Ontario unionists are organizing to battle the Tory government's planned takeaway of workers' rights on the workweek, overtime, vacations, and union membership.

The Ontario Federation of Labour reported that thousands of activists from across Ontario are developing community and workplace actions to stop the so-called "labor law reforms" planned by the Conservative government led by Premier Mike Harris.

The OFL said changes to the Employment Standards Act (ESA) and the Ontario Labour Relations Act (OLRA) that are planned by the Harris government would force people to work 60-hour weeks, take vacation a day at a time, and work longer for less money because of changes to overtime rules.

Harris also introduced legislation that would make it tougher for construction workers to have union representation and would require employers to annually teach all unionized workers how to get rid of their union, but not how to form one, the OFL said.

OFL Pres. Wayne Samuelson said: "Every union, every organized worker in Ontario has a stake in this assault on the rights of working families."

Samuelson said the ESA "amendments do nothing to extend basic protection for Ontario workers. The unorganized are particularly impacted as they have no union or collective agreement to protect them from the draconian measures."

The labor law changes, Samuelson said, "are designed solely to allow Ontario employers to force their employees to work harder and longer for less money."

Samuelson said the government refused to consult with workers and instead adopted wholesale recommendations from the Red Tape Commission. The commission is a group of conservative members of Parliament that gave themselves a "mandate" to eliminate pro-worker regulations on behalf of business, according to their mission statement.

The OFL provided examples of how the labor law changes would affect workers. Under existing ESA rules, for example, an employee working 56 hours in a week gets 12 hours overtime pay. With the new bill, an employee could be forced to work 56 hours in the first week and 40 hours for each of the next three weeks and be paid no overtime.

Workers also would be open to coercive pressure from employers to "volunteer" to work 60-hour weeks, the OFL said. Employers could demand that workers take their vacations a day at a time and split half- hour lunch breaks into two 15-minute mini-breaks. And, "to add insult to injury," the OFL said, the bill would abolish the two-day weekend for millions of workers.

The government's "rhetoric about requiring an employee's written consent before working extended hours or taking day-at-a-time vacations is meaningless," Samuelson said. "Cuts to the Ministry of Labour enforcement staff have left the ministry incapable of investigating and enforcing breaches of the act, and every employer in Ontario knows it."

"The only workers who will be able to resist forced overtime and one-day summer holidays will be unionized workers with a bargaining agent and a collective agreement," Samuelson said. "But we know that we're next. The same Red Tape group wants to do away with the Rand Formula to weaken unions' ability to stand up to employers on behalf of workers."