#rankandfile

[cmhoughton]

WAY COOL! @rikrankin answered my question during his Q&A today! #my15minutesoffame #outlander #thatwillneverhappenagain #instagram #rankandfile (at Chamberlayne, Virginia) https://www.instagram.com/p/B5JEZYnB8sx/?igshid=19sa3zjemzues

[gabotaf]

Hi po..pwd mag ask allowed ba rank and file mag official business sa seminar pero private org ang nag conduct ng seminar? Are the rank and file also entitled to claim allowable travel expenses and per

Hi po..pwd mag ask allowed ba rank and file mag official business sa seminar pero private org ang nag conduct ng seminar? Are the rank and file also entitled to claim allowable travel expenses and per

Hi po..pwd mag ask allowed ba rank and file mag official business sa seminar pero private org ang nag conduct ng seminar? Are the rank and file also entitled to claim allowable travel expenses and per diems? pls need lng masagot questions ko..thanks #RankAndFile #TrainingsAndSeminar #PerDiem #TEV #GABOTAF View Answers/Leave a comment

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[if-you-fan-a-fire]

“The political ground in Ontario is shifting. On April 4, 150,000 high school students from 700 schools across the province walked out of class in protest of the Tory government’s proposed cuts to education. Just two days later, over 30,000 teachers, education workers, and allies rallied at Queen’s Park against the cuts. These are the largest mobilizations against the Ford government to date.

The Ford Tories have spent 10 months of attacks on workers, students, the poor, and the public sector on multiple fronts. While some of these attacks have garnered a response, such as the vigorous protests of parents with autistic children, most of the fightback before this past week has been modest and fragmented. The government’s frontal assault on the public education system has brought together growing popular dissatisfaction into large, focused protests. The possibility of building a mass protest movement is now real, and sections of organized labour are already moving in this direction.

Labour’s plan to take on Ford

Two weeks ago, 1,000 trade union activists and allies met at the Toronto Convention Centre for the Ontario Federation of Labour’s “Power of Many” conference. Billed as a political action campaign to build the fightback against Ford, the unexpected high turnout showed many people have an appetite to fight.

The province’s labour leadership outlined their campaign proposals. Between late February and early April, the OFL has hosted regional activation meetings seven towns and cities, including Hamilton, London, North Bay, Oshawa, Waterloo, Kingston, Ottawa and Sault Ste. Marie. The overall campaign goal is to build rapid response networks in 12 regions and hire a part-time organizer in each of those regions. By the end of 2020, the OFL hopes to have collected 500,000 contacts and activated 4,000 new volunteers.

From April to June, a series of dates were identified by the OFL to mobilize around: April 6 rally for education; April 17 response to the budget; April 28 (April 29 in Toronto) Day of Mourning; April 30 health care rally; and the June 7 OFL day of action. Not identified were actions being organized for May Day and Injured Workers Day on June 1.

Beyond these dates the, the OFL has simply outlined July through October 22 as the “federal election campaign.” The second phase of the campaign set the goals of getting 500,000 more contacts from 2021-2022, activating an additional 10,000 volunteers, escalating direct actions with an aim of shutting down targeted regions, mapping all key ridings, and getting pro-labour candidates nominated in key ridings.

Labour does need an action plan. Identifying key dates to build coordinated actions around is a must if the fight against Ford is to escalate. But it was apparent from the conference the labour leadership is confused about the politics and strategy they’re proposing. It was not at all clear what the Power of Many is: it was simultaneously referred to as a tool to build a rapid response network and as a campaign.

It is necessary for trade unionists to build regional networks to broaden our base to stop Ford. But building these networks will require relevant and concrete demands that are more specific than just getting rid of Ford, and can speak to wider numbers of people in their workplace and neighbourhoods.

Rank-and-file activists will have to grapple with two very real issues: how can we connect workplace issues, the fight against employers, with the wider goal of stopping Ford’s agenda? And how can we ensure that we are bringing workers together and not simply reproducing the current divisions within the union movement and wider working class?

Focus on the streets not the ballot box

The labour leadership, however, are in crystal clear agreement that Ford’s agenda can only really be defeated at the ballot box. The Power of Many strategy focuses on key swing ridings, getting the right people nominated, and mobilizing the volunteers and contact lists into an electoral machine for 2022. While turfing Ford and the Tories at the ballot box is necessary, we also need to halt the Ford agenda, and empower workers to take on their employers. Emboldened by Ford, the business community will be unrelenting in their attack on workers until they feel the heat from workers. Waiting for change in 2022 to stop the attacks from Ford and his business base is not an option

It is deeply concerning that the Power of Many conference focuses on July through October as the federal election. To limit our anti-Ford organizing to canvassing and outreach for the federal election would be a fatal mistake for labour. Campaigns and political struggle cannot be turned on and off like a faucet; once campaigns become dormant, they lose any initiative they might have had, and become much harder to revive.

Rather than dropping all our work for four months to focus on the federal election, the labour movement would see far better results by focusing on fighting Ford’s agenda. Hammering the Ford Tories is the best way to ensure the Scheer Tories are beaten back in Ontario and beyond.

If Ontario’s labour movement can lead a large protest movement against the Ford Tories during this period, it would pull the political terrain to the left provincially and federally. Collective struggle, not electioneering, is what will give workers the tools to resist xenophobia and racism used to divide us, expose the anti-worker policies of the Liberals and Tories, and motivate people to go the polls and vote on class issues.

To ensure this happens we need to build effective workplace committees that are focused on activating members to take on Ford’s cuts and the bosses Ford serves. These committees need to have coordinated actions to build towards, using the already planned days of protest is a good start, but we need to think further ahead.

Education is the key fight

The fall will be a crucial period of struggle for workers in the province. The teachers, education workers and school staff will be in bargaining and could be heading towards a province-wide strike, while post-secondary students will be fighting to stop the Tories from turning the screws on tuition, loan conditions, and student union rights. If the teachers are defeated and the student struggle is not supported we are likely as a labour movement to experience many more defeats.

The outcome of this education fight will likely determine the balance of class forces in Ontario through to the next election and beyond. The fights around education are already touching a nerve across the province. While healthcare has the potential to be a major fight, union collaboration in the healthcare sector is weak, and sweeping essential services legislation keeps most of the sector free of industrial disruption.

Saying that the education fight is the key in building the fight back against Ford at this moment does not diminish the importance of other issues and struggles against Ford’s cuts. Nor does it mean we should abandon fighting on other issues. It simply means that at this moment we all need to find a way to relate to and support education workers and students in struggle, because it offers the best opportunity to build a broad united working-class opposition to Ford.

Bringing it all together for the Fall

A number of labour leaders at the Power of Many conference told the audience that if they called a mass action tomorrow we wouldn’t get the numbers. Twelve days later, 30,000 teachers and allies protested outside Queen’s Park at the Rally for Education. It is true that if labour leaders snap their fingers they are not going to magically conjure up large protests. But it would be a mistake to say that mass protests shouldn’t be on our agenda, especially in the current context. Rank-and-file trade union activists need build the case for large protests and mass actions, by winning the argument in our workplaces, in our union locals and labour councils. We need to drive this movement from the bottom up.

Ford’s budget on April 11 will likely contain attacks on many fronts. There is a real danger the Tory attacks will fragment our struggles, divide our forces, and exhaust our efforts as we try to fight on all fronts.

Isolating our struggles by sector or issue will be a barrier to building a broad movement. It would be a mistake, for example, to avoid developing a plan for the healthcare and education struggles to coalesce into a broader anti-Ford movement, and lay the popular foundations for new political priorities in this province. We know the playbook of both the Liberals and Tories is to divide and conquer, of “thoughtful” crumbs here, and big promises there. We should be arguing for Ontario’s working class to unify around common actions.

Much like the Fight for $15 and Fairness campaigns did, the labour movement should encourage local actions, with a clear political message and goals in a way which built towards larger actions. The Fight for $15 and Fairness early on identified key dates for coordinated action, the 14 and then the 15 of every month, for local organizers to work towards. These coordinated local actions set the rhythm of outreach activity and helped provide the base to call for even larger actions as the campaign grew.”

- David Bush, “How is labour going to fight Ford?” Rankandfile.ca, April 10, 2019.

[someday-all-the-adults-will-die]

the best Austin Texas punk zine ever, ca. 1981-82. Design and concept by Michael Nott, photos by Bill Daniel. Genius in cowboy boots.

[someday-all-the-adults-will-die]

Texas ca. 1981. Two great bands, one cool club, and a slasher film still?

[if-you-fan-a-fire]

“The Ontario government has finally unveiled their legislation that would repeal the gains workers made from Bill 148. In an emergency action coordinated by the $15 and Fairness campaign, 500 workers were out in the streets of Toronto yesterday evening, to send a message to Premier Ford that the actions he and his party have taken to repeal Bill 148 has betrayed workers across the province.  

The Bill freezes the minimum wage at $14 and only indexes it to inflation beginning in October 2020.

The ten personal emergency leave (PEL) days, two of which are paid, becomes 8 PEL days that are proscriptive (3 for sickness, 3 for family emergency, 2 for bereavement). None of those PEL days are paid. The requirement for workers to provide doctor’s notes in order to take these emergency leave days have returned. For workplaces with over 50 employees, these measures are worse than what existed before Bill 148.

“Doctors and nurses are busy enough without the additional task of writing sick notes, which will cost taxpayers hundreds of dollars,” says Dr. Kate Hayman, emergency doctor involved in the Decent Work and Health Network. “Let’s call this policy what it is. It’s bad for workers, and it’s bad for the health of every Ontarian. From a government that promised to listen to doctors and end hallway medicine, I expected better”.

The 3 hour pay guarantee for on call and shift work for workers not called in, or for shifts cancelled within 48 hours is among the long list of gains made that will no longer come into effect January 1, 2019.

Equal pay for equal work for part-time, casual, contract, and temp workers has also been scrapped, with the equal pay for equal work provision reverting back to gender equity provisions, rather than for the type of work done. Further, workers will no longer have the provision that put the onus on the employer to prove that workers are not employees in order to prevent job misclassification.

Rules that lowered the threshold of union cards needed to be signed to get employee lists, sector-specific card check, and sector-specific protections against contract flipping has also been eliminated.

Impacts on workers Given the estimated inflation rate between January 2018, the last increase in the minimum wage and October 2020, workers will be looking at a real wage cut of $0.80 to $1.00 by the time indexing comes into effect.

Molaka Barbin is one of the many food service industry workers that was counting on the planned increase to the minimum wage. “The $15 and Fairness campaign is good for us. $15 is good for us, and good for everyone. Now, I feel very sad. Everywhere, prices are increasing.”

Scrapping paid PEL days will keep workers going to work, even if they’re sick – which will undoubtedly harm public health and put further strain on our public health system. Mandating reasons for each set of PEL days requires workers to jump through more hoops to get them approved, which further adds to the stress that workers and their families will have to deal with. Nadira Bedum, a Toronto based $15 and Fairness organizer said:

“Not only me, but my community – Regent Park is disappointed. When I talked to workers yesterday, they were shocked. 2 paid sick days allows workers who are sick, whose kids are sick to stay home without any stress. Now, there’s no choice for workers.”

The scrapping of equal pay for equal work provisions in Bill 148 sends a message to employers to continue to attack the most vulnerable workers who are not in full-time employment. Since proving job classification is no longer on the onus of the employer, an increase in misclassification is expected, especially since it’s unlikely for the government to increase workplace inspections.

While Bill 148 did not grant card check in all workplaces, it was still a step forward. Rolling back these changes will have a negative effect on union density, with studies showing that union organizing increased significantly in Ontario when the Bob Rae NDP government introduced card check. Once the Harris government came into power and reversed that legislation, organizing decreased significantly.

Contract flipping, which has been used to break unions, (most notably at Pearson Airport) has long been an issue when it comes to backdoors to union busting. Now with the repeal of provisions preventing it, the government is explicitly sending a message to businesses that it is okay. Under the new legislation, contract flipping will increase and intensify.” - Chloe Rockarts and Gerard Di Trolio, “Ford takes on Bill 148, but there is resistance.” Rankandfile.ca, October 25, 2018.

[nadapop]

Rank and File - The Slash Years

Tracklist: 1 Amanda Ruth 2 (Glad I’m) Not In Love 3 Rank and File 4 The Conductor Wore Black 5 Sundown 6 I Went Walking 7 Lucky Day 8 I Don’t Go Out Much Anymore 9 Coyote 10 Long Gone Dead 11 I’m an Old, Old Man 12 Sound of the Rain 13 Hot Wind 14 Tell Her I Love Her 15 Saddest Girl In the World 16 Timeless Love 17 John Brown 18 Last Night I Dreamed 19 It Don’t Matter 20 Klansman 21 Post Office 22 Wabash Cannonball 23 White Lightning

#RankAndFile #ChipKinman #TonyKinman #AlejandroEscovedo #SlimEvans

https://youtu.be/yRwxXe9EehM

https://youtu.be/w5qAL5TygW8

https://youtu.be/aOo75cv6_F8

https://open.spotify.com/album/4gRMsuakBOjK66HxAEYMXc?si=3FywgF2IQeiaZwLAc7VS9A

[donnabalancia]

#punk legacy #tonykinman passes away, w brother @chipkinman co-founded #theDils, #Rankandfile LINK IN BIO (at Los Angeles, California)