Concerned residents and community members gathered at a vigil on Christmas eve for Jermaine Carby, a Brampton man who was shot and killed by Peel Regional Police three months earlier.  The gathering rallied about 50 members at the location of Carby’s murder, near Queen and Kennedy, where members of the Justice for Jermaine Carby Campaign along with friends, family, activists, and community members participated in an hour long blockade of the busy Brampton intersection.

Carby’s cousin La Tanya Grant, a lead member of the Justice for Jermaine campaign, stated that the vigil was held, “to bring awareness, to let [police] know that we are not going to stop, that we are going to keep coming in the media eye to demand answers for Jermaine.”

Carby was shot on September 24, shortly after being stopped by police for undisclosed reasons. Witnesses have stated that he had his hands up or was slowly approaching the officer who shot him, claims consistent with the gunshot wound to his inner left forearm which his autopsy indicated.

Grant spoke about his death as a personal tragedy, but also emphasised that it was only one moment in the red record of the Peel Police.

“A young man died and nothing is happening,” said Brampton resident Amuna, who went to highschool with Michael Wade Lawson, the 17-year-old who was also shot and killed by Peel Region Police officers in 1988 in the back of the head by an illegal 38-calibre slug known as a “hot bullet” which expands on contact, banned in Ontario by the Ontario Police Act.  Lawson’s murder, and the mass protests it set off, contributed to the creation of the S.I.U. a couple years later.

But nearly a quarter century later, organizers with the Justice for Jermaine campaign see little use for the S.I.U. except to “cover up” police actions, and put families on ice while community anger dissipates. Among the demands of the campaign included, disbanding the S.I.U., which organizers brought up “clears officers of wrongdoing at a rate of 98%.” The campaign is also demanding:

• That the name of the officer who shot Carby be released.
• That the name of the person in whose vehicle Carby was a passenger be released.
• Immediate public disclosure of whether a knife was recovered at the scene.

Police cruisers quickly showed up. They attempted to isolate the vigil by blocking off the roads around the intersection, but met with limited success for some time. While two or three drivers expressed anger at the vigil participants, uttering death threats to organizers right in front of Peel police, many others joined in, and some passersby shouted encouragement.

An inconvenienced driver threatens to the cops that he “run ’em over” if protestors are not removed by the police, while flailing his arms in the cops’ faces. How many people of colour could get away with uttering death threats and aggressively approaching the police? As one protestor mockingly hollered at this perturbed little man, “Hang on buddy, you’ll get to have that eggnog soon enough!” #white privilege #white terror 

One protester, who saw Jermaine like a big brother told BASICS, “I was homeless and he gave me a home. This was the kind of person he was… He helped me find a place… Why did they take him from me? He was my older brother and I love him so much, and I will not forget him.”

“Sabey” – being interviewd by BASICS correspondent Steve da Silva.

After almost an hour, the intersection was clear in all four directions but for the police roadblocks. The campaign organizers, buoyed by the strong impression they had made and the solidarity the participants had shown, thanked everyone in attendance. Shortly before the end of the vigil, a CityTV team showed up, but did not speak to any of the participants, and quickly left when it became clear that things were winding down. No other major media outlet was present.

For a video essay of the rally, see the following video

To listen to this episode by clicking the SoundCloud box to the right side of your window, or visit https://soundcloud.com/basics-news/1-dec-2014-radio-basics.

“We asked people working minimum wage jobs what they thought the minimum wage should be,” said Deena Ladd over the phone.

Deena Ladd is an organizer with the Workers Action Center in Toronto. In 2013, the Workers Action Center starting organizing to raise the minimum wage in Ontario.

The coalition was able to reach out to groups in over 15 cities throughout the province of Ontario throughout 2014. They met with working people to come up with a set of principles to determine the minimum wage.

“Together, we looked at how the price of living had increased, yet the minimum wage had stayed at $10.25.”

They agreed that the minimum wage should bring workers and their families out of poverty. The minimum wage should be set 10% above the poverty line. The minimum wage should also be updated every year with the cost of living. (Four other provinces and territories have already adopted this policy: Alberta, Newfoundland, Nova Scotia, and Yukon).

Based on their principles, the coalition agreed to fight to raise the minimum wage to $14 per hour.

For their first action, they invited their members to freeze $10.25 in a block of ice and deliver it to their provincial representatives.

Every 14th of the month, the coalition organized new actions throughout the province. They made the actions exciting and accessible for people with various levels of political experience.

“Our actions were covered in the small town newspapers and talked about on the radio,” said Ladd.

“Because our members were people working minimum wage jobs, they were great spokespeople. They spoke about their own hardships. They could tell anyone why the minimum wage needed to be increased.”

Beyond the grassroots, the campaign received a boost from professionals like doctors and nurses who testified about the adverse effects for health of living below the poverty line and the need to raise the minimum wage.

As the campaign gained momentum and press coverage, businesses and the provincial government got scared.  Rather than be divided, the coalition would continue to organize to put pressure on the government.

Businesses also tried to manipulate the public opinion and Ladd stressed the importance of having vocal small business owners on board.

After one year of organizing, the coalition was able to force the government to unfreeze the minimum wage and to agree to index the minimum wage to inflation.

Unfortunately, the Liberal government only raised the minimum wage by ¢75 as the NDP opposition was silent when it was time to ask for more.  The coalition was extremely disappointed by the NDP’s inaction at a crucial moment, and they took to calling the leader of the NDP to criticize them. Perhaps as a result of this pressure, the NDP has now put forward a call to raise the minimum wage to $15 – but only after the Liberals took a majority in Ontario and so only after it became easier to take a hardline from the sidelines.

Deena Ladd says that the Workers Action Center is continuing to organize and fight to raise the minimum wage for people throughout the province.

If you roll along the curves of 6th line following the flow of the Grand River you will come across two of the three sites where the Six Nations Farmers Association (SNFA) has planted community white corn that is ready for harvest.

Arthur Porter of the Oneida Nation and head of the SNFA shares, “the field, that’s down on River Range Road is the one that was planted later, and it’s actually good right now for ceremony. It’s good if somebody’s going to make green corn”.

The SNFA invite all Six Nations community members to visit any of the three growing sites and pick your own white corn that’s ready for harvest.

The sites are located at:

1. West of physical locator # 3202 on River Range Road
2. South side on 6th Line West of Chiefs Wood Road near physical locator # 1593
3. North side on 6th Line West of Chiefs Wood Road near physical locator # 1593

Porter explains, “we’ve been growing white corn consistently for a few years to help our community and the elected system has been kind enough to fund the projects, and we try to grow around 20 – 25-acres. So we have quite an anchorage there”. In speaking to the Two Row Times, Porter muses that, “we get a lot of good reports, people stop and compliment us on what we are doing. Sort of helps us to know that we are doing something good for the community. It takes a little bit of work, a little bit of time and land, but it’s good. We want to give back to the community, that’s the goal here”.

Fellow member of the SNFA, Ralph Sowden of the Mohawk Nation adds that “we didn’t just start it a few years ago, us guys [SNFA] have been doing it for quite a few years. It’s been 10-15 years that AJ Farm’s has been doing it. And the Band Council has just pitched in the last two/three years to help us to do the buying of the corn, [mostly] the seeds [because] the seeds are expensive”.

In exploring the reasons behind why this project was started and taken up by the SNFA, Mohawk and Turtle clan member Ruby Jacobs, who is the SNFA’s Secretary and Treasurer explains, “a couple of years ago there was no white corn; a shortage that stimulated a concern across the community and the farmers felt it and wanted to do something”. Further, Porter iterates, “in one of our meetings it was discussed how we could start to put something back and we started farming it [white corn] as a group in the Farmers Association. And it just kept going from there and we want to keep it going. We want to have corn available as long as we are farming. It’s a staple for our community and to give back that way is great”.

When asked about what are some of the challenges about getting the community white corn project off the ground, Porter shares “weather is the biggest part in growing anything on the farm…and we’ve had children ride through our crops, like ride through the corn. There’s been quite a bit of damage down there where they went through. It’s sort of picked up this year for some reason. We have worked with the police to get into the schools to tell the children, DON’T RIDE IN THE FIELDS!”

Farming along with stewardship of the land and care for community for each Porter, Sowden, and Jacobs has deep cultural and family roots. Porter emphasizes, “I think when you’re a farmer, an old school farmer I’d say, you want to help your neighbor, you want to make sure they have enough. If it’s white corn or extra potatoes you pass it on”. To that Sowden highlights, “I guess it’s just a community thing…There aren’t many people who want to help as it’s dollars that you see today, and there’s isn’t dollars at the end of the row I’ll tell ya…It’s got to be a community thing, help one another out.” Jacobs reflects, “because I came from a farm, I really understand the importance of that way of life, in order to sustain your family, community, yourself and the Haudenosaunee culture, the way of life of the Haudenosauee people”.

The SNFA, along with the community white corn project has plans of expanding their work and impacts in the community. Porter divulges, “we’ve been working on plans to get land to store our own grain, which would be better than taking her off the territory, plus a cold storage facility. Somebody would raise eggs; raise chickens, so we would have our own chickens, either way. There’s no reason in the world why we shouldn’t have our own….we’ve got some plans in the works. It’s just going to take a little time to get it, but hopefully before Ralph and I hang up our pitchforks. We want to have something in place for the next generation to carry on.”

Maria Corina Machado meeting with George W. Bush in 2002, when she was the head of Súmate, a rightwing “civil society” organization long involved with delegitimization campaigns against the Bolivarian government, its electoral process, and instigating rightwing violence against it. How many “civil society” leaders get to have private meetings with the “Commander in Chief” of the American Empire?

On May 8, 2014, one of Venezuela’s most prominent opposition leaders, Maria Corina Machado, was hosted at an event in Toronto at which she thanked Harper’s right-wing government and Canadian-Venezuelans for their ongoing support.

The event, organized by the Canadian Council for the Americas, was presided by boardroom chair and event moderator, Kenneth N. Frankel and it purported to want to bring stability to the country. Machado spoke to about 60 staunch opposition supporters at the offices of Cassels Brock & Blackwell LLP, a law firm in Scotia Plaza, on the corner of King and Bay, in Toronto.

So the few critics who were willing to pay the $60 fee to get in were not exactly amongst welcoming company.

This was particularly true for Julian Ichim, who stuck out like a sore thumb wearing jeans, a white t-shirt, black leather jacket and green army cap. When he rose to demand accountability from Machado, Ichim, who had a limp and walked with a cane, was quickly escorted out by five big guards.

“Over 40 people have died as a result of the actions of the opposition,” he said as he held up a cardboard that read “MARIA CORINA IS A LIAR” in big, bold letters.

“You refuse to sit down in peace…You refuse to negotiate. What you are doing is illegal, you have blood on your hands…” he was saying as he was dragged away.

Most booed him, hissed and yelled at him to leave, even Machado, asserted “This is only what they have, they don’t have nothing…”, in a manner as If she was enjoying seeing Ichim was dragged violently away. Not surprising, as Julian probably recognized he was behind enemy lines.

The accountability Ichim demanded referred to the fact that Machado recently lost her seat in the National Assembly for accepting a position, without the National Assembly’s authorization, as alternate envoy for Panama in the Organization of American States. Not to mention that she’s been at the forefront of advocating on behalf of and stoking the violent protests in Venezuela, and prior to that she was one of the signatories of the Carmona Decree, signed by supporters of the U.S.-backed coup against Chavez’ government in 2002.

Ignoring Ichim, Machado regained her composure and continued her speech amid cheers and applause from the crowd.

In fact, this crowd, which filled up on champagne, Heineken and expensive wine, could have cared less about Machado’s record of inciting violence. Or the fact she violated the Venezuelan Constitution after accepting the position with Panama without consent of the National Assembly or of the president, as stipulated by articles 149 and 191, respectively.

Or about her work with Súmate, a “civil society” organization that passed itself as an election-monitoring organization, and which was charged with treason and conspiracy for receiving funds from the US-backed National Endowment for Democracy.

During question period, the only two other people who were critical of her and the opposition were interrupted, booed and ultimately not allowed to ask everything they wanted to.

Maria Paez Victor, a prominent sociologist, was quickly interrupted.

“An attempt to represent the government of Panama in the Organization of American States is an example of your lack of loyalty to the constitution of Venezuela,” said Paez Victor, adding that no one in the Canadian parliament would, or even could, act in such a disloyal way.

The hissing and booing resumed, and Frankel demanded she get to the question or “we’ll have to go on.”

Victor continued with her explanation, but Frankel interrupted again and instead just gave her the question. “So why did she join Panama is your question,” said Frankel in an annoyed tone.

When Victor protested, Frankel protested back. “No, no, that is your question, thank you,” he said.

Another critic, Raul Burbano, who said he had been an international observer in the 2010 Venezuelan parliamentary elections, noted that many international observers have praised Venezuela’s electoral system.

“So it is…ridiculous that you would complain of corruption in the (election process),” Barbano said. He, too, was abruptly cut off and his question was deflected by Frankel once again.

Aside from sidelining the critics, the rest of the event unfolded with much fanfare amongst the corporate crowd. Despite Machado being an hour late, her half-hour speech riled up the troops, many of whom by now, probably half-drunk, cheered on loudly. Yet, none of what she said was original.

It was more of the same uncorroborated and inflammatory facts peddled in the media about inflation rates, violence, shortages, censorship in Venezuela, without an ounce of scrutiny to the violence and deaths attributable to the rightwing protests in Venezuela.

But this attitude is, at least, consistent.

Activists of the Hugo Chavez People’s Defense Front protest the visit of Maria Corina Machado at an event at Ottawa University on May 7, 2014.

At a similar event on Wednesday in Ottawa, a group of peaceful anti-Machado protesters outside another Machado event were violently pushed from the auditorium and assaulted by Machado supporters.

In the past, these same type of opposition supporters have threatened if not assaulted Toronto Anglican priest Father Hernan Astudillo, who expressed support for the Chavez and Maduro governments in the past.

By the end of the event, no concrete suggestions toward stability, dialogue or even semblance of peace were put forward. Just photo ops with one of the Venezuelan right wing’s leading figure.

An image from the Workers Action Centre website of the August 14, 2013 street party held in Kathleen Wynne’s riding.

On February 15, on a bone-chilling Saturday afternoon, almost five hundred people flooded Dundas Square calling on the government of Ontario to raise the minimum wage to $14 / hour.  It was the latest (and largest) of a series of once-monthly street mobilizations by the “Raise the Minimum Wage Campaign”.

This campaign, which pushes for broad class based demands, and uses mass protest as one of its primary tactics should be understood as a chance for a positive reorientation of labour politics in Ontario; a chance to start making a labour movement that is at home not with the stuffy politics of parliament but with the militant politics of the street.

The possibility of such a re-orientation, though still at a stage of infancy in Anglo-Canada, comes hot on the heels of major labour mobilizations in the United States, with successful strikes carried out by fast-food and other minimum wage workers all over the country; and with the successful struggle in Washington state, where the workers of SeaTac won a 15$ minimum wage in their city.  There are also precedents here in Canada, with the Quebec student protests and Idle No More bravely blazing a trail that relies on grassroots people power instead of relying solely on lobbying corrupt and over-paid politicians.

An image from RaiseTheMinimumWage.ca website.

In addition to a greater focus on militant street politics, the 14$ minimum wage campaign is also significant in that its focus goes beyond the usually narrow demands of organized labour.  Instead of focusing on simply defending the rights and privileges of better paid unionized workers, it is a campaign that calls for a wage increase for millions of un-unionized Ontarians, including those who currently earn below the 10.25$ minimum wage such as agricultural and migrant workers. Furthermore, this is rare in the labour movement in that this is not just a defense of existing gains by the working class, but is a counter-offensive against the interests of big business.

All this in mind, the demand for a 14$ minimum wage is essentially a modest one, at a time when the majority employers of minimum wage workers, such as McDonald’s and Wal-Mart, are raking in hundreds of billions of dollars in profits every single year, a push for a wage which sits at only 10% above the poverty line is not asking for much.  Nevertheless, all of the large parliamentary parties, including the so-called “worker’s party” that is the NDP, have rejected a 14$ minimum wage as too extreme with the NDP Ontario leader Andrea Horwath instead proposing a more “balanced” wage increase to 12$ by 2016. Such blatant opportunism has even caused even some close labour allies of the NDP to take pause, with Ontario Federation of Labour president Sid Ryan criticizing Horwath’s position as “unacceptable”.

Given the NDP’s track record of prostrating themselves before big business and attacking the interests of workers, students, and first nations peoples every single time they have been elected (we need only remember Bob Rae, or look to the recent Nova Scotia electoral loss for proof), this more recent betrayal is not surprising. However, the lack of any truly representative parliamentary party at the moment does bring into sharp relief both the current need for organizing in the streets, and the absolute necessity for organized labour to not only vocalize a criticism of the NDP but to do something concrete.

The on-going monthly protests for a higher minimum wage are a positive development. Yet, if they are to lead to any real changes, they must evolve into something more than simply the demand for people to be paid just enough to afford both paying rent and buying food for their family. For the 14$ minimum wage to have any lasting effect it must be approached not as an end goal, but as a stepping stone for building a peoples’ movement in the streets. Uniting middle and low income workers, students, and First Nations—demanding not just a higher minimum wage but also improvements in housing, migrant worker rights, healthcare, education, and environmental policy. The only way the modest gains of winning a 14$ minimum wage can be consolidated is if these gains lead to a movement which doesn’t just improve upon our society, but completely transforms it.

by Noaman G. Ali

Six Nations of the Grand River | “The introduction of Omnibus Bill C-10 is an attempt to criminalize the hard-working families and entrepreneurs of Six Nations and other territories,” Jonathan Garlow said to over two hundred people gathered at the Polytechnic of the Six Nations of the Grand River on February 22.

“It will disrupt the reconciliation efforts by Canada to restore the relationship of peace and respect with Indigenous nations, possibly resulting in another confrontation.”

Jonathan Garlow, founder of Two Row Times, speaks to BASICS. (SHAFIQULLAH AZIZ/BASICS)

The meeting was organized by the Two Row Times newspaper. Garlow, founder of the Two Row Times and owner of a small printing shop in Six Nations, told BASICS the community meeting was held to inform the many families in Six Nations who are involved in and benefit from the tobacco trade about the upcoming Bill and to start a conversation about resisting it.

The law not only criminalizes unstamped tobacco, it also introduces mandatory minimum sentencing that could land ‘offenders’ in prison for at least two years.

The Bill “seems to be a direct attack on the economic sovereignty of the Haudenosaunee [“Iroquois” or Six Nations] people in particular and Native people more generally,” Toronto lawyer Mike Leitold, who also addressed the meeting, told BASICS. “The Native tobacco trade is generally not sanctioned by the federal and provincial authorities and would be considered contraband.”

For hundreds of Indigenous people, the tobacco industry has meant an escape from poverty. Six Nations entrepreneur Audrey Hill told BASICS that her small tobacco manufacturing business directly employs 30 people, but benefits many more. “If they have five or six people at home, we’re talking 150-200 people, and anyone they help out—like their grandparents.”

When addressing the meeting, Hill estimated there were 12 such small tobacco manufacturers in Six Nations, indirectly contributing to 3,500 people’s livelihoods.

“People can’t borrow money here,” Hill said to BASICS, as banks impose restraints on the lending power of Indigenous people, and so suppress Indigenous business. Tobacco manufacturing and trade is one of the few businesses that can stabilize. They supply restaurants, pharmacies, convenience stores. “It’s not about personal wealth, it’s about making sure your community and families have some stability.”

Six Nations tobacco entrepreneur Audrey Hill speaks to BASICS. (SHAFIQULLAH AZIZ/BASICS)

In Tyendinaga, proceeds from the tobacco trade have been reinvested into food security and health awareness programs, according to speaker Shawn Brant, who owns a small “smoke shop” that sells Native tobacco. These social programs are not welfare, they are community building projects based on Indigenous economic self-determination. Natives want to move forward and enjoy the “same benefits that our non-Native sisters and brothers enjoy,” Brant said.

All speakers agreed that the legislation, by trying to destroy this small but vibrant industry, sought to undermine sovereignty and reintroduce dependence on the Canadian government.

Stephen John Ford, a lawyer also from Tyendinaga, told the meeting that outside of tobacco, the only viable industry on virtually all reserves is the Band Council administration, whose funding comes directly from the Canadian government, making them entirely dependent on the Canadian state and its colonial structures.

“With all due respect to the Band Councils, they are arms of the Canadian government,” Joe Deom, an education advocate and engineer from Kahnawake, told the gathering.

Large tobacco corporations and non-Indigenous convenience store owners have also come together to try and malign Native tobacco with baseless propaganda, according to journalist and Indigenous womens’ rights advocate Audrey Huntley. “There seems to be no real basis [to allegations] that there are worse health effects or effects on children smoking” of Native tobacco, lawyer Leitold said to BASICS.

Indeed, it seems the Canadian state, “Big Tobacco” and other non-Native businesses are forming an unholy alliance to put a brake on Indigenous people actually developing a profitable and competitive industry over which the Canadian government will have little or no control.

“It’s about denying First Nations peoples their own industries, their own sources of income,” Ford said. “It’s about federal control of First Nations people. They don’t want you to make money. It’s continued colonial oppression. This is a microcosm of that broader picture.”

Ford suggested that First Nations administrations should pass their own tobacco taxation laws and express their own jurisdiction. “That’s the fight we want.” These laws would be challenged by the Canadian governments in courts, and the burden would be on the Canadian government to prove that they have sovereignty over Indigenous nations. “Which they don’t,” Ford said to applause.

Brant disagreed about appealing to the courts, and put the looming crackdown on the Native tobacco trade in terms of a war on Indigenous people. He was skeptical about reasoning with “a government that calls itself a law and order government, but denies justice to the families and the women—825 times in the past few years—and yet will seek to prosecute and to impose mandatory minimums on men who only seek to support our communities and our nations and our families.”

Brant recently made headlines for offering an ultimatum to the Canadian government to call an inquiry on the issue of missing and murdered Indigenous women or to face an economic blockade. He stressed that the issue was the most basic one, and yet was part of a broader set of attacks on Indigenous people

Indigenous rights advocate Shawn Brant addresses the meeting. (SHAFIQULLAH AZIZ/BASICS)

“We will take this government on, on this issue of missing and murdered women, with the understanding that First Nations’ education, that healthcare, land and resource extraction issues, everything else is being dealt with at the same time as we engage them on an issue that is the most righteous and just that we can bring forward.

“I don’t want there to be any misunderstanding that we are fighting for economic gain and using our sisters as cannon fodder for that battle…. We took a position on murdered and missing women because we feel that if the government is engaging us in a conflict, in a confrontation, in a war over our existence, then we don’t have to decide what legal argument we have to take them to court on, we only need to decide whether or not we’re going to stand up, walk on to that battlefield, and meet them, engage them, fight them and defeat them.”

“That’s what we have to decide,” Brant said to great applause. He added, “If they’re going to come in and target our economy, then we better be damn well prepared to stand up and target theirs as well.”

Ford later responded that the struggle for self-determination should be waged on many fronts, for the attack on tobacco is part of a long unfolding and concerted attack on the lives, livelihoods and ways of life of Indigenous people.

“We’re asserting our sovereignty by saying that we can produce goods and services from our own community,” Garlow said to BASICS. “We won’t be dictated to by foreign governments telling us what we can and cannot sell.”

Ultimately, it’s not about the tobacco as a thing but as a means of empowerment used by the people—“It’s not ever a thing, it has to be the people. The people are the power, the people are the source,” Hill told BASICS. “You take things from the people, they will want to say, ‘Why? Why? No, you can’t, because it’s not yours to take.’ And that’s what’s going on here.”

With files from Shafiqullah Aziz.

Rogerio Marques DeSouza, an undocumented worker, died an untimely death. However, the discrimination he faced due to his immigration status did not end with his passing.

At 49, Rogerio, the father of three teenage children, had been fighting colon cancer for over three years. As an undocumented migrant from Brazil, he was denied access to health care and had to hide his illness.

When his bosses discovered he was coming to work with a colostomy bag, they fired him.

Unable to keep up with his rent on top of the $100,000 he incurred in medical fees, he began working in a bakery and moved in with his children to save on rent. Shortly thereafter his condition quickly worsened and Rogerio quietly passed away at Toronto Grace Health Centre on January 18 earlier this year.

“We got a call from Rogerio’s relatives asking for support. They had been trying to get [the City of] Toronto to fund the funeral, as they didn’t have the resources themselves but were being denied because he didn’t have status,” Syed Hussan of No One Is Illegal – Toronto told BASICS.

“We wrote the city a strongly worded letter giving them 24 hours to resolve the situation, but they responded with an offer that was starkly inhumane.”

Using his immigration status as an excuse, the City of Toronto denied Rogerio’s low-income family the City’s funeral subsidy and instead offered to quietly burn the body. As Barbara Steeves, guardian of Rogerio’s three children, explained in an interview with the Toronto Star, “They said we must sign the release of the body to the city, so they can bury him in an unknown spot. And that’s the only way.”

Adding insult to injury, the treatment of Rogerio’s remains and his family come just in advance of the one year anniversary of Toronto City Council reaffirming its commitment to providing services without fear to undocumented residents on February 21, 2013. The reaffirmation was the result of two decades of community mobilization, and caught Toronto up to over 50 American cities with longstanding “sanctuary city” laws of the sort.

But as we mark this date, we must also step back and reflect on the work that has yet to be done.

“Seeing that the City bureaucrats weren’t going to live up to the promise of a Sanctuary City, we released the details of Rogerio’s case in a Toronto Star story and planned a delegation to Metro Hall,” added Hussan. “Minutes before heading in, we received a call from a private organization that wanted to pay for the funeral.

“After much deliberation the family accepted the offer, but insisted that we can’t always rely on charity. The overall structure must change.”

Rogerio with his family.

No One Is Illegal has since launched a Change.org petition calling on the Ontario government to make its services accessible to undocumented peoples.

A report released by the Solidarity City Network in December recommended that the City identify key city-funded services accessed by undocumented residents and develop department specific policies to ensure full access. Test-calling to hundreds of city agencies showed huge numbers of undocumented people being turned away and the city has still shown little sign of upholding its promise to make Toronto a fully functioning sanctuary city in practice, not just on paper.

Immigration status, for those fortunate enough to receive it, is becoming much more temporary and easier to lose. Sponsoring family members, getting refugee status, and going from temporary worker to permanent resident are all being choked off by the federal government. Systematically, racialized immigrants and refugee workers remain insecure, while paying income, sales and property taxes for services they are not entitled to use and to subsidize tax cuts for the wealthy in a climate of increasing income-inequality.

Poor health, isolation and repeated displacement are made worse with the criminalization of migrants through indefinite detention, raids, and surveillance in our communities. The result is that an entire section of our communities is living in fear — the same fear Rogerio felt three years ago when he first began experiencing symptoms, afraid of being reported to immigration authorities by the hospital. This indignity followed him into death, when his family found out the City hadn’t implemented its own policy.

Rogerio’s story sheds light on the high cost of denying our friends, neighbours and coworkers access to basic services based on immigration status. While it is the federal government that determines citizenship, the actual result of that denial would be far less dangerous were it not for provincial and municipal policies that place citizenship requirements on accessing basic services. Both the city and the province can enact changes to fill this gap and resist such blatantly racist and exclusionary Federal immigration policies, by refusing to deny health care, social housing, medical services, post-secondary education, and other important services to people based on citizenship.

Although the government does not keep track of its undocumented residents, estimates hover around 200,000 throughout the country. Every day, people like Rogerio resist the forces that seek to criminalize them. Enrolling their children in school, feeding their families, and accessing basic services  – the day-to-day struggle to survive carries the ultimate risk. And in Rogerio’s case, surviving as an undocumented worker can carry the even greater cost of one’s own life.

Those of us working and living with status have nothing to lose and much to gain by standing alongside people like Rogerio. Let’s end these divisions imposed amongst working people and struggle for “Status for All.”

by Priscillia Lefebvre

Ottawa | Female Residence Fellows at Carleton University in Ottawa were met with blatant sexism and were told to “calm down” and to “stop blowing things out of proportion” when they approached Housing and Conference Services in October of this year with accounts of being actively harassed and intimidated by a male coworker.

Earlier this fall, another Fellow had brought concerns to management about being targeted by a student through physical intimidation ,verbal threats, and cyberbullying since early September. The floor she lived on was trashed and the door to her room was tagged with sexually derogatory slurs, but it fell on deaf ears. Management allowed the harassment to continue, undermining her authority to issue sanctions to students. According to sources consulted for this article, the situation finally spun out of control two months later resulting in a brawl breaking out on the floor involving approximately 50 students.

Residence Fellows are among the most overworked and precariously employed on a university campus. They are the front line workers for students living in residence and are expected to maintain a high level of visibility. Carleton University describes the Residence Fellow position as encompassing a scope of roles including “leader, administrator, facilitator, and educator.”  The position is usually reserved for upper-year undergraduate student-workers who deal with a multitude of issues in their jobs from underage drinking to sexual assault and suicide intervention.

Residence Fellows had been organizing to form a union for several weeks since early November, putting themselves at great risk in the process. A union could have raised awareness of the issues Residence Fellows face as university employees, pressured the University to sit down and negotiate a fair collective agreement, and allowed workers to grieve Housing Services’ failure to comply with the Occupational Health and Safety Act.

Residence Fellows were succeeding until they received shocking news on December 1 of this year from the Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE) – which boasts a membership of over 627,000 workers – that the union would not be accepting them after all.

The decision came from on high: the President’s office at CUPE National. Once the news surfaced the organizers were outed to management at Carleton. Workers were threatened with being fired for even mentioning the word “union.” Organizers were cut off from any support, leaving them to deal with potentially volatile situations on their own. Isolation and retaliation made their working conditions intolerable.

By December 7, three workers, including Marina Tronina and Miranda Moores, resigned as a result.  Because their employment was tied to their room and board on campus, this meant losing their homes as well. Moores explains, “We can’t work there anymore. Understand we didn’t resign simply because the environment was hostile; we resigned because we could not work there safely. It is too dangerous.”

A union campaign squashed… by a union

CUPE Local 4600, already representing Teaching Assistants and Contract Instructors on campus, had been working with the Residence Fellows to push for their inclusion into the Local. Their membership of about 2500 workers shares many of the same concerns including overwork, harassment, and job security. On November 21, Colette Proctor, CUPE National Organizing Representative, sent an email stating, “as long as the Local is fine with the possibility of having to cover the group I think we can organize them.” Thirty-one union cards were signed by November 24 reaching the certification requirement, before the President’s Office at CUPE National killed the campaign a week later.

When asked by Local 4600 on December 12 why the go ahead to sign cards was given before an official decision had been made, Proctor responded, “I didn’t foresee National having a problem organizing the group.” If staff at the Organizing Department was so certain that the campaign would be approved, why did CUPE National ultimately decide to turn its back on these precarious workers?

Their reasoning was weak, nonsensical, and indicates a clear lack of understanding of the experiences of young student-workers in the post-secondary sector. According to Francois Bellemare, Assistant Director of Organizing and Regional Services, CUPE National feels that the union would not be able to maintain appropriate services and “make a big difference” to these workers since they work on limited one-year contracts. Nor are they considered to be in an employer-employee relationship with the University since they work for room and board.  This is rather alarming considering members of Local 4600 only work four-month contracts and Residence Fellows are members of the Residence Life Staff who do indeed work for the University and pay income tax.

Workers left behind now have to deal with the aftermath. “We can no longer work there and Housing Services are now free to exploit workers who are still there. All the organizers are gone,” says Tronina.

Dan Preece, Vice-President of Unit 2 at Local 4600, elaborates on the situation, “There were options before. Now they are abandoned and this has created a poisonous environment. Workers are either too scared to say something or they have absolutely no faith in unions… Nobody should be signing a card if the decision from National could go either way. CUPE National needs to consider the human cost here.”

Paul Moist, CUPE National President: Not so young,  not really paid like a worker (with a salary at almost 160k in 2012 alone), and so probably not so in tune with precarious young workers.

The “Year of the New and Young Worker”

It is no secret that the deteriorating conditions for young workers have them struggling to keep up with rent increases and the cost of living as well as lumbered with student debt. CUPE’s own statistics they show a 30% drop in full-time employment among young workers. CUPE named 2013 the “Year of the New and Young Worker” and states that it recognizes young workers as especially vulnerable to exploitative working conditions through precarious contract positions characterized by minimum wage and no benefits.

CUPE National is on record as saying that “the issues facing young workers need to be connected to all aspects of the labour movement.” In light of the Residence Fellows, this statement is reduced to empty rhetoric and fist waving for the cameras.

Solidarity For…Never? The sad state of bureaucratized unions

With the right to collective bargaining under attack by anti-union governments and bosses, fighting back matters and there is strength in solidarity. The labour movement has a strong history of workers who risked their lives demanding respect, safety, and fair treatment in the workplace. CUPE National’s recent actions puts that history to shame and serves as a harsh reminder of how bureaucratized union institutions can actually impede workers fighting for their rights.

The Residence Fellows at Carleton University deserve to be treated with dignity and respect by their employer. It should not be too much to ask that the same be expected of Canada’s largest union, which claims to be “committed to improving the quality of life for workers.”

At the time of writing CUPE National President, Paul Moist has yet to agree to meet with either the Residence Fellows or Local 4600 about this matter. Nor has he taken any responsibility or offered compensation of any kind to the three workers who lost their jobs and their homes as a direct result of this debacle.