The Price Of Ignorance

Doug Ford tried to bully one labour union into a deal. What he really did was start a fire. Heather Scoffield writes:

Doug Ford has poked the bear that is organized labour, and the impact on the national economy could be significant.

Just take a look at the stage CUPE leaders shared on Monday after the Ontario premier told them he would revoke the bill that caused so much trouble by removing the education workers’ right to strike.

The Ontario Federation of Labour was there, as was the Canadian Labour Congress. More significantly, so were the United Steelworkers and Unifor — huge private-sector unions that haven’t always seen eye to eye with each other or with the broader labour organizations. Construction unions that had backed Ford in the last provincial election were there, too.

Lana Payne, the national president of Unifor, even delivered remarks, deliberately tying the labour dispute at hand to workers everywhere.

“If fundamental rights can be taken away from public sector workers without recourse, no one’s rights are safe,” she said. “There is no question that this same tactic could have been used here again in Ontario and in other provinces.”

Ford lit a fire under the Canadian labour movement:

The mood among movers and shakers on all sides of the labour movement, such as it is in Canada, was jubilant, giddy in its rare victory and the rediscovery of solidarity in their ranks.

And that’s significant because labour action in today’s economic environment has been notable for its absence.

Yes, the Bank of Canada and many an economist have spoken about the need to do whatever it takes to avoid a wage-price spiral. The fear is that workers would demand wages to surpass inflation, employers would oblige and then have to raise prices further to compensate for the higher pay — provoking an intractable spiral.

But the reality is, wages have not been keeping up with inflation, and pay increases were not the root cause of the inflationary pressure we see today.

Wages have been growing at a five-per-cent annualized pace, while consumer prices were up 6.9 per cent in September. It means workers writ large have been falling further and further behind.

Low-wage workers are particularly out of pocket, Statistics Canada says. And unionized employees, while generally earning more than non-unionized workforces, are less likely to have seen a wage increase over the past year.

That comes after years of slow wage growth. And it comes as high prices at the grocery store and gas station persist, eating away at families’ savings.

In other words, there’s good reason for workers, and unionized workers in particular, to be upset.

Doug, however, suffers from tunnel vision and he knows nothing about labour relations. There is a price to be paid for ignorance.

Image: The Toronto Star