December 2008-January 2009

Features

• 12

  WORKING HISTORY: MAKING THE LINKS

  By Ken Clavette

  If workers don’t understand the history of where and how they gained their rights, it makes it easier to take those rights way.

• 14

  WASHDAY

  By Irene Howard

  An excerpt from Gold Dust on His Shirt, the true story of an immigrant mining family.

• 17

  CREDIT CRUNCH

  It would be folly to take the Herbert Hoover route of slashing spending. The Canadian Labour Congress’ response to the economic crisis.

• 20

  COVER STORY: THE POWER TO CHANGE THINGS

  By Elaine Bernard

  No one sector can remain an island of good wages and working conditions in a sea of declining standards. Labour rights are human rights. And that’s why we need to get organizing.

• 26

  GOOD JOBS FOR ALL

  By Sean Cain

  More than 1,000 labour and community activists packed into the Toronto Metro Convention Centre in November 2008 to discuss how to get good jobs for all, and what that means.

Departments

• 5

  LETTERS

  Our Times in Class * Keeping History Alive * Labour History and Language * Diverse Labour History * Rideau Canal Workers

• 8

  NOTES

  LabourStart Photo Contest * Labour Rights are Human Rights * Boycott Petro-Canada

• 9

  OUR TIMES TALLY

  By Sean Cain

  Tonnes of Canadian CO2 emissions that could be reduced each year by maintaining proper car tire pressure: 1,500,000

• 11

  WEBWORK: UNION WEBSITE COMMENTS POLICY

  By Derek Blackadder

  One of the advantages the labour movement has as a latecomer to the Internet game is that a lot of the problems we’re worried about have already been solved.

• 16

  POETRY

  By George Amabile
• 30

  WORKING FOR A LIVING: TRUCK DRIVING

  By Daniel Johnson As told to Shelley Tomlinson

  The temperature had warmed up and then dropped down again, so the road was a sheet of ice..

• 34

  REVIEWS: SOLIDARITY DIVIDED

  Review by Robin Breon

  Solidarity Divided is an articulate, insightful and critical book about the U.S. labour movement.

• 37

  LABOUR AND THE CHALLENGES OF GLOBALIZATION

  LABOUR AND THE CHALLENGES OF GLOBALIZATION

  To have effective transnational solidarity, union movements need to work on improving conditions at home. A review of Labour and the Challenges of Globalization.

• 40

  COMMENTARY: THE BERKELEY SOLUTION

  By Randy Robinson

  Now would be a good time to solve both the environmental crisis and the jobs crisis by investing in green jobs. But there’s another piece to it.