Despite its unpolished character, the capitalists have chosen the Conservatives as the party of capital in the province.

The B.C. NDP’s slide to the right has made it possible for the B.C. Conservative Party to rise from the grave.

Since Dec. 10, Hudson’s Bay employees in Kamloops, British Columbia, represented by United Steelworkers Local 1-417, have been on strike in response to the company’s insulting $0.17 wage increase offer. 

Between Jan. 22-24, 180 transit workers from the Coast Mountain Bus Company (CMBC) launched a 48-hour job action. CUPE 4500 representing Transit supervisors, indicated that if a deal cannot be reached by Friday Feb. 2, it will begin a 72-hour expanded strike. 

In August 1913, Vancouver Island was engulfed in class struggle. The coal miners strike of 1912-1914, the Great Strike as it is called, crippled Vancouver Island for nearly two years as workers flew the red flag on Canadian soil. Coal miners on Vancouver Island rose up against the mining bosses and defied the power of the Canadian state, taking over the town of Ladysmith for three days, and bringing the Island to the brink of an all-out class war. 

The Liberal gov’t is preparing to intervene to end the strike of 7,400 B.C. port workers. The union must reject binding arbitration and any other attempt to force them back to work.

We say: Don’t back down, strike to win!

Workers at Granville Island Brewing in Vancouver, B.C., organized with Service Employees International Union (SEIU) Local 2—which represents approximately 20,000 service workers across Canada—have been on strike since July 8 against wage cuts. 

On June 28, B.C. port workers gave a 72-hour strike notice. Earlier in June, the province’s 12 International Longshore Workers Union (ILWU) locals, representing 7,400 workers across British Columbia voted to strike with a staggering 99.24 per cent mandate.

Capilano University Workers organized with MoveUP Local 378—which represents administrative staff across the university—have been on strike since June 6, against the administration’s effort to claw back their right to work remotely. 

There’s an attitude in the province that whatever else happens, “There will always be logging in B.C.” The industry as a whole has gone through plenty of boom-and-bust cycles as the price of timber products has varied over the years and decades. But, over those same decades this process of boom and bust has slowly devastated B.C. communities and led to the hollowing out of small towns up and down Vancouver Island and the mainland.