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I love history -- the history of anything that I'm interested in. Music, baseball, science and technology, and of course, the history of people's movements. Women, peace, civil rights, LGBT -- and above all, I love labour history. Learning about how working people organized and fought for justice in the workplace is thrilling to me, especially the ground-breakers, the pioneers, the courageous women and men who defied unjust law and immoral authority, who risked everything. Those people are my heroes. I feel a kinship, a solidarity with these historical figures. I feel the chain of labour battles stretching out across the ages, the torch passed from their hands to ours. Sometimes I feel like I was born in the wrong era. I dream of the time when workers would "down tools" and walk out, shutting the whole factory down. I dream of general strikes, of the IWW crossing class and colour lines, of the "mill girls" of Lowell and Laurence, Massachusetts (my all-time f...

It's been a while. 1. Mom went home. My mom went home two weeks ago, after spending seven weeks here. I was sad to see her go! We had a great time, and it got better as we went along and settled into a routine. The dogs must especially miss her. They loved to hang out in her room, and she adored them. 2. I took union training. I was in Nanaimo this week, participating in some training with my union, the BCGEU. I had three days of courses, plus a full day of travel each way, so I was gone for the whole work week. My workplace has an interesting union model. All the frontline staff are members of CUPE, and the professional staff -- librarians, senior librarians, and library managers -- belong to the BCGEU. This means I'm the only BCGEU member in all five of my libraries. However, there are BCGEU members in many other workplaces in my area. It's a very diverse union that represents social workers, administrative staff, BC Liquor and BC Cannabis workers, correctional officers, ...

For the portion of my training taking place in Campbell River -- two days this week plus all of next week -- I was booked into the Coast Discovery Inn, a Coast chain property. Before this trip, I was unfamiliar with the Coast chain. Their slogan "Refreshingly Local" means they acquire already-established hotels and bring them into the Coast brand. We stayed at one in Tsawwassen the night before taking the ferry to Vancouver Island, I stayed at one in Nanaimo. They were both very nice -- lovely rooms, amenities, and service. Based on those experiences, I was very disappointed when I saw my room in Campbell River. It was tiny -- one bed, and the bed took up the entire room. This is fine when you're out exploring Paris, but when you're living in a room for 10 days, it would be confining and inconvenient. In addition, Allan and Diego are spending the weekend (yay! can't wait!), and I don't see the three of us living in a shoebox together, even for a few days. I as...

These days, most hotel rooms contain some sort of green messaging, as companies are expected to show how eco-friendly they are. Usually guests have the option of not having their towels changed daily, which is supposed to yield big energy savings. Last week at the Sheraton Parkway in Toronto, I learned that Sheraton's green policy is not exactly as advertised. I don't know if this qualifies as greenwashing, but it is certainly not full disclosure. The card reads: Conserving water, energy and other resources is rewarding for you and great for the environment. Enjoy a $5 voucher at participating food and beverage outlets or 500 Starpoints® awarded at check-out for each night you decline housekeeping (except day of departure). It feels good to conserve. To participate in the Make a Green Choice program, please tell us at check-in or look for the door hanger in your guestroom. It may feel good to conserve, but your conservation doesn't feel good to hotel workers. For each gues...

I am very frustrated by progressive reaction to Doug Ford becoming the leader of the Ontario Progressive Conservative Party. People are acting as if Ford has already won an election that is three months away. I understand there is great -- and well-deserved -- anger against Kathleen Wynne's Liberal party. But are we progressives going to stand helplessly staring at polls as we are thrown from frying pan to fire? Under 20 years of Liberal governments, public spending has been frozen, resulting in a decrease of more than 40% in public resources. Corporate taxes are at all-time low. Privatization is strangling both services and jobs. And now -- supposedly -- we're all going to vote for more of the same. Either literally more of the same in the Liberals or worse than that in the Conservatives. And supposedly, we won't vote NDP because the NDP can't win. We won't vote for a party because the party can't win because not enough people will vote for it. How stupid do yo...

I recently attended the CUPE Ontario Library Workers Conference, which has become a highlight of my year since I first attended (and was elected to the organizing committee) in 2015. It has eclipsed and replaced the OLA Superconference as the most relevant and enjoyable must-attend conference in my schedule. When I first got my librarian degree, I was very excited about attending my first "OLA" (as it's always called). But I quickly learned that the sessions are a crap-shoot, sometimes relevant but often obvious and dull. There's also a great deal of boosterism by OLA and the member libraries. For the difference between the two conferences, for OLA, think employers and libraries , for CUPE Ontario, think  labour and library workers . In recent years, our Library Workers Conference has focused on precarious work and health and safety issues, two themes that are inextricably linked. This year's conference was called "Sex, Drugs & Bed Bugs," a light ...

Visit We Own It for all the facts on privatization. When public services are privatized, everyone loses -- except, of course, shareholders of a private company, who increase their wealth with our  money. But did you know the pain of privatization hits women disproportionately harder? As this excellent article by Jane Stinson in Canadian Dimension says: Privatization is not gender-neutral. It threatens advances toward women’s equality in the labour market and in the home. In the labour market, privatization usually means lower wages for women workers, fewer workplace rights, reduced health and welfare benefits, no pension coverage, less predictable work hours, more precarious employment, a heavier workload and generally more exploitative working conditions. In addition, in a society where women are still the primary caregivers for both children and the elderly, when services become both scarcer and more expensive , women's burdens grow -- often while their wages are shrinking. Th...

I've wanted to write about these two books for a long time, but adequately summarizing them is a daunting task. I just want to say to every activist and organizer: READ THESE BOOKS . I don't want to represent the authors' ideas, I want you to read them yourself . No Shortcuts: Organizing for Power in the New Gilded Age by Jane F. McAlevey and The End of Protest: A New Playbook for Revolution by Micah White are both aimed at activists and organizers -- people who already believe in the need for social change and are trying to influence the world in a progressive direction. Both books identify pitfalls and shortcomings in the current ways we approach our activism, and they offer concrete ideas for change, along with theory and philosophy to guide our decisions. Both are beautifully written, powerful, and essential. No Shortcuts  focuses on the labour movement, but McAlevey's analysis could apply to any movement. The labour movement is an excellent lens through which to...

Readers of a certain age might remember clocks and watches with glowing green dials . The dials were painted with radium, the radioactive element discovered by Marie Curie. We had clocks like this when I was growing up. I have a distinct memory of my mother saying, "The women who worked in the factories where these were made got very sick. They had to put the paintbrushes in their mouths, in order to paint the tiny numbers and dots, and they all got sick, and some died." I never forgot that -- yet I never heard it mentioned anywhere else. Who were those women? Why were they putting a radioactive substance in their mouths? When I saw a review of The Radium Girls: The Dark Story of America's Shining Women , I knew that someone finally had answered those questions. The story of those women was finally told. And what a story it is. The young, working-class women in Orange, New Jersey, and Ottawa, Illinois, who painted radium dials thought they had it made. Not only was the pa...

CUPE Ontario's striking new graphic urges us to be brave, to be bold, and to demand more. Those two words -- demand more -- deserve our attention. Every single law or regulation that protects us at work is a product of the labour movement. The right to days off. The right to a meal break. The rights of children to attend school. Paid holidays. A minimum wage. Maternity leave. All of it. Many broader rights that have benefited our society were championed by the labour movement ahead of the mainstream, such as protection from discrimination for the LGBTQ community. All this, and so much more, was the result of working people, standing together, and demanding more . We all know that union density -- how many people in any community are members of a union -- has declined greatly in the past decades. As corporations moved their operations to other countries to take advantage of cheap labour and the absence of environmental and health and safety laws, manufacturing jobs all but disappea...

The deadline to join the NDP and vote for Niki Ashton is August 17 . Last night I saw something that shocked me, and today I did something I've never done before: I joined a political party. And I did it so I can cast my vote for Niki Ashton for leader of the federal NDP. * * * * I worked on Saturday, and was very busy, with zero time to check headlines or social media. After work, I was watching the Red Sox trounce the Yankees and idly tapping on my tablet, when I was stopped cold. Heather Heyer was killed when a Nazi rioter drove a car into the crowd. I am not easily shocked. Perhaps I think I am shock-proof. But the spectacle of an angry mob carrying torches and Nazi banners, openly attacking a group of peaceful protesters, hit me like a gut punch. I've been writing about the collapse of the US empire, the US becoming a third world country, the fascist shift, and so on, for a long time. It's not like the rise of the white supremacists came out of nowhere. And it's no...

Loblaw Companies Limited 1 President's Choice Circle Brampton, Ontario, L6Y 5S5 Attention: LCL Customer Relations Centre Dear Loblaw Ltd.: I am a Loblaw customer and I was extremely disappointed by recent public statements made by Loblaw CEO Galen Weston, Jr., regarding the proposed raise of the minimum wage in Ontario. Mr. Weston claimed that the proposed wage hikes will result in higher prices and more self-checkout aisles, and speaks about labour costs "ballooning" by $190 million.* Mr. Weston clearly values Loblaw's shareholders more than it cares about its customers. When I spend my hard-earned money, I don't think it's too much to ask the store to provide check-out and bagging, and for there to be adequate staff on-hand to minimize time spent waiting in line. Instead, Mr. Weston implies that if the minimum wage is increased, I will be forced to provide his very profitable company with free labour by doing my own checkout. When a company posts $990 mill...

The City of Mississauga has a community recognition program , through which community groups can have their banner fly at City Hall for a day. When the program was announced, I said to a few of my union sisters, "I know a flag I'd like to see there...". I was only joking -- but they took me seriously! This morning, to the astonishment of many, the beautiful pink CUPE 1989 banner is flying beside Mississauga City Hall! This week marks one year since the members of CUPE Local 1989, Mississauga Library Workers, walked off their jobs and onto the picket lines. It was the first strike in our local's history and the first strike against the City of Mississauga. I am a member and now the president of Local 1989. In the past year, I've been invited to speak on panels, in conferences and conventions, in rallies, meetings, and gatherings of labour activists. Our local was honoured at the CUPE Ontario convention , and featured in a conference called "Building Strong Loc...

This week, the Toronto Public Library announced plans  to open libraries with no staff. Not just no librarians -- we've seen that in many places -- but no staff whatsoever. This was bad enough, but we were further horrified to see that the Ontario Library Association, a membership-based organization that is supposed to further the interests of libraries and librarians, seems to support this idea. OLA Executive Director had the chutzpah  to re-frame this as "innovative". If you are a librarian in Ontario, I hope you will provide feedback to the OLA through this petition: The OLA Should Oppose Staffless Libraries . Please consider sharing with your own library network. * * * * Petition by iPetitions * * * * March 23, 2017 Shelagh Paterson Executive Director Ontario Library Association Toronto, Ontario Dear Ms. Paterson: We, the undersigned, are public librarians in the province of Ontario and members of the Ontario Library Association (OLA). We are concerned and disturbed b...

How have labour unions benefitted our society? Union activism brought us: Weekends! Literally. There used to be an expression: "Don't come to work on Sunday, don't come to work on Monday." Meaning, if you took one day off, you were fired. Vacations - any vacation Paid vacations The 8-hour work day An end to child labour, so every child could have an education Rest breaks Equal pay for equal work for women Sick leave Canada Pension Plan Universal health care The minimum wage Pregnancy and parental Leave The right to strike Anti-discrimination rules at work Overtime pay Health and safety rules The 40 hour work week Worker’s compensation for on-the-job injuries Employment Insurance Pensions Public education! Collective bargaining rights Wrongful termination laws Whistleblower protection laws Anti-sexual harassment laws Holiday pay Unions even help nonunionized workers get better pay and benefits. Here's how. Unions have a substantial impact on the compensation and wo...

I spoke to a customer yesterday who was visiting from Denmark. He described himself as a trade-unionist, and he came to the library, looking for me, to learn about our strike! He also said he had read a book he loved, and was looking for more like it. He described the book: "by a Canadian author, takes place in Toronto, about the struggles of workers building a viaduct". It is some measure of my Canadian acculuration that before he finished his sentence, I idenfitied Michael Ondaatje's  In the Skin of a Lion , an excellent work of historical fiction and labour history. For the "more like that" question, I immediately thought of The Given Day , by Dennis Lehane, which led me to write this post about historical fiction in general.  So on the Labour Day weekend, I thought it would be fun to do a little labour-themed readers' advisory. Here's my list. Fiction In the Skin of a Lion - Michael Ondaatje The Given Day - Dennis Lehane Ironweed - William Kennedy T...