Canadian Labour Reporter

with the new company — again, starting at minimum wage — but our understanding is that not many of them have been hired," said Unifor national representa- tive Leslie Dias. "We had asked that they be able to be put to the front of the appli- cation process but, as can happen when jobs are available, there was a huge turnout and there were very long lineups. Our people had to get back to work. The cur- rent employer wouldn't give them any time to apply so a lot of them missed the opportunity just as a result of the way the process was set up… They weren't even given that basic courtesy. So it appears the vast majority of them are not going to get jobs with the TGAS." Legislative requirements In Ontario, private and public sector employers are bound by successorship rights legislation and required to maintain work standards negotiated by a union when businesses are transferred or sold. Ontario employers' sub- contracting services, however, are not bound by the same re- quirements. And federally regu- lated industries such as transport are not bound by successorship requirements because the Cana- da Labour Code contains no such provisions. So while the GTAA's decision to open a tendering process for the contract was legal, Unifor is calling the practice "unethical." "Frankly, it shouldn't be legal," Dias said. "Employees finally start to see some improvement (in their wages) and then they ba- sically get the rug pulled out from under them and they have to start over. Not just at the bottom of the pay scale but even trying to get the job, period." The contract for employees assisting passengers with spe- cial needs has been flipped every three years since 2004, accord- ing to the union. Unifor is calling on the GTAA to require that all contractors provide a minimum standard of pay when operating in the airport. "We hope to achieve a mini- mum standard and really having some of this work be awarded based on the competitiveness of the services provided rather than on being able to grind each other into the ground based on the low- est price," Dias said. GTAA improving services The GTAA, however, said the quality of services provided and potential benefit for passengers was the reason it decided to open a tendering process. "The point of issuing an RFP (request for proposal) is to make sure that you've got the best company doing the work that's required at any given time," said Scott Armstrong, director of communications for the GTAA. "We were hoping for, and we did get, a good response from a number of different companies that we then measured, compar- ing their prices and their service level standards, to see if they could meet the requirements of the job at hand." An upswing in complaints led to the issuing of an RFP, Arm- strong said. "We run our contracts in a re- sponsible way. We're hopeful that the new arrangement the airlines have with the service provider will result in a better level of ser- vice for passengers." This explanation didn't fly with Dias, however. She said the pri- mary reason the GTAA received complaints about service was be- cause the contract itself, set up by the airport authority, limited the number of employees. "You can't make the employ- ees themselves responsible for the lack of service when it was the airport authority that set up the contract that way," Dias said. "I think they've finally recognized there was a deficiency in the way they had the contract set up and so now it's set up on a different ratio system and there will be an opportunity to have some more people assigned to do the work." Unifor launched an infor- mational picket on March 20, distributing flyers to passen- gers in the airport, and Dias said the union will continue to fight against contract flipping. Legal issues However, the demand for suc- cessorship rights is unlikely to get off the ground, according to Muneeza Sheikh, a partner at Levitt and Grosman in Toronto, who said precedent in this area is very clear. "They're saying 'successorship,' but I don't think that argument is going to get them anywhere, especially looking at the recent cases in this area," she said. "From a legal perspective, I don't necessarily think the an- swer for Unifor lies in filing a successorship application before the board. I think it's a lesson to them and when they're involved in their next round of bargaining, what they could do is address the issue of sub-contracting in the collective agreement. That's the appropriate way to deal with this." Unifor could use bargaining as an opportunity to negotiate bet- ter protections within the collec- tive agreement, create stronger seniority provisions or introduce stronger language about what qualifies as a sub-contractor, said Sheikh. Another option is to introduce a provision that prevents sub- contracting altogether, she said. "If this is something the union is really concerned about, it's something they should be ad- dressing in their rounds of collec- tive bargaining," she said. "If it's that important, then ne- gotiate better protections for your people." 7 Canadian HR Reporter, a Thomson Reuters business 2015 CANADIAN LABOUR REPORTER news < from pg. 1 Complaints led to new service provider: GTAA The GTAA opened a tendering process for the contract for employees helping passengers with special needs after an increase in complaints, according to director of communications Scott Armstrong. Photo: Mike Cassese (Reuters)

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