Public Service Alliance of Canada BC

forwarded on behalf of CoDevelopment Canada

Dear CoDev supporters,

We found out on Friday last week that the government will bring Bill C-23, implementation legislation for the Canada-Colombia Free Trade Agreement, back to the House of Commons this week. We’re told by NDP Trade Critic Peter Julian’s office that the government hopes to hold a second reading and vote by the end of the week, which will send the FTA to committee for more deliberations.

You will remember that the Liberal opposition, led by Trade Critic Scott Brison, is backing away from the all-party standing committee decision last year that called for an “impartial human rights impact assessment be carried out by a competent body, which is subject to independent levels of scrutiny and validation,” prior to moving ahead with Bill C-23. The first order on the bill this week is to debate a motion by the Bloc Quebecois that would pull C-23 from the order paper on the grounds that the Harper government ignored this all-party recommendation. If this motion is voted on and defeated by the Conservatives and Liberals, the Canada-Colombia Free Trade Agreement will be one step closer to becoming reality.

It is urgent that Canadians write THIS WEEK and express their views on the CCFTA. We are asking CoDev members and supporters send messages to their MP and to key Liberal MPs expressing their views. We are including here some new information that you may want to pass on to your MP. Urge your MP to support the Bloc motion to remove the CCFTA.

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While Labour Day is a time to celebrate labour and our role in building a better world, it also provides us the opportunity to strategize and plan for upcoming challenges. All across the country we must be prepared to mobilize in support of collective bargaining, and, in the face of a looming federal election, to get our message out about the importance of defending quality public services for all Canadians.

It is also appropriate on this day to pay tribute to the many victories of organized labour in the struggle for workers� rights, better pay and safer jobs. We must be ever vigilant in protecting our hard-won gains and our right to free collective bargaining.

Thinking about our role in building a better world, we must also defend the rights of our brothers and sisters who risk their lives daily fighting for the rights of labour in countries where to be a trade unionist may mark one for violence or murder.

In July, I joined the leaders of Canada�s largest public sector unions and undertook a fact-finding mission to Colombia to examine: human and labour rights, the privatization of public services, working conditions, the impact of free trade and the absence of labour and human rights guarantees. Meeting with union leaders, indigenous groups, politicians, diplomats, and human rights groups, we were able examine first-hand the problems that afflict Colombia, especially given the current government’s human rights record and the concerns about the recent free trade agreement with Canada.

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Four of Canada�s top public sector union leaders, including PSAC National President John Gordon, recently visited Colombia to learn directly about the potential impact of a Canada-Colombia free trade deal on Colombian workers and their families. Here is a report.

We visited Colombia from July 18-25 on behalf of one million Canadian public sector workers. Our mission, among other tasks, was to see for ourselves whether our opposition to the Canada-Colombia free trade agreement was justified. What we saw and learned confirmed that we are right to oppose this deal and to speak out against it on behalf of Colombian workers and their families.

We met with many sectors of Colombian society, including the Colombian Minister of the Interior and government officials, the Canadian ambassador and embassy officials, leaders of the United Central of Workers (CUT) and trade unionists at all levels, members of the opposition Polo Democratico Alternativo, several non-governmental organizations, groups representing indigenous and Afro-Colombian peoples as well as media reporters and ordinary citizens.

We visited the poorest of the poor families displaced from their homes by paramilitary groups to benefit transnational companies wanting to expand agriculture production, mining and other business interests. We were told that more than 4 million people, 10 per cent of the population, have been displaced without reparations.

Continue reading at rabble.ca

via nupge.ca

Labour leaders undertaking week-long tour of South American country

Bogata (23 July 2008) – Four of Canada’s top public sector union leaders arrived at Bogota airport on July 18 to begin a week-long labour tour and learn directly about the potential impact of a Canada-Colombia free trade deal on Colombian workers and their families.

They were greeted by members of the Sindicato de Trabajadores Postales de Colombia (STPC – Union of Postal Workers) and the Association of Public Employees of the Human Rights Ombudsman (ASDEP), among other labour groups.

The Canadian delegation includes George Heyman, international vice-president of the National Union of Public and General Employees (NUPGE), John Gordon, national president of the Public Service Alliance of Canada (PSAC), Paul Moist, national president of the Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE), and Denis Lemelin, national president of the Canadian Union of Postal Workers (CUPW).

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Via makepovertyhistory.ca …

I am writing to you today to ask for your help in stopping a dangerous trade deal that you have probably never heard of. The government of Canada is negotiating a trade deal with Colombia, a country that Human Rights Watch calls the “worst human rights and humanitarian disaster” in the Americas.

This controversial deal will make many poor in Colombia worse off and help support a government involved in serious human rights abuses. The US Congress refused to approve a similar deal earlier this year, citing human rights abuses. If Canadians don’t speak up, this deal can be passed without parliamentary approval or public debate.

WHAT YOU CAN DO: Write to your Member of Parliament and insist that this deal not go through without a full debate in Parliament and the explicit approval of our elected representatives.

There is not much time – negotiations are underway, and are set to be completed before the end of the year. Millions of people in Colombia have been displaced through a violent conflict over land and resources. Transnational companies have become complicit in this violence. Many people living in poverty in Colombia are concerned that this deal increases the power of corporations at the expense of the poor.

Act in solidarity with Colombian social justice activists. Tell others that trade is a matter that affects poverty and human rights, and that you care. Speak out now!

Dennis Howlett
Coordinator
Make Poverty History

Prepared by Megan Adam, Public Service Alliance of Canada

In July of 2006, twelve delegates from four Canadian trade unions traveled to Colombia as part of an ongoing campaign to defend public services and trade union organizing in that country. Over twelve days our delegation visited three major cities and several smaller communities, speaking with dozens of people representing trade union, human rights and indigenous community movements. During our densely-packed itinerary we heard the Colombians’ stories of repression and resistance, saw films about police attacks and murders, and were called on to witness the ongoing degradation of public services and Colombian society. The tour was not only a chance to make stronger links with our southern counterparts, but a wakeup call to our future if global social justice and civil society movements do not continue the struggle to halt privatization pressures by organizations like the IMF and WTO.

• The first portion of the Frontlines Tour took place in 2004 when a delegation of Colombian workers visited Canada: read more at the Social Justice Fund website and the psacbc.com archives.

This report will give a brief overview of our activities in Colombia as part of the Frontlines Tour. The four participating unions (PSAC, BCGEU, CUPE and CUPW) are the major representatives of public sector workers in Canada and we met with many of our counterparts in Colombia as well as their human rights and community partners. This initiative in the PSAC is part of the ongoing work of the Social Justice Fund, and a component of the Make Poverty History campaign, incorporating the fight to defend quality public services such as health, education, welfare, clean water, sanitation and energy around the world.

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