Labour and the “Real” Constitution

Même si la constitution officielle du Canada ne fait aucunement mention du droit du travail ou de l’emploi, et quoique la jurisprudence ait depuis longtemps établi la prépondérance de la compétence provinciale dans ce domaine, les droits constitutionnels des syndicats et des travailleurs ont récemment fait l’objet de nombreux litiges et d’un examen approfondi dans la doctrine. Cet article passe en revue les tentatives de se servir des dispositions de la Charte canadienne des droits et libertés afin de protéger les intérêts des syndicats et des travailleurs et de faire progresser la cause de l’égalité en milieu de travail. Il explore ensuite la manière dont l’architecture constitutionnelle du Canada a eu tendance à contrecarrer les intérêts des syndicats et des travailleurs. En dernier lieu, il suggère que les intérêts des syndicats et des travailleurs seront tranchés en grande partie non pas par la constitution officielle mais bien par la « véritable constitution », soit la structure de son économie. Bien que la « véritable constitution » soit généralement défavorable aux droits et intérêts des syndicats et des travailleurs, à l’instar de la constitution officielle, elle est vague et laisse ample place à l’évolution et pour faire valoir des oppositions.While Canada’s formal constitution does not mention labour or employment law, and while jurisprudence has long established the primacy of provincial jurisdiction in this field, labour’s constitutional rights have been the subject of extensive recent litigation and scholarship. This article reviews attempts to use the provisions of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms to protect labour’s interests and to advance the cause of equality in the workplace. It then explores how Canada’s constitutional architecture has tended to frustrate the interests of unions and workers. And finally, it proposes that labour’s interests will largely be determined not by the formal constitution but by the “real constitution” — the structure of its economy. While the “real constitution” generally disfavours labour’s rights and interests, like the formal constitution it is vague and leaves ample room for challenge and for change

Tort Liability for Strikes in Canada: Some Problems of Judicial Workmanship

This article discusses issues of tort liability surrounding trade unions and collective bargaining in Canada. In particular, it examines the impact of compulsory collective bargaining legislation upon the common law. Through a discussion of several cases, the author examines the various techniques by which the common law imposes liability for strikes. Specifically, he discusses the tort doctrines currently employed by the courts such as the doctrine that breach of the Labour Relations Act per se confers a civil cause of action, the doctrine of civil conspiracy, as well as the doctrine of intentional interference. The author then discusses two particular decisions as a means of examining arbitration as an alternative to litigation in such cases. He concludes with a discussion of the physical, institutional, and analytical difficulties arising from cases imposing liability for strikes in Canada, and offers some of his own suggestions for counteracting such difficulties

Making Bricks Without Straw: The Creation of a Transnational Labour Regime

This essay suggest that attempts to create a transnational regime of labour regulation have been frustrated by a series of related and mutually reinforcing developments: the incapacity or unwillingness of states to intervene in labour markets, changes in those markets associated with globalization and post-industrial capitalism, the decline of the “standard employment contract”, the demise of working class consciousness, solidarity and power, and the shift from “hard” to “soft” labour law. It concludes with a proposal for three-part strategy of reinventing labour law in the new dispensation: by enlarging its intellectual ambition, expanding its clientele, and extending its spatial reach

Developing Industrial Citizenship: A Challenge for Canada\u27s Second Century

By about 1900, the Canadian wage earner, no longer bound to master or landlord by criminal sanctions or seigniorial obligations, was free to sell his or her labour on the open market. As a result, the rights and duties of the Canadian worker were created not by individual contractual acts, but by a process of piecemeal public and private legislation. There is, then, an emerging “industrial citizen” whose juridical attributes may be analogised to those of citizenship generally. H.W. Arthurs traces the evolution of industrial citizenship and examines the interrelationship between government, unions and management and the corresponding benefits, burdens, freedoms and responsibilities. The kaleidoscopic nature of this pattern of rights and duties demands a protean approach on the part of judges and lawmakers in the future