Labour Matters Project
Promoting a positive vision for unions in Canada
Labour Matters is a product of the Trade Union Research Collective. The collective’s goal is to promote greater understanding of the positive role that unions play in the workplace, in the labour market, in the community, and in wider society.
- The union advantage
- Fairness in the workplace
- The right to strike
- Decent pay
Our publications are available to all at no cost. Please support the CCPA and help make important research and ideas available to everyone. Make a donation today.
Work Life: The Role of Labour in the Green Industrial Revolution
Canada is well behind other developed – and some lesser-developed countries – in shifting gears to a green economy. Other countries are supporting green enterprises with targeted programs and subsidies….
Work Life: “We asked for workers; we got people instead”
The above quote, by one of Swiss author Max Frisch’s characters, succinctly captures the inherent conflict between employers and workers. Employers want results; they want productivity, machine-perfect timing and energy…
Work Life: Manitoba’s Proactive Enforcement of Temporary Foreign Worker’s Rights is a model for Canada
Canada’s Temporary Foreign Workers Program (TFWP) has become a hot potato for the federal government, which is frantically attempting to quell widespread outrage sparked by revelations of Canadians fired to…
Work Life: Youth Voices – Youth and Unions Need to Work Together
While the labour landscape has changed dramatically in Canada in the last 58 years, the legal framework has not. The labour relations framework that we use today in Canada was…
Work Life: More than a Dream
Many of us have, like John Lennon, imagined a world without war, greed, hunger or possessions. There are those rare individuals who insist that we should settle for nothing less,…
Work Life: Why we still fight
The Day of Mourning, more than any other day in the labour movement’s calendar, brings home why we must remain vigilant in the area of workers’ rights. As reported by…
Work Life: Temporary Foreign Workers: How federal settlement policies overlook some newcomers
Manitoba has embarked on aggressive immigration strategies to attract newcomers to settle in a variety of communities in the province with the purpose of meeting local labour force demands. In…
Work Life: International Women’s Day 2014 – The continuing struggle for bread and roses
This edition of Work Life forms part of the research by CCPA’s National Office for an upcoming report, “Working across Canada” which will analyze quantitative and qualitative data to determine…
Work Life: A Province with No Poverty?
The so-called war on poverty has been an abysmal failure. Poverty rates in Canada remain at stubbornly high levels. Most provinces, including Manitoba, still have about one in 10 living…
Work Life: The 2014 Federal Budget
Austerity for the many, prosperity for the few Observers were not expecting anything more than a middle-of-the-road federal budget for 2014, but even so the Finance Minister managed to disappoint….
Work Life: Gabriel Bako reviews Loreto’s latest book
A review of From Demonized to Organized: Building the new Union Movement by Nora Loreto This new book published by CCPA National provides a timely analysis of unions and neoliberalism….
A living wage for Manitoba families
READ THE FULL REPORT HERE. WINNIPEG—Low-income families face difficult choices: pay the rent or buy food; forego dental care to buy school supplies. Parents faced with these dilemmas are stressed…
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