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Liberals unfairly targeting teachers: union prez
find ways to create jobs and invest in green energy without all the money going to pri- vate corporations. Susan Hanson of CUPE Local 5678 was named Unionist of the Year at the labour council’s awards night. Richard Charlebois of the United Food and Commercial Workers, Local 175, was named Community Activist. Eric Blair of the Elementary Teachers’ Federa- tion of Ontario, Upper Canada District, was recognized for health and safety activism. Elaine MacDonald, president of the la- bour council, said the awards ceremony is necessary to remind people of the good that the unions do for workers. “This is the way we highlight for all the members what some significantly leader- like people have done … and the people who do this kind of work are all volunteers.” “So over and above their job when they are out there is working for the strength of their union and their brothers and sisters on the line and so … we reward them as the heroes they are.” MacDonald said that unions are gain- ing ground in the public sector but have “lost ground” in the private sector “because we’ve lost jobs there”. “We’re talking about teachers. We’re talk- ing about government community agen- cies. I mean, you name it – a wide range of jobs in our communities.” Just before prorogation, Premier Dalton McGuinty put a bill on the table entitled The Protecting Public Services Act which is basically“everything that was in Bill 115 and then some for the entire rest of the public sector,” Rennick said.
GREG KIELEC greg.kielec@eap.on.ca
The Ontario Liberals are trying to balance their books on the backs of teachers in- stead of making private business pay its fair share of taxes, says the president of the Canadian Union of Public Employees in Ontario. “How can it be that profitable multi-na- tional corporations and banks aren’t paying their fair share, yet somehow it’s the teach- ers or the custodians or the education as- sistants (being targeted)?” questioned Fred Hahn in an interview last Wednesday with The Journal . The union represents 180,000 Ontario public service workers, about 55,000 of whom are education workers who have seen their collective bargaining rights stripped away by Bill 115 passed by the On- tario legislature before it was prorogued by Liberal leader Dalton McGuinty. The Liberal government should be using public resources – namely tax dollars from Ontario residents -- to bolster the public
Photo Greg Kielec
From left, are award recipients Erin Blair, Richard Charlebois and Susan Hanson, with Cornwall & District Labour Council president Elaine MacDonald, and CUPE Ontario president Fred Hahn.
service for the benefit of the public at large, said Hahn, guest speaker at the Cornwall & District Labour Council’s annual awards cer- emony. “The private sector should pay their share, the businesses should pay their share be- cause it’s in their interest . . . it’s easier to
make profit when you have good roads, when you have a trained workforce, when you have a strong, healthy workforce,”Hahn said. “That’s what public services do for business and for all of us. It just makes good economic sense.” Hahn said the Ontario government must
CUPE members to ‘push back’
Local members of the Canadian Union of Public Employees are being mobilized against a perceived attack on their right to collective bargaining rights by the On- tario Liberal government. Members from Cornwall and area CUPE locals met last Tuesday – one of 21 such
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meetings across the province -- to discuss how to counteract pending provincial legislation the union fears will erode decades of gains made in collective bargain- ing.
“So it’s only a matter of time be- fore I think we see legislation like Bill 115 for the entire public sec- tor. And in fact it is already writ- ten,” she warned. Members will also going to bat for 55,000 education workers represented by CUPE who saw their collective bargaining rights stripped through the passage of Bill 115 by the Ontario Liberal government. “CUPE members from all across
“We are hoping to politicize our members in the Cornwall area and raise awareness about the government agenda that really sets out to strip … public sector workers of their rights to free col- lective bargaining,” said Candace Rennick, secretary-treasuer with CUPE On- tario. The bill is being viewed by the union as an attack on its collective bargaining rights and impartial third-party arbitration. The new bill could result in an increased work- load and decreased morale for CUPE mem- bers which could have a trickle-down effect on members of the public. About 180,000 health-care workers, school board workers, child-care workers, and workers in social service agencies and community agencies would be affected by pending provincial legislation, Rennick said. Rennick
the province are standing up and saying, it doesn’t matter if we’re in a municipality, in a child-care centre, in a long-term care cen- tre, in a hospital, we’re going stand with our education workers and we’re going to push back and hold the government responsi- ble,” Rennick said. “We didn’t elect a government to plow through a mandate that sets back workers rights by decades.” “So it’s really just about raising awareness and raising the bar on this political moment in time. And we’re just going to push back a little bit.”
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