Anti-Union Lobby Groups are Endorsing Pierre Poilievre’s Conservatives

While Pierre Poilievre promises to “champion workers” and “work with our unions,” the leader of the Conservatives is also receiving endorsements from anti-union “open shop” lobbying firms.

Poilievre, who recently criticized Liberal candidate Mark Carney over Brookfield Asset Management’s alleged “union-busting” and “anti-union activity” while Carney was board chairman, was also endorsed by the anti-union group Merit Canada a few weeks ago.

Merit Canada, which represents non-union employers in the construction sector, announced their endorsement of Pierre Poilievre. Two other provincial open shop organizations (the Independent Contractors and Businesses Associations of British Columbia and Alberta) endorsed Poilievre in January.

Merit Canada, which bills itself as the “national voice of Canada’s six provincial open shop construction associations,” represents open shop construction companies and describes its mission as ensuring “open shop construction workers have the ability to work in their chosen trade, without forced affiliation with a labour union.”

“Open shop” is a term often used by anti-union lobby groups to describe workplaces where workers can opt-out of joining or financially supporting a union, however, such workplace arrangements are not possible under Canadian labour law — in practice, most “open shop” workplaces are simply non-union.

Both Merit Canada and Merit Ontario, one of the organization’s provincial sister organizations, have maintained close ties to Canadian conservative parties.

Michael Gallardo, Merit Ontario’s president and CEO, was appointed to the Ford government’s Skilled Trades Council in 2022, where he was paid over $250,000 per year.

According to a press release announcing Merit Ontario’s endorsement of Doug Ford in the 2025 provincial election, the organization has received over $23 million through the Skills Development Fund for their training courses since Ford was elected as Premier in 2018, while eight Merit affiliate members have received more than $43 million to “help more people connect” with training.

Gallardo praised Ford’s investments in infrastructure projects and skilled trades training while “cutting red tape.”

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Merit has also lobbied to make it harder for construction workers to organize unions.

According to lobbying records for Ontario’s Office of the Integrity Commissioner, Merit Ontario lobbied the provincial government as recently as August 2024, pushing for mandated secret ballot elections during unionization efforts and the removal of restrictions that limit the ability of non-union contractors to bid on publicly funded infrastructure projects.

So far in 2025, Merit Ontario has already lobbied seven federal government agencies, including the Prime Minister’s Office, Finance Canada and the House of Commons.

Merit was represented by lobbyist Terrance Oakey, a former president of Merit Canada, and his boutique research, marketing and advocacy firm, One Persuasion. Oakey is a founding partner of One Persuasion alongside Hamish Marshall, one of the founding directors of Rebel Media and Andrew Scheer’s campaign manager during the 2019 election.

Office of the Integrity Commissioner

On the ‘Advocacy’ page of One Persuasion’s website, the firm boasts of working for Pierre Poilievre during the 2022 Conservative leadership race, as well as with Alberta Premier Danielle Smith and Vancouver Mayor Ken Sim, to “connect, mobilize and win.”

“The next Prime Minister of Canada, Pierre Poilievre, just gave you the roadmap to approaching his government, and you don’t have long to figure out how to navigate it,” reads a passage on the One Persuasion website.

In 2016, when Oakey was still president of Merit Canada, he co-chaired and handled corporate fundraising for the then-Ontario PC leader Patrick Brown’s biggest annual fundraiser.

During the Harper-era, Merit Canada was one of the most active corporate lobbyists in the Prime Minister’s Office. Oakey regularly met with Conservative MPs like Russ Hiebert and the Prime Minister’s senior staff members to push forward Hiebert’s Bill C-377, which sought “financial transparency” by forcing unions to disclose any payment exceeding $5000, including salaries, benefits and pensions.

Critics of the bill, including the Canadian Bar Association, pointed out that surrendering financial statements could risk violating workers’ privacy and be unconstitutional.

Poilievre was a prominent supporter of the bill, and also called for legislation that would make union dues optional, a cornerstone of “right-to-work” laws that undermine the collective bargaining process.

“I am the first federal politician to make a dedicated push towards this goal,” said Poilievre about introducing right-to-work legislation.

The close relationship and frequent closed-door meetings between Merit Canada and the Conservative Party were widely criticized at the time.

“Now we’re wondering who is actually writing this bill,” then-NDP labour critic Alexandre Boulerice said. “Is it Hiebert? The Prime Minister’s Office? Or even Merit?”

Harper’s Conservatives used their senate majority to pass the bill in 2015, but it was repealed by Justin Trudeau’s Liberal government in 2017.

Despite Poilievre’s close ties to anti-union lobbyists like Merit, he has promoted himself as a friend to the working class throughout his time as leader of the Conservative Party, frequently taking photos with union workers across the province.

But some labour leaders say he has no proven experience of standing up for workers.

“Pierre Poilievre has never worked on a factory floor, never run a business, never held corporate interests accountable. How can he negotiate with Trump when he has no experience of getting things done for Canadians?” said Bea Bruske, president of the Canadian Labour Congress, in a statement announcing the Workers Together platform.

Clarification: This article has been updated to clarify that while “open shop” workplaces refer to a workplace arrangement where workers can opt-out of union membership, workplace arrangements such as these are not possible under Canada’s existing labour laws.