MESSAGE FROM LABOUR COUNCIL
Communications

• Transit urgency
• City Contract Fight
• TDSB By-Election
• New Executive
• Farmworkers Tragedy

 

URGENT - TRANSIT COULD BE THE BETTER WAY

Toronto City Council is finally taking on the need for transit across the city, after a majority of Councillors  forced an emergency meeting to review how best to invest billions of tax dollars in transit. They are questioning Rob Ford’s unilateral decision to plow all the available money into tunneling the entire Eglinton line, rather than a mix of underground and surface rapid transit that would include northern Scarborough and North York.  The plan championed by TTC Chair Karen Stintz will bring far more rapid transit to hundreds of thousands more commuters in the suburbs, and includes widening Eglinton Ave. so no lanes are lost.

Labour Council and TTCriders, the transit advocacy group, is urging everyone to phone their Councillor to support the Stintz plan. For more information go to www.ttcriders.ca

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CONTRACT FIGHT CONTINUES

While the City and CUPE 416 announced on Sunday that they had a framework agreement designed to settle the new contract, there is still lots of work to be done before we have labour peace in Toronto.  Collective agreement language provides a certain amount of protection from workers being fired so the city can contract out. But the overall political fight will continue, to pressure City Council NOT to approve any further contracting out.  As well, the Library local 4948 is out all week leafleting library users and the public about key issues coming up.  Their website, for instance, lists the Scarborough Councillors who voted for or against deeper cuts to library services - http://www.local4948.org/#spine5

Labour Council is asking unions to keep circulating the flyer “It’s All Our Fight”, which lays out the reasons why every union needs to support city workers attaining fair collective agreements.  It also details how we have won important victories in the past when we work together. www.labourcouncil.ca

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TDSB BY-ELECTION

By-elections for the Toronto District School Board will be held on February 27th to replace two trustees who were elected to Queen's Park. Labour Council has endorsed Mary Hynes in Don Valley East and Sam Sotiropolous in Scarborough Agincourt. They both addressed the February Delegates meeting. To help out in these important elections, or get contact information go to www.campaignforpubliceducation.ca

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LABOUR COUNCIL EXECUTIVE

Labour Council has a new Executive Board, acclaimed at the February Delegates meeting. Veteran Steelworker Mike Seaward stepped down as Vice-President, and is replaced by Andria Babbington of UNITE HERE Local 75. Treasurer Sonia Reynolds stepped down as well, replaced by Jeff Irons of IBEW Local 353. New faces on the Executive Board include: Sharon DeSousa, Ontario Vice-President of the Public Service Alliance of Canada; Mary-Jo Eaton of UFCW Local 1000a; Roland Kiehne, President of CAW Local 112; Abdul Samad, Vice-President of the Toronto Steelworkers Area Council; Rocco Signorile, Secretary Treasurer of ATU Local 113.  Helen Kennedy of CUPE continues as Recording Secretary, while President John Cartwright starts his sixth term leading the Council.

A sincere thanks goes out to those Board members who have served on the Executive: Sherry Hillman (CAW); Bill Merlin (ATU); Mike Platt (OSSTF) as well as Curtis Tibbets who retired from the position of Tyler. Mike Seaward will take up that role for the next term.

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11 KILLED IN FARMWORKER TRAGEDY

The union that has led a two-decade campaign for increased workplace and safety rights for Ontario farm workers has offered its condolences and renewed its call for increased diligence in the wake of a horrific two-vehicle collision Monday that reportedly killed 10 agriculture workers riding in a van, as well as the driver of another vehicle.

"Our thoughts go out to the families of all the victims of this tragic and horrible accident," says Wayne Hanley, the national president of UFCW Canada. In association with the Agriculture Workers Alliance (AWA), UFCW Canada operates four Ontario support centres for domestic and migrant workers and 6 others centres across Canada.  More than 20,000 migrants work in the Ontario agriculture sector each season.  In 1948 a tragic air crash that killed 28 farmworkers being deported from the U.S. inspired Woody Guthrie’s anthem “Deportee”. You can hear it at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c2eO65BqxBE

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