Reprinted from the UK Socialist Website Left Horizons
By Aaron Clemens in Ontario
With cash flowing to bail out corporations during the Covid-19 pandemic, the working class got meagre crumbs in order to survive. Few sectors of the working class were harder hit than the education system, as teachers’ unions were attacked by conservative governments and education workers laid off.
Now that governments have chosen to ignore the still ever-present Covid crisis and force schools and workplaces to reopen, the time has come for contracts to be renegotiated and the stage is set for bargaining power to be in the hands of the workers. The working class is experiencing a renewed enthusiasm for organized labour. We see this in the USA with the rise of the Starbucks and Amazon Labour unions, and we saw it in the strike of the Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE) across Ontario this week.
With inflation at a near 40 year-high at 8%, and the average wage of public education workers hovering around $39,000 a year, the government of Ontario offered a 2% pay bump over a four-year contract. This was on top of the wage cuts made by previous Liberal and Conservative governments over the last decade.
A 2% increase amounts to a pay cut when inflation is factored in. Instead, CUPE negotiators were asking for an 11% pay increase, which would catch up their wages to where they were ten years ago, or on average an increase of around $3.25/hour.
Contract forced on workers
With neither side budging for months, negotiations with the Education Minister broke down and the government of Ontario, headed by Doug Ford, passed back-to-work legislation and to force a contract onto workers by using a “notwithstanding” clause. This is a clause that allows lawmakers to trample the constitutional rights of Canadians, and in this case was used to take away the collective bargaining rights of Canadian workers. The Conservative government also passed legislation declaring that were there was an ‘illegal’ strike, workers would face fines of $4,000 a day while on illegal strike, with the union fined $500,000 a day.
On Friday, November 4th, 55,000 CUPE workers ‘illegally’ walked off the job in response to this legislation in defiance of the provincial government. A wildcat strike came into effect, and a wave of solidarity and support came from nearly every union in the province. Every private sector union that endorsed Ford and the Conservatives condemned the actions of the Premier and stood in full solidarity with the CUPE employees. An outpouring of support came from the public, and from parents of children affected by the strike as well. Solidarity rallies occurred the next day, and the momentum appeared to be on the side of the workers.
Affiliates within the Ontario Federation of Labour, a coalition of 54 labour unions, began talks of a general strike across the province. Polls taken indicated that 70% of unionized workers supported walking off the job for a single day in a province-wide general strike to send a message to Doug Ford that the right to collectively bargain is non-negotiable, and they would not get away with trampling on the constitutional rights of workers. The vast majority of Ontario workers understood the implications of this fight. If they can force CUPE workers back to work without a negotiated contract, they can do this to anyone of us.
CUPE is prepared to strike again
On this Monday, November 7th at noon, CUPE announced the strike was over for now because Ford had promised the repeal of Bill 28 in a Monday morning press conference. The picket lines were removed by the end of day and workers were back at work the following day, allowing children to go back to school. Negotiations were able to begin for a new contract, although at the time of writing, no contract has been signed.
Laura Walton, president of CUPE, has said that they are prepared to strike again if they are unhappy with the direction of negotiations. They removed the picket lines as a show of good faith, to a government full of crooks and cronies.
We now enter into an uncertain period of negotiations, and every union in Ontario who supported the strike are now on standby. The general strike is called off for now.
Ford got out ahead of the CUPE press conference and made an announcement, putting the ball back in CUPE’s court. In doing so, he took the wind and momentum out of the sails of the massive united front of unions coming together against him, even those who had endorsed him. He has managed to cool down the anger toward him, especially from his supporters, who were stuck with child care costs, and supporters who are reactionary towards public sector unions.
The working class has been deprived of a potentially explosive moment in which they could have made massive gains for education workers, not just for better wages but for democratic control of the workplace and to fight against privatization.
The worry is that this may be a trap and that Ford will renege on his deal further down the road. The Ford government is no stranger to changing their position when it suits them. In the midst of the chaos with CUPE, the Ontario Conservatives also quietly passed a motion to bulldoze thousands of acres of farmland and wetlands within the Green Belt for his developer crony friends and his supporters in some construction unions.
This policy goes back on a promise he made in 2018, in which he rescinded his plan to expedite environmental review processes that would do the exact same thing. It is possible Ford could engineer an even larger crisis to rescind his promises to the CUPE union and hope that nobody notices.
Negotiations will be watched carefully by all workers
The mere threat of a general strike resulted in Ford backing off and making an offer to the union to rescind Bill 28 and start negotiations. There is a growing consciousness among Ontario workers that this “notwithstanding” clause is a direct threat to all workers’ rights and if CUPE lost this fight it would essentially mean workers have no rights to collectively bargain.
All unions are now on standby, which means the negotiations will be watched very carefully. Ford cannot afford to mess up now, he was backed into a corner by labour, and this has empowered workers across the province.
This episode was a lesson in the benefits of mass organizing around pickets. The picket line is still one of the most powerful weapons the working class has in its struggle against the capitalist class. Hopefully, the negotiations will lead to a very good deal for CUPE workers, and Ford will think twice before unleashing something like this again. If CUPE is not satisfied, they have the attention of every union in Ontario and we will strike back in even larger numbers.
The unions flexed their muscles and won.
Ford is now in a weaker bargaining position in the face of unprecedented solidarity and labour action. The unions flexed their muscles and won. This is indeed a victory for the working class, even if we haven’t seen a deal yet.
Every struggle against capitalism is another brick in the foundation of a new society in which economic and state power are in the hands of working people. What we can glean from this incident is the working class of Ontario has shown the rest of the country that solidarity is still real and is still an effective weapon against the bosses.
Every fight the working class engages in teaches them how to organize and coordinate. A grocery fund was instigated for workers off work, and major union pressure came down even from the labour bureaucracy. The teachers’ union in British Columbia sent $1 million in donations to help cover fines and expenses for the CUPE workers. Workers will remember who had their back in this crisis. This is not nothing, and, if anything, shows class struggle is alive and well even in the most advanced capitalist countries.
Specific goals around which workers can rally
It also shows what it takes to truly undergo a general strike in a given region, either provincially or nationally. A Facebook page with a general strike declared (Oct 15th 2021) with no aims or motives will accomplish nothing and those lefts who tried to organize it will get demoralized and cynical.
A general strike must have a specific goal around which workers can rally. In this case, it was for the repeal of Bill 28 and for Ford to come to the bargaining table. A simple, straightforward and attainable goal, which was won! It is through the small but cumulative victories that gives working people the confidence and empowerment they will need for the next fight.
A general strike must also involve organized labour and its leadership. While the major unions are run by massive anti-democratic labour bureaucracies, a general strike cannot be undertaken without their support. The fact that the labour leadership was even floating the idea of a general strike within a week only shows the seriousness of the Ford government’s attacks on the public sector, when historically they have relied on the courts to settle serious grievances.
Workers come to understand their own power
It is a major reason why, as Marxists, we see the importance of theory and education to the rank and file of all unions, as workers come to understand their own power and push back against their own labour leadership when that leadership fails to step up to the task. This experience will help nurture solidarity within and between private and public sector unions as the class consciousness of union workers develops.
If there is another general movement of workers, it will take place on a higher level. The old labour bureaucracies are on notice as the provincial government is on notice. Meanwhile, the newly formed unions like those among Starbucks and Amazon workers, will retain the militancy they gained when organizing.
The relationships built between private and public sector unions must be maintained and remembered for the next fight, because the next leader of Ontario might not cave so readily. As the capitalist crisis worsens, so will the class antagonisms and contradictions be made more apparent, the creativity and militancy of the working class will become abundantly apparent.
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