Labour Day 2005 is here. We have much to be proud of. The provincial federations that have met this past year, the Quebec Federation of Labour Convention and the Canadian Labour Congress Conventions have been significant events whose membership participation and enthusiasm provides a forward perspective in this dangerous and troubled world.     The Communist Party said some time back that there is an undercurrent, a stirring amongst the working people that has not yet fully matured into organizational and structural expression. Its main feature is the search for methods of struggle, combinations, alliances, a revitalization and dedication whose main feature, no matter how infant, is its forward direction. The labour movement and the effective struggles it has been involved in this past year can be viewed as a series of checks and balances. There have been no decisive defeats but also no major victories. By and large the working class and its allies have been involved in skirmishes. The working class and its labour movement have not yet come to terms with the main dangers, have not yet fully assessed the global, national and governmental forces manoeuvring to use and exploit them, and the danger these agendas pose to their well-being and unity, wedges of disunity and the hammers threatening to drive them deep.

We need to analyse our responses, but in all cases we must bear in mind that the main danger is the global corporate agenda and the imperialist countries that use political blackmail, economic leverage and outright military brutality to implement the agenda. We must also remember that these imperialist countries are cannibalistic, they may hunt in wolf‑packs but they will turn and consume each other to expropriate the spoils. They are the biggest danger to the nations of the world, to peace and the survival of the human species. This is the corporate world and its agenda is the main danger to people everywhere. Internally this sets the stage for the competition between different sections of Canadian capital and the way it exploits.

Unity of Nations and Class

The historic problem of the unequal union between English-speaking Canada and Quebec is still the cause of justified resentment in Quebec. Confederation treated the Quebecois as just another province, ignoring the history, culture, language and economic development that clearly establishes them as a nation within Canada, not a province. As a nation they must have the right to self-determination up to and including the right to separation. This right, if enshrined in a new Canadian Constitution, would be the strongest persuasion to remain voluntarily as equal partners in a confederal republic that also establishes similar rights for Aboriginal Peoples and Acadians.

The rulers of Canada are exploiters of labour and nations within Canada. They have been forced at times to soften the lines of exploitation and oppression, have had to bow to national and class resistance, but they were forced to do this to maintain control. The capitalist class exploits the working class. That is their essence, and in their imperial stage they capture and exploit whole nations. Sections of capital within the subject nations either join in as junior partners or resist and conduct nationalist struggles in their own interests.

We have all these conditions in Canada but in no case does any competition between the Canadian ruling class and elements of the national bourgeoisie in Quebec contain within it the emancipation of the working class, the best interests of the working class. They will both open recruiting offices and offer small gifts, but both have plans for increasing the rate of exploitation, of gaining a monopoly on the right to exploit.

Georgetti and Duceppe

The Canadian Labour Congress Convention in Montreal provided a good look at a courtship. The courtship was the pitch by the leader of the Bloc Quebecois, Gilles Duceppe, to the workers of Quebec and the leadership of the CLC. Obviously the pitch had already been aired in private, at least with the leadership of the QFL and the leadership of the CLC, but perhaps with leaders of other major unions, because on the convention floor the response preceded the pitch.

The response came in Georgetti's introduction of Gilles Duceppe to the delegates. It contained these gems of persuasion: "we have to accept the fact that there are two Social Democratic parties in Parliament... this man is a friend of labour... he is one of us."

It was after these introductions that Duceppe launched into his speech which included parliamentary support for the fight against the US "Star Wars" program, support for Employment Insurance reform, support for anti-scab legislation and a pledge to protect publicly owned and delivered health care. He also made it quite clear that Quebec must separate from Canada, that there would then be another "worker-friendly" state in North America, that the NDP concessions wrung from the Liberals meant nothing to Quebec and that globalization was not a bad thing for working people, "all we have to do is learn to manage it". He also took a shot at Jack Layton and the NDP's "centralized vision of Canada".

Duceppe is an adroit and polished politician, but who does his agenda truly represent? His progressive position on peace and anti-Star Wars is the position of the majority of the population in Quebec (more so than in any other part of Canada) and the credit belongs there, a compliment to the Quebecois. Employment Insurance reform, protection of public health care and support of anti-scab legislation reflect what is necessary to recruit labour and working class support in Quebec and compliance with what already exists. His rejection of the NDP and Layton is understandable because no matter what Jack Layton says or implies, the New Democratic Party, unlike the Canadian Labour Congress, does not recognize Quebec as a nation. This is a very serious problem that prevents the NDP from being a serious federal party, prevents them from addressing the unequal union of confederation and prevents them from providing a unifying force in parliament that would drive a wedge between the Bloc and the Harper Tories. The NDP refusal to recognize Quebec as a nation is a major obstacle to the union of the working class across Canada.

Duceppe is a representative of the nationalist agenda, of the small capitalists in Quebec. He is actively campaigning to deliver the working class into their camp because they must recruit working class support to fulfil their agenda. His party, the Bloc Quebecois, was originally formed by breakaway Tories who were major players in Brian Mulroney's Free Trade cabinet. Their dispute was over Liberal federalism and they support a version of national relations that requires separation. There may be social democrats in the Bloc, but the Bloc is not a social democratic party. It is a party of free trade, globalization and with a corporate agenda that must play to the progressive traditions and militancy of Quebec workers in order to succeed.

When Georgetti states that "he is one of us," it raises the question: who is "us"? If "us" is a section of labour leadership who are becoming more and more integrated with their "own" capitalists, who are prepared to lead the working class to supporting their national capitalists, then when he looks at Duceppe he truly sees another "us" who is doing the same thing in Quebec.

Does "one of us", mean that Georgetti agrees that globalization is not a bad thing? Does Georgetti even know what he means, or is he just shooting from the lip and trying to live one day at a time in an environment that is beyond his grasp? His public abandonment of the struggle against free trade, (never fully retracted or explained), his shady ties with British Columbia private health care investment groups, and the general malaise of the CLC in face of intensifying attacks on the working class indicates a real danger. A willingness to adjust to the political environment regardless of the welfare of the working class. Opportunism and compliance instead of struggle.

The history and the policies of both the Canadian Labour Congress and the Quebec Federation of Labour indicate that they are not pawns of either the Canadian ruling class or of the narrow nationalist aims of sections of Quebec capital. The presence of Duceppe at the CLC Convention and his invitation to speak might be justified by objective political developments both in Quebec and in the federal parliament and because the convention took place in Montreal. The Bloc opposition to "Star Wars" and for other legislation important to working people could be applauded. But an unconditional identification of the Bloc leader as "one of us" is a puzzling and risky short-cut which appears to be primarily intended to excuse the CLC leadership from its current neglect of policy on the national question and its general absence from the struggle for recognition of the right of nations to self-determination, including the right to separate.

What is needed?

The problem of the Quebec workers and Quebec progressive voters is that there is no major federal party whose platform represents their national and class interests. This problem is to the advantage of the Bloc who will try to capture their support by default. If, as the result of big nation chauvinism and intimidation from the Liberals and Tories in Ottawa and narrow nationalism and chauvinism from the nationalist parties in Quebec, Quebec separates, then this country and its multi-national working class will be in great danger of being delivered to the New York bankers on a silver platter. Canada, the second richest resource area in a resource-hungry world, will be splintered and available for plunder. Workers and labour in both nations would be less able to resist and we would find ourselves providing cheap labour and cheap resources to foreign capitalists.

At this time the only political program representing the rights of all Canadian nations, of all sections of the working class, is the program of the Communist Party of Canada (CPC) and the Parti communiste du Quebec (PCQ). For many years the Communist Party has put forward the proposal for a new constitution based on the equal and voluntary partnership of Quebec and English-speaking Canada with the full participation of Aboriginal peoples. A new constitution guaranteeing the right of nations to self-determination, and offering an equal, voluntary partnership in a confederal state, is what is needed.

The Canadian Labour Congress recognizes Quebec as a nation. That was won years ago at convention mainly because of communists and other left elements who campaigned vigorously for it and won. The QFL has a national status within the CLC that is unique and different from the provincial federations. There is also the CNTU with a militant history of struggle with whom unity can be developed.

This is an ideal platform for the launching of campaigns that would weld labour and class unity to such an extent that the working class across Canada would lead all social strata whose interests lie in the creation of a new constitution guaranteeing the rights of nations and preserving the social programs that provide the catalyst between our cultures.

It is not enough to sing solidarity forever at conventions. The CLC has the policies in place already but it has sat on them for years. It has not implemented policy into program and campaign on the national question. Solidarity and unity are not mystic ideals, they are hard practical necessities of working class life that must be forged in struggle, cemented in achievement and demonstrated every single day.

If Quebec workers looking at the rest of Canada could see a determined fight against the repressive and anti-democratic Clarity Act, a struggle to raise the peace and disarmament movement to match their own, a campaign by the CLC for a new Canadian Constitution, a sympathetic understanding of their national sentiments and a concerted effort to organize union densities up to the high levels existing now in Quebec, it would almost guarantee unity and solidarity would prevail. The unity and solidarity of the working class in the two largest nations could provide a leadership on national, democratic and social campaigning that is larger than our class but would put the labour movement at the centre of a social dynamic of growth and recruiting unknown since the 1940's.

A working class agenda that represents the national interests of Quebec and English-speaking Canada, Aboriginal Peoples, and Acadians would dictate the need for its political expression. We need a more aggressive and militant labour leadership. We need intervention, program and action. In the interval between Labour Day 2005 and Labour Day 2006 we must return every single day to the oldest and most valuable of all labour slogans.... Solidarity Forever. Unity, Unity and more Unity!

To achieve these goals, Canada must break out of pro-corporate trade deals. The treacherous NAFTA agreement, which prevents Canada from reducing oil exports to the United States or from setting lower domestic prices, must be abrogated immediately. Instead of integrating further into a U.S.-dominated "Fortress North America", Canada needs diverse, sustainable, and mutually beneficial trade based on respect for the economic, political, social and cultural sovereignty of all countries.