Union Update
Highlights of PSAC's 15th Triennial Convention - May 2009
- Highlights of PSAC's 15th Triennial Convention
- Public services more important than ever
- PSAC launches legal challenge against Harper government
- PSAC renews commitment to Think Public
- Pledge to defend public services
- Louise Arbour calls for a broader definition of security that includes human rights
- John Gordon and Patty Ducharme re-elected
- Strike pay gets a boost
- Convention supports our activists
- Subjects for negotiation
Highlights of PSAC's 15th Triennial Convention
Triennial convention shows there's power in our union
While a broken water pipe in the Vancouver Convention Centre forced the cancellation of the first day of PSAC's 15th Triennial Convention, it didn't dampen the spirits of the participants who reconvened on Tuesday, April 28.
They started the morning bright and early, joining the BC Federation of Labour to commemorate the International Day of Mourning for Workers Killed and Injured on the Job. Carrying hundreds of coffins in a mock funeral procession, PSAC members stood up for workplace safety and demanded that employers and all levels of government do more to prevent workplace injuries and deaths.
In his opening remarks to the convention, National President John Gordon reminded delegates that when PSAC members met in Toronto three years ago, the economy was growing but the Harper minority government had announced an expenditure review that lacked any investment in public services.
“While the economy is now in crisis, some things never change,” said Gordon. “Since our last convention, Harper has sharpened his attacks and made it clear he is no friend of workers, women, equity-seeking groups, the poor, Aboriginal Peoples… pretty much anyone who isn't Stephen Harper.”
Public services more important than ever
Gordon stressed the need for union members to use the recession to make the case for quality public services.
“As a union, we can champion the rights of people before profits, of workers before corporations, of quality public services for the people by the people,” he said.
He noted that our union has been organizing new members in new sectors and expanding our solidarity to reach around the globe. The world is changing and PSAC is changing to meet new needs.
“We have done great things but we can do more. We are a powerful force but we can be stronger. We can move the union forward; we can build a better world. We can do all of this if we work together … Our power is our solidarity and our commitment.”
PSAC launches legal challenge against Harper government
Speaking from the convention floor in Vancouver, Gordon announced that PSAC has filed a case with the Ontario Superior Court, challenging the constitutionality of the Harper government's Expenditure Restraint Act and Equitable Compensation Act.
“These Acts are a cynical attack on public services and the workers who deliver them by ripping up freely bargained collective agreements,” said Gordon.
They attack the union's right to advise and represent members on human rights issues and attack women's right to pay equity.”
PSAC renews commitment to Think Public
Three years ago, convention delegates voted overwhelmingly in favour of a PSAC policy that reaffirmed our strong support for quality public services and our opposition to practices such as privatization that would destroy both access to and the quality of public services.
The context in which we are fighting to defend quality public services has changed in the last three years. The current economic crisis has brought to light the perils of under-regulation in the financial sector, the extent of corporate greed and the fragile nature of workers' rights and job security.
The current job crisis in the private sector is being used by some as an opportunity to pit private sector workers against public sector workers.
The federal government is using the economic crisis as an excuse to underfund, privatize or eliminate public services and programs, making the task of defending public services even more challenging today.
Convention delegates unanimously renewed our union's commitment to work together to defend quality public services and programs. Our renewed Think Public platform has four cornerstones:
Regulation: We will campaign against deregulation and for strong regulations that put people and the public interest first, before corporations and profit.
Redress: We will campaign for public services that help redress the poverty and inequality gaps, and that help achieve equality for all.
Reinvestment: We will campaign to ensure that public investments include social infrastructure, like child care and health care. We will campaign to ensure that public funds are being invested to keep public infrastructure and services public. We will campaign against the public financing of public-private-partnerships and other forms of privatization that are more costly and don't work. We will also campaign to ensure that women and other equity-seeking groups benefit from the jobs created to rebuild our infrastructure, both physical and social.
Respect: We will campaign for public services that respect and include the diverse voices of Canadians and for public investments that enable decision-makers to be responsive to these voices. We will campaign for public services that bind communities together. We will campaign for respect for human rights and workers' rights, including the right to free collective bargaining.
Our defence of quality public services is interwoven into the fabric of our union. When we bargain new collective agreements, when we educate, when we organize new members, when we communicate with our members and the public, when we lobby political representatives, when we work with our labour and social movement partners, when we build solidarity among the structures of our union, when we build our alliances with workers around the world, we are working to defend the quality public services that are essential to a strong economy and an inclusive society.
Pledge to defend public services
National President John Gordon called on all PSAC members to take the Think Public pledge in his closing remarks to the convention.
“Leading the way for quality public services cannot just be our theme for this convention,” said Gordon. “We need to commit ourselves to take action to help build a better world.”
In urging members to take the Think Public pledge, Gordon asked them to become public service defenders.
“We must treat this like an organizing drive, building our activists and allies, building our collective power,” said Gordon. “We must treat this like a strike, where our collective solidarity and determination keep us motivated to continue speaking out and promoting quality public services. We must treat this like we are determining our future – because we are. We can do this, I know we can! Let's make it happen!”
Delegates pledged their support for quality public services by voting for a PSAC-sponsored lobbying campaign to oppose the privatization of federal labs and to raise awareness of the need for and importance of public science and research. The convention also called for the continuation of the campaign in support of funding for the Department of Fisheries and Oceans in order to meet its mandate.
Visit psac-afpc.com to read the Think Public pledge.
Louise Arbour calls for a broader definition of security that includes human rights
We are still in search of a common and universal vision of human rights, said internationally acclaimed human rights advocate Louise Arbour in her keynote speech to PSAC delegates on Tuesday, April 28.
The former United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights described a mainly western perception of human and state security that focuses almost exclusively on criminality, terrorism and war. She said this perception has been a consequence of a “quasiobsession on a narrow concept of security” in the first decade of the 21st century that, in many ways, began on September 11, 2001.
“On the other hand, for millions of men, women and children who live in extreme poverty (…) international terrorism, the crime of organized drug trafficking and armed conflict are not necessarily the main sources of their insecurity,” she said.
The two disparate views on the concept of security puts in conflict the principles of what President Roosevelt called “freedom from fear” and “freedom from want,” which were intended to be the indivisible foundations of the UN Universal Declaration on Human Rights.
“The fracture of the concept of indivisibility of rights, shortly after the enactment of the Universal Declaration, has taken political dimensions that render the advancement of all rights more difficult,” said Arbour.
She said Canada's international human rights advocacy can be strengthened by showing a stronger commitment to social justice legislation and international agreements. She pointed to the need for the Canadian government to implement the rights of Aboriginal peoples, reverse its decision to oppose the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples and extend the scope of Canadian law to protect Canadian citizens abroad, with Omar Khadr as a particular example of this opportunity.
“I believe that there is probably no more challenging political issue than to seriously enhance the protection of all human rights for all,” she said.
John Gordon and Patty Ducharme re-elected
John Gordon was re-elected as the PSAC National President in a two-way race. Gordon was first elected President in 2006 and had previously served as the union's National Executive Vice-President since 2000.
In a three-way race, delegates re-elected Patty Ducharme as the union's National Executive Vice-President for a second term. Prior to her election as National Executive Vice-President in 2006, Ducharme was PSAC's Regional Executive Vice-President (REVP) for British Columbia.
Jérôme Turcq, the Regional Executive Vice-President for Quebec, was acclaimed Alternate NEVP.
Strike pay gets a boost
Delegates voted in favour of increasing strike pay to $75 per day from the current $50. They also recognized that members in the North face a very high cost of living and limited alternative employment opportunities when they are on strike or are locked-out and agreed to bring strike pay in the North up to $100 per day.
Convention supports our activists
Recognizing that members on leave without pay for union activities shouldn't be penalized for their activism, delegates directed their union to negotiate with employers so that members can continue to receive their pay while on union leave, with employers invoicing PSAC.
Subjects for negotiation
As a result of convention resolutions, our union will be:
working to reactivate the Conferences of the North;
producing model bargaining language to protect members' privacy at work;
raising awareness, educating, mobilizing and lobbying on the issue of the duty to accommodate; and
negotiating a new policy for term workers that is fair for pregnant women.
For more highlights from PSAC's 15th Triennial Convention, including a description of the resolutions that were passed, visit www.psac-afpc.com/conventions/2009/psacconvention_
congresafpc/home-e.asp
