Mobilize for Ontario Day of Action

Sid Ryan, President of the Ontario Federation of Labour

Saturday April 21,  3:00 p.m.,  Queen’s Park

Message from the Toronto and York Region Labour Council

Premier McGuinty put banker Don Drummond in charge of recommending nearly 400 cuts to jobs and public services in Ontario. At a time when Ontarians are in desperate need of economic recovery, these cuts will jeopardize every aspect of society: from health care to full-day kindergarten to pensions. No public service is safe. However, in McGuinty’s reckless plan to balance Ontario’s books by putting more people out of work and destroying the social safety net, he refuses to roll-back corporate tax cuts that are starving the province of billions of dollars that could be better used to create new jobs and help tens of thousands of struggling Ontario families to get back on their feet.

Ontarians from all sectors of society must come together to tell Premier McGuinty that he cannot cut his way to economic prosperity. Help to mobilize your members, your families and your communities to stop the cuts and put Ontario on the road to economic recovery. www.ofl.ca

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Blockade of National Bank

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Quebec student strike puts Charest Liberal's on defensive

250,000 students and allies hit the streets for the historic March 22nd mass protest.  Photo by Paul Lamontaine

People's Voice
by Johan Boyden

Students in Quebec have stepped‑up their escalating strike action for accessible education, with a massive demonstration of over 250,000 people on March 22. The mobilization far exceeded the expectations of organizers, creating a human river of protestors as wide as four lanes of traffic and almost eight kilometres long, effectively shutting down the center of Montreal.

The student demonstration, one of the largest protest marches in Canadian history, has rocked Quebec and "upped the anti" for a movement on a collision course with the provincial Charest Liberal government.
"We are just getting started" the students spokespeople said at the rally, calling for all groups in Quebec society to join them, including labour, and by all accounts it looks like the struggle here could be just beginning.

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A budget that cuts jobs and services

"We're gonna cut by this much and then more!"

PV Vancouver Bureau

     Working people wanted the federal government to lay the basis for "a sustained and broadly shared economic recovery," said the Canadian Labour Congress in its analysis of the 2012 Federal Budget. Instead, "we got a budget that cuts jobs rather than creates jobs; which attacks needed public services and social programs; and undermines rather than enhances retirement security."

     While the corporate media praised the Budget as "moderate", the CLC points out that spending cuts rising to over $5 billion per year from 2014‑15 mean a 6.9% cut, with only "very modest" new initiatives.

     Each $1 billion of spending cuts represents about 10,000 lost jobs, says the CLC, divided between government jobs and private and not‑for‑profit sector jobs supported by government purchases of goods and services. The overall negative impact of the Budget on jobs will be about 50,000 when the measures are fully implemented.

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Three quick videos on the big Quebec demo - and a fast backgrounder

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