THE FISHERMAN, DECEMBER 16, 1996
BUZZ HARGROVE ... union committee backed stand against wage rollbacks.
The CAW held out against concessions at Canadian Airlines despite massive pressure from , Ottawa and airline executives. The union's stand changed the outcome dramatically.
Holding the line at Canadian
By BUZZ HARGROVE
At 11 a.m. on Saturday, Dec. 7, the CAW Council—a meeting of 600 elected delegates from all sections of the CAW—was interrupted and turned into a unique and emotional press conference. The Canadian Airlines bargaining committee had come up to the stage to officially announce a tentative resolution of the dispute at Canadian. The spontaneous standing ovation for the committee—an ovation full of pride and identification— reflected something the delegates already sensed before they heard any specifics: a victory had been achieved and something historic had just happened.
Yet what exactly was it that made this event so significant? There had been no long or dramatic strike, no radical workplace action. The negotiations weren't driven by worker demands for new gains but by the company agenda. The union hadn't been able to prevent wage concessions. What then made this apparent defeat into a victory? What was it— in that room full of experienced and tough union representatives from all sections of our union—that everyone seemed to know, share, and feel?
There are times in which the final result is overshadowed by what happened along the way. This was one of those times. Had the union simply accepted the company's original demand for a 10 per cent cut, it would have reinforced the public's view that wages were the problem. It would have demor-
alized our members and left them vulnerable to the next round of cuts, while doing absolutely nothing about stabilizing the company and securing our jobs.
But when our bargaining committee and members challenged the concessions, and stubbornly fought them, they set off a chain of events that transformed the debate. What was unchangeable, changed.
been elected on a platform of reversing Tory policy and making jobs the number one priority, and then immediately proceeded to out-Tory the Tories and plead amnesia on the jobs issue, suddenly donned the mantle of "democratic saviour." It cut off any further bargaining and ordered a premature vote on the company's latest offer. That was an unprecedented
'Neither Benson nor the federal Liberals seemed interested in opening the Royal Bank's contracts and lowering their interest charges and profits..'
What seemed obvious, was exposed.
The company's ultimatum that the cut was absolutely non-negotiable became quite negotiable as it was reduced to less than half (and could have been further minimized with solidarity across all unions and positive intervention by the federal government). Deadlines that were etched in stone came and went. The federal government's insistence that it was not a player was refuted by its eventual financial concession, by the Minister of Finance signing the "CAW Letter" on national TV, and in-between by the most cynical kind of anti-union intervention.
This government, which had
and dangerous intrusion on free collective bargaining.
Similarly, Kevin Benson who had argued that as a matter of market "principle", the union and the company must settle these things on their own, enthusiastically embraced the government's intervention when it was aimed at undermining the position of the bargaining committee. Coinciden-tally, the Royal Bank, Canadian Airline's main banker, had just announced its latest profits of $1.4 billion. While those who had already sacrificed were asked for more and the Royal had made more money than any company in Canada's history has ever made, neither Benson nor the federal Lib-
erals seemed interested in opening the Royal Bank's contracts and lowering their interest charges and profits.
At the end of the day, our refusal to fold under intense pressures led to the actual concessions being much lower and to the possibility— previously written off— of a national plan to bring some sanity into the industry. But even more significant, our persistence led to more profound changes that brought hope for a different future.
The tough and often painful struggle we went through changed our members, developed our collective confidence, and strengthened our union. It transformed how the public understood the industry, its problems, and its workers. Should Canadian ask for concessions again, it won't just be its workers, but the broader public that will then be asking: "What? Again?!" Should Canadian run into a future crisis because of excess capacity and destructive competition, we will then be so much better positioned, with a broader base for our on-going campaign for an effective airline policy.
Yes, we suffered another loss in income. But this time, unlike the past, our stubborn resistance led to us building something. That's what allows us to leave these negotiations with a sense of optimism. That's what's behind our conviction that an historic corner has been turned. That's what the delegates at the CAW Council meeting cheered. That's why workers who "lost," also won.
LETTERS
(I live on McKinley Lake, which was probably named by gold-seekers lured north after the Trail of '49 California gold rush petered out. The lake is fed by McKinley Creek and drained by McKinley River into the Horsefly River.
McKinley Lake was shaped by the advance and subsequent retreat of the last of the great glaciers about 10,000 years ago. While the ice re-arranged the local topography, it left McKinley Lake connected to the Pacific Ocean by waterways navigable to fish.
Sockeye and coho salmon made their spectacular appearance yearly, spawning on the gravel beds of the of the Horsefly River. Many of them passed up through McKinley Lake and Bosk Lake, at least as far as Goetzen Lake. McKinley Creek provided 2 5 kilometres of spawning channel above McKinley Lake.
Next August, 1997, is expected to see sockeye returning in record numbers to the Horsefly spawning beds. While fisheries has been trying (and allowing for a few mistake, quite successfully) to build up the runs, the logging industry, ably assisted by the B.C. Forest Service, has been destroying watersheds on which these runs depend.
During the latest dominant cycle year on the Horsefly in 1993, a few spawners were seen less than 10 kilometres above McKinley Lake. Hundreds, perhaps thousands, were schooled up below the thermocline at the head of the lake, waiting for the creek to cool to spawning temperatures. It didn't. They died in the lake.
During the minor run this year, no salmon were observed to enter the lake or the creek above it. Clearcut logging has made useless 25 kilometres of spawning channel in the only salmon rearing tributary of the Horsefly River.
If we get a warm August next year, the dominant Horsefly River salmon run could be endangered.
RAY JONES, McKinley Lake