Canadian Federal Politics Thread v5

[Monahammer]

Originally Posted by IGGYRULES

Alot =

Going to pick on you exclusively, but I have seen this far too often the last couple of weeks on this forum and Textcritic is not doing his JOB!

A lot= many
allot= give an amount of something

alot= nothing, this is not a ####ing word.

[iggy_oi]

Originally Posted by Locke

Long haul trucking is an industry in dire need of reform.

And just adding regulations to squeeze drivers' wages isnt the answer.

Love them or hate them Truck Drivers and trucking is a huge part of Canadian infrastructure and you cant keep kicking them in the face.

Won’t be able to fix the problem until our elected officials pass legislation that prevents employee misclassification. Not gonna happen so long as employers continue to lobby against it because they’ve got more money than the employees and we unfortunately live in a system where money buys legislation.

[Locke]

Originally Posted by iggy_oi

Won’t be able to fix the problem until our elected officials pass legislation that prevents employee misclassification. Not gonna happen so long as employers continue to lobby against it because they’ve got more money than the employees and we unfortunately live in a system where money buys legislation.

Theres obviously more to it than just that as the legislation preventing employee misclassification exists, its there its just not implemented or enforced, but moreso Canada is running into the problem where we have made employment cost prohibitive in a lot of industries.

[iggy_oi]

Originally Posted by Locke

Theres obviously more to it than just that as the legislation preventing employee misclassification exists, its there its just not implemented or enforced, but moreso Canada is running into the problem where we have made employment cost prohibitive in a lot of industries.

I strongly disagree. The legislation that exists has no teeth to it which makes it beneficial to employers. Employers can misclassify an employee until the employee takes them to court, which is going to probably cost that employee more money to fight than they would get out of it and then the company only has to pay them what they were legally entitled to receive in the first place.

It might be different in other provinces but in Alberta the labour board very rarely awards costs because they view it as an incentive to take an employer to court rather than attempting to reach a settlement prior to. So there really is no deterrent.

Labour costs being prohibitive isn’t the reason companies like Amazon that can obviously afford to pay their employees more structure their businesses in ways that make it as difficult as possible for their employees to improve their conditions of employment.

[Slava]

Originally Posted by iggy_oi

I strongly disagree. The legislation that exists has no teeth to it which makes it beneficial to employers. Employers can misclassify an employee until the employee takes them to court, which is going to probably cost that employee more money to fight than they would get out of it and then the company only has to pay them what they were legally entitled to receive in the first place.

It might be different in other provinces but in Alberta the labour board very rarely awards costs because they view it as an incentive to take an employer to court rather than attempting to reach a settlement prior to. So there really is no deterrent.

Labour costs being prohibitive isn’t the reason companies like Amazon that can obviously afford to pay their employees more structure their businesses in ways that make it as difficult as possible for their employees to improve their conditions of employment.

Wild stab at this, but I'll try..."if only they had a union"?

[iggy_oi]

Originally Posted by Slava

Wild stab at this, but I'll try..."if only they had a union"?

Now that you mention it, 100% of unionized truck drivers aren’t misclassified.

I can’t believe I’m saying this but, you’re not wrong Slava.

[Locke]

Originally Posted by iggy_oi

I strongly disagree. The legislation that exists has no teeth to it which makes it beneficial to employers. Employers can misclassify an employee until the employee takes them to court, which is going to probably cost that employee more money to fight than they would get out of it and then the company only has to pay them what they were legally entitled to receive in the first place.

It might be different in other provinces but in Alberta the labour board very rarely awards costs because they view it as an incentive to take an employer to court rather than attempting to reach a settlement prior to. So there really is no deterrent.

Labour costs being prohibitive isn’t the reason companies like Amazon that can obviously afford to pay their employees more structure their businesses in ways that make it as difficult as possible for their employees to improve their conditions of employment.

Okay, but I'm not talking about Amazon, I'm talking about Trucking companies of various sizes.

They have to lease vehicles, store and maintain them, fuel them, etc. Its a very expensive business and employees arent cheap either.

[iggy_oi]

Originally Posted by Locke

Okay, but I'm not talking about Amazon, I'm talking about Trucking companies of various sizes.

They have to lease vehicles, store and maintain them, fuel them, etc. Its a very expensive business and employees arent cheap either.

Who do you think Amazon contracts out their work to?

[Slava]

Originally Posted by iggy_oi

Now that you mention it, 100% of unionized truck drivers aren’t misclassified.

I can’t believe I’m saying this but, you’re not wrong Slava.

To the man with the hammer...

[iggy_oi]

Originally Posted by Slava

To the man with the hammer...

I’m just poking fun.

But at the end of the day I think you’d agree that better legislation would help protect employees from things like misclassification. Joining a Union is a right that people should be able to freely exercise to hold an employer accountable if they don’t follow the rules, and when available that deterrent will generally keep employers in check.

[Azure]

Originally Posted by Mayo

Sure you can build an oilsands mine or LNG export facility - but how do you get the product to and from them? Show the pipeline approvals.

Kind of like saying, "why aren't people building cars, designs are approved ...only they won't let you make tires"

Or more like 'car designed are approved, but wait what, we can't build highways?'

[opendoor]

Originally Posted by 8 Ball

What year was this? I can't remember the last time I witnessed any form of hazing or bullying in the trades.

A few years ago. And I guess it really depends on what you consider bullying vs. harmless pranks and I'm sure it totally depends on the organization. They were talking about things like locking a new guy in the portapotty during lunch break, messing with apprentices' tools (dumping their bags out, screwing a tool bucket to the floor, etc.) etc. And just generally the way they were talking about treating new workers. It's probably nothing compared to what people did 40 years ago. Still, stuff that would get you fired at most other jobs is considered run of the mill behavior on some construction sites.

I guess that's fine if everyone's on board with it, but it's going to naturally lead to self-selection of a specific type of person on those types of jobsites as well as give the whole industry a reputation which can partly explain why people aren't enthusiastically signing up for that kind of work.

[Locke]

Originally Posted by opendoor

A few years ago. And I guess it really depends on what you consider bullying vs. harmless pranks and I'm sure it totally depends on the organization. They were talking about things like locking a new guy in the portapotty during lunch break, messing with apprentices' tools (dumping their bags out, screwing a tool bucket to the floor, etc.) etc. And just generally the way they were talking about treating new workers. It's probably nothing compared to what people did 40 years ago. Still, stuff that would get you fired at most other jobs is considered run of the mill behavior on some construction sites.

I guess that's fine if everyone's on board with it, but it's going to naturally lead to self-selection of a specific type of person on those types of jobsites as well as give the whole industry a reputation which can partly explain why people aren't enthusiastically signing up for that kind of work.

When I worked at Greyhound they locked one of the new guys in a baggage tank under the bus.

They didnt find him until it pulled into Banff.

Little work pranks can be funny, but things like that are stupid and mean.

[Cappy]

Originally Posted by opendoor

A few years ago. And I guess it really depends on what you consider bullying vs. harmless pranks and I'm sure it totally depends on the organization. They were talking about things like locking a new guy in the portapotty during lunch break, messing with apprentices' tools (dumping their bags out, screwing a tool bucket to the floor, etc.) etc. And just generally the way they were talking about treating new workers. It's probably nothing compared to what people did 40 years ago. Still, stuff that would get you fired at most other jobs is considered run of the mill behavior on some construction sites.

I guess that's fine if everyone's on board with it, but it's going to naturally lead to self-selection of a specific type of person on those types of jobsites as well as give the whole industry a reputation which can partly explain why people aren't enthusiastically signing up for that kind of work.

I get calls like this on a daily basis. Many of them have made complaints to superiors and within a few months find themselves out of a job. There is still a huge toxic culture in many trades in some regions

[Azure]

Europeans this coming winter are facing a stark choice: heat or eat. As a result of the weaponization of energy by Russia, natural gas prices in Europe have skyrocketed, up more than 250 per cent in the past two months and are trading at the equivalent of more than US$500 per barrel.

...

To forsake our energy resource wealth, and ignore the global plea of our allies for more energy produced to the most ethical and cleanest standards anywhere in the world, is the equivalent of economic treason. The world needs more Canadian energy.

https://finance.yahoo.com/news/eric-...100048405.html

Dithering is a nice way of putting it.
Can't wait to hear all the excuses of why we can't do it while our southern neighbors are creating LNG development and export capabilities like crazy.

[DiracSpike]

Originally Posted by Azure

https://finance.yahoo.com/news/eric-...100048405.html

Dithering is a nice way of putting it.
Can't wait to hear all the excuses of why we can't do it while our southern neighbors are creating LNG development and export capabilities like crazy.

But there's no business case bro! The states certainly sees that there's a business case, because they're not stupid. They import our gas at $2-5, liquify it, and sell it for $40-60 on the LNG spot market because they have these facilities and we don't.

This is why I can't be bothered to care about most of what the Liberals do. Like this thing with the anti-Semitic "anti-racist" dude. Is it bad? I guess, if this was a normal competent government it would stand out as a scandal worthy of taking up bandwidth. But in the face of this epic, historic, generationally damaging stance in regards to natural resources it doesn't even register. Who cares, nothing could possibly be as bad as what they've allowed to happen to our rightful place in the energy space, the wealth they've forsaken and the help we could provide to ally countries gone for nothing, literally nothing. That last sentence sums it up perfectly, economic treason.

[Azure]

Has there even been such a disastrous result to policy as what we are seeing right now?

The world is going back to burning coal and the Liberals claim there is no business case to building LNG export capabilities, while at the same time as our southern neighbors are developing their own LNG, we have posters in this thread claiming it can't be done.

Over the next 25 years, how many billions in economic development are going to be squandered by this stupidity?

It boggles the mind.

[opendoor]

Isn't every existing US liquefaction facility simply a regasification facility that was retrofitted to export LNG? And most of the ones under construction are also just expansions of existing facilities? That's a little bit different than building facilities from scratch both in terms of approvals and investment dollars.

And the one big one in the US that's currently under construction that is purpose-built (Driftwood) is still 4-5 years from being operational, much like the ones under construction in Canada.

I'm sure if Canada had a bunch of unneeded LNG regasification facilities kicking around we could have begun exporting sooner, but we have historically had almost zero need for imported gas.

[Suave]

That plus construction costs for LNG plants in Canada are twice that of the Gulf coast, that makes a large difference in companies moving ahead with these.

[calculoso]

Geez. Maxime Bernier is insane.

https://twitter.com/user/status/1564637530158505985

Edit: added Bernier’s tweet directly:

https://twitter.com/user/status/1564634996819873797