In this series, we are exploring key challenges facing working people – from the fights unions are leading today, to global trends affecting workers, to what the future holds for the labour movement. Each session will feature CLC experts and leaders sharing insights and analysis on the issues that matter most to workers.

Webinar #2: Addressing the Housing Crisis

In this webinar, we’ll be joined by Lisa Freeman, Senior Researcher with the CLC’s Social and Economic Policy Department and our in-house expert housing, and Michèle Biss, Executive Director of the National Right to Housing Network. Together, we’ll be chatting about:

• The housing crisis and how the federal government is addressing it.
• A closer look at Build Canada Homes and the National Housing Strategy.

Tuesday, March 31, 2026
1:00 PM – 2:00 PM ET

This webinar will be delivered in English, with simultaneous interpretation in French.

Register here: https://us02web.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_1FVmpV0ZTZeCZZ7WDoUHzg

We hosted our first webinar in this series in January, where we discussed Retirement Security. If you missed it, you can find the recording here with English captions, and here with French subtitles.

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This series will explore key challenges facing working people – from the fights unions are leading today, to global trends affecting workers, to what the future holds for the labour movement. Each session will feature CLC experts and leaders sharing insights and analysis on the issues that matter most to workers.

The first webinar in the series will focus on the ongoing retirement security crisis.

The Issues and You: The Retirement Security Crisis Today
Wednesday, January 21, 2026
1:00 PM – 2:00 PM ET

Participants will hear from Chris Roberts, National Director of the CLC’s Social and Economic Policy Department, and the CLC’s in-house expert on pensions and retirement security. The webinar will examine why retirement insecurity remains a major issue for workers, even a decade after the Canada Pension Plan (CPP) enhancement, and what it means for workers today.

This webinar will be delivered in English, with simultaneous interpretation in French.

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With a diverse membership base, the NSTU is home to over 10,000 active members, consisting of educators from Primary to Grade 12 in public schools, as well as teachers from the Atlantic Provinces Special Education Authority.

As an organization deeply rooted in its commitment to educational excellence and professional development, the NSTU advocates for the rights and welfare of teachers while striving to create an environment conducive to effective teaching and learning.

“The NSTU’s affiliation with the broader labour movement is another example of the growth and solidarity of Canada’s unions. Workers across Canada stand united in their fight for the rights and dignity of all workers, including teachers. We’re proud to welcome them onboard,” said Bea Bruske, President of the Canadian Labour Congress.

Over the past few years, we’ve seen provincial governments attempt to undermine teachers, erode public education systems by reducing funding, weaken teachers’ unions and public boards, and trample queer and trans children’s rights to privacy and safety in schools.

“Recognizing the critical role educators play in shaping our society and supporting children throughout Nova Scotia, it’s important that we value their contributions, recognize their professionalism and promote the recruitment and retention of qualified teachers,” added Bruske.

“The NSTU has been grateful for the support and solidarity it has received from other unions across the province as we work to address the growing challenges facing our public school system,” says NSTU President Ryan Lutes. “Strengthening the bonds with other unions through the CLC is crucial to our efforts in advocating for safe and healthy learning environments for students and their teachers.”

Canada’s unions lead the charge in making transformative change for workers and families through advocacy and organizing.

NSTU joins a united labour movement of over 50 national and international unions under the CLC umbrella, collectively advocating for over three million workers.

The post Unified labour front: Nova Scotia Teachers’ Union joins Canadian Labour Congress appeared first on Canadian Labour Congress.

We need to advocate for better mental health resources and supports for workers. This can help prevent mental illnesses from occurring in the first place. That’s why the Canadian Labour Congress offers a Mental Health At Work online portal.

The post Mental Health Resource Centre appeared first on Canadian Labour Congress.

Members of the Elementary Teachers’ Federation of Ontario, the Ontario English Catholic Teachers’ Association, and the Ontario Secondary School Teachers’ Federation have overwhelmingly voted to stand up and fight for publicly-funded education.

Teachers and education workers are speaking for frustrated parents, fed up with growing class sizes and dramatic cuts to teaching staff. They are standing with students, who are facing a loss of access to course options and programs. They are sticking up for Ontario’s vulnerable and at-risk learners, who will be hit hardest by Doug Ford’s spending cuts. They are championing early learning by defending Ontario’s full-day kindergarten program and its unique and successful mix of teacher and early childhood educator expertise.

Doug Ford does not have the courage to own up to the scale and destructiveness of his cuts. He hopes that spin and blatant falsehoods will fool Ontarians.

Parents, teachers, education workers, students and voters have had enough. By undermining publicly-funded education and attacking our schools, the Ford government is jeopardizing the future of our children and Ontario’s economy.

Not only has the Ford government attempted to weaken the foundations of publicly-funded education, they have shown contempt for free and fair collective bargaining, most recently with Bill 124, which tramples the Charter rights of Ontario public sector employees.

The unions of the CLC demand the Ford government cease its assault on publicly-funded education, listen to the needs of parents, students, and education workers, and get serious about negotiating a fair settlement with these affiliates.

The unions of the CLC pledge to:

• Stand in solidarity with, and support, Ontario teachers and education workers;
• Stand in defense of high-quality publicly-funded education;
• Defend teachers and education workers against the Ford government’s attacks; and
• Recommit our efforts to fight for students and high-quality publicly-funded education.

The CLC represents over three million workers and brings together Canada’s national, international and provincial unions, along with the provincial and territorial federations of labour and 107 district labour councils, whose members work in virtually all sectors of the Canadian economy, in all occupations and in all parts of Canada.

The post Statement on educational sector collective bargaining in Ontario appeared first on Canadian Labour Congress.

Within ten days, about 2,500 workers in six hospitals and nine nursing homes were on wildcat strikes and hundreds of other health care workers joined work-to-rule and other worker solidarity efforts. Premier Ralph Klein could only watch in horror as his budget cuts backfired.

Alberta’s Conservative government eliminated tens of thousands of public sector jobs between 1993 and 1994 while cutting the wages and benefits of the workers who remained. The 1994 budget delivered a 20% cut in health care, a 21% cut in post secondary education and a 12.4% cut in K-12 education. Welfare rolls were cut in half over one year. Within two years, Alberta program spending declined by over 21%. Homelessness climbed 740% during the Klein years in office.

The labour movement, overwhelmed by the ferocity of the government’s attack on people to delivered essential services, was left struggling to respond. So, when the Klein-appointed Calgary Health Authority moved to further the province’s privatization agenda by contracting out the jobs of Calgary hospital laundry workers, it expected little resistance. They were wrong.

The workers had already taken a 28% cut in the previous round of bargaining in order to keep their jobs. They had given enough to “King Ralph” and were determined not to become pawns in the Conservative’s game plan to destroy the public sector.

The first to respond were 60 laundry workers at the Calgary General Hospital, members of the Canadian Union of Public Employees. When they learned that their jobs would be handed over to K-Bro Linens in Edmonton, they all called in sick. Workers at the Foothills Hospital where the laundry workers were members of the Alberta Union of Provincial Employees, followed suit the following day.

Within ten days, about 2,500 workers in six hospitals and nine nursing homes were on wildcat strikes and hundreds of other health care workers joined work-to-rule and other worker solidarity efforts. Trade unionists from outside the health sector as well as many members of the general public demonstrated solidarity with the strikers on their picket line and in public rallies.

Premier Klein watched in horror as his carefully orchestrated dismantling of public services in Alberta seemed to crumble. The Calgary Health Authority, under pressure from the government, offered the unions a delay in contracting out of 18 months, long enough for most of the affected workers to find other jobs. The “tough guy” government of Ralph Klein had blinked and it was a group of mainly immigrant women workers who had caused it to blink.

The courage displayed by the laundry workers inspired a wave of strikes and job actions by other health care workers; licensed practical nurses and general support service workers repeatedly took part in some of the largest walk outs in Alberta’s history during the closing years of that decade.

While the laundry workers’ victory was a partial one, the events that they set in motion marked a victory for all Alberta working people. The cuts and privatizations largely stopped for several years and the government began reinvesting in public services however modestly.

“I would just like to add to that, and that is that after the laundry workers’ strike the Klein government was a different animal than before the laundry workers’ strike. Before that, as Tom said, they were ideologically driven, they refused to discuss. There was no discussion of any of their policies, they were simply enacted. After that they became much more of a kind of populist government. Yes, they still had their ideological conditioning, but they looked before they leapt. They compromised, they backed off of things. If it looked like people were ready to make a fight out of things, they backed off. They did not come in and take people on directly that way again I don’t think, and I think that was a victory for the labour movement.”

Jim Selby interview.

– – – – – – – – – –

Source: Alberta Labour History Institute

The post Ralph Klein blinks – conservative plans to slash budgets and privatize health services thwarted by Calgary laundry workers. appeared first on Canadian Labour Congress.

Mike Harris’ plan to overhaul Ontario’s education system did not entirely go as planned. Introduced as the Education Quality Improvement Act, Bill 160 was a massive, 226 page plan to radically centralize power in the hands of the Minister of Education and the Cabinet, and then impose standards that had previously been set in the collective agreements negotiated by school boards with their local teachers and their unions. It imposed more work, with less time to do it as the government secretly planned to slash education spending.

Ontario’s teachers walked out in protest.

At the time, the protest was the largest work action by teachers in North American history, involving 126,000 teachers. Picket lines were set up across the province. Demonstrations took place at schools, on the streets, and at the offices of Members of Provincial Parliament (MPPs). Teachers and their unions organized mass rallies, including one on the front lawn of the legislature at Queen’s Park that drew thousands.

The government responded with a propaganda campaign, spending millions on television ads in an attempt to label the protest as an “illegal strike” and teacher unions as selfish “special interests” – but people were not buying it. One week into the protest, a poll found 63% of Ontarians wanted the government to scrap its reforms.

Harris’ attempt to have the protest declared an illegal strike by the courts also struck‑out when judges ruled that the teachers’ action was a legitimate protest. He responded by threatening back-to-work legislation to silence and punish the teachers instead.

After two weeks away from work, many teachers felt they had made their point and voted to end the strike.

No, they had not stopped the government’s plans to shift power away from local school boards, but they had won over public opinion. Talking with students, parents and media, the teachers and their unions exposed hidden aspects of the government’s agenda – plans to lay off teachers and cut education budgets that Harris himself had denied during the election campaign.

The solidarity shown by Ontario’s unions in support of the teachers and their protest also planted the seeds of future resistance to the ideologically driven austerity agenda that was at the heart of the Harris CSR.

Canada’s unions have a long history of standing up to the unfairness of government austerity, especially the ferocious and cult-like austerity seen in the 1990s under conservative-minded governments lead by Mike Harris in Ontario, Ralph Klein in Alberta and more recently under Liberal governments in British Columbia and Nova Scotia.

Funding tax cuts for wealthy investors and powerful interests by slashing public spending on health care, education, public infrastructure and social programs is an old corporate trick. So is undermining the unions, journalists, public institutions and social movements that stand up against them.

The 1997 Ontario teachers’ protest was a moment when people stood up and said enough. While it did not stop the government, it made them blink and it woke people up.

The post After 2 weeks in the streets, Ontario teachers end their historic mass protest. appeared first on Canadian Labour Congress.