Court to Witness another Spell of Labor Law Battle

This article was last updated on April 16, 2022

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The Court of Appeal is scheduled to hear the arguments from both sides today, namely Saskatchewan Federation of Labour and the provincial government, regarding the notorious Bill 5 that is fundamentally a services law which will put limitation on how many public sector workers can go on strike at once.

Back in February, a judge of Queen’s Bench, Dennis Ball, declared his ruling saying that the law indeed infringes the rights of workers and is of “no force or effect.” Furthermore, Ball allowed the provincial government to take time for fixing it. Though, the government decided to challenge some parts of the decision in a higher court. Ball also upheld a second key piece of labor legislation passed by the Saskatchewan Party government and challenged by the unions — Bill 6.

This legislation trimmed the Trade Union Act, putting an end to the practice of automatic union certification in cases where a majority of employees sign union cards. Now the new law implicates that a secret ballot vote shall be required for unionizing a workplace. Furthermore, the amendments made to the Trade Union Act, also increased the threshold percentage of workers needed to trigger a vote, up to 45 per cent from 25 per cent.

The SFL declared that it is well prepared defend the decision made by Ball on essential services bill and will try to overturn his decision on union certification rules also. SFL has long kept a stance that both pieces of legislation, passed in 2008, violate workers constitutional rights. The proceedings begin at the Court of Appeal in Regina at 9 a.m. CST.