Unions Slam Liberals’ Federal Labour Code Changes

Canada’s biggest labour organization is warning the federal Liberals’ new development bill will further undermine Canadians’ charter-protected right to strike.

On Monday, the Liberals tabled a piece of sweeping legislation that promises to speed up construction of federally regulated projects.

It included changes to the Canada Labour Code aimed at cutting down on disruptions from labour disputes in federally regulated industries, like airlines, ports and railways.

It would also change a little-known part of the code called Section 107, a vaguely worded piece of legislation the government has started using to try and end several high-profile strikes, including one in 2023 that shut down Vancouver’s ports and one last year by Air Canada flight attendants.

Ultimately the changes would explicitly codify the labour minister’s ability to end a strike or lockout and require both sides to head to special mediation before Ottawa can use the section to end a strike.

Federal Jobs Minister Patty Hajdu told The Tyee the changes add guardrails to Ottawa’s power to end strikes.

“The goal is to help them get to the deal themselves and stop that cycle of strike, lockout, government intervention, which then worsens the muscles of the two parties to actually get a deal,” Hajdu said.

But labour lawyer Mark Rowlinson said the changes gave the government “unprecedented” power to end strikes. He joined the Canadian Labour Congress in a press conference today.

“It provides the complete and unlimited discretion to the federal minister to decide who gets to strike and who does not,” Rowlinson said. “Any claim by this government that somehow they have put guardrails on Section 107 is just nonsense.”

Meanwhile, Canadian Labour Congress president Bea Bruske said Section 107 was never intended to give the government power to end strikes or lockouts, and that the new legislation will enshrine a misinterpretation of the law into the labour code.

“Make no mistake, this is an attack on the workers’ rights to be able to meaningfully get to the bargaining table and to leverage the only power that they have, which is to withdraw their labour,” Bruske said.

The Canadian Labour congress, which represents more than three million unionized workers, is calling for the government to take the changes to Section 107 out of the legislation. Hajdu said she expects the bill, called the Building Canada Strong Act, to be heard again in the House this week.

The act includes several changes that have been praised by the Canadian Labour Congress, which would affect the more than one million people who work in federally-regulated industries including banks, air transportation and postal services.

It adds funding for the Canada Industrial Relations Board and health and safety inspectors. It gives federally regulated workers successorship rights, meaning outsourced workers will stay unionized if their contract flips.

But it’s the changes to Section 107 of the Canada Labour Code that have incensed unions.

Often just called Section 107, the legislation allows the labour minister to direct the Canada Industrial Relations Board to take action that would secure “industrial peace” or promote conditions favourable to dispute settlement.

It’s been in the labour code for 40 years, but it wasn’t until recently that the government started using it to order workers back to the job. Previously, ministers would have to debate ending a strike in parliament.

It sat mostly unused until 2011, when then-labour minister Lisa Raitt used it during an Air Canada strike after the union twice voted down collective agreements.

But the federal government started using Section 107 to end disruptive strikes in 2023, starting with the strike that shut down Canada’s West Coast ports. Since then, Ottawa has invoked it at least nine more times including during 2025 job action by Air Canada flight attendants.

After that strike, the Canadian Union of Public Employees said the section violates the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, which guarantees the fundamental freedoms of peaceful assembly and of association.

Critics have also said the vague wording of the legislation, which lets the labour minister step in to secure “industrial peace,” gives the government ample room to end strikes. It’s criticism Hajdu said she has heard.

“Section 107 is such a black hole that the minister, the way the code is written right now, doesn’t really have to provide any reasoning for using it,” she said.

“We heard from labour groups that there needed to be more rigour about when that section is used and mechanisms to reduce the likelihood of its use, and that’s what we’ve done.”

The new act clarifies that the minister may direct the Canada Industrial Relations Board to order workers back if two conditions are met.

The first condition comes out of a new special mediation process. Under the new changes, the minister may appoint a special mediator to help both sides try and reach a deal. If both sides still can’t come to an agreement, the mediator writes up a report about the issues. After letting both sides review it for five days, the minister must release the report publicly.

“If they’re not serious about getting the deal at the table, or if an employer, for example, is unprepared to bargain, that will be in the report,” Hajdu said.

The labour minister can invoke Section 107 to end a strike or lockout only after considering the special mediator’s report.

The second condition introduced by the new changes will allow the minister to end labour action only if they think it “adversely affects or may adversely affect the national interest.”

Hajdu said that will mean the minister must take into account both economic impact and the people’s Charter-protected right to strike.

“It puts the accountability back where it rests, which is on the parties to get the deal, and reduces the reliance on the government to solve these very complex and frequently high-conflict relationships,” Hajdu said.

But the Canadian Labour Congress holds a fundamentally different view. Bruske said the changes explicitly give the government the power to end strikes, undermining workers’ ability to get a fair deal.

“This is clearly putting the lever on the side of employers,” Bruske said. “Any time that you have an ability to avoid a strike and to have an arbitrated settlement means that workers do not have the power that they need at the bargaining table to put forward their demands in a meaningful way.”

Meanwhile Rowlinson, with the law firm Goldblatt Partners LLP, also takes issue with inclusion of the term “national interest.”

“It’s a term I have never seen in labour law anywhere in the country,” he said. “What is the national interest? The national interest is whatever the minister says.”

Gil McGowan, president of the Alberta Federation of Labour, said the bill would give the minister broad power to end labour disputes.

“That kind of sweeping discretion makes a mockery of the right to strike,” he said. “A right that can never be exercised is not really a right at all.”

McGowan disagrees that Section 107 gives the jobs minister the power to break a strike in its current form. Instead, he said the government would be “codifying its preferred interpretation” of the law with this new bill.

He added the best agreements are settled at the bargaining table — but that the government should at least have to debate ending labour action in parliament.

“But if the government is going to consider the nuclear option, ignoring constitutional rights and forcing striking workers back to work, then at the very least the government should have the courage and accountability to take the issue back to our elected representatives,” he said.