NDP: stay true to the founding principles of the Regina Manifesto of 1933

Our movement was founded on the idea that, to quote the Regina Manifesto of 1933, “both the old parties in Canada are the instruments of capitalist interests and cannot serve as agents of social reconstruction” and that the “time has come for a far-reaching reconstruction of our economic and political institutions.”

Now, with rising inequality and unemployment in this country and across the Western world, Canada needs a party that will stand on socialist principles to offer a true alternative to the status quo of free-market capitalism. (from "The NDP should stay true to its socialist roots" by Arash Azizi. Toronto Star, April 10, 2013, below)
Pragmatic politics, and the spectre of achieving the ultimate in political aspirations, forming a national government versus hanging onto the founding principles, now seen as virtually pure idealism...this is the way the question is posed in many quarters.
Tommy Douglas was a firebrand socialist, the founding 'father' of the National Health System.
David Lewis, also trumpeted the socialist principles, in his frequently articulated, "corporate welfare bums" as he attempted to turn the gaze of self-satisfied Canadians to the idea of removing the perks from the coporations as found throughout the tax system.
Ed Broadbent, too, carried the socialist banned, with his fervent appeal to eliminate poverty, and even succeeded in getting the House of Commons to pass a unanimous vote to do so, back in 1979....although nothing has been done to implement that bill in the intervening thirty-four years.
People like Douglas Fisher, the MP from Thunder Bay, is remembered for his formidable presence on behalf of the underbelly of society, giving voice to the voiceless, among the political elite.
Ed Shreyer, Roy Romanov, Allen Blakeney, Dave Barrett four of the most articulate and committed servants of their respective provinces, as former premiers, held the banner of government balancing the appetite for excessive profit with balanced budgets, and for many years, gave the NDP a reputation that still stands as a foundation for its future, as a potential national government.
This is not the time to water down, for the sake of appearing "less threatening" to the middle-of-the-road Canadians, the party's commitment to social justice and social democracy and to the potential of reaching into the quivver of the many unused arrows that socialism offers, to curb the insatiable greed and appetite for profit that is gutting social programs, eviscerating the labour movement, and turning a blind eye to the threat of global warming and climate change.
We all know that Mr Trudeau Junior, will be knocking on the doors of the same corporations who write cheques for Mr. Harper, (just to balance their risk, should one or the other become Prime Minister) and we also know that whatever policies that do eventually emerge from the Liberal camp, following the coronation of Lord Justin, those policies will be "harper-lite" and insufficient to "right" the ship of state that has tilted almost to the point of capsizing, on a windy ocean of corporatism, globalism, and individual pursuit of profit as the holy grail of both politics and culture.
We can separate the need to re-brand Mr. Mulcair as a more user-friendly leader, with some warm-fuzzy encounters, to which he is clearly unsuited,from the need to rebrand the party, given the current political and social and even intellectual culture, marked as the latter is by "star" phemons in politics, regardless of whether they have substantive, creative and even courageous policy proposals or  not.
The NDP has never had to apologize for having sound and energetic policy proposals, and governments
wearing their monogram have consistently provided sound social policies with usually balanced budgets. A national NDP government can be expected to provide nothing less.
And pouring some tepid "tea" into the party's plqtform pot will only serve to lower expectations of both party affiliates and prospective voters, of whom there are millions waiting to be challenged.
Saying no to "watering the wine" of party history, tradition and political courage and vision is at this time the only and best way to honour the founding leaders and principles that have made the party what and who it is today....abandoning those leaders, principles and idealism when it is most needed would be a national as well as a party travesty.
We will be sending our support to the people on Mr. Azizi's side of the convention floor, enthusiastically, and unreservedly.

NDP agonizes again over what it stands for: Walkom


Does the NDP still believe in putting people ahead of profits? Or does it believe in winning power? Stay tuned.

By Thomas Walkom, Toronto Star, April 5, 2013 In Montreal, (this weekend) New Democrats will be wrestling with the thorny question of what they stand for.

Specifically, they will be debating — again — the preamble to their party’s constitution.
Two years ago, the NDP was at daggers drawn over whether to call itself social democratic or democratically socialist (the latest suggestion is to use both terms).
But now battle lines are being drawn over another clause in this strangely controversial preamble.
Should New Democrats devote themselves to creating a society in which “the production and distribution of goods and services shall be directed to meeting the social and individual needs of people . . . and not to the making of profit,” as the party’s current constitution states?
Or, as a party committee has suggested, should New Democrats content themselves with fighting for “a rules based economy . . . in which governments have the power to address the limitations of the market?”
To outsiders, such a debate might seem bizarrely irrelevant. In practice, the NDP is hardly a party of fire-breathing socialists. Even Prime Minister Stephen Harper tacitly acknowledged that when he picked Manitoba’s former NDP premier, Gary Doer, as Canada’s ambassador to free-enterprise America.
Outsiders might ask: Why don’t New Democrats face reality and admit that their once anti-capitalist party has made its peace with the bosses?
In one form or another, these are the arguments that those around NDP Leader Tom Mulcair are expected to make in Montreal.
In effect, they will be saying to delegates at the party’s convention: Face facts; we are not radicals; at best we are incremental reformers; let’s admit it and get on with the job of winning government.
It is a powerful argument.
The other side is harder to explain. New Democrats are a funny breed. Many were attracted to the party not because they necessarily expected to win power but because they believed in the idea of a democratic alternative to liberal capitalism.
My guess is that many of these New Democrats — at heart — still believe that an economic system based on private greed is fundamentally corrupt and that somehow, through hard work, a better one can be created.
Tommy Douglas, the party’s iconic former leader, referred to this as working toward a New Jerusalem. And within the NDP, the idea retains great potency.
Indeed, the most successful NDP politicians have been realistic idealists, people like Douglas and former Saskatchewan premier Allen Blakeney who, while eminently practical, never forgot the ultimate goal.
But for the federal party, idealism has often proved a weakness.
In spite of the solid record of their provincial cousins, federal New Democrats still face the charge that they are woolly-headed gadabouts.
In choosing Mulcair as leader, the party solved part of that problem. Mulcair’s very body language screams solidity. When he pronounces on issues, he does so with some subtlety.
Yes he would oppose the proposed pipeline from Alberta’s oilsands to the British Columbia coast. But he does not oppose all pipelines. Nor does he oppose development of the tarsands (although he argues it could be done more rationally).
Free trade with Europe? Mulcair says he’s open to the idea. All depends on the details.
Thanks to his performance, many Canadians would be hard-pressed to say whether Mulcair is Liberal or New Democrat. This is another way of saying that the NDP has the leader it needs to get a shot at winning.
Now the leader wants a party that can deliver him victory. That party, it seems, is not the NDP as it is currently constituted. We shall see how the rank and file react to being re-engineered.

And then there is this:

The NDP should stay true to its socialist roots


Removing any reference to socialism from the NDP's constitution would be wrong both tactically and in principle.By Arash Azizi, Toronto Star, April 10, 2013
Arash Azizi is an elected delegate from Toronto-Centre to the upcoming NDP convention in Montreal (April 12-14). He is among dozens of NDP members organizing against the proposed changes to the party constitution.
On Wednesday, April 3, delegates to the upcoming convention of the New Democratic Party received a message from our president, Rebecca Blaikie, about yet another suggested replacement of the preamble to our constitution.

That the party brass is taking another shot at changing the constitution comes as no surprise to any New Democrat. This is, at least, the third consecutive convention where we’ve seen similar attempts from the top. At the 2009 Halifax convention, there was suggestion that the “New” in the NDP’s name might be dropped so that we’d become the “Democratic Party.” Together with the presence of many Obama strategists at that convention, it suggested a rightward shift that would turn the NDP into a party of the centre like the American Democrats. The opposition to any such move was so great that it was not even proposed.
Then there was the 2011 convention in Vancouver. A few months after the massive Orange Wave, the party brass imagined a “love-in,” where all resolutions coming from the top would be voted in without much debate. This included a now-infamous motion to change the preamble to the party constitution so that it would no longer include the word “socialism.” I’m not exaggerating when I say this caused a revolt from the floor. Hundreds of delegates were angry at this move and the line-up at the “no” microphone was so long that it reached the doors of the hall. It included such recognized party leaders as Members of Parliament Libby Davies and Niki Ashton. Then-president Brian Topp intervened with a compromise suggestion not to vote on the motion and to defer the issue until the next convention.
Now, with less than a week before the convention, we are faced with another “new” preamble. Except there is nothing new about it. It is another attempt at erasing the democratic socialist foundations of the NDP that are enshrined in the party’s constitution.
The existing preamble couldn’t be clearer. It says that “social, economic, and political progress of Canada can be assured only by the application of democratic socialist principles to government and the administration of public affairs.” It then goes on to define these principles with three simple rules: production should be organized for need not profit, there should be economic and social planning and “toward these ends and where necessary the extension of the principle of social ownership.”
The newly proposed preamble is more than twice as long, but says much less. Trying to prevent another floor rebellion a la Vancouver, it offers lip service to the party’s traditions, mentioning the NDP’s association with “social democrat and democratic socialist parties.” When it comes to detailing actual policies, it says the party believes in a “rules based economy” where “governments have the power to address the limitations of the market” but, unlike the previous preamble, doesn’t specify in what fashion and to what goal. Gone are all the references to the principle of social ownership of resources. It thus accepts the primacy of the market precisely at a time when the capitalist system is facing a global crisis. Most shockingly, it erases the commitment to the “abolition of poverty.”
It’s no surprise that the ascent of the NDP to Official Opposition has prompted some soul-searching. This is an exciting moment for all New Democrats; the possibility of a NDP government seems very real for the first time in generations. But this opportunity also raises crucial questions. Will a NDP federal government fight for the cause for which the party was founded? If the voters finally try the “Orange Door,” will it offer them a substantially different government?
The newly proposed preamble doesn’t have a single sentence that differentiates the NDP from the Liberal Party. Far from making the NDP “electable,” it poses a severe threat to the party’s electoral aspirations. It makes us redundant. If people want to vote for the Liberals, they might as well go for the real thing. Furthermore, the political consequences of an NDP government that abandons its principles would be grave. Just look at Bob Rae’s NDP government in Ontario in the 1990s. Rae went on to become a Liberal but in the process destroyed the Ontario NDP’s chances for a generation. The NDP’s only chance for electoral success is to offer a real alternative to the status quo.

The NDP is rooted in the movement of farmers, labourers and socialists who built its predecessor, the CCF, in 1933. A lot has changed since them but these times do bear a striking similarity to the moment of the CCF’s founding.
The 1930s, too, had a global economic crisis that wreaked high unemployment and opened the door to austerity agendas everywhere. Our movement was founded on the idea that, to quote the Regina Manifesto of 1933, “both the old parties in Canada are the instruments of capitalist interests and cannot serve as agents of social reconstruction” and that the “time has come for a far-reaching reconstruction of our economic and political institutions.”
Now, with rising inequality and unemployment in this country and across the Western world, Canada needs a party that will stand on socialist principles to offer a true alternative to the status quo of free-market capitalism.

Where are the George Bernard Shaw voices in the current chasm between have's and have-not's?

College students over the last few years have made the phrase, "hook-up," part of our vernacular.
Two students of opposite gender( perhaps even of same gender?) spend the night together, without any thought or promise of an extended relationship.
Sexual experimentation, affiliation, thrills...call this "arrangement" what you will.
There is a different kind of hook-up that is becoming far more insidious, even to those who decry the sexual mores of the young adult crowd, armed as they are with all the protection they could ever want or need.
The second form of hook-up could, by some, by considered real, albeit political, incest, between the political class and the corporate class...or can we even separate these two any more, at least in North America.
Money and power, power and money, the two aphrodisiacs, the siamese twins, the two-headed monster of contemporary culture...Never mind how these seductresses are measured, branded, pursued, achieved, or even written about...they are still strutting their stylish and evocative magnetism on every prominent street in every prominent city in every country in the world...and they are also strutting their "stuff" on movies, magazines, advertisements, television shows and in every athletic arena, stadium, and all military bases.
They can be recognized by initials on their shirts, or diamond cuff links, or alligator shoes, or gowns by the most revered designer in the most coveted salons, especially if those gowns are worn by the rich and the famous.
They can also be recognized by the insignia on the front of their car hoods, or the executive jets parked in the private air clubs, or the yachts moored in the best "yacht clubs" wherever the sun shines brightest and longest, both by day and by season.
Box seats, in theatres, sports arenas, operas, and the top restaurants are reserved for their "preferred clients" whose presence will inevitably spark both rumour and adulation from both the staff and the adoring public, eager for a picture with the famous "name" or even just to be able to tweet that they were in the same "place" as X!
Their houses, and most have multiple, are among the gated communities in "chic" cities, or regions, and their money literally flies, electronically from one corner of the globe to another, in nano-seconds, should their "financial advisor" recommend some project, stock, mine, or innovation for their privileged participation.
And of course, this cadre of moguls, some of them created, as in Russia, by their mere "patronage" under the political regime, or perhaps through their foresight in having invested wisely in one or more niches in the emerging global markets, and then attracted both neophytes and sycophants to their burgeoning empires.
Their branding includes the names of reputable graduate schools, stints, whether an interns or an employees in the "best branded" corporations, including legal firms, financial services firms, investment banks, and even in private health care and private educational ventures, not to mention the digital tsunami that has swept over the planet in the last two or three decades.
And of course, hangers on from the political arena, always eager to be seen courting their fiscal and financial masters, whose names and companies comprise the list of donors to the "right" political campaigns, depending on the perception of "good breeding" of the political candidate,  being a member of the establishment in the town or village of their birth, or a member of the most treasured and honoured graduates of the best and most revered universities, form their instant 'chattering' class of platinum actors, in the drawing rooms of the most pursued hosts, or in the ballroom of the most frequented hotels, or ships.
And so, the money from one or two generations back is transferred, along with the many inseparable and intrinsic perks that come with the name, the membership in the right clubs and the right boards of directors or the most revered of universities, corporations, libraries, museums, orchestras, and foundations, of which there are a plethora in both Canada and the U.S.
Breeding of these "thoroughbred" human beings comprises proper manners at table, proper manners in social company including the de riguere "afternoon teas" and croquettes and film festivals, as well as school grades and honourable mentions in academic and cultural pursuits as both participant and as organizer. Breeding can, and often does, also include a stint in the appropriate religious organization, in such roles as altar boy or girl, choir member,  camp counsellor, and traveller as part of both school opportunities and family offerings.
Usually at least mastery of one additional language, and a stint living among people indigenous to that language is expected, as well as some honorary and possibly hands-on philanthropic endeavors.
The people who dwell in this "class" (let's not be afraid to call a spade a shovel) and their offspring expect to be achievers, to be steeped and seasoned in the best traditions of both the family and the economic sector to which one's family is attached.
And, of course, there are also millions of others swimming like sharks in the moats of the dwellings and offices and clubs of these "established" plutocracy members, concentrating their every thought and move on the right of passage into these hallowed halls. Secondary, and tertiary wannabee's are everywhere and always, and can be spotted wherever there might be an unexpected appearance of the "real thing"....in hopes of catching a glimpse of the mystical dust with which the anointed are sprinkled.
The children of the establishment frequent the private schools in North America, as they would the "public schools" in Great Britain. And then, through legitimate grades and/or the extra influence of their family's tradition and support of the best schools from which their grandparents also graduated, they also graduate from university and possibly even graduate school.
They know little to nothing about the people who live "on the other side of the tracks" in the ghetto, and what is worse, they really do not care to learn.
And their resistance, as a class, to actually experiencing the plight of the poor, the disadvantaged, the hungry and the often ill children of the same age, and school grade, and harbouring similar hopes and dreams for their own futures as these "privileged" children is palpable, just as is their parents' patronizing participation in "causes" that might bring "reading or literacy" or special music classes to the ghetto.
No matter how much governments attempt to bridge the gap between those families who live a privileged life and those living in basement apartments without enough food, the gap is so wide and so enduring, and what is worse, so GROWING, as we all sit and watch, and we sit and wait for what? .....
For the inevitable breakdown of a society whose rich have so much more than they need, and whose poor have so much less than their dignity deserves.
One does not have to be a Fabian, like George Bernard Shaw, also the co-founder of the London School of Economics to recognize the increasing exploitation and demeaning of the poor among us, through blocked access to the best education, through blocked access to the best jobs, through blocked access to the best apprenticeships and athletic camps, through blocked access even to appropriate health care including proper nutrition and clean water and a comfortable bed to sleep on, and a lighted desk on which to read and write and complete homework assignments.
One does not have to be a socialist, or a communist, or a radical political activist to want to shout from the hilltops, and the skyscrapers, from the televisions and the radios, from the blogs and the print media that the "hook-up between the have's and the state"  or the political incest among the elites in our societies, to the obvious, documented and growing disintegration of the least advantaged, and potentially most resourceful and most generous....how long will it take before the have-not's will join their hands, march into our government buildings and offices and demand what is their birthright in a wealthy society?
And when that happens, who among us will cry foul the loudest?  Of course, those whose privileges have lured them into a false echo chamber of their own narcissistic voices, wardrobes, dining rooms, ballrooms and boardrooms, walled off from the rest of us and willingly preserving their fiefdoms as long as their pride holds them to it. And then, perhaps, for it is no certainty, ordinary people will once again be able to offer their names for public office, because access will not be blocked by the pretentious millions "needed" to wage a decent campaign, and ordinary people will, once again, recover the voice and the power and the opportunities that were denied them by the willful exclusion of the political-corporate elites of the last century....and then, perhaps, human beings, even the least among us, will regain their appropriate voice of leaven in the national and international breads of our great-grandchildren....for it will take at least that long!

Ottawa has both feet mired in this dilemma: exploiting immigrant workers and undermining Canadian workers

Exploiting immigrant workers, by permitting employers (specifically 4000 of them) to hire at below minimum wage demonstrates where the government's head is at.
It is in the corporate board rooms, being lobbied by those corporations who seek to hire as many as possible at the lowest wages possible, in order to generate more and more corporate profit, motivated by their legendary corporate greed. And the government has their back, as they saying goes.
Only trouble is, this kind of overhaul of Canada's immigration system generates worker resentment, when  the Temporary Worker Permits expire (where do they go once they have no longer permission to work in Canada?) and removes those jobs from Canadian workers who must be paid a minimum wage under the law.
This dynamic has existed for many years in the argruculture sector in the U.S. especially at harvest time when immigrant workers would harvest vegetable crops for 'slave' wages, given the refusal of American workers to do those jobs at those wages. There are now some 11 million immigrants living in the United States, many of them undocumented, and living in the shadows, not knowing if or when they might be deported. And the Congress is wrestling with Immigration Reform, an issue hingeing on whether those 11 million will have a path to citizenship when the bill is passed.
Canada's neo-con government has fallen into the corporate-greed-profit trap in supporting Canadian employers who wish to cut costs (one of the holy grail mantras of the current business-government enmeshment) and now, as the information becomes public, there is a rising tide of anger, resentment and bitterness in both the immigrant communities and among Canadian workers who cannot find work....and the situation is also racially coloured...enhancing racism from Canadian workers against immigrants whose innocence of the situation has propelled them into a situation of short-term work, and long-term hostility.
And the agency making all thiss possible is none other than the Harper government, so umbillically tied to their corporate masters that the Canadian public "be damned", so long as their political masters are happy.

Ottawa exploiting immigrants to undermine Canadian workforce: Siddiqui


Canada is on the same disastrous course as the U.S., which has millions of illegal immigrants who are exploited and resented at the same time By Haroon Siddiqui, Toronto Star, April 11, 2013 Jason Kenney (Canadian Minister of Citizenship and Immigration)  is a clever politician juggling contradictory goals.

He floods the country with 250,000 immigrants a year, even though most cannot find jobs commensurate with the education and skills they were selected for. Tens of thousands of Canadian-educated graduates cannot find jobs either. His is an exploitative model that suits only the corporate sector — driving wages and worker demands down, profits up.
This arrangement is augmented with his even more blatantly exploitative temporary workers program. Employers get foreigners at a legislated lower wage than Canadians. The scandalous RBC case is one twist in a complicated labour scam.
Kenney does not know how many temporary workers leave at the end of their visas and how many disappear into the underground economy, thereby exposing themselves to further exploitation and also lowering wages for others. Canada is on the same disastrous course as the U.S., which has millions of illegal immigrants, who are exploited and resented at the same time.
He has upended our traditional immigration system, wherein newcomers were seen as future citizens (not just fodder for corporate greed or a force to undermine the ostensibly spoiled homegrown workforce).
Immigrants were entitled to family reunification and citizenship, the latter after three years if they stayed on the right side of the law. Now they struggle for ages to get their families united and become citizens. This is a matter of policy or bureaucratic incompetence. Either way, it is not good for them and not good for Canada.
Kenney courts selected ethnic communities, turning up for their festivals and dinners, and gaining just enough votes to win targeted ridings for the Tories.
At the other end of the electoral spectrum, he manages anti-immigrant backlash, especially in his conservative constituency, by harping about how he’s “fixing the broken immigration system”; keeping out bogus refugees, such as the Roma; and standing on guard against “barbaric cultural practices” being imported into the country.
This last bogus claim is repeated in a new federal guide for immigrants.
Designed to help newcomers navigate their way here, the 146-page guide also serves as a tool of Kenney’s political and cultural warfare.
It promotes the values his government has systematically rebranded Canada with — the monarchy, the Armed Forces, the War of 1812, the two world wars, the military mission in Afghanistan, etc. It ignores or downplays that which he thinks carries a liberal and Liberal imprimatur, such as our historic peacekeeping and the Charter of Rights and Freedoms.
The guide warns immigrants not to import such horrors as female genital mutilation, polygamy, honour killings, forced marriage, spousal abuse, etc.
Such references stigmatize certain cultures, says the NDP’s Jinny Sims, opposition immigration critic. She’s being politically correct. We should not hesitate to denounce awful practices.
The really offensive part is the guide’s working hypothesis and message: that immigrants are prone to such behaviour; that they are flooding Canada with such practices; and that Kenney and Co. is civilizing the barbarians arriving at our gates.
But there’s no proof that such practices are proliferating here.

•Genital mutilation: In the 1990s, there were whispers of this practice in the Ethiopian and Somali communities. The government of the day amended the Criminal Code to make that a crime, to remove any doubt.

•Honour killings: There have been a dozen in the last decade, according to one study. While one is too many, the context is that there were 598 homicides in 2011, the last year for which statistics are available, and in most cases the victim knew the killer.

•Polygamy: We know of no convictions among immigrants. However, we do know of the practice being prevalent for decades among the followers of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints in British Columbia.

•Forced marriages: One hears of these occasionally, but usually with a he said/she said complication.

•Spousal abuse: We do hear of this. But there’s no study showing it is more prevalent among immigrants. The studies consistently show that the practice cuts across income, ethnicity, religion, geography, etc.

Kenney justifies hectoring new immigrants on these subjects in the name of familiarizing them with the laws of their new land.
That doesn’t wash. Immigrants, like anyone else, must obey all the laws of Canada, not just those he chooses to highlight.
It would have been more useful to include a reminder of the laws that the newcomers are more likely to run afoul of, such as making rolling stops at stop signs and running red lights — routine infractions in China, India, the Philippines and other places where we are drawing most of our immigrants from.
He is posing as our spear-carrier against practices that fuel anti-immigrant discourse, especially in his right-wing constituency.
Or he is using inflammatory rhetoric to deflect public attention from ruthlessly exploiting immigrant and non-immigrant workers — and that during a prolonged period of high unemployment.

And this:
Rise in foreign temp workers questioned by labour groups


Labour economist says program allows firms to keep wages low

By Amanda Pfeffer, CBC News, April 10, 2013 The Alberta Federation of Labour called for an inquiry Tuesday after it obtained a government list of more than 4,000 companies given approval to hire temporary foreign workers last year, many in the service industry.

"You look down this list and what you see is McDonald's, Tim Hortons, and Subway. This list goes on. It stretches the bounds of credibility that all of these employers have been using temporary foreign workers to hire skilled workers," said Gil McGowan, president of the Alberta Federation of Labour, on CBC News Network's Power & Politics.
McGowan's comments come after a CBC story this week of one man's experience training foreign workers to take his job drew a fire storm of controversy and a hard look at Canada's temporary foreign workers program.
David Moreau told the CBC he and 42 other IT workers at RBC are being replaced by a foreign workforce.
"The new people are in our offices and we are training them to do our jobs," he said. "That adds insult to injury."
The head of RBC denied the bank is replacing Canadian workers with temporary foreign workers. Foreign workers were hired by iGate, an outsourcing firm, which has a contract with the bank to provide IT services.
Kelly Leitch, parliamentary secretary for the minister of human resources and skills development, said the government is looking into it.
"We have some significant concerns about what's going on in the temporary foreign workers program and that's why in (the budget) we’ve committed to fix the challenges that exist so Canadians can be better connected to jobs."
Labour economist Erin Weir says that kind of review is essential: "This should lead to a broader debate about the temporary foreign worker program. Is it really addressing labour shortages? Or is it undermining job opportunities and wages in Canada?"
Program has ballooned
The program began in 1973 to fill a gap in the labour market for jobs Canadians could not or would not fill — domestic workers and agricultural workers as well as highly skilled jobs, such as specialist physicians and professors.
"The idea of having a temporary foreign worker program is legitimate," according to Prof. Ian Lee at Carleton University's Sprott School of Business. "The Germans, other European countries and the U.S. all have this kind of program. The issue is to have the right checks and balances to ensure it isn't abused."
Gil McGowan, president of the Alberta Federation of Labour, says a government list showing thousands of jobs going to Temporary Foreign Workers stretches the credibility of the program. (CBC)But critics suggest those checks and balances have been undermined by recent changes to the program. The high-skill segment made up more than 50 per cent of temporary foreign workers, but all that changed in 2002. That's when the federal government under the Liberals began a pilot project adding a new category of "low skilled workers."
According to a recent report by the faculty of business at Athabasca University in Edmonton, the "low skilled category now dominates the temporary foreign workforce, with the top categories now including food counter attendants, kitchen helpers, cooks; construction trades, helpers and labourers, light-duty cleaners and administration workers including information technology."
In 2006, the new Conservative government expanded the pilot project, and added "fast-tracking" for some jobs in Alberta and British Columbia. The new list of jobs called "regional occupations under pressure," reduced the obligation by employers to seek out Canadian workers first.
The government document obtained by the Alberta Federation of Labour suggests employers such as fast food operators like McDonald's and Tim Hortons are using this accelerated program to bring in cheap labour.
The program is aimed at higher-skilled workers, but they don't have to prove they've advertised for Canadians to fill the jobs first, said Gil McGowan.
"They don't have to run over the same checks and balances and that's why we're concerned, because clearly this process is being abused by service sector employers. And it's important to note that the government wants to expand the accelerated program, which we think would be a disaster."
Cities taking more temporary foreign workers
While most think the program is meant to fill jobs in remote parts of resource-rich Western Canada, some of the largest increase in temporary foreign workers have been in cities.
Since 2008, permits for temporary foreign workers in Toronto increased by 60 per cent, in Montreal by 87 per cent and the Atlantic Provinces saw an 80 per cent increase, according to data from Citizenship and Immigration Canada.
The total number of temporary foreign workers has doubled in the last decade, to 338,189 workers.
"We now have about as many temporary workers in Canada as the entire workforce of New Brunswick," said Weir, an economist with the United Steel Workers Union.
"I think part of the problem is that a lot of companies are going through the motions of pretending to hire Canadians, in order to gain those Labour Market Opinions that they need to get temporary foreign workers."
Weir suggests the foreign worker program often allows employers to fill vacancies without providing training opportunities or raising wages to attract workers.
He points to recent studies showing Canadian companies underperform compared to businesses in other OECD countries, including the U.S., when it comes to training and development of its own workforce.
All Canadians could pay for the expansion of this category of worker, according to Weir: "Expanding labour supply, without an offsetting expansion of demand, increases unemployment and decreases wages."
Allowing cheaper wages
Another change to the program last year allows employers to pay workers 15 per cent less than Canadian workers. Carleton's Ian Lee says allowing lower wages could undermine Canadians' support for the program.
"The problem is it creates the perception that it's being used to undermine organized labour or undermine the market wage rate in that job classification. It’s going to discourage public support when Canadians realize an employer can do that."
"Canadian workers are being displaced, training is being ignored and the TFW program is becoming the first choice rather than a tool of last resort," said the Alberta Federation of Labour’s McGowan.
Kelly Leitch defends the program.
"When we don't have a Canadian available because there actually isn't anyone available, it's important that we have access to a good program, a sound temporary foreign worker program; that skilled labour can be brought into the country to make sure that firms can thrive."
She said the government is committed to reviewing the program, but had no details on when that review would be complete.
Perhaps the courts will get there first.
On Tuesday, HD Mining International was in a Vancouver courtroom, defending its decision to hire 201 workers from China for its coal mine in Tumbler Ridge, B.C.
Two B.C. unions launched the case against the company.
Brian Cochrane, of the International Union of Operating Engineers, hopes the case will result in changes.
"I think that this case is going to give us a chance to look under the hood of the whole temporary foreign worker program."

Greek Report: Germany owes us billions in reparations for two World Wars!

The alleged claims against Germany reach a grand total of 162-billion euros ($214-billion), including 108-billion euros ($238-billion) for rebuilding the country after the Nazi occupation from 1941 to 1944. This is 80% of Greek GDP.
The panel was chaired by Panagiotis Karakousis, head of the General Accounting Office at the Finance Ministry, and relied on 190,000 pages of documents scattered in archives. (from "Don’t mention the war (debt): Germany owes Greece 162-billion euros in war damages, explosive report claims," by Ambrose Evans-Pritchard, The Telgraph, in National Post, April 10, 2013, below)
Earlier today theacorncentreblog.com reported on a speech by George Soros in Germany in which the American tycoon predicted a recession by September, this year. The report originated with Bloomberg News, and was carried by the National Post.
Now, reports have emerged pointing to German reparations owed to Greece for both the First and Second World Wars, and their impact on Greece's attempt to rebuild.
If this reports does not "put the proverbial fox in the hen house," then nothing will.
Greece's financial status has been the subject of much turbulent negotiations and even some threats to the economy of the European Union. Greece has been significantly resistant to providing funds from her coffers to bail Greece out of her troubles.
Now, with this report's public "birthing" there will be even more intense negotiations to right the balance of Greece's debt, especially as it applies to one of Europe's more beleagured nations.
There will undoubtedly be, as the piece below points out, cries of "moral blackmail" on the part of Germany, at both the public disclosure of the document, and the "cheek" of the Greeks and their presumption.
However, the Greeks are not without an argument, whether the dollars claimed are reasonable or legitimate (only those who have studied the evidence can offer a reasonable and responsible view) and Germany will not be compelled to respond to the Greek claims.
So for the rest of the world, the past is never really buried, always has the potential to rear its head, both in international relations, and in more domestic relations. Once brutally assaulted, Greece is not about to take the terms of the financial bail-out and interest payments, mostly to private sources of bail-out funds, lying down, and silently going away, without putting up a fight.
This most recent disclosure, of the kind of behind-the-scenes scheeming that promises to enrage the Germany public and the German Bundestag, will be echoing through the corridors of power in both countries for years, possibly decades.
In the short run, the report's release could well spell the demise of either or both the Greek and the German governments.
And the whole world will be watching!


Don’t mention the war (debt): Germany owes Greece 162-billion euros in war damages, explosive report claims

By Ambrose Evans-Pritchard, The Telgraph, in National Post, April 10, 2013  
The Greek government is in disarray after the leak of an explosive report drawing up reparations claims against Germany, covering both the First and Second World Wars.

Prime Minister Antonis Samaras held a special meeting with top officials Tuesday to limit the diplomatic damage from the 80-page report.
The document – stamped “Aporito”, or secret – was drafted by a panel of experts for the Greek finance ministry and delivered last month.
The alleged claims against Germany reach a grand total of 162-billion euros ($214-billion), including 108-billion euros ($238-billion) for rebuilding the country after the Nazi occupation from 1941 to 1944. This is 80% of Greek GDP.
The panel was chaired by Panagiotis Karakousis, head of the General Accounting Office at the Finance Ministry, and relied on 190,000 pages of documents scattered in archives.
Mr Karakousis said that the report was commissioned by the current leadership.
“The purpose was to gather all the material available so that the political leaders can check the data,” he said.
The Greek foreign ministry said the report would be sent to the State Legal Service to assess and set the “claims of the Greek State”.

The report was first leaked to a Greek newspaper at the weekend in a story entitled “What Germany Owes Us”.
The panel concluded that Athens had legitimate grounds to press claims. “Greece never received any compensation, either for the loans it was forced to provide to Germany or for the damages it suffered during the war,” it said.
The newspaper said the issue has “detonated like a bomb” at a critical juncture when Greece is under intense pressure from creditors. “The government should publish all the findings and determine its position on this sensitive issue,” it said.
There has long been a vociferous lobby calling for war reparations from Germany, with the so-called “National Council” calling for as much as euros 500bn to cover stolen art work and the loss of 50pc of economic output over almost four years. Some 300,000 Greeks died under the Axis occupation, mostly from starvation.
But the new report is very different because it is an official document of the finance ministry. It is unclear, however, what Athens hopes to gain by stirring up a highly emotional issue.
The report is certain to be viewed by German officials as a form of moral blackmail as tough talks continue over each stage of Greece’s EU-IMF-ECB Troika programme. Sources in Greece say the document was prepared as a bargaining chip to be put away in a draw and used only in extremis.
The gambit raises serious questions about the true intentions of Mr Samaras, who has positioned himself as a friend of Angela Merkel, the German chancellor.
It again exposes the breakdown of trust in the eurozone after three years of depression in the south and mutual recriminations between creditors and debtors. It suggests that Greeks are not in fact reconciled to the policies being forced upon them.
The report includes a welter of different claims on Germany, including euros 54bn for the costs of forced loans from the bank of Greece to cover the wages of German troops and the Afrika Korps.
Greece has already enjoyed debt relief, though at the expense of private pension funds, insurers, and banks, rather than the German state.

Soros: German recession coming in September

“The monetary policy pursued by the eurozone is out of sync with the other major currencies,” Soros said. “The others are engaged in quantitative easing. The Bank of Japan was the last holdout, but it changed sides recently.”

The BOJ said last week it will double the monetary base by the end of 2014 through purchases of government bonds, in Japan’s biggest-ever round of asset buying. (from "Germany to be in recession by September, Soros warns" by Nicholas Comfort, Bloomberg News, In National Post, April 9, 2013, below)
Joining Paul Kruggman in opposing an approach that emphasizes austerity to the exclusion of economic growth, George Soros will inevitably add some considerable heft to the American Nobel Prize Winning Economist's political clout. Signalling an oncoming recession for Germany, and doing it on German soil, is not exactly the stuff of a shrinking violet, and George Soros is no shrinking violet.
A respected, financially secure voice from the left of the political spectrum, Soros has backed Democratic candidates in the United States, with both financial support and even more importantly, "thoughtful counsel" for many years.
While his warning may not please his German hosts, as the clouds of pulling back on government growth gather over the eurozone, nevertheless, his voice will not go unnoticed.
While President Obama continues to call for a balanced approach to the American fiscal woes, including both budget cutting and revenue enhancement and investment in necessary infrastructure and research, there is still an incredibly powerful mass of political opinion in the Congress that seems opposed to anything the Democratic president proposes.
The world needs more voices expressing the kind of temperate and farsighted and even generous and balanced view that Mr. Soros offered to his German audience, and from sources outside government who actually play a significant role in the world economy. Men like Soros and Warren Buffet are not exactly unschooled in either investment or tax matters, and their wise, and balanced views could do with both more distribution and more respect from both the media and the North American political class, especially those on the neo-con right, in both Canada and the U.S.


Germany to be in recession by September, Soros warns

By Nicholas Comfort, Bloomberg News, in National Post, April 9, 2013
Germany’s economy will probably be in a recession by elections scheduled for the end of September because monetary policy officials in the euro area aren’t providing the necessary stimulus, said billionaire investor George Soros.

“Germany itself remains relatively unaffected by the deepening depression that is enveloping the eurozone,” Soros said in a speech at the Johann Wolfgang Goethe-University in Frankfurt Tuesday. “I expect, however, that by the time of the elections, Germany will also be in recession.”
European leaders are seeking to exit their debt crisis by cutting spending while the European Central Bank has stopped short of outright bond-buying programs like those in the U.K. and U.S. Germany’s exports will probably suffer from lower demand in Europe and a weaker yen as the Bank of Japan joins peers in engaging in so-called quantitative easing, Soros said.
“The monetary policy pursued by the eurozone is out of sync with the other major currencies,” Soros said. “The others are engaged in quantitative easing. The Bank of Japan was the last holdout, but it changed sides recently.”

The BOJ said last week it will double the monetary base by the end of 2014 through purchases of government bonds, in Japan’s biggest-ever round of asset buying.
In July, ECB President Mario Draghi declared that central bank was prepared to buy unlimited quantities of government bonds if that meant saving the euro. At the same time, his pledge is tied to conditions so stringent that no country has yet asked him to print money on its behalf and the euro region’s economy is still mired in recession.
Soros also reiterated a call for Germany to back the issuance of joint debt by European countries to lower their borrowing costs or leave the euro area.
Germany “went too far” on pushing Cyprus to impose losses on depositors as part of a rescue for the country as European banks rely on savings as a source of funding and that could undermine the banking industry, he said.

Ottawa facilitates tax evasion, while crying "foul"!

...once a tax haven country has signed one of these (largely useless) bilateral treaties, it qualifies for special treatment under the new Harper rules, allowing multinational corporations to route their profits through the tax haven, thereby avoiding Canadian corporate tax. (from "Harper government’s fraudulent attempt to look tough on tax havens: McQuaig" Toronto Star, April 9, 2013, excerpted below)
Facilitating, aiding, abetting and turning a blind eye toward the very behaviour it says it abhors, by the Harper government, is just one more sign of the kind of co-dependent relationship that exists between the government and the people/organizations/corporations that hold the money. The government is extremely aware of how the public generally views tax havens and their growing use, linked to the growing pressure such tax havens are placing on national governments everywhere; however, their public stance, in sympathy with a "cease and desist" approach is clearly in conflict with their core values, and their core allegiances.
Saying 'we are appalled by the abuse of the tax collector by these rogue actors who park their money where it cannot be taxed' and then facilitating the very 'parking' of that money by creating bilateral treaties that permit the act is nothing short of the kind of hypocrisy which is the signature of the current Canadian government.
However, they also know, those wily foxes who currently run Ottawa, that the level of public outcry about this kind of billion dollar abuse of the national accounting and budgeting function, thereby requiring the need for austerity, and for cuts in government payroll, especially in the very office, the Canada Revenue Agency responsible for pursuing tax evaders, will be so low as to barely make it on the radar screen of public opinion polls.
So, in effect, the government is counting on the sheep to continue eating their (our) meager farm food, while we pay to little attention to the charade that unfolds before our eyes.
And so while the government should be covered with appalling shame and embarrassment, it is we, the 'sheep' in this little drama who are covered with our own shame of unconsciousness.


Harper government’s fraudulent attempt to look tough on tax havens: McQuaig


Rules are so poorly designed they’ve been useless in making it harder for Canadians to hide money offshore.

By Linda McQuaig, Toronto Star, April 9, 2013 Tax havens have grown explosively in the last few decades, but last week’s spectacular leak of tax haven documents could mean the jig is about to be up.

The documents provide details of offshore accounts held by tens of thousands of corporations and individuals — all from just two of the more than 50 tax havens, which hold an estimated $32 trillion in offshore money.
The stunning disclosure puts considerable pressure on governments to finally show some muscle against their tax-evading citizens.
With 450 Canadians identified — and estimates of an annual revenue loss of $8 billion from tax havens, according to Canadians for Tax Fairness — even the Harper government could be obliged to overcome its reluctance to go after wealthy cheats.
Ironically, the Harperites like to present themselves as tough on evaders — an image they pumped up in last month’s budget, introducing a turn-in-a-tax-cheat snitch line.
And back in 2007, the Harper government launched a campaign to push tax haven countries to sign bilateral tax treaties with Canada, ostensibly to force them to divulge information about offshore accounts held by Canadians.
In reality, the treaty rules were so poorly designed they’ve been virtually useless in making it harder for Canadians to hide money offshore.
On the contrary, they’ve actually opened the floodgates to tax haven use. That’s because, once a tax haven country has signed one of these (largely useless) bilateral treaties, it qualifies for special treatment under the new Harper rules, allowing multinational corporations to route their profits through the tax haven, thereby avoiding Canadian corporate tax.
For the Harperites to claim they’re clamping down on tax havens would be like claiming a clampdown on bank robberies by setting up a turn-in-a-robber snitch line, while at the same time providing robbers with instruction manuals on cracking safes.
If the Harper government had any genuine interest in tackling tax havens, it would get behind growing global efforts to shut them down. Even the U.S. Congress passed a sweeping law, to take effect next year, requiring foreign banks to report all assets held by their U.S. clients to U.S. tax authorities.
A plan to develop an international system along these lines, long championed by the U.K.-based Tax Justice Network, has fresh momentum in the wake of last week’s revelations.
Such a system would be similar to — and no more complicated than—the international system of passports. All governments identify everyone entering their country when the person’s passport is electronically scanned at the border. Similarly, all banks could electronically report all their clients’ accounts to relevant tax authorities (as they already do domestically).
Tax haven users — who include a rogue’s gallery of money launderers, fraud artists, embezzlers, organized criminals, drug and human traffickers, as well as wealthy tax-evading individuals and corporations — would then find it no easier to move money undetected around the world than to travel without a passport.
But why would our government bother supporting serious global efforts to eliminate a system that facilitates despicable crimes and robs national treasuries, when it can look tough by crossing its fingers and hoping to catch a few cheats with a snitch line?
Linda McQuaig is author, with Neil Brooks, of The Trouble with Billionaires: How the Super-Rich Hijacked the World and How We Can Take It Back. Her column appears monthly. lmcquaig@sympatico.ca



..

Leading is more than "not getting caught"...

My experience in coaching high-level executives has led me to conclude that far too many of them suffer from either a narcissistic desire to be perfect and have a reticence to admit mistakes or even see them as a necessary part of being a good leader. (from "Great leaders use failure to become more successful" by Ray Williams, National Post, April 3, 2013, below)
The character of a leader is, indeed, an important component in how s/he fills the role. A narcissistic desire to be perfect and a reticence to admit mistakes or even see them as a necessary part of being a good leader are two qualities that emerge from the demands of both the society, as represented by the media, and the organization in which the leader operates. Failure and risk taking which might lead to mistakes are not the kind of cultual legacy any leader wishes to leave in an organization. However, paradoxically, the demand for perfection imposes strict limits on too many organizations through their leaders, as to in effect impose a culture of "restricted and impaired vision" for the leader and the organization.
North American culture, especially, runs corporate training programs in public relations, for the specific purpose of training leaders in how to manage "screw-ups" by the organization. And everyone on both sides of the 49th parallel knows that all corporations and all leaders "screw-up"....only the ones who successfully manage those screw-ups survive.
Managing the screw-ups sometimes burying a scapegoat, on whom responsibility for the public relations 'nightmare' can be shifted. Sometimes, it means putting out stories that present a different narrative from the one that exposed the failure. Sometimes, it means transferring the responsible leader to another department, or anther country, in order to "skate" through the thin ice of public opinion. Sometimes, it means taking action on a different file in order to deflect the public attention away from the screw-up....
And none of these public relations tactics serves the organization's core responsibility of integrity, regardless of the kind of business it is in.
There is a deep and profound resonance to failure, and everyone who breathes knows how deeply impacting it is. Only the "driven" and the obsessive fail to see their own part in the drama that is currently embroiling both the leader and the organization. What is both tragic and avoidable is the resistance to accept the leader's and the organization's responsibility for their individual and collective participation in whatever disaster is encircling the executive suites.
Accepting responsibility, including coming forward publicly to others serving in the organzation and to the wider "client" publics, is an must become an integral act of both contrition and integrity on the part of both the leader and the organization.
What is tragic is to witness the complete detachment from all forms of organizational failure by both the leaders and the organization, as if to say and to believe, that getting caught is the only thing that matters.
It was Iago's wife, in the Shakespearean tragedy, Othello, who articulated such a point of view, as the one incarnated by her nefarious husband Iago whose manipulations of both the hero and his love directly led to their tragic ends.
Getting caught is not the only thing that matters, and the sooner we are able to excise such thinking from our parenting, our schools, our religious training and our organizational cultures, the more likely we will remove the lowered ceilings of both vision and accomplishment from our various organizations.
And that will take courageous leadership, something we see far to little of today.


Great leaders use failure to become more successful


By Ray Williams, National Post, Aprilo 3, 2013 —Ray Williams is President of Ray Williams Associates, a company based in Vancouver, providing leadership training, executive coaching and speaking services. He can be reached at ray@raywilliamsassociates.com

We’ve often heard the expression “whatever doesn’t kill you makes you stronger.” By extension, that means failure and obstacles are good things. Yet this thinking for the general populace doesn’t seem to apply to leaders.

When these concepts are applied to leadership it can take the form of a career requirement. Steven Snyder, author of Leadership and The Art of The Struggle, argues “struggle and leadership are intertwined… Great leaders use failure as a wake-up call.”
Yet, our culture, and the media that propels it, favours promoting leaders as faultless — a Teflon-like image. As Bill George argues, we quickly turn away from leaders who have made mistakes and the media tries to bury them.
Despite the substantial amount of psychological research and anecdotal evidence that demonstrates how failure and adversity can be of great benefit to leaders, we continue to insist on perfection.
Snyder argues that great leaders don’t use failure as a reason to blame others, don’t avoid responsibility or become victims, but rather, “seek out the counsel of a mentor and/or turn their attention inward for reflection and introspection.” He advances the following principles of his “Struggle Lens” to guide leaders:

•Leadership is a struggle that provides a gateway to learning and growth;

•All human beings have flaws, including leaders;

•While accomplishing goals is important, human values must drive leaders;

•Leaders must accept the world as it is, not as they would like it to be, while still striving to make it better.

Drawing on his experience of working with Bill Gates in the early days of Microsoft, and his knowledge of leaders in companies such as Apple, Target and General Mills, Snyder proposes a framework for leaders to thrive in struggle: become grounded; explore new pathways and deepen adaptive strategy.
My experience in coaching high-level executives has led me to conclude that far too many of them suffer from either a narcissistic desire to be perfect and have a reticence to admit mistakes or even see them as a necessary part of being a good leader. In many ways, this demand and expectation for perfect leaders has been responsible for recruiting and promoting these kinds of leaders, who ultimately don’t serve their organizations, or society well.
Snyder’s book makes a significant contribution to realizing that struggles and failures make the best leaders.


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