Why not direct investment in something like this, building a fund for Canadian manufacturing while building pensions:

From the Duncan Cameron column:

Happily citizens need secure outlets for savings. The recent ABCP (Asset Backed Commercial Paper) debacle where savers lose or taxpayers pick-up the cheque for the mistakes made by banks, should remind us that Canadian government debt is more secure than private debt.
Issuing Green Bonds is one positive way for governments to bring citizens anxious to contribute to reducing global warming together with green investment projects funded by government that produce climate change returns.

By buying government issued Green Bonds citizens would get a competitive rate of interest, higher than money market funds, or GIC's (Guaranteed Investment Certificates) and safer assets. Governments would get long term, patient money. Instead of paying yearly management expense at rates of over one per cent every year as families now pay to keep their money in a bank run money market fund, savers would pay a small one-time commission of one-quarter of one per cent to the seller of the bond.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Or would all of this be too socialistic for today's worker, too complex, in the world of ABCP creations that are now failing their pension funds?

It could be called a "workers' future" fund.

[ 29 August 2008: Message edited by: George Victor ]

The Hargrove factor in that other aborted thread???

Buzz wuz a Liberal, not at all up this this idea.

Edited to include that line about rather than unions waiting for Godot, try this?

[ 29 August 2008: Message edited by: George Victor ]

The loss of union density in B.C. and the abysmal circumstances in Alberta are closely related to the fact that worker access to bargaining, organising, is highly restricted by bad laws that involve a two tiered certification process (cards and a vote), full protection of employers who chose to fight unionisation and a litigation system that drags out even the least meritorious objections.

Loss of density due to loss of manufacturing capacity is certainly a factor, particularly in the forest sector. Many of the mill closures (that have been widespread) occurred well in advance of the US housing crisis as result of forest policy changes that severed supply from the requirement to process.

Wating for "Godot" is only my weak attempt at saying that waiting for some political reversal to make things okay again for union organizing and retention ain't gonna happen. And you persist in the wait...

(quote)
In my opinion, what the Stats Can data shows is that the working class is being stymied in many parts of Canada by the prevailing right wing corporatist politics that are in control. The answer is to change the politics, not to encourage capital shifts through bond issues (although for other reasons, the concept is worthy of consideration).
(end quote)

You want to "change the politics" but it seems to me that labour has to be instrumental - a leading force - in changing the nature of the corporation. Investing in those corporations that will survive into the bloody-minded period of adjustment to climate change that is coming on us like an express train.

If you haven't yet read Duncan Cameron's column, give it a shot.

I may me misusing his idea - which is associated with what I've been on about for months now - the recognition of the importance of pension/mutual funds for everyone - the centrality of the corporation's success in this economy. And, of course, that is central to understanding why you shouldn't be waiting for Godot.

Just read "Labour Pain", a little piece in the September Report on Business from the Globe. There's a little pic of Buzz, apparently in tears, and a graph showing the GM stock price of $42.63 (US) June 26, 1992, and its position at $17.01 June 4, 2008.

The piece quotes Hargrove on the attack throughout the years of bargaining, calling GM "vultures at a blood bank" in '92, to the '08 announcement that the Oshawa truck plant would be closed..."our plant willnot cease production in the third quarter of 2009."

The reader is left wondering if GM's price on the market was ever considered.

--------------------------

My question is: Why wait around for someone else to create a green CANADIAN car? If some labour people could hold their nose, the NDP has for five years been saying that "green cars.....could save jobs and the climate."

Buzz wuz a Liberal at heart.

[ 29 August 2008: Message edited by: George Victor ]

And things "green" should soon infiltrate union thoughts - even in the auto industry.

But what about the nature of those corporations and union pension funds, etc. etc.? Some thoughts?

p.s. I'm just nicely into Joe Bageant's Deer Hunting With Jesus, a look at the author's hometown in northern Virginia. Should be prescribed reading for union leadership.

I hope that all union members as well have an opportunity to read what wages in GE and the service industries in the Appalachians...and what that - along with religion and U.S. politics - has done to folks down thataway. (And what it continues to do to Manufacturing industries in Canada.)

[ 29 August 2008: Message edited by: George Victor ]

quote:

---

Originally posted by George Victor:
Given the positive revulsion for NDP doings in some quarters hereabouts, it will be a frosty Friday in hell before political change brings about positive changes to the labour code anywhere in this country.

And things "green" should soon infiltrate union thoughts - even in the auto industry.

---

You seem to forget that the "green car" initiative was launched jointly by Layton, Hargrove, and Greenpeace in July 2003, and endorsed by David Suzuki.

Since then, the CAW has paid as much lip service - and done as little to make it a reality - as the NDP has.

So I'm not sure why you keep making this illusory distinction. Unionized workers understand the issue of climate change as well as anyone else. But don't tell manufacturing workers that they must get laid off to save the planet while the oil and gas tycoons continue to gorge themselves on the pillage of our natural wealth.

I'd be happy to see the NDP take a strong stand on this issue. Definition of strong stand: One which figures in bargaining over coalitions and confidence votes.

[ 29 August 2008: Message edited by: unionist ]

But labour laws especially in construction play a big part in the density of the unionized sector. But so does solidarity. They busted the construction trades to build Expo and they haven't recovered since. Instead of the 70's and early 80's when 85% of heavy construction was unionized now it is only 15%.

But for all workers certification by the vote system is the problem. By the time the vote is counted (after the Board has heard endless objections) the original activists have been laid off or fired. Then of course to get a company to work under a collective agreement you have to negotiate a collective agreement. As long as the company goes to meetings and says pound sand to anything significant and yes to some insignificant issues they can drag out bargaining indefinitely.

In BC you need to have a strike vote of the workers before you can apply for any first collective agreement rules like binding mediation. Its can take 6 months to a year to find out whether the union won and then you bargain for another good period during which the Board rules that 2 out of the 5 people fired are reinstated. Strangely many of the workers begin believing the employer's threats to close the plant or business because of the union's too rich demands.

In certifications it is true that justice delayed most often turns into justice denied.

Given that the certification system is so skewed and that retail is the fastest growing part of the economy it will take the people in the jobs themselves to stand up and fight before it gets better. Combined with companies ability to merely close the doors and leave with no repercussions on the shareholders other than maybe a upward spike in their share these are tough times. But unions were built when belonging to one was illegal.

posted 28 August 2008 03:53 PM
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Just received a mailing stating:
FIVE YEARS AGO, alongside autoworkers and environmentalists, Jack Layton unveiled a job-saving Green Auto Strategy:

.Spurring innovation by setting mandatory fuel-efficiency standars for all vehicles sold in Canada.

.Jumpstarting production by investing in the development and assembly of efficient hybrid and alternative-fuel vehicles.

.Building markets for greener cars by offering consumers GST rebates and greening the massive federal vehicle fleet.

.Working internationally with jurisdictions like California to develp green auto markets based on leading fuel-efficiency standards.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
From: Cambridge, ON | Registered: Oct 2007 | IP: Logged
-------------------------------------------------

But you still avoid discussion of the bonds and otherwise coming to grips with the corporations.

Howcum?

--------------------------

p.s.
This old canard has always been the union take on questions of environment. Something to do with their leadership's assumptions, and inability to read the "green" part of the necessary manufacturing changes (see Layton's program, above).

(quote)
So I'm not sure why you keep making this illusory distinction. Unionized workers understand the issue of climate change as well as anyone else. But don't tell manufacturing workers that they must get laid off to save the planet while the oil and gas tycoons continue to gorge themselves on the pillage of our natural wealth.
(end quote)

That's soapbox stuff, u. Nobody is talking sacrifice and layoffs.

The workers are interested, of course, in the company's viability and ability to provide a pension at the end of the day.
What I'm talking about is creating their own pension fund with "green" investments - in job-producing industry.
Give it a gander for god's sake. Enough of the tycoons gorging and pillaging already. Right now they have to gorge and pillage to produce a bottom line attractive enough to investors. Right now we are stuck on the gorge and pillage scenario because the market demands it.

Let's step around the machine, get off the treadmill, u.

[ 29 August 2008: Message edited by: George Victor ]

quote:

---

Originally posted by George Victor:
But you still avoid discussion of the bonds and otherwise coming to grips with the corporations.

Howcum?

---

1. It's irrelevant to this thread.

2. I gave you my answer, and you ignored it:

quote:

---

Originally posted by unionist:
I don't believe in workers allegedly securing their jobs by investing their wages in them. I do believe that society as a whole should invest in the means of production - indeed, it should own them. But unions?

---

Labour's opposition continued right into Hargrove's term, and he, like all the others before, could not get off the timeless condemnation of the employer, even as the employer was going down the drain with its impossible autos(see the report on business piece) and talk about the kinds of cars that should be built now. And it was his buddies in the Liberal camp with the subsidies to the automakers for more of the same kind of auto manufacturing that got Buzz's approval.

Why do union people have to be so goddamed neanderthalic? Nobody a third of a century back, and nobody now, is talking job losses, the sacrifice of the worker to the bloody "gorged" capitalist.

That's 19th century theatrics, u. Soapbox stuff in lieu of seriously coming to grips with the brave new world that you know is going to have to be confronted more and more, its politics, its economics, its social structure, including the unionized worker's role. Why not replace the gorged capitalist with the progressive worker?

posted 29 August 2008 05:53 AM
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
http://tinyurl.com/5u28u3
There is continued slippage. In B.C., the negatve impact of regressive changes to the Labour Code continues to be felt. Alberta, with some improvement, continues to exist in the Stone Age. Look out, Saskatchewan, given the nasty changes just made to labour law.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
From: Port Moody, B.C. | Registered: Jun 2007 | IP: Logged

-------------------------------------------------

As for the comments about Hargrove and the auto industry - cars are not manufactured in B.C. or Alberta. This suggests there are regional issues associated with the union density issue, but the one over-riding question is the policial culture and the framework set by right wing governments for labour law.

---------------------------------------------

The most revealing piece of B.C. political history I can remember, munroe, explaining why the parties of Tweedledee and Tweedledum had to pair up under one banner to beat labour and the CCF soon after the war (in early 50s), was the nature of work in the mountains, and the nature of the companies employing miners and loggers.

Resource extraction meant particularly challenging work conditions and the formation of unions to do battle - political as well as working conditions - was a natural. And the businesses, family and corporate, sought state protection, and B.C. workers understood that they were at war.

What is the makeup and political affiliation of union membership today? Lots of cozying up to the "Liberal"(Conservative, Socred, Alliance) Party of B.C.today? Any hope of exposing it for what it is?
----

The law does matter and it is skewed in favour of employers. I have yet o find anyone who says that the CAW's stand at an OFL Convention many years ago turned him or her ant-union. Nor do I find that the fear of higher gas prices and the loss of Ontario's manufacturing base informs their opinion.

[ 01 September 2008: Message edited by: munroe ]

quote:

---

Originally posted by Kdrunkin1:
It has become "no holds barred" in attacking unions, collective bargaining an even individual organisers.

I just have to wonder why you have the right to organize and send out your pro union rhetoric but the employer does not have the right to say anything anti union or converse to the employees about union drives.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Kdrunkin1:
I just have to wonder why you have the right to organize and send out your pro union rhetoric but the employer does not have the right to say anything anti union or converse to the employees about union drives.

---

The approach historically was that the choice of joining a union was a worker's alone - unionisation was not a polical campaign. The "campaign" concept was imported from the States and a very different culture. The Campbell Liberals set all of this on its head, just as the new neocon government in Saskatchewan.

quote:

---

The law does matter and it is skewed in favour of employers. I have yet o find anyone who says that the CAW's stand at an OFL Convention many years ago turned him or her ant-union. Nor do I find that the fear of higher gas prices and the loss of Ontario's manufacturing base informs their opinion.

---

The law CERTAINLY DOES matter, munroe, and I do understand the fear factor involved where there is no protection under the law.

And it is exactly that factor - the union's very life depending on the politics of the day - that I am on about.

The Scandinavian countries have rationalized the whole process so that unions are part of a yearly (or more frequent) process of communication with government and industry with the viability (profitability) of their workplaces in mind.

I am thinking, too, of the "company unions" of Japan where the CEO of the firm comes off the shop floor, and often the union leadership.

Changing economic conditiions and imperatives, internationally, are causing them all to modify, but I don't see that at work in North America. And that, it seems to me, can have only one result - the U.S. example, where the thoughts of Kdrunkin 1 would win praise in unread circles.

I'm not talking about instantly climbing into the kip with management. I am concerned about a long-term process of re-structuring that attempts to surmount the achilles heel of the union movement, politics.

"Green" industries and bonds seem a logical place to start in what is going to have to be a revolution in industrial relations matching a revolution in our relationship with Earth.

I rather saw it as "diamond in the rough."

Nothing to do with a "labour party", but lots to do with the association of unions, government and corporations as in other countries where it's all part of a nationalist package.

Apparently we can't talk union here without looking over the shoulder at the U.S. Strange thing about the United Steelworkers, however - from time to time down the years they have burst out singing O Canada.

But it is going to require real equity in what is being made, beyond the sweat. See again, Duncan's green bonds and imagine the worker holding them and not some mutual fund or pension portfolio with equity in everything the worker doesn't stand for.

And, of course, it's going to require a nationalist political force reflecting what is happening everywhere else. Our historic mining firms (INCO), must no longer be sold to firms based in, say, Brazil, and then Canadian firms interested in developing potash deposits in, say, Brazil, be told that, no, Brazilian national interests won't allow that.That was last week's story. This week it's John Deere going to the U.S. and Mexico.

Bay Street has long sold out this country, but in recent years, the working stiff has joined the investing class more interested in building a pension fund than a future place of employment.

I'm sure this continues to be "clumsy", NB, but I'm trying to fashion a way out of this pickle before we have to sue for statehood. Can't just watch the losses mount and grumble about fate, politicians and guv'mint, eh? That just doesn't cut it.

The problem with such an approach now, much less the past problems that I won't go into, is that the other side (business and government) aren't interested. They've been engaging in class war against working people since Bennett won in 83 in BC and the war was declared. There's no point in humming a tune that no one will sing along with you.

But I'm talking about workers who understand that the corporation has to be a money-making proposition - not the "blood suckers" of the late Buzz Hargrove's imagery (and so many others stuck in 19th century liturgy).

The blood appears in the markets when there are no profits and no increase in stock value...!!!
Later, it appears in the plants being shut down.