New Brunswick Workers' 100 Days Campaign
The 100 days campaign for negotiated wage increases that workers deem acceptable ends on Labour Day, September 6. There will be more than 22,000 CUPE members whose collective agreements have expired who will be in a legal position to hold a strike vote if the government persists in trying to impose its dictate. The New Brunswick government is indifferent to the workers' arguments as it is blinded by the neo-liberal anti-social outlook that persists in privatizing social programs and institutions and treating workers as disposable. They accuse workers of harming the "taxpayers" when they speak out and fight to improve their wages and working conditions. Given that it is government pay-the-rich schemes which are harming taxpayers and undermining public services, these arguments are contemptible. Providing modern conditions and wages for the delivery of the services that people need is crucial. The government wants to have a free hand to further privatize health care and public services to enrich narrow private interests and the workers are opposing that and defending public right.
This article was published in Article Link:   Website: www.cpcml.ca Email: editor@cpcml.ca |
The aim of the New Brunswick workers' 100 days campaign is to break the
mandate of wage freezes and wage restrictions that has been imposed for
over 15 years by successive governments. In the CUPE workers'
negotiations for the renewal of their collective agreements, some of
which expired as long as four years ago, the current
Conservative majority government is insisting upon imposing wage
freezes and restricting wage increases to levels that are well below
the rate of inflation and are actually wage cuts. Workers firmly reject
this dictate, pointing out that this means further impoverishment for
them, the worsening of the retention and recruitment problem in the
public
sector and increased migration of New Brunswick workers to other
provinces.