A Reflection on Unifor Leaving the CLC Several months ago the National Executive Board (NEB) of Unifor violated Unifor’s constitution by holding a conference call to debate and vote on a motion to withdraw from the Canadian Labour Congress. (CLC) This action violated the union’s constitution which it makes it clear that such a decision can only be made by the union’s Canadian Council.
Significant opposition erupted in response to the NEB’s action. Opposition was particularly evident in Unifor locals based in southern Ontario comprised mostly of autoworkers and auto parts workers. Out of this opposition came a challenge to the NEB action by way of the filing charges with Unifor’s Public Review Board.To the surprise of many the Public Review Board ruled that the NEB’s action in withdrawing the union from the CLC was in fact done in violation of the union’s constitution. The NEB’s action stood exposed as illegitimate and illegal. This was unprecedented.
Unprecedented and illegitimate though the decision was the NEB did not respond by doing the right thing and reversing the decision. The immediate response was deafening silence and not the slightest acknowledgement of any wrongdoing. The national leadership's formal response was to have the issue of the withdrawal from the CLC dealt with at the Unifor Canadian Council meeting in Halifax in mid-August. It was ratified there with relatively little opposition.
The ratification of this arbitrary decision was entirely predictable. It was entirely predictable because no recommendation from a National President has been voted down at a Unifor or CAW national council meeting since 1992. This is because these councils are effectively rubber stamps designed to give whatever decision or course of action the national leadership wants an appearance of having the support of the entire union. It shows that Unifor like the CAW before it effectively functions like an anti-democratic, one party state.
The consequences of this withdrawal from the CLC are evident in labour councils and provincial federations of labour across Canada. Unifor has been frozen out of these bodies and vilified. This has been particularly evident at the Niagara Regional Labour Council. Its absence has had a crippling effect on these organizations and has left Unifor marginalized except when the Liberal Party finds it expedient to grant it status as a “stakeholder” when it serves their purposes.
In this context Unifor dubiously proclaims ad nauseum that the CLC needs to be fixed. But its leadership is unwilling to try to fix it from the inside and will not acknowledge that it can never be “fixed” from the outside. Furthermore, the actions which brought us to where we are now illustrate that there is lots to be fixed in Unifor. Sadly, the prospects for fixing Unifor are bleak at best and arguably non-existent given that it is an intrinsically undemocratic organization ruled by an entrenched, privileged and self-perpetuating bureaucracy. Contemplation of the need to build new labour organizations from the base up has consequently become a practical necessity.
