A NEW YEAR AND THE
STRUGGLE
CONTINUES
(The
following article is from
the January 1-15,
2008
issue of People's Voice, Canada's leading communist newspaper. Articles
can be reprinted free if the source is credited. Subscription rates in
Canada: $25/year, or $12 low income rate; for U.S. readers - $25 US per
year; other overseas readers - $25 US or $35 CDN per year. Send to:
People's Voice, c/o PV Business Manager, 133 Herkimer St. Unit 502,
Hamilton,
ON, L8P 2H3.
By Sam Hammond
Finance capital
and its imperialist
agenda, led by the United States, co-operates politically and
militarily to crush dissent, seeks to destroy alternative socialist
models, prevent the development of potential competitors in the third
world and capture unchallenged control, even ownership, of every
people's resources and markets.
Just as much
a part of this equation is the innate cannibalism and competition
between imperialist states and their state based corporations who fight
over the spoils, thus instituting war, human suffering, deprivation and
ecological disaster as permanent and escalating features of capitalism
in its final stage.
In their
drive for global dominance the imperialist states co-operate and
compete. The offensive of imperialism, its inner contradictions and its
plans for assimilation of Canada, both materially and politically have
created a crisis in manufacturing, an attack on social programs, a
drive for privatization, involved us in imperialist military ventures
and created the social conditions that the Canadian working class and
particularly the labour movement must deal with.
As a junior
partner in the imperialist family the Canadian ruling class has used
our resources, energy and the productivity of our people as their ante
into the imperialist game. Their compliance in this game has given us
Free Trade (NAFTA), laid our resources and diminishing industrial base
open to foreign ownership and control, created a manufacturing
nightmare of lost jobs and de-industrialization, and ushered in a
massive transfer of wealth and profit from the public property and
labour of Canadian people into the coffers of the corporations.
And this is
just the beginning. The plans for deep integration, continental
security, control of ports, an integrated military and TILMA are all
plans of assimilation. The compliance of Canadian governments, and the
most dangerous of them all, the Harper government, is treasonous and
criminal. This is not just one of the cyclical dips, the traditional
boom and bust of earlier capitalism where workers could struggle
through deprivation and try to exist for the next boom. The present
crisis has unique features like relatively high employment actually
leading to relative and absolute impoverishment. Thus the transfer of
manufacturing and well paid service jobs to subsistence and part-time
employment in retail and Mc-service jobs at below poverty level wages.
Amongst the
organized working class this has escalated both resistance and
regressive offers of class peace and co-operation. There are those who
would rather parallel the corporations and adjust to their demands than
risk the danger of refusal. They see the corporations and their
governments as a permanent phenomenon too strong to resist, so they
look to compliance and the "best deals they can get". Most workers are
not entirely committed to either of the poles of resistance or
compliance but will be pulled into the massive struggle which is
pending and will have to decide what their future existence depends on.
There will be
many experiments, much soul-searching many crossovers as people try to
find their way and provide for their families. The present conditions
have created an infant resurgence of the left, but more importantly not
only the conditions for its rapid growth but the absolute necessity for
it.
The welfare
of our people, our sovereignty and the future of the nations within
Canada demand resistance. Only resistance and struggle against the
corporate agenda can protect the gains of generations including a
labour movement that is ours alone, our instrument. If compliance and
partnership become dominant not only will the working class find itself
saddled with a leadership who represent corporate interests but they
will allow the wealth of our country and the labour power of our people
to finance and sustain the military and political agenda of
imperialism, to escalate it. Imperialism must be denied and all the
peoples must be protected. This is the material and pragmatic base of
unity, solidarity and internationalism.
It is against
this backdrop that we have taken such strong positions against the deal
created between Magna Corporation and the leaders in CAW. A deal that
gives up the right to strike and replaces the independent partisan
tradition of adversarial worker representation, of worker control, with
a corporate partnership based on efficiency, productivity and mutual
dedication to the corporate agenda.
We have
watched warily the tendencies toward accommodation with the major
corporations by elements in the leadership of the labour movement, not
by any means restricted to the CAW but even more flagrant in some
areas. We have been critical of the raiding and squabbling amongst most
of the major unions that prevents a united front and unified action. We
have been dismayed by the intransigence of social democracy as played
out in the labour leadership when the Ontario Days of Action were
scrapped and resistance to the neo-liberal Tory and Liberal agenda put
on the back shelf, or when the BC Federation sought to diminish the
militancy of the Teachers and Health Workers strikes and seek
accommodation with the Campbell Liberals. We have expressed our dismay
over the decrease in union membership and the business unionism that
promotes competition, capture and merger as a solution to shrinking
membership rather than organizing.
But we also
have promoted every major campaign that labour has launched. We have
complimented and lauded the militancy and principled resistance of
Ontario and BC teachers and health care Workers, the resistance of
Steelworkers in Hamilton, and hundreds of smaller engagements and
occupations across this country. We have been impressed with the
strength and courage of the Ontario division of CUPE when it stood so
courageously in solidarity with the Palestinian people. Our young left
activists have been very prominent in the campaign for a better minimum
wage and are known in the labour movement for their work. We know that
the preparations for a general labour action in Quebec shook the
government even though it was aborted. We have taken a critical but
complimentary approach to the last round of negotiations in the "Big
Three" where the CAW with some minor flaws managed to bargain honestly
under great duress for their members. We took a strong partisan
position for CN workers embroiled in a very confusing struggle where
their militancy had to counter the CN and deal with raiding and weak
leadership at the same time. We have complimented the CAW for providing
the impetus and the finances for the "Manufacturing Jobs Matter"
campaign which was highlighted by the demo of 40,000 in Windsor. We
have taken the same critical-complimentary approach to the labour
movement that is taken by every progressive labour activist.
It is
necessary to expose the dangers of the "Framework of Fairness"
agreement worked out by some of the CAW leaders with Magna because this
deal could change the direction of a union that was born in rejection
of concessions, a union that by definition expressed for a time the
aspirations and hopes of the labour left and the social justice
movement, a Canadian union built on a firm base of rank and file
involvement and control.
To neutralize
the ideology of the CAW is to deprive hundreds of thousands their own
independent instrument in the struggle for social justice. This is not
about whether or not several thousands of workers get a raise. We want
raises even more substantial for every worker in this country, as does
every critic of the Magna deal. Any experienced trade unionist who has
ever sat on a negotiating committee has been faced with the dilemma of
under what conditions wages are won, of winning gains and at the same
time rejecting corporate bribery that would divide the membership,
penetrate the union and neutralize its shop floor representatives.
Only the
inexperienced could think that this is all about an hourly wage. This
modern economism would sentence the working class to an eternity of
striving to grab that carrot forever beyond their reach. Just look at
how many strikes have been waged over working conditions, health and
safety, or recognition and protection of the union. The union was won
for us by past generations and we must at all costs preserve it for our
future generations.
The pact
worked out between Buzz Hargrove and Magna does not give CAW a foot in
Magna so much as it gives Magna a foot in the labour movement.
Criticism of the Magna deal and the support of Buzz Hargrove for one of
the founding bourgeois parties is not an attack on the CAW. It is part
and parcel of the fight to maintain independent trade unionism at the
service of the working class, and it is in harmony with the powerful
and principled voices from within the CAW who have vowed to bring their
union back to its constitutional fundamentals and historic membership
democracy.
The Magna
deal was signed without membership input or approval and those that
demand a membership discussion should put that demand first and
foremost to the CAW leadership. The Magna deal is not just another
contract, it is a fundamental change in policy that will alter the
direction of the CAW and open the door for corporate demands in every
workplace and union in this country.
That is why
800 delegates at the Ontario Federation of Labour Convention
unanimously passed a resolution critical of the CAW-Magna deal and
warning employers and government that interference in the
administration and independence of their unions would not be tolerated.
That is why this deal has sparked a debate in the labour movement that
goes far beyond the deal itself, a debate that has reached into the
past as well as the present, because rejection of Magna is not enough,
the conditions that led to it must be understood and its rejection must
provide alternatives that are achievable.
When it
shelved the fight-back against the Tories in Ontario the OFL took a
sleeping pill that lasted until the present. Even right-wing trade
unionists who promoted Wayne Samuelson and withdrawal behind the plant
gates, a rebuttal of the CAW and its action program, its integration
with the social justice movement and outreach, lately have joked
privately about the absentee labour organisation.
The Canadian
Labour Congress also has managed to snooze through the greatest plunder
of manufacturing jobs and the haemorrhage of ruined families this
country has ever seen. There have been great research projects and
briefs by the carload, but the street level political campaigning to
put them to use has been absent. The CAW-Magna deal is not isolated
from the lack of labour action amidst the crisis the working class
finds itself in. The CAW was allowed, even pushed, into isolation from
the mainstream of labour, and in the vacuum leap-frogged over the
others into a dangerous experiment.
But where is
the solution to this dilemma? Many workers and trade unionists, faced
with the immensity of the attack and the ineffectiveness of their
organizations, are overwhelmed and in despair of finding a way out.
This will certainly lead to more retreat and more Magna deals if there
appears to be no alternative. The necessity of growing the emerging
left, including the Communist Party, becomes a pivotal point for the
recruitment of hundreds of thousands in the struggle for control of our
lives and social environment. The question isn't "if" but "how".
For the first
time in a decade debates have broken out in the labour movement that
give an insight into where people and ideas are situated, to measure
the possibility of alliance and fightback. The present debate is
propelled by rejection of the partnership model that was threaded
through the CAW Council on Dec. 7. But it will leave behind a more or
less defined left that has already embarked on organizational form and
program within the union.
The ensuing
conflict is the property of CAW members but will have an effect on the
larger searching within the working class that is the property of us
all. If the subject matter of the alternative remains in the debate
stage it will stagnate. It must develop substance and program, and it
must be expansive enough to attract diverse sections of the population
into mass action. It would be wrong to start off narrow and then get
narrower. The vision of another world, of emancipation, of social
justice and defeat of our exploiters must be part of this debate but
the immediate proposals must start with some very practical achievable
objectives that will change the political map in Canada.
The CAW has
committed to keeping "two tier" wages out of Canada in the next round
of "Big Three" negotiations this fall. Regardless of feelings over the
Magna deal this must become a priority for the entire labour movement
and its allies in the social justice movements. The CAW is absolutely
correct in this, and the pressure will be immense after the UAW fiasco
and concessions in the US.
There can be
no excuse for sectarianism here; it is very practical to disapprove of
Magna but support the union in every instance where it defends the
rights of workers. We need more maturity and expanded unity, especially
around the fight against two-tier wages which will sell out the youth
and eventually separate them from the union. If the CAW loses on this
issue it will set the stage for a general corporate offensive against
wages, benefits and working conditions.
It is
possible to re-awaken the fight against free trade and develop higher
the struggle against SPP, Atlantica and TILMA. These are already
underway and ripe ground for alliance and unity. The fight to maintain
Canadian industry and manufacturing must be framed in the demand for
repossession of resources, basic industry, manufacturing,
transportation and ultimately public ownership. We have to educate our
youth on what we have lost, recruit them in the struggle to regain our
country for the people, for them. We must manufacture farm equipment,
develop transportation grids and the rail and heavy machinery to travel
on them, we must manufacture marine equipment, we must develop a host
of environmentally sound energy programs.
There is no
reason we should be the permanent victims of foreign-owned auto
companies, whose interests are only profit and who will abandon us when
the profits are easier to acquire elsewhere. In the short term we need
another auto pact, and in the long term we need a publicly-financed,
owned and built in Canada automobile suitable for our needs, our
weather, propelled by safe non-polluting energy and designed for the
needs of our people and market. The near future will be difficult and
the tasks are immense, but labour has the history and ability to lead
and the working people have the strength to hold and counter-attack.
Found at:
http://www.peoplesvoice.ca/articleprint09/A_NEW_YEAR_AND_THE_STRUGGLE_CONTINUES.html