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- Published on Thursday, 14 April 2016 17:15
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Dear Friends of SJS,
Join us on the 18th! @DemilitarizeDay #welfarenotwarfare
Monday April 18th from 12pm - 1pm
827 Fort Street, Victoria
Outside DND Recruitment Centre
Organized by the Canadian Voice of Women for Peace and theInternational Peace Bureau
The Canadian government spends over $23.6 billion on the Department of National Defence and $9.8 billion on Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness but only $1.5 billion on Environment Canada, of which only $172 million is planned to be spent on "Climate Change and Clean Air" for the 2015, 2016 & 2017 budget periods. Canada is the 6th highest spender on the military among... NATO countries and is the 16th highest worldwide.
We cannot tackle the climate crisis and end poverty in our country, if we continue to waste our precious tax dollars on war and weapons. Let’s move the money from militarism to sustainability!
Read the VOWPeace.org Article...
Government of Canada Must Reduce Military Spending
Cuba: Into the Future
Throughout the 23 years of Victoria Friends of Cuba’s existence, Victorians have shown great interest and understanding towards Cuba. Many Victorians have joined us in such campaigns as ending the Injustices in the illegal US blockade of Cuba and the US occupation of Guantanamo Bay.
Cuba/US relations have been restored and President Obama recently visited Cuba. What does all this mean? You are invited to our upcoming event to find out.
CUBA: INTO THE FUTURE
With guest speaker, Javier Dómokos Ruiz, Cuban Consul General in Toronto
7:00pm Thursday, April 21
2994 Douglas St. (BCGEU Hall)
Admission by Donation
https://victoriafriendsofcuba.wordpress.com
Greater Victoria Acting Together for the Common Good has a new web URL: http://gvat.ca
At GVAT we have been busy advancing our program to create new capacity in our community for broad based engagement, leadership development and strong relationships across issues and actions to advance the common good.
Recently we have:
- incorporated as the non-profit "Greater Victoria Acting Together Society";
- held "house meetings" to explain and engage in a small group setting the plan going forward;
- meet with many groups and individuals who have promised to join GVAT or are advancing their organization toward joining.
We continue to hold house meetings almost weekly and you can see the schedule at http://www.gvat.ca/calendar
Also please visit our booth at the Sustainability Showcase this weekend. http://creativelyunited.org/festival-2016/april-16/
Finally, we intend to hold a large member assembly on June 24 and 25 so please keep those dates open.
Greater Victoria Acting Together for the Common Good
http://www.gvat.ca/
Presenting
Victoria MayWorks
Join Retail Action as we organize and host a series of fun, diverse, and informative events in support of worker's rights and social justice in the community. Inspired by similar festivals across Canada, the Retail Action Network is planning a variety of events to take place around May Day 2016. These events range from workshops and panels to social dinners and discussions, rallies, movie nights, and more. The festival runs from May 1st to May 11th, 2016. May Day will begin MayWorks and our Working Class Wednesday will bring it to a close.
Some of our planned events include:
The People's Market – an anti-capitalist fair showcasing and sharing locally-made goods, skills, and services with the community and each other.
Labour History Walking Tour – learn about the struggles and triumphs of diverse workers in Victoria
VIPIRG Report Launch and Dinner Discussion – celebrate the launch of VIPIRG's report on retail and hospitality work in Victoria and learn about important issues in an area of precarious employment.
Labour Justice-Themed Movie Nights – because the revolution is better with popcorn.
Ginger Goodwin Play – the first public reading of an original play about Ginger Goodwin, a historical labour activist from .
Would you like to get involved? As the festival nears, we will be looking for volunteers to assist with events and promotion, as well as individuals to share their skills and services at the People's Market. If you are interested and want to know more, please contact Natalia at the Retail Action Network at (250) 588 3672, or by email at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..
We are a network of workers and labour activists that fight for workplace justice, increased wages, and better conditions for retail and service workers.
This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.?subject=Hello%2C%20I%20want%20to%20organize%20with%20the%20Retail%20Action%20Network" target="_blank" title="WANT TO ORGANIZE WITH US? CLICK HERE TO GET INVOLVED ">WANT TO ORGANIZE WITH US? CLICK HERE TO GET INVOLVED
Presenting
Victoria MayWorks
Join Retail Action as we organize and host a series of fun, diverse, and informative events in support of worker's rights and social justice in the community. Inspired by similar festivals across Canada, the Retail Action Network is planning a variety of events to take place around May Day 2016. These events range from workshops and panels to social dinners and discussions, rallies, movie nights, and more. The festival runs from May 1st to May 11th, 2016. May Day will begin MayWorks and our Working Class Wednesday will bring it to a close.
Some of our planned events include:
The People's Market – an anti-capitalist fair showcasing and sharing locally-made goods, skills, and services with the community and each other.
Labour History Walking Tour – learn about the struggles and triumphs of diverse workers in Victoria
VIPIRG Report Launch and Dinner Discussion – celebrate the launch of VIPIRG's report on retail and hospitality work in Victoria and learn about important issues in an area of precarious employment.
Labour Justice-Themed Movie Nights – because the revolution is better with popcorn.
Ginger Goodwin Play – the first public reading of an original play about Ginger Goodwin, a historical labour activist from .
Would you like to get involved? As the festival nears, we will be looking for volunteers to assist with events and promotion, as well as individuals to share their skills and services at the People's Market. If you are interested and want to know more, please contact Natalia at the Retail Action Network at (250) 588 3672, or by email at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..
Presenting
Workers' Movie Nights During MayWorks
Two movie nights, all in the first week of May! Two movies per night, all related to the struggles of working people! The exact locations and times are yet to be finalised, but we want to get the news out about of the possible films right away! The current planned screenings, which we intend to have start around 6:45pm (so as many workers can make it after their shifts), are as follows:
Tuesday May 3rd:
- The Hand That Feeds
- Pride
Monday May 9th:
- Goodwin's Way (WORLD PREMIER + Q&A with director Neil Vokey)
- Jimmy's Hall
After work come join us for popcorn, movies, and discussions at the movie nights during this MayWorks! Let us spread the energy of May Day beyond the 1st, and celebrate the international working class struggling against capitalism!
BC's Minimum Wage Leaves Workers Feeling like Fools
Press Release from the Retail Action Network
As of this past April Fools' Day, BC now has the lowest minimum wage in Canada, leaving minimum wage workers feeling like fools. Last Friday, New Brunswick lifted its minimum hourly wage to $10.65, leaving BC's minimum wage workers struggling at $10.45 per hour (or $9.20 per hour for liquor servers).
While BC's low minimum wage affects over 120,000 workers across the province, minimum wage workers in BC no longer fit the commonly held perception that they are all teenagers living with their parents. 82% of minimum wage workers are over 19 years old while more than 15,000 are over the age of 65. Minimum wage workers in BC are also highly educated with 53% hold a post-secondary degree
(CONTINUE READING AT RETAILACTION.CA)
Did You Know?
On March 18th, 1871 the ordinary working class people of Paris rose up and took control of their own lives. They formed the Paris Commune, a system unlike any government before or after; it was run by the workers themselves in their actual common interest—far better than the disconnected politicians we have today. The privileges of the few were done away with for the well-being of all. The lessons of the Commune continue to influence workers 145 years later.
Tipping and Precarious Restaurant Work
written by Kaitlyn Matulewicz
In 2011, the BC government introduced the “liquor server minimum wage”: a lower minimum wage rate for liquor servers. As of September 15, 2015, when the regular minimum wage was raised to $10.45 per hour, the liquor servers wage was raised to just $9.20 per hour. Ontario and Quebec also have lower minimum wages for workers in the service industry earning tips. Unlike these provinces, however, BC law fails to regulate tips and tip pooling1. Ontario has recently passed the Protecting Employees’ Tips Act, a law intended to prevent employers from keeping a portion of tips for themselves. No similar protection exists for workers in BC.
The liquor server minimum wage is significant. It recognizes and legitimizes the norm of tipping and condones a wage-tip relation. This is problematic because customers are outside of the employer-employee relationship. With the practice of tipping, customers participate in an important role normally performed by an employer, paying workers for their labour, but are beyond labour law’s reach.
The wage-tip relation contributes to precarious work in the restaurant industry. Tipping makes restaurant work precarious because it is an unreliable source of income. Unlike an hourly wage, the amount a customer pays a server or a bartender for their labour is not worked out in advance. Actually, since tips are left at the customer’s discretion, there is no guarantee that a customer will tip at all (the exception is an automatic-service charge added to a bill, for instance, for a large party). In addition to the discretion of a customer, the amount a worker earns through tips can depend on a number of factors that are outside of their control, including: the weather, the day of the week or time of the day they work, or even the section they’re given to work in (e.g. if the tables are desirable and get a lot of customer traffic).
(CONTINUE READING AT RETAILACTION.CA)
Grant's Law: The Fight for Grant DePatie & Isolated Overnight Workers Continues
written by James
Grant DePatie was killed on March 8, 2005, due to a gas and dash incident when he was working alone as an gas station attendant. This tragedy shone light on the fact that workers alone in their workplace face greater risks of experiencing violence. For two years after his violent death, Grant's father and grandfather campaigned with their unions and the B.C. Federation of Labour to get new WorkSafeBC regulations adopted. In 2007, bowing to pressure, the provincial government implemented what became known as Grant’s Law. This new set of WorkSafeBC regulations were put into place to protect the worker by adding safeguards against violence - employers had to provide either a barrier between clerks and customers or a team of two or more workers for night work.
However in April 2012, facing lobbying pressure from companies like Mac's Convenience Store, the BC Liberal government weakened the legislation and reversed worker protections. The regulations were changed to focus on the safety of the products being sold rather than the worker. Security cameras and panic buttons are now mandatory but they do nothing to protect workers who are alone at night.
Each year we return to Mac's to fight for these protections to be brought back and to ensure that similar tragedies like Grant DePatie do not occur again. Please join us on Saturday, April 16 at 8PM to 6AM at the MAC’s on Yates and Douglas in Victoria to fight for the rights and protection of night shift workers. Please join us, and check out more info here.
International Women's Day & Its Class Roots
written by Robyn Karina
(first published on March 8th, 2016)
The following was originally published on the 18th of March, 2016.Appreciation of women, for all the amazing things they do, should not only take place on International Women's Day; it should be a daily practice. Women have played a leading role in Retail Action Network from it's beginning and will continue to in it's future. We thank the women who have organised RAN, those who have shared their experiences and ideas in our discussion groups, those who have shown brave solidarity in the direct actions involving Wild Coffee, and those who took part in our first Working Class Wednesday event last month. Each of you is integral to the community and it's struggle towards a better world for
To celebrate this day we present below a shortened portion of Russian revolutionary Alexandra Kollontai's 1920 article, of the same name as the day, which explains the historical development of this annual world-wide event
(CONTINUE READING AT RETAILACTION.CA)
The First of May: The World Workers' Day
written by Robyn Karina
Fellow workers! May Day, also known as International Workers' Day, on the 1st of May, celebrates the international working class in solidarity across the world as we all struggling against the exploitation and oppression inherent in capitalism, as we all struggle for a better world of mutual aid, peace, and cooperation.
This day, no matter how many class-conscious workers are able to come out into the streets to sing and wave red flags and black, demonstrates the division of class in capitalist society: on the one hand, the vast majority, the working class, toiling for meagre wages to barely survive; on the other, the elite few, the bourgeois ruling class, squeezing the life out of the workers for profits to add to their absurd wealth.
(CONTINUE READING AT RETAILACTION.CA)
UPCOMING EVENTS
Saturday, April 16th at 8pm - Sunday, April 17th at 6am @ Mac's Convenient Store on 1304 Douglas Street
All Night Sit-In for Grant's Law & Workers' Safetly
Wednesday, April. 20th
Organizer's Meeting
This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.?subject=Interested%20in%20Organizing%20with%20the%20Retail%20Action%20Network" target="_blank">Get involved in the Retail Action Network.
Sunday, May 1st - Wednesday May 11th
May Day / MayWorks
Working class community solidarity events for a whole week!
Sunday, May 1st
May Day March From Centential Square to Fernwood Community Centre where there will be an anti-capitalist People's Market!
Wednesday, May 11th
Working Class Wednesday including the release of a VIPIRG report!
Bring your coworkers for dinner and discussions and drinks and fun!
Special thanks to everyone involved in the community, from those challenging Bill C-51 to those organising a Black Lives Matter march and to those just coming out to relax at our Working Class Wednesdays. Together we can make a better world!
Margo MatwychukDirector
Social Justice Studies ProgramUniversity of Victoriaweb.uvic.ca/socialjustice/@UVicSJS on TwitterUVicSJS on FacebookUVicSJS on YouTube
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