Public Service Alliance of Canada BC

Here is an excerpt from an excellent article by Rafe Mair, writer, broadcaster and former Socred Cabinet Minister.

A re-election of Mr. Campbell will mean the not so slow strangulation of BC Hydro, our power company that is the envy the world and it will happen this way. Hydro has lost 1/3 of its employees to Accenture, the bastard nephew of the infamous Enron, and its transmission lines to a new crown corporation, BCTC. Meanwhile, what�s left of our public power utility, BC Hydro, is banned from developing new sources of renewable energy and is forced instead to buy large quantities of expensive private river power that we don�t need and can�t use at more than twice the market price. Buy high and sell low! With just a few private projects now up and running already Hydro owes $30 BILLION on long term indexed prices and every private project adds to the total and tightens that strangling noose. Barred from producing new sources of power and still carrying its $7 BILLION Capital debt, Hydro is on its death bed only waiting for Mr. Campbell to administer the Last Rites.

As he did with BC Rail, Premier Campbell promises to keep BC Hydro publicly owned � that, if nothing else, must tell us what he intends to do.

Visit ourrivers.ca to read the entire article. For more about the campaign� to return of all BC Hydro�s operations to public control visit publicpowerbc.ca.

PSAC members all over the Province, coordinated by their Area Councils, are spending the summer letting the public & politicians know the value of strong public services – services that should be protected and improved. They are attending events in their communities, meeting with the public, distributing fans and leaflets with the Public Services Are Cool message and website address, and encouraging people to send a message to Ottawa …

Federal public employees are on the job every day to protect our health, safety, environment, culture and standard of living. Our quality of life would be poorer in Canada without them. As workers, citizens, and neighbours, they contribute to strong communities.

I expect their employer, the Government of Canada, to treat them with the respect they deserve. That means compensating them fairly for their labour, providing them with the equipment and infrastructure they need to do their jobs well, and ensuring there is enough of them to get the job done properly.

I support federal public emplyees because their work supports me. Quality public services bring us quality of life. They help keep us safe, healthy and secure. Social programs and benefits support us in difficult times: when we’re ill or unemployed, or facing economic hardship. They provide security in old age.

Quality public services promote social equality and cohesion, and are vital to our prosperity and a sustainable environment.

Quality public services: they’re the ties that bind us together.

Visit www.publicservicesarecool.ca to send a message to your MP, sign on to the petition, and enter to win an enviro-friendly bike.

Here are some photos taken at various events around the province …

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The Conservative government intends to sell and then lease back nine federal buildings as a pilot project that will be expanded to include up to 40 more buildings. The initial nine buildings ­– located in Vancouver, Edmonton, Calgary, Toronto, Ottawa and Montreal – are among the most modern and well-maintained buildings the government owns. This proposed sale will rank as one of the largest sales of Canadian public assets ever.

• More about the buildings for sale in Vancouver: Sinclair Centre and 401 Burrard.

Last fall, the federal government awarded a contract to BMO Capital Markets Real Estate Group and RBC Capital Markets Real Estate Group to determine whether or not it made sense to sell the buildings. BMO and RBC recommended selling the buildings and have since handled the sale. On May 1, 2007, the nine buildings were listed for sale over a six-week period. On June 12, 2007, the bidding period closed with a 60-day review period.

The sale of the buildings is being driven by the Conservative government’s unwillingness to invest in maintaining its properties and by an ideological belief that government should not be in the business of owning and maintaining infrastructure. The government intends to sell the buildings and then lease them back for 25 years with a guaranteed 100% occupancy rate. We believe that taxpayers will pay $2 in leasing costs for every $1 gained in proceeds from the sale of the buildings.

• Email your MP – let them know this is a bad deal for Canadians.

Aside from it being simply a bad deal, the sale of these public assets – property that belongs to the people of Canada – lacks accountability to Parliament and to the people of Canada.

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Public Services International conference to develop agenda against privatization

Ottawa (14 March 2006) — More than 75 trade union leaders and activists from six countries will gather in Ottawa this week, under the umbrella of the Public Services International (PSI), to foster alliances and develop a coordinated agenda to prevent the privatization of public services.

“Many governments around the world are in the midst of turning control of public services over to large corporations,” says Nycole Turmel, National President of the Public Service Alliance of Canada (PSAC). “The public is paying a huge price for this privatization in terms of less quality, less access and less accountability.”

The three-day conference, being held at the Westin Hotel in downtown Ottawa from 14-16 March, will provide a forum to share and evaluate recent union campaigns against privatization and to develop a coordinated trade union agenda in the fight for quality public services.

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VICTORIA – The B.C. Liberal government has been told its $1 billion bonus fund for early settlements with unionized government employees won’t make up for further contracting out of provincial civil service jobs.

The 25,000-member B.C. Government and Service Employees’ Union has responded to the government’s new bargaining structure in a traditional way, announcing a strike vote that is to be held over the next three weeks.

BCGEU president George Heyman said while he is encouraged by the government’s offer of signing bonuses and an end to the two-year wage freeze, a plan to privatize 700 more union positions is not acceptable.

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