Restructuring
at Behest of Narrow Private Interests
Provincial Governments' Use of Pandemic as Cover for Anti-Social Actions -
Barbara Biley - Decisions taken by federal and
provincial governments ostensibly in response to the COVID-19 pandemic
have an aim other than protecting the well-being of the people and the
society. The "emergency measures" and legislation brought in since
March have nothing to do with building an independent self-reliant
Canadian economy based on meeting the needs of Canadians. Since March,
under respective provincial laws, the provinces have declared states of
emergency and enacted orders-in-council, ministerial orders and orders
of public health authorities to put measures in place to deal with the
pandemic.  In several
provinces, particularly Quebec, Ontario and Alberta, and in different
ways in other provinces, the pandemic has been used as a cover to
introduce legislation and methods of operating that significantly
restructure the state so that any public authority whatsoever is
eliminated. This is a continuation and ramping up of the anti-social
offensive of the last 30 years, the aim of which is to open space for
the most powerful oligarchs globally to directly rule society's affairs
in their own narrow interests. For example, over the last decades
governments have handed over huge parts of the health care sector
including hospital food services, housekeeping, IT, laboratory services
and more throughout the country to some of the biggest foreign
multinational corporations.
In long-term care and
assisted- and independent-living there has been a vast expansion in the
ownership and operation of residences by private, many foreign-based,
corporations. To this end, health care workers and their organizations
have come under unprecedented attack because workers' wages and working
conditions are considered a cost and therefore an obstacle to the
agenda of narrow private interests and the governments that serve them.
Using the pandemic as cover, governments are restructuring the state,
eliminating any vestiges of a public authority, in favour of direct
control by the most powerful oligarchs. Alberta
  
The
actions of the Kenney government in Alberta are a case in point. Since
the second session of the Alberta Legislature opened on February 25, 34
pieces of legislation have been passed, four dealing directly with the
pandemic. Most of the legislation is directed towards completing the
program of the United Conservative Party government to de-regulate
industry and privatize education and health care, to meet the demands
of the energy oligarchs.  The wide-ranging
legislation has been introduced so quickly, one anti-worker anti-social
bill after another, that it is difficult for the people's opposition to
keep up, and the Kenney government is using its majority to ram the
bills through the legislature.
The first piece of
legislation in this session was Bill 1, the Critical
Infrastructure Defence Act, which criminalizes anyone who
interferes with public infrastructure. The definition of public
infrastructure in the law is so broad as to allow authorities to
criminalize workers' strike struggles, youth action on climate change
and all manner of opposition. It was introduced in the legislature on
February 25 by Premier Kenney himself who made it crystal clear that
the legislation was specifically in response to the recent country-wide
actions in support of the Wet'suwet'en Land Defenders' fight against
the energy monopoly Coastal GasLink's pipeline that will cross their
traditional territory in northern BC, without permission. Since
then the government has threatened the Calgary School Board with
dissolution for its stand against cuts to education, and has passed
legislation -- including Bill 32, the Restoring Balance in
Alberta's Workplaces Act, 2020, to amend the Employment
Standards Code and the Labour Relations Code
in ways that trample workers' rights. Days after Bill 32 was introduced
the government launched a major assault on working people through the
review of two major pieces of labour legislation, the Occupational
Health and Safety Act (OHS Act) and the Workers'
Compensation Act for the purpose of preparing to make changes
that favour employers and violate workers' rights. In
July, the Health Statutes Amendment Act (Bill 30)
was passed, which is an omnibus bill that amends nine pieces of
legislation, and whose purpose is cutting services and privatization,
including contracting out in hospitals, making way for private surgical
clinics, and changing how doctors are paid.  On
October 13, the Minister of Health announced that the government will
be proceeding with the layoff of 11,000 health care workers and the
privatization of one sector after another of the health system --
including laundry, food and environmental services -- and will
continue to cut nursing staff through attrition until it declares the
pandemic over, and then proceed with layoffs to eliminate the
equivalent of 500 full-time nurses, which the United Nurses of Alberta
estimates will result in the layoff of 750 nurses.
This
assault on the workers and the incredible harm such measures will cause
to the capacity of the health care sector to deal with the pandemic is
of no concern to the Kenney government which is being directed by the
likes of Ernst and Young to make changes that favour the oligarchs and
remove obstacles, such as workers' rights and organizations, that stand
in the way. Ontario 
August-September 2020.
Rallies and pickets at offices of provincial members of parliament
across Ontario are organized by health care workers to demand
the repeal of Bill 195.
On March 17, the Ontario
government declared a state of emergency throughout the province in
response to the COVID-19 pandemic. Under the emergency powers which the
government granted to itself orders were issued regarding all aspects
of the functioning of the economy, social gatherings, closing of
schools and hospitals, and of long-term care homes to visitors, among
others.  Many of the
orders issued under the emergency powers state explicitly that despite
the existence of any collective agreement, employers can unilaterally
set staffing priorities, redeploy staff as required, change work
schedules or shift assignments, cancel vacations, hire part-time,
temporary or contract labour and use volunteers to perform bargaining
unit work. Grievance procedures are suspended for any matter referred
to in the order. Health care workers, despite their first-hand
knowledge of their workplaces, were completely excluded from any
decision-making with regard to how to deploy staff, what measures
should be taken to protect workers and those they care for, and,
particularly in long-term care, how to mobilize other forces including
families, volunteers, and health care workers from outside the care
home sector.
On July 7, the Reopening
Ontario (A Flexible Response to COVID-19) Act, 2020 (Bill 195),
was introduced in the Ontario legislature. The bill extends the
government's emergency powers while eliminating key oversight
mechanisms -- in the name of "flexibility." Bill 195 formally ends the
state of emergency (as of July 24) but allows the emergency orders
issued under the Emergency Management and Civil Protection Act
(EMCPA) to be continued by decree of the Lieutenant Governor in Council
(i.e., the provincial cabinet). While under the EMCPA emergency orders
had to be re-approved every 14 days, under Bill 195 they can be renewed
by cabinet for 30-day periods, for up to a year, and the powers of the
bill can be extended for a further year. Orders may also be amended to
apply to additional persons or groups. In the
meantime, what should have been done to ensure that the health care
system is in shape to handle a second wave, already underway, has not
been done. Quebec  
October 19, 2020. Quebec health care workers shut down bridges in
Montreal and Quebec City to demand action on their demands for the
conditions they require to carry their responsibilities to society.
A state of public health emergency was declared on March 13.
Among the first measures taken were ministerial orders issued on March
15 and 21, through which the government gave itself the power to
override health care and social service workers' collective agreements
and impose working conditions that violated negotiated agreements. This
was justified under powers claimed by the Minister of Health under the Public
Health Act. Nowhere in that Act is there any reference to
cancellations of collective agreements or changing of working
conditions and the Quebec government has offered no explanation of how
such draconian actions protect the health of the public. The
ministerial orders allow government to cancel workers' leaves,
including vacations, change workers' assignments and schedules, impose
extended work days of up to 12 hours and "suspend or cancel agreed
working time arrangements and refuse to grant new arrangements." These
orders have been renewed repeatedly and continue to be in effect.
While the government has gone to great lengths to permit
employers to act unilaterally in ways that put workers, patients and
residents of long-term care homes at increased risk, it has refused to
listen to the front line workers who know best how to organize the work
and what is needed to keep everyone safe. It has also blocked others
who want to be part of the solution, including student nurses who
volunteered to help out and whose offers were ignored.  On June 3, the
Legault government tabled Bill 61, An Act to restart Quebec's
economy and to mitigate the consequences of the public health emergency
declared on March 13, 2020 because of the COVID-19 pandemic.
The bill was a major state restructuring in terms of decision-making
power. It cited the public health emergency and the need to mitigate
its effect on the economy as justification for giving all power to the
government executive to cancel and violate existing laws and
regulations under the hoax of speeding up the reopening of the economy.
Bill 61 would have allowed the government executive to violate
provisions of the Public Health Act, the Environment
Quality Act, the Expropriation Act, and
the Act Respecting Contracting by Public Bodies
and, in addition, gave immunity from prosecution to government
ministers and others acting under the legislation.
A
main feature of Bill 61 was that any change that it made to existing
laws would be permanent. The government executive would have had the
power to make legislative changes without input from the Legislative
assembly or those directly concerned by the new provisions, giving full
power to the executive to enter into any arrangements with private
interests without public scrutiny. Bill 61 would
also have extended the public health emergency and the powers it gives
to the government executive for another two years. Because
of the massive opposition of the people, the Quebec government could
not pass the bill before the National Assembly adjourned on June 12 and
on September 23, the Legault government tabled Bill 66, An
Act respecting the acceleration of certain infrastructure projects,
a replacement for Bill 61. The new bill would grant the government
authority to override laws on environmental protection and
expropriation but does not include the power to override the Act
Respecting Contracting by Public Bodies or grant immunity to
government ministers or extend the public health emergency.  What is common in
the actions of the governments of Alberta, Ontario and Quebec, as well
as others, are four things:
1) the actions being
taken further the restructuring of the state to serve private interests;
2) the rights of health care workers, including their right to
act collectively to defend their rights, are under attack; and
3) the entire polity, in particular health care workers,
patients and seniors who receive care, and families and others
intimately involved in the lives of patients and seniors, are shut out.
4)
these anti-social measures and pay-the-rich schemes to not have the
consent of the people and are facing increasing scrutiny and acts of
resistance and opposition from the working class and people.
Through
coercive measures, the Alberta, Ontario and Quebec governments are
trying to negate the experience of the people and the lessons learned
fighting the pandemic. These governments are using executive powers to
continue to impose a direction of the economy in which the entire
organization of society is based on increasing pay-the-rich schemes and
intensifying the concentration of power and wealth in fewer and fewer
hands. The workers are putting forward their demands based on the
collective recognition that this direction and the way the society is
organized have failed to meet the basic needs of the people.
This article was published in
Volume 50 Number 41 - October 31, 2020
Article Link:
Restructuring
at the Behest of Narrow Private Interests: Provincial Governments' Use of Pandemic as Cover for Anti-Social Actions -
Barbara Biley
Website: www.cpcml.ca
Email: editor@cpcml.ca
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