By almost any measure, the world is in a state of chaos right now. But we cannot lose hope. Around the world, we are seeing ordinary people rise up and demand better. I am urging CUPE members to join them.
Together we must fight for good jobs, social protections, human rights, and access to strong public services. We must build a mass movement to demand the Canada we want and need.
CUPE members know how to step up. We know how to lead. And that’s exactly what we have to do. There is no other way forward and no time to wait.
Mark Carney’s Liberals are taking a sharp turn to the right. The $82 billion allocated in the budget for new military commitments over the next five years comes at the expense of public services and good paying jobs. To help finance this, Carney is cutting $57 billion in federal program spending and will eliminate 40,000 federal jobs.
Unless we mobilize our members to fight back, these cuts will mean reduced services, longer wait times, and less government oversight. They threaten public safety and health, the administration of justice, the environment, and the protection of human rights.
Carney’s plan to strengthen Canada’s economy relies almost entirely on the private sector. Most of his $10 billion nation-building initiatives are in corporate hands. At a time when our country needs a strong social safety net, he is backing away from much-needed investment in social infrastructure, like child care, pharmacare and the dental plan. Canada Health transfers are being scaled back, and billions of dollars for various health programs are set to expire.
For CUPE members who work in sectors dependent on federal funding, this will mean tougher collective bargaining in the years ahead. And for the communities we serve, it means less access, long wait times, and declining quality of life.
But there is another side to this story: CUPE members are on the front line to defend these services and the people who rely on them. These challenges do not signal defeat. They are a call to action.
We need to build a strong and powerful movement to turn things around. We must organize within our locals and rally community support. We must build a popular front strong enough to stop this agenda of cuts.
We must demand tax policies that force corporations and the wealthy to pay their share, and federal spending that creates jobs, expands services, raises workers’ income, and addresses the worsening problems of poverty, climate change and inequity.
We have a lot of work ahead of us. But we also have an enormous advantage: we have the experience, we have the knowledge, we have the resources and we have 800,000 members who refuse to stand by quietly.
