#May1TO: Unite the Struggles of the People on International Workers’ Day for an Anti-Capitalist May Day:

Rally starts at City Hall and marches to Alexandra Park for a Cultural Festival

4pm: Rally and Food (Not Bombs!) @ Nathan Phillips Square
5pm: March
7pm: Cultural Festival @ Alexandra Park (Dundas and Bathurst)

On May 1, 2012, International Workers Day, join us at 4pm at Nathan Phillips Square for a rally and march to respect Indigenous sovereignty, insist that no one is illegal, for international workers solidarity, to defend and expand public services, to stop prison expansion and corporate handouts, to end imperialist wars and aggression, to build people’s power, and to move beyond capitalism.

Media sponsor: rabble.ca

For more information, to volunteer, and to endorse, email: [email protected]

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All over the world on May 1, millions of people fill the streets to advance the struggles and issues of the working class.

On May 1, 2012 in Toronto, we need to also be out in the streets – not as a parade, but as a call to people across the city and across the country. A call to action against the governments of the bankers and the rich who are imposing “austerity” on the people.

After decades of spending billions on wars, prisons, police, tax cuts and tax breaks for the rich, subsidies, oil and mining companies and other corporations, they tell us there is an ‘economic crisis’ that justifies their layoffs, wage freezes and reductions, cuts to social programs and higher and more fees for what we need. THIS IS CAPITALISM: THEIR SYSTEM IS THE CRISIS!

This is a call to unity against the nationalism, racism, anti-immigrant sentiments, sexism, homophobia, and any other hatred their media creates to keep us divided while the rich continue to line their pockets.

Since its founding, Canada has been stealing and plundering First Nations lands, minerals and resources and now launches imperialist wars around the world to plunder other people’s resources. The land rights of First Nations and those of other people fighting for their rights and freedom should be everyone’s fight. The right to work and dignity for those who come as immigrants and migrants need to be the fight of all of us who came as or descend from immigrants.

This is a call to reject the rampant consumerism and the social decay, climate chaos and environmental destruction imposed by this system. We don’t want the “growth” that capitalism has to offer.

We want a truly democratic and just society that meets the social needs of all people. Capitalism can’t do this.

So May Day is a call to all those coming under attack, to the sick and tired, the exploited and oppressed.

A call to all unionized workers whose rights and wages were the result of years of struggle, not from supporting this or that party or by back-room negotiations. Remember your role in this society, reclaim the proud history of militant labour.

A call to precarious workers with little job security and no benefits.

A call to the students struggling to find jobs and tied down to tens of thousands in debt.

A call to all the working class women who have to work multiple minimum wage part-time jobs to feed a family.

A call to the racialized youth, targeted and brutalized by police and under attack from policies aimed at stuffing their bodies into new prisons.

A call to the migrant mothers and fathers, brothers and sisters, who left their homes in for the empty promise of a better life.

A call to the indigenous peoples defending their land rights against Canadian colonialism, and a call to all non-indigenous peoples struggles to unite with them.

On May 1, 2012, International Workers Day, join us at 4pm at Nathan Phillips Square for a rally and march to respect Indigenous sovereignty, insist that no one is illegal, for international workers solidarity, to defend and expand public services, to stop prison expansion…and corporate handouts, to end imperialist wars and aggression, to build people’s power, and to move beyond capitalism.

Rally with the May 1st Movement contingent!

Rally with the red flags!

The rally, march & cultural festival from 4pm to 9pm are being coordinated by Occupy Toronto, May 1st Movement and No One Is Illegal – Toronto.

Media Sponsor: rabble.ca

Endorsed & Supported by Afghans for Peace, CAMP Sis, Canadian Auto Workers Union, Centre for Social Justice, Coalition Against Israeli Apartheid, Committee for the Defence of the Iranian Peoples Rights (Canada Organization), Committee of Progressive Pakistani-Canadians, Common Cause Toronto, Communist Party of Canada, DAMN, Greater Toronto Workers’ Assembly, Health for All, International Council of Latin American and Caribbean Women in Canada, International Federation of Iranian Refugees, Iraqi Federation of Refugees in Canada, International League of People’s Struggles Canada, Latin American and Caribbean Solidarity Network, Law Union of Ontario, Maggie’s: Toronto Sex Workers Action Project, Metro Toronto Labour Council, Mining Injustice Solidarity Network, Movement Defence Committee, Ontario Coalition Against Poverty, Ontario Federation of Labour, Ontario Secondary School Teachers’ Federation District 12, OPIRG Toronto, OPIRG York, ProtestBarrick, Rhythms of Resistance, Socialist Project, Stop the Cuts, Toronto Bolivia Solidarity, Toronto Socialist Action, Trans Film Screenings, Tudeh Party of Iran – Canada Organization, United May Day Committee, Unity Against Unemployment in Iraq, Women’s Coordinating Committee for a Free Wallmapu [Toronto], Workers Action Centre, Workers Communist Party of Iran and more…

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The May 1st Movement (M1M) was founded in late 2008 as a coalition of working-class and people’s organizations to reclaim the history of May Day for the working class in Toronto. In 2012, after four years of organizing May Day activities and rallies, we are working with No One Is Illegal – Toronto and Occupy Toronto together with other people’s organizations for a united rally on International Workers’ Day. In the coming years, we must broaden and strengthen this unity with all possible forces in order to advance our struggles. Join us!: http://www.may-1.org/

April 2012 – BASICS Community News Service reports on the struggle of low-income residents unfolding in the Downtown Eastside (DTES) neighbourhood in Vancouver to oppose a new condo development that will drive up rents and drive them out. Contextualized with a historical overview of the DTES, residents describe the effects that gentrification has had on them and their community in recent years.

[Source: ACTION]

Coldwater Heritage Museum Board of Ditrectors have requested to the organizers of an Anishinabek Oshkimaadzig Camp to pack up and leave the Museum’s property as soon as possible in a show of good faith after setting up camp without permission.

The Camp has been set up for over a week by three Anishinabek Men who are trying to bring an awareness of the 1764 Niagara Treaty Belt, 24 Nations Belt, Two Row Wampum, the One Dish One Spoon Belt and the Ojibway Friendship Belt where they feel Canada’s Specific Claims Policy along with the Indian Act are in breach of these peace agreements as well as the Canadian Constitution.

”Our intention was not to cause any disruption between the residents of Coldwater or the members of the Four Communities in the Coldwater Land Surrender. Our intention is to raise awareness that an absolute surrender of our land title is an absolute surrender of our Sovereignty. As of yet our lands have not been surrendered. ” says Memeskwaniniisi one of the camp organizer’s

”In a show of good faith we will leave only if the illegal occupiers of our traditional territories also leave until a resolution to this fraudulent surrender as been resolved using an approach that is reflective of our peace agreements represented in the expressed belts and Canada’s Constitution.” We only want to establish a partnership with our neighbours and enhance this museum with factual historic facts of this area and mobilize our people who only want to uphold our end of the peace agreements. We Will not Surrender or leave.” says Kai Kai Kons another of the camps organizers.

A meeting today between OPP Aboriginal Response Team, Museums’ Board of directors and the Camp was held to establish a partnership with the Museum. a Second meeting to come to a resolution to this issue will be held tomorrow at 1pm.

OPP are closely monitoring this situation. The Camp is calling out to all supporters to join the encampment  and help uphold the peace agreements.

SITE PHONE

416 806 6929

FACEBOOK UPDATE PAGE:  Oshkimaadziig Camp

On May 1st, 1886, workers in Chicago were shot down as they marched for an 8-hour workday. Ever since then, May 1st or May Day has been recognized as International Workers Day, a day of celebration and struggle for the toiling masses all across the world.

The twentieth century witnessed heroic struggles and glorious achievements of human liberation under the leadership of workers and supported by the most oppressed and exploited people.  The struggles of workers and peasants, women and students of the popular classes, and people resisting occupation, military dictatorship and fascism carved out important gains for the people in the past century.  However, decades of neoliberal “globalization” have reversed the gains of previous generations of working class struggles, revolutions, and anti-colonial movements.

With the onset of the 2008 financial crisis – after a brief period when many were questioning the viability of capitalism – the ruling classes of the G20 countries regrouped, decided upon their strategy, and declared open war on the people.  In June 2010 at the G20 Summit in Toronto, while 1,100 people were being rounded up in the streets of Toronto and thrown into cages, Stephen Harper announced that we were entering the “Age of Austerity”.

But this new era of “austerity” really isn’t so new. It intensifies the attacks of neoliberalism of the last thirty years on the Third World and the poorest people in countries like Canada, while extending the offensive to those layers of the working class who previously considered themselves as “middle class” – workers in manufacturing and the public sector.  Since 2003, 500,000 well-paying manufacturing jobs have been transferred from Canada to countries where workers are more heavily exploited.

For decades, Federal governments have slashed corporate tax rates in the name of job creation and attracting foreign capital. Yet, non financial Canadian corporations alone are sitting on more than $500 billion in cash reserves – never mind what the banks and financial corporations have.1   The stagnant economy is not the result of high taxes or “uneasy investors”, but a crisis of overproduction and overaccumulation of capital across the world economy.  The biggest corporations in the world seek to grow today not by expanding their capacity to invest in new production, but by swallowing up their competitors and often closing down their factories in order to conquer new markets, control output, and tweak price levels just to optimize profits.  One can say there is a crisis of “overaccumulation” because the capitalists have more capital than they can profitably invest.  Redistributing wealth is not an option for the ruling class because that means us workers wouldn’t be as desperate and exploitable.

This crisis of overproduction is what accounts for the upsurge in mergers and acquisitions (M&As) amongst the biggest corporations in the world. The media has a lot to say when a Canadian company is confronted with a takeover by a foreign corporation, but has little to say about Canadian companies buying up assets all across the world. In fact, Canadian companies, especially in mining and finance, have outpaced foreign companies in M&As for the last few years. In 2010, the global mining sector in particular experienced a record number of mergers and acquisitions – a staggering 2,693 – worth USD113 billion, in which Canadian capital was responsible for a breathtaking 713 of these takeovers, or 36 percent of the total global value in this sector.2  Canada is not being taken over by foreign corporations; Canadian companies are more and more dominating in the world.  This is what makes Canada “imperialist”, and it’s the people – most especially Aboriginal peoples, and third world workers and peasants  – who are paying the heavy cost for the gains of these big capitalists. But it’s also the workers losing their jobs. Our misery is their profit.

These takeovers then allow for big companies to close down the competition and shift production to places where labour is super-exploited.  This was the case with Caterpillar’s takeover of Electro-Motive in London, Ontario in 2010 and its eventual shutdown of the plant when it liquidated 500 jobs in early 2012, shifting production to a non-unionized plant in Indiana.  Meanwhile, the corporate media divides the working class by blaming more exploited workers in other countries, especially China, for the movement of capital.

The Federal government’s drastic reforms to the immigration system complement super-exploitation. Refugees are being criminalized to keep them out and it is being made more difficult to sponsor family members to come to Canada, while Canada continues the “brain-drain” of professionals and high-skilled workers from the “developing” world — labour and experts that the Canadian system did not have to invest in to train and educate. Meanwhile, the numbers of Temporary Foreign Workers (TFWs) in the country continues to grow.  Capital wants to see a workforce that is disposable — that has few rights, no access to services, and can be sent back home when they’re no longer needed (when they’re injured or done their jobs).  In 2008, the number of TFWs entering Canada exceeded the number of permanent residents being allowed into the country.  As of 2011, there were more than 300,000 TFWs in Canada.  These workers look to Canada for a better life precisely because multinational corporations like those in Canada have made the prospects of a better life back home (under capitalism!) impossible.

Cheaper wages and shrinking social programs are allowing the capitalists to make record profits. Yet, only four years after the biggest financial bailouts in human history, running into the trillions of dollars, the international bankers and G20 countries have the audacity to call for more austerity from the workers!  The Canadian government (through the Canadian Mortgage and Housing Corporation) is currently guaranteeing the big banks for up to $600 billion dollars in mortgage assets. That means that as Canadians begin to default on their mortgages under the heavy weight of record-high debt levels, public funds will go to bailout these banks rather than the people who cannot make their payments due to declining wages and lack of jobs.

Such bailouts are a major part of the  “fiscal crisis” that has become the justification for the major spending cuts and privatizing public goods. Tens of thousands of Federal public sector workers will lose their jobs in the coming years, a move that will disproportionately affect women employed in these jobs and families who rely on the related services.3  Workers under 54 years of age have had two years stolen from their old age security in the last Federal budget.

Yet, you can always become a cop, join the military, or help build new prisons for the poor!  These “public services” are exempt from austerity because they’ll be needed to contain the next round of popular struggles. Canada is in the midst of the largest prison building boom since the Great Depression.  Federal and provincial governments are building or expanding upon 60 prisons across Canada to make space for the Federal government’s Omnibus Crime Bill.4   The second largest addition is the New Toronto South Detention Center with 1100 beds.  It costs $117,000 to house an inmate at a Federal facility.  If even a quarter of this money was directed towards job creation, community services, affordable housing, and raising the disability support and welfare rates, crime would plummet significantly.  How do we know this? Close to 100% of all inmates are from the poorest 10% of the population – a shocking statistic that reveals the relationship between poverty and criminalization.5   What’s worse is that the prison population is “racialized”: Aboriginal and black peoples make up much higher proportions of the prison population than they make up in the Canadian population.

Yet the main debate we see animating Parliament today is about who got the contract to build the F-35 jets and how many we’re getting for however many billions of dollars.  The people are asking why the hell we’re spending billions on these death machine to begin with.  There’s no party in Parliament that has clearly stood up against any spending for these weapons of mass destruction to begin with. Why would they? Every parliamentary Party supported the bombing of Libya.  Canada dropped more than 550 bombs on the country, destroying its infrastructure and paving the way – or destroying the way – for the new Western-backed Libyan government to take out billions in foreign loans from for “reconstruction”.  It’s for wars like this that the F-35s are needed.

Meanwhile, the unions can’t even resist the concessions being forced onto their members. The only leverage that the unions have to resist attacks on their narrow defense of the collective agreement – the right to strike when collective bargaining breaks down – has been virtually banned by the state through the wanton use of “back-to-work legislation” by Federal and provincial governments. Examples: Air Canada pilot strike in March 2012; Canada Post postal workers in June 2011 and Air Canada flight attendants in October 2011; York U. teaching assistants and contract faculty in 2009; Toronto transit workers in 2008; the list goes on.  Some workers, such as seasonal farm workers, have no right to form unions at all.

Yet, the only resistance that labour leaders have to offer is begging at the feet of corporate management and various levels of government for “good jobs” and “green jobs”, as if the harmonious relationship between workers and capitalists can continue – a collaboration that was always premised on the super-exploitation of workers and peasants in the oppressed countries.

Now that this era of class peace between unionized workers and the big capitalists in countries like Canada is coming to an end, a new era is opening up for class struggle.  It’s time to reclaim the history of militant labour!  It’s time to reorganize workers under the leadership of our own class! It’s time to break with the bosses, the bureaucrats, and the bourgeois politicians! Most importantly, it’s time to break with the illusions of the previous era: namely, that capitalism can continue and that the majority of us have anything to gain by continuing to defend the capitalist system.

Our exploitation is their profits. Our grinding poverty and desperation means we’re forced to work for less.  Price increases to food, gasoline, and rent are extorting the people of our ever-shrinking real wages, while filling the coffers of the rich.

It’s either capitalism or the people. It’s either a system based on blind production for private profit and necessitating the destruction of the environment and the conquest of peoples and nations, or a system where production meets the needs of all people and future generations.  Those are the only two ways forward at this juncture of history.

The May 1st Movement (M1M) was founded in late 2008 as a coalition of working-class and people’s organizations to reclaim the history of May Day for the working class in Toronto. After four years of organizing May Day activities and rallies, in 2012 we have contributed to bringing together people’s organizations for a united rally on International Workers’ Day.  In the coming years, we must broaden and strengthen this unity with all possible forces in order to advance our struggles.

To do this, M1M and all progressives, militants, and revolutionaries – all anti-capitalist, anti-imperialist, and anti-colonial forces – must work together to win over more and more people to a positive vision of what is to be done.  The crisis of capitalism is deepening day-by-day.  Before the ruling class finds more reactionary solutions to the crisis, people’s organizations must struggle to unify around a project of universal liberation.

The May 1st Movement (M1M) believes that we cannot expect capitalism to meet the needs of the people. Our demands should reflect this reality, and so should our strategy for change.  We can’t propagate illusions about what’s possible in this system.  We need to build the capacity of the people to fight for a new society. We need to reclaim the history of militant labour and unions led by the workers, not big salaried bureaucrats. We need grassroots power in our communities and our schools — in every sector of society.  We need as many people as possible to take a lead. The Aboriginal people in this country are showing us the way forward as they stand up all across the country to defend their land, their lives, and their livelihoods from the plunder of Canadian government and the corporations.  The rest of us must do the same.

Let May Day be the launching point for the struggles that must come.  Let May Day be the day when we march with the toiling peoples of the world against the global capitalist and imperialist system!

by Jasmine Green

As of April 12th, student associations representing over 171,000 students from Quebec’s universities and CEGEP programs have gone on strike and organised protests in opposition to the recent government decision to increase tuition fees by 75 percent over five years. It began with 30, 000 students on February 13th and grew  to reach  192,000 students in 39 days. This nine weeks student strike is the longest in Canadian history.

Major peaceful protests, some met with police violence, have been taking place in Montreal and have resulted in hundreds of arrests. On March 7, CEGEP student Francis Grenier suffered an eye injury as a result of a clash with the police.

Student associations at various universities have been going on strike to demand that the Liberal government reverse its decision to increase tuition fees by $325 a year, for a total of $1,625, by 2016.

“The main focus of the strike is tuition fees,” said Hugo Bonin, a student in Concordia’s women studies program whose association is on strike. “But I think this is an opportunity to politicise a lot of students and people across Quebec.”

While there seems to be an overwhelming support for the strike among the student community, a few CEGEPs and student associations voted against the strike, most notably  the student union at Dawson College.

Quebec’s tuition fees are currently $2,519 per year on average, the lowest in the country. Even with the proposed changes, Quebec’s tuition will remain lower than the Canadian average of $5,366. This has been a common point of criticism against the strike.

But Bonin disagrees.

“Tuition fees are lower in Quebec than the rest of Canada, but so is the student debt, which is a good impact of low tuition fees,” he said. “This [along] with the free CEGEP years has resulted in a 9% higher enrollment than the rest of Canada.”

The student movement in Quebec has a lengthy history of strikes, the most recent successful strike being in 2005.

On March 22, 200,000 people took to the streets, in opposition to the hikes. There still has not been any options for negotiations between the liberal government and the student union CLASSE, as they have been requesting.

Line Beauchamp, Quebec minister of education,  refuses any renegotiation of the hike. As the strike goes on, the demonstrations have begun to incorporate the blockage of economic power centres as part a strategy to increase the pressure on the government to negotiate.

Students have begun to call for general strikes, and have been receiving widespread support from everyday citizens in their protests. Most recently, on April 14th, 30, 000 people took to the streets in Montreal calling for a broader social mobilisation in the province, referring to it as the “maple spring”.  Other slogans such as: “the strike is student, but the struggle is a popular one!” show that the classist nature of this strike is clear to the movement and therefore supported by society at large.

In the context of governmental austerity, this struggle is perhaps the most decisive yet. CEGEPS and Universities have begun ordering students back to classes, going against democratic decisions of general assemblies. Injunctions are beginning to be imposed on picketers of classes by universities. Nevertheless, the movement has not let the intimidation tactics break the strike, as massive outpour of support comes from fellow students and even professors.

“In Ontario, education is no longer accessible,” Nicole Desnoyers, a campaign organizer with the University of Ottawa “I think that Ontario students getting a victory to lower tuition fees is partially dependent on Quebec students being able to block this tuition fee hike.”

The issue of student poverty and student debt is an increasing concern for students. If the trend of tuition hikes continues, there is a fear that universities will witness higher dropout rates, especially of students from lower income families.

“This struggle is being led by the people who will be hit the hardest by the strike: parent-students, women and working class students with loans up to their ears,” notes Louisa Worrell, a student in the University of Quebec in Montreal UQAM “For these people, the hike will be the difference between attending university  or not. That is why the struggle will win;  we have no other choice.”

By Mike Brito.

Some recent numbers coming out from Statistics Canada show that unemployment rates across the country are reaching levels above 17% for people between the ages of 15-24.  This is more than double the national unemployment rate from 2011, which was around 7.5%.  In Ontario, the numbers are slightly lower, but are still above 15% for youth 15-24.  According to Nancy Schaefer, president of the Toronto based non-profit organization Youth Employment Services, “The permanent, well-paying jobs that you can count on just aren’t there.  So young people, even if they’re able to get something, are taking part-time work, or piecemeal work, or contract work. “

Often these unemployment levels are attributed to changing dynamics specific to Canada including the recent elimination of mandatory retirement and larger numbers of “baby boomers” hanging on to jobs.  Some have pointed out that laid-off workers are competing with youth for an increasingly smaller pool of jobs to distribute amongst workers.  The reality of the current situation is that this is part of a larger worldwide trend, in particular amongst Europe and North America where the Global Recession of 2008 has contributed to an increase in youth unemployment that has reached levels as high as 50% in Spain and Greece.  According to Tom Zizys of the Metcalf Foundation based here in Toronto, “in times of recession, youth are the first to go and the last to be rehired.”

The rioting that occurred across England last summer was sparked by the police shooting of Mark Duggan, many observers have connected the uprisings that started in London but quickly spread, to the high-levels of unemployment amongst young people in that country, where rates are over 20% for people aged 16-24.  According to police, the rioters were almost all under 20, mostly born in the 1990’s with the youngest arrested being 11 years old.  Research conducted after the uprisings has also shown that the districts with the highest rates of youth unemployment were the most effected, and that most of the participating youth were from low-income neighbourhoods and public housing where employment prospects for youth are low.

Across Europe there has been similar trends in levels of unemployment, the EU reports their youth unemployment rate as 22.4%.  Greece and Spain have some of the highest levels, both with rates above 50%.  In Spain, young people also took to the streets last year in a movement called “Los Indiganados”, or the indignant ones.  This movement opposed high levels of unemployment as well as protested banks, bankers, capitalism, welfare cuts and the entire Spanish political system.

By Mike Grant and Martin Cook

The government recently announced that, in 10-15 years it will raise the age of eligibility for Old Age Security (OAS) from 65 to 67.

Their decision will affect the vast majority of us living in Canada and with the greatest  impact falling on those of us working low paying jobs and do not have a workplace pension.

OAS currently provides anyone over the age of 65 with $540.12 a month.

The Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives (CCPA) estimates that “OAS and GIS [Guaranteed Income Supplement] make up 36% of the income of seniors”.

The government is using a supposed demographic crunch to justify saying that the program is not viable.  They say that as the baby boomers retire, the program costs will be too high.

The math doesn’t add up.

The plans to raise the age of eligibility would be implemented in 2029, just as the program cost will have started to decrease. The CCPA notes that the “the ratio of expenditures to GDP is then projected to drop from 3.1% in 2030 to 2.6% in 2050”.

The government is creating the impression of a crisis to modify the terms of the OAS so that they are less favourable for working people.

The government is intent on making seniors more financially insecure so that they are more willing to accept any job. That’s not to say that there will be more jobs available, rather there will be more people competing for the same crappy jobs.

To further help out the government’s friends in business, the financial sector is hoping to expand the market in private savings by cashing in on the gap created by the government.

Jim Stanford, an economist for the Canadian Auto Workers union, put together a chart to detail how much you’re getting screwed based on your age. If you’re 20 years old now, you stand to lose over $34,000 in OAS benefits, whereas someone who’s 54 years old or older won’t lose out.

The government’s plan to raise the age of eligibility for OAS in the next decade is a shady way to push anti-people legislation. To avoid the political blow back, politicians have pushed its implementation back 10 years and therefore those about to retire won’t be affected. It’s just the rest of us who are getting screwed.

April 21, 6:00pm – Holy Rosary Parish Hall, St. Clair West (just east of Bathurst Street)

We are inviting you to the upcoming 4th year CORDILLERA DAY celebration in Toronto, Canada on APRIL 21, 2012 from 6:00 pm to 10:00 pm at the HOLY ROSARY Parish Hall on St. Clair West (just east of Bathurst St.). Our theme for this year is INDIGENOUS PEOPLES, UNITE! DEFEND OUR LIFE, RIGHTS and LIVELIHOOD.

Binnadang-Migrante is a newly-formed organization in Canada of indigenous migrants from the Cordillera in Northern Philippines, advocating for the assertion of rights as migrants and actively engaged in the struggle of the indigenous peoples in the Cordillera for self determination and the Filipino people’s struggle for genuine freedom and democracy.

Committed to these principles, Binnadang has adopted and spearheaded the annual celebration of Cordillera Day here in Toronto since last year. Cordillera Day has been celebrated every year on the 24th of April for 28 years since the assassination of Maclling Dulag, a respected pangat (tribal chieftain) who bravely opposed the World Bank-supported Chico Dam Project of the late dictator Ferdinand Marcos. This intensified the struggle of the Kalinga and Bontoc tribe for the defense of their land and resources. Cordillera day is at once a commemoration of the historical struggle of the indigenous peoples of the Cordillera for the defense of their ancestral domain and their right to self determination, as it is an occasion to strengthen the unity among the different indigenous groups of the Cordillera and build solidarity with other indigenous peoples, sectors and other nationalities for social justice, freedom and democracy.

In this regard, we look forward to your active participation in the form of cultural presentations and/or solidarity messages related to our theme to make this event meaningful and successful.

Please send solidarity message and confirmation of your presentations on or before April 10, 2012 for program preparation.

For inquiries and confirmation, please call any of the following:

Jenny Owatan:416-877-5725; Bridge Cosme Dang-ay:647-740-4175; Geralda Cobsilen: 647-898-7531; Marivic Kalagui:647-894-1270; Anabelle :416-275-7164 and Nellie Kablay 705-984-6536

by Peter Braun

The austerity agenda that governments worldwide are currently imposing upon workers, students and poor people is now being brought to bear on the post-secondary education system in Canada.  In Ontario, this has become especially apparent with the so-called “three-cubed” document, recently leaked to the public.  Although this document is merely a “background paper,” and therefore not necessarily intended for implementation in its current form, it nonetheless presents in bold strokes the general character of the re-structuring that the McGuinty government hopes to impose on the post-secondary education system in Ontario.  In particular, it recommends reducing the length of undergraduate degrees from four to three years, with each year consisting of three four-month long semesters.  More alarmingly, it recommends that all Ontario universities be required to offer three-fifths of their courses online – a move that would, in all likelihood, further reduce the number of teaching positions available for recent PhD graduates.  The authors of the document argue that it would allow undergraduate students greater flexibility in completing their degrees, while also making post-secondary education more cost effective and “productive.”  However, these same authors fail to consider seriously the pedagogical implications of this shift to more “flexible” education – indeed, it is hard to imagine online courses, wherein students have even less contact with professors and teaching assistants than they currently do, actually improving the quality of education.

It is in this context of looming austerity that CUPE Local 3903, the union representing teaching assistants, research assistants and contract faculty at York University, has been bargaining with the university administration for a new collective agreement (CA).  It is perhaps not surprising, then, that the union has faced a number of hurdles in their negotiations with the employer.  One of the most significant of these hurdles has been the administration’s unwillingness to actually bargain – indeed, for the first four months of negotiations, the administration refused to discuss any of the specific proposals put forth by the union’s bargaining team (BT).  Instead, they simply insisted that the union whittle down its proposal package to fit within the austerity parameters that they (the administration) outlined at the beginning of negotiations – namely, a 2 percent increase on the union’s previous CA, which, in the context of roughly 3 percent inflation, would have amounted to an erosion of union members’ real wages and living standards.  Moreover, to the extent that actual bargaining did take place in these first 4 months, the process was rather lopsided, with the union agreeing to 22 proposals put forth by the administration, and the administration accepting only 12 of the proposals put forth by the union.

In an attempt to overcome the employer’s intransigence, the union organized a strike mandate vote – this was held the week of March 10th.  Of the roughly one-third of the membership that turned out for this vote, 66 percent indicated their willingness to strike in defence of the current collective agreement, and in support of the improvements on that agreement that the union’s bargaining team (BT) is currently seeking.  Around this same time, the BT put together an offer of settlement – one that the administration ultimately rejected.  Had it been accepted, this proposed settlement would have amounted to an increase slightly less than that recently agreed to at the University of Toronto.  Indeed, under the terms of the union’s settlement offer, union members’ salaries would have increased only 2 percent per year – just under the current inflation rate of (roughly) 3 percent.  Total compensation under this proposed settlement would have amounted to 4 percent per year.  CUPE 3903 members were willing to accept this decline in real wages in return for, amongst other things, the re-implementation of post-residency fees, which would lower the cost of tuition for graduate students upon their completion of coursework.

Despite this attempt at a settlement, the administration chose to continue their policy of refusing to engage seriously with any of the issues deemed priorities by the union membership – namely, the return of post-residency fees; the creation of anti-clawback language to keep the employer from reversing gains won in the CA by issuing reductions elsewhere; the creation of a minimum funding guarantee for graduate and research assistants, who currently make anywhere between 6000 and 9000 dollars per year; and the creation of continuing appointments for contract faculty members, who are currently assigned work on a year-by-year basis.  Indeed, although the administration has recently agreed to a number of minor concessions, it is significant that none of these concessions bear upon the above-mentioned priority issues.  It’s also significant that the administration has agreed to these concessions only after the recent strike mandate vote – apparently, they had no interest in bargaining with the union absent the threat of a strike.

In light of the administration’s failure to address any of these priority areas, the union’s bargaining team recently filed a “no board” report, putting the local in a legal strike position as of April 12th.  Despite filing this “no board” report, the union executive and BT still hope to reach an agreement with the administration prior to the April 12th deadline – indeed, it is hoped that a concrete bargaining deadline and the threat of a strike will force the employer to address the issues that are most important for union members.  Whether or not a strike action can be averted is yet to be determined – the administration will make the union a final offer on April 12th, and the membership will discuss then whether-or-not to accept that offer.  It’s anyone’s guess at this point which way the wind is gonna blow, but 3903 will be prepared for whatever hits us.