The Progressive Conservatives have lost a bid to get Premier Kathleen Wynne to “play hardball” with Quebec for making it tough on Ontario construction contractors, workers and truckers to toil in la belle province.

Hours after Tory Leader Tim Hudak urged MPPs to back Tory MPP Jack MacLaren’s private members’ bill on construction labour mobility, it went down to defeat on second reading Thursday by the minority Liberal government and New Democrats.

Hudak charged Quebec is ignoring a 2006 agreement on the issue while its workers easily find employment in Ontario.

“It’s not fair . . . blue collar workers are being left out in the cold,” Hudak told a news conference, saying the situation in eastern Ontario has reached a tipping point. “It’s time we stopped being boy scouts.”

Labour Minister Yasir Naqvi said he wants nothing to do with the legislation, which he insisted would have the “opposite effect” and hurt the job situation.

“It will create trade barriers,” he said in the legislature’s daily question period, citing opposition from the Unionized Building and Construction Trades Council.

“We would rather work on resolving ongoing issues . . . because barriers are not the answer,” council spokesman Richard Hayter said in a statement, acknowledging “there are still ongoing issues.”

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Bill 80, known as the Fairness is a Two-Way Street Act, echoes 1999 legislation of the same name from the government of former premier Mike Harris. That bill was repealed when the 2006 deal with Quebec was reached.

“It did not work at that time . . . it’s the wrong approach,” Naqvi said of the law, which Hayter said resulted in escalating trade disputes and fewer jobs for the 32,000 construction workers his organization represents.

MacLaren’s bill would have prevented Quebec construction contractors from bidding on provincial and municipal government contracts in Ontario, require them to register and post a $10,000 bond with the province to bid on private contracts and mandate that Quebec workers register with Ontario’s jobs protection office.

“The real objective is to have Quebec come to the table . . . so we have unlimited labour mobility,” said MacLaren, who represents the Ottawa-area riding of Carleton-Mississippi Mills.

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The bill is supported by Greater Ottawa Trucking Association.

“Our guys in Ontario have simply stopped trying to penetrate the Quebec market,” said general manager Ron Barr. “As soon as we go in, we get harassed.”

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