CUPW right to challenge Tories over back-to-work law
Having a majority government shouldn't mean the right to always have your way, even when you're wrong.
It's something that the Jean Chretien government never learned -- especially with its Hepatitis C shenanigans -- but it's something that the Harper government clearly needs to learn.
Many conservatives would likely be shocked to be told that they should actually support the Canadian Union of Postal Workers in their bid to challenge the Tories' back-to-work legislation in court. They should take it as far as the Supreme Court if they have to.
"This back-to-work legislation was unjust," declared CUPW President Denis Lemelin. "It was the democratic rights of workers that were attacked. There is a fundamental principle here -- the freedom of association."
CUPW isn't right about many things, and certainly not very often. The political activities of the union executive and far-left hardliners -- so often taken in the name of the entire union -- are certainly a big problem for the responsible governance of that union. But that isn't what was at stake with the back-to-work legislation, and anyone who thinks it is has confused the issue entirely.
Many conservatives have mistaken labour unions for their natural enemy. This isn't actually the case.
The labour rights that have made it possible for blue-collar, working-class people in Canada to succeed on their own terms were the result of agitation by labour unions.
Admittedly this was a long time ago, when labour unions were focused entirely on improving the workplace conditions of their workers. Now, many labour unions -- including CUPW -- are more focused on advancing the personal political agendas of their leaders.
Perhaps some Conservatives have concluded that the solution to this is to simply crush the unions outright. This is a mistake.
In cases such as the CUPW back-to-work legislation, it's difficult to escape the conclusion that this is precisely what the Tories have set out to do. It's important to remember that CUPW was not under a general strike when the legislation was introduced, they were locked out by Canada Post.
There is something very wrong with a government that has the power to direct the executives of a crown corporation to end the lockout they imposed instead imposing back-to-work legislation to send postal workers back to the job.
When union leaders note that the government's actions undermine the position of all labour unions in Canada to bargain collectively, they are entirely right. That the government seems so eager to intervene in the Air Canada flight attendants' strike is even more alarming. Air Canada may have been founded as a crown corporation, but it was privatized in 1988.
It seems that there's no limit to how itchy the Harper government's trigger finger has become, and no limit on when and where it's prepared to legislate workers back to work.
CUPW needs to win this court challenge for the benefit of all Canadian workers who have reaped the benefit of responsible collective bargaining. And frankly, this is one time that the Harper government needs to be taught a lesson.
Showing posts with label CUPW. Show all posts
Showing posts with label CUPW. Show all posts
Thursday, October 13, 2011
Monday, June 27, 2011
Conservatives Should Not Mistake This For Victory
Back-to-work legislation for locked out workers signals a lawless attitude toward labour
When Prime Minister Stephen Harper and the Conservative Party won a majority government in the May 2 election, many Canadians were wondering what to expect out of a government that could basically do as it wishes.
The mission for the Conservatives needed to be to do the right thing. To govern conservatively, but not to use the power of the government to conduct ideological warfare against the political opposition.
Ever since 2006 there have been accusations against the Conservatives that they have done the latter, and not the former. The cutting of funding to various far-left groups that had no business receiving public funds in the first place was treated as an outrage by the far-left. It wasn't.
The passage of back-to-work legislation sending Canada Post workers back to work is another matter entirely. It would be one thing if CUPW had ever gone on a full-scale strike. A comparatively small-scale rotating strike had been underway by members of the Canadian Union of Postal Workers.
But in reality, postal workers in Canada have not been working because they were locked out.
The NDP attempted to filibuster the legislation vigorously. They were actually right to do so on this occasion. In introducing back-to-work legislation, the government is forcing postal workers Canada Post itself locked out to return back to work without satisfying their right to bargain.
Canadian law allows workers the right to organize, if they choose, and bargain collectively. The government's actions in frustrating the bargaining rights of CUPW signals an adversarial attitude toward labour unions -- not a good idea -- and a generally lawless attitude toward collective bargaining rights.
Some have tried to argue that the government is not responsible for the actions of Canada Post management. Considering that the operations of Canada Post fall under the authority of the Minister of Transport, Infrastructure and Communities (currently Denis Lebel), the government had the authority to order Canada Post to end the lockout and allow negotiations to proceed.
They declined, and proceeded with back-to-work legislation nonetheless.
Perhaps a relentlessly-adversarial attitude toward labour unions has fooled some conservatives into believing that anything that frustrates a union's ability to function is a good thing.
There may be a litany of political activities -- coercively funded by union membership, and directed toward the pet causes of union leaders -- to object to. But that doesn't justify attacking the basest rights unions possess, and that union leaders were attempting to exercise in this case.
This may be a victory for the Conservatives -- who very much seem to have gone looking for this fight -- but it is not a victory for conservatives.
Anyone who thinks differently is fooling themselves.
When Prime Minister Stephen Harper and the Conservative Party won a majority government in the May 2 election, many Canadians were wondering what to expect out of a government that could basically do as it wishes.
The mission for the Conservatives needed to be to do the right thing. To govern conservatively, but not to use the power of the government to conduct ideological warfare against the political opposition.
Ever since 2006 there have been accusations against the Conservatives that they have done the latter, and not the former. The cutting of funding to various far-left groups that had no business receiving public funds in the first place was treated as an outrage by the far-left. It wasn't.
The passage of back-to-work legislation sending Canada Post workers back to work is another matter entirely. It would be one thing if CUPW had ever gone on a full-scale strike. A comparatively small-scale rotating strike had been underway by members of the Canadian Union of Postal Workers.
But in reality, postal workers in Canada have not been working because they were locked out.
The NDP attempted to filibuster the legislation vigorously. They were actually right to do so on this occasion. In introducing back-to-work legislation, the government is forcing postal workers Canada Post itself locked out to return back to work without satisfying their right to bargain.
Canadian law allows workers the right to organize, if they choose, and bargain collectively. The government's actions in frustrating the bargaining rights of CUPW signals an adversarial attitude toward labour unions -- not a good idea -- and a generally lawless attitude toward collective bargaining rights.
Some have tried to argue that the government is not responsible for the actions of Canada Post management. Considering that the operations of Canada Post fall under the authority of the Minister of Transport, Infrastructure and Communities (currently Denis Lebel), the government had the authority to order Canada Post to end the lockout and allow negotiations to proceed.
They declined, and proceeded with back-to-work legislation nonetheless.
Perhaps a relentlessly-adversarial attitude toward labour unions has fooled some conservatives into believing that anything that frustrates a union's ability to function is a good thing.
There may be a litany of political activities -- coercively funded by union membership, and directed toward the pet causes of union leaders -- to object to. But that doesn't justify attacking the basest rights unions possess, and that union leaders were attempting to exercise in this case.
This may be a victory for the Conservatives -- who very much seem to have gone looking for this fight -- but it is not a victory for conservatives.
Anyone who thinks differently is fooling themselves.
Monday, June 13, 2011
Hands Off Canadian Pensions
Government had no right to seize pension surplus, must return it
Unbeknownst to many Canadians, there's a pivotally-important question at the centre of the ongoing -- and escalating -- postal workers' strike.
That question is: to whom do the pensions of Canadians belong? To themselves? Or to someone else?
In 1999, the Liberal government of Jean Chretien had an answer that should outrage all Canadians. They essentially decided that the pensions of public service employees belonged to them, to do with as they please.
They took it upon themselves to seize a $6 billion surplus in pension funds belonging to public service employees, the RCMP and the military and use it to eliminate the federal deficit.
"It was a money grab," fumed Public Service Assiance of Canada Executive Vice President Patty Ducharme. "The federal government has a responsibility to its employees, to the plan members; but they just took that money out of the plan ... and stole it."
"Stole" is a strong word. But it's bloody well close.
As the faceoff between Canada Post and the Canadian Union of Postal Workers draws on, it pays to remember that one of the issues at play in the strike is the state of the CUPW pension fund. The union wants to use funds from a profit-sharing program to restore solvency to the fund.
But they shouldn't have to. The funds snatched from the pension fund should have been returned long ago. They should have been returned, at the latest, five years ago.
It's largely Jean Chretien and Paul Martin who are responsible for this scandalous outrage. (It's one of many underhanded means they used to balance the deficit, including cutting transfers to provinces, raiding EI premiums, and cutting funding to health care and education.) But they don't carry it alone.
It's an absolute outrage that the Conservative Party has bothered fighting this at all. Prime Minister Stephen Harper and Finance Minister Jim Flaherty should have smiled and obligingly introduced a program to restore the pilfered pension funds in 2006. They didn't, and the government is fighting it still.
The figure under discussion? $30 billion. That's $30 billion being withheld from hardworking public servants, including the woman who brings you your mail (and in this author's neighbourhood, doesn't at all mind when a well-behaved dog accompanies her on her rounds), the RCMP officer you call when you need help (even if he occasionally writes you a traffic ticket), the military personell who risk their lives for us, and countless others.
It's absolutely mind-boggling that the Ontario Superior Court of Justice could decree that public service unions are not entitled to those surplus funds, and sign of a deep rot in that institution.
It's a simple idea: in Canada, our pension funds belong to us. It should be not a whit different for public employees. If their pension managers do such a splendid job that they have a $30 billion surplus, that surplus belongs to the fund, not to the government.
This doesn't mean CUPW is right about everything in this strike. But they are right about this.
Fair is fair. And it's beyond the time for the government of Canada to do the right thing, and restore that $30 billion surplus to these pension funds.
Unbeknownst to many Canadians, there's a pivotally-important question at the centre of the ongoing -- and escalating -- postal workers' strike.
That question is: to whom do the pensions of Canadians belong? To themselves? Or to someone else?
In 1999, the Liberal government of Jean Chretien had an answer that should outrage all Canadians. They essentially decided that the pensions of public service employees belonged to them, to do with as they please.
They took it upon themselves to seize a $6 billion surplus in pension funds belonging to public service employees, the RCMP and the military and use it to eliminate the federal deficit.
"It was a money grab," fumed Public Service Assiance of Canada Executive Vice President Patty Ducharme. "The federal government has a responsibility to its employees, to the plan members; but they just took that money out of the plan ... and stole it."
"Stole" is a strong word. But it's bloody well close.
As the faceoff between Canada Post and the Canadian Union of Postal Workers draws on, it pays to remember that one of the issues at play in the strike is the state of the CUPW pension fund. The union wants to use funds from a profit-sharing program to restore solvency to the fund.
But they shouldn't have to. The funds snatched from the pension fund should have been returned long ago. They should have been returned, at the latest, five years ago.
It's largely Jean Chretien and Paul Martin who are responsible for this scandalous outrage. (It's one of many underhanded means they used to balance the deficit, including cutting transfers to provinces, raiding EI premiums, and cutting funding to health care and education.) But they don't carry it alone.
It's an absolute outrage that the Conservative Party has bothered fighting this at all. Prime Minister Stephen Harper and Finance Minister Jim Flaherty should have smiled and obligingly introduced a program to restore the pilfered pension funds in 2006. They didn't, and the government is fighting it still.
The figure under discussion? $30 billion. That's $30 billion being withheld from hardworking public servants, including the woman who brings you your mail (and in this author's neighbourhood, doesn't at all mind when a well-behaved dog accompanies her on her rounds), the RCMP officer you call when you need help (even if he occasionally writes you a traffic ticket), the military personell who risk their lives for us, and countless others.
It's absolutely mind-boggling that the Ontario Superior Court of Justice could decree that public service unions are not entitled to those surplus funds, and sign of a deep rot in that institution.
It's a simple idea: in Canada, our pension funds belong to us. It should be not a whit different for public employees. If their pension managers do such a splendid job that they have a $30 billion surplus, that surplus belongs to the fund, not to the government.
This doesn't mean CUPW is right about everything in this strike. But they are right about this.
Fair is fair. And it's beyond the time for the government of Canada to do the right thing, and restore that $30 billion surplus to these pension funds.
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