April 28
Day of Mourning for Workers Injured or Killed in the Workplace
Mourn the Dead and Fight for the Living!
The Communist Party of Canada (Marxist-Leninist) joins workers from coast to coast to coast on April 28 to mourn workers killed on the job and pays deepest respects to all the families who have lost family members and to their co-workers and friends. It expresses solidarity with all those workers who have been injured or suffer illnesses as a result of their conditions at work and profound sympathy with all those who are suffering mental disorders or autoimmune conditions as a result of stress they are forced to endure at work. It also expresses profound concern for the actions of certain employers who are running roughshod over workers with disabilities or work related injuries by taking away their jobs in a new brutal form of cutting back their workforce, as Canada Post is doing.
The National Day of Mourning aptly brings us together to mourn for the dead and fight for the living. All workers have a right to safe working conditions. Our fight is for compensation for those who have been killed or injured or made ill at their workplaces and for a society that takes care of everyone and leaves no one to fend for themselves.
Across Canada and the world, ceremonies, vigils, meetings and other
activities are being held, upholding the dignity of labour and
reflecting on what must be done to improve working conditions and
guarantee the right to health and safety. Workers' lives are more and
more endangered as the state
is being restructured to put private interests in control of everything.
Governments are taking actions to get rid of regulations and allow
businesses to override laws, including those protecting workers' health
and safety, in the name of "cutting red tape."
On this day, we join in the demand that governments at both the federal and provincial levels make sure that all workers who suffer injuries or families which are deprived of a breadwinner are fully compensated as a right. Governments and employers must face strict consequences for neglecting worker safety or intimidating those who assert their rights. We demand too that workers and their families do not fall into poverty or suffer distress because they are forced to fight every step of the way for compensation and the health care that they need.
Workplace injuries and deaths are not inevitable; they stem from a lack of workers' control over their conditions of life and work. Accidents and diseases can be prevented by empowering workers to control their workplace conditions and safety measures. Sick pay and injury compensation systems must fully support workers and families. Workers must have the right to have their say concerning workplace health and safety and refuse unsafe work without fear of retaliation. It is only by being able to exercise decision-making at all levels that workers can ensure that workplaces are organized around guaranteeing their health and safety.
All manner of anti-social and anti-worker decisions of the federal and provincial governments are being made in the name of protecting workers and supporting "good union jobs" with schemes to pay the rich to plunder Canada's resources for use in war production. Workers are used as a backdrop for their photo-ops announcing grand pay-the-rich schemes to invest in private enterprises – from production, including war production, to pipelines to infrastructure – needed by the rich for their projects.
An example is the federal government's plans under Chapter 7 of the Canadian Free Trade Agreement on labour mobility, which could lead to lowering standards as provinces have different requirements for training, safety standards and scope of practice. This is a concern particularly for workers in the skilled trades, health care, transportation and high risk jobs.
Workers are not consulted about what is required in the sectors of the economy where they work and face an uphill battle against employers and governments to ensure that their working conditions are acceptable and safe. There is no acknowledgement of the key role the working people play when they transform the bounty of Mother Earth to create the wealth the society depends on for its living. Workers produce all the wealth of society, transport the goods, rear and educate the younger generation, look after the health of the entire population and care for seniors. It is this living labour which the ruling elites denigrate.
Workers across the country are speaking out in their own name, laying the claims which they must which includes opposing the punitive measures the governments at both the federal and provincial levels are taking, including to make their struggles illegal. By speaking out in their own name, they are empowering themselves and holding the ruling class to account. On the occasion of the Day of Mourning, as the workers from coast to coast to coast uphold the dignity of labour, let us pledge to not permit a society which forces everyone to fend for themselves.
This article was published in
Volume 56 Number 24 - April 28, 2026
Article Link:
https://cpcml.ca/TML2026/Articles/T560241.HTM
Website: www.cpcml.ca Email: editor@cpcml.ca