The Effects of Partisan Political Stripe on Provincial Labour Policy Orientation in Canada

Abstract

This paper aims to answer the question of how partisan political stripe affects provincial labour policy. It does so by examining labour policy legislation passed from 1997 to 2024 in British Columbia and Saskatchewan. These cases were chosen on the basis of differences in the partisan stripe of their governing parties both across the two cases and over time within each. Over the period of study, British Columbia transitioned from right-wing governments with labour-negative policy to left-wing governments with labour-positive policy. Saskatchewan instead began with left-wing governments with labour-positive policy, while right-wing governments with labour-negative policy followed. If parties adhere to different ideological orientations regarding labour policy, one should expect differences in labour policy orientation under governments of different partisan political stripes. If these policy differences are significant, they should manifest themselves in differences in unionization rates. However, as provincial governments are both regulators of collective union bargaining and employers themselves, it seems crucial to examine their behaviour in both roles and to consider unionization rates in both the public and private sectors. Unionization rates in each province, as an indicator of labour power, have varied in the public sector, but consistently decreased in the private sector, providing an example of the effects of change in labour policy orientation. These patterns can be connected to those of government party. However, the conclusion speculates that this effect is limited in the private sector realm given similarities in the patterns of private sector unionization rates in both provinces over time which might be explained by the adherence of both left- and right-wing provincial governments in their roles as labour policymakers to neoliberal economic principles following a belief in the efficacy of the free market which is distinctive from their behaviour in their roles as public sector employers where partisan political stripe does seem to correspond to distinctive policy approaches.