Hot Tubbin' For Justice

"Solidarity of the working class is the greatest force for change in history."  Sara Nelson, CUPE National Convention 2019 The 2019 CUPE National Convention took place in Montreal, October 6-11th. This convention marked 10 years since I attended my first union event and as the BC Caucus Whip, I was really excited for the ensuing week. I am so proud to be from BC. I tried to coordinate the floor differently this time by using an app that would enable communication to get to delegates in a more consistent and timely manner. Our executive board came together, we huddled, chatted and cheered each other on. Everyone stepped up when I needed help and I thought we did a great job repping our region.  Here are some of my thoughts on various parts of convention. Post-Secondary Sector Meeting This year, the post-secondary sector meeting focused on the rise of hate on our campuses. We were fortunate to have Kimalee Phillip, one of our Human Rights reps, speak to...

10 years ago, I entered the convention hall at the Palais de Congres in Montreal and had no idea what I was getting myself into. It was my very first CUPE National Convention. I was new to the union, a young worker, and really overwhelmed by the size of the floor and the number of chairs in the room. I'll admit, I thought the whole "brother/sister" thing was super creepy. (I did not know the history of those terms, that I have come to love). There was so much going on - it  was hard to keep track. The paramedics in BC were on strike and we all got t-shirts as a solidarity act and I thought that was pretty cool. Then we shut down the streets of Montreal and marched to city hall in support of local 301, Montreal's blue collar workers. That was FUN! I went to the Young Workers caucus and there were maybe 20 of us there - probably less. Later in the week, I was approached by someone from the Young Workers' Committee to speak on one of their resolutions. I HATED p...

Homestretch! We spent the morning in our sectors concluding our meetings. After a quick debrief by the room we were ready to head back into plenary to hear back from all of the sectors and NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh. One by one the sectors shared their top priorities, so in random order: Education address chronic underfunding and workload issues create a national campaign against privatization to highlight work in the school sector tools and resources for locals to deal with ineffective managers and employers (whatever that means) Library countering austerity - tackling precarious work, staffless libraries, underfunding and the use of volunteers  health and safety - library workers' roles in the opioid crisis, and violence in the workplace mental health in the workplac Healthcare strategies and tools to deal with workplace attendance management programs workload health and safety - violence in the workplace - prevention and lobbying for further protections ...

We started the morning off with a discussion on the day's theme "creating safe and respectful workplaces." We were treated once again to the great co-moderating team of Preethy and Matthieu where we heard about 3 very different situations where CUPE member are facing serious disrespect and challenges with their employer(s).  Sharon Richer - Ontario Council of Hospital Unions (OCHU) Sharon set the context by sharing the horrific violence healthcare workers in Ontario are experience - often by the very patients they are there to take care of. Not enough is being done to create a culture where violent behaviour would be tolerated in the workplace. OCHU has spent a lot of time over the last little while surveying their members - asking them about frequency of violent incidents at work, incidents of sexual violence/harassment, fears, frequency of reporting, employer follow up and support.  The stats she shared were staggering.  There are so many factors as to why me...

Back in Ottawa (on the unceded territory of the Algonquin Anishnaabeg peoples) - this time for the third CUPE National Sector Council Conference . Established in 2013, after many delegates at convention felt that the 2 hour sector meetings every two years were simply not enough time to connect with our counterparts from across the country, so we decided to hold a sector conference in the off years of national convention.  The first version of the sector conference was in Toronto and well, it was not good. Then 2 years ago, we decided to give it another shot and it was great. I wrote about the conversation we had on sexual violence on campus in 2016 , which led to some sector solidarity on the subject. We passed a resolution calling for a tool kit on the issue of sexual violence on campuses, critical incident stress support for stewards and bystander training for all CUPE members and staff. It passed - not sure where they are at in the development of the materials we asked...