02) SAFEGUARD JOBS AND INCOMES FOR CANADIANS

(The following article is from the October 16-31, 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.)

As global stock markets lurched into serious decline at the end of September, the Central Executive of the Communist Party of Canada issued a statement warning that "Stephen Harper's claim that the Canadian economy is on `a solid footing' looks utterly foolish..."

     The Party went on say that "In reality, Canada is on the brink of a Dirty Thirties depression, thanks largely to the neo-conservative policies pushed by Harper, Bush, and other advocates of `unfettered capitalism.'"

     Instead of more self-congratulating Tory speeches, the statement said, Canada "needs emergency measures to protect working people from the pending economic disaster spreading from our largest trading partner, the United States."

     Pointing to declines in exports, consumer spending, residential housing construction, and investments in plant and equipment, and the loss of almost 400,000 manufacturing jobs in recent years, the Communist statement says that working people are "struggling to stay afloat, compelled to take low-wage, part-time service sector employment to pay the bills. No wonder that Canadian households now carry $1.25 in debt for every dollar of disposable income."

     At the same time, corporate profits shot up another 8.3% in the second quarter of 2008, largely due to corporate gouging for gas and home heating fuel, which feeds the spiral of declining disposable incomes for working families.

     "The emerging crisis has been worsened by deregulation, privatization, brutal cuts to the social safety net, and huge tax breaks for the rich and the corporations," says the Communist statement. "In Canada and other capitalist countries, the needs of the people have been ruthlessly sacrificed as right-wing governments help big business rack up ever larger profits. By removing any meaningful restrictions on the predatory business practices of big capital, these policies sucked untold billions from the pockets of working people and into the bank accounts of the rich.

     "Now the chickens have come home to roost, and the list of victims of this economic binge grows longer every week: Bear Stearns, Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae, Lehman Brothers, the American International Group, Merrill Lynch, Wachovia. Losses are mounting into the trillions of dollars, and the `bailout' just voted down in Washington [adopted in amended form a few days later] would put the burden squarely on the backs of working people, guaranteeing an even deeper crisis in the very near future. Now there are ominous warnings that `a hurricane of bad credit card debt will start crashing ashore in the United States.' In other words, the worst is yet to come.

     "Politicians who claim that Canada is `insulated' from this catastrophe are lying. And those who want to shovel more truckloads of taxpayers' dollars into the coffers of the corporations are simply pushing the same policies which helped generate this crisis in the first place.

     "The capitalist economic debacle presents grave dangers, but also an opportunity to debate fundamental changes in Canadian society. This is a time to say `NO' to corporate greed, and `YES' to Canadian sovereignty and independence, `YES' to the needs of the Canadian people."

     The Communist Party leadership called for an immediate action plan to protect the Canadian economy and Canadian jobs, pensions, social programs and living standards, including:

- immediate withdrawal from NAFTA, a halt to the Security and Prosperity Partnership (SPP) negotiations, and the adoption of a diversified, multilateral trade policy based on mutual benefit;

- nationalization of the energy industry to guarantee domestic supply and to provide the material basis for the economic rebuilding of Canadian industry and the creation of hundreds of thousands of jobs;

- protections for Canadian working people through the immediate introduction of plant closure legislation to stop the exodus of manufacturing jobs, legislation to protect workers' wages and pensions, and the expansion of EI to cover all workers for the full duration of unemployment;

- an immediate increase in the minimum wage to $15/hr. to help raise all wage levels and stimulate domestic consumption;

- sweeping progressive tax reform based on ability to pay, and the revocation of all corporate tax breaks, hand-outs, write-offs and deferrals at every level - measures that will shift the tax burden from working people onto the corporations and the wealthy;

- emergency measures to protect and extend public healthcare, education and other social programs, including the establishment of a universal system of quality public child care;

- a massive public investment program to construct affordable social housing, to rebuild Canada's decaying infrastructure, in environmental protection and conservation, and in job creation programs for youth; and

- immediate withdrawal from the disastrous war of occupation in Afghanistan, and a 50% cut in military spending.