can have some power, some ability to earn their own livelihood?" You do not have that by saying everybody can go out and fend for themselves, because a majority of the people are accustomed to paying homage to this one particular species of animal.

What we need is an equalizing of the playing field and what you do is to interest our people. That's what leadership is all about. You tell your communities that unless we can reverse this so that you have women in your leadership, women in the church, black people in the workplace, Chinese people doing different things other than the local Chinese restaurant -- if you have that, then you begin to socialize the idea of equity. But you cannot have equity by declaring them equal.

The Ontario Human Rights Code is very good. It's declared everyone equal. We love that. But you and I know that the majority of your folk don't think I am equal to them. I can guarantee you that. The way to redress that is to ask my university that if I am qualified for a promotion, alongside with my compatriot, a white male, and both of us can do the job equally well, I'm no worse off than him, then it should promote me. That it allows the students, the faculty, to recognize that I can be whatever, and you then begin to improve the level at which our people are involved, women are involved and so on. I am hoping that we do not have to do this. Nobody wants to be given things. I hope I was never given this job because I was black, but I had to work very hard and even now I have to act doubly hard to maintain the job, because the majority of the people will always want to see -- and that's the difficulty.

Mr Tilson: I'm finished.

The Chair: Mr Njoroge, thank you for your presentation and coming from Trent to participate in these hearings. I want to welcome the visitors who have come here and wish them well, both in their stay here in Ontario and back home.

Mr Njoroge: Thank you very much.

JANAKI BALAKRISHNAN

The Chair: Sri Lankan Graduates Association, Janaki Balakrishnan. We have half an hour.

Emergency alarm sounded.

The Chair: I think it's the same message as before. We'll disregard it if that's the case. Please begin.

Ms Janaki Balakrishnan: First of all, I'd like to make a change in the presentation. This is not made by the Sri Lankan Graduates Association. Unfortunately, they couldn't make it, but I am making this presentation as an individual from the Sri Lankan community.

Good evening, ladies and gentlemen, honourable members of the standing committee on administration of justice. My name is Janaki Balakrishnan, I belong to the Sri Lankan community and I am a professional engineer. My personal past experience as a minority female member in a non-traditional profession prompted me to make this presentation. Further, I feel strongly that I have a civic obligation to inform the standing committee on administration of justice of my experience and my recommendations so that other members of the designated groups can benefit in the future.

I arrived in Canada 11 years ago, possessing an electrical engineering degree and more than seven years of experience in the same field. During my nine years' stay in Ontario, I spent two years at the University of Toronto in a full-time graduate program to obtain an MASc degree in electrical engineering. The rest of the seven years were spent engaged in sessional jobs -- unrelated, underemployed, underutilized, underpaid positions -- and tirelessly seeking a related position. Self-learning and update and training with the growing technology have been continual during this period. I have been employed by Toronto Hydro for the last two and a half months.

In the midst of all of this, I attended seminars and workshops conducted by the former Liberal government on access to trades and professions, equity etc. I believe the Honourable MPP Mr Alvin Curling was responsible for the equity program then. Recently, I had an opportunity to express to the honourable Premier on behalf of Sri Lankans my views on employment equity policy in practice with no positive effect on Sri Lankans. Lastly, I attended the public press conference on Bill 79 to hear the address by the honourable Minister of Citizenship.

I am in a position to make this presentation because I am with Toronto Hydro today, where employment equity is practised in an appreciable manner when compared to many other workplaces. Previous employments would have neither permitted time nor provided exposure and confidence to participate in this process.

My submission is primarily based on my personal experience and the experiences that I heard from other Sri Lankans and some other minority members. My sincere thanks to the members of the standing committee and the honourable Minister of Citizenship for this opportunity to express my views on the Employment Equity Act of Ontario.

My conclusions toward this legislation are:

(1) I welcome this legislation as a positive, constructive approach to achieving employment equity in the province of Ontario, whereas voluntary methods have not proved successful in the past.

(2) It is a just piece of legislation which will have enormous impact on aboriginal people, people with disabilities, members of racial minorities women and other disadvantaged groups that may be recommended and included as designated groups. They are directly or indirectly taxpayers of Ontario and also participate by contributing to the wealth of this province.

(3) The legislation specifically targets employers' accountability, numerical goals, timetables and several other effective approaches that are commendable.

(4) Nevertheless, a few major modifications will assist in reaching effective results.

Before I discuss constructive recommendations on page 5, I would like to comment on opinions from others which may arise in due course. The mythical "principle of merit" argument is always followed by the phrase "employment equity." I believe if the principle of merit had been in place in the past, I wouldn't be taking this stand today.

Honestly speaking, I haven't reached the level to compete with white males. I'm still at the level of competing with other minority males. I was looking to the press to comment on the presentation made by the Committee on the Status of Women. I saw nothing, except on the front page, "Survey: Over 10% of Women Victims of Violence." What we need is media equity.

1600

Honourable Mr Winninger, I believe you can recall this event. I met Mr Winninger at a certificate presentation ceremony of my chapter of the Association of Professional Engineers of the Province of Ontario. I was the vice-chair of the chapter, which consists of 3,500 members, but I was unemployed then. This picture of a minority group female engineer -- I think you have the last page in the package -- receiving a certificate and my position are system realities, sugar-coated sour candies, but what I am relating here today is the practical reality. Honourable Mr Winninger, you are practically perfect in this scenario. If this picture is the practical reality, why is there a separate women engineers group consisting of a number of white females within PEO's structure?

The other item may be the divide-and-rule approach of destruction. Some of the minority groups may express their concerns that they were satisfied with prior employment equity policy and there is no necessity for this legislation. I wonder what motivates such groups. Some other minority groups may feel secure at present, but might be threatened by additional competition.

As I mentioned before, voluntary employment equity policy was not beneficial to many Sri Lankans. Honourable Mr Alvin Curling, I do not know whether you can recall, but I still remember your address on the topic of literacy at Seneca College five years ago. The honourable Mr Alvin Curling was on the Seneca College board. I was a sessional teacher there. In that, Mr Curling mentioned that a high literacy rate exists in Sri Lanka.

Honourable Mr Alvin Curling and other members of the standing committee, I strongly believe this legislation is the only means for minority groups like Sri Lankans to enter the workforce with a fair opportunity and contribute by their talents.

Now I would like to discuss the constructive recommendations and suggestions to the legislation.

Recommendation 1, exception of employers: Remove exception of employers. Include all employers in the regulation.

It will not be surprising if the big employers split their businesses to form smaller businesses and others downsize to 49 employees just prior to the effective date. A 49-employee workplace, do not ask equity; $3.99 a meal, do not pay PST. Something like that.

I believe the exception of employers will be an obstruction to achieving a permanent solution through this employment equity legislation. Small workplaces are highly unregulated and these have been places of exploitation of most members of designated groups when they were refused access to other so-called regulated workplaces. Discrimination and intimidation take place very openly in these small workplaces and are not being challenged. At some workplaces, employees are expected to enter, work and leave with no employment letter and other documents.

Perhaps setting up numerical goals can be difficult for smaller employers. However, auditing and monitoring can be done with every employer to check the status of employees. Set up timetables for smaller employers for submission of present status of employees and advise them of plans and implementation to achieve employment equity to the best level.

Untrained staff should not be an excuse. Most of the workplaces have a personnel officer or a payroll clerk. Employers expect Canadian experience from foreign-qualified immigrants on day one. Why couldn't these personnel officers train themselves in employment equity matters? If not, there are employment equity agencies that are very willing to train and provide sufficient information to the employers and the related personnel.

The solution to this is to redefine "employer" to include "related employer" as determined under the Labour Relations Act. Delete employer exceptions with fewer than 10 employees in the public sector and with fewer than 50 employees in the private sector.

Recommendation 2 on the implementation period: Reduce the implementation period for smaller workplaces.

According to previous discussion, in highly unregulated small workplaces, especially in the private sector, members of the designated groups are exploited very badly. Providing a long implementation period to these employers will not improve the situation.

Workplace survey and collection of information will not require much time, which is a one-time activity, immaterial of the size. The Employment Equity Commission should assist in preparing a consistent employee survey questionnaire for employers based on the size, organizational structure, nature of business etc. I believe an 18-month period is sufficient for education and training of staff to prepare the plan with the assistance of the Employment Equity Commission and other employment equity agencies.

Solution: Reduce the implementation period of private sector employers of fewer than 100 employees to 18 months, and thereby reduce the implementation period from a maximum of 36 months to 24 months.

Recommendation 3 on employment polices and practices: Specify items to be reviewed of employment policies. Obtain reports from the employers of their practices in relation to the specified polices.

Setting up guidelines to review employers' employment policies and practices will be a consistent and a faster approach. Further, obtaining information on the practices in the past, along with the plan, will assist the Employment Equity Commission for any feedback in advance.

Solution: Include employment policies to be reviewed in section 10. Policies shall include hiring and recruitment, development of job description, duties and responsibilities etc. I'm not going to read all those now. You can have a look at that one.

Recommendation 4, employment equity plan: Amend section 11.1, clauses (b) and (c), to identify members of the designated groups appropriately, and item (e) to describe in detail -- to basically clarify the scope of the legislation.

Recommendation 5: Employer to submit a progress report every year since the plan is filed. Specify the format of the report with specific facts and figures.

Monitoring is essential in achieving employment equity effectively. It may be a burden to the employers at the beginning of the process; however, it will relieve them from penalties in the long run.

The solution is that progress reports shall provide the following: composition of employees, with numbers and ratios and the composition of designated groups etc; and hiring, promotion, terminations, voluntary leaving numbers and ratios etc, as given in that list.

Recommendation 6, access and participation: Provide for access and participation to non-unionized employees and the unemployed.

Employees holding seasonal, sessional, casual, temporary and contract positions do not belong to unions. When I was a sessional teacher at college, I could not join the union. Such employees do not have any representative. Furthermore, there are members who are unemployed. They will be left in the dark, having no access. Most of these members belong to designated groups. Make provision for them to be represented by other supporting groups or as individuals.

Identify groups that should represent non-unionized employees and the unemployed. Specify the procedure, terms and conditions for individual representation or representation by the other groups.

Recommendation 7, access to information: Provide employment equity plans and reports accessible as public information. Make provision for the employees to see the plans and progress reports of employers regarding the employment equity at all stages. I believe not only the designated groups but also the public have the right to access to this information.

Solution: The employer shall post copies of the plan and progress reports at the workplace as employees' information. The Employment Equity Commission shall make provisions for the public reference of all the plans and progress reports of the employers.

Recommendation 8, Employment Equity Commission: Engage the Employment Equity Commission to deal with employment equity education, training and systemic issues.

Recommendation 9, the equity tribunal: that a single equity tribunal be established to deal with the complaints under the employment equity legislation and the Ontario Human Rights Code.

Recommendation 10 on discrimination and intimidation: Include additional cases in paragraph 29(2)2 which are refusal of employment, refusal of promotion, refusal of equitable salary, underutilized and underpaid situations, overutilized and underpaid situations.

That's all. I would like to thank again the Minister of Citizenship for the courage and initiative that she has taken to introduce this legislation. I also thank all the members of the standing committee and, finally, the honourable Premier of Ontario.

The Chair: Thank you very much. Five minutes per caucus, Mr Curling to begin the questions.

Mr Curling: Thank you very much, and also I want to thank you for your presentation. I know it takes a lot of hard work for an individual to look into this. Some of the points you've made in there are excellent.

I agree with you that Hydro has moved in the direction of employment equity, and maybe they could look at some of those things that they are doing and make some pattern to some of the progressive ways they have moved.

1610

I just want to go to your recommendation 9 in the short time. You said for an equity tribunal to be established. Would you feel that you could include the Pay Equity Commission under this equity tribunal to deal with most things of equity, all equity-related issues on that? Do you see pay equity being included in this?

Ms Balakrishnan: I haven't gone through pay equity in detail as such, so I don't know what the pay equity tribunal deals with, what matters, so far. But I'm not in favour of a human rights board dealing with the employment equity issues. We would like to have a separate one because human rights is already backlogged with several cases, and also this is a different situation. That's why I suggested that the Employment Equity Tribunal should concentrate on this issue alone.

Mr Curling: You also mentioned, and I'm sure demonstrated, that you're a victim, one of those who are qualified and yet do not fall into the category of being employed because you could be subject to Canadian experience, and most of the time when you are being employed, you're underemployed etc.

The task force that you mentioned about access to trade and professions, the recommendations are still sitting there not being implemented. As a matter of fact, I gather that the ministers and their colleagues are quite happy with it, but not happy enough to where they could implement a recommendation. They have set up a pilot project in order to put some of the recommendations in place.

As you said, employment equity on its own is not sufficient, but that task force recommendation would help. Would you feel that the government should implement that task force recommendation immediately, not only on a pilot project but a full-blown program, giving people like yourself access to the workforce without any discrimination?

Ms Balakrishnan: As a next step, that's what we were going to ask, that they implement it quickly. It's going on; of course probably that would have been our next request of the government, that also.

Mr Curling: Let me just follow the debate. You said, "As a next step." If you get the employment equity in place first, do you feel, as it stands, that, although we welcome the presentation of the employment equity bill in the House being debated now, a lot is to be done in amending it? Do you feel that as it is, if no amendment is made, this would be an effective bill, without any amendments?

Ms Balakrishnan: I think so, because they have called for recommendations from the public and the designated groups, so they are trying as much as possible to make it effective. So I hope this will be effective legislation and that's what I have concluded in my presentation.

The Chair: Thank you, Mr Curling. Ms Tilson. I beg your pardon. Ms Witmer.

Mr Callahan: Is there something we don't know about, or what?

Mrs Witmer: Thank you very much for your presentation. We've actually had a number of presentations from the Sri Lankan community, and it's become I think abundantly clear that certainly those individuals are highly literate and very well educated and still feel that they have been denied opportunities to employment. I appreciate the comments that have been made.

You've indicated that you would remove the exception and include all employers in the act. When you say that, are you saying everybody above 10 employees?

Ms Balakrishnan: All employers, whoever it may be, whether two employees, three employees. At least it should be included in the act that they have to submit a report of the status of the employees, with the salary and what their position is and so on. They cannot implement numerical goals to those employers, according to the employment equity legislation. However, they can set up some other guidelines for them to see whether the employees are being treated equally, respectfully, and paid well and so on.

Mrs Witmer: Then all employers, regardless of size?

Ms Balakrishnan: Yes.

Mrs Witmer: Once you have one employee, you would be subject to the employment equity bill and legislation, you're saying.

Ms Balakrishnan: Yes.

Mrs Witmer: You want to reduce the implementation period for the smaller workplaces. Why would you suggest that this would happen?

Ms Balakrishnan: That's why I mentioned and I have discussed in this recommendation 1 how the employees in smaller workplaces are being treated. If we let them have longer periods for these smaller employers, again, we are going to face the same problem. Rather, we can solve those problems. If you consider bigger places like Toronto Hydro, Ontario Hydro, they have already had employment policy in place. It may not be very effective to a 100% level, but it's easy for them to improve their situation, whereas smaller places which have never had any implemented employment policy should initiate right away and set up a plan within a short period to show some improvement.

Mrs Witmer: There's been a recognition by some presenters, and I think even this morning by one of the unions, that certainly with the small amount of turnover in the workplace, given the present economic situation in this province and the fact that employers aren't going to be hiring many people, it could take -- I think the figure this morning -- nine years before we see any changes. What is your response? Do you recognize that there is very little turnover in employees at the present time?

Ms Balakrishnan: Okay, if they're around, that might turn over with employees. But I'm saying if it is slow, then it's much easier. Even the personnel offices don't have much work to do, there aren't that many employees in the company, so they can establish policies and place this one in order so that when the economy gets better they can start implementing that one immediately.

Mrs Witmer: So you recognize that it could take some time.

Ms Balakrishnan: Yes.

Mrs Witmer: I guess, finally, you've indicated that somehow we have to provide access and participation for individuals who don't belong to a union or who may be unemployed. Do you have any specific suggestions as to how we could reach those individuals? I think it is important that they be included.

Ms Balakrishnan: Yes. It could be racial minority groups representing a certain racial minority group or some professional groups which have -- but there are some professional associations. They have a licensing group as well as the professionals' welfare group, so they can represent them for those type of people.

The Chair: Mrs Witmer, we ran out of time. Mr Winninger. There are three speakers, by the way, in the event that you want to leave room for others.

Mr Winninger: It was indeed a pleasure meeting you a few months ago, and I'm quite surprised you still remember. For those who don't know, the Attorney General is responsible for the engineers' legislation and that was an important evening where many new Canadians received their licences to practise. I understand that there's a lot more work that can be done in promoting access to the professions. I'm sure you would agree with that.

Ms Balakrishnan: Yes.

Mr Winninger: There is a question I have for you, though, around your recommendation regarding subsection 11(1) and the identification of members of the designated groups. Given that the definitions are provided in the regulations and the whole framework is one of self-identification, some people have suggested that self-identification is important to protect the privacy of members of the identified groups. Other critics have suggested that this might lead to abuse because people would self-identify to qualify under the provisions of Bill 79. Could you comment on that?

Ms Balakrishnan: You mean personal identification, for an example, in a survey when they take it? Whether I say or not, they are going to identify me as a visible minority, and also, even if I don't go there in person, when I send my résumé, obviously they're going to see I'm coming from a visible minority. So I don't have any problem identifying myself personally as a visible minority or a female or whatever it may be. If it is going to benefit in overall my career, as also in overall the whole of the province of Ontario, I have no objection at all about that issue.

Mr Winninger: In general do you think that people will be hesitant or fearful about identifying themselves as a racial minority?

Ms Balakrishnan: I cannot comment for other people, but as far as I know, in overall I can see outside, whether I say or not, from the accent, from the name and everything. Other people are going to identify somehow or another. So I don't think there is any reason for them to fear this identification.

Mr Winninger: And quite clearly you're in agreement that there is a need for this kind of legislation and you speak from your own experience in the engineering community. You'd like to see some changes in the legislation, but you do affirm its principles.

1620

Ms Balakrishnan: Certainly I do, yes. By making these recommendations, I think we can make the legislation more effective and implement it as soon as possible.

Mr Winninger: I agree. You've made some very constructive recommendations. Thank you.

Ms Harrington: I also want to thank you for this extremely good brief with your list of very specific recommendations, because this is the stage we're at now; we're looking at the bill and seeing how we can make it work better. So I certainly thank you for this.

Your suggestions here about reducing the time lines for companies with 100 employees etc to the 18 months I find interesting, and I don't see why that really wouldn't work; your concern about access for non-unionized employees and your personal story about being on a contract basis?

Ms Balakrishnan: A sessional job, yes.

Ms Harrington: A sessional basis, and feeling that these people should have access and protection and involvement.

I wanted to get to my main concern, I guess, today, your recommendation 1, and that is for small employers. We've heard from some businesses that they feel it's going to be an undue hardship on small business, that it will take time and paperwork and that small businesses in particular would find it difficult to comply in that sense of the red tape involved. What's your view with a very small business, say, five employees, or up to 25?

Ms Balakrishnan: Initially the paperwork might be a little more, but when considering the number by number they are very small, so it will not take much time for them to do the process. But once they have started the process, I believe there will be more input to them and assistance from the Employment Equity Commission and the employment equity agencies, if they were willing to get assistance from them. They can easily implement that.

The Chair: We ran out of time. Ms Balakrishnan, we want to thank you for coming and to congratulate you for the diligence with which you've applied yourself in writing this submission.

Ms Balakrishnan: Thank you very much.

VIETNAMESE ASSOCIATION OF TORONTO

The Chair: Vietnamese Association of Toronto, Linh Tran. Mr Tran, you have half an hour for your presentation. I hope you'll leave some time at the end for questions and answers as we did with previous presenters.

Mr Linh Tran: Okay, very good.

The Chair: Please begin any time.

Mr Tran: Mr Chairman, ladies and gentlemen, my name is Linh Tran. I'm the vice-president in charge of external affairs and culture. I'm here to represent the Vietnamese Association of Toronto. I would like to bring up a few concerns in reading through Bill 79, but before I do that I would like to provide some organizational background of my organization.

The Vietnamese Canadian community is one of the newest in Canada, having been formed after the Vietnam War ended in 1975, the year that South Vietnam collapsed, forcing thousands of Vietnamese to flee their homeland. The community is primarily comprised of refugees and immigrants sponsored to Canada by the federal government, relatives, religious institutions and private groups.

The Vietnamese Canadian population in Ontario is continuously increasing since Ontario possesses a dynamic multicultural nature and the largest Vietnamese community in Canada. At the moment there are over 65,000 Canadian of Vietnamese descent, origin, residing in the province of Ontario. During the six years between 1985 and 1991, Canada has welcomed some 47,000-plus Vietnamese immigrants. This is according to immigration statistics in 1991. Approximately about 31%, 32% of these immigrants chose Metropolitan Toronto as their home city. This is also according to the integration needs assessment report of the Vietnamese association in June 1993. With other Vietnamese Canadians who came to Canada before 1985, these immigrants comprise a relatively large population in great need of services, including employment-related services.

Founded in 1972, the Vietnamese Association of Toronto has developed from a volunteer-based socialization group to a non-profit social service provider for over 60,000 Vietnamese Canadians in Metro Toronto. The Vietnamese association has been the only linguo-specific multiservice organization serving this population for the last 21 years. It is financially supported by all levels of government, the United Way of Toronto, Levi Strauss and Co (Canada) Inc, Ontario Trillium Foundation etc. Its 15 full-time-equivalent staff are working on 15 different major projects and programs such as anti-racism, community participation, integration needs assessment and service development and so on and so forth. The association assists Vietnamese immigrants to cope with adverse situations with services ranging from housing, employment referral and placement, family counselling, language training, advocacy, outreach, interpretation etc. It provides services to over 10,000 clients annually. Its clientele comes from all municipalities across Metro Toronto and its vicinity. That's all the way from Mississauga, the town of Vaughan and certainly Scarborough. Vietnamese Canadians are recognizing the Vietnamese Association as a leader in providing culturally sensitive and linguo-specific services to them and as their representative in dealing with issues related to settlement and integration in Canada.

Now I would like to go on to the need for policy and implementation of employment equity.

One of the most critical and persistent issues that we have to deal with has been employment. Due to various reasons, including discrimination, the majority of our employed members are undertaking low-paid jobs in factories or restaurants. The 1986 statistics show the Vietnamese are among those ethnic groups whose incomes are the lowest in Canada. Only about 2.6% of Vietnamese Canadians earn over $30,000 annually. This also holds true for many other southeast Asians, whose average employment income is about $20,000, compared to $26,000 or $27,000 for the total labour force. The 1986 average annual income of a Vietnamese was $12,000, in comparison with the Metro average of about $20,000 to $21,000.

Now I'd like to bring out some of the barriers to employment.

The first one: Our experience indicates that whereas language skills may play the most important role in newcomers' route to successful settlement in Canada, they are the very ones that the majority of Vietnamese-speaking newcomers lack:

"About 40% of immigrants have trouble with official language skills. This is especially true of immigrants whose mother tongues are Chinese, Vietnamese..."

This is quoted from a social report for Metro, July 1992.

Because of this, access to essential services and training programs has remained a chronic problem for them.

Second, the lack of Canadian experience and the lack of recognition of previous experience for those who recently settled here in Ontario.

The third issue is that the lack of knowledge relevant to Canadian life, combined with the incapability to overcome the burden of discrimination, have historically and unfairly victimized many Vietnamese Canadians. As addressed by Madam Assistant Deputy Minister Anne-Marie Stewart of the Ontario Anti-Racism Secretariat on March 19, 1993,

"Some obvious patterns of systemic racism include: racial minorities concentrated in low-paid job ghettos, racial minority and aboriginal youth with low self-esteem and low academic achievement...persistent family violence, drug abuse and crime in racial minority and aboriginal communities."

This is perfectly true in the case of the Vietnamese Canadian community.

Many members of the Vietnamese Canadian community have for long been vulnerable to racist incidents and injustice. Explaining why a first offender was sent to prison on a relatively minor offence, Toronto's Judge Anthony Charlton said:

"In Toronto, in these courtrooms, sometimes I sent young men from Vietnam to jail rather severely on offences.... They've been in Canada a short time, they've been in Canada a year or two or three, and I have to work out a kind of sentence that appears to have no bias.... I lay out some severe sentences that perhaps wouldn't apply in the same set of facts with someone who'd been in Canada 20 or 30 years."

This is quoted by my executive director in "Investigate This Judge," editorials, Toronto Star, in April 1993.

Now I would like to move on to the opening statements.

Many of the aboriginal people, persons with disabilities, racial minorities and women face discrimination. Consistently not hearing about job openings, being overlooked in a job competition or passed over for promotion are so common that the practices seem to be built into the way many of the employers do business. They go beyond individual acts of prejudice or meanness. This kind of unintentional, built-in discrimination is called systemic discrimination.

1630

Individuals cannot fix systemic discrimination with individual complaints to change discriminatory business practices. Equity-seeking groups see employment equity legislation as a giant remedial order to fix or to ameliorate the systemic discrimination in all Ontario workplaces. It is an extension of human rights laws we already have.

Now, Bill 79 calls on employers and employees to engage in a process of planning to get rid of the barriers that keep these designated groups from fully participating in the workplace. Once the parties identify these barriers, they ought to develop a plan to remove them and change their employment practices to better suit the groups mentioned. The plan should set goals and timetables for making this workplace reflect more of the composition of the community where it is located.

We support these objectives, that is, the Vietnamese Association of Toronto. We also support employment equity legislation. We call on the committee to recommend changes to make Bill 79 effective and enforceable. However, some of the sections in Bill 79 and the regulations should be clarified further so that our goals of achievement of employment equity would be adequately met.

I brought with me the three perhaps most important issues that would be raised that we hear over and over again from our organization.

The first issue is the establishment of numerical goals and timetables. We strongly believe that the acts and the regulations are ineffective without measurable and enforceable targets and objectives. The regulations do not appear to have specified numerical goals and timetables. This, in our opinion, will lead to the situation where employers have the law at their mercy.

Subsection 50(2) of Bill 79 provides in general that the goals shall be determined with reference to percentages approved by the commission. The regulations, however, not only fail to develop this principle but they also omit it completely. We ask that the regulations be amended to include the percentages and timetables which are to be approved by the commission.

The second issue we have here is timetables. With reference to timetables, the regulations again fail to respond to the principle that Bill 79 has brought forth. "Reasonable progress" referred to in the regulations obviously cannot substitute for the timetables which are essential for any real improvement in employment equity. We ask that the word "timetables" for reaching numerical goals be reinstated in the regulations.

The third and very last issue we have would be the review of employment policies and practices. This is in the regulations. Now, an important method of achieving employment equity is the identification and removal of discriminatory barriers that are used to prevent qualified people from attaining, retaining jobs or getting promotions.

Section 10 of Bill 79 fails to provide sufficient guidance as to which policies and practices should be reviewed. Similarly, subsection 14(6) fails to provide specific terms for dealing with the special needs of members of the designated groups. We ask that Bill 79 be amended to include the determination of job qualifications. These qualifications must be spelled out in detail, and I underline "detail" because we want to put that in, and must not include the requirement of Canadian experience.

We also ask that section 14 of the regulations be amended to include:

"(a) Work-related language training for those employees who otherwise have met all the criteria for promotion; and

"(b) A public education program be conducted to educate employees about the Canadian employment system, including the Employment Equity Act, the Pay Equity Act, the Employment Standards Act" and so on.

We would like to reiterate our stance regarding the Employment Equity Act as follows:

Bill 79 and the regulations are not "too strong," as criticized by some other sectors in our society currently. In fact, it simply reaffirms the basic rights of every Canadian regardless of his or her physical status, origin, race or gender. It also makes a lot of economic sense in involving everyone in the process of making our province prosperous and fair.

That concludes my presentation.

The Chair: Thank you, Mr Tran. Six minutes per caucus, and we'll begin with the third party.

Mr Tilson: Thank you, sir. Your thoughts are appreciated. You've obviously spent some time on this presentation.

From the Vietnamese perspective, I will say the main message you seem to give is that both the bill and the regulations lack details, and I agree with you.

You mentioned what I call the quota section, subsection 50(2), which talks about how numbers and percentages can be set. Yet we don't know what those are or indeed how they're going to be calculated. We don't even know what "community" means. We don't know whether a definition could be different for different occupations or different jobs, I suppose. We don't know whether the census data are going to be used. We really don't know anything.

My question to you is, is it possible that these unnamed definitions, these unnamed percentages of non-whites, for example, could in fact discriminate against individual non-white groups, such as Vietnamese?

Mr Tran: No. This is actually in the same line. We would advocate that the commission or the tribunal would consult with an advisory committee, for example, that is set up to do a population study that does not give any kind of bias based on the employment population. Let's just say a company has, say, 10% of its employees belonging to a certain designated group. Then what we want to do is have a certain percentage perhaps worked out by certain formulae.

Mr Tilson: How do you get to that first group, though? How do you get there? How is that calculated?

Mr Tran: The company can do a general survey of all the employees --

Mr Tilson: Yes.

Mr Tran: -- and ask them whether or not they would like to be identified with that particular --

Mr Tilson: What if they're all white?

Mr Tran: Then they have the option of stating that there's no such need for that particular percentage of that designated group to be there. They have the right to tell us what they find in their studies.

Mr Tilson: How much time do I have, Mr Chair?

The Chair: Three minutes or so.

Mr Tilson: Mrs Witmer has a question.

Mrs Witmer: You've indicated here that one of the barriers your community faces is the issue of language.

Mr Tran: That's correct.

Mrs Witmer: Certainly that's a barrier that many people moving to this country do face. Your suggestion is that the employer would be responsible for providing some of that language training in the workplace.

Mr Tran: Yes, we would like to see that implemented.

Mrs Witmer: What responsibility do you see the government having? I guess I personally believe that one of the key barriers to fairness and equity, in the hiring process as well as in promotion, is the educational and training barrier and language barrier. Obviously, there are steps that need to be taken. What would you suggest?

Mr Tran: I would suggest a built-in training program offered by the companies whereby, because of the joint benefits and responsibilities of the government and the companies, we would like to see the government provide or subsidize part of the money for such training. Ultimately, in the long term, it is the entire country that would benefit from such training.

1640

The companies certainly should chip in because it is an educational program whereby all of the employees will benefit, and hence the productivity and the quality of that company would be raised.

I don't think it would be unreasonable to advocate a user fee. The employee might need such a training program to be better integrated into that particular group of employees, to be promoted, to create a sense of fluidity in the daily work with the rest of the Canadian society, the general group. So a user fee wouldn't be out of the question.

Mrs Witmer: So you're saying then that those accessing the language training would pay a fee.

Mr Tran: Nominal fees of some kind, yes.

Mrs Witmer: So really what you're looking at is a very cooperative approach between the employer, the government and the employee.

Mr Tran: I think that would be the fairest system I can think of, yes.

The Chair: I'm sorry, we ran out of time. Mr Fletcher.

Mr Fletcher: Thank you for your presentation. Just to continue along the lines, as far as people being given the opportunity to learn the language, I know there are a lot of employers throughout the province who do offer English in the workplace. That's only after you have the job, of course, and the first step --

Mr Tran: Exactly, yes.

Mr Fletcher: What employment equity is trying to do is to make sure you get that first step, the foot in the door, to get the job so that you can have the job. Once you get through the door, then we can start working on the education as far as English in the workplace.

We are doing a lot of other things right now, as far as trying to get rid of some of the discrimination that goes on in our education system, through the destreaming issue, not having children streamed into certain areas and also with the anti-racism curriculum that we have.

I read your brief. I was looking at the establishment of numerical goals and timetables. Are you asking that the government actually set out the numbers that a company should have? In other words, for company A you have to hire 25 individuals of a certain minority group or disabled persons with disabilities. Is that what you're saying?

Mr Tran: No. That's something I must clarify. I'm not advocating for companies to set out quotas to achieve. I don't want them to be so result-oriented that they forget what they're after.

I'm looking at companies or employers setting up their own goals of achievement in such a way that would better reflect the community they're in. That would allow them more flexibility to work with, to move around, such as doing a need assessment and saying, "Okay, in this particular number of applicants I have advertised in sign language or in special language and I have no response from, say, the visually impaired." Then they have the right and the flexibility to say, "Okay, look, I have no one applying for this job, but I did advertise in such a manner to get the employees to come to work for us."

So the timetables and the numerical goals should be set at least in the regulations, not in the bill, so that each of the companies or employers has the flexibility of setting its own, depending on the needs assessment in the community it's in.

Mr Fletcher: Okay, I understand.

Mr Tran: But not quotas, because meeting the quotas might be just filling in numbers without seeing the quality of the people who actually work in that, and that's not what we want.

Mr Fletcher: You don't want to just fill in slots and say: "There we go. We've done it."

Mr Tran: No, definitely not. We don't want to see that.

Mr Fletcher: I agree with you, and I agree with you wholeheartedly in your presentation, that if we don't start using all of our people, we're going to be in big trouble.

Ms Harrington: In your presentation, you say that the removal of discriminatory barriers is very important, and I certainly would agree with you, and you ask that in the bill the government provide sufficient guidance as to which policies and practices should be reviewed. I'd like to get into that a little bit.

I also want to mention another statement you made here, and that is that the bill should include the determination of job qualifications, that these must be spelled out and "not include the requirement of Canadian experience."

We'll start with the first one then. I think what we have done is left it open as to what policies and practices could be seen as barriers. I'm sure there are many that we have not even considered that could be barriers for different target groups. What would you recommend we put in as to which policies are in fact barriers?

Mr Tran: All right, what we're mentioning here is that upon either an interview or hiring, some of the people who were trained in Vietnam, for example, who had all the qualifications of being hired or being promoted -- the only thing they probably would be lacking is either the ability to verbalize or perhaps speak English with a certain kind of accent or not a perfect Canadian accent, for example, and we don't want to see that as being an excuse to exclude them from the workforce or to exclude them from any kind of job that they are well qualified for.

Ms Harrington: So you're asking for a list of the barriers?

Mr Tran: Exactly.

Ms Harrington: What I think we're saying is that maybe we make a list, but there's always other ones out there that probably should not be ignored. They're so insidious that they could be hidden, they could be anywhere and they're still barriers.

Mr Tran: At least the ones that are spelled out, either in the regulations or in the bill, for that matter, would eliminate the need for using those as an excuse. At least, say, for example, there's a finite number of, 100 excuses being discriminatory to exclude this person from the workforce. Now, if the bill listed 50, then at least they only have another 50 to work with and then we will slowly identify those as barriers and we will slowly tackle it bit by bit until the day they are removed.

Ms Harrington: Could you --

The Chair: Sorry, we ran out of time.

Mr Curling: Mr Tran, thank you very much for your presentation. Because of the short time I'm going to leave a time for my colleague here for the last question.

What I read your first recommendation to talk about is establishing numerical goals and timetables. Let me quote you a bit: "We strongly believe that acts and regulations are ineffective without measurable and enforceable targets, objectives." From time to time we hear inside here about goals and timetables, but, "Please don't use quotas itself."

I don't know what is so frightening about all of these wordings themselves but, again, these timetables and goals are being established by the employer. Why would you have an objective because eventually, if, at the end of the day, the employer does not meet the timetable or goals, and it is therefore that they did not meet the quota they set themselves up to accomplish, is it such a bad thing to say "quotas"?

Mr Tran: No, it's not bad to say "quotas." Quotas are a means of achieving these numerical goals and that's fine. But quotas should not be a means whereby you just fill in the blank, just saying, "Okay, I now have to hire 10% of my workers being one of the members of the designated groups," be it female, Vietnamese or any other racial minority group. But at least the company would have its own quotas, depending on its own assessment. That allows them more flexibility, more realistic goals to achieve, than merely setting up, "Okay, I'm going to try to hire 10%," and present this to the government and say, "Okay, it looks good." But then, at the end of the year, you only achieve 1%. At least in the goals and timetable aspect I think they can explain why they could not achieve what they have set out to do.

Mr Curling: If there was time, I would allow it to proceed, but one other quick question.

Mr Tran: Okay.

Mr Curling: Subgroups: There are people who have presented here and have said that they have been excluded because they are being just categorized as a visible minority. Do you believe that groups should be identified either in the legislation or the regulations as subgroups and say, "Visible minorities are," and those subgroups be defined in there, who are the visible minorities?

Mr Tran: No, they should not be defined as such. The employee -- she or he -- should be able to self-identify with such a group. Say, for example, if I am one of the workers in the thousands and, okay, the company said, "You don't have to identify with but you do have a choice to identify yourself with that particular designated group," then they should be given that choice of being chosen to be one of the groups.

Mr Callahan: We've had presenters here who have wanted to extend this legislation to all employers, regardless of what size. I think it's your community, perhaps it's the Korean community, that there's a very large group of mom-and-pop type of operations. Does that hold true in the Vietnamese community?

Mr Tran: Actually, from my very own experience of dealing with the people from within the communities, I wouldn't say a large percentage, perhaps no more than 30%, 40%, no.

Mr Callahan: Okay. You'd agree, though, that those -- or at least the operations that I've seen in my community, not just by people in the Korean community or the Vietnamese community but in a whole host of communities, the place is run by the family, the husband, wife and the kids. So this suggestion that it should be applicable to all employers would literally devastate or could devastate those groups.

Mr Tran: Actually, at the board of directors' meeting, we did not bring up that issue so I cannot speak on behalf of everyone. However, we did not have any reason to believe -- or any members of our board bringing up such an issue. They have agreed with the range, the limitation range of 50 to 99 being small employers, and Bill 79 not being applicable to smaller employers of less than 99.

Mr Callahan: They have enough rules with GST, PST, filling out forms for everything under the sun, without having that.

The Chair: Mr Tran, thank you for your presentation and participation here today.

Mr Tran: Thank you, ladies and gentlemen, Mr Chairman, for giving me an opportunity to voice my community's concern.

The Chair: We appreciate it.

This committee is adjourned until 10 o'clock tomorrow morning.

The committee adjourned at 1652.