We’ve
seen disgruntled public service workers taking action all over Canada in the
last year or so – whether it be teachers in Québec, twenty-thousand
Newfoundland public sector workers, Ontario’s Hydro One workers, or the members
of the Hospital Employees’ Union. The increasing labour unrest culminated this
summer when private sector workers stepped onto the scene in a major way with
the victorious Truckers’ strike.
Management
at the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC) is trying to force through a new
contract on their employees – a contract eliminating restrictions on the
broadcaster's ability to contract out work instead of hiring full-time
employees. They have now applied a lock-out and it looks like it is going to a
long and bitter struggle.
Telus
workers across BC and Alberta have been on the picket lines since
Thursday July 21st, making it clear that they will not roll over and
take the offer that the company is trying to impose. In five years
without a contract, the members of the Telecommunications Workers Union
have put up with Telus stalling, conniving, and repeatedly bargaining
in bad faith, in a blatant attempt to break the union.
Fightback
calls for the nationalization of telecommunications under democratic
workers’ control, as the only solution to the problems of poor
management at Telus.
The Marxists in Canada are launching a new website – www.marxist.ca,
and a new publication – Fightback. We support their call for all
Canadians who read In Defence of Marxism and agree with the ideas of the
International Marxist Tendency to contact them and join their fight. We welcome Fightback
and www.marxist.ca
as new comrades in the struggle, and we are confident that they will become the
key organisers for revolutionaries in Canada. We are publishing three articles from issue #1 of Fightback.