Lately, there has been a lot of moaning about the so-called Harper Agenda from the Canadian Labour Congress. Last weekend, the CLC held a political action conference to discuss their concerns about the present political climate on organized labour.

Some of these concerns are legitimate, including the erosion of workers’ rights. However, CLC President Ken Georgetti’s approach of partisan political action and protests is not going to get us anywhere. He is essentially calling for more of the same, which is only going to strengthen his opponents. As the old saying goes, “You can’t expect a different results if you keep doing the same thing.”

“The union wants to hold a Zumba class in this facility?” cried the administrator. “What does Zumba have to do with labour relations?”

The above scenario is currently playing out in CLAC healthcare facilities across Ontario. The question is a good one: what does Zumba—the dance fitness program that has taken the world by storm—have to do with the work of the union?

“R-E-S-P-E-C-T, find out what it means to me.” Otis Redding’s famous song brings out a significant truth about life, including our work life. Lack of respect is one of the main reasons that workers join a union—even more so than wages.

What does a frustrated and angry employee cost in terms of lost productivity, poor service, or indifference to patient care? What bright ideas lie buried because nobody bothered to even ask?

I find that the best part of being a union representative is that I can tell truth to power without fear of being fired by the employer.

Bloated, bureaucratic, broke—all words that are used to describe Ontario’s workers’ compensation board (WSIB). A number of voices are calling for a private insurance option for employers who are rightly concerned about ever rising premiums and the growing unfunded liability of WSIB. They feel the system is broken and that competition is the only solution.

I agree that WSIB is bureaucratic and in desperate need of reform. One only has to be involved in worker appeals and the unending delays to see that.

But is private insurance the answer? Here are five reasons why private insurance is not the way to go.

I am often frustrated by economic arguments on both sides of the political spectrum.

The right argues that we need to create jobs at any cost and that job creation alone will lift the poor out of poverty in a trickledown fashion. All we have to do is destroy unions and leave employers to create jobs and all will be well.

The problem is that the jobs being created are low-skilled and low-paid McJobs that cannot sustain a family and that will not lead to a prosperous society for all Canadians.

We can look to the US for results of the right’s arguments. There, we see incomes falling and a growing gap between rich and working poor.

The left argues that we need more support programs to help the poor live a sustainable life.

But pouring more money into social programs that keep folks where they are, year after year, only increases the debts of the province, and doesn’t help the poor move into a higher income bracket.