Category: Bargaining
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Corrections has our wholehearted support
There are tough jobs, and there are even tougher jobs: Imagine having to face a crowd of angry prison inmates every shift. Our sisters and brothers who work in the infectious, overcrowded and often dangerous provincial jails have our admiration and support. They perform a necessary public service under very stressful conditions. So when provincial…
Andy Pedersen
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A Pathway to Prosperity
In past articles we’ve identified the causes of our current economic crisis. Now comes the hard part: providing solutions. We must now map Ontario’s pathway to prosperity. As a fundamental truth, prosperity cannot come from austerity. It never has and it never will. Austerity has brought attacks by the moneyed class. They have hit the…
Andy Pedersen
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We’re not for sale!
When you apply privatization and outsourcing to public services it all adds up to the same thing: Profit for a few and job losses for many. Worse yet, it brings inferior services to all. Trade unions oppose privatization due to the immediate and permanent impact on jobs, but there is more to consider. When services…
Andy Pedersen
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Their fight is our fight
A thousand OPSEU members march on Queen’s Park, joining thousands more autoworkers and retirees rallying to preserve pensions. A few days later, thousands of people from all over attend a rally to protect our rural hospitals from layoffs and closures. We call it solidarity – actions that show a revived unity in the labour movement…
Andy Pedersen
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Solidarity Forever
When the union's inspiration through the workers' blood shall run, There can be no power greater anywhere beneath the sun; Yet what force on earth is weaker than the feeble strength of one, But the union makes us strong. CHORUS: Solidarity forever, Solidarity forever, Solidarity forever, For the union makes us strong. Is there aught…
Andy Pedersen
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Paying down the deficit: here’s how
Well, it’s 2010. Happy New Year! As you read this, staff at the Ontario Ministry of Finance are hard at work to put together the 2010-11 provincial budget. This year’s budget deficit has grabbed a lot of headlines, with Finance Minister Dwight Duncan saying it will hit $24.7 billion. To no one’s surprise, the Premier…
Andy Pedersen
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Last chance for Liberals to refocus
As the Ontario Liberal Party gets ready for its Annual General Meeting Oct. 15-17, one thing is clear: The Liberals are in rough shape. Something like 70 per cent of Ontarians think the McGuinty government is on the wrong track. It’s not hard to see why. The Premier’s vision of a prosperous Ontario with strong…
Andy Pedersen
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Getting high
Justin Trudeau recently admitted he had smoked marijuana after becoming an MP (yawn). This sparked a national debate. Talk of getting high is all the rage. I say, "It"s about time." But I am not talking about the same kind of high. It is time to turn that frown upside down. After the past lows,…
Andy Pedersen
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Corporations Giving “the Business” to Canadians
Last week, in an apparent moment of heightened consciousness, Margaret Wente of the Globe and Mail scolded corporations for their poor behaviour. This is the same Margaret Wente who frequently rails about unions and the need for their demise. She hasn’t yet made the connection that unions are the last line of defense against greedy…
Andy Pedersen
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A Gift That Keeps On Giving
Sometimes the best gift comes from the strangest place…or more precisely, person. For the holiday season, Tory leader Tim Hudak offered up a gift of mammoth proportions. Hudak and his spin doctors thought they would get some political mileage out of taking on "Ontario"s Union", OPSEU. The results were not what they expected. It started…
Andy Pedersen
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We need an economic summit, now
We need an economic summit to unite the three pillars of the Ontario economy – business, labour and government – together as a team to help the ailing economy. There are all kinds of examples of progress being made when you get the right people in the room. That means people from the boards of…
Andy Pedersen
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The wage freeze: a Labour Day response
Dear friends, Every year, some bad boss reminds me why Labour Day matters. In 2010, a company from Brazil stripped pension rights from nickel miners in Sudbury. Billionaire Galen Weston told 30,000 Ontario grocery clerks to eat a 25 per cent pay cut. And Premier McGuinty told a million provincial workers to accept a wage…
Andy Pedersen
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Rise up!
Dear sisters and brothers: It’s clear to me that the timing of this year’s Convention theme couldn’t be better. This year’s theme is “Rise up!” And everywhere I look in OPSEU, I see green shoots of activism sprouting up. Of course there is never a time when our members aren’t taking action on some issue.…
Andy Pedersen
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OPSEU supports the Occupy movement
Dear friends, OPSEU stands in solidarity with all who struggle for justice. We support the Occupy protestors as they expose growing economic inequality and corporate corruption. We will add our strength to this peoples’ movement for as long as it takes. The Occupy movement is provoking change. Taxes on financial transactions are gaining recognition as…
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Labour’s voice has never mattered more
Around about Labour Day I usually find myself humming a few good old union songs. Songs like “There once was a union maid,” “Joe Hill,” “There is power in the union,” and of course, “Solidarity Forever.” If there are enough people around I even sing out loud. So here’s a question: “Why are there so…
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Get ready to defend your right to retire
If you are an OPSEU member with a pension plan, get ready to defend your right to retire. The Oct. 6 provincial election is coming up fast. In the weeks ahead, you’ll hear more voices calling on government to pay less in pension premiums. Business groups will say your pension is “platinum plated.” Sun TV…
Andy Pedersen
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Convention 2012: A baptism of fire
Convention 2012 will go down as one of the most eventful in our storied history. It was to be expected. A call for a dues levy in this economic climate will do that. It was just what our union needed. Passionate debate. Exchanging of ideas. A clash of philosophies. But in the end we achieved…
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A compassionate society is possible
To hear some business people talk, the only way things can ever change for most of us is to get worse. The gap between the rich and the poor has been growing in Canada for about 30 years, and it has nothing to do with recessions. In good times and bad, the rich have been…
Andy Pedersen
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We have voted for a new kind of Ontario
Ontario’s elections have demonstrated clearly that our province is mobilizing for change. People across the province are demanding good, permanent full-time jobs. We are fighting back against the draining of public coffers through corporate tax cuts, and demanding respect and funding for the public services that make this province great. I assure you OPSEU will…
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The Times – They Are a Changing!
September 6, 2012 will go down in history as a turning point in Ontario politics. It also marks a turning point for the movement to defend working people and the middle class from relentless right wing attacks. We promised this change and delivered by mobilizing our members. As a result, the political leader who built…
Andy Pedersen