Presented by Ken Georgetti on Monday, 24 October 2011

(Check against delivery)

Sisters and Brothers, I am pleased to bring you greetings of solidarity on behalf of the 3.2 million workers who are members of the Canadian Labour Congress.

And I want to thank President Rick Clarke and your officers for inviting me here today.

Rick does a great job representing the interests of Nova Scotia workers at the Canadian Labour Congress – always making sure that your great province is front of mind.

Unfortunately Rick gets a bit too enthusiastic about Nova Scotia and I did have to turn down his request that we move the entire CLC office from Ottawa to Halifax!

But who needs CLC jobs moving here when Nova Scotia just won the biggest shipbuilding contract in Canadian history!

Congratulations to the Nova Scotia Federation of Labour, to the unions representing shipyard workers and trades workers, and to Nova Scotia Premier Darrel Dexter for ensuring that the shipbuilding industry in Canada will once again prosper.

This $25 billion contract – along with the smaller $8 billion contract awarded to British Columbia shipyards – doesn’t just mean a guarantee of generations of jobs in our shipyards.

It also means building the infrastructure,and training the new workers who will allow Canada to compete fairly with other shipbuilding countries and win new contracts for even more work in the decades to come.

That’s good news for workers in Nova Scotia and good news for workers in Canada!

This enormous economic boost for Nova Scotia in one of your key unionized industries also means something else – something unrelated to shipbuilding.

It means that business fear-mongering about unions scaring away jobs and investment is nothing but stale, hot air.

Just ask the unionized workers at Irving Shipbuilding.

So I believe that this significant announcement means it is time for the New Democrat government to make its own significant announcement – that it is time for Nova Scotia to have first contract legislation.

First contract legislation is really about fundamental democratic rights – about the ability of every worker in Nova Scotia to exercise their right to join a union to represent them in their workplace.

Saying workers have the right to join a union and then allowing an employer to do everything possible to frustrate that right for months and even years by abusing the process is totally wrong.

That legislation exists in other provinces – and while not perfect, it has allowed workers to form unions successfully.

And it has also removed the often irrational objections some employers have to unions from poisoning the workplace or leading to lengthy lockouts or strikes for a first collective agreement.

But I want to say also that first contract legislation is about more than workers' rights.

It's about the single most important public policy measure to address wage inequality – to reduce the gap between rich and poor...

And that is this – the ability to join a union, to negotiate wages and benefits and pensions has done more to build the middle class in this country and around the world than any other government measure, monetary measure or taxation measure can possibly achieve.

Women do better when they are in a union and have a union contract.

Workers of colour do better when they are in a union and have a union contract.

Workers with disabilities do better when they are in a union and have a union contract.

Young workers do better when they are in a union have have a union contract.

So I commend the Nova Scotia Federation of Labour for its strong campaign to bring in first contract legislation and I urge Premier Dexter and his government to listen to working people in this province – and not the hysterical elements of the business community who oppose basic workers’ rights and want to stand in the way of workers earning decent wages.

I also want to briefly say the CLC is concerned about the closure of the New Page paper mill in Port Hawkesbury and the terrible impact on the more than 500 workers there and their families and communities.

The CLC stands with the members of CEP Local 972 in their efforts to encourage a new buyer to maintain jobs there – it’s important and thank you to this Federation for supporting them.

You know, situations like the New Page paper mill are far from unique.

All across Canada, the United States and other countries, workers are facing job losses due to corporate greed.

This relentless pursuit of windfall profits is paid for at enormous costs to working people.

It’s one of the biggest reasons why the Occupy Wall Street movement has spread to cities beyond New York and into Canada.

And I want to tell you that the labour movement welcomes what these young people camping outdoors in tents are saying – because we have said the very same thing for many years:

That the 1 per cent who are the mega-rich make windfall profits while the 99 per cent of us who are ordinary working people get shafted.

That growing income inequality is hurting our society.

That corporate greed has caused yet another market meltdown – the 5th in just 25 years.

That we are angry – angry with governments that drive the get-away car for these big business bandits – instead of stopping the rip-off.

And that despite what a TV ad from one of the big banks claims – you are not “richer than you think.

We are in fact poorer than we should be – because banks and corporations don’t share the wealth.

So while we may not always agree with the tactics or even the strategy of Occupy Wall Street, we can completely agree with the principles behind the protest.

But labour has found some surprising new allies who are angry at income inequality.

See if you can guess who said this publicly on Twitter, and I quote:

“Class warfare by the 99 per cent? Of course, they’re fighting back after 30 years of being shot at.”

Was that an American union leader? No.

A left-wing professor? No.

It was Bill Gross, who runs the world’s largest bond fund, the $1.2 trillion Pacific Investment Management Co.

Then there’s Warren Buffett, the third wealthiest man in the entire world – personally worth $50 billion dollars.

And what is Buffett telling governments?

“Stop coddling the super-rich.”

That’s a direct quote.

Billionaire Buffett actually wants higher taxes imposed on the wealthy.

Here’s the key thing Buffett said: “We mega-rich continue to get our extraordinary tax breaks.”

Buffett should know – he makes $40 million a year.

But he only pays 17.4% of his income in taxes – that’s outrageous!

Not one person in this room pays that low an income tax rate!

But Warren Buffett isn’t the exception – he’s the rule – because the rich make money from money – not from an honest day’s work like your members.

And don’t foolishly think that this doesn’t happen in Canada.

The head of one of Canada’s largest cable TV companies – Shaw Communications CEO Jim Shaw – recently retired at just 53 years old.

Shaw will collect a pension that pays him $16,000.

Not $16,000 a year.

That would be a lot more than the average Canada Pension Plan benefit of only $6,000 a year.

Not $16,000 a month. That would be $192,000 a year – or 4 times more than the average Canadian worker makes.

No, Jim Shaw will retire on $16,000 a day – every single day.

That’s $6 million a year – for the rest of his life.

He makes the maximum yearly Canada Pension Plan benefit every 17 hours!

And yet Shaw and his super-rich CEO friends tell the Canadian Labour Congress to forget about our plan to dramatically improve the Canada Pension Plan so all Canadians can retire with dignity and security.

My friends, the reality is simple.

The American billionaires are telling the truth when they admit that class war was quietly declared 30 years ago.

It’s a class war waged by the super rich and big business against the ordinary working people who labour represents.

Nobel Prize winning economist Paul Krugman explained it in his New York Times column:

“The way to understand all of this is to realize that it’s part of a broader syndrome, in which wealthy Americans who benefit hugely from a system rigged in their favour react with hysteria to anyone who points out just how rigged the system is.”

But now at least a few of the wealthy are telling the truth.

And the truth is this – we are being played…with a bait and switch game.

Unions have been framed by our opponents, painted as the bad guys.

When they try to frame us, we have to fight fiction with facts.

Fight fiction with facts – by using social media – like Twitter and Facebook and blogs and texting and the Internet.

I said at the Canadian Labour Congress Convention in May that labour can’t be playing 8-tracks...and expect to organize workers listening to Podcasts on their iPhones!

It’s true – we have to be more relevant to our members – and to the public.

We have to do more talking to the public through unfiltered media where our direct message can be heard – because we have a compelling story to tell about the union advantage.

And that’s one of the key ways we are going to get out of this mess and win the class war being waged against us.

We also have to use political action – like you have done in Nova Scotia federally and provincially.

Unfortunately, while labour has had some impressive political action successes, there are none to report from Ottawa, home of the Stephen Harper Conservatives.

Instead I have a strong message – be very afraid of this new majority government.

Already the Conservative government has legislatively intervened on the side of management at both Canada Post and Air Canada this summer.

Then Labour Minister Lisa Raitt blocked a possible strike by Air Canada flight attendants this month by using the Canada Industrial Relations Board to hear a procedural question and do the government's dirty work.

The Conservatives are desperate to muzzle unions so we can’t talk about the real issues that threaten ordinary workers.

Here’s an example.

Just 20 years ago, you could work full-time at a supermarket and actually support a family.

You would have a reasonable wage, and benefits to cover dental and vision care for your kids.

But it wasn’t just supermarkets – there were lots of other examples – jobs in construction, in auto manufacturing plants, in all sorts of workplaces.

And those family-supporting jobs were there because those workers had the union advantage.

The wage gap between union and non-union workers is now about $6 an hour – that’s worth an enormous amount of money over your lifetime – about $600,000 in greater earning power.

That means the ability to buy a home, pay off the mortgage, raise your kids and send them to college perhaps, and then retire with a decent pension.

The union advantage ultimately means one simple thing – quality of life.

Belonging to a union has always been the path to a decent middle-class income, with some security for your family.

And that, brothers and sisters, that is what all these corporate conservative attacks are trying to take away from us.

Let’s be clear – we all want business to succeed – but we want to be treated fairly.

And that’s simply not what’s happening today.

What has happened is that since 1976 in Canada median earnings inched from $44,100 to $45,600 adjusted for inflation.

That’s an increase of just $1,500 more per year in 33 years – a third of a century!

But between only 1997 and 2007, one third of all income gains went to the richest 1 per cent of Canadians.

And that is not sharing the wealth.

That is why it’s time that the middle class started pushing back.

And that means our labour movement has to lead the way.

We have to educate our local executives, activists and stewards to engage our members with our own message.

And we need every union member’s help to get these simple messages across:

“That lifting up our standard of living is a good thing.”

“That being in a union means earning a decent wage so that we can buy a home, a car, raise a family, take a vacation, put our kids through college, and after a lifetime of work, be able to retire in dignity.”

Unions are the way we achieve all these great things – so we should publicly celebrate our unions and be proud of all we do – all that you do – for workers and for their families.

So when we talk to our members, when we fight fiction with facts, when we give them the strong message of the union advantage – then sisters and brothers, then we will win.

Thank you for listening and for all you do to make this a better world.