Canada

  • Steelworkers Take Fight at Canadian Mine Global

    Steelworkers at nickel giant Vale Inco’s operations in Sudbury and Voisey Bay in Canada have been on strike since July. After rejecting contracts calling for deep concessions, Steelworkers (USW) members there find themselves in the midst of one of the largest battles in their history.

  • Employer Neutrality Backfires for Steelworkers in Canada

    Author(s):
    John Humphrey

    Excerpt:
    The springtime news from the United Steelworkers and the Dofasco steel bosses rocked Hamilton, Ontario. Within days, the Steelworkers would be allowed into the company’s plants. They would chat with workers informally, one-on-one and in small groups, listen to their concerns, and gauge their interest in joining the union. . . .

    Available Online:
    Yes

  • Things Aren’t Always What They Appear to Be

    Author(s):
    Herman Rosenfeld

    Excerpt:
    The ongoing debate about the Canadian Auto Workers in these pages isn’t about particular tactics, it isn’t about whether or not to consider new and creative approaches (who could oppose that?), and it isn’t about underestimating the very real challenges that Canada’s largest private sector union (and all unions) face today. . . .

    Available Online:
    Yes

  • Viewpoint: CAW Committed to Militancy, Movement Unionism

    Author(s):
    Jim O’Neil

    Excerpt:
    Labor activism has never been limited to a single tactic or channel. It is this point that Herman Rosenfeld fails to recognize in his Viewpoint criticizing the recent direction of the Canadian Auto Workers union (see Labor Notes February 2008). . . .

    Available Online:
    Yes

  • Viewpoint: Canadian Auto Workers Moves from Fighting Back to Cooperating

    Author(s):
    Herman Rosenfeld

    Excerpt:
    For many labor activists around the world, the Canadian Auto Workers (CAW), a union born in the refusal to accept the concessions agenda of the 1980s, has been an inspiring example. . . .

    Available Online:
    Yes

  • Canadian Auto Workers Surrender Right to Strike, Shop Floor Independence in Magna Agreement

    Author(s):
    Herman Rosenfeld

    Excerpt:
    The Canadian Auto Workers unveiled a plan in mid-October for organizing Magna, the largest automotive employer north of the border and a notoriously anti-union company. . . .

    Available Online:
    Yes

  • Steward's Corner: How Our Local Bonded With The Community

    Author(s):
    by Ken Riley; President ILA Local 1422, Charleston, South Carolina

    Excerpt:
    For a long time our local union was a sleeping giant in the community. Other groups solicited us only for our funds and not for our involvement. We were also losing ground in contract negotiations: Charleston is a major port, and we weren't taking advantage of that fact to address issues that were particular to Charleston.

    Available Online:
    Yes

  • Auto Workers Sanctioned Over Raiding Charges

    Author(s):
    by Marsha Niemeijer

    Excerpt:
    A dispute over which union will represent 30,000 Ontario health care workers is threatening to split the Canadian labor movement. The Canadian Labour Congress has imposed far-reaching sanctions on the Canadian Auto Workers, following accusations that the CAW had attempted to raid eight Ontario locals of the Service Employees International Union. The CLC stripped CAW delegates of the right to vote in district labor councils, provincial labor federations, and other CLC bodies.

    Available Online:
    Yes

  • Global Labor Stands Up to Global Capital

    Author(s):
    by Kim Moody

    Excerpt:
    They didn't start in Seattle. Protests against the impact and institutions of corporate globalization have been mounting around the world for some time. As global capital pokes its sticky fingers into one corner of the planet after another in search of profits, disrupting lives and communities, destroying jobs and the environment, spreading low-wage high-stress work, and subordinating entire nations to its goals, resistance has grown.

    Available Online:
    Yes

  • 'The Kids Are All Right'...and other thoughts from IUE visitors to Seattle

    Author(s):
    by Jeffy Crosby, President IUE Local 201

    Excerpt:
    I went to Seattle with 15 members of the North Shore (Massachusetts) Labor Council. Eleven were from IUE Local 201 at the GE plant in Lynn and Ametek Aerospace in Wilmington. Contrary to the musings of Robert Reich and others that the primary loss of jobs in the United States through "free trade" would be unskilled work, both GE and Ametek aircraft engine work are headed to Mexico, Russia, China, Brazil, and other countries. The engineering and planning work is going as well.

    Available Online:
    Yes