OANHSS Response to
Time for Change: Ontario's Employment Standards Legislation
Consultation Paper
November
2000
The Honourable Chris Stockwell
Minister of Labour
400 University Avenue, 14th Floor
Toronto, Ontario
M7A 1T7
Dear Mr. Stockwell:
Re: Time for Change: Ontario’s
Employment Standards Legislation Consultation Paper
The Ontario
Association of Non-Profit Homes and Services for Seniors is a provincial,
membership-based association that represents close to 300 not-for-profit
providers of long term care, services and housing which employ over 30,000
employees. Member operations span
the full spectrum of the non-profit long term care continuum including
facilities, community services, and seniors housing.
The long-term
care sector is a labour intensive business with over 80% of operating costs
being funnelled towards labour expenses. Given
this, our response to the consultation paper has focussed on ensuring labour
costs are reduced or at least maintained at their current level.
Listed below
is our response to the questions raised in the consultation paper.
1)
Flexible Work Arrangements
a)
Hours of Work and Overtime
We agree with the elimination
of the current permit system for excess hours, the extension of maximum weekly
hours to 60, the option to average overtime over a three week period, the
establishment of taking time off in lieu of overtime pay and the proposed
weekly rest provision.
For organizations such as
homes for the aged where shift work and 24 hour care is provided, these
changes provide better flexibility and allow greater scheduling options to be
implemented.
b)
Vacation With Pay
While we agree with the principle of allowing
employees to take vacation in increments, the proposed change to allow this to
happen in daily increments would create an administrative bottleneck when
dealing with large workforces and unionized environments. Unlike the acute care
sector, the long-term care sector is limited in its human resource management
capacity. For the most part,
facility administrators and directors of nursing have the responsibility of
managing human resource practises in addition to carrying out their primary role
of delivering care. Given the
current labour shortage in the health care sector, any additional work such as
more tedious “scheduling” is a concern as it takes health care staff away
from providing care. For example,
if an employee with seniority were to take vacation in daily increments, several
weeks at a time would be blocked when other staff would not be allowed to take
vacation.
Given the perceived problems this change
would cause, we would support the proposed amendment if the words “if mutually
agreeable by employee and employer” were added to the amendment.
c)
Public Holidays
We support the proposed reforms of permitting
employees to work on public holidays without the necessity of scheduling
substitute days off. Once again,
this improves scheduling flexibility and lends itself well to continous
operations such as homes for the aged.
2)
Family Leave
a)
Family Crisis Leave
We support the
provision of annually granting employees with days of unpaid leave in the
event of family crisis, however, clearer requirements need to be provided
around how this leave would be meshed with existing sick leave, short term
disability plans and union collective agreements.
b)
Pregnancy and Parental Leave
We agree with the direction to maintain the
current provisions in this area, however, if the federal amendments to the
Employment Insurance Act are implemented, the Provincial Employment Standards
Act must be also amended to ensure consistent policies.
3)
Modernizing and Clarifying the Act
a)
Payment of Wages
We agree with the use
of electronic direct deposit for wages with the employee’s agreement.
b)
Definition – Employment Relationship
In today’s world, there are many
different forms of relationships and as such the definition of employee is not
clear. For example, an employee is defined differently within the following
pieces of legislation, the Pay Equity Act, the Labour Relations Act and
Revenue Canada regulations. This inconsistent definition needs to be removed
if any consistent approach is to be taken in defining who is and is not “an
employee”.
c)
Enforcement
OANHSS endorses the need for
compliance standards, however, our members are already heavily regulated by
numerous compliance processes and in a sector where labour shortages are
already occurring, we suggest the approach be kept simple and not duplicate
the compliance requirements outlined in other Acts. For example, since the Labour Relations Board currently deals
with most labour issues for our sector, we recommend they also be given the
enforcement role under this Act rather than creating another regulatory
process.
We suggest that employees be
provided with a tool similar to the workwell audit tool provided under the
Workers’ Compensation Act. This proposed tool could provide an organization
with a checklist of issues that need to be in place in order to successfully
pass the compliance inspection.
The
proposed directions outlined in the government’s “Time
for Change” Consultation document are generally positive steps
forward to ensure Ontario meets the opportunities and challenges of the 21st
Century. However, we want to ensure that this legislation does not add any
more administrative processes to an already complex and costly health care
system.
We thank
you for the opportunity to submit our comments on the proposed changes and
look forward to participating in the next stage of the process.
Sincerely,
Donna A.
Rubin
Chief Executive Officer
Ontario Association of Non-Profit Homes & Services for Seniors
7050 Weston Road, Suite 700, Woodbridge, Ontario L4L 8G7
(P) 905-851-8821
(F) 905-851-0744
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at 905-851-8821 ext. 233
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OANHSS members include not-for-profit providers of long term care, services and
housing for seniors in Ontario.
Members include municipal and charitable long term care homes, non-profit
nursing homes,
seniors' housing projects and community
service agencies.
