LABOR

tract April |

strike.

TORONTO — Bya vote of 39-18, the striking Macleans workers, members of the Southern Ontario Newspaper Guild, accepted a new con-

With a boycott of the weekly newsmagazine gathering momentum, and weekly pickets outside

3, that brought them a 40 hour work week — one of the key demands of the 13-day

the company’s north Toronto printing plant attracting positive support, the pressure was on management to negotiate.

The settlement calls for a 4.25 per cent increase in each year of a two year deal with workers at the low end of the pay scale receiving a higher percen- tage than workers at the top.

TRIBUNE PHOTO — MIKE PHILLIPS

Charter campaign set

By MIKE PHILLIPS

OTTAWA — Declaring it a “bad day for workers in Canada,” Daryl. Bean, . president. of . the 180 ,000-member Public Service Alliance of Canada, pledged a total campaign April 10 to get the right to strike and bargain collectively entrenched within the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

The decision, immediately sup- Ported by the Candian Labor Congress, the National Union of Provincial Government Employees and other unions and labor lead- fs, came in the wake of three Separate landmark rulings from the Supreme Court of Canada, brought down April 19.

In effect, the rulings exposed the

fact that under Canada’s free

enterprise system the right to strike and to bargain collectively are not Suaranteed under the Charter’s

_ Provision for the right to freedom

of association.

The three decisions stemmed from litigation in which the PSAC had challenged the federal govern-

Ment’s ‘6 and 5” wage control

Program in 1982; a challenge to Alberta legislation banning strike action by 50,000 provincial govern- Ment employees; and an appeal of 4 lower court ruling in Saskatche- Wan, which had overturned the

€vine Tory government’s pro-

- Vincial legislation barring dairy

Workers from striking.

The rulings in all cases were Split decisions upholding federal and provincial anti-strike laws, and affirming government's right {0 arbitrarily set wages through Compulsory arbitration.

The decisions effectively have Stripped away any legal recourse

Y the trade union movement in the face of government back-to- Work legislation, and protection 4gainst punishment for defying Such legislation.

In fighting these cases through

courts, the unions had argued

that both the right to strike and to bargain collectively were implied in section 2(d) of the Rights Char- ter guaranteeing the right to free- dom of association.

But Mr. Justice Gerald Le Dain, the author of the majority opinion in each appeal, ruled to the contrary because the framers of the Constitution hadn’t speci- fically identified the right to strike in the Charter.

‘‘The constitutional guarantee, in the case of the trade union, does not include the right to bar- gain collectively and the right to strike’’, Le Dain wrote.

‘To intervene in that dynamic process at this early stage of the charter development by implying constitutional protection for a right to strike would in my view

go far towards freezing the feiopmell of labor relations and curtailing the process of evolution necessary to meet the changing circumstances of a modern society in a modern world.”

With the right to strike already severely restricted throughout the country, many labor leaders we- ren’t especially surprised by the Supreme Court rulings.

“Nobody ever gave us the right to strike, we took it, and we’ll do it again if governments pass un- just laws’’, he said.

CLC president Shirley Carr warned that the rulings meant that the Charter might eliminate the rights workers have won over the years, rather than protecting them. If collective bargaining isn’t a fundamental right, she asked, what does that do to the through the law-governed bar- gaining process.

Carr predicted “‘utter chaos” for the industrial relations system unless the government addresses these issues.

Canadian Auto Workers leader Bob White said the rulings un-

doubtedly demonstrate “‘that the Charter of Rights and Freedoms doesn’t address the rights of working people.”’

The right to strike, he said, is the only weapon workers have to ensure social and economic prog- ress for themselves and their fami- lies.

‘*That right is the foundation of collective bargaining, and to de- clare that that right is not constitu- tionally guaranteed, is a threat to collective bargaining itself’, White said.

He added that the CAW would join the fight for changes in the Charter to guarantee rights for la- bor, Aboriginal peoples, women and all other groups who’ve been deprived of entrenched collective rights.

The rulings also confirmed warnings from the Left during the framing of the constitution, that the unions should press for a labor bill of rights within the Charter.

The United Electrical workers in an editorial in the latest issue of UE News noted how the judicial rulings brought “‘into sharp focus the need to entrench Labor’s Bill of Rights.”’

Citing labor’s ‘‘obligation . . . to fight tooth and nail until labor is free to breathe again in a truly free and democratic society’, the edi- torial noted how the CLC’s re- fusal to press for such entrench- ment has confronted the move- ment with “‘having to launch a rear guard fight which may have been redundant had we won that fight during the constitutional talks in the early 1980s.”

‘*Meantime’’, the UE stated, ‘rallying public support and mobilizing more workers for the entrenchment of the right to strike and bargain effectively in a Bill of Rights for Labor is a prime re- sponsibility for all unions throughout Canada’’.

Labor in action

GEORGE HEWISON

‘Snow storm or snow job?

(The recent Canadian Autoworkers decision to grant a charter to the Newfoundland Fishermen’ s Union has created more than a ripple in the trade union movement. This is the second of a three part series in which - Labor in Action will examine the ramifications of this critical develop- ment. Last week, I traced the background to the split with the UFCW — and the decision by the F. ishermen to merge with Autoworkers. }

Since the March 12 announcement of the CAW-Fish merger, the international union offices, and some Canadian ones as well, have been busy as beavers putting the blocks to Robert White and the Canadian Autoworkers. -

The U.S.-based unions have never forgiven White for freek ranks more than a year ago and forming an all-Canadian auto workers union. More than that, they are paranoid as growing numbers of Canadian members of the internationals cast more than a second look at the kind of fightback unionism which a sovereign trade union brings. -

The merger announcement has moved the internationals to. action. Ina display of righteous indignation, they have invited the trade unionists of Canada to expunge Bob White and the CAW from their ranks as a renegade. :

Raider of the Lost Ark — “ Their evict-Bob White party in Toronto, two weeks ago, drew e afew diehards, but mostly telegrams and messages of regrets. the foiled assault on the man they've dubbed ‘‘Raider of the Let . Ark” has been blamed on the snowstorm. But these lads don’t quit easily. : They’ ve now invited the courts in for a piece of the fun. The ~ amount for which they're suing the Autoworkers just happens to_ be the alimony payment the CAW received from the autoworkers : union stateside. : - But it hasn’t been an international show entirely. ‘Some Cana- _ dian Union leaders have been critical of White as well. Many to _ public sector leaders, when the bafflegab is stripped away, \ wo use any opportunity to see White swan dive into an empty { Ego and personal ambition in leadership, long a bane of the trade union movement, regretably still flourish.

Sees tpre ren seacpestg Cotas Wiacsee AS midgets can now rise up in nauseous self-righteousness as de- fenders of non-interference in the internal affairs of another trade _ _ union —but rather in underestimating the forces at work not only | } against him, but arrayed. against the. entire, trade union

movement. - Those forces a Muses (ste ie peas ont wee - Richard Cashin, the Newfoundland and fishermen’s leader in the — UFCW, were left holding yesterday’s soggy garbage by their — erstwhile leader and ally, not to mention a retrenched and vindic- = _tive International President, renowned for Sealing in doors - _ when things don’t go his way. — : - ‘These allies heard about the merger the same way everyone _ else did via the media. The last they'd heard from Richard was _

. preparation: Vancouver at the Region 18 convention in September. a Pah ae cee ale emporiy

x CEE Ge eed nou: eel ar tly eres Hein _ where previous rights enjoyed by the Canadian membership were _ . revoked by virtue of a merger created in the U.S.? 7 It is here that the Congress, as a whole, will have to go much "further to guarantee a home within the House of Labor to those — _ unions or sections of unions who cannot live under ii: es s - diktat. This is not just a question for autoworkers. = Those trade unionists who cry foul on the autoworkers, but. ~ make a religion out of raiding; speak to conventions of the Cana- dian Federation of Labor; and drag a fellow union member — through the bosses courts —the same courts which strip workers ates right to strike — should se Se little sympathy from the . oT as never before the trade union movement is beige test : ~The Supreme Court decision of April 9 clarifying that trade unions do not enjoy the right to strike under the Canadian Rights Charter; Vander Zalm’s vicious union-busting legislation in B.C.: Merv Lavigne; free trade and the united front of the employers all - point to a serious challenge to labor. To underestimate the attack could prove fatal. There is a need for unity, unity and more unity. Ways need to be found to solve, ‘ina principled way, those issues which stand in the way of unity. (Next week: “‘A United, Sovereign’ and Independent Trade Union a

PACIFIC TRIBUNE, APRIL 22, 1987 e 7