Dutch Emigres from Collaborationist Regime Create CLAC
A point I have wanted to make about CLAC, Christian Labour Assoc. of Canada, in my previous article, is that the origin of their organization is Dutch DP's, displaced peoples who emigrated to Canada after the Second World War.
Holland, which is now an extremely libertarian country, during WWII was a collaborationist country, a fact overlooked by many. While the Vicy government of France has been severely criticized for its collaboration, including internal investigations and trials, the same cannot be said for wartime Holland and the Dutch collaborationists.
There has been less discussion about the collobrationist politics of the Dutch during WWII. They too were occupied by the Nazi's in 1940 as were other sections of Northern Europre in preparation for the Battle of Britain.
Holland was liberated this week sixty years ago by Canadian Forces, my father was a Security Intelligence officer with the Canadian Army as they pressed into Holland during the D-Day operations. He had fond memories of the liberation of Holland, and of the Dutch peoples.
The Dutch, as did the French and other Northern European citizens, created resistance cells against the Nazi's. But the majority of the Dutch were under collaborationist rule. The result was the deportation of 70% of Hollands Jews to death camps, including the famous Anne Frank.
After WWII Canada and the US became a haven for collaborationsts as Cold War allies against the Soviets. The DP policy adopted by both countries aided and abetted the collaborationists in their exit from Europe.
Like operation Odessa by the Catholic Church, and the CIA extraction of General Gehlen of the SS intelligence service Russian division, the immigration policies of both countries favoured the collaborationist emigre's.
Canada and the US became home to the displaced Ukrainina fascists of the Ukrainian National Army UNO, who collaborated with the Nazi's, and went on the create the World Anti-Bolshevik League now known as the World Anti-Communist League, home of wayward fascists.
Fascists always defend their politics as 'anti-communism'.
CLAC founded in 1954, took advantage of the red scare to hide its collaborationist origins behind the mask of anti-communism at the height of the Cold War.
Notorious deportation camp remembered
AMSTERDAM, Netherlands (CP) - Dutch Prime Minister Jan Peter Balkenende criticized his country's collaboration with its Nazi occupiers during the Second World War on Tuesday, shortly before commemorating the 60th anniversary of the liberation of the country's main deportation camp.
Balkenende said government authorities at the time "worked on the horrible process whereby Jews were stripped of their rights," Dutch public broadcaster NOS reported.
Thousands of survivors, soldiers and students gathered for a solemn ceremony at Westerbork camp, in the eastern Dutch countryside, where Jews and others considered enemies of the Nazi regime were detained before being deported to death camps in Poland and Germany.
Westerbork was liberated by Canadian troops, and 876 prisoners were freed. Members of the South Saskatchewan Regiment and the 8th Reconnaissance Regiment rolled into the camp April 12, 1945, releasing the inmates.
Many of those present Tuesday laid flowers at the camp's memorial - a short length of railroad tracks with one end twisted up skyward.
"It's a wonder that I exist," said Eveline Hertzberger, whose grandparents were interned at Westerbork.
She said she and other descendants of survivors were living proof that the Nazis had failed. "We're still here. The suffering wasn't for nothing. We bring honour to our history and our race."
More than 100,000 Dutch Jews - 70 per cent of the country's Jewish community - were deported from the Netherlands after Germany occupied the country in May 1940, with the efficient help of Dutch authorities.
Westerbork was run with minimal guidance from the Nazis; Dutch policemen handled security and a council of internees determined who was selected for deportation.
Most Dutch victims of the Holocaust, including the German-born teenage diarist Anne Frank, were held temporarily at the camp, 160 kilometres northeast of Amsterdam and not far from the German border. It was destroyed after the war.
Deportees were sent to death camps in Germany and Poland and most died in gas chambers, among the six million Jewish victims of the Nazi genocide. Frank died in Germany of typhus.
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Wednesday, April 13, 2005
Thursday, March 01, 2007
Labour Shortage = Union Busting
The only labour shortage in Alberta is finding unskilled folks to work at Timmies, and even there they are now paying $14 an hour plus benefits. But as for skilled labour, well they are working there too because they can't find jobs through the Merit Contractors and their business pals like CNRL and the Padrone's of CLAC.
These guys being anti-union would rather hire temporary workers for $14 dollars an hour no benefits. To do union jobs that pay over $22 an hour with benefits.
And since our new Minister of Human Resources; Monte Solberg loves his Timmies it's no wonder he is joining his pals in the non-union construction sector in Alberta calling for more Temporary Workers. Thats so more unionized workers can get jobs at Timmies. There are lots of unemployed skilled workers in Alberta, but of course they belong to the building trades unions.
Companies like CNRL and others that are using Merit Shops to build oilsands projects are taking advantage of this to undercut the unions. Heck even right wing Edmonton Sun Columnist Neil Waugh noted this 'fact' last summer. And he notes it again today in a scathing attack on lack of planning by the new Stelmach regime.
That's because the Merit Shops are not independent contractors at all but spin offs of unionized companies! Merit Shops are about as independent as CLAC is an independent union. Neither of them are and both are spin offs of Alberta's Big Construction Companies trying to bust the Building Trades Unions.
See
Labour Shortage
Find blog posts, photos, events and more off-site about:
CLAC, unions, labour shortage, Monte Solberg, Canada, Alberta, tarsands, oilsands, labour, labor, work, jobs, IBEW, Merit Contractors, non-union, rat unions, yellow dog union, Timmies, Tim Hortons, temporary workers
These guys being anti-union would rather hire temporary workers for $14 dollars an hour no benefits. To do union jobs that pay over $22 an hour with benefits.
Worker shortage a 'myth' - union
'Lots of skilled people in province'
Alberta's labour shortage is a myth, says the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers.Tim Brower, IBEW Local 424 business manager, says non-union contractors are using the "myth" of a labour shortage to bring in temporary foreign workers who are taking away jobs from Albertans. "There is a shortage of unskilled people in this province. I won't deny that," he told reporters at the legislature yesterday. "Tim Hortons is looking for people. 7-Eleven is looking for people ... but when it comes to skilled people in this province, there is no shortage. I am the expert. I have them available."Brower said 1,000 electricians in his union are unemployed or working other jobs because they can't find work in their trade. "I have run into my members working at Home Depot handing out electrical components," he said. "Some of them are driving trucks.
And since our new Minister of Human Resources; Monte Solberg loves his Timmies it's no wonder he is joining his pals in the non-union construction sector in Alberta calling for more Temporary Workers. Thats so more unionized workers can get jobs at Timmies. There are lots of unemployed skilled workers in Alberta, but of course they belong to the building trades unions.
Companies like CNRL and others that are using Merit Shops to build oilsands projects are taking advantage of this to undercut the unions. Heck even right wing Edmonton Sun Columnist Neil Waugh noted this 'fact' last summer. And he notes it again today in a scathing attack on lack of planning by the new Stelmach regime.
That's because the Merit Shops are not independent contractors at all but spin offs of unionized companies! Merit Shops are about as independent as CLAC is an independent union. Neither of them are and both are spin offs of Alberta's Big Construction Companies trying to bust the Building Trades Unions.
Kushner is the president of the Merit Contractors Association and the person most responsible for getting a review of the Code rolling. Call them merit contractors, or open shops, it all means non-union (or at the very most, an "alternative" labour group such as the Christian Labour Association of Canada).
Alberta's non-union construction industry began 20 years ago, as the oil price slump of the early 1980s shut down jobs and pushed companies into bankruptcy. Driven by the earlier, decades-long boom and labour shortage, construction labour relations had become a perpetual upward spiral of wage increases. Faced with the crunch, companies had to cut costs or go under.
The end result was the famous "spin-off" company, a term industry people are reluctant to use to this day. After locking out their employees for 25 hours, the firm would hire them back in a subsidiary company, or through a labour broker, at lower wages. After the dust settled, the complexion of Alberta�s construction industry had changed forever.
Today, there are few union contractors working in the commercial/institutional sector, while the large industrial projects are built almost exclusively by organized labour. The Merit Contractors Association represents 670 companies in Alberta, employing over 20,000 persons who complete 32 million hours of construction work annually. The Association has been growing at a rate of 36% a year, for the past four years. During those four years, it�s been lobbying ceaselessly, in its own right and through its members, for changes to workplace legislation, making annual presentations at Standing Policy Committee and appearances at Conservative Party functions.
See
Labour Shortage
History of the WRF
Alberta's Free Market In Labour
The Labour Shortage Myth
AFL Agrees With Me
Lack of Planning Created Skills Shortage in Alberta
Find blog posts, photos, events and more off-site about:
CLAC, unions, labour shortage, Monte Solberg, Canada, Alberta, tarsands, oilsands, labour, labor, work, jobs, IBEW, Merit Contractors, non-union, rat unions, yellow dog union, Timmies, Tim Hortons, temporary workers
Saturday, September 26, 2020
TAX THE CHURCH!
Putting the R-word in politics: How religion has become the sleeper issue of the 2019 election
The remaining 80 per cent is broken up among the aforementioned activities, again using percentages from other studies, and then the money is calculated from there, for example, 3.5 per cent, or $1.2 billion for safety net supports. The largest cohort, categorized as “individual impact,” is worth about $13.4 billion, or 38 per cent of the total. That includes the benefits, broadly, of providing support “to individuals, couples, and families,” the report says.
“Housing, food banks, care for immigrants and refugees, care for those who are in abusive situations, often it’s people in religious communities who are the first responders to that,” said Dijkema.
“Often people, when they think of religion, they think of people praying privately … but I think what this shows is the religious character of many communities in Canada have vast and under-appreciated public effects.”
The study doesn’t consider some all potential effects of faith, though. While Christmas, for example, is worth about $10 billion to the Canadian economy, Cardus ignores it, since it is not necessarily directly attributable to faith.
As well, Cardus cautions the study doesn’t account for some of the negative influences of religious life. They also say the “most important” limitation is that the estimate of the value of goods and services “is based on the proposition that the findings from other halo-effect studies can be extrapolated up to the national level.”
CARDUS IS A NEO CALVANIST THINK TANK FROM THE SOUTH AFRICAN BASED DUTCH REFORM CHURCH AND ITS FORMER RIGHT WING LABOUR THINK TANK THAT BECAME CLAC THEIR MANAGEMENT UNION AND NOW CARDUS. IT HIRES DUTCH SOUTH AFRIKANERS IT IS LINKED TO THE RIGHT WING REFORMED CHURCH MEMEBERS LIKE BETSY DEVOS IN THE USA AND THE AMERICAN RIGHT WING THINK TANK THE ACTON INSTITUTE.
Religion and its services contribute $67.5 billion to the Canadian economy, calculates new study
Tyler Dawson
Provided by National Post
Tyler Dawson
Provided by National Post
A service is held at St. Eugene De Mazenod Catholic Church in Brampton.
Even as the proportion of the faithful in Canada declines, the activities of religious people and organizations account for nearly $67.5 billion of economic activity in Canada each year, according to estimates in a new paper from Cardus, a faith-based Canadian think tank.
“There is a broad, wide and overall totally beneficial effect of religion on the lives of everyday Canadians, on our country, on our social safety, and that applies to people not just who are religious,” said Brian Dijkema, vice-president of external affairs at Cardus. “It shows the broader public benefit of religion to Canadian society as a whole.”
The report, the first of its kind in Canada to tally up the economic impact of faith, suggests there are hard-dollar contributions to the economy, worth about $31 billion, which considers the revenues of faith-based charities, organizations and congregations. Then there is a further $37 billion in “halo effects,” which tallies up the economic impact of things such as substance-abuse support, or kosher and halal food sales.
“Understanding the socioeconomic value of religion to Canadian society is especially important in the present era characterized by disaffiliation from organized religion,” the report, released Monday, says. “Of course, faith has much more value than is represented by a dollar estimate, but such a valuation provides a new way of understanding the contribution of faith to Canadian society.”
Of the nearly 38 million people in Canada, roughly half (55 per cent) are Christians of one persuasion or another, according to a PEW study from 2019; a further 29 per cent are some variety of agnostic, up from just four per cent in 1971. A further eight per cent fall among other religions, such as Sikh, Hindu, Muslim, Jewish and Buddhist.
To come up with its estimates, Cardus trawled through charitable returns, school and religious health-care financial documents and religious publication revenues.
Of the direct economic contribution of $31 billion, the lion’s share is publicly funded Catholic schools, which is a total of $14.5 billion. The next most significant economic outlay is congregation revenue at $7 billion, then health care at $4.7 billion. The remainder is made up by independent schools, charities, higher education and religious media.
The most important part of the estimate, said Dijkema, involves the “halo effect” of religion.
“We’re talking about $35 billion worth of activity that takes place simply because these religious communities are committed to making the lives of their members and their community that much better,” he said.
The report catalogues several ways in which religion provides additional economic benefits: religious employees, for example, pay taxes; congregations spend in local economies; churches attract revenue-generating activities such as weddings and provide an “invisible safety net” of social services (Cardus says that 47 per cent of Alcoholics Anonymous meetings happen in churches.)
These estimates use modelling from other studies. To come up with its total indirect spending estimate of $37 billion, Cardus assumes congregations spend what they bring in, approximately $7 billion, but that represents only 20 per cent, per the other research, of total congregation activity.
Even as the proportion of the faithful in Canada declines, the activities of religious people and organizations account for nearly $67.5 billion of economic activity in Canada each year, according to estimates in a new paper from Cardus, a faith-based Canadian think tank.
“There is a broad, wide and overall totally beneficial effect of religion on the lives of everyday Canadians, on our country, on our social safety, and that applies to people not just who are religious,” said Brian Dijkema, vice-president of external affairs at Cardus. “It shows the broader public benefit of religion to Canadian society as a whole.”
The report, the first of its kind in Canada to tally up the economic impact of faith, suggests there are hard-dollar contributions to the economy, worth about $31 billion, which considers the revenues of faith-based charities, organizations and congregations. Then there is a further $37 billion in “halo effects,” which tallies up the economic impact of things such as substance-abuse support, or kosher and halal food sales.
“Understanding the socioeconomic value of religion to Canadian society is especially important in the present era characterized by disaffiliation from organized religion,” the report, released Monday, says. “Of course, faith has much more value than is represented by a dollar estimate, but such a valuation provides a new way of understanding the contribution of faith to Canadian society.”
Of the nearly 38 million people in Canada, roughly half (55 per cent) are Christians of one persuasion or another, according to a PEW study from 2019; a further 29 per cent are some variety of agnostic, up from just four per cent in 1971. A further eight per cent fall among other religions, such as Sikh, Hindu, Muslim, Jewish and Buddhist.
To come up with its estimates, Cardus trawled through charitable returns, school and religious health-care financial documents and religious publication revenues.
Of the direct economic contribution of $31 billion, the lion’s share is publicly funded Catholic schools, which is a total of $14.5 billion. The next most significant economic outlay is congregation revenue at $7 billion, then health care at $4.7 billion. The remainder is made up by independent schools, charities, higher education and religious media.
The most important part of the estimate, said Dijkema, involves the “halo effect” of religion.
“We’re talking about $35 billion worth of activity that takes place simply because these religious communities are committed to making the lives of their members and their community that much better,” he said.
The report catalogues several ways in which religion provides additional economic benefits: religious employees, for example, pay taxes; congregations spend in local economies; churches attract revenue-generating activities such as weddings and provide an “invisible safety net” of social services (Cardus says that 47 per cent of Alcoholics Anonymous meetings happen in churches.)
These estimates use modelling from other studies. To come up with its total indirect spending estimate of $37 billion, Cardus assumes congregations spend what they bring in, approximately $7 billion, but that represents only 20 per cent, per the other research, of total congregation activity.
Putting the R-word in politics: How religion has become the sleeper issue of the 2019 election
The remaining 80 per cent is broken up among the aforementioned activities, again using percentages from other studies, and then the money is calculated from there, for example, 3.5 per cent, or $1.2 billion for safety net supports. The largest cohort, categorized as “individual impact,” is worth about $13.4 billion, or 38 per cent of the total. That includes the benefits, broadly, of providing support “to individuals, couples, and families,” the report says.
“Housing, food banks, care for immigrants and refugees, care for those who are in abusive situations, often it’s people in religious communities who are the first responders to that,” said Dijkema.
“Often people, when they think of religion, they think of people praying privately … but I think what this shows is the religious character of many communities in Canada have vast and under-appreciated public effects.”
The study doesn’t consider some all potential effects of faith, though. While Christmas, for example, is worth about $10 billion to the Canadian economy, Cardus ignores it, since it is not necessarily directly attributable to faith.
As well, Cardus cautions the study doesn’t account for some of the negative influences of religious life. They also say the “most important” limitation is that the estimate of the value of goods and services “is based on the proposition that the findings from other halo-effect studies can be extrapolated up to the national level.”
CARDUS IS A NEO CALVANIST THINK TANK FROM THE SOUTH AFRICAN BASED DUTCH REFORM CHURCH AND ITS FORMER RIGHT WING LABOUR THINK TANK THAT BECAME CLAC THEIR MANAGEMENT UNION AND NOW CARDUS. IT HIRES DUTCH SOUTH AFRIKANERS IT IS LINKED TO THE RIGHT WING REFORMED CHURCH MEMEBERS LIKE BETSY DEVOS IN THE USA AND THE AMERICAN RIGHT WING THINK TANK THE ACTON INSTITUTE.
SEVERAL CANADIAN CALVINIST UNIVERSITIES CONTRIBUTE
TO CARDUS/CLAC.
SEE
Friday, October 19, 2007
How Do You Spell Sell Out?
B U Z Z.
CAW shelves right to strike
In Alberta workers are fighting to change our regressive labour laws to allow the right to strike which was recognized this summer by the Supreme Court. In Ontario workers are being sold out by once progressive talking union leader Buzz Hargrove. All so he can increase his declining membership and assure his pork choppers their salaries. It is sending a chill through out the Canadian labour movement.
Hey maybe Buzz would like to move to Alberta, since the bosses here would love this kind of agreement. In fact thats why CLAC is so popular with employers out here. So what's the difference between CAW and the employee management consultants from CLAC....nothing.
Neither of these moves were not about democracy or workers rights, since both unions have hired staff and their own management structures. Rather it was about money. In the CAW's case busting a rival union and gaining its members, in AUPE's case retaining affiliation fees they could use themselves.
Now Buzz has gone even further with the potential of 20,000 dues paying workers with a forced dues check off, the Rand Formula, and no right to strike, he will be able to use those funds to balance the books as more attrition hits the auto sector and more of his members retire.
It's a cynical and shallow motive but one that should be expected by business unions that no longer see their purpose as overthrowing capitalism but as getting their members the best deal they can under capitalism.
Once upon a time unions like CAW and others called themselves Social Unions
somehow different from their American International business union counterparts. They were about fighting globalization and neo-liberalism. Buzz has repeatedly claimed he is left wing. Yep the left wing of capitalism.
Today the CAW as I predicted, is all about adapting to globalization and neo-liberalism in order to give Canadian corporations a fighting chance in the world market.
This is not unlike the recent mergers of the International Transportation and Steel unions and other international unions that are facing declining memberships and lack of bargaining power.
Once again the unions show they are merely an extension of capitalism not an alternative to it.
That alternative exists and it is Revolutionary Syndicalism that was birthed with the IWW over a hundred years ago.
See:
Unions the State and Capital
Global Labour in the Age of Empire
WHITHER SOCIAL DEMOCRACY?
THE CRISIS OF CAPITALISM, LABOUR AND THE NDP
A SOCIALIST PERSPECTIVE
Will Canadian Labour Accept Free Trade?
Buzz Hargrove,
Liberals, unionization,
CAW, Canada, auto, automobile, Frank Stronach, Magna, business unions, auto parts
CAW shelves right to strike
In Alberta workers are fighting to change our regressive labour laws to allow the right to strike which was recognized this summer by the Supreme Court. In Ontario workers are being sold out by once progressive talking union leader Buzz Hargrove. All so he can increase his declining membership and assure his pork choppers their salaries. It is sending a chill through out the Canadian labour movement.
Hey maybe Buzz would like to move to Alberta, since the bosses here would love this kind of agreement. In fact thats why CLAC is so popular with employers out here. So what's the difference between CAW and the employee management consultants from CLAC....nothing.
Hargrove recognizes the need for his business union to adapt to modern business practices, mergers and acquisitions to expand the base of capital (union dues). This began when CAW raided SEIU for its members, claiming it was doing it in the name of democratic social unionism. Which got CAW temporarily removed from the CLC. AUPE in Alberta followed CAW's lead and left the AFL and CLC declaring itself an indepedent union, with support from Buzz.If workers vote in favour of the CAW and the contract at their plant, any subsequent collective bargaining disputes would be resolved through binding arbitration rather than a walkout by the union or a lockout by the company.
The fundamental right to withdraw labour is a provision that unions have protected vigorously for decades as its only ultimate power against management.
But the CAW's decision to give up the right to strike triggered criticism from other labour leaders.
"It's a pretty drastic measure and ultimately is not good for workers because they no longer have the right to withdraw their labour," said Wayne Samuelson, president of the Ontario Federation of Labour.
"It's pretty fundamental to the labour movement and collective bargaining. This is not good, especially if it's exchanged for voluntary recognition of the union. It certainly sets a precedent that working people need to be concerned about."
"Hargrove is creating CAW-employer associations," added Wayne Fraser, Ontario-Atlantic director of the United Steelworkers. "What's to stop other employers, especially Magna competitors, from rightfully asking the CAW for the same no-strike right."
Hargrove said it wouldn't be possible for other auto-parts companies with a union to demand the same provision. However, a non-union employer could get a similar arrangement, he said. "Invite us in."
Neither of these moves were not about democracy or workers rights, since both unions have hired staff and their own management structures. Rather it was about money. In the CAW's case busting a rival union and gaining its members, in AUPE's case retaining affiliation fees they could use themselves.
Now Buzz has gone even further with the potential of 20,000 dues paying workers with a forced dues check off, the Rand Formula, and no right to strike, he will be able to use those funds to balance the books as more attrition hits the auto sector and more of his members retire.
It's a cynical and shallow motive but one that should be expected by business unions that no longer see their purpose as overthrowing capitalism but as getting their members the best deal they can under capitalism.
Once upon a time unions like CAW and others called themselves Social Unions
somehow different from their American International business union counterparts. They were about fighting globalization and neo-liberalism. Buzz has repeatedly claimed he is left wing. Yep the left wing of capitalism.
Today the CAW as I predicted, is all about adapting to globalization and neo-liberalism in order to give Canadian corporations a fighting chance in the world market.
| Oct 19, 2007 | Sam Gindin | The CAW and Magna: Disorganizing the Working Class | |
| Through the 1980s and 1990s, as the attacks on past working class gains intensified, the Canadian Auto Workers Union (CAW) was widely recognized – not just in North America but abroad – as standing at the forefront of working class resistance. With the Magna-CAW Agreement signed on October 15, 2007, the CAW now seems at the forefront of working class desperation and defeat... | |||
This is not unlike the recent mergers of the International Transportation and Steel unions and other international unions that are facing declining memberships and lack of bargaining power.
Once again the unions show they are merely an extension of capitalism not an alternative to it.
That alternative exists and it is Revolutionary Syndicalism that was birthed with the IWW over a hundred years ago.
The employing class and the working class have nothing in common."
Preamble to the IWW Constitution
"When the working class unites, there will be a lot of jobless labor leaders."
Eugene Debs, 1905 speech to the IWW Convention
See:
Unions the State and Capital
Global Labour in the Age of Empire
WHITHER SOCIAL DEMOCRACY?
THE CRISIS OF CAPITALISM, LABOUR AND THE NDP
A SOCIALIST PERSPECTIVE
Will Canadian Labour Accept Free Trade?
Business Unions Sell-out B.C. General Strike
Nationalism Will Not Stop North American Union
This is Class WarCAW To Leave CLC?
Sniveling NDP
Labour Abandons the NDP
Unite the Left
Find blog posts, photos, events and more off-site about:Buzz Hargrove,
Liberals, unionization,
CAW, Canada, auto, automobile, Frank Stronach, Magna, business unions, auto parts
Saturday, November 10, 2007
A Union the Conservatives Like
The 'bosses favorite union' Christian Labour Association of Canada (CLAC) and its front group the Work Research Foundation.
Their 'Christian' views are those of Calvinist protestant sect; the Christian Reformed Church in Canada for whom both organizations are front groups.
They are ideologically right wing and organizers have been active in the Reform party as well as the Conservative Party. They are avowedly anti-Social Democrat and pro right to work.
Find blog posts, photos, events and more off-site about:
CLAC, unions, labour shortage, Jason Kenney, labour, Christian Reformed Church, work, Christian Labour Association of Canada, WRF, Work Research Foundation, non-union, rat unions, yellow dog union,
Secretary of State Kenney Attends Work Research Foundation Presentation About Vimy Ridge
MOUNT HOPE, Ontario, November 8, 2007 -- The Honourable Jason Kenney, Secretary of State (Multiculturalism and Canadian Identity), will attend tomorrow the Work Research Foundation's presentation "Leadership Lessons From Vimy Ridge" at the Canadian Warplane Heritage Museum.
As part of Veterans' Week, the presentation will deliver a message about Canada's historic role in World War I's Battle of Vimy Ridge and honour the Canadians involved in that battle.
"The Government of Canada remembers and honours the achievements of the extraordinary men and women who have served and are serving Canada," said Secretary of State Kenney. "I am pleased to attend this presentation and I commend the Work Research Foundation on its efforts to commemorate the sacrifices and achievements of our veterans and to help Canadians draw leadership lessons from the Battle of Vimy Ridge."
"Secretary of State Jason Kenney speaks and thinks with a powerful knowledge of history framing his words. He not only honours the courage and sacrifice of our Canadian soldiers, but he honours the great ideas of history that we seek to protect and for which Canadian men and women have given their lives," said Michael Van Pelt, President of the Work Research Foundation.
The Work Research Foundation is a not-for-profit foundation that was incorporated in 1974 with a mission to advance a Christian view of work, civic society, and public life. The foundation functions as a research organization and think-tank focussing on productivity and work relationships.
Their 'Christian' views are those of Calvinist protestant sect; the Christian Reformed Church in Canada for whom both organizations are front groups.
They are ideologically right wing and organizers have been active in the Reform party as well as the Conservative Party. They are avowedly anti-Social Democrat and pro right to work.
Find blog posts, photos, events and more off-site about:
CLAC, unions, labour shortage, Jason Kenney, labour, Christian Reformed Church, work, Christian Labour Association of Canada, WRF, Work Research Foundation, non-union, rat unions, yellow dog union,
Wednesday, February 01, 2006
Marriage Debate
A year ago when I launched this blog I posted this as one of my first articles:
Today I see it is still relevant, since there are idiots out there saying this:
Marriage is not merely a right. It is an institution that predates all states.
Once again the christian fundamentalist right wing will try any arguement to deny the reality that Same Sex Marriage is now legal in Canada. And will probably remain so despite the Harper government promise to revist this.
Originally posted by Burkean Canuck, which should tell you something of his politics, aristocratic apologist that Edmund Burke was. Appropriately he has a union jack on his blog page, still thinks we are a bloody colony of the British Empire. Probably a loyalist, slave owners that they were.
Which is not that far off since the Author, Russ Kuykendall is also a Research Director for t the Work Research Foundation.
WRF is a front group for the anti-union right wing labour 'association' CLAC (Christian Labour Association of Canada). Both the WRF and CLAC were founded by members of the Dutch based Christian Reformed Church of Canada. The CRCC was one of the last of the Reformed churches to break with it's partner in Aparthied the CRC of South Africa.
The article was cross posted to the Shotgun blog, where it has generated much heat and little light, around sixty or more comments. Some libertarians going to battle for the fact that human sexual relationships were not based on marriage but on communal sexual relationships in tribes. This is true, they were also not based on private property which is the sole source for the institution of marriage, property relations, as I argued. Matrilinear inheritance was that the child carried the mothers name, not the fathers in these societies.
To sum up my arguement contrary to the B.S. floated around by right wing fundamentalist christians, MARRIAGE IS A STATE INSTITUTION AND A PROPERTY RELATIONSHIP. It is a modern development of the city states of the Ancient world, post Etruscan, where the woman owned property as did her husband, and is codified into law by Greeks and Romans.
A tip o the blog to Ianism for this.
Also see:
Whose Family Values?
Marx on Bigamy
Tags
gay
anarchism
feminism
socialism
Canada
Politics
women
marriage
Same Sex Marriage
The Sanctity of Marriage Debate What’s Love got to do with it?
An Anarchist Response to The Sanctity of Marriage Debate
Today I see it is still relevant, since there are idiots out there saying this:
Marriage is not merely a right. It is an institution that predates all states.
Once again the christian fundamentalist right wing will try any arguement to deny the reality that Same Sex Marriage is now legal in Canada. And will probably remain so despite the Harper government promise to revist this.
Originally posted by Burkean Canuck, which should tell you something of his politics, aristocratic apologist that Edmund Burke was. Appropriately he has a union jack on his blog page, still thinks we are a bloody colony of the British Empire. Probably a loyalist, slave owners that they were.
Which is not that far off since the Author, Russ Kuykendall is also a Research Director for t the Work Research Foundation.
WRF is a front group for the anti-union right wing labour 'association' CLAC (Christian Labour Association of Canada). Both the WRF and CLAC were founded by members of the Dutch based Christian Reformed Church of Canada. The CRCC was one of the last of the Reformed churches to break with it's partner in Aparthied the CRC of South Africa.
The article was cross posted to the Shotgun blog, where it has generated much heat and little light, around sixty or more comments. Some libertarians going to battle for the fact that human sexual relationships were not based on marriage but on communal sexual relationships in tribes. This is true, they were also not based on private property which is the sole source for the institution of marriage, property relations, as I argued. Matrilinear inheritance was that the child carried the mothers name, not the fathers in these societies.
To sum up my arguement contrary to the B.S. floated around by right wing fundamentalist christians, MARRIAGE IS A STATE INSTITUTION AND A PROPERTY RELATIONSHIP. It is a modern development of the city states of the Ancient world, post Etruscan, where the woman owned property as did her husband, and is codified into law by Greeks and Romans.
A tip o the blog to Ianism for this.
Also see:
Whose Family Values?
Marx on Bigamy
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Tuesday, July 26, 2005
This is Class War
The Only Labour Relations between Workers and Bosses is Class War!
"The employing class and the working class have nothing in common."
Preamble to the IWW Constitution
It is time for the Labour Movement in
In
A disputes inquiry is being held into the
For a dozen years, Ralph says his government won't pick winners and losers in the marketplace. Then, late Tuesday, the Klein Tories pick a winner and a loser.
They use the heavy hammer of Big Government and call off a legal strike at Lakeside Packers in Brooks, a walkout slated to commence early yesterday morning.
Winner. Lakeside Packers, a slaughterhouse owned by the world's biggest meat merchant, Tyson Foods of the U.S. of A.
Losers. The employees at Lakeside Packers.
Tyson is happy. Their plant is operating. Reports surface of supervisors telling employees the union is powerless.
Doug is left to calm down his members, more than half are new Canadians and most are from Sudan, fleeing from a full-scale human slaughter by a dictatorship bent on genocide.
They don't understand what is happening. Why is the government in this democratic land not protecting them? They are also angry with the union for not fighting, not realizing the union has no choice with the province playing favourites.
Doug advises them to obey the law and go to work. The union asks Cardinal to address the rank and file. He passes.
Then O'Halloran speaks words no one with any sense of fair play wants to hear.
"I think they screwed us," he says, of the province.
Ralph Screws Workers Calgary Sun Cries Foul
"Where is the government all this time?" Ringe Lual, a trimmer of the plant, said of the lengthy negotiations that led to Wednesday's strike deadline. "Why they step in at [the] last minute? Where are they all this time?"
What a Friend Tysons has in Ralph
Mason urges arbitration to resolve Lakeside dispute
Says appointment of a Disputes Inquiry Board favours Tyson over workers
NDP Opposition Leader Brian Mason today sent a letter to Human Resources and Employment Minister Mike Cardinal condemning the government’s deliberate use of labour legislation to favour Tyson Foods over unionized workers at its Lakeside plant near Brooks.
Government 'dirty tricks' in Lakeside dispute? Would 'impartial umpire' choose sides? Asks AFL
While unions have representatives on the LRB so do the bosses and the government picks who it wants as chair.
In this case the chair is a management lawyer representing the anti-union Construction Industry Merit Shops who have sweetheart contracts with CLAC. He was appointed by the Klein Government after they fired the pro-labour Chair when they didn't like one of his rulings in favour of the union.
There is no fair or level playing field for workers in
The Faces of Labour Relations in Alberta
AUPE President Dan MacLennan and Alberta Premier Ralph Klein chat during the premier’s Klondike Day’s breakfast July 26 on the Legislature grounds in Edmonton. The annual event was attended by thousands of AUPE members. ( they are golf pals too. ep)
AUPE President Dan MacLennan and Alberta Premier Ralph Klein chat during the premier’s Klondike Day’s breakfast July 26 on the Legislature grounds in Edmonton. The annual event was attended by thousands of AUPE members. ( they are golf pals too. ep)
And now we have Telus getting support from the Canadian Industrial Labour Relations Board and the Supreme Court of B.C. If this isn't enough to ring the clarion bell of class war I don't know what will.
Telus wins injunction against striking workers
Phone company Telus has won an injunction barring striking union members from blocking access to company premises in
The B.C. Supreme Court granted the injunction Friday, a day after the Telecommunications Workers Union (TWU) went on strike."This is a very broad and positive ruling that gives Telus the ability we need to ensure our team members can safely come to work and serve our customers," Audrey Ho, the company's vice-president of legal services, said in a statement Saturday. The decision also bars the TWU from picketing at or near customers' premises, the company said.
New contract implemented by Telus
Labour board doesn't stop unilateral move
A major work stoppage at Telus Corp. entered its second day yesterday as the company went ahead and unilaterally implemented a contract offer that its main union has spurned.
Vancouver-based Telus essentially got the green light to proceed on Thursday evening. That's when the Canada Industrial Relations Board issued a key decision that didn't order the removal of lockout measures introduced in April. This has allowed Telus to continue with plans announced last week to implement the contract yesterday. “It's an endorsement of what we've been going through,” Telus vice-president of corporate affairs Drew McArthur said yesterday. “The CIRB has found that we're well within our rights to take the approach that we have.”
Unions in
A hostile legal and regulatory climate explains much of the disjuncture between provincial macroeconomic success, and the ho-hum economic condition of Alberta' workforce. Rules regarding union organising, certification, strikes, and picketing are the toughest in Canada. This is at least as important as the much-vaunted "free enterprise" culture of the province in explaining the low level of unionisation. Alberta's low provincial minimum wage also helps keep wages from getting out of hand.
In this context, economic progress for working people will not descend upon their hands like manna from the free-market heavens. Workers will get what they demand and what they fight for. All of which brings us to the Herald strike.
It's no accident that this bitter strike is occurring in Alberta. The issues being confronted by the strikers will rear their heads across the country, as the Southam chain is restructured and reoriented. Indeed, if the strikers lose, the employees of newspapers elsewhere in Canada can expect to face demands for the elimination of seniority protection and other concessions. Calgary is a great place for Southam's management to test-drive its new policies.
In this sense, then, Alberta's anti-union institutions clearly promote the sorts of bitter conflicts that they are purportedly designed to prevent. A tilted playing field does not stop workers from fighting for their rights; it only makes those struggles more difficult and violent than they need to be. The determination of the Herald strikers is simply more evidence of that historical finding.
But playing on the reformist ideals of the trade union movement, that it is a partner in capitalism, the state and the bosses created Labour Relations Boards and the Labour Relations Industry. A whole new profession for left leaning progressive lawyers and members of the NDP.
It is the Management’s Rights clause, the recognition that Capital dominates the workplace and is the owner of the means of production that solidified the AFL/CIO industrial unions, as the handmaidens of capitalist production in the post war era. Workers Power was now not a revolutionary power to overthrow the capitalist system, but a form of fixed capital to be bargained with for the crumbs of an expanding capitalist system.
The strength of the IWW was its refusal to give up the right to wobble the job, no contract was signed that ever gave up the right to walk off the job over grievances. This development of the Management’s rights clause is key to the development of a whole legal, labour industry of paid reps, service or insurance model unions, labour and employer lawyers, mediators, arbitrators, all the functionaries of the state. The growth of the labour law industry and labour relations boards, etc necessitates the unions and management being part of the capitalist state. On the shop floor the post WWIi unions bargained away their members rights for a guaranty of increasing wages and benefits, while at the same time the unions recognized the State as arbitrator of the social contract, one which created a tripartite relationship between the state, capital and labour. This social contract was the realization of the dreams of the second international, social peace replaced class war.
Unions, the State and Capital
Unpublished Paper by Eugene Plawiuk, 2003
By giving up the right to take direct action on the job, that is to 'wobble' the job over grievances, leads unions into the morass of labour relations games.
The idea of eliminating the management rights clause in collective agreements was raised not by radical syndicalists, but by the outgoing chair of the Industrial Relations Society in the
A learned judge he saw management's rights as the clause which not only limits union’s abilities to represent their members but restricts union members from getting immediate satisfaction over their grievances. There is no level playing field for workers with collective agreements that allow for management rights and for a grievance arbitration procedure.
There is no justice in the courts or the labour relations tribunals. They are there to enforce LAW AND ORDER. To make sure production is not disrupted by strikes. Even short two hour strikes that would resolve an immediate grievance on the shop floor.
They exist to limit, restrict and make illegal direct action by workers. And to have our unions sit on these boards, and play tripartite footsie with the bosses is what drives workers mad, as in angry. Cause we always lose.
Alberta Workers Angry at Government and Union
The process of grievance arbitration is long and drawn out, and can take years to resolve. And if it is a case of being unjustly fired from a job, the cash you get will be far less than the non-union worker who can take the issue to court under common law as constructive dismissal and get a settlement for more money faster.
Business Unions act on behalf of the company, not on behalf of their members. They promise to make their workers tow the line; they act as agents of Law and Order on the shop floor. What’s good for GM is good for CAW.
It is only when workers strike and run their own strike committees, can workers take power over their lives and away from the union hacks.
Canfor workers back on the job in Prince George after wildcat strike
A case in point is the
Doug is a deal maker, he wants a contract, he wants a deal, he's looking after his and UFCW's best interests. Yep but both he and UFCW don't care about their members interests. Because whatever happens they have a pool of dues paying members who fatten their bank accounts.
To what end? Well to buy a million dollar house as a retirement gift to their outgoing International President as they did in the 1990's.
You'd think with all their money and lawyers, UFCW and O'Halloran would have the guts to challenge an unfair anti-worker ruling on behalf of the folks who pay his lucrative salary. Nope, not a chance.
You would think that the labour movement, that so called house of labour would organize their members to join mass pickets during strikes. Instead they make a toke show on the picket line.
'Good turnout' includes support from B.C. and local unions
To really shut down Telus, right now would take thousands of workers marching the picket line in solidarity with TWU workers.
And is this likely to happen? Nope. Most unions are lucky to mobilize two or three well paid reps to attend the picket line. And they always have excuses. After all its summer time and the union reps are off on paid vacation leave.
UFCW INC. BUSINESS UNIONISM AS USUAL
The other excuse is that the strike is strictly the union’s affair. This is the biggest crock of BS ever. The strike is the weapon of the class; it is the fundamental tool of class war. Even the bosses know this. For a strike can be the match that lights the prairie fire of the General Strike. When a union wins a strike it is a victory for all working people when they lose it is a defeat for all working people. As Jim Stanford points out in the quote above, the Herald strike which was lost, was not just a loss for workers at the Calgary Herald, but for newspaper workers across the country.
A case in point is when UFCW struck Safeway’s in the early part of the 1990's they accepted a roll back in wages in particular for first time employees . UFCW is no small union, they are one of the largest private sector unions in Alberta and their acceptance of a roll back contract impacted the whole labour movement in the province.
Loblaws, a Canadian grocery and retail chain, opened Real Canadian Super Stores (RCSS) in Canada several years ago. RCSS combines food and discount retail under one roof, paying wages that are typical of the discount retail industry, as do Supercenters in the United States. RCSS entered the market in Alberta in the late 1970s and early 1980s. Safeway has been the primary unionized supermarket in Alberta for years, and Safeway wages in Alberta were considerably higher than RCSS. By the early 1990s, competition with the lower labor-cost RCSS began to have a dramatically negative impact on Safeway profits.
Safeway executives estimated that the wage gap between their employees and RCSS workers was between $8.00 and $12.00 per hour in Canadian dollars.10 In 1993, Safeway concluded it could no longer compete without drastically cutting pay and benefits. Management presented employees with two choices – either Safeway would cut its losses and leave the Alberta market, or cut pay and benefits by the equivalent of $5.00 per hour (Canadian). Eventually, the unionized employees agreed to the pay and benefit cuts. Safeway implemented the pay cuts both by reducing pay and benefits and by buying out the contracts of 4,000 experienced employees and replacing those workers with persons earning approximately $6.00 per hour with no benefits.11 In 1997, Safeway employees went on strike in an effort to restore wage and benefit concessions that were part of the 1993 agreement. The strike ended without the union regaining the wage and benefit concessions that were part of the 1993 agreement.
The Impact of Big Box Grocers on Southern California: Jobs, Wages, and Municipal Finances
Examples Of The Labor Market Impact Of Wage Differentials – Cases From Canada
This allowed the Klein government to use this as an excuse to bring in wage roll backs for public sector workers. Klein cleverly pitted private sector workers against public sector workers, saying that what was happening at Safeways should apply across the province. He also had the NDP government in Ontario to use as an example of another provincial government trying to get public sector unions to accept roll backs.
Another case is when UFCW led their worker’s out on strike at Gainers, instead of occupying the plant, and demanding the plant be put under workers and farmer control. Since it was originally owned by the Alberta government. But it had been sold off to Burns, owned by Tory bagman Arthur E. Childes, at a fire sale price. Burns then sold it to Maple Leaf foods. Even the leadership of the
All this was done under the leadership of Doug O'Halloran who speaks not in the interests of the workers but in the interests of UFCW Inc. And he cries crocodile tears when the government halts the
THE FALL OF THE HOUSE OF LABOUR
If the local labour councils and the Federations of Labour as well as the CLC is the so called house of labour, then it is a dilapidated slum. The leadership is terrified of losing their jobs. They suffer bureaucratic senility. They will always prefer the backroom deal with the bosses or the government to the idea that this is class war and that the purpose of unions is to overthrow capitalism. They oppose plant occupations because well they are illegal; they oppose the wildcat strike because it's illegal too. But isn't that why we have high priced labour lawyers, to get the leadership out of jail. Nope that can't be the real reason either. The reason is that these actions are taken by the rank and file 'out of the control' of the paid reps and leadership. And if such ideas spread, it might lead to, horror of horrors, a General Strike.
Even the most militant leader or leadership in the labour movement accepts their role in upholding Law, Order and Good Government. And once they do, it will always be the workers who get screwed.
The reason is simple workers who do take strike action realize they have given up all to win the fight. Including the fight over the day to day grievances that have usually piled up until the strike. Not so their leadership who see it as just another moment in collective bargaining. This is why workers on the line are always more militant than their union leadership.
Professional union reps and paid hacks are not capable of challenging the bosses or their government cause well they are paid not to. They can't organize the workers who pay their salaries; because they are out of touch with the rank and file. Or worse yet they are opposed to rank and file control because it threatens their job security.
They promote local union executives to political positions in their unions, offering them careers and lucrative jobs as reps, as long as they tow the line. They often take the best and brightest, activists who really care about workers interests and put them into the union machinery to become another cog in the wheel.
If workers organize themselves, the first to attempt to squash them aren't the politicians, or cops, or lawyers, it’s their own union leadership, fearful for their 'jobs'.
IT'S TIME TO TAKE BACK OUR UNIONS
The only way this can change is if members of a union mobilize to take back their unions for themselves. To eliminate paid full time representatives who earn $100,000 salaries off the backs of part time workers who get $8.50 an hour.
Replace these reps and union business agents with elected rank and file reps who serve two year terms and are up for staggered election, with their pay and benefits being no more than the highest paid worker on the job.
Rank and File strike committees shall be directly elected by the members. These delegate committees during strikes are the only ones allowed to negotiate with the bosses, not the paid reps or union executive and leadership.
Union locals will have democratically elected executives and committees of members, and any regional, national, or international reps will answer to the local membership.
All union locals must be politically and economically autonomous from their national union.
Locals will not give up the right to strike in collective agreements, and in fact will further enforce this basic right with a further clause that states that members of the local will not cross other workers picket lines.
Unions will not participate in Labour Relations Boards, arbitration or Industrial Relations. Any action taken by the state whether it is an injunction, or attempts at arrest will be met with mass action not only by the union affected but by all unions in the region.
Fines against the union will NOT be paid to the state. If such fines occur it will abrogate the Rand Formula and the union will implement a direct dues collection off the shop floor.
Union locals will be autonomous and form not for profit societies to hold their funds in escrow in order to protect their autonomy.
Union locals will affiliate with whom they please in the labour movement. If their International or National organization fails to adapt to direct member democracy the local has the right to federate with whom it pleases according to a democratic vote of the members.
Union locals will form flying picket squads of all members, to make sure that all strikes or lock outs are kept short and effective. Based on the principle of An Injury to One is and Injury to All, and The Longer the Picket Line, the Shorter the Strike.
All grievances will be solved as quickly as possible on the shop floor, or in the institution where they occur by a meeting of the union steward and management. Should management not resolve the issue, workers have the right to walk off the job until there is a resolution to their satisfaction.
The union has the right to use any and all tactics to solve their grievances, these include the sit down strike, rotating strike, wildcat strike, and plant occupation the use of the standard strike tactic will be reserved as a weapon of last resort. If it is applied the union will mobilize for sympathy strikes, hot cargoing and building a call for a general strike.
These are just a few suggestions on how we can take back our unions from the labour hacks and well heeled, well paid bureaucrats. Who see the labour movement not as a class struggle but as their career opportunity, economically and politically.
A career they make off our backs.
Saturday, October 13, 2007
We Get Complaints
Remember the cartoon with the bottomless box labeled 'complaints'.
Of course it's kind of hard to complain when you are dead.
SEE:
Find blog posts, photos, events and more off-site about:
CLAC, unions, labour shortage, Monte Solberg, Canada, Alberta, tarsands, oilsands, labour, labor, work, jobs, IBEW, Merit Contractors, non-union, rat unions, yellow dog union, Timmies, Tim Hortons, temporary workers
Foreign workers get complaints office
Of course it's kind of hard to complain when you are dead.
SEE:
Alberta's Padrone Culture
AUPE Calls General Strike Over Safety
Day of Mourning
Find blog posts, photos, events and more off-site about:
CLAC, unions, labour shortage, Monte Solberg, Canada, Alberta, tarsands, oilsands, labour, labor, work, jobs, IBEW, Merit Contractors, non-union, rat unions, yellow dog union, Timmies, Tim Hortons, temporary workers
Thursday, October 14, 2021
Supported by Cypress-Medicine Hat MLA, Free Alberta Strategy released
Wed., October 13, 2021
Wed., October 13, 2021
Published September 28, the Free Alberta Strategy is a policy paper written by Airdrie MLA and lawyer, Rob Anderson, University of Calgary political scientist, Barry Cooper, and constitutional lawyer, Derek From, in cooperation with the Alberta Institute.
The paper has two key objectives, which include establishing provincial sovereignty within Canada, and the end of equalization payments to have-not provinces.
“We believe that Alberta needs to declare itself a sovereign jurisdiction within Canada,” said Anderson. “Part of that is to pass a piece of legislation called the Alberta Sovereignty Act, which specifically states that the province of Alberta will not enforce federal laws that are unfair, that unfairly attack the province of Alberta, or that are outside of the jurisdiction of the federal jurisdiction of Ottawa. An example of that would be the carbon tax. If the legislature feels that the carbon taxes are an unconstitutional attack on Alberta and on our jurisdictional rights as a province, then we would simply say, under the Alberta Sovereignty Act, that he will not be enforcing that law within the boundaries of Alberta.”
The paper does not advocate for complete separation from Canada, points out Anderson, who believes that separatism is another option Albertans are tired of hearing of as the proposed only alternative to doing nothing about what is outlined in the strategy.
“The main issues that I'm hearing is, first of all, the lack of resource movement, is the fact that that Albertans are the best in the world at taking risk and safely extracting oil and gas are unable to get work unable to get work at the pay they used to, or they have to go hundreds of miles away to find work, and all the time the demand for oil and gas is increasing. So that would be the main one,” said Drew Barnes, MLA for Cypress-Medicine Hat. “Secondly, the fact that Alberta is such a cash cow to the rest of Canada, large parts of that through equalization, and the fact that equalization, and this money transfer is unfair in terms of giving some provinces, you know, sovereign funds as big as Alberta's. It's given them cheaper services. And it has created a problem where some provinces have not tried to increase their revenues or develop their resources, because they want to continue to collect equalization. It's an unfair system that hasn't worked well for anyone.”
Barnes noted a strong frustration in his constituency in the wake of the federal election, and said that “people are frustrated that elections are decided, you know, before we even finished counting our votes here.” Barnes said that seeing legacy parties adopt strategies to “keep Quebec and Ontario happy rather than protect the individual Alberta” definitely fanned the flames in the area.
“It starts with the fact that in Cypress-Medicine Hat, too many, too many of us are not able to work in the oil and gas industry, because of the fact that, you know, Ottawa has blocked pipelines, and that needs to change. Secondly, you know, the fact that, you know, taxes are so high in Canada, and the federal government does so little for us. People realize that there has to be a better system and opportunity for hardworking people and hardworking families to keep more of their own money. So they have more choices,” said Barnes.
There is confidence that with this sovereignty, Alberta would be fine operating on a much more individual scale, said Anderson.
“I will put my belief in Alberta, governing itself over Ottawa governing Alberta any day of the week,” said Anderson. “Obviously, there's going to be times when the government of Alberta doesn't do a great job. But that is a rare occurrence in comparison to the absolute gong show. That is the federal government in Ottawa and specifically, as it relates to Ottawa to Ottawa is consistent attacks on Alberta's energy and agricultural sectors. It's been unrelenting for the last 50 years. It doesn't stop. And so, you know, if there are from time to time, obviously provincial governments are going to screw up but at least at the very least, they have Alberta's best interests at heart. You cannot say that about Ottawa.”
Anderson believes that Alberta would not look much different in terms of healthcare or social programs, save for the improvement made by more of the revenue generated in the province being re-invested into the province itself.
“We'd have more resources under the free Alberta strategy,” said Anderson. “They contemplate the stopping equalization and, and net transfers out of the province, we've sent more than six over the last 60 years, we've spent more than a cent more than $600 billion to Ottawa, more than we've got back and in federal spending, and that 600 billion is largely gone to Quebec as well as as well as the Maritimes for vote buying schemes in those areas, by generally federal liberal governments, but also by conservative federal conservative governments as well, just to a lesser extent. but this with the strategy contemplates putting an end to that. And so that means more resources for Alberta, which means more healthcare dollars, more education, dollars, more social spending, and also fewer taxes.”
Anderson specifically notes that the money could be used to increase ICU capacity during this pandemic, and said that money being sent to Ottawa may be the cause of the lack of healthcare resources in the province.
“We’re sitting here with 300 ICU beds in the middle of a pandemic, well, of course there's gonna be problems when you run your health system like that,” said Anderson. “When you don't have enough resources. So that's why we're losing doctors and nurses to neighboring provinces right now. And we're not going to get them back so long as we continue to have our resources sucked dry by Ottawa.”
Anna Smith, Local Journalism Initiative Reporter, Prairie Post East
ALBERTA SEPERATISM IS AMERICAN DECSENDENTS IN ALBERTA, AND SOME AMERICAN SECOND GENERATION WHO PROPOSE THESE LETS SEPERATE AND JOIN AMERICA SCHEMES
IN THE PAST WE HAVE HAD NUMEROUS SEPERATIST PARTIES OF THE RIGHT SINCE PETER LOUGHEED FOUGHT OFF THE WESTERN CANADA CONCEPT (WCC) WHICH AROSE OUT OF THE COLLAPSED SOCIAL CREDIT PARTY/GIVERNMENT
IT AROSE IN SOUTHERN ALBERTA AS ALL THESE MOVEMENTS OF THE RIGHT DO.
CALGARY IS THE LARGEST AMERICAN CITY IN CANADA
RIGHT WING MORMONS PROMOTE ANTI TAX CAMPAIGNS AS THEY PAY THROUGH THEIR CHURCH TITHES INSTEAD.
DUTCH REFORM CHURCH RIGHT WING ACTIVISTS CAME HERE FROM SOUTH AFRICA
AND PROMOTE THEIR NEO CALVANISM THROUGH GROUPS LIKE THE FAKE UNION CLAC AND THE CHRISTIAN FARMERS ASSOC OF CANADA WHO FOUNDED AND SUPPORTED THE REFORM PARTY
SEE
Wednesday, May 19, 2021
Thursday, June 25, 2020
Kenney speechwriter called residential schools a 'bogus genocide story'
Elise von Scheel
© Thomson Reuters Alberta Premier Jason Kenney speaks during a news conference after meeting with Canada's Prime Minister Justin Trudeau on Parliament Hill in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada December 10, 2019. REUTERS/Blair Gable
Alberta Premier Jason Kenney's speechwriter once wrote an article dismissing the "bogus genocide story" of Canada's residential school system and said Indigenous youth could be "ripe recruits" for violent insurgencies.
Paul Bunner penned the column, titled "The 'Genocide' That Failed," for the online magazine C2C Journal in 2013. Brunner was a speechwriter for prime minister Stephen Harper from 2006 to 2009 and was hired by Kenney last spring.
C2C IS A RIGHT WING NEO CALVINIST JOURNAL PUT OUT BY THE REFORMED CHURCH OF CANADA, FORMERLY OF SOUTH AFRICA, AND ITS FRONT GROUPS CLAC THE FAKE UNION, AND CFAC THEIR FARMERS GROUP. C2C WAS FORMERLY KNOWN AS THE WORK RESEARCH FOUNDATION
Alberta Premier Jason Kenney's speechwriter once wrote an article dismissing the "bogus genocide story" of Canada's residential school system and said Indigenous youth could be "ripe recruits" for violent insurgencies.
Paul Bunner penned the column, titled "The 'Genocide' That Failed," for the online magazine C2C Journal in 2013. Brunner was a speechwriter for prime minister Stephen Harper from 2006 to 2009 and was hired by Kenney last spring.
C2C IS A RIGHT WING NEO CALVINIST JOURNAL PUT OUT BY THE REFORMED CHURCH OF CANADA, FORMERLY OF SOUTH AFRICA, AND ITS FRONT GROUPS CLAC THE FAKE UNION, AND CFAC THEIR FARMERS GROUP. C2C WAS FORMERLY KNOWN AS THE WORK RESEARCH FOUNDATION
The article questioned what Bunner deemed the "unchallenged" view of residential schools.
"Vast swathes of the public education system are uncritically regurgitating the genocide story as if it were fact," Bunner wrote, arguing that fuels certain Indigenous activists in their "never-ending demands" for money and autonomy.
Bunner argued that if Indigenous youth are "indoctrinated" in the belief that Canada wilfully tried to annihilate their ancestors it could make them "ripe recruits" for potential violent insurgencies, referring to a novel about an Indigenous uprising that he said was "frighteningly plausible."
He encouraged people to question the balance of residential school stories, to push back against "perverse financial incentives" that "reward stories of abuse" and called for more context about the general hardships of life at that time.
© Indian and Northern Affairs/Library and Archives Canada/Reuters Female students and a nun pose in a classroom at Cross Lake Indian Residential School in Cross Lake, Man., in a February 1940 archive photo. Alberta had some of the highest numbers of residential schools.In at least one interview since, Bunner has stood by the column.
More than 150,000 Indigenous children were removed from their families and compelled by the government to attend residential schools over the course of a century.
Many relayed stories of physical abuse, sexual assault and emotional anguish at the hands of those who ran the schools. Most of the perpetrators were never prosecuted. The last federally run school closed in the late 1990s.
One of the heads of the federal Truth and Reconciliation Commission that investigated residential schools from 2007 to 2015 says he's heard these arguments before, but can't swallow them.
"I really wish he'd walked in my shoes for those 14 years," said Chief Willie Littlechild, who was among those sent to a residential school. "I think you would have a totally different story."
Littlechild recounted how he was stripped of his name and given a number.
"They called me 65. You idiot, 65. Stupid 65."
He said he's "insulted" by the arguments in Bunner's column, but he holds no grudge.
Bunner was Harper's chief speechwriter when the prime minister made a historic apology in the House of Commons to residential school survivors.
"There is no place in Canada for the attitudes that inspired the Indian residential schools system to ever again prevail," he said in 2008.
Bunner has said he didn't write Harper's speech. He told APTN News in 2015 that he stood by his column and wasn't happy with Harper's apology.
The premier's office declined CBC News' request to interview Bunner. Interviews with backroom staff are uncommon.
"Mr. Bunner is a speechwriter. He is employed to take the Government's policy and put it into words. Mr. Bunner is not employed as a policy advisor nor is he involved in policy making," a spokesperson wrote in an email.
"I'll also remind you that the Premier was a senior minister of the federal government which issued the apology and settlement. Elected officials set policy — not staff."
The Kenney government has made several efforts to advance partnerships between the province and Indigenous groups since he was elected last year, particularly around natural resource development. The premier called it an "economic and moral imperative."
Duane Bratt, a political scientist at Mount Royal University in Calgary says the premier's office needs to address Bunner's article. He added it's a blow to Alberta's efforts to build trust with Indigenous communities.
"This isn't written 30 years ago. This isn't written 20 years ago. This was written after a public apology."
Bratt also said that while speechwriters don't dictate policy, they can influence it like any other adviser.
Bunner's column says that not all residential school students had a bad experience, and that white children also experienced abuse at boarding schools. He did acknowledge that Indigenous people endured worse than most.
But he blamed prominent Indigenous activists for using residential schools to propagate an "entitlement narrative" that has morphed into a "gold mine."
"The bogus genocide story of the Canadian Aboriginal residential schools system is an insult to all of us, Native and non-Native, dead or alive, who are justifiably proud of the peaceful, tolerant, pluralistic history and values of our great country," the article concludes.
Gabrielle Lindstrom is from the Kainaiwa First Nation in southern Alberta and teaches Indigenous studies at Mount Royal University. She wasn't surprised when she read the article.
"I would say that these claims are very common," she said, explaining that she often sees university students with similar misconceptions.
Lindstrom says this issue is not just about one man's words, but generations of stereotypes against Indigenous people.
"We've made the abuse of children debatable and we've made the violence against Indigenous people something that is alleged and something that is debatable."
The Truth and Reconciliation Commission heard from 6,500 witnesses, creating a historical database made up of five million documents. At the end of its work, the commission released 94 calls to action, which were accepted by the federal government.
The commission said the schools amounted to cultural genocide, attempted to eradicate Aboriginal culture and to assimilate Aboriginal children into mainstream Canada.
Littlechild still sees many areas for improvement — and says he wants to work on that shoulder to shoulder with people like Bunner.
"When we have challenges like this, let's talk about it and see how we find a solution to it," he said.
"It would serve [us] much greater if we walked that path together."
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