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June 7, 2012 - No. 36
Ontario's Pay-the-Rich Schemes
Opposition to McGuinty Government's
Anti-Social Offensive Continues
Ontario's
Pay-the-Rich
Schemes
• Opposition to McGuinty Government's
Anti-Social Offensive Continues
• Significance of the Appointment of New Head
of Jobs and Prosperity Council - Steve Rutschinski
Growing Opposition of
Education Workers
• Negotiate Don't Dictate! - Laura
Chesnik
• Windsor Rally Expresses Education Workers'
Stand to Defend Public Education
The Battle for Toronto
• City Budget Surplus, Deficit for the People
- David Greig
Support for Public
Sector Workers
• Peel Region Public Services Workers Join
Ontario Works Staff to Demand Justice
Ontario's Pay-the-Rich Schemes
Opposition to McGuinty Government's
Anti-Social Offensive Continues
 Ontario Premier Dalton
McGuinty recently issued an open invitation in the Legislature to "any
people on those [Opposition] benches who want to come over and sit on
this side of the floor." McGuinty flaunted his contempt for any
criticism of his political opportunism in nominating Progressive
Conservative
MPP Elizabeth Witmer to chair the Ontario Workplace Safety and
Insurance Board in an attempt to secure a majority through a yet to be
called by-election. "If you can't beat them, buy them" is how
McGuinty's actions have been described in the monopoly media. The
impression it leaves with the Ontario electorate
is of crass manoeuvring and serves to increase cynicism about the
party-run electoral system.
These developments signal that the McGuinty Liberals and
the rich minority his government represents are in no mood to
compromise, accommodate or negotiate anything. The only agenda for
society is to be their agenda. The social contract is finished and it
is not business as usual in that sense any more.
The McGuinty government for example made no concessions
concerning the austerity part of the Ontario 2012 Budget to save itself
in the deal struck with the NDP. Every penny of the new tax on the rich
is to be used "to pay down our deficit faster," said Premier McGuinty.
Contract negotiations with teachers and education
workers in the secondary and elementary systems began with the
appointment of a former bankruptcy judge -- a man who knows nothing
about education -- to head the provincial discussion table. Any attempt
by the teachers' unions to discuss the agenda has
been dismissed. This has left many wondering what McGuinty is up to
because he prides himself in being "education premier" and counts
teachers as part of his extra-parliamentary base of support.
 Whether it be teachers,
students, health care workers, manufacturing workers, public sector
workers, injured workers, pensioners, migrant workers or refugees, the
realization is that the anti-social offensive of the rich and their
political representatives is being stepped up against everyone and the
attempt is being
made, with the assistance of the monopoly media, to marginalize,
disinform and criminalize their struggles. It requires a response by
workers and people to resist the power to negate their rights.
Ontario Political Forum
will continue to report on the
struggles of different contingents of the population to show that
public sentiment is against the irrational decisions of governments
including the implementation of austerity budgets that attack workers,
students and everyone else. A coherent and pro-social
planning of the economy and politics is necessary and can be achieved
when the working people put themselves at the forefront of making sure
the crisis is resolved in a manner which favours their interests, not
those of the rich.
Significance of the Appointment of
New Head of Jobs and Prosperity Council
- Steve Rutschinski -
Nixon the banker is
to be in charge of deciding which private interests
are to receive "business incentives" from the public purse
Rapidly, we are seeing in Ontario the rich politicizing
their interests no matter what the cost in terms of blatantly exposing
the class nature of the state, the democracy or who is in charge and
who decides. The public interest is being marginalized and
depoliticized but its champions are resisting and organizing as seen in
the actions on the front lawn at Queen's Park and in rallies and town
halls all over the province. Teachers, students and workers from all
sectors of the economy are protesting the government's austerity
agenda, the attacks on their rights and livelihood and the lowering of
the standard of living.
In May the Premier appointed Royal Bank of Canada CEO
and President Gordon Nixon as Chair of the province's new Jobs and
Prosperity Council. What does it say when the person appointed to such
as position is the head of a bank that just the month before was
charged by the Commodities and Futures Trading
Commission in New York with illegal futures trading to avoid paying
taxes? Furthermore, the appointment of a banker to be in charge of
redesigning and disbursing provincial government grants, interest free
loans and tax credits for "business incentives" leaves little doubt as
to who is in charge and who is setting
the direction for Ontario.
As we continue to discuss the significance of the
McGuinty government's much touted public-private partnerships, what
clearly emerges is the use of the public treasury and public authority
to promote pay-the-rich schemes. This is precisely what is meant by the
politicization of private interest. In this regard,
it is instructive to use the occasion of Nixon's appointment as head of
the Jobs and Prosperity Council, to look at his background.
In the Legislature, on May 15, Minister of Economic
Development and Innovation Brad Duguid boasted about Gord Nixon's
background including his role as Chairman of an organization called
MaRS. The MaRS website describes the organization as follows:
"MaRS began with a question: 'Is there a better way to
capture the commercial potential of Toronto's $1 billion in annual
science and technology research spending?'
"The answer was a resounding 'Yes!'
"A charitable organization could be created to better
connect the worlds of science, business and government. A
public-private partnership with a mission to remove the barriers
between silos. Nurture a culture of innovation. And help create global
enterprises that would contribute to Canada's economic and social
development.
"Visionary individuals and organizations took the lead.
They raised capital, secured a strategically-located heritage building
and began to develop the MaRS organization."
Nixon's role as Chairman of MaRS makes it amply clear
that his role as Chair of the Jobs and Prosperity Council is to
increase public-private partnerships, which really are private
interests dressed up as some sort of public interest, so as to make big
scores for private interests from government spending. The public
aspect of these partnerships is solely to hand over public assets to
private interests.
The appointment of Gordon Nixon to head the Jobs and
Prosperity Council signals a significant change in how government
disburses public money to private interests in the name of "business
incentives." Billions of dollars in grants, forgivable loans and tax
incentives are currently disbursed through some 44
funding programs across nine different ministries.
In 2010-11 Ontario ministers paid out over $1.3 billion
cash from the public purse to private interests in the form of grants,
loans and loan guarantees. Another $2.3 billion was provided to
business through these programs in "indirect support," primarily tax
credits (e.g., for research and development), tax incentives
and rebates for manufacturing and processing businesses.
The mandate of the Jobs and Prosperity Council is to
"make a clean break" with this old system of discretionary spending,
wrap up these programs by the end of fiscal year 2012-13 and pool the
funds and tax expenditures "into a single envelope used to fund
business support programs [which] must align
with the productivity focus of the government economic development
policy."
Nixon the banker is to be in charge of deciding which
private interests are to receive "business incentives" from the public
purse. It must not pass!
Growing Opposition of Education Workers
Negotiate Don't Dictate!
- Laura Chesnik -
  
On May 23, the McGuinty Government issued revised
so-called parameters for its Provincial Discussion Tables (PDTs) with
teachers and other education workers employed by Ontario's
publicly-funded school boards. The new parameters do not set out
how negotiations with the province's
education workers will take place in a calm and rational atmosphere
that respects the right of education workers to collectively bargain
their wages and working conditions, and where the interests of the
students and their education could be put at centre stage. Instead, the
amended
parameters are the same dictatorial attacks
on the wages and working conditions of education workers and the
learning conditions of students issued in February, and then again in
the Provincial budget in March -- with one minor revision. Rather than
dictating the loss of 14 sick days per year, the government is
dictating the loss of 10 sick days per year. These
are the new parameters: you can lose 10 or 14 sick days --
you choose!
No doubt this is an attempt by the government to present
its attacks as negotiating in good faith. The McGuinty government
surely knows that Canadians are in no mood to be dictated to, as
evidenced by the revolt of Quebeckers against the Charest Liberal
government. McGuinty may well also be trying to see
if any of the unions blink and accept the parameters.
Unfortunately for McGuinty, there is a growing
recognition that governments cannot be permitted to dictate wages and
working conditions and undermine collective bargaining. There is also a
growing recognition that the method the McGuinty government uses in
Ontario is the same as that being used by the federal and other
provincial governments. This method is to force workers to accept
the theft of billions from the public purse to pay the rich while the
workers themselves are presented as intransigent or greedy to cover up
governments' lack of responsibility to the public interest.
Education workers across the province should continue to
turn the tables on the McGuinty government. For proper negotiations to
take place, the McGuinty government
must remove the threat contained in the budget to legislate what it
cannot dictate. It should rescind its fraudulent
parameters and sit down with teachers and education workers in an
atmosphere that respects their defence organizations and their role as
educators of the next generation.
McGuinty Government's Amended Parameters in
Provincial Discussion Table Process
According to the Bargaining Bulletin of the Ontario
Secondary School Teachers' Federation (OSSTF), the Government of
Ontario
tabled the following outline of the parameters which it is demanding
serve as
the starting point for the 2012-2014 Provincial Discussion Table
agreements with education workers.
Parameter: Term of the
Agreements
- Term of 2 years (September 1, 2012 to August 31, 2014).
Parameter: Salary
Increases
- 0% salary increases for 2 years (September 1, 2012 to
August 31, 2014).
Parameter: Retirement
Gratuities and Sick Leave
- Replace retirement gratuities with a short-term sick
plan, as follows:
- Freeze banked sick days accumulated as of August 31,
2012 and with future gratuity pay out, upon retirement, at the
employee's salary rate in effect as of August 31, 2012.
- Effective September 1, 2012 introduce a short-term
sick leave plan which each year, and not carried forward from
year-to-year, offers 10 sick days paid at 100% salary and 24 weeks at
66.66% salary.
- Effective September 1, 2012, eliminate all accumulated
non-vested sick days.
Parameter: Pensions
The government believes that filing a valuation of the
Ontario Teachers' Pension Plan (OTPP) in 2012 is in the best interests
of all partners. The government is seeking to resume negotiations with
the Ontario Teachers' Federation to secure the future viability and
solvency of the OTPP for future generations.
Government representatives in these negotiations will take the view
that the viability and solvency of the OTPP must be secured without
increases in government contributions and without negatively affecting
the government's fiscal plan.
Parameter: Salary Grids
Review school board employee salary grids with
stakeholders during the term of the 2012 to 2014 PDT agreements
including, but not limited to, how employees move on the experience and
qualification salary grid (where applicable) and the variation
currently in the monetary value of each grid step, with a view
to future sustainability.
Current teachers and other school board staff whose
salary is determined based on their placement on a salary grid and who
are not at the maximum(s) of their experience on the salary grid will
have their salary frozen as of August 31, 2012 for two years with no
future adjustments to recognize those missed grid
steps.
Current teachers and other school board staff whose
salary is determined based on their placement on a salary grid and who
are not at the maximum of qualifications on the salary grid will have
their salary frozen as of August 31, 2012 for two years with no future
adjustments to recognize missed movement across
the grid. At the beginning of the next PDT agreements, placement on and
future movement by qualification across the salary grid will be based
on the new salary grid in effect as of August 31, 2014 and will not be
retroactive.
Parameter: Province Wide
Collective Bargaining
Ontario's 2012 Budget proposed to move forward with a
more centralized approach to collective bargaining in the Broader
Public Sector. In keeping with the 2012 Budget, the government will
begin consultations in the Fall of 2012 with the teachers' federations,
support staff unions, school board trustee associations
and school boards to develop the appropriate legislative and regulatory
framework for provincial bargaining that would, if approved by the
legislature, take effect by January 1, 2014.
Parameter: Benefit Plans
The government proposes to establish a committee
composed of teachers' federations, support staff unions, school board
trustee associations, school boards and the government (Ministries of
Education and Finance) to fully investigate the creation of one or more
"provincial" benefits plan(s) for the education sector,
with a view to consolidation and consistency of approach.
The Committee would complete its work by January 1, 2014
for consideration during collective agreement discussions in 2014, with
solutions that ensure the fiscal sustainability of benefits plans for
employees, employers, and taxpayers into the medium and long-term.
Windsor Rally Expresses Education Workers' Stand to
Defend Public Education
On June 1, more than 500 education workers and their
supporters rallied outside Windsor West MPP Teresa Piruzza's
constituency office to oppose the McGuinty government's disrespect for
collective bargaining and threats to legislate attacks on wages and
working conditions. The main feature of the rally was the
unified spirit of education workers from many different unions that a
stand must be taken now, together, in order to show the government that
it cannot treat them with such contempt.
The action was called by all the unions that represent
education workers in the city's public education system in the face of
the McGuinty government's attempts to divide the
unions at the Provincial Discussion Table as part of negotiations
towards a new contract.
The action unleashed the initiative of workers who want
to let the public know that in standing up for their own
rights, they are defending the rights of all to the highest quality
public education the society can provide.
In the lead-up to the action, elementary teachers began
flyering at the malls and the riverfront in order to speak
directly to the public about why they are taking a stand against the
government.
Elementary and secondary teachers, custodians,
secretaries and other support staff, and many others who provide
different aspects of education in the city were present and were joined
by those who support them. All were united in demanding that they be
respected by a government that operates like a schoolyard
bully trying to attack wages and working conditions so as to free up
billions to pay the rich.
Speakers at the rally, representing all the unions in
the sector, spoke eloquently about their stand not to accept government
dictate and to stand up, stand strong and stand united. The speakers
also condemned the McGuinty Liberals for their political opportunism in
asking education workers for support to
get elected and then only months later treating them like scrap. The
rally was also addressed by Windsor West NDP MP Brian Masse.
At the end of the rally it was announced that the action
was such a success the next target will be Ontario Minister of Finance
and Windsor-Tecumseh MPP, Dwight Duncan. This was met with loud cheers.
A demonstration at Duncan's office
will be held on June 19, six days
before the Ontario legislature is set to vote on the provincial budget.
 
The Battle for Toronto
City Budget Surplus, Deficit for the People
- David Greig -
 In April it was revealed
the City of Toronto ran an operating budget surplus of $292 million
for the year 2011. At the end of May, the city reported a $70 million
surplus for the first three months of 2012. Both results need to be
considered in relation to the Mayor Ford administration's loud
assertions since
taking power that there is a fiscal crisis that requires drastic cuts
to
public social programs and services, privatization, sale of public
assets, job elimination, the degradation of the city workers'
remuneration and security, and the regime's implementation of this
city-wrecking agenda.
Ford, his executive and their media cheerleaders present
such results as evidence of their good work and fiscal responsibility,
but such a conclusion is blatantly self-serving and ignores the history
of this particularly anti-social administration and the conditions
existing in Toronto.
Instead of honestly assessing the situation upon taking
power at the end of 2010, the Ford administration deliberately
distorted the fiscal state of affairs as a crisis requiring the
implementation of its anti-social agenda of cuts and privatization. But
at the same time it cancelled the city vehicle registration fee and
then froze property tax for the year, directly contributing to its
crisis scenario which it claimed to be combating. The regime again and
again cited a supposedly unprecedented $770 million fiscal emergency,
which was the
centre of a whole fog of disinformation. By the time that monster was
exposed as more of a normal budgetary
challenge, the cuts, privatizations and job eliminations were well
underway. Of course, when a fiscal situation is presented as much worse
than it is in reality, this favours the eventual appearance of a
surplus.
The other aspect of these budget surpluses is that they
reflect the regime's implementation of cuts to public social
programs and services, to jobs and to remuneration of the city workers.
Likewise, they emerge in relation to the already existing inadequacy of
social programs and services, either never addressed
or arising from previous stages of the anti-social offensive. Job
elimination, cuts to pay and benefits due to privatization and contract
imposition, and cuts to public services and programs may, as in this
case, contribute to city budget surpluses. But the people of Toronto,
deprived of programs, services, housing,
jobs and remuneration that meet the Canadian standard, are left
shouldering a real and growing deficit.
Predictably, the Ford administration opposes suggestions
the surplus should be used to reverse the cuts it has implemented.
Instead, it wants the funds used for capital spending and to start to
eliminate the city land transfer tax. The former consists of paying the
large private businesses contracted for capital projects.
The latter is a tax loudly opposed by the powerful real-estate
interests. (When it comes to current revenue sources like this or
residential property tax, the cancelled motor vehicle registration fee
or user fees, which are in general more or less favourable to the rich
and unjust to others, especially the poor and workers
who create the wealth, the private monopoly interests in power
continually push for revenue collection even more favourable to
themselves and unjust for the people.)
The Ford regime approach to its finances is in line with
that of other governments in the service of private monopoly interest
and the monopolies themselves: if its own situation is "healthy," its
budgets balanced or in surplus, that is all that matters, the world is
unfolding as it should. But these governments and
the monopolies they serve self-interestedly refuse to consider the
financial or economic health of human society as a whole. Budget
surpluses and growing profits in the midst of and generating
unemployment, insecurity, impoverishment and lack of public services do
not indicate a healthy situation. On the contrary,
they are marks of injustice and retrogression, of powers that block
society from meeting its needs and guaranteeing the rights and
well-being of all.
Support for Public Sector Workers
Peel Region Public Services Workers Join Ontario Works
Staff to Demand Justice
Rally for striking
Ontario Works and Peel Region Public Works employees, Mississauga, June
1, 2012.
CUPE Local 966
picket, May 9, 2012.
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Peel Region's 262 Public Works workers organized by
Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE) Local 966 joined Ontario
Works Human Services Unit staff on picket lines June 4. They are
rejecting the employer's demand that workers pay for any wage increase
themselves by making concessions to their
benefits. The workers are responsible for water treatment, five
recycling sites and the planning, budgeting, design, construction,
operations and maintenance of 1,578 kilometres of arterial roads in
Peel. The Region of Peel consists of the municipalities of Brampton,
Caledon and Mississauga and is part of the Greater
Toronto Area.
The 600 Ontario Works staff, also organized by CUPE 966,
walked out on May 3 when Peel Region unilaterally imposed a "final
offer" leaving the workers little option but to strike. Ontario Works
employees provide important public services to local residents
including employment, health and child care for
sole support parents, outreach to vulnerable residents, financial
relief for those in need, employment assistance, retraining and
education, including resume writing and interview skill training, court
support for families and children, housing assistance, immigrant
settlement and other essential services.
A June 1 rally, called by CUPE Ontario members at their
recent convention in Windsor, converged at Mississauga City Hall and
included
the presentation of a large sum of financial support for the Ontario
Works staff. After this show of resistance and support the Region of
Peel made a formal request for the Ontario
Works staff to return to the bargaining table. Meetings scheduled June
2 and 3 failed.
Ontario Works Local 966 members are seeking parity with
contract settlements in Caledon, Mississauga and Brampton. After
members rejected Peel Region's offer May 16, CUPE Local 966 President
Mary Jo Falle said, "They are offering us a two-tier system and that is
not acceptable." In a posting on their
website, June 2, Falle stated:
 "We arrived to bargaining
today in good faith and waited until afternoon for the employer to meet
with us.
"What they presented to us was arguably worse than the
deal our members rejected on May 16th. The Region still wants to take
back the Ontario Health Premium (OHP) refund and are still seeking all
the benefits concessions you rejected two weeks ago. The Region is
still offering only 6 incidental days. In
addition, if you have used all of your 6 days in the calendar year, and
are approved for Short Term Disability (STD), payment for STD will be
backdated to first day of illness, but your 6 days will not replenish.
They also offered a 4th year to your contract with a 1.25% increase
January 1, 2015 on the condition
that if any other CUPE Bargaining Unit in Peel did better than 1.25%,
you would get the same increase. This means the Region will ensure that
NO-ONE gets more than 1.25%."
A third CUPE 966 unit, 120 TransHelp staff who provide
specialized transit services for Peel residents, has rejected
management's latest contract offer and will be in a position to walk
off the job the second week of June.
 
Mississauga, June 1, 2012.
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