By Kamloops-South Thompson MLA Todd Stone

Highway construction projects to get more costly due to NDP’s union-only labour requirements

Aug 28, 2018 | 4:16 PM

THROUGH THE IMPOSITION of so-called ‘Community Benefits Agreements’ (more properly referred to as ‘Project Labour Agreements’), which will allow only select union contractors to build major infrastructure projects like bridges, highways and rapid transit lines, the NDP have ensured that all such projects will cost BC taxpayers hundreds of millions of dollars (possibly billions) more than they otherwise would, will face longer construction timeframes, and will result in likely scope reductions.

In late July, the NDP released details of the ‘Community Benefits Agreement’ (CBA) which is now attached to the Pattullo Bridge replacement project in the Lower Mainland. A few highlights (or lowlights depending on one’s perspective) of these new requirements include the fact that non-union companies are free to bid on projects as long as they pay wages and benefits set by American-based “qualified affiliated unions.” Workers must join one of the select 19 unions affiliated with the BC-Yukon Building Trades Council within 30 days of being hired on a worksite, and will of course have to pay union dues. It’s noteworthy that 25 cents per worker hour will also be directed into a “council administration” fund, though the NDP have been less than forthcoming as to what this is if not a cash-grab to benefit their union friends.

We have subsequently learned that workers will only be able to embrace the privilege of helping to bulk up the coffers of select unions when working on a CBA-mandated project *if* said workers live within 100 km of the construction site. That’s because the CBA ‘prioritizes’ the hiring of qualified workers who live within 100 km of the job site. Think about that. Recognizing that skilled construction labour is highly mobile, practically speaking this means that all kinds of hard-working men and women with skilled trades designations in the Kamloops area or anywhere in the Interior/North for that matter will face significant obstacles to working on billions of dollars of work related to CBA-mandated projects in the Lower Mainland like the Pattullo Bridge replacement, rapid transit line expansions and any number of highway capacity projects.

A further dive into the details of the CBA provides additional rationale for why CBA-mandated projects are set to escalate in cost by seven per cent (an estimate the NDP grudgingly acknowledged), though I expect cost escalation will likely exceed the NDP’s estimates.

For example, the CBA dictates specific menu requirements for work camps including the following: “Salad table will be refrigerated or ice provided. Minimum requirements … an assortment of salads, coleslaw, green salad (tossed), potato salads and two other prepared salads (Caesar, Greek, pasta, bean salad, protein etc.). Beef steaks must be served once per week, between Monday and Thursday. Roast beef once per week. There will be no duplication of first line choice [meats] in a five-day period other than beef and beef steak.” And every meal must be all-you-can-eat.”

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All of this, plus the creation of a new Crown corporation (read bigger government) to oversee these CBAs, is set to increase the cost of the Pattullo Bridge replacement project by $100 million. And the NDP are just getting started!

The NDP’s announcement excludes qualified companies from bidding on government contracts thus ensuring best price will no longer figure prominently in how projects are procured. This isn’t fair and it’s not right – unless viewed from the perspective of the building trades unions which have donated over $20 Million to the NDP since 2005.

Think back to the 1990s and the NDP’s construction of the Island Highway — an instructive example of the NDP’s similar union-only rule and its implications back then. The Island Highway project came in 38 per cent over budget, costing taxpayers hundreds of millions of dollars more than it otherwise would have, was delivered several years late, and resulted in an inferior project when compared to what the original budget provided for with respect to scope. On the later point, the original project budget provided for no traffic lights from Greater Victoria to Campbell River, yet the project (delivered years late and hundreds of millions of dollars over budget) included many intersections with traffic lights where interchanges were originally supposed to be built. The NDP proved then, and will again now, that they’re rather adept at giving British Columbia taxpayers less for more.

In a more local context, an important section of the Trans-Canada Highway was set to be four-laned (from Hoffman’s Bluff to Jade Mountain) via a three-phase project. As the then Transportation & Infrastructure Minister, I was proud to announce this project 2 ½ years ago and to secure the required $199 Million in combined provincial/federal funding. Construction on the first phase of this project was supposed to start last September/October (Fall 2017), yet nothing has happened since May 2017. Disappointingly, we recently learned that this entire project has been pushed into 2019 and that construction may not start for a full two years later than it was supposed to.

Now we know why – a ‘Community Benefit Agreement’ is coming soon to this project!

And current NDP Transportation Minister Claire Trevena has the gall to continue to say with a straight face that she and the NDP government are intent on ‘accelerating’ four-laning projects on the Trans-Canada between Kamloops and the Alberta border! Really. Oh, and don’t forget that in addition to construction delays for this project, we will likely now also have to wrap our heads around some combination of a higher price tag and decreased scope for this project. But again, don’t worry, the NDP are committed to ‘accelerating’ this project and others just like it. The NDP’s decision to reach back into the grab bag of good old 1990s NDP policies and impose select union-only requirements to the construction of large public infrastructure projects today is bad public policy, bad for the 85 per cent of construction workers who are non-union, and bad for British Columbia taxpayers who are ultimately paying the bill.

NOTE: This is an opinion piece provided by Kamloops-South Thompson MLA Todd Stone. Would you like to respond to Stone’s argument? Submit your own Sound Off piece here.