Tag: Ontario

MARCH 16, 2005 – Tomorrow, March 5, will see marches across the country to celebrate International Women’s Day. Your paper (The Toronto Star) will undoubtedly cover these events. But to really cover issues of women’s rights, your paper should also cover a story a little closer to home. Since December 6, 59 mostly women workers – members of the Communications, Energy and Paperworkers’ Union (CEP), Local 87-M – have been on strike against Brabant Newspapers, a company owned by TorStar – the owners of your newspaper. These workers earn a top rate of $8.99 an hour. But they have been offered…

MARCH 7, 2005 – The Toronto Star likes to market itself as a progressive voice, including a progressive voice for women’s rights. But its owner – TorStar Corp. – is now 14 weeks into a bitter labour dispute with 59 low-paid, mostly women workers at Brabant Newspapers in Stoney Creek. And not one line about the strike has appeared in the pages of the “progressive” Toronto Star. The strikers – members of local 87-M, Communications, Energy and Paperworkers Union of Canada (CEP) – include inserters, whose top rate is $8.99 per hour. Mike Sullivan of CEP says that in 1993,…

JANUARY 4, 2005 – Many readers will be familiar with the reputation of the Toronto Star, centre of Canadian liberalism. It portrays itself as pro-women, progressive, and pro-labour. But its parent – TorStar corporation – is currently engaged in a dispute which puts a lie to this entire reputation. Sixty members of the Communications, Energy and Paperworkers Union (CEP), Local 87-M, have been on strike since December 6 last year against their employer, Brabant Newspapers which since 2003 has been owned by TorStar.[1] Many of the strikers are women working in the inserting department. According to a flyer distributed on…

DECEMBER 7, 2004: TORONTO – In the first big labour mobilization since Dalton McGuinty’s Liberals took office, just over one year ago, almost 4,000 trade unionists marched to Queen’s Park November 27 under the slogan, “times up, keep your promises, Dalton.”[1] While there have been pro-labour changes under the Liberals – including “a rollback of the 60-hour work week (implemented by the Tories) and a hike in the minimum wage (frozen by the Tories)”, there is frustration at the slow pace of rolling back other of the anti-labour measures introduced by Mike Harris. In addition, labour leaders in the health…

NOVEMBER 18, 2002[1] – The average union member working at the Cobourg Daily Star and Port Hope Evening Guide, earns $10.91 an hour.[2] No wonder they have been walking the picket line since October 11,[3] demanding nothing more than a living wage. Twenty years ago, non-union graphic arts employees were making $10 an hour in Ontario. It is scandalous that, 20 years of price increases later, people are expected to live on the same amount. According to the strikers’ union, the Communication Workers of America local 30248, “over the past three years employees” at the two papers “have lost 1.9…

DECEMBER 8, 2001 – Fifty newspaper inserters making poverty line wages and fighting for their first union contract have been stymied at every turn by their employer, media giant CanWest Global. “In the lead up to Christmas, one of the most profitable times for newspapers, these women who make an average of $8 an hour, have literally been left out in the cold,” said Cec Makowski, the Ontario Region Vice-President for the Communications, Energy and Paperworkers Union of Canada. The 50 women workers, many single moms and newcomers to Canada, have been forced out on strike against Hamilton Web, the…

MAY 10, 1999 – Suddenly, what seemed unthinkable 18 months ago, is looming as a real possibility. Mike Harris, reviled by thousands, might just get re-elected in the Ontario election. Some polls have him trailing the Liberals. But the Toronto Star, based on a fairly large sample, put Harris at 51% just as the election was called, 12 points up on the Liberals, and far ahead of the NDP.[1] Harris could still blow it. There is deep hatred towards him across the province. He will be dogged by activists at every stop. But what happens on June 4 if we…

MARCH 15, 1999 – When striking educational support staff in Toronto turned to mass pickets last week, they unleashed a power that can stop the Tory cuts. Two weeks into their strike against the Toronto Board of Education, the 14,000 striking members of CUPE local 4400 switched from pickets scattered across the more than 300 schools in the district, to concentrated mass pickets of hundreds at selected high schools.[1] From Harbord Collegiate and West Toronto Collegiate in the west end, to Riverdale and East York in the east, hundreds and hundreds of pickets and supporters, on Monday and Tuesday of…

MARCH 1, 1999 – Saturday morning, February 27, more than 14,000 educational workers in the Toronto school board, members of the Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE) local 4400, walked off the job.[1] According to CUPE, the Toronto board is facing budget cuts of $172-million because of the Harris Tories’ Bill 160, cuts which pose the possibility of 4,358 job losses in the next four years.[2] But these are essential workers. They are the custodians, administrative staff, teaching assistants, English as a Second Language (ESL) instructors, international language instructors and lunch-room assistants. They have already faced job losses and downsizing.…