Union friends across the water

I had the chance a few weeks ago to reconnect with Joe Marino, the general secretary of the Bakers, Food and Allied Workers Union in the UK. I first met Joe in my late teens aboard a ship sailing from Montreal to Liverpool. He invited me to Manchester to meet his family. During my six-month stay, Joe and I took jobs at a unionized bakery. It was our introduction to the labour movement and the beginning of our seemingly parallel journeys up through the ranks. Mine here, his in the UK.

Joe was visiting Vancouver as part of a study tour with a delegation of UK trade unionists. We also learned a lot from them. Delegation members conveyed their fears about the future of the UK labour movement and unionized workers under the new Cameron-Clegg coalition government. They told us about the potential slashing of tens of thousands of public sector jobs, and their concerns about a protracted attack on union rights in the UK.

Also worrying, we were told, is that Canada’s fiscal policy is being held up as the remedy to the UK’s economic woes. The same policies that have resulted in massive and devastating cuts to public services in Canada during the last decade and a half. Cuts that we, and our affiliate unions, continue to fight.

Based on our experience, working people in the UK face difficult times ahead. We know the anti-union forces in Canada will be watching what happens there, with a view to inflicting more pain on the labour movement here.

We’ve pledged to stay in touch with Joe and the other UK labour groups. We’re going to compare notes. The trade union movement works best when it works together. We’re allies and friends. And we’re all in this fight.