Unions Must Keep Fighting, Conference Told

Written by Local 793 Staff

Unions like the Operating Engineers built this country and we need to continue fighting for what we believe in, Local 793 business manager Mike Gallagher told delegates at the 55th IUOE Canadian conference in Nanaimo, B.C. “We have a responsibility in the labour movement to stand up, stop sitting on our heels and being complacent, […]

Unions like the Operating Engineers built this country and we need to continue fighting for what we believe in, Local 793 business manager Mike Gallagher told delegates at the 55th IUOE Canadian conference in Nanaimo, B.C.
“We have a responsibility in the labour movement to stand up, stop sitting on our heels and being complacent, and do what we did in the past – march on Ottawa or the provincial Legislature or whatever,” he said in a speech on the final day of the conference.
Gallagher was critical of the way some national labour leaders have handled relations with the federal Conservative government, saying they have a responsibility to stand up to governments.
He told the audience it might be time for the Operating Engineers to say, “If you’re not going to do the job properly, we’re not going to send you another dime of our members’ money while you waste it coddling a government that’s destroying our way of life.”
The audience reacted to his comments with a standing ovation.
Gallagher touched on a number of issues in his remarks, including right-to-work and the failure of the Temporary Foreign Worker Program (TFWP).
He said the TFWP is an “abomination” and “a complete failure” and a “failed policy position” because it ignores Aboriginal communities and young people.
“I’m not against immigration,” Gallagher told the audience. “I believe that we should be working with skilled workers who want to come in to this country, become Canadians and live in Canada, not those who take whatever scraps they’ve earned while they’ve been abused on some bridge or mine somewhere, then take it back to where they’re from.”
Unions have to stand up and object and get the government to start spending money on youth, Aboriginals and women, he said.
“Let’s have a policy for made-in-Canada, Canadians first, and cut the crap. We’ve had enough of corporations dishing out little scraps off their tables while creating more failures.
“We have to, in the labour movement and our union, wake up and get out front and say, ‘Enough is enough.’”
On right-to-work, Gallagher said Operating Engineers might be wise to take a page from what Local 18 did in Ohio to let people know that it’s not a workplace freedom act, but a workplace imprisonment act.
“What it is, it’s locking away workers from the rights to have a pension plan, a benefit plan and be represented without discrimination in the bargaining unit.”
Local 18, under business manager Patrick Sink, is, in fact, making progress by revealing the truth about right-to-work legislation.
The local has been aggressive in fighting against right-to-work legislation, running TV ads, and placing ads on billboards and issuing stickers for workers to wear on their hardhats.

Political Action Strategy Being Developed

Written by Local 793 Staff

The Operating Engineers will be putting together a national political action strategy in time for the next federal election in October 2015. A resolution on the matter was passed at the 55th IUOE Canadian conference recently in Nanaimo, B.C. The resolution had been drafted and proposed by Local 793. The executive board of the IUOE […]

The Operating Engineers will be putting together a national political action strategy in time for the next federal election in October 2015.
A resolution on the matter was passed at the 55th IUOE Canadian conference recently in Nanaimo, B.C. The resolution had been drafted and proposed by Local 793.
The executive board of the IUOE Canadian conference will be working with the IUOE Canadian regional office in Ottawa to develop an effective and properly funded action strategy.
The resolution said the federal Conservatives led by Stephen Harper have unfairly targeted trade unions and working families over the last few years and there’s no sign of it subsiding.
The resolution stated that the Conservatives have legislated away workers’ rights in labour disputes at Air Canada, CP Rail and Canada Post, and have implemented changes to EI that will make workers accept jobs at lower wages and travel extensively in order to qualify for benefits. The resolution also stated that the Conservatives have increased the age for collecting Old Age Security to 67 and are working to pass Bills C-377 and C-525.
“Without a co-ordinated strategy to fight back and say clearly that enough is enough, the federal Conservative attack will only continue and likely escalate,” the resolution states.
Local 793 business manager Mike Gallagher had spoken about the need for action in a speech at the conference.
“We have to change the way that we are operating,” he said in his remarks on the final day of the conference. “Our traditions are fine but the ground is moving underneath our feet right now and we’re not getting ahead of all of the challenges that we have coming.”
He said the Operating Engineers, along with other labour unions across Canada, need to step up to the plate and take action because the country is headed in the wrong direction.
“It’s way off on the wrong track and what we’ve done in the labour movement – including ourselves – is we’ve battened down the hatches and we’re trying to hold on to our traditions and we’re not having any kind of success, from what I can see, whatsoever.”
According to the resolution, the Conservatives are likely to continue their attacks on unions.
The resolution states that the only option to ensure that no government is allowed to dismantle all the Operating Engineers and other building trade unions have achieved in terms of improving worker and trade union rights is to develop an effective “fight-back” campaign.