Nova Scotia bills

Nova Scotia's Traffic Safety Act replaces the former Motor Vehicle Act, consolidating and modernizing the rules governing highways, vehicle registration, driver licensing, commercial carriers, roadside enforcement, and traffic safety compliance across the province.

This Nova Scotia bill amends the Trade Union Act to allow automatic union certification (without a vote) when more than 50% of employees in a bargaining unit are union members in good standing, and lowers the threshold required to trigger a certification vote from 40% to 35%.

This Nova Scotia bill amends the Time Definition Act to change the province's time zone offset, effectively moving Nova Scotia from Atlantic Time (UTC-4 in summer) to Atlantic Standard Time year-round (UTC-3), eliminating daylight saving time — but only if New Brunswick and Prince Edward Island make the same change.

This Nova Scotia bill requires the Minister of Health and Wellness to create a Tick-borne Illness Prevention Strategy and a dedicated research and prevention fund, with ongoing public reporting and a five-year effectiveness review.

This bill updates the incorporating legislation for a Baptist church in Kings County, Nova Scotia, renaming it to 'Billtown United Baptist Church,' modernizing trustee eligibility rules, and confirming the church's existing constitution and bylaws.

This Nova Scotia bill does two things: it creates a temporary process allowing property owners to apply for court-ordered access to a neighbour's land when needed to complete eligible construction or development work, and it restructures the regional transportation agency (renamed 'Link Nova Scotia') by placing it under direct ministerial control and expanding its mandate to plan and coordinate transportation across the Halifax region.

This Nova Scotia bill requires the Minister of Growth and Development to create a Technology Sector Growth and Talent Development Strategy within 12 months, aimed at growing the province's tech industry by improving education-to-employment pathways, supporting talent attraction and retention, and fostering partnerships between tech firms, universities, and schools.

This Nova Scotia private member's bill requires the Minister of Finance to review all provincial taxes, develop a strategic plan to eliminate 'tax on tax' situations (where one tax is calculated on an amount that already includes another tax), and introduce implementing legislation by January 1, 2028.

This Nova Scotia bill requires the Minister of Natural Resources to submit an annual progress report to the House of Assembly on the implementation of recommendations from the 2018 Lahey Independent Review of Forest Practices in Nova Scotia.

This Nova Scotia bill creates a suite of protections for small businesses (under $3M revenue, 50 or fewer employees) including mandatory prompt payment with interest on commercial contracts, a new Small Business Commissioner to handle complaints and disputes, and a commercial rent cap tied to CPI for eligible small business and charitable tenants.

This Nova Scotia bill adds mine rescue workers to the list of occupations that receive automatic (presumptive) workers' compensation coverage for post-traumatic stress disorder, meaning they no longer need to prove their PTSD was caused by their work.

This Nova Scotia bill requires the Minister of Agriculture to create and publish a Provincial Food Security Strategy within one year of the Act coming into force, covering food insecurity reduction, local food procurement targets for public institutions, value-added food production support, and food hub infrastructure development.

This Nova Scotia bill requires the Minister responsible for the Nova Scotia Liquor Corporation (NSLC) to conduct a comprehensive review of the markup rates applied to locally produced craft beer, with a focus on whether a progressive or graduated markup structure could better support small-scale brewers.

This Nova Scotia bill establishes a formal legislative framework for fire protection services across the province, creating the Office of the Fire Commissioner, setting standards for firefighter training and certification, and clarifying municipal responsibilities for fire protection service delivery and planning.

This Nova Scotia bill requires the provincial government to develop and fund a Suicide Prevention Strategy through an interdepartmental group and a community advisory committee, with annual progress reporting to the House of Assembly.

This Nova Scotia bill requires the Minister of Housing to develop and publish a Provincial student housing strategy within 12 months, addressing affordability, supply, and barriers to student housing construction.

This Nova Scotia bill strengthens the regulation of lobbyists by replacing the existing Registrar role with an independent Lobbying Commissioner, introducing a code of conduct, banning certain gifts to senior public officials, imposing a post-employment lobbying cooling-off period, and creating new enforcement powers including fines and lobbying prohibitions.

This Nova Scotia bill bans employers from using replacement workers (whether paid or unpaid) to do the jobs of striking or locked-out employees, and protects workers who refuse to cross picket lines from retaliation. It introduces fines of up to $100,000 per day and an administrative penalty system for violations.

This Nova Scotia bill expands workers' compensation coverage to nearly all employers and workers in the province, increases earnings-replacement benefits from 75% to 85% of gross earnings for the first 26 weeks, eliminates the waiting period before benefits begin, and raises the maximum insurable earnings cap to $120,000 indexed to inflation.

This Nova Scotia bill establishes an Intellectual Property Bank as a division of Invest Nova Scotia, tasked with identifying, protecting, managing, and commercializing publicly supported intellectual property to retain economic value and jobs within the province.