FOR THE WORKERS

Today workers in Canada face a heightened systematic abuse at a pace that quickens continually. Workers rights suffer endless attacks and erosion by a hostile entrenched hatred. The sophistication, the "corporate agenda" has mounted a fierce onslaught, particularly in the last decade and a half. Corporations in Canada have successfully captured the liberal democratic forms of government, while alongside blaring their overreaching message through the mass media. The public interest has been so completely supplanted by corporate interests as to make the nation state a thing to be patented through direct incorporation. Any small deviation, for the meek argument of social benefit, must be thoroughly wrapped in a mercantile conception. Business is, mot definitely "King".

The circumstances of this present situation for the working class in Canada, can be traced to the advent of "Free Trade" with the USA. "Free Trade" was negotiated with the USA in the mid 1980’s. The economic dominance of America and of the lopsided character of this relationship, insured the outcome. As the United States more openly treats the developing world as a client, "Free Trade" put into law our domestic subordination. The arguments then centered around the need to have access to the American markets. The corporate spokesmen and their "pitchmen" in government accepted this arrangement as necessary and a vital evolution. At that time the labour movement recognized the threat to the domestic capacity of certain sectors of the Canadian economy. Thus the labour movement mounted a formidable public opposition to "Free Trade" with the US and public opinion rode well against such a agreement. The national debate over the "Free Trade" became a very defining moment in the life of Canada and for the matter of the labour movement. Industrial investment, often unionized in Canada, would suffer a supreme blow.

This consequence was squarely identified by Robert White, the then the National President of the Canadian Auto Workers. From his autobiography "Hard Bargains" Robert White states: "In 1985 we had a $20 billion trade surplus with the United States. It is naïve to suggest that under "Free Trade" we’ll have an even greater surplus and more jobs in Canada. The Mulroney government and the MacDonald Commission weren’t able to point to one single job that would be created in Canada under "Free Trade". In fact, the reverse is true. Job losses would be felt immediately in manufacturing, especially in textile carpets, boots, processing computers, and boat building." As the experience of the "Free Trade" has shown us, the domestic industrial base was every bit as dramatic as White foresaw and then some.

The character of the Transnational Capital was not fully understood then. The nationalistic pride and the assumed rational acceptance of the domestic viability in Canada by the economic elite and their governments was one of two rallying points. The other was to cultivate strong public opinion against "Free Trade". Ultimately the Federal Elections returned the Conservative Government in 1988 and they implemented "Free Trade" with the USA. The role of the trade union movement in Canada was weakened. In the balance, a nationalist argument is a mere small trouble to the capitalists as it was identified. It was a naive presumption that such an argument would prevail in such a narrow context. Narrow, in that the class character of this opposition was well secondary to the clutching of the Maple Leaf.

As the last fifteen years demonstrated, the labour movement has been demoralized. "Free Trade" with the USA then became "NAFTA" –North American Free Trade with the USA and Mexico. Industrialization was significantly depleted in Canada. There have been in excess of 300,000 manufacturing jobs lost in the early 1990’s. This is a mass exodus of investment transferring back to the US. Many union members and leaders see this period as one of the past, yet the ramifications are unending. The fight against US dominance through "Free Trade" and now "NAFTA" is the basis of our fight today. What we see today in a number if sections of the economy; auto, steel, airlines, aerospace, fisheries, lumber and mills is a gross depletion.

US protectionism, the hypocrite to this capitalist method of trade relations, harms Canada’s producers and the workers it employs. The trade surplus is still in our advantage, yet when you see what that surplus represents, you might think otherwise. Our resources make up the greatest glut for such a trade surplus. Labour intensive goods, where jobs are a necessary obvious requirement, are not at the source if such surplus. Economic downturns have impacted unionized sectors in Canada, while the rate of foreign imports, have grown in steel and auto. This trend threatens the core of Canada’s industrial unionism.

How are these unions coping with this eminent disaster? The Auto Workers Union (CAW) has proposed a full scale capitulation. They are arguing now for hundreds of millions of dollars to be given by the Canadian government to such private corporations. The notion of buying investment through the public treasury, they hope to escape direct contract concessions. The concessions then come at the expense of the socials programs; such as healthcare, pensions, education, social housing – they have all seen massive governmental retrenchment during the 1990’s. The Auto Workers wish to utilize these public funds, that have substantially diminished to buy investment. In fact, false information about tariff was made by the Auto Workers leadership, as a basis for such corporate welfare. The idea of a tariff was purely fictional. The public funds in the hundreds of millions are argued to be paid to the auto-manufacturing moguls. The union then becomes an agent "hawking" for the boss while seeking public dollars.

Governments are the spokesmen of these corporations, so the whole scenario is rather ridiculous. These American based Trasnational corporations seek to become as unaccountable as the Churches. No taxes through deferrals, hefty public grants, and a compliant workforce. All these facts still cannot secure jobs and investments. The CAW understood this all too well when departing from the International United Auto Workers Union. The UAW bought into heavy concessions of profit sharing in the early mid 1980’s. This period was very militantly opposed by the Canadian section of UAW. The Canadian section then split from the American based UAW on such substantial basis. For the CAW today, to fall so far backwards in collaboration with capital in the auto sector, is to forget its very heritage and reason for being.

Another union that has been a scandalous advocate of class collaboration and business unionism is the United Fruit and Commercial Workers Union. The UFCW, another American-based International Union has back-stepped throughout the 1980’s and 90’s. The Meat Packers suffered scandalous union concession bargaining in the US and Canada. In the 1980’s, at the corporate giant "Gainers" and in the 90’s here in Canada at the "Maple Leaf Foods". Massive setbacks were rationalized instead of a militant fight back.

Workers have become cynical at the ideals expressed by such unions because of the corporate assaults. Today, trade union locals in the grocery store sector of retail, were forced to have huge wage cuts, without a vote by a passive union membership or a lack of overall participation.

Work has been casualized and dropped without any benefits. The UFCW is presently arguing that this is the best defense against a corporate rival of their employer "Loblaws" from the huge "Wall-Mart" superstore concept. The predatory aspect of capitalism is then engrained into the mindset of trade union members. The hostility is then channeled at the union while the root of the exploitation lies with the employer. The confusion is deadening. Workers must see as to who is who, even if graphically they become foreign to themselves if their trade union seeks to be an appendage of a corporation. This anti-union attitude has been a bulwark against a more united militant Labour Movement.

Comprehension of economics and a rejection of corporate aims must be cultivated within the working class by their leaders. The problem exists that the corporation is given a "pass" by the labour leadership and this puts them above critique. There seems some kind of absolute nature of the corporation. The worker is defeated before he or she has the chance to form a full understanding. Acceptance of the capitalist ethos is the main mis-direction of the labour movement. Today in Canada, labour leaders still live off the fumes of the Cold War era. They harken back to the modest growing welfare state, mixed economy that is so far out of date, it makes Ford’s Model-T look space aged. Conventional attitude and approach from labour while there is revolutionary assault from capital.

Many of today’s labour leadership were brought up in a world that consisted of two competing social systems, the Soviet Union and the West, which allowed labour here to be bought and thereby slag the never-ending communist influence. This anti-communism allowed modest respectability, or the perception of it, by capital. As our trade unions have become less class conscious and more taken in by society that repudiates them, the union membership became vulnerable. At the present time, trade union membership barely attend their own meetings. Often running for union office means more face to face with the boss and the possibility of promotion into management. Union Staff people, promoted from local union levels enjoy handsome middle class incomes. Infection from within breeds insecurity and trade union militants are often marginalized or routinely attacked.

When these changes are versed against the origins of industrial union ism in Canada, the differences are shocking. Labour historians have objectively raised the fact that revolutionaries, communists, and various militants are the ones that have built the labour movement. These truths are suppressed or virtually ignored in trade union education. Trade Union leaders are still looking at the rear view mirror while crashing towards extinction.

There are signs of a progressive fight-back by rank ad file union militants forming strike support committees. This outgrowth is a very welcome sign, yet we must understand that this formation came from the rank and file, not from its leadership. The economic growth perspective of many of these militants holds them from advancing beyond immediate confrontation with fierce anti-union employers that lock out workers from their jobs. The development of these militants and their practical actions, then coupled with political revolutionary theory is a requirement. Many rank and file members and local union leadership maintain a hope that we can arrive at a better set of circumstances. This hope coupled with an open conception that runs a distance from the stale old anti-communism of a bye-gone era. We have experienced that last decade and a half and we can see a disturbing conformity to capital by the Canadian labour movement.

Some speak of coming generations that may escalate a more class-oriented confrontation with the employers. This dismisses us from the tasks at hand today. It also presumes that the mainstream corporate ethos may be bucked when in a more probable reality it would be all the more accepted. To illustrate how capitalism confounds even the highest leaders of the labour movement, Buzz Hardgrove, President of the Canadian Auto Workers (CAW) writes in his book "Labour of Love": "One night in 19777, a few of us, including Ken (Gerard), and Jim (O’Neil), were sitting in a bar at the UAW’s leadership school in Black Lake, Michigan, USA, talking about the UAW. We felt that the fierce passion for unionism, especially the social unionism of the left wing, was evaporating. The younger members who had fought their way through the 1960’s, were getting frustrated as the times became less radical. We felt blocked by an aging union administration. There seemed less chance for pushing through more progressive ideas." Indeed!?

The main characteristic of the labour movement is its political marriage to the Social Democratic Party (NDP) in Canada. In the early 1960’s the NDP was born from the National Labour Congress and the former Commonwealth Co-operative Federation (CCF).

The NDP, like many social democratic parties around the world allowed space politically for labour’s advocacy during a bi-polar world. The existence of the Soviet Union admonished routinely by the Social Democrats allowed them the place to seek modest reforms from the hostility of Canadian capitalism.

The formation of Universal Healthcare, public pensions were reforms that were notable in the post-war period. In a world set by two developing socials structures, Socialism on one hand and Capitalism on the other, the NDP danced between the two. The working class was under a barrage of propaganda by big business and government, claiming the worst possible atrocities of Communism and of the Soviet Union and also of the communist influence. No one in the Canadian NDP epitomized better the narrow anti-communism of the Social Democrats (NDP) better than David Lewis. David Lewis was the Canadian leader of the NDP from the early 1970’s and a long time CCF activist. When he was asked as to who is the main "enemy", he responded definitely "the communists". Lewis hated communism and damaged the strength of a swelling tide for social change and he was ultimately voted out of political office, after doing his dirty work. Oddly enough, his anti-corporate "welfare bums" campaign and his book earned him the best support ever during his political life. This anti-communist Social Democrat contrasts very sharply with the early CCF, which was formed in the early 1930’s in the province of Saskatchewan, Canada. At that time, very often the Communists and the CCF worked in admiration and unity. This was during the period of capitalism’s dirty 1930’s depression. David Lewis can be viewed today rather obviously as someone lost in personal isolation on the political nature of unity. He grossly underestimated the nature of capitalism, yet condemns the communists.

This confusion seeps into the very life of the Canadian working class. Ironically today, his prolific son Stephen Lewis, a major voice in the Social Democratic movement (NDP) left and the former leader of the Ontario NDP opposition, speaks of the errors and notions that he had once had. Needless to say, these same notions were of the whole Lewis family and beyond that of Social Democrats and labour leaders. Stephen Lewis today expounds the sheer horror of the intense globalization and the degradation of the developing world. He speaks about the Cold War notion of the collapse of communism and of the huge peace dividend that people would enjoy. This naive belief in a "peace dividend" has been spent on more wars since the collapse of the Soviet Union. But, the Social Democrats have held on to the faults of the corporate organization of the State, while sneering at those that could best have helped them to pass by such gross assumption.

The NDP today has moderated itself to a point as to be barely distinguished from the second wing of Canadian capitalism. This moderated liberalism from the arch conservatism often is seen as a close cousin. This confusion politically created untold troubles for the working class in Canada. It seems that the choice of a lesser evil, accommodates the corporate drive in the society. This cold comfort has driven many workers from political activity and again set them to be vulnerable to the very process that they ignorantly embrace. In their defense can be said that of a lack of political and organizational leadership throughout this contemporary period.

Again to expose the political orientation and failure of Social Democracy in a uni-polar world, a long standing debate ensued within the Canadian Social Democrats (NDP) The proposal was to copy the policies of Tony Blair’s Labour Party of England as the "Third Way". Rebirth of the NDP was seen as a requirement. This meant yet another move into the political center. Now Blair’s war hawk actions have silenced such a re-grouping in the NDP. The fatal example is virtually laughable if it wasn’t so pathetically discredited. Perhaps it could be argued that today in Canada Social Democracy (NDP) is more confused than the working class.

The final oppositional formations in Canada are the Communist Parties themselves. In Canada there is the Communist Party of Canada (CPC), the Communist Party of Canada Marxist-Leninist (CPC M-L) and the offshoot of the CPC, the Committee of Canadian Communists (CCC). The CPC was formed in 1921 and was aligned with the Comintern and with the newly formed state of the Soviet Union. The CPC (ML) was formed in the early 1970’s. The CCC was also formed in late 1970’s as a group that also charged the CPC with revisionism.

Over the last decade and a half all of the communist parties failed in their attempt to re-assert themselves within the political life of the working class. The collapse of the Soviet Union set back temporarily the revolutionary struggle to be sure. The struggle to re-emerge as a political force eludes these parties to this day. The reasons for this are found in a fear to once again propose a path of leadership. The phobia of isolation grips the parties. Isolation from activists and embryonic movements that sprout up on various issues from opposition to municipal reorganization of mega cities to the anti-war peace formations.

The CPC follows the sentiments of the working class. It fails to criticize the dead end proposed by Social Democrats. It speaks at length about democracy in a "loosey-goosey" abstraction. It fails to tie the economic need to the practical argument for meaningful democracy that is fit for the working class .It is unwilling to flesh-out a democracy that is fit for the working class. It never opposes the simplistic legacy of the anti-communist cold war. The value it places on its members is to see them only as the contributing financial sustaining factors and nothing else. The history of many of its members is seen to be less of a cherished value and more like a weighted anchor. So many veteran activists in unions and cultural groups lament the changing revision of a party that they once loved and lived for. The collapse of the USSR left their personal histories open to nauseating criticism of left over "Stalinism"! The mindless simplification from the left never saw the objective departure the Soviet Union made from the legacy of its prior leader, Joseph Stalin.

Lies that the archives have proven over and over again to be lies, are of no interest to those who wish to condemn a leader who ruled for over thirty year period. The deaths and atrocities that are claimed to have occurred under Stalin, is a right of passage for any modern day revolutionary with membership in the CPC’s in Canada. Rather then defy the age-old falsehoods the CPC plays to them for the hope of landing greater membership. This crass opportunism is a fatal mix that insures the still-birth of any communist upsurge.

When conversion is substituted for principal - limitations follow. Lenin never agonized over a small party or isolation. On the contrary, he celebrated a party of fewer members but with a sharper ideological character. The opposite is unfortunately true for the CPC. The aspiration of a mass party is worthy only if predicated on a solid revolutionary aims and practices. The spontaneous nature of workers open to socialism becomes evident in experiences of mass actions such as strike actions. Then the accepted order of things come into question for a worker, when lines are clearly drawn and social needs are posed against the corporate greed. Picket lines, rallies and demonstrations require practical intervention. An earnest willingness to speak directly to the workers.

The CPC-ML makes such directness, but the format and dogmatic argumentation is numbing so as to lose union members past their personal reflection in their publications. After countless corporate scandals and rotten anti-worker closures, the role of the employer must be targeted.

The CP’s must expect that which can be only be achieved under social ownership of the means of production and must make such demands regardless. The inability and the outgrowth of the present market economy as it applies to private ownership, must the subject of discussions and thought within the working class.

The Communist Parties in Canada are somehow afraid to make such valid and practical arguments. The idea seems to be too forceful and beyond the present experience. Such conservative limitations are self-fulfilling. To have expected the Communist Parties to have radicalized themselves in early 1990’s after the collapse of the Soviet Union is understood.

The real "enemy" is that of private profit motivated capital that now has far replaced such a role. The thought of absolute control and dominance of capital is now ritualistically accepted. The practical and the radical must merge to rip off this fake portrayal. The need to defy and boldly invigorate the working class today is the requirement of the Communist Parties. The nature of these parties will determine whether they will follow the working class. It is more evident with each year that passes that the working class requires the strength and ideological leadership a Communist Party. It is also a very real fact that in politics the extreme movement pulls the middle along with it.

For class- conscious workers in Canada, the need to form or reform such a party is a deep necessity. The formation of such a party, however modest, is to break with the present malaise.

The future is disastrous for Canada’s workers. The present oppositional parties in Canada are tired and confused. The way is clear for a more radicalized and spirited defiance to capitalism. Workers, whether in demonstrations, picket lines or rallies have the worry and wonder mixed with unrelenting hope for a finer collective future.

It is the Communists as it always was, that can lead the way. And it is the Communists in name and deed that can exceed beyond the narrow, hallow dictates of corporate Globalization.