A 2020 report by the UN Special Rapporteur on Toxics and Human Rights noted prevalent discrimination in Canada’s policies and laws related to hazardous substances and wastes, stating: “there exists a pattern in Canada where marginalized groups, and Indigenous peoples in particular, find themselves on the wrong side of a toxic divide, subject to conditions that would not be acceptable elsewhere in Canada.” This pattern is called environmental racism, and it has a long history in Canada.

Residents of African Nova Scotian communities like Africville, Shelburne, and Lincolnville have been subjected to it – exposed to sewage systems, landfills, toxic waste, and other pollutants placed in their communities.

This is not just a part of history. Environmental racism springs from deep and ongoing structural inequities that have left communities with few resources and protections over many generations. Today, Black workers and communities continue to live with the consequences of economic and social policy decisions rooted in systemic racism that have resulted in their greater exposure to environmental hazards.

Policy decisions often disregard the long-term environmental, social, and economic costs shouldered by the communities most impacted by these decisions. For Black, Indigenous, racialized, and marginalized communities, the outcome has been exposure to higher rates of pollution and contamination, causing great harm and reducing life expectancy. These communities are paying a high price for unjust policies impacting access to employment, income, housing, and health care.

“Climate change only deepens the injustices of environmental racism, and while all workers are increasingly dealing with its effects, not all of us are feeling it equally. Black workers are also contending with longstanding structural inequities, including discrimination and anti-Black racism and the income inequality that stems from these. This causes Black workers to be more vulnerable to the climate crisis on all fronts – both on the job and at home,” said Larry Rousseau, CLC Executive Vice-President.

With the development of its first-ever National Strategy on Environmental Racism and Environmental Justice, the federal government has an historic opportunity to make lasting change by ensuring meaningful consultation with Black workers and communities, as well as with Indigenous and racialized workers and communities; allocating sufficient funding for community-led solutions and investing to protect and create good, sustainable union jobs by aligning solutions with strong occupational health and safety protections; responding to urgent needs while also addressing systemic environmental racism; and collecting and using disaggregated race-based data to develop good policy that effectively addresses risks and structural inequalities. 

Black workers’ survival and well-being depend on equitable access to good, safe jobs, as well as government action to address the root causes of income inequality and the climate crisis. Join our calls and send a letter today to the Minister of Environment, Climate Change and Nature and urge government to take swift action to develop and table the National Strategy and combat environmental racism faced by Black workers and communities.

And sign up to learn about, receive updates and get involved in our Future That Works campaign, a worker-centred campaign for a sustainable, equitable and climate-resilient future!

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Recent data shows that Black workers are the most likely racialized group to be covered by a union contract, with unionization boosting their annual income by more than $3,000. Unionized Black workers benefit from better wages overall, increased job security, and protections against discrimination.

However, systemic barriers in employment persist, creating harmful impacts that ripple across generations of Black workers. Despite higher rates of unionization and the resulting benefits, Black workers still deal with significant barriers at work: the report also shows that Black workers face the second-largest racialized wage gap due to their disproportionate representation in lower-wage sectors and limited access to or exclusion from work in higher-wage sectors.

Black workers in Canada experience ongoing labour market discrimination and systemic racism—severe obstacles which impact their access to fair employment, advancement, and equitable treatment at work. The effects of anti-Black racism are far-reaching, causing enduring barriers to economic advancement and empowerment for Black communities.

A 2023 Black Canadian National Survey conducted by York University’s Institute for Social Research, in partnership with the Canadian Race Relations Foundation, showed that 75% of those polled experienced racism in the workplace as a serious or very serious problem, and that Black workers see workplaces as epicentres of racial discrimination and unfairness.

This is unacceptable, and unions have a pivotal role to play in addressing and redressing these systemic injustices—both in workplaces, and in broader society.

“The labour movement must continue to uphold our core mission to fight for equity, fairness, and dignity for all workers. This means actively working to dismantle anti-Black racism and discrimination in workplaces and unions, bargaining for equitable opportunities, educating members and leaders, amplifying the voices and leadership of Black workers, and engaging with Black workers to organize for better jobs and pay,” said Larry Rousseau, Executive Vice-President of the CLC. Unions can be a powerful force for racial and economic justice for Black workers, whether at work, in the union or in society. Don’t forget to register for our webinar on February 18, and be sure to check out our new factsheet on Black workers and unionization. You can also get involved with us this Black History Month and beyond by texting BHM to 55255 (message & data rates may apply).

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“In the face of adversity and deep inequities, the actions of courageous Black community trailblazers and activists have carved out room for increased equity for Black and racialized workers and community members,” said Larry Rousseau, Executive Vice-President of the CLC. “This progress is evident not only in our workplaces but also in the very fabric of the communities we inhabit. We honour these trailblazers by continuing the fight for justice and equity.”

Canada’s unions continue to support Black communities’ calls to tackle pervasive systemic anti-Black racism in Canada. The reach of anti-Black racism is wide, impacting community members across their entire lifecycle and following individuals everywhere they go: from their educational institutions, to their workplaces, to the communities in which they reside.

Anti-Black racism is systemic – deeply rooted in Canada’s foundation as a violently colonial nation – and creates major barriers to economic and social advancement and empowerment for Black workers and communities. For generations – and still to this day – persistent labour market discrimination has seen Black workers consistently earning lower wages and experiencing hurdles at every stage of employment, beginning at the initial hiring process, to advancement and promotion, as well as retention.

To address these issues, Canada’s unions continue to demand that the federal government take concrete steps to ensure anti-Black racism and discrimination are meaningfully tackled, and that Black workers have access to full and fair participation in the labour market. The government can work toward eliminating systemic anti-Black racism in employment by implementing the recommendations of the Employment Equity Review Task Force. The Task Force held consultations with stakeholder groups, including Canada’s unions, and its extensive report detailed tangible ways to ensure a more inclusive and equitable Canadian workforce. Among its recommendations is the inclusion of Black workers as a designated group under the Employment Equity Act to take into account the unique barriers experienced by Black workers.

We call on the federal government to:

• Ensure the reform and modernization of the Employment Equity Act includes employer requirements to divulge pay gaps affecting Black workers, and a plan to narrow and eliminate the gender and multigenerational racial pay gap;
• Create an intersectional national anti-Black racism strategy, including strong employment and pay targets and concrete measures to address systemic labour-market discrimination and disadvantages faced by Black workers;
• Uphold the human rights of Black workers and redress the injustices faced by Black federal public service employees via the Black Class Action lawsuit; and
• Immediately release Canada’s renewed Anti-Racism Strategy, and the National Action Plan on Combatting Hate to address the rising tide of racism and hate across Canada.

Join our calls by writing to your MP here, and check out our Twitter, Instagram and Facebook all month long to learn more about some of the incredible pioneers and activists in Black Canadian history who fought to make Canada a more just place for all.

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From the hidden experiences of Black Nova Scotian domestic workers in the mid-twentieth century, to the young Black women domestic workers who participated in Canada’s West Indian Domestic Scheme, to the Black women who overcame significant racial discrimination to train and work as nurses, Black care workers have been integral to this country’s care history.  

 “Black care workers helped build this country. They fought and organized for justice, helping to secure the rights that all workers now benefit from. Today—and every day— we honour this hard work by fighting for fairness and justice for Black care workers,” said Bea Bruske, President of the Canadian Labour Congress.

Care workers continue to do the hard work of providing care—paid and unpaid—for our families and communities. This work is often carried out by Black, racialized, immigrant and migrant women.

Wages and working conditions for care jobs do not reflect the true value of the work: jobs are precarious and wages are low. These women often work under poor, unsafe and unfair conditions, with few protections. Care work is traditionally understood to be women’s work, and as such, it is undervalued. This upholds gender stereotypes promoting ideas about women’s place in society and the forms of work assigned to them.

“The racial dimensions and undervaluing of care work also have deep roots, going back to when African and Indigenous peoples were bought, sold, traded and inherited in Canada’s system of chattel slavery, the impacts of which are still felt deeply by Black and Indigenous workers and communities. Black workers helped raise this nation, caring for others—first under duress, and today, out of necessity, yet their work and contributions aren’t properly valued,” said Larry Rousseau, CLC Executive Vice-President.

In addition to the hardships of unjust wages and working conditions, Black care workers face anti-Black racism, racial violence and abuse on the job. Without access to equal rights and protections, these inequities persist.

Care work is necessary to the continued well-being of our families and communities, and the functioning of our economy. Despite the indispensable nature of this work, Canada’s care systems are failing its workers and all those who need care. The pandemic has exacerbated the existing cracks in our care systems.

Black care workers helped build Canada and continue to provide the crucial care we all need and depend on. Let’s show up and show we care by fighting together to secure fair and decent work for Black care workers and committing to eradicating gender, racial and other inequities that are bound up with the undervaluing and maldistribution of care work. Send a letter to your MP urging them to invest in repairing our public care systems and join the fight at https://showwecare.ca/.

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“Black people in Canada have had to struggle with the impacts of colonial systems that have rooted anti-Black racism into our institutions, policies, workplaces and society,” said Bea Bruske, President of the Canadian Labour Congress. “So, while we celebrate Black History Month, it’s critical that our commitment to support and stand with Black workers and communities extends beyond this one month,” said Bruske.

Black History Month is an important time to recognize both the contributions and struggles of Black communities in this country. The history of Black people in Canada spans centuries and consists of a wide range of experiences, including slavery and abolition, homesteading and migration, the civil rights movement, and immigration.

Black people in Canada have made notable contributions to all aspects of life in this country, including to the labour movement, but these achievements have not come without struggle – which Black communities continue to face to this day.

“The social and economic impacts of anti-Black racism and discrimination have been significant and have resulted in a multigenerational wage gap for Black communities in Canada. And the barriers to social and economic advancement are only worse when the Black experience meets other experiences of marginalization, such as for Black people with disabilities, Black Muslims, Black women or Black trans people,” said Larry Rousseau, Executive Vice-President of the CLC.

The effects of systemic racism include ongoing labour market discrimination against Black workers, which has seen Black workers receive lower wages and face barriers in all aspects of work, from the hiring process, to advancement and retention.

Longstanding issues require long-term solutions and supports. Canada’s unions are calling on the federal government to address economic and systemic racism and discrimination faced by Black workers by committing to and implementing the following actions:

• Create an intersectional national anti-Black racism strategy, including strong employment and pay targets and concrete measures to address systemic labour-market discrimination and disadvantages faced by Black workers;
• Ensure the reform and modernization of the Employment Equity Act includes employer requirements to divulge pay gaps affecting Black workers and a plan to narrow and eliminate the gender and multigenerational racial pay gap;
• Invest in public social infrastructure and care work as part of an equitable pandemic recovery plan to ensure good, safe jobs and stronger care systems that support all those who need care as well as all care workers – many of whom are Black women; and
• Launch an inquiry on the overrepresentation of Black children and youth in the care of child protection services.

This Black History Month and beyond, Canada’s unions stand in solidarity with and support Black workers and communities. Show your support and join us for a text rally on February 23 at 1pm. Eastern, where we will be texting Canadians across the country and inviting them to demand change from government and increased supports for Black workers and communities.

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“This is a time of reckoning,” said Hassan Yussuff, President of the Canadian Labour Congress (CLC). “The double crisis of a global pandemic and outcries over racial injustice and police violence have taken a significant toll on Black communities in particular. We must move forward together and ensure no one is left behind.”

Black communities have been among the hardest hit by the pandemic. COVID-19 mortality rates are higher in neighbourhoods with a larger proportion of population groups designated as visible minorities, including Black people.

Black workers are at work on the frontlines of this pandemic. Many of these workers are women who are largely underpaid, working in dangerous and precarious working conditions without access to paid sick leave. This makes them even more vulnerable to the health, social and economic fallout of the pandemic.

“The pandemic has only worsened long-standing, stark social and economic inequities,” said Larry Rousseau, Executive Vice-President at the CLC. “Racial equity and the needs of Black communities must be a priority in the government’s COVID-19 response and recovery efforts. The government must seize the opportunity to centre the voices and concerns of Black workers and communities.”

Canada’s unions are also calling on the government to make stronger data collection and accountability a priority. The availability and collection of race-based data in Canada is sorely lacking. Without such data, the full scope and manifestations of systemic anti-Black racism and racial inequity will remain unaddressed.

Furthermore, there is an urgent need for critical investments in public social infrastructure including child care, Employment Insurance and affordable housing, as well as community-based health and social services.

The CLC will be hosting a webinar on equitable recovery for Black workers and communities in Canada during Black History Month. Information will be available on the CLC’s Facebook page.

In the meantime, be a part of our work by signing our petition today for a just, equitable and disaster-proof pandemic response and recovery plan.

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Statistics show workers of colour are more likely to be employed in precarious, low-wage jobs with no benefits. These workers also have higher unemployment rates. In fact, the unemployment rate of Black women is almost double that of non-racialized women. Black men earn 66 cents for every dollar a non-racialized man earns, and Black women only 56 cents per dollar.

One important way to address these disparities is to strengthen the federal Employment Equity Act, and restore mandatory compliance with the Act for federal contractors.

“Strengthening the Employment Equity Act is one step towards fairness for racialized workers,” said Canadian Labour Congress Vice-President Larry Rousseau. “In our country’s history we have seen men and women of colour work to support each other, even when discriminatory laws made it that much more difficult. We owe it to them to correct such inequality moving forward.”

From Desmond Davis and the other founders of the Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters to his daughter, Janice Gairey, former Human Rights Director at the Ontario Federation of Labour. From Carrie Best, who founded her own newspaper and worked to publicize the case of Viola Desmond, to her son Cal Best, former President of the Civil Service Association of Canada.

“These workers and activists and many, many more have paved the way and ensured the participation of racialized workers who follow in their footsteps,” said Rousseau. “Now we will pave the way for future workers.”

For Black History Month, the Canadian Labour Congress will be doing interviews with Black union leaders, please check our Facebook page for more information.

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This Black History Month, Canada’s unions say there can be no environmental justice without racial justice: addressing anti-Black racism is an integral part of the conversation on environmental activism.

Alongside Canada’s Indigenous communities, Black and people of African descent are disproportionately burdened with environmental hazards. This environmental racism includes exposure to toxic waste facilities, garbage dumps, and other sources of environmental pollution that negatively impact quality of life and health outcomes.

Africville, a small, yet vibrant, Black community in Halifax, NS, is an important example of how anti-Black racism was perpetuated by environmental policies. Despite paying municipal taxes, the community was deprived of basic services such as access to clean water, sewage, and waste management. Africville’s proximity to the development of an infectious disease hospital, a prison and a garbage dump, over time, added to deplorable living conditions imposed by the City.

The residents, after 120 years of resilience, were subject to a forced and dispersed relocation. Often overnight, over the span of a number of years, residents had their personal items transported in garbage trucks and their homes demolished.

This forced relocation, after years of marginalization by the City of Halifax, impacted the community by displacing residents both from their homes and their place of work, therefore exacerbating their economic insecurity.

Today, compounded by the barriers to sustainable employment, pay inequities, and barriers to opportunities for advancement in the workplace, Black workers and their families are still exposed to harmful and often life-threatening conditions in their home communities.

Hogan’s Alley in British Columbia, Leamington in Ontario, and Shelburne in Nova Scotia, are only a few examples of Black communities faced with the serious challenge of environmental racism.

“In the case of environmental racism in Black communities, environmental justice is linked to economic justice and that is at the root of why this is a trade union issue,” said CLC Executive Vice-President, Larry Rousseau.

A UN Working Group of Experts on People of African Descent recommended that the “Government of Canada should encourage federal, provincial and municipal governments to seriously consider the concerns of African Nova Scotians and help to develop legislation on environmental issues affecting them.”

Ingrid R.G. Waldron, author of There’s Something In The Water: Environmental Racism in Indigenous & Black Communities, has said that although environmental racism has a disproportionate impact on Black and Indigenous communities, pollution travels to adjacent communities, meaning this injustice affects everyone and will require collective action.

“Ingrid Waldron’s research shows the true reach of this issue — it expands far beyond Nova Scotia. We can’t ignore or deny the history of mistreatment of Black communities across Canada. Canada’s unions can play a key role in connecting the dots between environmental justice and anti-Black racism,” said Rousseau.

Last February, the Federal Government acknowledged the International Decade for People of African Descent (2015-2024). While this recognition is important, more action is required. Canada’s unions and our allies are ready to take on the issue of environmental racism in Canada.

To learn more about anti-Black racism in Canada and how workers are challenging it, sign up here.

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Such a strategy would require the government to commit to analyzing race-based statistics on how various institutional policies impact Canada’s Black communities. The key objective would be to eradicate institutionalized racism that is disproportionately harming this specific segment of Canadian society.

“Black people in Canada are systematically disadvantaged in workplaces, criminalized and victimized by the judicial system, and discriminated against in public services and housing,” said CLC President Hassan Yussuff.

The federal government should look to taking the following steps:

• Create an intersectional national anti-Black racism strategy;
• Institute criminal justice reform to address anti-Black racism in the judicial and prison system; and
• Call for an inquiry on the overrepresentation of Black children and youth in care of child protection services.

The United Nations General Assembly proclaimed 2015-2024 as the International Decade for People of African Descent as a response to the need to strengthen the rights of people of African descent. Canada’s federal government officially recognized the International Decade of People of African Descent this week.

“Recognition is a step, but it won’t mean much if it isn’t followed up with concrete commitments to addressing the real grievances people have,” said Yussuff.

Canada’s unions are striving to educate their membership on the issue of anti-Black racism.

Last year, the CLC hosted a series of webinars called Working While Black. The series highlighted the contributions of Black activists and organizers in Canada and helped build skills and knowledge towards confronting discrimination.

This year, Canada’s unions are celebrating Black History Month with the release of a special podcast later this month called “Smoke and Mirrors: Uncovering Truths about Human Rights in Canada”. Hosted by lawyer, writer and PhD candidate Hadiya Roderique, the episode will explore the history of anti-Black racism in Canada and its legacy on society today.

The podcast features interviews with Black intellectuals and activists including authors and historians Robyn Maynard and Dr. Afua Cooper, as well as the award-winning journalist Desmond Cole.

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