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Building Power: Aboriginal / Workers of Colour Conference Report, June 14, 2003

By Tania Das Gupta

The conference took place at the OFL Building from 9 am – 5 pm. However, I attended from 10 am – 3 pm, which was a substantial part of the day.

There was an interesting introduction of different groups of workers represented at the conference. There were public sector workers, autoworkers, retail, service, hotel, and healthcare workers, to name a few. The majority of the participants were workers of colour and aboriginal workers, although exact numbers were not available to me.

There were 2 sets of excellent workshops available, before lunch and after lunch. In the morning, I attended a workshop called “Building Leadership: The New Leaders of Tomorrow” facilitated by Jenny Ahn of CAW and Mohammed Baksh of USW. The workshop had about 90 in attendance, although each workshop was supposed to have about 35.

Through popular education techniques, the 2 facilitators encouraged participants to share their stories of success or failures within the union movement as workers of colour. Barriers that were mentioned were: racism, sexism and discrimination against English as Second Language speakers, harassment, lack of networking. Other issues mentioned were need for childcare, need to learn about union structures.

There was a discussion about “what does it take to be a leader?” The following issues were brought up: talking to people who are or have been union leaders, networking, active participation, public speaking, being honest and credible, educating oneself.

The following future actions were recommended: another similar conference next year, more workshops before next year, report cards every 6 months, networking strategy

In the afternoon, I attended a workshop on Toronto Civic Action Network (Toronto CAN): Mobilizing and Defending Communities” facilitated by Rachna Contractor and Julius Deutsch. This workshop had about 15 participants.

Toronto CAN is a community and labour partnership committed to protecting services and programs. It has been involved in many budget battles at City Hall. The workshop talked about how Toronto CAN has been able to successfully protect many community-based programs and services during the budget process. The facilitators also talked about how Toronto CAN is preparing the People’s Summit for October 3 and 4, 2003 and how local union activists can get involved. Their website address is: www.torontocan.ca . The participants led a discussion on “how do we make change?” The following principles were brought up: political awareness and voting, self esteem and power, organizing by ward, by issue. It was also mentioned that many people who now reside in Toronto immigrated here in the last 10 years, therefore many can’t vote due to not having citizenship rights. Toronto CAN wants a campaign to get them the vote.

There was a special address by Stephanie Payne (School Trustee) and David Miller (Councillor & Mayoralty Candidate).

An announcement was made about the organizing and action going on at Matrix Packaging Inc. (Mississauga) where workers contacted UNITE, the union of needletrades, industrial and textile employees. The union organizers were assaulted by hired company “thugs”. Employees who are predominantly South Asian women have been harassed, including obscene phone calls and threats of violence. A solidarity rally for the workers was announced before the Matrix Packaging Plant. Two organizers addressed the conference.