R&F.ca Weekly Update
- Details
- Published on Friday, 24 July 2015 03:15
- Written by editor
r18.
Like on Facebook 
Follow on Twitter 
This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.
We need your money!
Help fund independent labour news. Make a donation via PayPal, and put a motion forward to your union local. Learn more about the impact of your donation.Callout for Contributors!
Rankandfile.ca is always looking for new people to expand its network of writersand correspondents. No experience necessary! We will work with you!
THE STATE AND FUTURE OF CUPE: EQUALITY, EQUITY & ERASURE
By Kimalee Phillip, Equity Officer with CUPE Local 1281 and Ontario Representative on CUPE’s National Women’s Committee
I’m 30. Many of my friends and those within my age group will probably never experience what it’s like to have a full-time, permanent and unionized job, much less a secure job with any semblance of benefits. I keep harping on to my friends the importance of having unionized workplaces.
Given the current context of widening economic inequalities and increasing attacks against organized labour, having members lose hope and question the direction of the union needs to be taken seriously.
I’m a trade unionist and my cultural and political upbringing in Grenada demands of me to remain cognizant of the critical importance of workers’ rights, but of also the need to challenge systems of domination and exclusion within organized labour.
It was extremely disappointing to not only witness my labour union regress on practices of equity but to also do so nonchalantly, while dismissing voices of dissent and racialized women. Read more!
FORCED OUT BY A BROKEN SYSTEM
“It has been a long four years and even though we now have a lawyer, not much has happened, which is very frustrating,” reads a recent email from a former co-worker.
Almost a decade later, specific workers are still being harassed in my seriously toxic former workplace. What happened to me continues today for other workers. What happened to me should never have been allowed to happen to anyone in our society.
As a woman and a permanently disabled worker, I was both regularly threatened with physical violence and psychologically harassed daily in my workplace.
The company labeled me a CL2 (2nd Class worker). I was demeaned daily by managers and co-workers alike as a disabled worker working modified work. This workplace abuse has been going on for decades now and continues to get worse, according to emails from my former co-workers. Read more!
GROCERY WORKERS FIND THEIR VOICE
By Sonia Singh
After years of pressure to accept wage concessions, workers at Canada’s largest grocery chain are finding their voice.
Contracts expired July 1 for 28,000 workers in 119 Loblaws stores across Ontario. Food and Commercial Workers (UFCW) Locals 1000A, 175, and 633 bargained together in solidarity.
Events took a couple of dramatic turns. After members voted 97 percent to authorize a strike, the bargaining committees reached and recommended a tentative agreement, and majorities in Locals 175 and 633 ratified it.
But at nine stores covered under a separate agreement (including members of both locals), workers rejected it and went on strike on July 2.
Another 12,000 workers, members of Local 1000A, voted down the same agreement, forcing the company back to the table to hammer out a better deal. Read more!
MARINE SAFETY THROWN OVERBOARD BY TORIES
By Chad Stroud, President of Unifor Local 2182, representing coast guard communication officers.
Canada has the longest coastline on the planet. It is a sensitive — and often unique — collection of ecological zones that provide a living for commercial fishers, tourism operators and First Nations.
The Canadian Coast Guard is our first line of defence during marine emergencies, such as oil spills.
But despite the role of Canada’s coast in commerce, transportation and leisure, our coast guard services have suffered greatly under Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s government.
Beginning in 2014, the Harper government began to “downsize” essential coast-guard services with the closure of 10 of 22 marine-communications and traffic-services bases. Read more!
Check out our weekly labour news update every Monday for a summary of the past week's top labour news stories, and our feature labour video every Saturday! @rankandfilca Youtube r53 | r54
This email was sent to s6
why did I get this? r34 r35
Rankandfile.ca · 584 Lisgar Street, Ottawa, ON, Canada · Apartment 2 · Ottawa, ON K1R 5H7 · Canada
r1 