Trying a comeback.

Labour took a beating during the recession and downsizing of the 1990s but, as the economy gets healthier, unions are getting more militant, particularly in the public sector

In October 1996, the antigovernment protests that hit Toronto were the fifth in a year-long effort that also hit London, Hamilton, Kitchener-Waterloo, and Peterborough. The protests shut down public transit, closed offices and ended in a march of tens of thousands.

It was a stormy year for labour-management relations across the country; time lost to strikes and lockouts for the first half of the year hit levels not seen in six years.

The Ontario Federation of Labour President Gordon Wilson described it as "the worst labour relations environment in my history. And, there's going to be a hell of a lot more strikes in the coming months."

The labour movement in Ontario knew it was in for harder times when the province's New Democratic Party government lost the election in 1995. A new labour law was the first major piece of legislation passed by Mike Harris' Conservative government. Known as Bill 7, the law cancelled the previous NDP labour legislation. It ended a ban on the use of strike breakers and made it harder to certify unions.

The Conservatives' labour-law revisions also included rules making it easier to decertify unions, removed the right of agricultural workers to unionize, and ended job protection for service workers, such as janitors, when their employers lost contracts.

Unions blamed the new law for a steep drop in successful organizing drives; employers claimed the lower figures showed that employees weren't interested in joining unions.

By 1997, labour leaders were ready to continue the fight over more proposed legislation. Bill 136, would govern labour relations covering 400,000 workers in the public sector during transitions caused by the extensive restructuring, reorganizing, amalgamations, and downsizing.

The government argued that the pieces of labour legislation brought in during the previous two years had tilted the balance of power too much in favour of unions. It was time to reduce the advantages that organized labour had gained.

Opponents said the government's purpose was part of an anti-labour agenda.

The Ontario government wants "to force major concessions in wages and benefits on workers," according to one labour document, "to dramatically reduce the public-sector work force" and "to weaken organized labour so that it will be much less effective."

Judy Darcy, national president of the Canadian Union of Public Employees, said in an interview, "It has taken decades to build up our collective agreements...We're not going to stand by and let them be stripped away."

The government insisted that the legislation was necessary to minimize labour disruptions as it merges hospitals, municipalities, and school boards across the province.

Equally insistent, Ms. Darcy described it as "a heavy-handed attempt to strip away contract rights so that jobs can be arbitrarily contracted out, privatized, or eliminated.

"Front-line health, education, and municipal workers have good reason to fear (losing) provisions they have previously negotiated with their employers...

"With this bill, the Harris government is attacking some of the lowest-paid and most vulnerable workers in the public sector; the health-care aides, sanitation workers, secretaries, cleaners, and laundry workers who keep our schools and towns and cities and health-care system running..."

The Ontario Federation of Labour also held an emergency convention -- the first in its 30-year history. A total of 2,475 delegates and guests attended, double the number expected. They adopted an action plan and set out their objections to the bill. They saw the labour bill as a severe threat to workers in particular and the union movement in general; so much so that several organizations not affiliated with the OFL joined its common front against the proposed law. These included groups representing teachers, nurses, firefighters, and police officers.

After three months of battling, the government introduced amendments to the controversial bill that met most of the unions' key demands.

Unions continued to fight across the country.

In March 1997, Alberta labour leaders saw a new deal giving nurses a 7% raise over two years as a signal for other public-service unions to wrestle back their own wage cuts absorbed three years earlier. The deal reached by the United Nurses of Alberta averted a walkout and gave the message to other unions to stand up for themselves

And, although union membership in Alberta is among the lowest in the country, the strike/lockout of 10,000 provincial Safeway workers had wide public support. Union members wanted to recover wage rollbacks made in 1993. The company earned Canadian profits of about $70 million in 1995 and union officials say sacrifices made by workers to get the company back to financial health should now be rewarded.

Labour is boiling in Quebec too. In 1997, the Quebec government proceeded with the deepest cuts in social spending in the province's history. This sparked widespread condemnation as Premier Lucien Bouchard focussed on eliminating the province's deficit.

The Quebec government applauded its leader's ultimate deal with public-sector unions in March 1997. However, labour leaders representing the 440,000 public-sector workers were angered by the strongarm tactics used to force them into signing a deal. The alternative was to face the equivalent of a 6% salary rollback.

The ruling Parti Quebecois has been warned that it will pay a price at the ballot box for turning its back on the labour organizations that helped it get elected in 1994.

SUGGESTED ACTIVITIES:

1. When 25,000 people walked picket lines in February 1996 in the first day of Ontario's first civil-service walkout, Premier Mike Harris took a confrontational stance, saying that holding a tough line in the strike would be a strong, positive signal to investors and the business community. Mr. Harris also said former New Democratic Party Premier Bob Rae was to blame for giving provincial employees the right to strike two years earlier. In 1992, under Mr. Rae, the government said the Labour Relations Act, which had not been updated for more than 16 years "must reach out and embrace, in particular, the needs of women, minorities, and lower-paid workers in vulnerable sectors of our economy... They should at least have the right to organize. Another solid reason for reform is that, today, workers want more input and say in decisions affecting their jobs." Who's right? Hold a class discussion on the most successful approach to labour / management /government relations.

2. Research and report on recent labour disputes in your area.