Month: May 2026

The RadioLabour episode that carried this report can be found at:  https://rabble.ca/podcast/clc-sets-a-workers-agenda-for-canada/

This week the top stories sections on our Canadian French- and English-language pages included what’s becoming a weekly announcement:  Two more CUPE locals in Nova Scotia’s LTC system have joined the expanding provincial strike.  Over thirty care homes are now behind pickets.

Other stories that caught my eye were the national protests organized by SEIU to draw attention to a cleaning company’s enthusiasm for creating toxic workplaces. 

And while there will be questions about whether it goes far enough and the extent to which all affiliates will participate with enthusiasm, the CLC convention this week “adopted a sweeping action plan to rebuild democratic participation, strengthen working-class political power and confront authoritarian politics.”

But my favourite item among our Canadian stories this week and a candidate for Favourite Labour Story of 2026, was about the delivery drivers in Saskatoon who cut to the chase and skipped the whole ‘sign cards, get a vote, get a union legally certified and go through a few months of bargaining’ stages of building a union and went straight to the picket line.  With reason, given their working conditions and abysmal pay.

As their walkout continues the workers are talking to UFCW about formally organizing, which should be a dawdle.

As LabourStart is a global organization I like to highlight at least one non-Canadian story for you.  This week’s is from Ukraine where the ILO is working with the country’s labour movement to build its capacity despite having to do so in wartime conditions.  Both of Ukraine’s central labour bodies, the Federation of Trade Unions of Ukraine (FPU) and the Confederation of Free Trade Unions of Ukraine (KVPU) are involved.  The program is largely funded by the government of Belgium, thanks to lobbying by Belgian unions.

Over on LabourStart’s Working Women pages stories from Canada included more interviews by the mainstream media by striking Nova Scotia care workers, a collection of first impressions by CUPE members attending the 70th session of the United Nations Commission on the Status of Women, and the struggles of BC women farmworkers for basics like toilets and lunch rooms, not to mention PPE when pesticides are in use.

That same story popped-up on our health and safety page and newswire along with stories about  a Teamster working as a security guard who was shot during a robbery in London Ontario and why retail unions are livid after a shop worker in Winnipeg was assaulted by an irate customer.

LabourStart’s Photo of the Week, which you can catch on our main page until Monday, is a photo of one of the many creative organizing tactics FECUT, the healthcare workers union in Peru has used in its wildly successfully organizing efforts over the last year or two.

This week we did not publish a new podcast..maybe next week.  However the series of interviews with trade union activists and leaders from around the globe remains available.  Just follow the link on our main page.  For better or for worse, almost all of them are as relevant today as they were when recorded.

The labour movement’s history is what inspires our current struggles and this week we marked the anniversaries of these events.  This week has historically been a big one for Canadian workers.

In 1992 an underground explosion took the lives of 26 miners in Pictou County, Nova Scotia. A public inquiry into the Westray Disaster blamed politicians, managers and bureaucrats for creating “a predictable path to disaster.”

In1972 leaders of the Québec Common Front went to jail for defying back to work laws during the April general strike. More than 300,000 workers participated in work stoppages and occupations that brought the provincial government back to the bargaining table.

In 1940 Emma Goldman, the veteran feminist, labour and anarchist organizer, dies in Toronto. A memorial service was held at the Labour Lyceum on Spadina Avenue. She was later buried with the Haymarket martyrs in Chicago.

This week in 1946 saw the start of a six-week strike by loggers in British Columbia, the first after the achievement of collective bargaining rights during the war. The strike helps set postwar standards by achieving higher wages, shorter hours, and an industry-wide contract.

In 1872 some 1500 workers in Hamilton, Ontario took to the streets under the banners of the Nine Hours movement, to demonstrate for a reduction in working hours.

And now the biggie:  This week in 1919 a general strike in a major city brought thousands of workers out in support of labour rights and social change. Winnipeg came to a standstill in an urban rebellion that exposed the unresolved class conflicts of capitalist democracy in Canada.

There are lots more labour history items like this to be found at the bottom of our Canadian news pages. 

This is Derek Blackadder from LabourStart reporting for RadioLabour.

The RadioLabour episode that carried this report can be found at:  https://rabble.ca/podcast/child-care-radiolabour/

This week the top stories sections on our Canadian French- and English-language pages included the lead-up to the CLC convention in Winnipeg, the AFL’s reaction to the voting doxxing scandal in Alberta, and how employers are using AI to disguise call centres.

But my favourite item, among our Canadian stories at least, is going to seem a bit repetitive.  Because it is.

This week two more CUPE locals at LTC facilities in Nova Scotia joined their sisters on the line.  By my count this means the total now is over 30 locals.  Support from the public, from residents and from residents’ families is strong and growing.  The strike hasn’t been won yet but the state of LTC in the province hasn’t received this kind of sustained public attention in a very long time, if ever.

If you want to follow the story more closely just find a item with a highlighted ‘Nova Scotia’ in the lead and click on it.  You’ll be taken to our Nova Scotia union news pages.

As LabourStart is a global organization I like to highlight at least one non-Canadian story for you.  This week I have to mention two good news stories.  The first, from the BWI, that’s the global union federation for construction and building materials workers, brings the news that globally this years International Workers Memorial Day (as the Day of Mourning is known in many places), set new records for the number of events held and the number of workers attending.

The second is the very, very good news that after 17 before the courts, 14 Turkish women union activists have been acquitted of a grab-bag of nonsense criminal charges that boil down to the Turkish government finding women organizing more than a bit scary.

As it should.

The women and their union credit international solidarity and the attention it focussed on their plight for winning them their acquittals.

Think about that for the eight seconds it will take you to join our two active online actions in solidarity with other union activists in Türkiye.  Follow the links for each from our main page.

Speaking of union women, over on LabourStart’s Working Women pages stories from Canada included the heart-warming to labour history buffs news, in the form of a video report from CTV news, that Ontario’s Blyth Festival has begun rehearsals for a play about the Fleck strike. 

The Fleck workers, almost all women, hung in there for five months and won not just their strike but changes to labour laws across the country.  The photo and film records of the walkout are iconic.  80 women facing down five times as many police in riot gear escorting scabs into the plant.  Or trying to.

Sisters of 78 opens on 12 June if you are looking for a reason to visit the Huron Peninsula.  If you have other plans for your summer holidays, spend some time with the strike’s Wikipedia entry.

On our health and safety page and newswire this week was a report from CUPE on the perhaps surprisingly nasty workplace that is the Timmy’s at the Peterborough hospital, and another on what education workers in Saskatchewan are doing to make their workplaces safe.

LabourStart’s Photo of the Week, which you can catch on our main page until Monday, is from Rome.  It is one of dozens we could have run this week as workers flooded streets around the world, just not in Norther America, to mark May Day with demand for economic equality and peace.

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 1952 more than 1,000 retail employees, most of them women, began a strike at Dupuis Frères, a major department store in Montréal. It took three months, but support for the new militancy among Catholic unions helped the workers win a collective agreement.

In 1887 British Columbia’s worst mine disaster took 150 lives after an explosion in a deep underground mine at Nanaimo. The casualties included 53 Chinese labourers, whose names were not recorded by the company employing them.

And in 1972 Saskatchewan brought in an Occupational Health (and Safety) Act, the first of its kind in North America. It included the right to information about workplace hazards, to participate in safety decisions and the right to refuse unsafe work.

There are lots more labour history items like this to be found at the bottom of our Canadian news pages. 

This is Derek Blackadder from LabourStart reporting for RadioLabour.

The RadioLabour episode that carried this report can be found at:  https://rabble.ca/podcast/1-increase-in-health-care-spending-could-raise-billions/

First of all, May Day greetings to you all.  Look for coverage of celebrations and demonstrations around the world on, where else, LabourStart.

This week the top stories sections on our Canadian French- and English-language pages included May Day greetings from CUPE that hopefully will be joined by statements from other unions as the day goes on, updates on the strike by CUPOE members working at long-term care facilities across Nova Scotia, and reactions by unions and the CLC to the federal budget update.

Other stories included the release of the CCPA’s report on the state of the labour market in Nova Scotia (not good), the ratification of a first contract for Uber drivers in Victoria after a vote by UFCW members, and the coming strike vote by members of the BCNU.

But my favourite item, among our Canadian stories at least, was Unite-HERE local 40’s demo at the FIFA congress in Vancouver during the run-up to the world Cup.  The rally was meant to highlight the growing gap between the billions generated by the global sporting event and the affordability crisis faced by the workers who make these events possible.

As LabourStart is a global organization I like to highlight at least one non-Canadian story for you.  This week’s is from New Zealand where healthcare workers and school staff formed a solidarity chain to mark May Day.  The chain ran across Wellington, from a school to a hospital in an effort to draw attention to the workers affected when the new conservative government killed-off the New Zealand Pay Equity Act, depriving hundreds of thousands of women workers, many of them working in care and education jobs, of a chance for pay equal to that of male workers.

Speaking of women workers, over on LabourStart’s Working Women pages stories from Canada included a WTF story from Nova Scotia (is it just me or is that province often in the labour news these days, and not in a good way) about retro pay calculations for daycare workers.

On our health and safety page and newswire this week were a pile of stories that used the Day of Mourning to highlight ongoing dangers for workers. 

Globally this year’s theme was mental health at work and a highlight for me was a speech by a comrade in Sudbury who spoke at the Day of Mourning event in that Ontario city.  Hip-hop musician and miner Mickey O’Brien shared his story of recovering from addiction and mental health struggles during the Day of Mourning ceremony.  His opening was “I’m lucky I’m still here”.

LabourStart’s Photo of the Week, which you can catch on our main page until Monday, is from Istanbul where this week 15 women leaders of KESK, the Turkish public sector union confederation, were finally acquitted of numerous criminal charges dating back 14 years.  The charges related to such nefarious activities as organizing conferences for women workers and advocating for gender equality.

This week we published a new podcast, an interview with

Stirling Smith, a trade union educator who has worked in many countries, and especially in South Asia. He is active now in the Greater Manchester Hazards Centre and he spoke with our editor Eric Lee about the International Labour Organisation’s estimate that 70% of the world’s workforce is now vulnerable to extreme heat.  Stirling ansewers the questions how is this affecting workers and what can unions do?

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 1921 the Communist Party of Canada is founded at a three-day meeting in a barn in Guelph, Ontario. The party was to achieve its greatest influence in the 1930s and 1940s organizing unemployed workers and industrial unions, and in struggles against war and fascism.

In 1919 coal miners in Drumheller, Alberta went on strike for recognition of the One Big Union after they vote overwhelmingly to leave the United Mine Workers of America.

Also in 1919 thousands of workers in Calgary and Edmonton go on strike in solidarity with their Winnipeg counterparts.

And in 1927 under pressure from unions, feminists and social reformers, the House of Commons approves a limited old age pension plan.

There are lots more labour history items like this to be found at the bottom of our Canadian news pages. 

And speaking of inspiration, we are currently campaigning on behalf of the recently arrested leadership of the Turkish Shipbuilding and Maritime, Warehousing and Storage Workers’ Union.  Demanding secure employment, a decent living and trade union rights, and opposing unpaid wages, workplace murders and precarity is not a crime unless you live and work in a country like Türkiye.

The union is asking us all, and I do mean all, to send protest messages.  A message is prepped and waiting for you and in seconds you can join the thousands of workers around the world who are demanding an end to union-busting by the Turkish government. 

This is Derek Blackadder from LabourStart reporting for RadioLabour.