Get out of NAFTA! Nationalize Bombardier: Stop the Giveaway - Page 2
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1 • PEOPLE’S VOICE • NOVEMBER 1-15, 2017 Prolétaires de tous les pays, unissez-vous! Otatoskewak ota kitaskinahk mamawentotan Workers of all lands, unite! NOV. Chavistas 1-15, 2017 people's win big VOL. 25 Page 9 #18 Printed by union labour in Canada $1.50 Canada Post Publications Mail VOICE Agreement #40011632 1917-20171917-2017 Centenary of the Great October Socialist Revolution Events to mark the greatest political event of the 20th century - see pages 2 & 6 - Get out of NAFTA! Nationalize Bombardier: Stop the Giveaway - page 2 - 3 INSIDE 12 Canadian labour history "Dangerous times" 4 Canadian Peace Congress acting A victim of austerity The Great October Socialist president Miguel Figueroa was on a Revolution had a huge impact on western Canada speaking tour during After bureaucratic rules cut off the the working class in Canada, October, warning that the US pension he earned by a life of hard work, helping radical trade union leaders administration poses a dangerous Billy's rent cheque bounced. He died on and anti-war activists to win wide threat of global war. Toronto's Danforth, a victim of austerity. support for socialist ideas. 2 • PEOPLE’S VOICE • NOVEMBER 1-15, 2017 Nationalize Bombardier: Stop the Giveaway Statement by the Central was NAFTA, and the decision of stake in the C-series for 7.5 years, wages, poor working conditions, to the working class in Canada. Executive Committee, the US administration to slap a while sales will be larger because and a union-free, regulation-free The practice of massive public Communist Party of Canada 300% tariff on Bombardier’s Airbus is a mega-player in the environment all acceptable bailouts to huge corporations, in sales of the C-series jet to Delta aerospace industry. reasons to move production out exchange for job guarantees that The Communist Party’s airlines in the US. The tariff was Canadian workers get left of Canada. evaporate, must end. The Executive Committee is the result of demands holding the bag for public This is another perfect example aerospace and transportation demanding the federal by the US based-Boeing investments and loans that will of why Canada should pull the industry is a key element in government immediately corporation which never be repaid, and for jobs that plug and get out of NAFTA now. Canada’s economy and it must block the corporate deal claimed that Bombar- will never materialize because Continuing in NAFTA means be developed in the interests of with Airbus that will kill dier was unfairly wages are so much lower in the continuing to watch as the people, not corporate profit. thousands of new jobs subsidized by the US. In fact, there is a good chance manufacturing and industrial jobs Enough is enough! Get out of and give away controlling Canadian govern-ment. that the 2,000 Bombardier jobs in are routinely stripped out of NAFTA! Nationalize Bombardier interest in Canada’s C- To get around the tariff, Montreal could disappear, as Canada, while wages are beaten and block the deal with Airbus. series jet for $1. Bombardier made a production ramps up in Alabama. down, pensions are gutted and Build the C-series jet in Canada. Further, Parliament must step deal with Airbus to build the jets NAFTA gives corporations unions and labour rights are And build a Canada-wide trans- up to put Bombardier under public in Alabama, in a non-union shop, complete freedom to set up and undermined and destroyed. portation system that’s publicly ownership and democratic control, in a US right-to- work state. In close down wherever and Private corporations have owned and democratically and pull the plug on NAFTA which exchange Bombardier gets a 31% whenever they want, with low repeatedly demonstrated, in their controlled, and meets the needs of has contributed in a big way to this pursuit of profit, that they cannot the people who live and work in debacle. be relied upon to provide good Canada – not those corporations Bombardier’s $8.7 billion debt jobs with fair wages and benefits, that profit here. includes over $6 billion spent on development of the C-series jet – a project meant to make Canada a leader in the global aerospace industry, creating thousands of new Ontario college faculty jobs in Canada. That’s why the federal government made $1.3 on strike against billion in loans to Bombardier and why the Quebec government precarious work invested $1.25 billion for what began as a 49.5% interest, now shrunk to just 19%. PV Ontario Bureau While reaching into the public purse time after time, Bom- On October 16, 12,000 college faculty went on strike at Colleges bardier’s executives were being of Applied Arts and Technology (CAATs) across Ontario. The paid millions in publicly funded faculty are members of the Ontario Public Service Employees bonuses year after year – without Union (OPSEU). any public oversight or control. The strike began after the College Employer Council (CEC) What induced Bombardier to rejected a streamlined final offer from the union and walked away hand over control of the C-Series from the table. OPSEU negotiators described the offer as “bare jet to the European based Airbus, minimum we need to ensure quality education for students and treat contract faculty fairly.” The union’s offer included several non- monetary proposals such as stronger recognition of academic freedom, improved seniority provisions, and longer notice periods for teaching contracts and work assignments. Conference and celebrations across Canada The offer also included the union’s key demand for a 50:50 ratio of full-time to non-full-time faculty. Ontario colleges have steadily to mark centenary of Great October and deliberately increased the number and proportion of part-time and contract teaching positions, which currently outnumber full- The 100th anniversary of the include People’s Voice editor communist leader George Gidora time positions by nearly three times. Great October Socialist Kimball Cariou, and Nova Scotia on alliances of the working class The strike is also about the faculty’s desire to enhance the quality Revolution - the outstanding communist activist and academic and other forces. of education they provide to students. The union has argued that political event of the 20th century Jim Sacouman. The final session of the precarious employment for faculty directly erodes their ability to will be marked this month by a In a session on “creating and conference is titled “Two properly prepare and present courses. number of celebrations (see page defending the socialist state – the Alternative Histories – Socialism As with many other public services and institutions in Ontario, 6), as well as by a November 18- early years of the revolution”, vs. Capitalism”. BC communist CAATs have increasingly adopted corporate and privatized labour 19 weekend theoretical retired Hamilton labour activist activist Hanne Gidora will practices. In all of these cases this trend has undermined the quality conference, hosted in Toronto with Sam Hammond and former compare the record of planned and accessibility of those services, and it has sharply eroded online participation from other Ryerson University sociology socialist development vs. profit- working conditions and union strength. cities. instructor Jeanne McGuire will driven capitalist “development”. Ontario Communist Party leader, Dave McKee, observes that, Using webinar technology and describe the new Soviet socialist Ontario Communist leader Dave “One of the underlying issues to this dispute is the provincial viewing screens, presenters will McKee will contrast the government’s ongoing underfunding of colleges. At a time when speak on a wide range of topics, internationalist foreign policy of colleges have expanded their mandates, provincial funding has beginning with the background to the Soviet Union to the inability dropped by nearly 20%, and continues to fall.” OPSEU has noted the Revolution and the events of of social democratic governments that Ontario ranks tenth out of ten provinces when it comes to its first days, and the place of “Great to change imperialist foreign college funding on a per-student basis, with the government October” in the subsequent policies. Finally, Communist committing to a pitiful 0.2% increase for the 2017-18 year, and zero revolutions which rocked Party of Canada leader Liz increase for 2018/19. capitalism and imperialism for Rowley will address the urgent McKee said that pressure from underfunding has led colleges decades. Other speakers will historical necessity of socialism to make up the difference through a combination of increased examine the struggle to create and to tackle the environmental crisis, student fees and increasingly precarious employment conditions defend the first socialist state, the and to meet human needs on a for faculty. “Instead of standing up for public education at the Soviet approach to advance the global scale. college level and demanding adequate funding, the colleges have rights of women and oppressed Because of the four and a half used government underfunding as an excuse to increase precarious nations, the contrast between state, and the factors of mass hour time zone different across employment for faculty, to pursue different forms of privatization, planned socialist development involvement and political the country, the meetings will take and to diminish education for 300,000 college students in versus the profit-driven and crisis- leadership in the building of place at different times: from 10 Ontario.” ridden capitalist system, the role socialism. Former CPC leader am to 4 pm on both days in British The Communist Party is demanding that the College Employer of the USSR in the international Miguel Figueroa will speak on the Columbia; 11 am to 5 pm in Council return immediately to the bargaining table and negotiate a struggles for peace and national factors which contributed to the Alberta; 12 noon to 6 pm in fair contract with faculty.