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CODC Foundations for the Future -Conference 2003CODC held its Foundations for the Future Conference at Regina’s Ramada Hoteland Convention Centre, on February 14 and 15, 2003. Delegates were constructionemployers, construction trade union leaders and union executive board members.

Conferencedelegatesreviewed andreaffirmed CODCobjectives, andthey were givenvery thorough andfrank briefings onthe issuesthreatening thefuture ofunionizedconstruction inSaskatchewan.

CODC ConstructionOpportunitiesDevelopment Council Inc.is wholly and equallyowned by theSaskatchewan buildingand construction tradesunions and CLRConstruction LabourRelations Association ofSaskatchewan Inc.

Part of the CODC MissionStatement is “...torecognize the value andskills of our employees byworking towards anaccident/incident freework environment and byempowering individualsto be creative, innovativeand productive.”

The CODC partnership isthe working vehicle thatwe have adopted toadvance our mutualefforts.

Conference Highlights

The purpose of the conference was two-fold. The first task was to review thecreation and development of CODC since its inception, and the second was to haveindustry representatives tackle the various issues facing the industry. Much of thetime was spent in Work Groups, which provided the greatest opportunity for inputfrom everyone on the path forward from here.

Keynote Speakers

The Keynote Speakers at the CODC Conference gave delegates a clear andunsettling picture of issues facing the construction industry. The message brought bythese industry leaders—owners, contractors and union representatives—is thatchanging attitudes in the workplace is key to the future success of the unionizedconstruction industry.

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Bert Royer, CODC Co-chair,addresses delegates at the openingof the conference.

Robert Blakely

“The North AmericanExperience”

Robert Blakely is Director ofCanadian Affairs for the Buildingand Construction TradesDepartment, AFL-CIO.

Robert Blakely used theexperiences of unionizedconstruction labour in the US tohighlight the situation faced by theindustry in Canada.

In the US, the market share forunionized construction droppedfrom 80% market share in 1979 to17.5% in 2001. This trend isevident in Canada.

Blakely talked about the attitude ofthe building trades in the late 70sand the early 80s. “They need us.”“They can’t do the job without us.”“They can’t get the men.” “Theyhave to pay because it’s our turn.”“Who’s running this job, anyway?”The attitude of the local unionswas that they were “large and incharge.”

Attitude was the problem. “Factis...the politics of our unions weremore important to us than thereality of our marketplace.”

The members don’t understandthat the contractor has to be thelow bid to get the job. Members

perhaps don’t understand theeconomics of the industry. Thecost of labour is limited by themarketplace.

The owners say “show us thevalue”. What do owners want?They want safety, productivity,quality, stability and no workstoppage.

No one else can do this for you.Have politics in your union, but beaccountable.

“We can’t lapse into oldbehaviours. The business agentisn’t the guy who comes on the jobto find tiny problems; he’s the guywho comes on the job to sort outthe problems. One trade can takedown the rest, and in our business,market share is king. Failure is notan option for us. As leaders in ourindustry we need to be to thefront.”

Mike Singer

“Facing the GlobalRealities”

Mike Singer is Vice President ofWeyerhaeuser EngineeringServices.

Mike Singer described the changein the competitive environment inthe lumber and forest productsindustry. Better value and cost-effective construction is not onlythe best way to go, it’s the onlyway to survive in this competitiveenvironment.

“Cost is themaster in our

industry.”

Construction owners need:

• contractors who can becompetitive, including good-quality supervision that keepsproject sites safe.

• skilled craftspeople with agood work ethic—people whotake pride in their work.

• good quality training programsand apprenticeship programs.

We have to be competitive; we’vegot to beat our competition; we’vegot to be better than them. We haveto look at all of our options and wehave to decide what is the site,what is the work force, what is theproject that is going to bring themost value to the company.

“To me, testing forsubstance abuse is

probably the most basicand cost-effective

precaution that we cantake for safety.”

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Sid Matthews, CODC Co-chair. “Let’sidentify what's wrong, how can wemake it right and what we need todo to prevent the negatives fromrecurring.”

Richard Albright& John Schel

“Progressive DisciplineProcedures—ABoilermaker Initiative”Richard Albright is InternationalVice President of the InternationalBrotherhood of Boilermakers, andJohn Schel is the President of theBoilermaker Contractors’Association.

Bob Blakely (who filled in forRichard Albright) and John Schelbrought information andperspectives from the experiencesof the Boilermakers in Alberta, andthe changes that they have made totheir operations as a result.

“We all realize the problems thatwe have here in Saskatchewan arequite similar to Alberta. We werehaving some major problemsoccurring with our particulartrade.”

The majority of Boilermakers arehonest, hardworking, skilledpeople. Unfortunately, a smallgroup of Boilermakers aresabotaging the Boilermakeradvantage, and they’re destroyingour careers with their personal

agendas, bad attitudes, late starts,early quits, poor productivity,absenteeism and job disruption.

Work stoppages and slowdownswill no longer be accepted. Due toactions on Alberta projects, 83Boilermakers have been bannedfrom further work in the industry.

The result has been a specialBoilermakers’ initiative to put inplace a set of work rules thatensure the safety of workers,protect the rights of all involved,and protect the jobs and livelihoodof Boilermakers who want to workin the industry.

“We don’t want people who are outto destroy our industry. We don’twant to be accused of being theones causing wobbles. And it’sbeing pushed by the union, not bythe contractor. Because the unionrealizes that they’re going to go outof existence unless we dosomething.”

Damian Gannon

“Today is Not Tomorrow”

Damian Gannon is Manager ofEngineering and Construction,ATCO Power.

From an investor’s perspective,what we’re looking for in a projectis fairly simple. We’re looking fora reliable, economic plant, built onschedule and on budget.

Gannon underlines that the owneris a long-time, term investor—inthe project for 40 years. They’renot looking for something builtcheap and nasty that breaks downafter 12 months. Nor do they wantsomething that’s gold-plated andwill never pay for itself. They arelooking for value for money, forreliable and predictableperformance.

“What we try to analyze is whatwill give us the lowest cost per unitof electricity for 40 years.”

The variation in project successcomes from a difference in attitudeon the projects, the safety. Peoplehave to start taking safety moreseriously across the board, and notjust from project to project.

The answer lies in education andchanging people’s attitude aboutthe acceptability of injuries onwork sites.

“It’s important to rememberthat it’s a privilege to be a

member of theBoilermakers Union, not aninherent right. We have the

skills. We may have aproblem with attitude, mayhave a problem with workethic—but we can do it.”

“Through training andeducation I think we can

move closer to achieving theexpectations on safety.”

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What was SaidThe conference gave delegates andkey speakers the opportunity toshare ideas about the industry andits future. Here is a selection ofcomments from the conference.

...we must make those necessarychanges that will limit or eliminateour dependence on governmentintervention....we must do a betterjob of educating our members onthe need to impress owners ofconstruction with top quality, ontime, within budget projects. Inshort we have to becomeindisputably the best of the best.

union delegate

Delegates discuss industry concerns and the path forward.

(Damian Gannon, continued)

Gannon said that contractors cando a better job of managing thework force, and that “contractorsalso have to look to the skills oftheir superintendents and generalformen to improve productivity."

"Re-work due to engineeringerrors and omissions has been anon-going concern across all of ourprojects lately." Eliminating re-work due to poor workmanship is atraining issue, and this wouldimprove productivity on all sites.

“If we do not improve, there aregoing to be fewer projects for us tochase.”

Unless we do what’s necessary tofix these problems ourselves, andnobody’s going to do it for us,we’re not going to be around or wewill be working other than union,both the tradesmen and the con-tractors. Every contractor andevery union member has to under-stand that.

contractor delegate

...the most important thing, themessage has to get down to themembership...

union delegate

Non-union contractors are aliveand doing well in Saskatchewan.Non-union competition is real andwe must be competitive to survive.

contractor delegate

The Path Forward

In light of the workplace andindustry issues discussed during theconference, CODC willimmediately begin to expand itsprograms to address the issuesidentified during the conference.

For More Information

For more information relating toCODC Construction OpportunitiesDevelopment Council Inc. or itsactivities contact:

CODC Construction OpportunitiesDevelopment Council Inc.Box 4019Regina, SK S4P 3R9Phone: 306-347-7299Fax: 306-352-8081E-mail: codc@sasktel.net

or, contact your local union.