The Future of Flying in Canada - The News Forum, 2022-03-09

The Future of Flying in Canada

Counterpoint with Tanya Granic
The News Forum
2022-03-09

"There is this new change to the (Canadian) Labour Code that's in process — it's coming — its expected any week or month now — where there will be a vaccine mandate coast-to-coast if you work for a federally regulated industry."

"Recently the Federal Government has announced some kind of changes to its Labour Code which will mandate vaccines for all employees for all Federally regulated industries. And of course that includes the airline industry. And just to be clear there are approximately 18,500 employers in federally regulated industries, and together they employ almost a million Canadians."

"We are talking all Federally regulated employees. So we are talking banking, telecom, things like grain elevators ... mining. There are all sorts of obscure pieces. And, more importantly, any business that is vital and essential to those businesses."

{See below for a list of Federally Regulated Industries and Workplaces in Canada}

"If we put this (vaccine mandates) in the Labour Code, it is there firmly and permanently, and that's why everyone should be concerned about this."

"Once it is there, it's there to stay."

"This is a Charter (of Rights and Freedoms) issue." ... and a jurisdictional issue "outside the scope of what's permitted."

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Tanya Granic Allen of The News Forum welcomes Greg Hill, founder of Free to Fly, and Sunira Chaudhri, lawyer and partner at Workly Employment and Labour Law Firm, to discuss mandates being enshrined into the Canadian Labour Code and the impact they will have on the airline industry.

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Federally Regulated Industries and Workplaces in Canada

The Canada Labour Code (the Code) regulates the following industries and workplaces:

1) Federally regulated private sectors (parts I, II, III and IV of the Code):
- air transportation, including airlines, airports, aerodromes and aircraft operations
- banks, including authorized foreign banks
- grain elevators, feed and seed mills, feed warehouses and grain-seed cleaning plants
- First Nations band councils and Indigenous self-governments (certain activities)
- most federal Crown corporations, for example, Canada Post Corporation
- port services, marine shipping, ferries, tunnels, canals, bridges and pipelines (oil and gas) that cross international or provincial borders
- postal and courier services
- radio and television broadcasting
- railways that cross provincial or international borders and some short-line railways
- road transportation services, including trucks and buses, that cross provincial or international borders
- telecommunications, such as, telephone, Internet, telegraph and cable systems
- uranium mining and processing and atomic energy
- ** any business that is vital, essential or integral to the operation of one of the above activities **

2) Federally regulated public sector (parts II and IV of the Code only):
- the federal public service
- Parliament (such as, the Senate, the House of Commons and the Library of Parliament)

3) Private-sector firms and municipalities in Yukon, the Northwest Territories and Nunavut (part I of the Code only)

https://www.canada.ca/en/services/jobs/workplace/federally-regulated-industries.html