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In 2002 the Quebec National Assembly adopted the Act to Combat Poverty and Social Exclusion. This law obliges the Quebec government to establish a national strategy including actions that “must address both the causes and the consequences of poverty and social exclusion to ensure that all persons concerned may obtain the support and encouragement their situation requires and may, on their own, achieve self-sufficiency, and participate actively in the life and advancement of the community.”

The “national strategy” was to have reduced poverty levels in Quebec to the lowest in the industrialized world by 2013.

This, of course, did not happen.

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New Brunswick Premier Blaine Higgs has called a snap election for September 14, well in advance of the 2022 date established by the provincial Legislative Assembly Act, which mandates that a general election be held every four years on the third Monday in October.

This election comes after the Liberals refused Blaine Higgs’ ludicrous “deal” to keep his minority Conservative government in power until 2022 or until the end of the COVID-19 pandemic, while removing the ability of the opposition to raise criticism – an attempt by Higgs to subvert democracy. In spite of the pandemic, public health and the public interest, Higgs and the Tories are opportunistically vying to seize power at a time when the federal Liberals are at their weakest due to the WE Charity scandal. The Tories are aiming for a majority government, which would free them to continue inflicting their campaign of austerity on New Brunswickers. Higgs is running on a campaign of stability while taking full credit for New Brunswick’s success with the pandemic, despite the major contributions from the other three parties in the minority government.

Higgs’ history, however, states the obvious – he is neither for working people, nor for their health.

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Much of the world is facing a crisis around the use and abuse of various sorts of substances, with different countries taking different approaches to the issue. The United States has generally focused on prohibition, enforcement and corrections; the Netherlands and Portugal have tried legalization and drug therapies for users. Still, headlines worldwide indicate many deaths each day from overdoses.

The Business of Drugs, a six-part documentary series on Netflix, features former CIA analyst Amarylis Fox exploring issues around six different types of illegal drugs. For leftist critics of drug prohibition, this series provides excellent examples of how capitalism is a major cause of the drug crisis – both in terms of why people use drugs in the first place and the fact that the US, in particular, currently lacks a planned or coherent response to this crisis. Perhaps the most politically salient episodes are the ones on cannabis and opioids. Fox herself ends the series with a clear critique of “unregulated capitalism.”

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Manitoba’s Conservative government has used the coronavirus pandemic and resulting economic crisis as an opportunity to ram through legislation aimed at privatizing the province’s forests, parks, water infrastructure and flood control.

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Alberta’s provincial government has slated 164 provincial park sites – 37 percent of parks in the province – for closure or third-party “partnerships.” Jason Kenney’s United Conservative Party also intends to remove protected area status from these parks.

This involves 9 provincial parks, 149 provincial recreation areas and 6 natural areas, scattered widely all over the province. Ten of these have already been closed. Having their protected area status removed means that the parks are no longer subject to the province’s Parks Act and related regulations, and the Parks Division of the Alberta government will no longer be the land manager. The lands will revert to being public lands under the Public Lands Act which, while maintaining some regulation, allows for a wider range of activities than on park lands. For example, agricultural production could be allowed, or the lands could be sold or transferred to a municipality.

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Activists building an emboldened movement for progressive reform

India, Ireland, Mexico, Norway and Kenya won the June 17 elections at the 74th United Nations Assembly for five non-permanent seats on the UN Security Council. The two-year terms start on January 1, 2021.

The biggest loser was Canada, in its competition with Ireland and Norway for two available seats in the Western European and Other States Group. A total of 128 votes were needed to secure a two-thirds majority. Norway received 130 votes while Ireland got 128. Canada received just 108 votes. All efforts by the Canadian officials, including multiple phone calls to other countries’ UN ambassadors, failed. This is the second loss, following one in 2010 under the Harper Conservative government.

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United in action, Toronto’s tenants descended upon John Tory’s private residence on July 6, intending to deliver a mock eviction notice to the mayor. After years of casting futile ballots, petitioning groomed staffers and participating in patronizing consultations, disenfranchised neighbours have reached the conclusion that the only way to combat the deliberately engineered housing crisis is to take matters into their own hands.

Tenants did not kick down the mayor’s door with firearms on their hips. Tenants did not drag the mayor from his home in handcuffs, changing the locks behind him. Tenants did not throw the mayor into the streets of a city that views him as subhuman clutter obstructing the path of development.

Far from this, Tory cowered behind the Toronto police – the country’s most expensive gang of brutes – as they inflicted the violence they were established to impose. They twisted arms, yanked ankles, punched throats and maced eyes. “I have been around and am used to the fact that there are protests, including some directed at me, but I live in a condominium building and I am more concerned for my neighbours,” Tory snivelled the next day. Meanwhile, he has spent months looking the other way as a tidal wave of evictions approaches and threatens to swallow entire communities whole.

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On July 7, the United Conservative Party government of Jason Kenney introduced Bill 32, the Restoring Balance in Alberta’s Workplaces Act. It’s a massive omnibus bill that amends six different labour and employment relations acts. Don’t be fooled by the title of the bill – it is, without a doubt, an attack on workers and unions to the benefit of corporations and the rich.

An attack on one group of workers almost inevitably has repercussions on other workers. This bill must be halted!

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On June 25, Mark Austin and Candace Zinkweg were walking their dog in Dentonia Park in Toronto’s east end. When their dog was bitten by an off-leash dog, they confronted the dogs’ owners who quickly became very aggressive and threatening. Zinkweg was assaulted and suffered a concussion. The assailants hurled racist abuse at Austin, who is Black, and threatened him with gun violence, both during and after the incident.

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Last week, the Public Service Alliance of Canada (PSAC) made history with its largest ever anti-racism training event, hosting one thousand members and non-members in the English webinar on July 20 and more than 700 registrations for the French session on July 21. It ought to be remembered as a moment of moral clarity for a union whose membership constitute a dynamic substratum in Canada’s organized working class. PSAC members are employed in all sectors of public administration, from program delivery, to integrity enforcement, to activities adjoining or directly engaged in the carcel state. They are in a unique position to passively observe, actively exploit or actively challenge the many intersections of structural oppression in Canada. It is my hopeful imagination that labour historians will look back at this moment as one small, but brave step by PSAC in the long march towards a just society.

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