Unions claim wide-ranging requests the result of growing sophistication
A Toronto law firm is cautioning employers to be discriminating about disclosure in advance of collective bargaining.
Daniel Fogel, a partner with Hicks Morley, said several of his clients in the social services sector have received broad disclosure requests that may not be readily accessible, or even relevant, to negotiations.
“We’re telling them to err on the side of caution,” he said.
Fogel said requests have included full financial disclosure with respect to the employer’s entire operations, including those outside the bargaining unit. This type of information could become a “distraction” to the collective bargaining process, he said.
“Collective bargaining is meant to be an efficient process. You run the risk of opening the door to more questions than answers.”
Clients have also been asked for increasingly expanded information around the issue of benefits. For example, master contracts of insurance and underwriting agreements, as well as census and financial information relating to benefits for eligible members. Fogel said this type of information could raise privacy issues between the employer and its benefits carrier.
“There have to be limits that balance that confidence with the need to have full and relevant discussions at the table,” he said. “An organization has a right to conduct its business affairs with a certain level of confidence.”
Other requests have included complete organizational charts listing all positions, including those outside the bargaining unit. Fogel said employers should question the relevance of this information before handing it over.
“You have to ask what the relevance of information about non-union staff is,” he said.
Sid Ryan, president of the Ontario Federation of Labour, said transparency is the reason unions are increasingly making more broad disclosure requests. He said unions are “a lot more sophisticated” today and want to be sure they have a complete picture of an employer’s situation when it comes time to bargain.
“Most unions now have their own economists. If you’re coming to make the economic argument for this, we want to see the money on the table,” he said. “Show us the profits from the last quarter and how giving us a 3 per cent wage increase will affect you.”
Ryan said there are “serious” problems with transparency in many organizations and unions are “not prepared to take people’s word for it” when companies say they can’t afford a demand at the bargaining table.
“If we hear that a wage increase could result in an organization closing its doors, we need to see the books,” he said.
How much an employer is willing to reveal also impacts on the tone of negotiations, said Ryan. Disclosing as much as possible before they start increases goodwill and can go a long way to preventing a strike.
“If they stall with information, our backs automatically go up,” he said.
However, Fogel cautions employers “not to have a knee-jerk reaction” for fear of a labour dispute. A union’s right to receive information is not absolute. He said many factors come into play including the content of the bargaining proposals, the stage of the negotiations, collective agreement obligations and the relationship between the parties.
Fogel said a discussion to downsize that has only been floated internally is one thing; a decision that will involve layoffs, and only one step away from approval, is another.
“At the end of the day, you want to facilitate good discussions and have open discourse,” he said. “But you have to be careful because you may create a problem that’s not there in the first place.”
