YUFA
External
Canadian Labour Council's 12th Annual
Women's Conference
June
14, 2003
By
Linda Briskin
I
have recently returned from the 12th CLC Women's conference held in Ottawa
from June 8-11. There were approximately 500 delegates and in addition to
plenary sessions, there were 17 break-out groups. I attended a workshop
that focussed on "Organizing in our Workplaces and Unions", and
chose to attend one of the two bilingual workshops in order to get a
better sense of the concerns and struggles of Francophone women. I was one
of two Anglophones in this workshop, which met four times over the course
of the conference.
EQUITY
AND DIVERSITY
Central to the organization of the conference was the attempt to highlight
issues of diversity. I have not been to a CLC Women's Conferences
for more than a decade and I was impressed with the heightened
consciousness among the delegates about the issues of equity and
diversity. Speakers at the plenaries were members of many equity-seeking
groups: in particular, aboriginal women, women of colour, and young women,
as well as women involved in global organizing.
There
is no doubt that the CLC has developed much expertise in the practice of
inclusivity from which we can learn a lot, especially given the current
struggles in YUFA. It occurs to me that YUFA might invite some members of
the Equity and Human Rights Department to do some training with YUFA
leadership and stewards, and help YUFA develop its equity program.
Although
I had some concerns about how young women's voices were profiled at the
conference, the visibility of young women underscored the fact that, in
YUFA, we need to do more to organize new faculty, both to respond to their
concerns but also to raise their union consciousness. They will be the
next generation of YUFA activists and leaders and as Nancy Riche (recently
retired as the CLC Secretary / Treasurer) pointed out, union leadership
should 'look like' the membership.
In
both the plenaries and the workshop, a backlash against equity issues and
women's committees was identified, as well as the tendency for some union
leaderships to create competition for resources and political space among
various seeking groups. I regret that there was no real discussion of
strategies to address these problems since it is also happening in the
universities. I think that YUFA's representative on the CAUT Women's
Committee (Barbara Cameron) should encourage a discussion and perhaps a
conference that focuses on this issue.
EDUCATION
/ POLITICAL ORGANIZING
Since the CLC women's Conference does not have the constitutional right to
send resolutions to the CLC convention, the major focus is on education.
Despite the value of many of the 'exercises' we were involved in during
the workshops, I was disappointed that the structure of the conference did
not include some kind of political action or political statement. This was
an unusual gathering of 500 women unionists and it seemed unfortunate to
me that this collective voice was not mobilized to any political end, and
made more visible to the public and the media.
BARRIERS
TO LEADERSHIP
One of the handouts prepared for the conference focussed on "Common
Obstacles Women Activists and Leaders Face." I think this document
quite useful and recommend that it be posted to YUFA's website and used
actively in YUFA's equity program.
NUCAUT
CAUCUS
Prior to attending the conference I contacted the CAUT in order to find
out who was attending as a NUCAUT delegate. I organized a caucus for the
six women (from Laurentian, Capilano College, Mount St Vincent and York);
in addition, two delegates from MUSA (McMaster University Staff
Association) and one from Acadia University Staff Association attended.
We had a very useful discussion. In particular, we decided to follow up on whether NUCAUT has a seat on the CLC Women's Committee, and about the possibility of setting up a National Women's Committee for NUCAUT. There was also a strong view that at all labour movement functions, NUCAUT should meet as a caucus, and perhaps in the future (at CLC Conventions), all those in teacher unions should also meet as a group.
To read Ruthann Dyer's report on this conference, click here.