Is Bell Canada addicted to free labour? The Marilyn Denis Edition

Last fall I penned a brief piece questioning the ethics of universities advertising unpaid internships on behalf of large corporations. Well the practice hasn't stopped and here's an example of how absurd the situation is. 

CTV's Marilyn Denis

Bell Media and The Marilyn Denis Show are looking for a couple unpaid interns (here's the advertisement pulled off York University's career website). The positions relate developing web content and are "vital to the efficiency of the network's digital media efforts", but not apparently vital enough to pay the minimum wage of $10.25. The duties include writing copy, editing on Photoshop, shooting photos, and coding web pages with HTML. In short, these positions appear to be jobs and probable misclassification of employees as interns.

What leaves a real bad taste in my mouth is the fact that Bell is an extremely profitable company earning $574 million in profit in Q1 2012 alone and sitting on close to billion dollar in cash reserves. Bell prides itself as a good corporate citizen, but is the reputation deserved given the practices described above? This isn't an isolated incident either, consider the small army of unpaid interns Bell Mobility has amassed in Mississauga within the PMP program. Rather it's quite possible that there's some deeper addiction to free labour ingrained with Bell's internal culture.

What has to be remembered here is that this situation is abnormal as no corporation posting huge profits should be allowed to treat young workers in this manner. To provide some perspective, consider that Chinese interns at the oft maligned Foxconn might be beginning to have better working conditions than many interns in North America.

Take a look at the these articles documenting the growing practice of using unpaid internships in the Canadian media industry, see: here, here, and here. Finally, here's the ILO's Director-General discussing his objections to unpaid internships and how to organize against the practice, see:

Upcoming Conference on Precarious Work in Canada's Cultural Industries

Ryerson University's Centre for Labour Management Relations will be holding a one-day conference on October 18, 2012, entitled "Will Work for Exposure: Cultural Work in Precarious Times" (it's free too). It's going to be examining work in Canada's booming cultural sector and how this work is becoming increasingly precarious in nature. 

Of particular interest is a panel called "Experience or Exploitation? Debating Unpaid Internships" which will be discussing the rise of the intern culture within the youth labour market in Canada. Now I'm on the panel with: Andrew Weir of the Canadian Intern Association; Agata Zieba, an M.A. candidate from Wilfrid Laurier University whose masters' thesis is on internships; and, Edward Keenan of The Grid. 

If you're interested in the who internship issue then I encourage you to attend as you'll be able to get a sneak-peek of my research into the legalities of unpaid internships in Canada which I'm doing for my LL.M degree from Osgoode Hall. To the best of my knowledge this research is the first attempt in Canada to map the legal dimensions of unpaid internships within the labour market. My portion of the panel discussion will explore the linkages between the uncertainty in the legal status of interns to the development of precarious work in the cultural sector.

The conference also features talks from Toronto MP Andrew Cash and NYU sociologist Andrew Ross; furthermore, there are also panels on cultural worker rights, working without a safety net, and living as a precarious worker. Take a look at the video of Andrew Ross delivering the Eric Schocket Memorial Lecture at Hampshire College last spring, see:

Paper Tigers: Why is the Ministry of Labour Ignoring Wage Theft?

Wage theft is an ongoing problem in the across Ontario's labour market. This is a major issue that has been ignored by the Ministry of Labour for far too long. This post is going to analyze three concrete examples of wage theft in the lower end of the labour market and what's not being done to stop it.

Example One: Gas and Dash Deaths

Victim: Jayesh Prajapati

This is perhaps the highest profile example of wage theft in recent memory. Shell gas station attendant Jayesh Prajapati was killed after being dragged by a car driven by a thief who had stolen $112.85 worth of gas. Now why would an employee put themselves in harms way over that amount? Well, it's a common practice in the industry to charge employees directly after a theft. This is a direct violation of Ontario's Employment Standards Act, 2000 ("the ESA") which prohibit deductions of this nature.

Now, there's a simple solution that can virtually eliminate the problem of gas and dash: pre-paying for your gas. British Columbia implemented this type of legislation in the wake of the tragic death of Grant De Patie and it has been working; however, the oil and gas industry doesn't like laws of this nature because it cuts down on impulse purchases by consumers. 

Curiously, Minister of Labour Linda Jeffrey seemed to parrot the oil and gas industry's line when she said: "What we learned from that was there are significant concerns from stakeholders about the feasibility of the pay-at-the-pump laws. Other jurisdictions have not seen the expected results or uptake after passing the legislation." But how did she know the position of the oil and gas industry? Well, last year Atifeh Rad, a gas station attendant in Mississauga, died after being dragged by a car driven by a thief who stole gas.

There was an explicit decision within the Ministry of Labour not to pursue implementing preventative legislation after the first death, but now that decision has been removed from their purview after MPP Mike Colle put forward a high-profile private member's bill aimed at eliminating gas and dash deaths and doing exactly what Linda Jeffrey scoffed at. Frankly I don't understand why the industry's concerns were taken seriously given the sky high gas prices and the fact that this is a problem that the industry created itself through systemic violations of the provisions in the ESA banning deductions for theft. Is the death of a worker acceptable when there's a fool-proof, low-cost solution available?

Example Two: Tip Theft in the Restaurant Industry

Linda Jeffrey: Soft on theft, soft on death.

I have a lot of friends who work in the restaurant industry and they're frequently subjected to all manner of abuse, assault, and other arbitrary punishment in the course of their employment. A particularly insidious (and commonplace) practice is management taking a cut of their employee's tips out of pure greed. This problem disproportionately impacts young people who often take serving jobs to pay for school or as a second job to make ends meet (at a reduced minimum wage too, i.e. $8.90 vs. $10.25, which may violate the Charter, but I digress).

MPP Michael Prue put forward a private member's bill earlier this year to address the practice of tip dipping earlier this year. At first Linda Jeffrey didn't like the proposed legislation and indicated that she had no concerns with the practice of tip dipping stating that "I think that they need to have that relationship clear at the very beginning of the employment history. We want employers to treat their employees fairly and if they are not treated fairly they should speak to the Ministry of Labour. When you are a good server, it's a very competitive environment. You can go where you get the best deal." Is anyone else detecting a trend here?

This story had a happy ending though when Premier Dalton McGuinty realized the blunder his junior minister had made and then proceeded to hang her out to dry stating that: "I think the NDP has put their finger on an important issue. I've given that advice to the minister." Michael Prue's bill remains on the order paper at Queen's Park and will be moving forward this fall, but it remains to be seen whether the Ministry of Labour is beginning to realize the seriousness of this issue.

Example Three: Misclassification of Interns

Unpaid internships represent a massive source of wage theft in the youth labour market (I'm not talking about internships part of an academic program either, that's a different can of worms). The wage theft in this area operates a bit differently than the previous two examples insofar the wage theft occurs via misclassification rather than directly stealing wages from the employee, but it's far more insidious and damaging to the labour market overall. 

Employers looking for cheap labour have stumbled upon a vicious loop-hole in unpaid internships whereby they simply assert (falsely, of course) that the person is an intern rather than an employee and then proceed to deny them entitlements flowing from the ESA. Voila: no need to pay wages; no deductions for payroll taxes; and, you can fire the intern with immunity (i.e. at-will employment). Unpaid internships literally take some the worst aspects of employment law developed over the last five hundred years and roll them into a neat employer friendly package.

Much like the previous two examples it's clear that the Ministry of Labour has no interest in taking any sort of action in addressing this issue, but they should. Here's why: employers are getting free labour and not hiring actual employees thereby increasing unemployment; the Federal and Provincial government are losing out on contributions for CPP, EI, income tax, and WSIB; young people are losing out on wages thereby depressing the overall economy; and, it's denying many young people from lower socio-economic backgrounds access to white collar industries that require people to engage in unpaid work as a prerequisite for paid employment (i.e. journalism, fashion, public relations, dietitians).

The problem with unpaid internships is that the misclassification that inevitably occurs contributes to a stubbornly high youth unemployment rate in Ontario and strikes at the heart of intergenerational equity. Unless ameliorative measures are undertaken by the Ministry of Labour to address this issue the problem will continue to spiral out of control as the misclassification grows more pervasive within the labour market.

Further Reading: Low-End Theory

If you want to learn more about wage theft and precarious work in Ontario's labour market take a look at these resources: Toronto's Workers' Action Centre's reports about wage theft (see: here and here); the Law Commission of Ontario's vulnerable workers interim report; and, this article about wage theft against nannies in Toronto. Finally, check out this fascinating video about wage theft, see: 

Paths to Poverty: Tim Hudak's Anti-Family/Anti-Worker Agenda

Dumb and Dumber

Tim Hudak, the leader of Progressive Conservative Party of Ontario, was on TVO's The Agenda last night talking about labour market reform. It's apparent that Mr. Hudak's understanding of the global economy and labour markets is simplistic; furthermore, his proposals are an explicit attack on the middle class in Ontario. Mr. Hudak's ideas have little to do with job creation or economic growth, rather it's a thinly veiled ideological attack on the next generation of workers through a low-wage, no rights agenda.

The proposals focus on destabilizing Ontario's labour market, deregulating key legal protections, and creating a right to work state. This is engaging a race to the bottom that would push countless young workers, children, and senior citizens into poverty. The terrain of damage that Mr. Hudak would leave in his wake would make the actions of Mike Harris, his mentor, pale in comparison. 

Mr. Hudak hopes to accomplish his dubious goals through a strategy that decimates governmental institutions which protect workers, attacking the ability of organized labour to work towards better working conditions, and erode the democratic rights of citizens to respond to changing social and economic times. If these proposals were ever enacted the social stability and economic fabric within Ontario would be shredded in favour of pure market forces which would leave us reeling for generations to come. In an era of rising income equality and profound uncertainty it takes a radically unbalanced mind to advance ideas that will literally throw millions of people into crisis.

I urge each person reading this to study Mr. Hudak's white paper in detail and educate yourself about what he's proposing. His strength comes from passing off a simplistic view of the economy as a workable innovative strategy that will serve as a cure-all for our woes. It's easy to buy into a fiction like that, but given the complexity of our globalized interwoven global economy there aren't any simple fixes anymore. 

Simply put, the Ontario that Mr. Hudak wants is gone forever and no matter how many times he clicks his heels it won't come back. What's left is a more difficult precarious future reality, but one still filled with opportunity and hope if we're able to confront change in an organized fashion. That's not what Mr. Hudak is proposing, it's quite the opposite with a Russian-roulette approach to the future economic prosperity of Ontario - this is the politics of fear, division, and insecurity.

To learn more about some of the ideas that Mr. Hudak has been proposing as of late, see: here and here.  Finally, take a look at this video from the 2011 provincial election where the three leaders debate job creation (at the time I found each of the parties' job creation strategies to be sophomoric at best), see:

Statscan Finds that the Millennial Generation is Moving Home (or Never Left)

Statistics Canada released some interesting research today related to the 2011 Census and it's provides a level of insight into today's boomerang generation. The Portrait of Families and Living Arrangements in Canada (full report here) paints a picture of the changing nature of families and social relations in Canada. Of interest to me are the parts of the research that examines what's happening to young Canadians; this is documented in a separate brief entitled Living Arrangements of Young Adults Aged 20 to 29 (full report here).

The finding are fascinating. Twenty-somethings are living at home in much greater (and increasing) numbers than in past decades, which the study attributes to a higher cost of housing, the necessity of pursuing advanced degrees, and weakness in the youth labour market. The research also found that there was a gendered dimension to this trend with young men being more likely to live at home than young women; furthermore, Southern Ontario (particularly the 905) was also singled out as having a high percentage of 20 to 29 years living at home, which I'll attribute to the depressed labour market in Ontario and the housing bubble which has simply priced many young people out of owning their own home.

The proportion of young people living as a couple is also on the decline. This is part of a long term slide in young Canadian forming relationships. In 1981 51.8% of twenty-somethings were in relationships, but the figure today is just 30.8% which is a 2% drop from the 2006 census figure of 32.8%. The study attributes this decline in young people focusing on their education or careers rather than forming relationships. I'll throw in my two cents: it's hard to form stable relationships amid a labour market that exploits young people and when one graduates with tens of thousands of dollars in debt. Finally, it should be pointed out, as unsurprising as it may be, that more young people are living with non-family members (i.e. roommates and other situations) than in past censuses.

For some additional reading on the boomerang generation phenomena take a look at these links: the Pew Research Center has some interesting insights into the overall social trend; the CBC produced a great documentary called Generation Boomerang; and, this article from The Guardian about ever present threat of the quarter-life crisis. Finally, take a look about this video about the what's happening with today's young Canadians, see:

Inside the Canadian Law School Scam: Back to School Edition

I read an article yesterday about Ontario's articling crisis. It was a rehash of publicly available information, but one passage stands out. It comes from Bruce Feldthusen, the embattled Dean of the Common Law program at the University of Ottawa's Faculty of Law. In the article Mr. Feldthusen totally absolves himself and the University of Ottawa from any responsibility in flooding the labour market with law school graduates and contributing to the articling crisis. This blog post will examine how the University of Ottawa flooded the labour market with law students, the other factors driving the articling crisis, and where we might be headed.

Is Something Rotten at Fauteux Hall?

Bruce Feldthusen

Mr. Feldthusen's comments defy incredulity in the face of overwhelming evidence that the University of Ottawa bears quite a bit of the responsibility for the vast oversupply of law school graduates in Ontario and the articling crisis. Consider the evidence:

In 1997 the University of Ottawa's Faculty of Law admitted 165 students, while in 2011 they admitted 376 students which translates into an increase of 221 students (over the same period all the other law schools in Ontario only increased admission by 83 students and in some cases actually reduced the number of students). This represents a 128% increase over the last 15 years in the number of students admitted into the law school.

In 2009 the University of Ottawa's Faculty of Law admitted approximately 50 additional students after an administrative error led to 600 applications being "lost". Bart Cormier, the former Assistant Dean, Academic Affairs and External Relations, who was responsible for managing the admissions office when the admissions error was made left his employment with the law school in June 2009 which necessitated a search for a new Assistant Dean.

The following academic year the University of Ottawa's Faculty of Law did not reduce the number of students to pre-error levels, rather the decision was made to increase the number of students by a further 39 students. Till this day the University of Ottawa's Faculty of Law has not taken the appropriate steps to reduce the number of law students it admits to sustainable levels and seems to be operating under the illusion that things are hunky-dorky for recent law graduates.

What Are the Other Factors Driving the Articling Crisis?

It would be unfair to pin the entirety of the articling crisis on the University of Ottawa's Faculty of Law as there are other factors in play. Let us consider some of the wider issues playing into the slack labour market for law graduates in Ontario. 

The Ministry of Training, Colleges, and Universities clearly failed in providing oversight over a long period of time. Simply examining the numbers of admitted students at Ontario's six law schools reveals that the University of Ottawa increases in admissions were abnormal. Why this was allowed to occur is unclear, but it could have been pure incompetence on the part of ministry staff or perhaps a political decision.

The University of Windsor's Faculty of Law increased the number of students they admitted by approximately 50% from 1997 to 2011 when they went from 151 students up to 226. This was a much smaller increase than the one at University of Ottawa, but the labour market didn't assimilate this increase terribly well. Further driving the Windsor angle are the ongoing problems with unemployment in South-Western Ontario, a decimated manufacturing sector, and the decline of Michigan's economy. All of the aforementioned factors impact on the demand for legal services in South-Western Ontario. On a side note, here's an internal memo that minimizes the role that the University of Windsor has played in creating the articling crisis.

In the wake of the financial crisis the demand for legal services plummeted and greatly reduced the number of students being hired by firms. This is a major factor that's driving the articling crisis and with Ontario economy still in shambles the legal profession is still feeling the impact of the financial crisis.

Universities in the U.K. and Australia are enticing undergraduates in Ontario to study law abroad. Companies like Students Solution and Barclay & Knap use questionable tactics to push students into studying abroad only to have them find out that their degrees are virtually worthless in Canada's legal landscape and that they have to jump through hoops to gain certification once they graduate. Beyond this, some institutions such as Bond University have set up dedicated academic programs teaching Canadian law which have been flooding the legal market with lawyers with substandard legal education.

What's Coming Down the Pipes?

I've been told that the Law Society of Upper Canada's Articling Task Force will be recommending that some alternative process of licensing other than articling be adopted going forward. Other than that it would be prudent if the Ministry of Training, Colleges, and Universities pressured the University of Ottawa and the University of Windsor to immediately reduce the number of law students (this happened with Teacher's Colleges) they admit back to 1997 levels as Ontario does not need a structural labour market problem in a key profession and we'll soon have further pressure within the system when an additional law school that will admit an additional 150 students per year comes online.

Here are some more links if you want to learn more about the articling crisis, see: here, here, here, and here. Youth and Work has been watching this issue develop for a number of years so check out some of the previous articles on this topic, see: here, here, and here. Finally, check out this great interview with New York Times reporter David Segal discussing the current state of legal education, see:

 

Is Rob Ford continuing to abuse his young staffers' workplace rights?

Rob Ford is many things: an accomplished liar; a convicted criminal; and, currently the defendant in a high-profile conflict of interest case. But is he also a serial abuser of young workers? Rob Ford's grasp of workplace law has been thrust back into the media with revelations that he's been using junior staffers to assist him with his football coaching duties. 

Now Councillor Doug Ford, the Mayor's brother and city councillor, has pushed back against these allegations stating that "This is on their own time, after forty hours, Rob doesn't force anyone to work on city time". Curiously, this isn't the first time that Rob Ford has faced questions about contravening Ontario's Employment Standard Act, 2000 ("the ESA").

In the wake of 2010 municipal election Nick Kouvalis, then Rob Ford's Chief of Staff, stated that: "I wanted young kids because I could pay them nothing and they would do what I told them to. I paid them $500 a week and I wanted 60 or 70 hours a week out of them." This statement was clear admission that Rob Ford's campaign breached the provisions in the ESA relating to minimum wage, overtime, and overtime pay.

The new allegations relate to overtime and overtime pay; furthermore, it again raises the concern that Rob Ford is using public resources to further his private activities. Personally, I doubt that a breach of the ESA actually occurred given that it appears the junior staffers involved were probably hired onto Rob Ford's staff more for there football ability rather than their political acumen and it appears that they have no problem with volunteering to coach football, but it does leave lingering questions about Rob Ford's adherence to the workplace laws of Ontario.

That's all, check out the Ministry of Labour's fact sheet about the provisions governing overtime in Ontario under the ESA and my original blog post about Rob Ford's treatment of campaign staffers. Finally, check out this video of Rob Ford interacting with some young Torontonians, see:

Appealing the Debt Sentence: Is it Time to End Student Debt?

I'm quoted in an upcoming issue of Maclean's discussing student debt arising from professional degree programs. The article was written by by Kate Lunau, a talented young journalist, who also wrote the great cover story from last week's Maclean's discussing the mental health crisis at Canadian post-secondary institutions.

Tuition levels continue to skyrocket across Canada and far outpace the rate of inflation. The Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives released a landmark report this week called "Eduflation and the High Cost of Learning" which traces the incredible damage being inflicted on young people vis-a-vis a failing post-secondary education strategy that has downloaded the cost of learning onto students and their families. 

This push is rooted in neoliberal ideology which holds that education is essentially a personal investment devoid of wider social benefit, students should bear the costs themselves, and that post-secondary education's aim should be to train workers. Curiously, politicos like Glen Murray and talking heads such as Margaret Wente selling this false prospectus benefitted hugely from publicly subsidized education in the post-war era and never had to take on a small mortgage before they had their first job.

The policy of endless tuition increases is inherently unfair and perversely taxes young Canadians who need to acquire credentials to remain competitive in the labour market. Simply put, most students cannot afford these yearly hikes and are incurring massive amounts of debt. This point was not lost on students in Quebec who obtained a total victory over Jean Charest last week when his government was brought down after his summer election gamble backfired spectacularly. Quebec's students and their allies have provided a compelling model that needs to be repeated across the country.

The path that we're on is not sustainable. Education is a public good that has profound benefits for society, but these superlatives are greatly diminished when students are held hostage to market driven demands. It's clear that student debt (and the growing bubble) is one of the great questions facing North American society at present. Placing young people in debt is an explicit choice, it's not a edict from God and is something that can be ended. The problem is well delineated, the task now is how we exit the path we've been on and secure an affordable high quality post-secondary education system that doesn't impede the prospects, hopes, and dreams of the current and future generations.

For more on the tuition issue check out the following: this recent article from the Toronto Star; the CCPA's Education Project; and previous posts on Youth and Work (see: here, here, and here). Also, check out this video about the high cost of tuition in Ontario, see:

What Recovery? Youth Unemployment Jumps to 14.8%

Youth unemployment continues being an extremely stubborn problem in Canada and it has been back in the news since the release of Statistics Canada's latest Labour Force Survey for August 2012 showing a depressed youth labour market. This blog post is going to examine the latest statistics, ask some tough questions, and give some perspective about the ongoing problems that young people face.

Where Do We Stand?

In August 2012 the Canadian economy created 34,000 jobs. Overall, 46,700 part-time jobs were created, but this was offset by a loss of 12,500 full-time jobs. The unemployment rate remained unchanged at 7.3% and the participation rate of 79.6% is at the highest level since August 2010.

Total employment among workers aged 15 to 24 stands at the lowest level since 2002 - this essentially means that the number of real jobs for young workers has returned to the level it was a decade ago. The 15 to 24 year old cohort loss 20,000 full-time jobs in August and was the group that bore the brunt of the job losses.

Currently, the youth unemployment rate stands at 14.8% (representing a jump of 0.5%) and the total number of jobs that young people hold has fallen by 72,000 compared to a year prior. Full time students faced the worst summer labour market in years with the employment rate standing at only 47.9%; this is lower than the past couple years and far lower than the average of 54.1% in the three years leading up to the crash. 

Are the Statistics Canada Numbers Even Accurate?

The numbers that are thrown around in the media often don't give the full picture. The real unemployment rate for youth in Canada is probably above 20% given the recent spike in the youth unemployment rate. Even the Statistics Canada numbers are suspect as the data collection techniques fail to capture the fastest growing segment of the youth labour market: unpaid internships. It's difficult to assess to true picture out there (or craft policy responses) when tens of thousands of misclassified employees are excluded from official statistics. On this point, Ross Eisenbrey of the Economic Policy Institute wrote a short missive about this problem in the U.S. context.

Where's the Response From Government?

Curiously, the Federal Government has committed fifty million dollars to create 3,000 new jobs for young people in Canada. While this is encouraging, it's a departure of sorts and flies in the face of their explicit anti-middle class, anti-worker strategy that's aimed at eroding organized labour, driving down wages, and decimating what remains of the social safety net. When this move is contrasted with the elimination of the student summer jobs centres early this year it's clear that the Harper regime lacks any semblance of a coordinated youth jobs strategy; however, to be fair though provincial governments, such as Ontario, also lack a coordinated approach to youth unemployment.

What Will Happen Going Forward?

The youth labour market will continue to be weak as the economy waits for external signs coming from Europe and to a lesser extent China. Overall, there seems to be a modest recovery in process in Canada and the United States in terms of jobs, but the growth isn't nearly enough to reduce the unemployment rate or get the long-term unemployed back into jobs. Essentially, there's a lot of uncertainty in the wider economy and this will continue to dampen prospects for a stronger recovery in the youth labour market.

For additional analysis take a look at these resources: TD Economics put out a backgrounder on the latest numbers; the Huffington Post posted a great article about the issue; and, Youth and Work has also posted a number of articles recently examining this issue (see: here, here, and here).

What should I do if I wasn't paid at my unpaid internship this summer?

It's the first day of classes and school ain't getting any cheaper these day. So if you worked an unpaid internship this past summer and weren't paid for your labour (or underpaid via an honourarium or less than minimum wage) what can you do about it? Quite a bit actually. This post is going to explain the steps that you need to take in Ontario to potentially get paid for your work. These aren't trivial amounts either, considering that if you work forty hours per week for four month the wages owing could top out over $7,000.00.

First Step: Do you have a claim?

The first step you have to take is assess whether you potentially have a claim. All unpaid internships in Ontario are governed by section 1(2) of the Employment Standards Act, 2000 ("the ESA") and there is no way that an employer can escape their obligations under it. 

Section 1(2) lays out a six prong test: (1) the training has to be similar to that which is given in vocational schools; (2) the training has to be for the benefit of the intern; (3) the employer has to derive little, if any, benefit from the intern who is being trained (i.e. no coffee fetching, mass photocopying, or data-entry); (4) the intern being trained cannot displace other employees of the employer; (5) the intern is not accorded the right to become an employee of the employer providing the training; and, (6) the intern cannot be paid for the time they spent in training.

All the conditions listed above must be met for the employer legally use an unpaid intern. In my experience most unpaid internships have multiple breaches of the ESA and the vast majority are illegal under the ESA. That being said, if your unpaid internship was part of your academic program (i.e. a requirement needed for graduate from your program listed in your school's course calendar) then you might not be covered due to section 3(5)(2) of the ESA which exempts "an individual who performs work under a program approved by a college of applied arts and technology or university".

A number of useful commentaries have been written about this subject: the Ministry of Labour has one (but not a very good one); my blog has written an overview of the case law and statutes governing internships; Professor David Doorey has written an excellent commentary with examples; and, Toronto Lawyer Nav Bhandal has written a good overview as well.

Second Step: Document Your Case

If you determined that you might have a case the next step is to organize everything into a file folder. Essentially, you need to do the following: (1) write down as much as you can remember about your internship; when the internship started and ended; what tasks you were doing; who you reported to, what projects you worked on; what your hours were; what the name of the company is; etc; (2) print out any emails you have from your employer, co-workers, and other interns; and, (3) copy any letters, cheques, agreements, or other documents that you have from your internship. Once you have done all of this write up a one or two page summary covering all the essential details of your internship.

Final Step: Call the Ministry of Labour

For students (and young people in general) the best way to legally contest an unpaid internship is through Ontario's Ministry of Labour, but there are couple catches - under the ESA you can only claim unpaid wages going back six months from the date the claim is filed and there is a $10,000.00 cap on the amount that can be recovered. So, if you did an unpaid internship this past summer the best course of action if you want to get paid is to file a claim with the Ministry of Labour immediately. Under the new system for filing claims, employees have to first ask their employers to address the problem, but for young workers this part can be skipped (if the person you speak with wants you to do this then ask to speak with the Director). 

The Ministry of Labour can be reached at 1-800-531-5551 to a claim under the ESA. Once you're speaking with an Employment Standards Officer you can explain that you have put together a file documenting your unpaid internship.

That's it. If you have any questions about what to do then flip me an email or give me a call at (416) 525-1082. If you're outside of Ontario, don't fret as I'm currently researching the law on unpaid internships in the other provinces and territories. Finally, check out this video where I discuss the legalities of unpaid internships in Ontario, see: