Daily Update: July 7, 2020

Restoring Balance in Alberta’s Workplaces Act

Bill 32 will provide employees and employers with clearer and more transparent rules promoting fairness and productivity, including more clarity about rest periods and temporary layoff notices.To help inform these proposed changes, 5,421 responses were received during an online public survey conducted in November 2019. Key Highlights: 

• Clarifying that employees continue to accumulate vacation time while on a job-protected leave.
• Clarifying rules for rest periods and flexibility in scheduling breaks.
• Restoring balance to the relationship between employers and employees with updated rules for union certification and revocation, such as removing strict timelines and remedial certification provisions..
• Updating rules for temporary layoff notices to help employees stay attached to their jobs longer.
• Adding flexibility to rules for hours of work averaging arrangements to make it easier for employers to set up arrangements, create schedules, and calculate overtime.
• Helping youth find work, and reducing red tape and administrative burdens by expanding the types of jobs 13- and 14-year-olds are allowed to do without first needing a permit.
• Creating simpler and more flexible rules for general holiday pay, group terminations, payment of final earnings upon termination, payroll processes and paying administrative penalties to help employers save time and money in their daily operations.

Supporting sand and gravel operators

By amending the Environmental Protection and Enhancement Act, the government is eliminating confusion about what constitutes a mineral by providing clear definitions in legislation. This will ensure sand continues to be regulated under its current process, which is simple, straightforward and protects the environment. More information

Alberta Investment Attraction Act

If passed, Bill 33 will create the Invest Alberta Corporation, an arm’s-length agency that will help promote Alberta as a prime investment location for businesses from across Canada and around the world, attracting high-value, job-creating investment.  More information

Final Components of Phase 2 of the COVID-19 Emergency Support Fund for Cultural, Heritage and Sport Organizations Announced

Minister Guilbeault today announced the final details regarding Phase 2 of the disbursement of the $500-million fund, announced earlier this year. This final component helps address some of the gaps that have been identified by the industry across Canada since the fund was first implemented. This final component of Phase 2 of the COVID-19 Emergency Support Fund for Cultural, Heritage and Sport Organizations will be distributed through grants and contributions as follows:

• $45 million through the Canada Periodical Fund to assist free magazines and weekly newspapers, including those that serve official-language minority or ethnocultural communities;
• $25 million distributed through partners to assist independent news and community radio broadcasters;
• $20 million to Musicaction and FACTOR to help presenters in the live music sector;
• $2.5 million to support producers of content in a language other than English or French through the Canada Media Fund; and
• $52.1 million to various arts and culture organizations that do not normally receive funding from Canadian Heritage programs and/or did not receive funding during Phase 1. This amount will be provided as follows:
  • $8.2 million for the arts sector;
  • $27.8 million for the audiovisual and digital media sector;
  • $5 million for the music industry;
  • $10 million for the publishing sector; and
  • $1 million for arts and culture organizations that serve official-language communities.

Applicants seeking emergency assistance from the Canada Periodical Fund will be able to submit their requests as of July 7. Application details for the other Phase 2 funding opportunities will be available shortly on the dedicated COVID-19 emergency funding section of the Canadian Heritage website.

The first component of Phase 2 was announced on June 18. It included $53 million in support to organizations with heritage collections through the emergency component of the Museums Assistance Program. Details on the application process for small community museums will be available very soon. More details are available in the backgrounder.

Canada Invests in Clean Technology for Alberta’s Natural Resources Sectors

The Honourable Seamus O’Regan, Canada’s Minister of Natural Resources, today announced an investment of $6 million, as part of the Canadian Emissions Reduction Innovation Network (CERIN) initiative, to the Petroleum Technology Alliance of Canada (PTAC) and Canadian Gas Association (CGA), through their Natural Gas Innovation Fund, to support their work in the oil and gas sector.

CERIN is a collaborative initiative between Natural Resources Canada and Alberta Innovates, which contributed $4.3 million to accelerate the development of technologies that reduce methane emissions in the oil and gas sector.  The program brings together a unique collaborative network across Canada of academia, government and industry test centres, including a fully operational natural gas testing facility, focused on finding the right technologies so that they can be deployed quickly in Alberta, across Canada and globally.