02) LABOUR UNDER ATTACK BY LABOUR? THE OFL CONVENTION 2015

 

Ontario Trade Union Commission, Communist Party of Canada

 

            Can anyone explain how a cabal of “heads of unions” with the active support of the CLC decides the agenda of Ontario Labour prior to an OFL Convention? And can anyone explain the fact that this has been fought out and justified in, and with the participation of, the mainstream capitalist media? And can anyone explain why Hassan Yussuff, president of the CLC, would be involved in bypassing the elected leadership of his Ontario division by taking part in a pre-emptive caucus of “heads of unions” (not all heads of unions, invitation only) to actively intervene with a leadership slate to wrest control of the impending convention?

 

            The “heads of unions” favoured with an invitation into the elite will argue that the slate will have to be democratically elected at convention. But what they won’t say, and what is very well known, is that to stand against the slate, especially if successful, will be an act of suicide for any future in the labour movement. Sid Ryan is the example of what the future holds for anyone who has too much respect for democracy.

 

            Part of the answer is the CLC structure which has evolved as a model of “Business Unionism” as distinct from its rank and file control generations past. That transition is a history of transition into a federated organisation. The formation of a “heads of unions” group to subvert the OFL Convention is merely an Ontario mirror of the CLC constitutional structure called the Canadian Council, the ruling body that rules permanently and is not a creature of, not elected by the CLC Convention.

 

            The over-the-years transition from Convention control of the CLC to the non-convention rule of the Canadian Council is a general view of the decline in democracy in labour, and the transition from “social-unionism” to “business unionism”. Another structural flaw in the CLC allows affiliation to the CLC, but does not require affiliation to its Provincial or Quebec divisions or local Labour Councils. Thus CLC affiliates have the choice to support or starve the provincial or municipal organizations, to support their grass-roots campaigns or not. This is what made possible the Ontario dues strike, withdrawal and late payment tactics, to undermine the stability of the Ontario Federation of Labour.

 

            Because of the financial undermining of OFL stability, and the perceived impossibility of unity, Sid Ryan has stated that he will not stand for re-election as president at the OFL's November 23-27 Convention in Toronto.

 

            Ryan’s announcement was preceded by years of open criticism, usually in the media, harassment on frivolous issues, withholding of dues, withdrawal from affiliation, and general guerrilla warfare that never, even once touched on the main issues: mass organization, street level resistance and social partnership, as opposed to tri-partist acquiescence and farming out labour's political program to the NDP. Even though Sid Ryan is an ardent NDPer, he also is a social-unionist who believes in the independent power of direct worker action. This makes back-room politics and deal-making difficult, so Ryan has to go. 

 

            In Ryan’s own words, in his open letter published in the Toronto Star, “If there is one thing that both my strongest supporters and my harshest critics agree on, it is that in mobilizing workers I have often spoken over the heads of labour leaders to reach union members directly. It is a critique that I wear with pride”.

 

            Ryan was elected after the “long sleep” of Wayne Samuelson’s presidency of the OFL that reflected the lethargy of the “pink paper” unions, which issued an attack on the militancy of the “days of action” campaign against the Mike Harris government and its anti-labour, anti-worker policies. Their proposed alternative was published on pink paper, and the “pink paper” unions ushered in a period of drowsiness, sleeping through working class crisis like Rip Van Winkle. After years of slumber, they could not maintain the sleep any longer, and Sid Ryan with an agenda for social unionism and labour action went into the Presidency unopposed in 2009. Ryan was unanimously elected twice more without opposition.

 

            Several large unions went on a “dues strike.” A couple withdrew completely to create a financial crisis in the OFL, and then complain that they could not support the OFL because of financial mismanagement. First create a crisis, and then attack because of it. The method developed by right-wing governments over the last two decades apparently was well learned by labour leaders on the right. Too bad Ryan stepped back from the fight he had started.

 

            Too bad because this fight is really not at all about Sid Ryan.  It is a clash between “business unionism” and “social unionism”. Business unionism is the corporate triangular structure of top-down leadership with the membership in a client relationship with staff and top leadership who wield power and deliver services. They are elected, it is true, but in very controlled conventions. Social Unionism is the root from which all labour grew, rank and file driven, mass participation, and with a political vision that represents the needs of all working people, not just the dues payers. Social unionism seeks to lead mass movements and recruit social allies.

 

            The “heads of unions” hosted by Unifor and calling themselves an “election caucus” are not primarily to get rid of Sid Ryan, who has bowed out of the contest already. The main issue is the message to the upcoming convention that if you elect leadership we don’t like, if you adopt policies we don’t like, we will destroy you. We will then have labour unity, the unity of the cowed and controlled.

 

            Everyone has the right to put together a slate and campaign for election, but the implied and demonstrated retribution for a democratic convention that disagrees with the “heads of unions” is undemocratic and will ultimately neutralize and disenfranchise labour to the extent that is has south of the border where “business unionism’ is much more dominant.

 

            That is why recent labour history is marked by two phenomena: the consolidation of power through merger and restructuring, and the decline in membership as a percentage of a growing and increasingly disenfranchised and precarious working class. The contradiction in labour is between what we have and what is needed, between business unionism and social unionism.

 

(The above article is from the October 16-31, 2015, issue of People's Voice, Canada's leading socialist newspaper. Articles can be reprinted free if the source is credited. Subscription rates in Canada: $30/year, or $15 low income rate; for U.S. readers - $45 US per year; other overseas readers - $45 US or $50 CDN per year. Send to People's Voice, c/o PV Business Manager, 706 Clark Drive, Vancouver, BC, V5L 3J1.)