“As this week progresses, you will see how workers all across the globe are connected,” said Buffenbarger. “What happens to workers in China impacts workers in Nigeria. What goes on down in South Carolina affects what happens in South America. Working conditions in India have an impact on conditions for workers in Indonesia, Vietnam and Bangladesh.”
Delegates at the Convention will have ample opportunity to consider the scenarios described by Buffenbarger. With an agenda featuring speakers and activists from around the world, this year’s Convention will provide the IAM’s answer to multinational corporations who eagerly pit nation against nation and worker against worker.
“International solidarity begins with you, the delegates to this Grand Lodge Convention,” said Buffenbarger. “We must never forget that in a race to the bottom, there are no winners.”
Hope for All Who Toil
AFL-CIO Secretary-Treasurer Liz Shuler was one of a host of guest speakers to address delegates on the opening day of the 38th Grand Lodge Convention. Shuler discussed the many challenges facing working families and reiterated the importance of global solidarity. “With all the challenges we face, we can’t do this alone—especially not in the face of the vast sums of money our opponents can throw at lobbying and political races.” said Shuler. “So what do we do? We broaden ourselves. We broaden ourselves to include people we generally haven’t in the past. To include all people who work—‘all who toil,’ as your theme so aptly suggests.”
“Today, with globalization and free trade agreements, we need international unions more than we’ve ever needed international unions before,” said Sid Ryan, President of the Ontario Federation of Labour. “Workers need to come together. We need to send signals that workers cannot just sit back and allow our social programs, our health care systems, and particularly our jobs to be contracted out and shipped overseas to China and wherever else they can lower the rate of pay for workers.” He told delegates, “Let us form stronger links between the AFL-CIO and the Canadian Labour Congress and all the unions in between.”
John Cartwright, President of the Toronto and York Labour Council, played a vital role in the fight to increase Ontario’s minimum wage to $10.25 per hour – the highest in North America. Cartwright told delegates there is only one response to employers who say the next generation in both of our countries deserve less. “I think it’s our obligation to fight like hell to make sure that never happens.”
Andrea Horwath, Ontario New Democratic Party Leader, echoed the need for change in Canadian government. “‘Hope for all who toil’ – these are not idle words,” said Horwath. “I’m still a big believer in hope, and optimism, and what we can achieve – all of us – by working together. We need to make some choices. You can stick with a system that leaves the middle class feeling squeezed and leaves people falling further and further behind, or we can embrace change that puts people that actually make this province work at the heart of our plans
Canada’s Labour History Hits the Big Screen!
As part of the opening day ceremonies, delegates watched Canadian labour history come to life on a football field-size screen.
From its roots during the War of 1812, unions in Canada grew with the emerging industrial economy. The first nationwide labour organization, the Trades and Labour Congress of Canada, formed in 1883. Two years after the IAM’s founding in 1888, the first Canadian Lodge, Local 103, was organized in Stratford, Ontario and in 1895 the first General Vice President for Canada, Arthur Holmes, took office.
Machinists were at the forefront of many labour battles, including taking a prominent role in one of the most militant and bloody strikes in Canadian history, the Winnipeg General Strike of 1919.
Canadian IAM members survived the Great Depression and another World War, and blazed new trails by helping form a labour-based political party, the New Democratic Party, under the leadership of the charismatic Tommy Douglas.
When delegates gathered in Montreal in 1992, the last time the Grand Lodge Convention was held in Canada, the Convention theme of International Solidarity – strength, security and success – echoed today’s challenges of globalization.
In the first ten years of the 21st Century, IAM members in the transportation and manufacturing sector faced similar challenges as their brothers and sisters across the border. But they organized and pushed back, as Machinists do, and by 2011, they helped elect 102 New Democratic Party candidates to Parliament and formed the Official Opposition.