The post Blog: Unionizing During a Pandemic appeared first on Global Labour Research Centre.

In the seventeenth installment of our series Workers' Stories in the COVID-19 Era, we interviewed Paulo, a teacher in British Columbia who has worked throughout the pandemic. The perspectives they share highlight the importance of having a strong union like theirs representing workers. The British Columbia Teachers Federation (BCTF) has been a cornerstone to pandemic response in the field of education. Paulo shares that they believe sick leave and better communication are key to addressing public health crises and are rights that workers should have in general. They conclude this installment by reflecting on the relative privilege teachers have experienced when compared to workers in other sectors.

For privacy, all names have been changed to protect the identities of our interviewees.

Interview

Christina: Can you describe your job, how long you’ve been working there, and in the field, and go over some typical tasks/duties?

Paulo: I am a high school shop teacher and have been in the education field for over a decade now. Prior to teaching shop, I was involved working for my union as an elected representative for a few years and I was a math and science teacher before that. I work in a pretty small and remote district, which has made the work more flexible in some regards and more stressful in others.

I work in a pretty small and remote district, which has made the work more flexible in some regards and more stressful in others.

Currently during the pandemic, my job has consisted of going in-person, barring at the very beginning of COVID, to teach my students. Teachers are responsible for implementing public health measures in the classroom; we regulate the physical distancing, masking, handwashing, and things like that, all while delivering the curriculum.

Another thing that’s relevant is that I’m a staff rep/union steward for my local. Throughout the pandemic, my role in this regard has involved helping my colleagues field health and safety concerns, put forth grievances, and generally try to uplift the voices of fellow workers represented by the union.

Christina: How has the pandemic impacted your work and working conditions? What makes your experience of this different from other sectors?

Paulo: If you ask any teacher, they’ll talk primarily about the kids and the classroom when discussing the effects of the pandemic. We have a very close view of how our students’ lives have been impacted by COVID and seeing how their stress levels have increased and the shift in the quality of education we were able to provide was huge. Some of the kids would be missing big chunks of school, and we were essentially asked to do two jobs at once for a time by teaching remotely and in-person. Doing that significantly increased our workload but, luckily, we didn’t have to juggle that for long because our union fought for our right to a reasonable level of work.

Personally, I don’t have the option to work from home. I have to go into the classroom, and being around so many people during a pandemic has increased the stress I experience. I’m nervous for myself, my partner, and my young children who cannot be vaccinated yet. Not all of our students follow the pandemic guidelines, so me and my colleagues don’t always feel safe. Thankfully, I don’t have significant health concerns and I’m not caring for older family members, unlike some of the teachers I know.

Christina: In your experience, how supportive have your workplace and the government been towards teachers throughout the pandemic? Is there anything you’d like to comment on in particular?

Paulo: Our employer has been following the government’s directives very closely. They have been responsive, and they did meet with the provincial union, so we have a lot of say in designing the pandemic protocol. Overall, I felt like the province did respond to the best of its ability to the changing circumstances we’ve been facing. However, it would’ve been nice to see more of a regional approach due to the differing needs of each region. We’re such a big province and some areas were hard hit while others had way fewer cases. I think that a plan wherein restrictions were tightened and loosened based on concrete regional data would have been preferable to the current blanketed and fairly rigid restrictions.

As for our union, it advocated quite hard and was fairly effective in communicating the needs of teachers. All in all, they’ve been pretty vocal and effective in their role, so I don’t have too many complaints on that front. What I don’t appreciate is how the government has stopped reporting and contact-tracing for students who’ve contracted COVID. They just generally monitor attendance now and respond to areas with ‘high absences.’

Christina: You touched on this in your previous response, but what has been the role of your union in all this? Do you think they have been advocating for yourself and your coworkers and meeting your needs?

Paulo: I think the union has been advocating for and listening to me and my coworkers in a way that’s responsive. Some of the things I’ve shared about regional approaches, for example, have been on my radar as I have involvement in the provincial union body. Other things I’ve been bringing up include responding better to cases, advocating for ventilation, calling on accountability from the government, etcetera.

The union has been very grassroots and receptive of all the teachers in the locals, even holding frequent conference calls with all the presidents. I believe we have 63 locals in our union and the Senior Table Officers have been meeting weekly with presidents and staff to share stories, learn, advocate more, and inform the leadership. So, they’re listening to the members and they’re working hard, despite the fact that the government isn’t always the most responsive to their discussions.

The union has been very grassroots and receptive of all the teachers in the locals, even holding frequent conference calls with all the presidents.

Our union is doing a good job of making sure its members are heard. When it came to vaccine mandates, for example, they worked really hard to be supportive of science and collective responsibility. They also stood up for workers’ rights and members who had legitimate health reasons to not receive a vaccine. What I particularly support about that is the opportunity for those individuals to have alternate work so that they and the kids are safer. We have work-from-home and regular testing as protocols for those members, which I think is a good middle ground.

Christina: Do you feel like you’re treated fairly in the workplace? Pay, accommodations, resources, etc.

Paulo: Yes. It’s not perfect, there are certainly some areas of improvement, but overall, yes.

Christina: If it has changed, how has the pandemic shifted the public’s perception of teachers?

Paulo: I think the pandemic has positively influenced public perception. The British Columbia Teachers’ Federation just had some polling done for public perception of teachers, and we’re up quite a bit. I think we made a jump from 54% to 63% of respondents being strongly in favour of teachers and the work we’ve been doing. This is coming at a good time because we’re in a bargaining year right now, so support from the public should help us with that. People are realizing how necessary we are and how much we tend to go above and beyond for our students and communities.

Christina: Has working during the pandemic taken a toll on your mental and physical health and wellbeing?

Paulo: Yes, it has. A lot of the sports and activities I participated in got shut down. Sports were one of my ways to destress, and in absence of them I haven’t had as much of that physical outlet. That, coupled with an increase of workplace stress as a result of the pandemic, has been difficult to deal with. I have a lot more worries than I used to and these past couple of years have been hard. We’ve also been unable to visit family as much and not being able to connect with them like before the pandemic has been a challenge for us.

Christina: What are some things you would change if you had political power?

Paulo: Sick leave is one of them. I think that universal paid sick leave is a big issue that, while I as a teacher am unaffected by, I believe to be a basic right entitled to all workers. Throughout the pandemic, I’ve felt privileged to have the option of paid leave available to me, but these sorts of things shouldn’t really be considered privileges so much as the absolute baseline.

Communication is also a big thing, and I probably would’ve tried to combat fake news differently. Lack of accountability and verification of data in all forms of media, especially corporate and social media, have been driving factors to misinforming the public and platforming those without a working knowledge of healthcare and epidemiology. All the factually and scientifically incorrect information circulating has been a huge detriment to peoples’ responses to the pandemic.

Christina: If you could give a pre-pandemic version of yourself any advice, what would you want you to know?

Paulo: I’d want myself to know to stay calm and encourage those around me to stay calm. I tried to reassure people, but it would’ve been more useful if I was able to have done that a bit more impactfully, knowing what I do now. I would’ve probably also not travelled the March Break the pandemic came out. I went to the BCTF Annual General Meeting down in Vancouver, which got cancelled, but I had already made the necessary arrangements to go down and while we were there things just blew up. Looking back, the responsible thing to do would’ve been staying at home.

Christina: Do you have any last thoughts or things you think that the general populace should know?

Paulo: Mainly, there seem to be more protections in place for many other workplaces. In my field, we experienced a rush to get kids back in, often to crowded classrooms and portables with horrifically poor ventilation—that isn’t talked about nearly as much as it should be. Class sizes never decreased, barring absences, so if a kid is sick, they’ll be spreading it. Teachers just didn’t feel safe, and though they could exercise their right to refuse unsafe work, functionally you couldn’t really do that except in very specific circumstances. Too many people felt forced to work in an unsafe environment. I feel like we did try our best, but outbreaks happened like at nursing homes and people got sick. I’d want the public to know that teachers were still forced to work in unsafe conditions, like many other workers across sectors and borders.

I’d want the public to know that teachers were still forced to work in unsafe conditions, like many other workers across sectors and borders.

Even stating that, teachers were quite lucky in general. We still had a job, we still got paid, we have sick days. We didn’t face as much economic uncertainty, and for that I feel really lucky. My last remark is: Paid sick days for all workers!

The post Much Ado About Unions: Teaching During the Pandemic appeared first on Global Labour Research Centre.

In the sixteenth installment of our series Workers' Stories in the COVID-19 Era, we interviewed Ursula, a Tim Hortons barista/supervisor in a major Ontario city. Working throughout the pandemic, Ursula notes the particular struggles associated with the intersections of race, immigration, and gender. A Filipina international student, Ursula stresses the importance of always moving forward. She notes that compartmentalizing the abuse she faces at work is necessary because she has a family to support and cannot afford to break down. Ursula recounts harsh realities that no one should face.

If any Filipinx students find themselves in circumstances like Ursula’s, there are supports available:

All of the services offered by/through these organizations are free or free for low-income folks living in Canada/Ontario.

For privacy, all names have been changed to protect the identities of our interviewees.

Interview

Christina: Can you tell me a bit about your job? What are some of the things you do at work?

Ursula: I work at a Tim Hortons as a barista. I started out in 2019 and then got promoted to a supervisor position last fall. My main job as a barista is to prepare customers’ orders, whether they’re just drinks or also food. As a supervisor, my duties have expanded to include training new hires, responding to any concerns the staff or customers have during my shift, and I also do some of the paperwork.

Christina: How has the pandemic impacted your work and working conditions?

Ursula: To start off, the precautions we now take have meant that the place I work at has added a lot more labour to our jobs. For example, before the pandemic we’d have a station for customers to add creams and sugars to their coffees themselves, but now we have to do all that for them. This may seem like no big deal, but it adds up and decreases the speed we work at. We also now have to sanitize everything all the time. Every time we touch money we have to wash or sanitize our hands which has made my skin incredibly dry. This can be really painful and sore at times, and the employer doesn’t supply us with gloves or cream or anything to help with it.

More than that, it’s the fear. We are afraid everyday because we just never know the kind of day we’re about to have and what kind of customers are going to come in. The branch owner is also pushing this message of the pandemic being hard for her and that we need all the customers we can get. Even though we’re all uncomfortable with it, we still have to serve the people not wearing masks as a result of this policy.

We are afraid everyday because we just never know the kind of day we’re about to have and what kind of customers are going to come in.

We’ve had four or five lockdowns already and protests started happening every weekend around the second lockdown. These people will hold their protests outside of the location I work at, and usually they’ll gather in the store afterward which is really nerve-wracking because the store is small and they’re obviously not wearing masks and are acting unsafe. We try to serve them as fast as possible so that they leave, but that’s not always the case, and there’s always the fear that they’ll blow up at us if we ask them to wear a mask or distance or something.

It is my job as supervisor to protect my coworkers, and I’m just not able to do that. I know that there are different government policies around these sorts of things, but when you’re actually in a situation where someone is becoming violent due to you trying to enforce [the policies], there’s really not much you can do besides trying to avoid an attack. A lot of the bills and laws seem to be written by people pretty detached from the realities of working people. At the end of the day, you’re just trying to get by as best you can, which has gotten more and more difficult with the pandemic.

Christina: Did they hire any additional staff to offset the increased labour you were having to do?

Ursula: There’s actually a story behind this; before the pandemic we had a full staff. Since the lockdowns and reopenings have happened, we have retained four of the original 15. A lot of the original staff had to look for different jobs when they were laid off and the owner never bothered to hire anyone to replace them. I’ve actually watched a manager who had to stay over 14 hours to open and close the store because there was just no one else to do it. This was a woman who worked 50 hours, 60 hours per week for not much money, especially considering how much she does.

There is a bit of controversy there too because our boss lives in another country and has been stuck there for three years. Basically, the manager has had to run the store in her absence, even though that is not her job to do. Being in another country also means that our boss has no actual grasp on how things are going here on-the-ground. Like those lawmakers I was talking about before, she’s detached from everything, and more unforgiving because of it. We’ve been having problems with pay especially.

Being in another country also means that our boss has no actual grasp on how things are going here on-the-ground.

We’re just trying to get by and what complicates the issue is that we’re all Filipinas, most of us immigrants, and we’re sending money back home to people who are relying on our support. Our families don’t get food if we’re unemployed, so we make compromises to keep our jobs and keep conflict to a minimum. Even though we’re frustrated and infuriated with what’s happening, we’re just trying to keep going and move forward. There is a duality of being silent as well as silenced, which I think that a lot of Asian women can identify with. We’re just trying to survive.

I have watched my manager deteriorate before my eyes and now that she has been able to find another job, I’m up for her role and that scares me. The thing about it is that we’re part of a franchise with decentralized ownership of each store. Basically, it’s not the CEO of Tim Hortons that owns the individual stores, it’s a franchise owner, and our boss has been using this to say she can’t pay us more.

People have told me I rarely stand up for myself, but behind that is the fact I’m from a different country where women are not expected or supported in speaking up generally. There’s this dissonance that comes with adjusting here in Canada. I’m trying to learn what’s okay and what’s not, trying to learn my rights as an employee—they don’t tell you about any of this stuff when you migrate. It makes immigrants more vulnerable, and people can, and do, take advantage of us as a result.

Christina: How does all this make you feel? How are you dealing with everything?

Ursula: Yeah, so I’m an international student, I’m paying my fees, supporting myself and my family, and eventually I’m going to try to find a better job and get my PR (permanent residency). Throughout all the years I’ve been in Canada, I’ve had to learn to ignore and tolerate the abuse I’m getting in the name of surviving. I try not to think of it as much as possible, because if I let myself fall into that hole, I’d never be able to climb my way back out. I can’t let myself break because I would utterly shatter.

Throughout all the years I’ve been in Canada, I’ve had to learn to ignore and tolerate the abuse I’m getting in the name of surviving.

Christina: How have the customers been treating you throughout this time?

Ursula: There’s good and bad. During the pandemic, most of our customers have been employees at nearby stores, so we have this shared experience and solidarity which has been nice. So, I would say that the majority have been understanding and supportive because of this, but there is definitely a significant number who are demanding and abusive towards the staff. The pandemic has definitely made this worse. It’s not all the time, we’ve mostly been lucky with having security guards around for the more violent ones, but there have been many instances where people would scream at us and degrade and belittle us. There have been customers who’ve ranted to us about how masks and vaccines are oppressing them, and in situations like that it’s dangerous to disagree so we’d just have to play along.

Also, a lot of the people we end up hiring are Asian women, specifically Filipinas. We do try to keep diversity in mind, but in our experience, Asian women are more likely to make the best of the situation, comply with vaccination policies, show up for work, etc. Anyway, because of this there have been instances where men, especially ones who look East Asian, would sexually harass us. One of my former coworkers says that she thinks it’s because they think we can’t speak English as well and won’t advocate for ourselves. They almost treat us like we’re a fetish rather than people.

Christina: Has your employer offered any benefits or relief programs due to COVID? And do you have paid sick days?

Ursula: *laughs hysterically* I’m sorry, that’s just so out of the realm of what’s actually been happening that I couldn’t help but laugh. There is a saying that comes to mind: “Do not bite the hand that feeds you.” In this circumstance, it also means not to ask for any more than the hand is offering, or the hand will bite you.

Since my store is a franchise and all of the Tims use the same system, sometimes I’d be loaned out to different stores if they needed staff. At one point I was working for three different locations at the same time. Prior to doing this, I had no exposure to the practices and the nature of pay at other locations. So, it was only around a year and a half ago that I learned that I am entitled to overtime and vacation pay. I hadn’t been paid vacation pay for the first two years at my current store and I haven’t gotten any backpay for it. Concerning overtime, I had to fight to get it recognized and reimbursed. Around the holidays there were more hours and I was working above 40 and max 55 hours per week for many of the weeks. When I told my boss that I’m entitled to overtime pay, she just kept deflecting me, saying she’d check it, and never getting back. It took me over three months to get my overtime pay, and the owner only conceded after my manager threatened to call the Ministry of Labour on her. I should not have to do all this work just to get what I am legally supposed to be getting.

It took me over three months to get my overtime pay, and the owner only conceded after my manager threatened to call the Ministry of Labour on her.

I don’t get any incentives or regular raises. As a supervisor, I got a raise to $15 per hour, but that’s nothing now that minimum wage has been increased to $15. I also have no company sick pay, but when I got COVID, I was eligible for CRSB (Canada Recovery Sickness Benefit) so I got some money, but it wasn’t much and didn’t last long. There was also a reimbursement process the employer had to go through, so some of the money’s in limbo and I have no idea if I’m going to get paid it or not. In December when I caught COVID, it was doubly hard because I sent money to my family five times. I need this job for PR so I’m just putting up with it. If I go back to the Philippines my family will die of hunger.

Christina: I’ve heard that you have experience with protesters from the so-called Freedom Convoy. How has this impacted your work?

Ursula: So, I live near a transit stop that is close to where protests are taking place. I can say first off that they have been incredibly noisy and disrespectful to the neighbourhood. Around my work, people have been very nervous and scared for their safety due to the protesters being known to come into workplaces and abuse and assault the staff there. Personally, I’ve been scared for myself and others since my coworkers’ safety is my responsibility as supervisor.

When the protesters initially came, the security and police were everywhere, so that helped with crowd management as only a few at a time could come inside. Luckily, we haven’t had any really bad incidents so far, but I can’t say the same for other workers in the shops around my store. Even then, though they weren’t necessarily as physically present as they could have been, the fear and the anxiety has taken an immense toll on all the employees. The first couple of days a lot of people of colour in and around my store’s location ended up calling in sick because they feared for their lives.

One of my coworkers who encountered protesters on transit told me that even though no one was physically harmed, there were many different acts of intimidation she witnessed. I just hope this doesn’t escalate.

Christina: Do you feel like your rights are being respected at work?

Ursula: I don’t even know what my rights are to begin with. I only know I’m supposed to get 1.5 times my regular wage for overtime and on some holidays, but c’mon, I come from a different country, I don’t know everything and no one’s taught me. I was actually offered a salaried position recently, but I calculated it and they’d be paying me less if I was on a salary rather than by the hour. I don’t feel respected, and even though I don’t have full knowledge of my rights, those aren’t being respected either. I feel voiceless. You just need to survive, and I can’t stand up for myself when I have to just keep swimming or else I’ll drown.

I feel voiceless.

Christina: How has working during the pandemic impacted your mental and physical health and wellbeing?

Ursula: There are times I work 11-12 hours per day, and I didn’t know I was entitled to two breaks. I can’t demonstrate how exhausted I am in any way clearer than that. Every night when I go home I’m almost crawling; sometimes I can’t even take a bath because if I sit down I won’t be able to get back up. I’m still young and I’m fairly healthy, but this work ages you, I have pain everywhere.

I don’t even have time to deal with my emotions, and I can’t, or else I’ll not be able to get back up from that either. If I fall apart I’ll suffer more. Maybe I’d be able to confront all this if I could actually go home and see my family, but I can’t right now.

Christina: Is there anything you think the public should know? Or wish they would understand and consider when interacting with you?

Just see us.   

Ursula: I wish they would understand what our lives are like and how our positions in society impact the way we experience the world. In customer service, we cannot fight back, we’re just trying to get by. We deserve better than the hand we’re often dealt. I think that awareness is crucial, people need to know what’s happening. Just see us.

The post “Just See Us”: Reflections from a Filipina Barista Working During the Pandemic appeared first on Global Labour Research Centre.

Christina Love is a contributor to the GLRC’s interview series entitled Workers’ Stories in the COVID-19 Era. She was also a union organizer with Workers United at her local Shoppers Drug Mart from October 2020 – February 2021. A staunch labour and human rights activist, Christina has been involved in her local community, politics, and the 91��ɫU community since starting university. Formerly the Director of Public Relations for the Palestine Solidarity Collective at 91��ɫ, a candidate in the 2021 federal election, and the current President of OPIRG 91��ɫ, Christina seeks to do what she can when she can. We all deserve better.

Introduction

Organizing is a loaded word. What is an organizer? While what it means to be an organizer is debatable, for me, organizers do the following: engage their community/communities and try to advocate for change. They put their values into concrete actions.

My relationship to labour organizing is one that starts with injustice. I could go on and on about theories of poverty and the working classes, but it is an entirely different matter to actually live it. It’s incredibly hard to break free of the machine I was born in and have lived within my whole life.

Background

Growing up for me was marked by the complicated existence of being poor in Canada. Looking at where and how I grew up means looking at the fact that I live in the suburbs, grew up in the 2000s and 2010s, and am a white, able-bodied woman. Like many in my situation, my relationship with poverty is one marked by familial trauma and mental illness. From almost going bankrupt and becoming homeless, to the complications of depression, to the necessity of having 24-hour care for some family members, there are hidden costs to being poor that we don’t often think about. Even so, having resources like a grandfather who did his best to help when he was still alive, and a mom with a stable income, gave us advantages that so many other poor folks just don’t have.

Growing up for me was marked by the complicated existence of being poor in Canada.

When I think of poverty and my younger years, I think, Why? Why were things like that? Why are they still like that? My activism and beliefs are rooted in my own experiences, and compassion for others who experience oppression. This is the backdrop against which I built my beliefs about labour into real action.

Setting the Scene

From the age of 12 I’ve had various jobs because I knew that it was up to me to fund my post-secondary education. Initially, this meant having a paper route and doing babysitting and dog walking. Once I was 16, I got my first formal part-time job as a cashier at a local Shoppers Drug Mart. Looking back, they took advantage of my desperation for employment from the start. They encouraged me and my coworkers to stay late and made us work irregular hours. They also allowed customers to abuse staff, did not compensate us fairly, discouraged breaks, etc. The COVID-19 pandemic brought these, and new, issues to a head.

I have never been worse abused by other people than I have been working retail during the pandemic. I would like to bold, underline, and highlight that. When people are pushed to breaking points due to forces outside of their control, they will often lash out at those who are devalued in society. In this context, this has meant a sharp increase in violence against workers. From the standpoint of employers, this pandemic brought about an opportunity to prey on people’s increased vulnerability and further profit off of exploiting them.

I have never been worse abused by other people than I have been working retail during the pandemic.

At the beginning of the pandemic, not too much changed. We didn’t have to start wearing masks until that summer and there were no plastic dividers or anything like that yet. It was mostly just a slight increase in wiping down high contact surfaces and product shortages. We also got a $2 wage subsidy from Loblaws Companies Ltd., which was much needed for those of us working minimum (and unlivable) wage jobs. As the pandemic progressed, however, our duties increased drastically and any support we got at the beginning petered out.

Some of the things cashiers were now expected to do, in my location at least, were to wipe surfaces after each customer, enforce distancing and mask-wearing, answer pharmacy calls, and monitor store capacity. This was in addition to our regular tasks of stocking and tagging shelves, checking for product expiries, cashing out customers, answering customer service calls, and responding to inquiries. In March of 2020, I also started working in the post office as well since one of the full-time workers was going on maternity leave. The most concise way I could describe this experience is hellish. As a part-time worker, I had to rapidly learn all the post office paperwork, the various systems and services we offered, and deal with twice the traffic with half the staff. Understaffing was a constant issue on all fronts during the entire pandemic. It wasn’t as though there weren’t people who wanted to work—there were—but staffing was cut for ‘capacity reasons.’ This is despite the fact that we had the same amount, if not more, customers in the store. In short, it was a money-grab at the expense of the workers.

The most concise way I could describe this experience is hellish.

One of the worst aspects about working during the pandemic was the abuse workers were getting from the customers. We had people endlessly complaining about the restrictions, refusing to mask and distance, lambasting employees for product shortages as if we were personally responsible, and so much more. One of the worst things that I experienced was a person who came into the store to access the post office. When I notified them that we were closed and the website did not have an updated closing time, they proceeded to scream at me, calling me a lying bitch who was just a lazy asshole and didn’t want to serve them, among worse things. They did this for around seven or so minutes and I was afraid they were going to get behind the counter and hit me at one point. I called a manager, but in a classic managerial move, they didn’t arrive until after this person left. We didn’t yet have the mall security number posted and I was hesitant to call 911. Instances similar to these were almost a daily experience at this point, and that $2 wage subsidy ended three months in.

Precarity rose significantly in retail during the pandemic. Our week-by-week schedules now got less reliable, and hours madly fluctuated. I might’ve worked 37 hours one week and eight the next. Towards the end, I was barely getting five hours a week. Contributing to this precarity was the lack of paid sick leave. Not only did we have to arrange our own coverage if we were sick, but we’d be missing out on pay, so some people would just come in feeling unwell. When you are desperate, choices aren’t treated as rights, so much as luxuries.

When you are desperate, choices aren’t treated as rights, so much as luxuries.

Management was horrific during this all. Not only did they allow the customers to abuse us with impunity, understaff the store, and give us a large number of new tasks outside of the scope of our positions, but they also implemented COVID protocols with about as much care as Doug Ford gives to human rights. Off the bat, there were no options for curbside pickup, so anyone who medically could not wear a mask was forced to come into the store at greater risk to themselves and others. This also meant a decrease in workplace safety since we could not refuse service to anyone who could not, or would not, wear a mask and direct them to an appropriate accommodation. Furthermore, the Workplace Hazardous Materials Information System (WHMIS) was disregarded entirely with regards to the unlabelled cleaning chemicals we were using to disinfect high touch areas. Not only did we not know what was in these cleaners, but as the store gradually got restocks of regulated cleaners, they were all sold off rather than having a supply reserved for store use. We had no one at the doors ensuring proper masking prior to entry, nor did we have a designated staff person to monitor store capacity limits; this would fall on the cashiers and supervisors and many times things would slip through the cracks. To put candles on the cake, no one was notified if a staff member or customer tested positive for COVID. Public Health or the people themselves would notify management, but not one of us workers would be briefed and offered testing.

All of this compounded into constant frustration and mental strain. I genuinely didn’t know how I was going to get through the day most of the time. I felt like a robot; I was stressed, I was abused, and I lost faith in almost everything. I am not one to complain without at least trying to do something, though, so I decided to go for broke and attempt to unionize. Being a part-time worker with some savings, and who could likely find different work if unionization didn’t pan out, put me in a position of not caring about losing my job anymore.

I am not one to complain without at least trying to do something, though, so I decided to go for broke and attempt to unionize.

Initial Contact

In September of 2020, I began to research and email, which, as I soon found out, is a surprising amount of what labour organizing entails. I looked into the different unions and a bit into the history of the labour movement in Canada. I then emailed the Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE), Industrial Workers of the World (IWW) Toronto, United Food and Commercial Workers (UFCW), and Workers United to ask about unionizing. A CUPE representative got back to me rather quickly saying that they didn’t organize retail. IWW didn’t get back to me until about two months later, at which point I had already been in talks with reps from UFCW and Workers United.

From phone calls and emailing back and forth, I decided to pursue unionization with Workers United because they seemed to be a more democratic union. I then met a rep at a local Tim Horton’s and discussed the ins and outs of unionizing, including what to expect in terms of pushback should the managers or owner find out about it.

How to Organize a Union

Step 1: Research the history of unionization, what benefits union-members experience, and options in terms of local unions; and list out the reasons why you want to unionize. Such extensive research isn’t strictly necessary, but it helps with resolving your thoughts and really getting committed to the work you’re about to do. I think that this is important since half-hearted organizing is generally unproductive.

Step 2: Contact a bunch of different unions in your sector and talk with different reps. Get a good grasp of the differences between unions and what resources they provide you with as an organizer.

Step 3: Connect with the union you have decided on and they will match you with a rep who will help you along the way.

Step 4: CARD SIGNING TIIIMMMEEE! Basically, it is a legal requirement to have at least 40% of non-managerial staff sign a union card before an application to be unionized can be filed with the Labour Board; this didn’t used to exist, but labour laws have changed. This is the most difficult step since you need to talk to people and convince them to sign a card expressing their support for unionization. Ideally, you’ll get more than 60% of people to sign so that the vote is likelier to pass. To properly complete this step, you need to get an approximate gauge on the number of non-managerial workers there are. Since there were no convenient lists I could access, I got an idea of our staffing situation by taking discreet pictures of the logbook and schedules.

Step 5 (I didn’t get this far): An application to be unionized will be filed by your union rep with the Labour Board. At this point, there will be a week’s processing time and the employer will receive notice that their staff wants to unionize.

Step 6: The employer will be trying to spread anti-labour propaganda and instigate division between workers. You and the more passionate coworkers will be dispelling this and reaffirming the choice to unionize, especially highlighting that the bosses wouldn’t be so anxious to stop it if it was such a bad thing for the employees.

Step 7: A vote will now be held by secret ballot. In order for a union to pass, 50% plus 1 person needs to vote in favour of unionizing. The only people who can vote are the non-managerial staff, and, in the case of Shoppers Drug Mart, those who aren’t pharmacists. Once a union vote passes, everyone is unionized, not just the people who voted in favour.

Step 8: If the union vote is successful, you will now be creating a Collective Agreement (CA) outlining the terms and conditions of your employment. Essentially, its function is to act as a legal shield against the brunt of injustices that employees at your workplace are facing. A CA is negotiated through collective bargaining, which is the back-and-forth debate on terms between the union and management.

Step 9: Congrats! The Collective Agreement passed and you are now fully unionized. This means that you are legally entitled to have the CA be upheld and will begin paying union dues. From what I was told, the pay raise per hour will be more than enough to cover dues and then some. The raise you negotiate depends on the nature of your CA, which you decide. Regardless, when I was organizing, dues for Workers United were between $7 to $9 per week.

Step 10: Labour organizing does not end upon the implementation of the Collective Agreement. A democratic union is one in which the members fully participate. This means being engaged in the broader union structure, including voting and talking to your coworkers about what does and doesn’t work when the time for renegotiating the CA comes around. If you do not participate, the employer and opportunists within the union will take advantage of this, usually for financial or career benefits.

A Few Notes on Unionization

*A very common misconception is that unions themselves dictate the terms of the CA. This is untrue. While they will help with the wording and provide legal support, it is the employees that decide on the terms and conditions.

*Another misconception is that you start paying union dues immediately. This is also blatantly false. You only start paying dues (which are proportional to hours worked per week) once the CA comes into effect.

*A note on the method of unionization I chose: Though you can form a union solely of your coworkers rather than going with an established union like Workers United, you don’t have the same access to legal resources or experienced advice in that case. Moreover, you need a LOT of buy-in for this form of unionization to be impactful. Interestingly enough, IWW takes an approach to unionization in between this and conventional unionization.

My Experiences Organizing

I felt a weird mix of emotions while I was in the process of trying to unionize. On the one hand, I felt like I had this bubble of inner strength that came from knowing I was trying to change things, which made going to work easier. On the other hand, I got fairly dejected with organizing due to the responses I was receiving from some coworkers and the nature of organizing during the pandemic.

…I felt like I had this bubble of inner strength that came from knowing I was trying to change things, which made going to work easier.

Some admin issues delayed my rep from Workers United from providing me with union cards initially. I ended up receiving a stack of cards in late November/early December 2020. Prior to this, I had started to discuss unionizing with a couple of coworkers I trusted and knew would be interested. Once I got the cards, I branched out a bit more. Now, prior to COVID, union reps would themselves visit people’s houses to discuss unionization and organizing plans. However, the pandemic meant that the only direct interaction my coworkers were getting was with me, though I did provide them with the contact information of the union rep.

Finding the time to talk with people was a huge challenge. This is definitely the sort of conversation you want to have face-to-face, but I was basically just seeing people while on breaks, while in the back room cashing out, and occasionally when someone would offer to drive me home. Those drives home and catching people after work was when I was best able to discuss unionization and the implications for us if we unionized. I initially reached out to people I knew would at least be open to hearing my message, and I was largely correct. By February I had about 14 cards signed.

This is where I met a couple of roadblocks. First, I was starting to get worn out. Everyone I had talked to, while passionate about the cause, was concerned about retaliation if we were caught so I was the only one actively talking to people and getting cards signed. This caused a significant amount of burnout and slowed the process. Second, I was now beginning to talk to the more apathetic or reluctant coworkers. This posed a few issues.

You cannot make anyone see your views if they won’t even look. This means that if someone didn’t want to hear about unions, they would not hear from me. A lot of the merchandisers who weren’t very customer-facing and the employees from more privileged backgrounds were like this. Many didn’t see the point, some didn’t want to make the (marginal) effort, and others were actively anti-union. In the end, we didn’t get to the voting stage.

You cannot make anyone see your views if they won’t even look.

Final Thoughts & the Privilege of Quitting

It’s not my place to blame anyone for not wanting, or not being able, to unionize. I did the best I could and, to date, trying to unionize is the thing I am most proud of doing in my life. I made this effort because the injustices myself and so many others face need to be fought against. Who will fight if we won’t? We all deserve so much better than the status quo and unionization is one avenue we can take to decrease injustice. The labour movement has been so historically powerful because of regular people getting together and imagining a better future, then seizing the present. Our legacies lie in the actions we take and what we leave behind.

Who will fight if we won’t?

I quit my job at Shoppers on Monday, March 15, 2021. The day before, I had a shift where three anti-maskers came in and I had to call security twice because they were getting violent. I called the manager on the third anti-masker, and rather than having them wear a mask or go elsewhere, the manager proceeded to check them out in front of my station. I’d had enough of this. I went home and cried then wrote two letters of resignation. One was very harsh, and I wrote it to vent more than anything else, and the other more calmly outlined my reasons for quitting. I delivered it the next day, gave away my only shift in the next two weeks, and walked out without a backward glance. I haven’t stepped foot in that store since the day I quit.

Once I had left, there wasn’t relief so much as an emptiness where I once had ongoing pain. The scars of the trauma I’ve experienced working during the pandemic continue to impact my life, but the difference now is that if I’m in a situation where someone is abusing me, I can fight back or walk away. That is my unalienable right. Even so, I generally avoid going shopping now because I get really anxious and tense whenever I see someone indoors without a mask or someone who is abusing an employee. I can and will step in when I see something wrong happening, but there’s not much I can do about maskless people other than walk away.

Quitting was a privilege for me, especially since so many people have lost their jobs and been so desperate for work during the pandemic. I had enough saved to pay tuition for the next couple of years and with negligible expenses from living at home, and I was in an okay place to leave that job. Many are not and they need our solidarity to fight for their rights.

Poem: The Worker

Day in.

Day out.

I am no longer a person.

I have no rights.

My life is sold.

My mind is clouded.

There is no light at the end of this tunnel.

There is abolition or apathy.

– Christina Love, 2022

The post Nothing to Lose but Our Chains: Attempting to Organize a Union During the Pandemic appeared first on Global Labour Research Centre.

In the fifteenth installment of our series Workers’ Stories in the COVID-19 Era, we interviewed Ta'Kaiya, a former administrative assistant at a Toronto mental health clinic. They speak about the absurd waitlists to access treatment and services as well as the higher intake volume as a result of the pandemic. Concerning their experience with the Canada Summer Jobs program, they state that it isn’t right to only subsidize minimum wage. In all, Ta'Kaiya illustrates the importance of workers’ rights and an increase in mental healthcare services.

For privacy, all names have been changed to protect the identities of our interviewees.

Interview

Christina: Can you describe your job, how long you worked there, if it was remote/in-person/hybrid, and some typical tasks?

Ta'Kaiya: Over the summer of 2021 I worked at a mental health clinic that was a division of an immigrant services centre in Toronto. I worked there officially between the months of May to the end of September, but I had prior experience volunteering there pertaining to requirements for my Certificate in Refugee and Migration Studies. In both roles, I was an administrative assistant. I was hired on after my volunteering concluded through the Canada Summer Jobs program, and then received a contract extension from the organization itself after the funding expired.

The tasks I had to do were things such as contacting clients and patients to remind them of appointments, scheduling new appointments, managing files, and maintaining contact with our service providers. I worked in tandem with my supervisor who taught me many of the clerical skills required to perform my job. Initially some of the work was remote and some was in-person, but it transitioned to being mostly in-person as my contract progressed and lockdowns lifted.

Christina: How has the pandemic impacted your work and working experience?

Ta'Kaiya: The pandemic significantly impacted my working experience. When I first started with them, it seemed like there was a massive amount of work to do in a miniscule amount of time. Aside from myself, there was only one other admin assistant, and there was a significant backlog of work because the previous person in my role was unable to fulfill their duties due to chronic illness. I really didn’t have the skills to do everything they were asking of me, so I did a lot of learning on the job.

…there was a massive amount of work to do in a miniscule amount of time.

Everyday was fairly busy but my hours remained regular and consistent. There was a lot of clients coming into the office as well as a deluge of phone calls.

Christina: What were some of the things you weren’t prepared for?

Ta'Kaiya: I really wasn’t prepared for how busy the centre could get at times. I’ve heard it from others that there was a significant uptick in clients and patients because of the pandemic. Effective time-management was essential, but I was exhausted by all the work. I also wasn’t prepared for how fast I’d have to learn and apply the different skills I was being taught due to the sheer number of people who were coming in as lockdowns were lifting and they were trying to access services.

Christina: What have you noticed about mental health during the pandemic?

Ta'Kaiya: Speaking to my own mental health, it wasn’t significantly impacted by working this job during the pandemic. As for what I’ve observed about mental health in general, I can say that we received a lot of phone calls from prospective patients and clients who were seeking psychiatric services and counselling. I also saw many people accessing programs relating to domestic violence, problems with gambling, substance abuse, etc.

With regards to our capacity for psychiatric care, our centre unfortunately had a two-year waitlist. One of the psychiatrists was Italian-speaking and the other spoke Farsi and Arabic. Despite this, there were many clients and patients who needed counsellors and psychiatrists who speak a wider array of languages, especially since the centre caters to refugees, newcomers, and immigrants. Counselling was generally more accessible than psychiatry in terms of expected wait, but it was still a bit slow. We tried to help as many people as possible, but there were some that we couldn’t assist and who we referred to other mental health services.

…there were many clients and patients who needed counsellors and psychiatrists who speak a wider array of languages, especially since the centre caters to refugees, newcomers, and immigrants.

Christina: Was there an increase of mental health supports offered, either quantity or diversity, that catered to needs expressed by the pandemic? Do you think what was available was enough?

Ta'Kaiya: I think that the services offered covered quite a wide range of concerns pertaining to mental health. We had psychiatric services, general counselling, counselling for domestic violence, some people would be court-mandated to take partner abuse response programs, we had a gambling program, programs for the elderly, a program specific to newcomers and refugees, there was also family counselling. We didn’t really have something explicitly in response to the pandemic, but programs like the domestic violence one saw more people in it due to the pandemic.

Christina: Do you think that what was available was enough?

Ta'Kaiya: Yes and no. I think that the existing programs covered a wide breadth so for people who just needed something like counselling, they’d be covered. The real issue was the waitlist. There are also a lot of hoops to jump through for intake, so we couldn’t really respond to crisis calls and had to refer them elsewhere. Having crisis workers would be much appreciated in that community. Again, to reiterate the languages thing, though there were interpreters available sometimes, it genuinely wasn’t enough and not enough languages were represented. They could have done to hire another clerical assistant or two to lessen the burden on existing staff and rotate duties more.

The real issue was the waitlist.

Christina: Did you find yourself to be more tired while you were working during the pandemic?

Ta'Kaiya: I’d say yeah, but not by a lot.

Christina: Were you unionized? And what was your experience with workers’ rights in that job?

Ta'Kaiya: I did not have a union representing me due to the nature of my contract. As far as workers’ rights go, I’d say I was treated fairly by most of the staff. However, I did notice that there was a lack of clarity around my expected tasks due to the supervisor not properly briefing me. They then tried to hold us accountable for their mistakes.

Christina: Were you compensated enough for your labour and were you getting hazard pay?

Ta'Kaiya: I was actually getting hazard pay, but not with Canada Summer Jobs. With CSJ, I was paid minimum wage, which I do not think is enough for this type of work, or any type of work really. Once I got the contract extension, my wage got bumped up to $20.40 per hour which did include hazard pay. I also had some vacation pay I was able to cash into. If it hadn’t been for school, I probably would have continued with the clinic because they did offer to extend my contract once it was about to expire.

While the second contract was better considering the pay increase, for the amount of work that an administrative assistant does on a daily basis, I would say that it is more reasonable to offer a starting rate of $25 per hour. You’re doing outreach with patients, you’re doing admin work, you do miscellaneous office tasks, you really do it all and it isn’t respectful to offer someone $14.35 or $20.40 for doing all that.

Christina: Did you feel safe working?

Ta'Kaiya: Yes. At the mental health clinic there weren’t a lot of people who were anti-mask, but anyone who didn’t come wearing a mask would be offered one and turned away at the door if they refused. I’d also give clients and patients a verbal COVID-19 screening over the phone prior to their appointments.

Christina: If you had ultimate power, what changes would you make to that job specifically and to labour in general?

Ta'Kaiya: For that job specifically, I’d definitely add more admin assistants and pay them well. A lot of priority is given to hiring service-oriented positions, but administrative positions are also required in order to make things run. Lunch was also unpaid, and we’d have to alternate watching the phones during that time, which I thought was unfair. As a general thing, I’d increase the funding to the centre.

More broadly speaking, I think that workplaces should be unionized. I’d also increase EI and bolster access to various employment programs and mental health services. In terms of Canada Summer Jobs, they really should not be capping their funding at minimum wage – it’s an insult to us workers. If you have to take a sick day, I also think that you should still receive pay.

The post From the Inside Out: A Mental Health Assistant’s Perspective on the Pandemic appeared first on Global Labour Research Centre.

In the thirteenth installment of our series Workers' Stories in the COVID-19 Era, we interviewed Morelia, a server and supervisor at a Queen St. bar/restaurant in downtown Toronto. In the dialogue below, Morelia speaks to the way they were treated during the pandemic. They discuss how the responsibility for reopening the economy has disproportionately and unreasonably fallen on our most vulnerable workers. Morelia insists that hospitality workers deserve to be humanized and that the onus to do so is on the public.

For privacy, all names have been changed to protect the identities of our interviewees.

Interview

Christina: Can you describe your job, how long you've worked there, and some typical duties?

Morelia: I work as a server, bartender, supervisor—I basically do it all. But mostly I bartend. I’ve mostly been working at the bar I’m currently at since August of this year. Throughout the pandemic I’ve had a couple of other jobs and been laid off, but this and a job I have teaching yoga have been the most consistent. Some weeks I'm full-time, some weeks I’m part-time, but because I teach yoga in between, my hours pretty much balance out week to week.

I've been working in hospitality since I was first legally allowed to, so it feels like forever. Around 18 or so was my first hospitality job where I worked in a beer tent at a racetrack. Now I'm a supervisor at a bar on Queen West. My relationship to my current position is that it’s my secure, pay-the-bills, pay-my-rent type of job.

Christina: How has the pandemic impacted your work and working conditions?

Morelia: I could go on and on and on and on about this. First, the transition from one place to another during the pandemic was definitely a learning curve. I left one of my old serving jobs to work just at my current one last winter and at one point I was juggling both plus teaching yoga and it was overwhelming to say the least. It was generally the same deal for both places: very short-staffed, obviously, because everybody wants to stay on EI instead of working in crappy conditions. They’re getting paid to stay home and out of harms way, let alone the other issues with this work, so why wouldn’t they if they could?

…everybody wants to stay on EI instead of working in crappy conditions. They’re getting paid to stay home and out of harms way, let alone the other issues with this work, so why wouldn’t they if they could?

But yeah, because we were so short-staffed, the people we did have were working way overtime. In this line of work that also meant the services weren’t that good, people weren’t always very happy, everything takes more time, etcetera. You end up dealing with a lot more dissatisfied customers and things like that, which is awful. On the other hand, you get some people who are really understanding of the circumstances. They'll usually tip more and they're really grateful that you're even there to serve them a beer or whatever it may be. That's a surface overview of how it's changed for me as a server during the pandemic.

Christina: Would you say that the balance of really good to really bad patrons was equal or does one outweigh the other?

Morelia: I can’t give a definitive on that; it really depends on the day. I would say in most of my spaces I'm pretty lucky; a lot of the folks coming to the bar that I work in now are younger so they understand the situation more and I can relate to them on a peer-level, I think. So that's been nice, and I've met a lot of great people.

I will say, though, that there are still a lot of people coming in who aren’t necessarily cognizant of the situation given the area that my bar is in—Queen and Bathurst. You’ll get folks who are just walking by and want to get lunch or whatever but totally don't understand the circumstances and are really impatient because of it. If I had to put a number to it, I’d say the divide is around 60/40 good vs bad.

Christina: How has the pandemic impacted your relationships between your boss, coworkers, and customers?

Morelia: It definitely makes it a little bit more difficult as staff. Specifically, again, because nobody wanted to work in the beginning, we were understaffed, so for the people like myself who came back to work when we could, it was really tough. I know I didn't necessarily have to come back to work right away but I sort of felt like I needed to because, as an able-bodied person, this restaurant I worked at needed me. I was all gung-ho, “Okay I'm going to go do this and contribute back to the economy right away.” Since I could go back to work, I went off EI and I was working full-time again.

It was difficult because, physically, I cannot work six days a week. Not to mention that I have other things going on and a life, I just physically am not able to work that many shifts, I will keel over. But the situation with the restaurants and understaffing meant that there wasn’t anyone else to do them. So, either you come in or they didn't open. That was way more stress than I wanted to carry for this workplace that was supposed to be my easy, pay-the-bills, type of job—my security job. It started to really weigh on me. I know many of my coworkers have expressed the same thing because a lot of businesses have gone under, and we all felt a sense of responsibility to keep this one running. In terms of customers, it seems like the pandemic brought out the worst in the people who might’ve been just unpleasant before. The stress and pressure definitely created a hostile environment for all of us.

Burnout is something that's been really prevalent among many of the staff I've worked with. A lot of people are just trying to keep their head above water. Then, factoring in the ever-changing circumstances we’re constantly trying to adapt to, it’s just too much for us. There’s a tangible lack of support that we all feel as workers.

Christina: If your place of employment offered better pay and benefits do you think that more people would have wanted to return?

Morelia: Oh, absolutely. A lot of the folks who worked at my bar, or any bar, would be making more money on EI than they would be working part-time. There’s no reason for them to come back unless the bosses make it worthwhile. Another thing at our restaurant was difficulty hiring and retaining senior staff. Not a lot of people wanted to become managers and supervisors because it really wasn't worth the pay raise considering how much more responsibility you have. There’s so much labour involved, and not just physically, but emotionally as well. De-escalation, motivating the team, dealing with any problems that come up, it’s a huge thing to do day in, day out.

There’s so much labour involved, and not just physically, but emotionally as well.

Christina: What supports were available to you through work and the government during the pandemic? Do you think that they were enough?

Morelia: It was weird because when I was getting CERB before I went back to work in summer 2020, it was great because I was able to actually pay my bills with it. Then I went back to work for a short period of time and another lockdown happened shortly after. At that point I wasn't getting CERB anymore, I was getting EI, which was not as good as CERB. It was taxed and also a smaller amount of money, so I ended up having to start a dog-walking business to scrape by and pay my bills.

CERB was sort of like UBI in a way because everyone got the same amount of money and for the most part it was enough. I wish I never had to switch to EI and it could’ve been CERB all the way through. The experience really humbled me as well. I’ve been financially independent from my parents for a long time now, but I had to reach out to my mom to help me make rent sometimes. I’m so lucky to have had that support too because not a lot of folks have those resources. All of the people having to move back with their parents and all of the people who became homeless during the pandemic in Toronto really go to show that the financial support was not enough.

I’ve been financially independent from my parents for a long time now, but I had to reach out to my mom to help me make rent sometimes.

Christina: Going off of that, do you think that the government did a good job with restrictions, aid, and everything? What do you think they could have done better?

Morelia: I absolutely think that the restrictions were needed to keep our population safer, but I think that the brunt of the work caused by them fell disproportionately on frontline and service workers, and that we’re the ones having to police everything. For example, every time someone walks into the restaurant, I have to take an extra three or so minutes to look at their vaccine passports and their IDs and have them sign in before they can be seated. It’s just… I'm not getting any extra money for this. I didn't get any extra training on how to authenticate vaccine passports—for all I know they made them up on Procreate. [Editor’s note: Procreate is a graphics editor app].  It's unfortunate that all of this is falling on people like ourselves and we're receiving no training and no subsidized pay for it.

I look at my coworkers and think about how lucky I am to have at least some de-escalation training from outside this job. There are a lot of customers who’ll come in ready for an argument, especially about government-mandated masking and the vaccine passports. Since our employer won’t sponsor trainings around this and doesn’t compensate us for all the extra work, it’s really up to the government to mandate it and follow through on giving us support. These skills are coming to be necessary, and we’re just not being taught them. The government has honestly failed in that respect, and I think it speaks to how little they think of us workers.

At our work, higher-ups are not working frontline; they don't understand the severity of the situation and how crucial it is that we have these tools. Case in point, it took us having been robbed to get security at the bar. It’s just ridiculous. They only seem to do anything to change when it begins to impact their bottom line.

Christina: In terms of how your workplace was governed, how democratic is it? Do you guys have a union at all or any collective decision-making power?

Morelia: We don't have a union and I would say it could be more democratic. At this point we can lodge complaints and if it violates company policy or any laws then it has to be dealt with, but we’re not in a position to come up with our own policies and procedures, or modify existing ones, as workers. As an employee, I wish my voice was heard and prioritized more. I've had situations where I'm like, “Okay I feel like my safety is compromised when I come to work and I'm reaching out to you to say that I'm scared to come into work.” In those cases, nothing would be done until four, five, six, seven, eight employees reach out and say, “I don't want to come to work anymore, it’s unsafe.”

As an employee, I wish my voice was heard and prioritized more.

I wish that these things didn’t have to get to this point for them to do something about it. I wish that it just took one person having this experience for them to act. I like to think that I have a tiny bit of power as a supervisor and I try to bring that to the other workers during those shifts, but as for the bartenders, kitchen staff, servers, and support staff, they don’t have much of a say at all, really. It’s difficult to approach higher-ups with a problem or with their opinions.

Christina: What has your experience been as restrictions have relaxed?

Morelia: Moving from patio to indoor wasn't really a big deal. We were mostly excited for it because it meant we could make more money. More customers would come, they’d stay longer indoors, tip more, and it was generally supported because we really needed the money. The one thing though is vaccine passports were a really difficult adjustment in the beginning and, being on Queen St. West, we’d get a lot of ‘protestors’ come by and try to mess with us, push our buttons, generally just see what they could get away with. So that was really stressful.

I also feel like the first couple days of each new lift of restrictions, there's always a little bit of weirdness that goes on, or people trying to test the boundaries. And then it’s this cycle of it becoming more neutral until the next change happens. How it plays out typically is that they’ll try to test the boundaries or whatever and they’re turned around at the doors and immediately leave. As for the other patrons, it gets annoying to have to remind people to wear their masks and still distance inside when they’re not seated. People don't like to be told what to do, they will get annoyed even if you're very nonconfrontational and say something like, “Hey, I just need you wear your mask inside please to keep the other guests safe.” As a supervisor they’ll also complain to me about being reminded to wear their mask and it’s just like, have they not heard the news? The server’s just doing their job. It’s like that one meme where it says, “Get your nose in your mask and out of my business.”

Christina: How has working during the pandemic impacted your physical and mental health?

Morelia: Back to me not being physically able to work six days a week, there’s definitely a pressure that’s put upon you when the establishment says that you need to come in or they won’t be able to open. That’s like a dual physical/mental issue that’s come up with the pandemic. I’m human, I need a few days to recharge or else I can’t operate the way that I want to, my capacity and social battery are only so big. I’m not the person I want to be, and everything gets neglected for work. I’m also not as good at my job when I'm tired and burnt out.

My time was something that was sort of robbed from me for a bit. I definitely felt the consequences of that in that you get to feel depressed, disassociated, and you’re basically on autopilot when all you’re doing is getting up, working, and going to bed. More to do with the physical side of things, all of this work and stress meant that I couldn’t prioritize certain things. At one point, I’d be eating like one meal a day—I’d be getting home at 4:00 am and no one wants to make food at 4:00 am. All I could do was sleep. Working 10 hours a day, six days a week isn’t healthy or sustainable, you can’t prioritize yourself in the most basic sense. Cooking, grocery shopping, resting, hobbies, all that gets brushed away and your life is just a cycle of work and sleep. I don’t think that was necessarily everyone’s experience, but for the people who initially came back, it definitely was.

My time was something that was sort of robbed from me for a bit.

Adding onto that already crappy situation was the general anxiety of having to deal with people who view you as less-than. Having to say no to people and argue and de-escalate all these different situations made it really uncomfortable to come into work. I’d get these knots in my stomach before going in and I know that many of my coworkers felt the same way too. It definitely hasn't been easy, but I've learned a lot from it, and I now approach situations with strangers in a new way.

Christina: We got into it a bit with your comments on CERB, but if you had ultimate power, what are some of the things you’d do going forward?

Morelia: I think I would like to have somebody advocating for the staff and for our voices to be heard, considered, and acted upon. If we even just had one person who had our back and could go up to the higher-ups and tell them something needs to happen, that would be so helpful. I’d also want for the government to realize how much extra work we've had to do—we’ve been doing twice as much work for half as much pay, basically—and support us accordingly. Especially as tip-based workers, we need to be subsidized for our lost income. I don’t think I would have minded all of it as much if it felt like it was worth it.

I would love a union. I might look into it, actually.

Christina: What do you wish people understood about being a server during the pandemic?

Morelia: I wish people understood everything that it takes for us to get here and do the job. Because they only interact with us when we’re directly serving them, it’s almost as if we stop existing when we’re not. Our sacrifices are going almost entirely unnoticed in general society outside of some people who will say they’re grateful we’re there but who won’t advocate for us. For example, when I went back to work, I couldn’t see my mom for a whole year because she’s immunocompromised and I just couldn’t risk it, she’s my best friend. People need to understand that service industry folks are making sacrifices to be at work. We’re sacrificing our health, safety, mental health, and a lot of people just sort of treat it like it's the same old, same old. They expect perfect service, and they expect their server to be a superhuman at all times.

Our sacrifices are going almost entirely unnoticed in general society…

Hospitality workers need to be humanized and others need to understand that we’re people too. Don’t treat us like we’re providing you a service. First and foremost, treat us like people. The connection and respect are gone a lot of times in this entitlement culture. We are a part of the community whether they like it or not and we deserve better. It’s easier to be nice than it is to be a jerk and kindness is free. You’ll get better service and a healthier community.

The post “Kindness is Free”: Serving in the 6ix During the Pandemic appeared first on Global Labour Research Centre.

Read the Executive Summary

Written by Bronwyn Bragg (SSHRC Postdoctoral Fellow, Centre for Refugee Studies, 91��ɫ)

Download [PDF]

The post "No Safe Place": Documenting the migration status and employment conditions of workers in Alberta’s meatpacking industry during the pandemic appeared first on Global Labour Research Centre.

Christina Love is a contributor to the GLRC’s interview series entitled Workers’ Stories in the COVID-19 Era. Her post below features findings and quotes from those interviews.

TW: Mention of suicide in the worker quotes (Karl).

History

In 1894, over 50 labour organizations from across the country petitioned parliamentarians to create a federal workers’ holiday [1]. Since then, Labour Day has been a Canadian statutory holiday celebrated the first Monday in September. Originally a holiday that platformed speeches, parades, picnics, and worker solidarity, Labour Day has increasingly changed in its nature since the 1940s. Now, among the mainstream, Labour Day is more of a family-centred holiday that is largely treated as an additional weekend day.

The day was borne of the working struggle and celebration of its victories. Crucial to this struggle was the successful 1872 printers’ strike in Toronto which instigated the Trade Union Act, decriminalizing unions [2]. The now-legal unions could begin to do what unions do – they began to organize, demanding better wages, fair treatment, and lower working hours. The industrial standard from before the Act was a 12-hour workday and a 6-day workweek [3]. Since unions have come onto the scene this has significantly shifted, and the working standard for most jobs now is an 8-hour workday and 5-day workweek.

The current de-politization and sanitization of Labour Day is reflected in the policy decisions of our leaders and the increasing restrictions on worker organizing and the power that worker organizations can hold.

Present

Neoliberalism has meant a workforce that is increasingly precarious and disenfranchised. Add on a pandemic and you have rampant injustice at its extremes.

In terms of unions, this has manifested itself in combative legislation that seeks to undermine the power of the collective and to limit the scope of what they can do. Of special note is back-to-work legislation. Basically, governments have steadily eroded workers’ legal abilities to strike by enacting legislation that can force them back to work. Particularly, for example, CUPE 3903 members at 91��ɫ since 2018 would remember the Ford government forcing an end to that year’s historic strike, effectively infringing on workers’ bargaining power [4]. Most recently at the federal level, Bill C-29 was tabled in the House of Commons on April 28, 2021, forcing striking Port of Montreal workers back to work [5]. If workers cannot strike, their leverage effectively vanishes, allowing employers to ignore worker demands.

In response to the public health crisis of the pandemic, the Ontario government passed Bill 195, which reduces the legal power of the Ontario Nurses Association (ONA) and other unions, with no designated future end [6]. For all unionized workers, this bill overrides collective agreement provisions, and interferes with collective bargaining and the grievance process. For nurses specifically, this bill notably empowers employers to redeploy nurses to units in which they’re not qualified to work, and ignore their objections.

Precarity is at an all-time high, particularly among young workers. Experiencing a 6-percentage point increase in unemployment from 2019-2020 is just the tip of the iceberg for young people [7]. The pandemic has exacerbated an increasing trend that has been steadily growing since the 80s; 78.95% of young people in 1989 had fulltime, permanent jobs [8]. In 2019, this fell to 70.15% of young people [9]. People are still working, mind you, but it is getting harder and harder to find fulltime, permanent, positions.

This is a dual issue reflected in legislation that makes employers responsible for greater expenses for fulltime employees, disincentivizing the voluntary hiring of fulltime staff, and a simultaneous desperation for work among the people due to a lacking social safety net. Young workers put up with terrible conditions, low pay, and unreliable work because they have to. We don’t have free post-secondary education, we don’t have a Universal Basic Income, and there are huge housing and affordability crises in huge urban population centres like Toronto, Montreal, and Vancouver. People are taking what they can get because they have no choice.

It is galling that we celebrate a holiday every September that was intended to uplift and promote solidarity with workers, yet at the same moment, the actions of governments and businesses undermine the very goals and premise upon which Labour Day was founded. How long before unions are so legislated that they’re effectively recriminalized?

The Workers’ Voices

The people who have faced, and are facing, the impacts of these policies and these social, economic, and political trends are the workers. This begs the question: What are the workers saying? We interviewed frontline and essential workers throughout the summer as part of our Workers' Stories in the COVID-19 Era dialogue series about their experiences of work and labour in Canada and the world, specifically concerning the changing nature of labour as affected by the COVID-19 pandemic.

Below, we have pulled a quote from each of our interviews to highlight the views of workers, spoken by the workers themselves.

I have never been worse abused by other people than I have been working in retail, this being wholly exacerbated by the pandemic. You begin to feel less than human, between the unreasonable demands of managers and the customers who treat you like scum. – Emma, former Shoppers Drug Mart post office clerk and cashier

I think my anxiety is way higher than it's ever been in my life. I think I have to figure out my day, their day, entirely… But we need to make that all work, so that I can still work and keep a professional noise level and am able to work with my kids, and have them be able to have some sort of normality to their day. – Felicity, educational assistant and parent

So, the pharmacist owned the branch where I worked, and she was very discriminatory; she favoured the people who worked at the pharmacy more than any of the other employees in the store. For example, she got all of her pharmacy staff vaccinated in early January, and the rest of the staff…she never even talked about getting them vaccinated or discussed anything with them. – Lucy, former Shoppers Drug Mart cash supervisor

Even if I had perfect time-management, the workload has increased to the point where we need to be getting overtime or have more staff be hired. How can I manage twelve hours of genuine work in eight hours even if I'm perfect at prioritizing?... For me, there's no paid overtime but I’m putting in overtime every single day. – Audre, Canadian medical researcher

It was just too hard. We had all these new ‘COVID’ changes in place to reduce labour costs, which severely limited our kitchen staff, let alone the adaptation to online ordering. With Uber Eats and Skip the Dishes, you get a “ding ding ding order request” and you have to accept it and prepare the order superhumanly fast, and the orders just keep coming in, like “ding ding ding ding,” fucking constantly. You’re constantly stressed, constantly behind, and with absolutely no help. &�Բ�����;– Damian, GTA line cook

I was still working full-time and trying to find a job that didn't make me actively want to commit suicide. Near the end of my time at that second veterinary clinic, suicide was an option, it was a part of my brain, and it was a way out. But because I was working full-time, if I went to places like Durham Recruiter, they pretty much told me that they couldn’t help me because I was working, even though I was always one paycheque and $50 away from starving… - Karl, former vet assistant turned hot tub salesperson

With this pandemic, the approach to unions have changed. Before, workers were chased by unions and now workers are chasing unions for membership, knowing that unionization provides them with some security and socio-economic protection. – Edward, Ghanian public utility sector worker

A big thing was that sometimes I’d have to call in sick for some shifts due to health issues, and while they didn’t fire me for being sick, I wasn’t given any sick pay at all, and I had to find someone to cover my shift. So that’s a major financial hit I took whenever I wasn’t feeling well enough to work. – Angela, former Shoppers Drug Mart cashier

I wanted to honour my country and my traditions by continuing to work in a way my father and forefathers did, in a way that I thought would honour the land and the sea, but the pandemic showed me that I will be left behind by change, that my country will not protect me. I could barely afford to keep food in the mouths of my wife and children… The poor get poorer, the sick get sicker, the rich get richer. – Joseph, traditional Maltese fisherman

I would say don't hedge your bets on whatever current employment you have, and always be ready at any given point to switch to a new form of employment. You as an individual are inconsequential to your employer. – Attilio, laid-off Old Navy merchandiser

It’s a difficult situation to be told you have no choice of where you're going to be working or else you could lose your job. They don't outright say it, but you know it's in the background. You try to grieve something, but it doesn’t work. – Ahed, Ontario nurse

The post Labour Day, the Pandemic, and Canada appeared first on Global Labour Research Centre.

In the eleventh installment of the Workers' Stories in the COVID-19 Era dialogue series, we interviewed Attilio, a former worker at an Old Navy store in Ontario. Attilio describes the disillusionment many student workers felt during the pandemic. Attilio primarily wishes that the government did more for students and that they had access to more resources and benefits when they need them most.

For privacy, all names have been changed to protect the identities of our interviewees.

Interview

Christina: Tell me a little bit about your job. How did you get hired, what were some typical duties, and if you're not still working there, why not?

Attilio: I started to send out job applications on Indeed in September and I had some rough luck with that for awhile. Then in late October I got a call for an interview at a local Old Navy store. Around early November, I got hired there. I worked there part-time from early November to around mid-December, which is the point when I got laid off.

My typical duties would have been folding clothes and putting them on stands. I mostly did merchandising. What a lot of customers would do is that they would take clothes with them to the checkout line and inevitably some of them would decide last minute to not buy those clothes. The cashiers would dump the castoffs in a bin right behind the register and we would come over every five minutes or so, collect the bin of clothes, refold them, tag them appropriately, and put them back to where they were supposed to be.

I did not stay on long enough to be trained for other stuff like cashier work, because when COVID-19 quarantine regulations became stricter in December of 2020, they couldn’t keep their newer staff and I got cut. This was an incremental process and I got much-reduced hours before the final cut.

Christina: How do you think that the pandemic has impacted the job search, as well as working conditions?

Attilio: The two biggest impacts that COVID-19 had on my working experience was the reduced traffic at my store, which impacted job retention, and the difficulty of finding work in the first place. Basically, since there was decreased revenue, my wages couldn’t be justified by the corporation, so they laid me off. They did mention that I should re-apply when things get laxer, but that hasn’t happened yet. Due to the pandemic and restrictions, I’ve also found it harder to get work in general. A lot of places just aren’t hiring. So that's been the impact of COVID-19 on my employment career so far.

A lot of places just aren’t hiring.

Christina: I understand you’re a university student; why did you initially pursue getting employment during the pandemic?

Attilio: It was mainly for peace-of-mind. My mom is very cautious with how and how much she spends her money. She tries to put forward that no matter what needs to be spent, whether it's tuition, medical treatment, or trips and things, she can do it. While I acknowledge that her putting out this sort of outlook is the result of her hard work after immigrating to Canada, we’re very much still lower middle class and I want to help. Tuition is not cheap, some medical procedures I’m pursuing are not cheap; I’m able and willing to work so that’s why I wanted to get a job.

Tuition is not cheap, some medical procedures I’m pursuing are not cheap; I’m able and willing to work so that’s why I wanted to get a job.

Christina: Do you think that the government did well with pandemic regulations? What might you have done differently if you had power?

Attilio: If I had power, I would have made the regulations on quarantining stricter so that you didn't have to go through these cycles of huge case counts, lower case counts, huge case counts… It’s inefficient and isn’t based on the best interests of the people so much as businesses. This response badly affected people's jobs, especially students and their capacity to find paid employment. My main issue can really be boiled down to the short-term memory of a lot of these policies.

If I had power, I would have made the regulations on quarantining stricter so that you didn't have to go through these cycles of huge case counts, lower case counts, huge case counts…

I'm also not sure if this was the company of Old Navy not being allowed to do this because the government prevented them, or that Old Navy didn't want to do this for the sake of their sales and the government didn't care enough to force them, but I would change the response to masking that the company had. Even though Old Navy would play announcements in their store stating that customers must be wearing a mask when they come in, that was not actually a rule they let us enforce. The most we could do was gently remind people to put on a mask and offer them one. If they would refuse, or yell at us, or anything like that, we would just have to take it and let them walk around the store.

Thankfully I don't have people in my household, like the elderly or young children, who are at a higher risk of complications with COVID. But regardless of that, there are many people, many workers, who are in that sort of situation, and the fact that the government refuses to make masking an enforceable rule inside buildings is mind-boggling. I think that people can obviously have their free decision to put their lives at risk, they just shouldn’t have the decision to put others’ lives at risk.

Christina: What have you learned about employment and/or labour because of working during the pandemic?

Attilio: I've learned that finding long-term employment, specifically long-term part-time employment, is probably naively hopeful, at best, during the pandemic. Most places you'd find work at probably already have no shortage of current employees who have more experience doing that job than you would, as someone new. This has translated to new workers only being brought on as temporary extra labour until the next wave inevitably hits.

Jumping from job to job is the way of life for most students in my position. It's what I see until the pandemic is over, quote unquote. To put it lightly, there’s a huge amount of job insecurity for part-timers.

Christina: If you could tell the public anything about your experience working during the pandemic, what sort of message would you want to get out into the world?

Attilio: I would say don't hedge your bets on whatever current employment you have, and always be ready at any given point to switch to a new form employment. You, as an individual, are inconsequential to your employer. Even if things seem fine now, and even if you might feel that the restrictions are over, and the pandemic might be over, it's very easy for everything to tighten once again, and then you're out of a job. It's best to have backup plans, and backup employment ideas, in mind.

You, as an individual, are inconsequential to your employer.

Christina: If you were given ultimate power over the political, economic, and social conditions of your community, how would you have done things differently? Specifically concerning the pandemic’s impacts on the working class and student workers.

Attilio: It's honestly sort of hard to answer this without coming across as a smarmy know-it-all, I'm sure that there are people smarter than me who have thought of better ideas. If it was up to me, I would probably have kept the restrictions for a longer period before I allowed everything to resume, rather than just continually having this financial instability, where you can be put in and out of a job based on the current state of government pandering towards businesses and corporations. You know, loosening restrictions on a whim just because things look nice in the moment. This kind of insecurity has been really hard for student workers especially and they’ve just been going through these seasons of either losing their jobs or being afraid of losing their jobs.

As far as students are concerned, I would probably help them by reducing the criteria for government benefits. For example, a student who’s in my position and who only gets a job once they’re already in university, and who gets laid off shortly into their employment, cannot access financial benefits like Employment Insurance or the Canada Recovery Benefit. If I recall correctly, you need about 500 hours working beforehand to qualify and a certain amount of income. If you've been working since high school, that's probably not too much of an issue for you. However, if you're the type of person who has, say, only worked a bit in high school, but just started to work more when they're in university and the pandemic hits, you’re out of luck.

All in all, I would put more money towards student worker benefits, and benefits for workers in general, who’ve gotten screwed over during this pandemic.

The post At the Flip of a Switch: A Worker’s Perspective on Getting Hired and Laid off During the Pandemic appeared first on Global Labour Research Centre.

In this installment of the Workers' Stories in the COVID-19 Era dialogue series, we interviewed Joseph, a small-scale commercial fisherman in the Republic of Malta. In the dialogue below, Joseph discusses not only how the COVID-19 pandemic has impacted his life and his industry, but also discuses how issues of neo-colonialism and neo-liberalism further exacerbate the effects of this global health crisis.

For privacy, all names have been changed to protect the identities of our interviewees.

INTERVIEW

Suzanne: Can you tell me what you do for a living, how long you have been doing it, and what your work entails?

Joseph: I have been an independent small-scale fisherman here in Malta for about 30 years, since I was a little boy. My profession is a long-standing tradition in Malta and Gozo. I chose to follow in the footsteps of my ancestors, and I try to make a living from the land and the sea as my father and grandfather did. I used to fish with my father and that’s how he supported our family. Now, it’s how I support mine.

I chose to follow in the footsteps of my ancestors, and I try to make a living from the land and the sea as my father and grandfather did.

What my work entails is pretty self-explanatory. I own my own fishing boat, a medium sized offshore fishing boat. Every morning I wake up, I head out, I use my fish-finder technology to direct me, I catch what I can for the day, and I head back and sell my fish to the local fish market, or directly to a restaurant or a customer.

Suzanne: Has the COVID-19 pandemic changed your work?

Joseph: On top of everything else us fishermen have had to go through recently, this pandemic has almost ruined my life; it has ruined my livelihood that’s for sure. Maltese small scale legitimate fishermen can barley survive as it is with diminishing fish stocks, the endangerment of Bluefin tuna, new EU restrictions on swordfish season, the industrial trawlers that are clearing the Mediterranean Sea, and the sale of “black fish.” With the pandemic and no tourists coming in, and no restaurants needing fish for tourists, it got even worse. When the government closed the restaurants to prevent the spread of the virus, I practically couldn’t sell any fish at all.

Suzanne: And you could not sell any fish because there was no market for the fish anymore?

Joseph: No, there is still a market of course; the Maltese people still needed fish for food. While the restaurants were still open, they still needed fish even though the tourists were not coming for their Maltese customers.

It was a smaller market of course. During the summers here in Malta we have a million tourists, so the demand goes up. Even in the winters we still need to eat ourselves, but the sale of “black fish” almost starved my family during COVID.

Listen, to tell the truth, the sale of “black fish” is always a very big problem for us small scale legitimate fishermen but when tourists are here, we can make it. However, when the borders are closed and the restaurants are closed and everyone is buying “black fish,” how can I survive?

Suzanne: Can you tell me what you mean by “black-fish” and how its sale affects you?

Joseph: “Black fish” is the illegal selling of fish caught by unlicensed and unregulated fishermen in Malta. Basically, anyone can go out and catch fish in Malta, no license required, but you need to be a licensed and registered fisherman to be able to legally sell your fish.

As a legitimate fisher I have to pay for my license and registration, I have to keep my boat a particular way, and if I hire an apprentice, I have to pay wages the government has approved. All of this costs money. I have to claim the money I earn and I pay taxes. I also have a maximum number of fish I can catch and I have to declare my fish sales to be able to keep my commercial license. Meanwhile, these guys just jump in their boats with friends or their sons, they catch whatever they want, whatever they can, and they go and sell it for cash, and of course their prices are cheaper than mine because they had to pay nothing to catch them.

With all the police corruption, nobody even cares. They just get to keep doing it, meanwhile they destroy the sea and the legitimate market for fish on the islands.

With all the police corruption, nobody even cares. They just get to keep doing it, meanwhile they destroy the sea and the legitimate market for fish on the islands.

Suzanne: So, you were unable to sell your fish because tourists stopped coming into the islands and locals turned to the sale of “black fish”?

Joseph: Exactly, and I am pissed off about it. The fish market acts as the middleman for us. We take our fish there and sell directly to restaurants or suppliers, so they come to us basically. But when it closed due to COVID precautions, we had to start going directly to the restaurants. So, I’d go into a restaurant and I’d say I have this type of fish and this many kilos, and they’d tell me, “No. I just bought the same fish, for €1 − €2/ per kilo less.” Of course, when you don’t have to pay licenses or anything to catch fish, you’re able to undercut legitimate fishers and sell for cheaper.

Even to sell directly to locals, during COVID half of Malta stopped working and the government gave out vouchers for around €800 a month, so people couldn’t afford to buy fish that was caught properly and according to the law; they had to go for the lowest prices they could find. That’s not their fault; we all need to survive, but I need to survive too. I can’t lower my prices because soon I won’t be making any money doing this anymore.

Sicilian, Libyan, and Tunisian fishermen come and they catch more fish than what we are ever allowed to, and in contested waters. They can take it back and sell it and feed their families. Local “black fishermen” are the same; they overfish and don’t pay taxes. But what about me? What about us? We do everything right according to the books and the laws so why would my family have nothing to eat if we didn’t have fish?

Suzanne: How could this situation have been improved for you and other small-scale fishermen during the pandemic?

Joseph: During the pandemic we needed help from the government, that’s it. As self-employed workers, we got nothing. The government gave all unemployed employees a benefit of €800 per month and vouchers, and they gave a monthly grant to mothers who had to stay home to take care of their children and disabled people, but there was nothing for us self-employed. All of us fishermen who don’t work for the international “Big Fish” companies were in the same situation. Even the people who work in the markets (local artisan markets) spend loads of money per year on permits and licenses and then in the face of a pandemic, they closed everything and they left us to fend for ourselves.

But more than just some basic pandemic benefits, we need two things. The Maltese government has to stop turning a blind eye to illegal fishers who are undercutting Maltese people who are involved in our traditional Maltese ways of living, and who are trying to do it with respect to the laws. From the local police all the way to the very top, the Prime Minister and the President all know about how the sale of “black fish” is affecting our lives and our livelihood but will do nothing to stop it. The corruption in Malta is so intense that you cannot make a traditional living and be an honest man anymore.

The second thing we need is for our government to stop kissing the EU’s ass and take back control of the islands that should have never belonged to Europe in the first place. In 1800 the British came and colonized us, and now it’s 2021 and we are begging these same European powers to send us their tourists and their corporations, to destroy our lands and our seas for their own profit!

In 1800 the British came and colonized us, and now it’s 2021 and we are begging these same European powers to send us their tourists and their corporations, to destroy our lands and our seas for their own profit!

It was our government that bowed down and allowed these commercial, sea-sweeping trawlers to clean out our sea. It was our government that sold our tuna ranching rights to just five companies, all foreign-owned. It’s corrupt and I don’t know how our way of life will survive it this continues.

Suzanne: I understand that the pandemic has caused you a lot of financial harm on top of all of these practices and policies. Can I ask, how do you feel about being, or staying, a fisherman now?

Joseph: It doesn’t matter how I feel. I have no choices now. It’s too late for me. I wanted to honour my country and my traditions by continuing to work in a way my father and forefathers did, in a way that I thought would honour the land and the sea, but the pandemic showed me that I will be left behind by change, that my country will not protect me. I could barley afford to keep food in the mouths of my wife and children, but everyone who works in the offices, on the computers, on the internet kept their jobs. I used to wish that one of my sons would take over my boat, but now I tell them to stick to school. This is no way to live anymore.

[T]he pandemic showed me that I will be left behind by change, that my country will not protect me.

Suzanne: Is there anything else that you would like to share?

Joseph: All I want to say is all around the world people lost their lives and they lost their livelihoods, but in some places, people are more unfairly impacted than in others. Everything that was unfair before, and has always been unfair, is worse now. The poor get poorer, the sick get sicker, the rich get richer.

The post Living Traditionally During a Pandemic that Has Exacerbated Colonialism and Injustice appeared first on Global Labour Research Centre.