The RadioLabour episode that carried this report can be found at: https://rabble.ca/podcast/brampton-auto-plant-the-first-to-close/
Top stories on our Canadian French- and English-language pages this week included lots about tariffs and the impact the trade war is already having on Canadian workers, what our governments are not doing to cushion the blows.
On the weirdly-fascinating side of things this week is a lovely inside look at the ‘union avoidance’ campaign that Amazon used against Unifor and the workers at its facility in BC, thanks to Jacobin.
You know the warehouse I’m talking about? The one where the workers recently won a union in part because of exactly the tactics that the company’s own documents spell out in some detail.
If the subject grabs you, see if your local public library has a copy of Marty Levitt’s memoir ‘Confessions of a Union Buster’. Leavitt was a hugely, massively successful union buster in the US who, after he got sober with some assistance from a twelve-step programme, made amends for his behaviour when drinking by exposing the ‘union avoidance industry’ down there. I read it when working as an organizer and it was fascinating and useful.
From what I can see while some of the delivery methods are new, like social media, the fundamentals of union busting remain pretty much the same.
One other Amazon story made our site this week. That was the news that, facing organizing pressure from several unions including Unifor, the company this week raised wages by a loonie an hour.
Other stories our volunteers found and posted were about the spectacular, in terms of participation as well as outcome, strike vote by CUPE healthcare members in Saskatchewan, as well as a really interesting piece from Justice for Truck Drivers about their campaign to be converted from independent contractors to employees.
Justice for Truckers is just the most recent example of workers forming what is in effect a union, despite being denied access to the processes and protections of labour legislation.
This week’s international story of note came from Bangladesh and Pakistan by way of stock markets around the world.
Following the 2013 Rana Plaza mass industrial murder in which 1134 Bangladeshi garment workers died, two global unions, IndustriALL and UNI, negoitiated the so-called International Accord. The Accord is meant to improve health and safety by pushing the global brands that contract with factories across Bangladesh and Pakistan to require a set of minimum standards. When it came into effect 43 brands and retail chains signed-on.
This week the number of garment brands and retailers that have signed the Accord reached 300. The legally binding agreement on worker health and safety across textile and garment factories now covers over 3.4 million workers across 2,000 factories in Bangladesh and Pakistan.
Over on LabourStart’s Working Women pages stories from Canada included… nothing. We didn’t pick up a single story from Canada.
If you see a union or union-friendly news item out there, especially one about women workers, do send it along. Apparently we could use some extra help.
Among the Canadian items appearing on our health and safety page and newswire this week were a piece from PSAC about mental health challenges for Parks Canada workers and an impressive but straightforward account of the efforts being made by the Immigrant Workers Centre in Montreal to empower non-union, often domestic workers, to take on their health and safety concerns.
LabourStart’s Photo of the Week, which you can catch on our main page until Monday, came to us from Uruguay where the Workers’ and Employees’ Union of Norteña (SOEN), is fighting to safeguard jobs and secure the future of AB InBev’s Cympay malting plant. The company is demanding job cuts in exchange for reopening the facility which has been closed since March. AB InBev is the world’s largest brewer and the company behind some of the world’s best-known beer brands, including Budweiser, Corona, Stella Artois, and Beck’s.
Podcast-wise we’ve recently posted a short, ten minutes or so, interviews with Mark Bergfeld, Director of Property Services at UNI Europa.
Our Editor, Eric Lee, chatted with Mark about the two groups of workers represented by UNI Europa’s Property Services department — security guards and cleaners. Mark explains some of the issues that these workers face and the challenge of organising them into unions.
Worth listening to just for the bit where, when asked about union density in these sectors, Mark threw out the astounding statistic that in Belgium, over 80% of these workers are unionised. But in other countries, the numbers are much lower. Canada, sadly, ain’t Belgium or even close to it.
The labour movement’s history is what our current struggles are built on and this week we marked the anniversaries of these events:
This week in 1945 in Windsor, Ontario, the United Auto Workers began their historic strike against the Ford Motor Company. It lasts for 99 days and leads to the Rand Formula for union security.
In 1933 a general strike began in the factories in Stratford, Ontario and spreads across the city. Troops and armoured cars were called out.
Speaking of troops being used to break strikes, in 1912 Vancouver Island coal miners begin what becomes a two-year strike for workplace safety and union recognition. To defeat the miners’ union, the companies bring in strikebreakers and the province calls out the militia.
On a happier note, in 1913 the New Brunswick Federation of Labour was organized at Saint John. That makes it the provincial federation in Canada with the second longest continuous history.
And, finally, this week in 1941 saw the federal government make all strikes in “war industries” illegal. If any worker went on strike contrary to the new regulations, or encouraged or incited others to strike, then they would be liable to a fine of $500 or a year in prison. Lots did anyway.
This is Derek Blackadder from LabourStart reporting for RadioLabour.
Members of the Trade Union “Labor” applied to the Labor Inspection Service for clarification regarding the classification of passenger transport activities as heavy, harmful, and hazardous work, and the entitlement to an additional 10 days of leave.
Labour News Network 