Canadian Safety Reporter

FEBRUARY 2014 Interns, foreign workers may get more protection Ontario could expand rights under OHSA, employment standards BY LIZ BERNIER INTERNS, CO-OP students and temporary foreign workers in Ontario could soon have more of the same legislative protections afforded to regular workers in the province. In December, Minister of Labour Yasir Naqvi tabled the Stronger Workplaces for a Stronger Economy Act, which amends five existing statues to incorporate better protections for unpaid and precarious workers. "The mark of any compassionate society is to protect the vulnerable workers," said Naqvi. "What we want to do is ensure that workers get paid for the work that they have done, and give businesses that play by the rules a competitive advantage." The bill includes an amendment to the Occupational Health and Safety Act (OHSA) that would change the definition of "worker" to include interns and co-op students. It also includes changes for temporary foreign workers and workers who find employment through temp agencies. As of press time, the bill had passed first reading in the provincial legislature. Extended protections for vulnerable workers Currently, interns and co-op students in Ontario are not covered by the OHSA. "If the bill passes, it will make sure that co-op students, trainees and unpaid learners are covered under the Occupational Health and Safety Act, so (they) will have the full protection of the law and will have the right to refuse unsafe work," said Naqvi. The legislation would also extend the eligibility period for claiming unpaid wages to two years instead of the current six months and 12 months, and remove the $10,000 cap on wage recovery. If the bill passes, Ontario will join Nunavut and Newfoundland and Labrador in setting longer time limits for recovering unpaid wages. Under the act, temporary help agencies and agency clients would be liable for employment standards violations, and employers would be responsible for injuries to temp workers in regards to 6 Credit: Jon Blacker (Reuters) Ontario's Minister of Labour, Yasir Naqvi, tabled legislation in December designed to provide stronger protections for unpaid and precarious workers. workers' compensation claims. "We want to make sure there is no contracting out of dangerous work to temp workers, and the rights of temp workers in terms of (OHSA) are properly protected," said Naqvi. The act would also extend the 2009 Employment Protection for Foreign Nationals Act to cover temporary foreign workers, he said. "As a result, it will require employers to provide employment standards rights information to the temporary foreign workers, it will prohibit the charging of recruitment fees and it also will forbid employers from retaining or withholding essential documents like passports." The bill would "level the playing field" for employers that play by the rules, said Naqvi. But the issue hasn't really been a concern for smaller employers, according to Nicole Troster, senior policy analyst at the Canadian Federation of Independent Business (CFIB) in Ontario. "This is something that we've been following… but, to be honest, this isn't something that our members have raised with us as a concern. What we find is the relationship between small business owners and their employees is really quite unique in the sense that… it's in the owner's best interest to maintain a Canadian HR Reporter, a Thomson Reuters business 2014 respectful working relationship," she said. "From our surveys, we know that (with) paid internships, for example, our members will actually pay higher than minimum wage in order to retain the employee and retain talent, because it's harder for small firms to attract talent because they don't have the same resources to provide the same benefits that some of the bigger firms do." One thing the ministry could focus on is enforcing the existing legislation, said Troster. "One of the issues is we've got existing regulations and the ministry really has to make a point of enforcing them. Because we've got the Employment Standards Act and if employers aren't following it, that's a problem with ministry enforcement," she said. Intern, student groups strongly support legislation The bill was met with strong support from intern and student groups, who say it is an encouraging first step from a provincial government. "It's a really good initiative — it's the Ontario government really doing something and the minister of labour really Continued on page 7

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