View cases - Stewart McKelvey

from the legislation was unequivocally expressed by the Minister of Agriculture and Food. Thisclarity of statutory language and legislative intent cannot be converted by the interpretive processinto a completely different scheme.For agricultural workers, the meaningful exercise of the right to collectivebargaining requires two additional components. The first is a statutory enforcement mechanismwith a mandate to resolve bargaining disputes. Since it is not a contravention of the AEPA to2011 SCC 20 (CanLII)refuse to engage in a good faith process to make reasonable efforts to arrive at a collectiveagreement, the Tribunal is without jurisdiction to grant a remedy for any violations of s. 2(d)rights. The second essential element is a requirement that the employer bargain only with therepresentative selected by a majority of the employees in the bargaining unit. This concept,known as majoritarian exclusivity, has been a central and defining principle of labour relations inCanada since 1944. Given the singular employment disadvantage of agricultural workers, theabsence of statutory protection for exclusivity effectively nullifies the ability of agriculturalworkers to have a unified and therefore more cogent voice in attempting to mitigate andameliorate their working conditions.The absence of these statutory protections cannot be justified under s. 1 of theCharter. The objectives of the rights limitation — the failure to provide agricultural workerswith the necessary statutory protections to exercise the right to bargain collectively — were toprotect the family farm and farm production/viability. The minimal impairment branch of theOakes test is determinative in this case. The complete absence of any statutory protection for aprocess of collective bargaining in the AEPA cannot be said to be minimally impairing of the