Bill 29 restructures Alberta’s public-sector labour regime. It removes several provisions from the Public Service Employee Relations Act, adds non-academic staff at universities, colleges and polytechnic institutions to that Act temporarily, and then transfers those employees into the Labour Relations Code on July 1, 2022.
The transition is more than a change of statutory label. It moves these bargaining units from a public-service framework into the province’s general labour-relations system, including its rules for strikes, lockouts, essential services and Labour Relations Board oversight.
The bill also preserves existing agreements, grievances and proceedings during the changeover, while allowing disputes about the transition to receive a final Board ruling.
At a Glance
What It Does
The bill repeals the Public Service Employee Relations Act’s definition of “arbitral item,” removes specified government positions from an employee exclusion, and repeals the provision limiting what compulsory arbitration boards may decide. It adds non-academic staff at universities, comprehensive community colleges and polytechnic institutions to the Act, then moves them into the Labour Relations Code on July 1, 2022.
Who It Affects
University, college and polytechnic boards, their non-academic employees and their bargaining agents face the clearest changes. The Labour Relations Board, public-sector employers covered by the existing statutes and parties involved in collective bargaining or arbitration must also apply the transitional rules.
Why It Matters
The bill separates non-academic post-secondary employees from the public-service bargaining framework and places them within Alberta’s broader labour-relations system. That change affects the legal route for strikes, lockouts, bargaining disputes, certifications, grievances and future collective agreements.
More articles like this one.
A weekly email with all the latest developments on this topic.
What This Bill Actually Does
Bill 29 amends three Alberta statutes: the Public Service Employee Relations Act, the Labour Relations Code and the Post-secondary Learning Act. Its central change concerns non-academic staff at public universities, comprehensive community colleges and polytechnic institutions.
The bill identifies both the institutional employer and the affected staff in the schedule to the Public Service Employee Relations Act, creating a clear statutory bridge before the later transfer to the Labour Relations Code.
The bill also changes the machinery of compulsory arbitration under the Public Service Employee Relations Act. It repeals the definition of “arbitral item” and removes section 30, which had barred compulsory arbitration boards from addressing issues such as work organization, assignment of duties, staffing levels, job evaluation, selection, promotion, training, transfer and pensions.
The text therefore removes those express statutory limits rather than replacing them with a new list in the bill.Separate amendments update the Labour Relations Code so the newly covered post-secondary employers, employees and bargaining agents fall within the Code’s provisions governing strikes, lockouts and essential services. The bill also makes the Code’s general application provisions expressly include these institutions and employees.
The Post-secondary Learning Act is amended to define a non-academic staff association by reference to a bargaining agent under the Labour Relations Code, aligning terminology before the 2022 transfer.The transition rules determine what happens to existing legal relationships. On July 1, 2022, a bargaining agent certified under the Public Service Employee Relations Act becomes a bargaining agent under the Labour Relations Code, and the Labour Relations Board must issue a replacement certificate.
Existing collective agreements and grievances move under the Code, while applications and complaints filed before the effective date continue under the old Act. Bargaining already underway generally continues under the Code, but a dispute already referred to a compulsory arbitration board remains governed by the old framework until it concludes.If the parties disagree about how these provisions operate or about another matter connected with the schedule amendment, either party may refer the issue to the Labour Relations Board.
The Board’s decision is final and binding. Most amendments take effect June 1, 2019; the post-secondary additions, related Labour Relations Code changes and the Post-secondary Learning Act amendment take effect July 1, 2022.
The Five Things You Need to Know
The bill repeals section 30 of the Public Service Employee Relations Act, removing its express exclusions for work organization, staffing, job evaluation, promotion, training, transfer and pensions from compulsory arbitration.
It adds non-academic staff and their institutional employers at universities, comprehensive community colleges and polytechnic institutions to the schedule of the Public Service Employee Relations Act.
On July 1, 2022, existing bargaining-agent certificates for those non-academic employees convert to Labour Relations Code certificates issued by the Labour Relations Board.
Collective agreements and related grievances move under the Labour Relations Code, but applications and complaints filed before the transfer continue under the Public Service Employee Relations Act.
A compulsory arbitration proceeding already referred before July 1, 2022 continues under the old framework, and the resulting collective agreement is treated as one made under the Labour Relations Code.
Section-by-Section Breakdown
Every bill we cover gets an analysis of its key sections.
Removes selected public-service definitions and exclusions
The bill applies to the Public Service Employee Relations Act, repeals the definition of “arbitral item,” and removes section 12(1)(f). That exclusion had covered employees in specified positions classified under the Public Service Act, including budget officers, systems analysts, auditors, disbursement control officers and certain hearing officers, as well as people performing substantially similar duties.
The practical effect depends on the remaining coverage rules and the employees’ positions, but the amendment removes this specific statutory exclusion rather than creating a new classification scheme.
Expands the possible scope of compulsory arbitration
Repealing section 30 removes the provision that restricted compulsory arbitration boards to matters that could appear in a collective agreement and separately excluded work organization, duty assignments, staffing levels, job evaluation, job allocation, selection, appointment, promotion, training, transfer and pensions.
The bill does not specify a replacement boundary for arbitral authority. Employers and bargaining agents therefore face a less detailed statutory framework, with the scope of compulsory arbitration left to the Act’s remaining provisions and applicable legal interpretation.
Adds university non-academic staff to the public-service schedule
The bill adds each university’s board of governors, when acting as employer, and the university’s non-academic staff to the schedule of the Public Service Employee Relations Act. This distinguishes non-academic employees from the academic staff, graduate students and postdoctoral fellows already identified elsewhere in the schedule.
The addition is temporary in practical terms because the bill later moves these bargaining relationships into the Labour Relations Code on July 1, 2022.
Adds college and polytechnic non-academic staff
The schedule also adds the boards and non-academic staff of each comprehensive community college and each polytechnic institution. The provisions use definitions from the Post-secondary Learning Act to identify the institutions, employers and employees covered.
Together with the university amendment, these sections establish the population that receives the transition rules and later enters the general labour-relations regime.
Connects the new units to strikes, lockouts and essential services
The bill amends the Labour Relations Code’s cross-references so the newly designated post-secondary employers, employees and bargaining agents fall within the Code’s provisions on strike and lockout entitlement and the division dealing with essential services. It also adds them to the Code’s general application provisions.
This matters because the legal consequences of a labour dispute will no longer depend only on the public-service statute. Once the transfer occurs, the parties must use the Code’s procedures and definitions for the relevant labour-relations issues.
Preserves legal continuity during the 2022 transfer
The transitional section converts existing bargaining-agent certificates and moves collective agreements and grievances to the Labour Relations Code on July 1, 2022. Pre-existing applications and complaints continue under the Public Service Employee Relations Act, while bargaining begun under a prior notice to bargain continues as though the notice had been issued under the Code.
The bill draws a specific line around arbitration: a dispute referred to a compulsory arbitration board before the effective date stays under the old framework through completion. The Labour Relations Board receives final and binding authority over disputes about the transition or the schedule amendment.
Updates the post-secondary labour terminology
The Post-secondary Learning Act’s definition of “non-academic staff association” changes from a bargaining agent under the Public Service Employee Relations Act to a bargaining agent under the Labour Relations Code. This amendment keeps the post-secondary statute consistent with the new legal home for these bargaining relationships.
Sets two implementation dates
The bill gives most of its provisions an effective date of June 1, 2019. Sections 5 to 7—which cover the post-secondary schedule additions, related Labour Relations Code amendments and the terminology change—take effect on July 1, 2022.
The split timing creates an interim period in which the general public-service amendments operate before the post-secondary transition takes effect.
This bill is one of many.
Codify tracks hundreds of bills on this topic across all five countries.
Explore this topic in Codify Search →Who Benefits and Who Bears the Cost
Every bill creates winners and losers. Here's who stands to gain and who bears the cost.
Who Benefits
- Non-academic university, college and polytechnic employees gain a defined path into the Labour Relations Code, with continuity for bargaining-agent status, collective agreements and grievances during the transfer.
- Bargaining agents representing the affected post-secondary units avoid an automatic loss of certification and receive statutory treatment for ongoing bargaining, pending complaints and arbitration.
- Employers and unions with disputes about the transition gain a single adjudicative route through the Labour Relations Board, whose decision is final and binding.
- Parties negotiating public-sector collective agreements may face fewer express limits on compulsory arbitration because the bill removes section 30’s detailed exclusions.
Who Bears the Cost
- University, college and polytechnic boards must adapt bargaining administration, certificates, agreements and dispute processes to the Labour Relations Code, with potential legal and operational costs during the transition.
- The Labour Relations Board must issue replacement certificates and resolve transition disputes while also applying the Code to newly transferred bargaining relationships.
- Bargaining agents and employers with ongoing proceedings must track different rules based on whether a matter began before the effective date, creating recordkeeping and jurisdictional work.
- Public-sector employers and unions remain exposed to uncertainty about the scope of compulsory arbitration after the bill removes the former list of excluded subjects without supplying a replacement list.
Key Issues
The Core Tension
The bill seeks a cleaner and more general labour-relations framework for non-academic post-secondary employees while preserving existing rights and proceedings. Those goals pull in different directions: the more completely the system changes, the more difficult it becomes to maintain continuity, and the more the bill removes old arbitration limits without replacing them, the greater the flexibility—and uncertainty—for employers and bargaining agents.
The bill creates continuity, but not complete simplicity. Different matters can follow different statutes depending on when they began: a pre-existing complaint stays under the Public Service Employee Relations Act, bargaining generally shifts to the Labour Relations Code, and an arbitration already referred before the transfer remains under the old regime.
Parties will need to classify each proceeding carefully rather than assume that all rights and obligations move on one date.
The repeal of section 30 is also consequential because it removes a detailed boundary around compulsory arbitration without stating an equivalent substitute. That may give an arbitration board or reviewing court more room to determine what is properly arbitrable, while making the exposure of employers and bargaining agents harder to predict.
The change to section 12(1)(f) similarly removes a specific exclusion for certain public-service positions, but the bill does not explain how affected classifications will be treated under the Act’s remaining provisions.
The 2022 transfer may align non-academic post-secondary labour relations with the province’s general system, but alignment can produce different outcomes from the former public-service model. Essential-services rules, strike and lockout procedures, certification records and dispute forums must all operate across institutions with distinct staffing structures.
The bill supplies statutory continuity, but leaves implementation details—and some of the practical meaning of the changed arbitration framework—to the institutions, bargaining agents, Board and later interpretation.
There's more to this law than the bill.
Codify Laws traces every connection across the legislative lifecycle.