The CLC Pacific Region Winter School is the largest labour school in Canada and we take pride in offering the very best in labour education. Surrounded by mountains and situated on the southern shore of spectacular Harrison Lake, the Harrison Resort & Spa is wholly unionized, with staff members of IUOE Local 882 and UNITE HERE! Local 40. It has been the site of the CLC Pacific Region Winter School since 1974.

Schools like this one provide you with an opportunity to hone your skills and knowledge so that you can be more effective in all that you do. What you learn here will make all of us stronger. Together, we can ensure that the labour movement remains a beacon of hope for progressive change in our country. 

The 2012 school runs for 5 weeks this year beginning on January 15, 2012. We offer over 30 courses for this semester and we are pleased to introduce 2 new courses in particular:

Women's Health and Safety

All workers face health and safety issues at work - injuries, workplace hazards, disease, and stress. Many of these issues also have a gender dimension - they affect women's bodies in particular ways.

In this course, participants will discuss and learn about how women's health (including reproductive health) is affected by toxic workplace substances, the way work is often designed to fit men's bodies, and workplaces stresses such as violence and harassment.

The program gives participants skills for assessing workplace hazards, and provides participants with key health and safety principles, (hazard control, precautionary principles, right to refuse, right to know, and the right to participate). This program is geared to women who are health and safety committee members, and to all women who want to know more about how to make our workplaces and lives safer and healthier. This course meets the criteria for the 8-hr annual educational leave that OH&S Committee members and worker representatives are entitled to under the Workers Compensation Act.

Arbitration: To Go or Not To Go?

One of the most difficult issues facing unions is whether to advance grievances to arbitration. It can be a legal mine field. Taught by both counsel and arbitrators, this course will provide the legal knowledge required for unions to determine what the critical issues are in individual grievances and to make informed decisions regarding the progress of grievances.

Participants will learn the law with respect to duty of fair representation obligations, as well as the standard arbitral legal tests in relation to discipline, contract interpretation, and evidence. There will also be a legal research component, which will focus on locating the law and conducting efficient legal research. Participants will present an overview of a grievance with recommendations on whether to proceed to arbitration.