The Internet's savviest people may have been too young to remember the 1981 air traffic controllers strike in the United States. The air traffic controllers went on strike shortly after Ronald Reagan became president in 1981. Reagan ordered them back to work, threatening to fire those who remained on strike. And so Reagan fired the vast majority of air traffic controllers.
The chill of that memory came up recently when Canada's Labour Minister Lisa Raitt proposed back to work legislation in a rotating Canada Post strike and an Air Canada strike.
The Canada post strike had been rotating to various cities, so this wasn't deeply disruptive. Canada Post is owned by the Crown corporation, similar in the way the United States "owns" the post office, but not quite. So Canada Post locked out its employees. The Air Canada strike involves counter personnel and not pilots, flight attendants, etc. Again, this was a strike where service was slow, but flights still took off and landed.
Raitt cited the uncertain economy as the reasoning to introduce back-to-work legislation in Parliament, the same economy that the Conservatives touted during the spring federal election. But the quick, swift government action is less about the economy and more about sending a message to labor that a new sheriff is in the capital. And while this isn't on the scale of the U.S. air traffic controllers, by Canadian standards, this is a rather dramatic
While the Conservative government has been in power for 5 years, the small difference between minority government and majority government is often huge. This proposal would not have been stuck at the gate under the parliamentary allocation last year.
In the United States, a Secretary of Labor (minus the u) has one of the easiest jobs in a Republican administration (most Republicans couldn't tell you who was the Labor Secretary under W) because they are invisible. In Canada, Raitt is making a name for herself, but it isn't on the side of labor.
Those who label themselves as "conservative" on both sides of the 49th parallel don't like government interference, especially when the reasons given are very bogus. Let's see if they cry out against this government intervention. And whether this will be a pattern for the Harper government that, thanks to its majority will be around until at least 2015.
In Toronto we have sleeping on the job subway ticket sellers working at 60K per year plus all the overtime they could wish for within a standard schedule - that never modifies its hours during special events like the 7:30 a.m. marathons* which start and end directly at subway stop city/borough halls. Since '04 they went on a wildcat strike. A few years later they went on a second strike, giving only a 90 minute notice as of 10:30 p.m. on a Spring Friday with the downtown full of College-aged students recently done with their school year. We have p-t library assistant jobs as advertised at $33 - $38.50 per hour; these are not even f-t workers, letting aside the stereotypical head bitty who shushes people. And I can personally walk to about 8 different branches within 30 minutes. We have Garbage collectors with a "Jobs for Life" agreement - signed during a 'veteran conservative' mayor's term. That was signed before they went on strike in '02 a mere one month before a Papal Visit! They went on another strike about two years ago and received everything they asked for either via the then-mayor or secret unnamed gov't waged negotiator. Currently we are looking towards privatizing an additional third of the city.
We have a provincial Gov't that announced a raise freeze; caught later having signed a special extra raise to one of its unions, and also both city and province have given raises to their post G20 police forces?? The teachers union (which owns the Leafs, Raptors, and until last fall, at least, held 20% of this country's largest 'private' TV/newspaper/radio company is openly raising its union dues to directly campaign in the next provincial election. The next largest competitor went bankrupt and they cherry picked most of the best assets of the third TV/radio company with the regulatory body's approved blessing.
Then there is the public works; multiple of my neighbourhood arterial roads have had lane reductions (from 4 to 6) to accommodate gussied new streetcar only raised platforms which do not speed up public transit after real measurements including things like additional left turn lights are factored in. And this is while thousands of either new tacky or ultra plush looking condo and crammed townhouse units are shoehorned in despite Canada's vast land mass.
We have cops at $65 per hour standing alongside every single daytime road construction crew. They also sign up for standing at long standing tobaggan hills telling kids not to. I saw a lone young female cop a couple weeks ago; she was standing guard in front of an empty funeral parlour parking lot. Who died? (All our 'mafia' wiseguys moved out to the northern burbs years and years ago.)
We have bicycle cops all over. Finally after numerous alt newspaper articles Summer following Summer etc. a bike thief was arrested - for 3,000 stolen bikes!
* We tired of dual city marathons, only three to four weeks apart in Sep to Oct. The (IMO) wrong one was moved to Spring. So it was scheduled this year to the very same early morning(!) as the next door suburban marathon.
We had big fancy projects like the overhanging Museum Crystal. The sidewalk is now closed during each winter due to mega icicles. And then the Art Gallery cronies (and many other direly valued agencies) have padded their excecutive pay as though they were rebuilding Chrysler. It just never ends around here.
And back to the posties(?) and other governmental federally paid groups. I've just been hearing too much of this anti-Israel crap over the last half decade. Even today we have dozens of special do-gooders flying to Greece to join the flotila to Gaza. As though Greece, or native Canadians or Haiti or Japan, itself couldn't use our assistance? Keep marching their blight flight direct to Israel's borders?!?
Sorry I rambled here ;)
Posted by: CQ | June 20, 2011 at 04:53 PM
There are extremes at both scales. Labor and management can work together. And even if you think there should be reform, the heavy hand of government on only one side of the equation isn't a good way to go.
Posted by: Chad | June 21, 2011 at 11:29 AM