(The following article is from the February 15-28, 2009, 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.)

Special to PV

Last August, the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Canada met days before a snap federal election campaign, which was jolted mid-way by the global stock market crash.

     For the first time since that crisis broke, the CC gathered in Toronto over the Jan. 31-Feb. 1 weekend, amidst a very different political scene in Canada and around the world. Gone are illusions about the "success" of neoliberal capitalist policies, while working class interest in a people's alternative and in socialism is on the rise. The coming year, the CC members agreed, will be a time of sharp challenges for the working class, and tremendous new opportunities to build the Communist Party.

     A wide-ranging political report adopted by the CC analyses of the international situation and the fightback across Canada, and ongoing work to strengthen the mass movements and to build the Communist Party.

     As Party leader Miguel Figueroa said, "This Central Committee meeting comes at an extraordinarily critical moment in the struggle for peace, jobs and the social and political rights of the working class in Canada and internationally. It is also a critical meeting for our own Party, which faces huge challenges with limited resources, but also under circumstances that offer significant opportunities for the growth and development of our Party and of the fightback movement as a whole."

     Figueroa's report, presented on behalf of the Central Executive Committee, provided a wide range of data on the global situation. For example, on Jan. 21, the World Health Organization released a disturbing report on "The Financial Crisis and Global Health", warning the "the world risks the most serious economic downturn since the 1930s. The impact of earlier increases in the cost of food and fuel are estimated to have tipped more than 100 million people back into poverty. The challenge facing the world now is to prevent an economic crisis becoming a social and a health crisis.... Shortages of food and consequent malnutrition predispose individuals to disease and thus act in vicious concert with the economic downturn."

     Rejecting arguments that the present downturn is "just another cyclical crisis," Figueroa's report stressed that "what distinguishes the current crisis from previous ones are those features which have come to play a dominant role in the process of capital accumulation, in particular the role of speculative capital." While speculation has always been a component of  capitalism, it now penetrates all aspects of the economy and politics, not only stocks and enterprises, but also national currencies, to the point where international financial markets dictate national economic policies.

     Despite some divisions, Figueroa noted, "What unites the ruling class is the desire to overcome the crisis at the expense of the working class - both directly through lowering the cost (price) of labour, the principal target of which is the organized labour movement... and indirectly, through the use of public revenues (the bulk of which come from the pockets of working people) to insulate investors from losses and prop up sagging profits. The differences between the two camps revolve around tactics, not any shift in fundamental policy."

     For the working class, he concluded, "neither prescription is acceptable. With respect to so-called `stimulation' financed by public revenues and/or deficits, the issue is not `stimulation' as such, but rather what types of stimulation, whose interests they serve."

     Figueroa emphasized that the CPC "wholeheartedly concurs with the position of the Greek Communists, which was summarized in their intervention at the International Meeting of Communist and Workers' Parties this past November: `In our opinion, what the bourgeoisie considers a threat to its economic and political stability is a hope for labour and the people's forces, as long as the communist parties and the anti-imperialist movement do not lose sight of the only way out... We should utilize this situation to the maximum in order to promote the process of unity among the working class as well as its social political alliance with other popular strata..."

     The report was sharply critical of the tendency by some labour and social democratic leaders to yield concessions rather than to mobilize for a stronger fightback. Figueroa pointed to the recent statement by CAW head Ken Lewenza, who signalled that his union is prepared to reopen union contracts to grant wage and benefit concessions because "we can't ignore the precarious financial state of these (auto) companies." On a similar note, NDP leader Jack Layton, speaking to the Toronto Board of Trade in January, said "It's that courage of the Canadian people which makes our country strong. Let's match that quiet courage with smart investment for the future... It's that kind of courage workers will need to take a pay cut so your friends at the plant can keep their job."

     On the contrary, said Figueroa, "Canadian workers need to replicate the examples set recently in Europe where millions have taken to the streets across Greece, France, Germany and elsewhere with one unifying message: `We did not create this economic crisis, and we're not going to pay for it!'"

     With unemployment skyrocketing, the most immediate critical challenge will be the struggle to restore access to Employment Insurance for the two-thirds of Canadian workers who are denied EI by restrictive regulations, and to improve the terms of benefits. The Central Committee decided to launch a special campaign on the issues of jobs and EI, including public actions, forums, leaflets, and other efforts designed to deepen understanding of the capitalist crisis and the attack on jobs and social programs. The Party will also give full support to the efforts of the labour movement to improve EI.

     This public activity will be complemented by a stepped-up program of party educational work. A growing influx of new members means that a majority of Canadian communists have joined since the early 1990s. Many are from immigrant communities, bringing powerful traditions of class and revolutionary struggles from their homelands. To take full advantage of the improved conditions for recruiting, the CC stressed, more work is needed to help improve the level of activity and organization in party clubs, the base of the CPC. These efforts will help to strengthen and build the Party heading into its 36th Central Convention, which is planned for February 2010.

     Young Communist League General Secretary Johan Boyden reported to the CC on the activity of the YCL and the work of Communists among youth across Canada. Since its refounding convention in 2007, Boyden said, the YCL has increased its membership and overall level of activity, and YCL members play important roles in a number of labour and student organizations.

     The CC meeting also adopted several special resolutions, including a call for full participation in anti-war demonstrations this April to mark the 60th anniversary of NATO. Another resolution salutes the 90th anniversary of the Winnipeg General Strike, which took place in May-June 1919 and had a historic impact on the Canadian labour and revolutionary movements.

     The full documents of the Central Committee meeting will be posted on the Communist Party's website, http://www.communist-party.ca. Printed copies will be available from the CPC's central office as well as provincial and local organizations.