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  • Access to labour relations legislation is generally seen as a prerequisite to unionization of agricultural workers in Canada. British Columbia is one of eight Canadian provinces that now include agricultural workers in provincial labour relations legislation. But agricultural workers were not always included. Although union organizing and strike activity were not unheard of in BC’s agricultural sector in the 1930s, the Industrial Conciliation and Arbitration Act of 1937 excluded agricultural workers. This exclusion followed a larger pattern of excluding agricultural workers from employment-related legisla­tion. Agricultural workers continued to be excluded until the mid-1970s, when the efforts of NDP backbenchers persuaded their own government that agri­cultural workers ought to be included in provincial collective bargaining laws. As demonstrated in a brief overview of the two campaigns to unionize agri­cultural workers under BC’s labour relations legislation since 1975, although small numbers of workers have been able to form unions and achieve collec­tive agreements under the legislative protections of the Labour Code, those collective bargaining relationships have thus far proven unstable and often short-lived.

  • This thesis provides a multi-method – historical, quantitative, qualitative, and jurisprudential – socio-legal case study of the unionization of agricultural workers in British Columbia. Agricultural employees have access to the Labour Relations Code of British Columbia. A historical examination of exclusion of agricultural workers from labour relations legislation from 1937 to 1975 explores the rationale behind labour relations laws and the political context of the legislative exclusion. Next, economic aspects of BC’s agricultural sector are described, with a focus on employment characteristics and the regionalised nature of agricultural production. Finally, this thesis explains the legal aspects of an ongoing campaign by the United Food and Commercial Workers (UFCW) to unionize migrant and resident agricultural workers. The union organizing campaign shows how legal labour relations processes operate in relation to migrant workers in a sector with low rates of unionization and high rates of precarious and low-paid, dangerous work.

Last update from database: 11/27/24, 4:10 AM (UTC)

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