The Liberal government’s 2022 budget is a budget for Bay Street, not for working-class Canadians. It’s full of incentives and subsidies for big business, including fossil fuel companies and private developers. It has a housing program that will leave thousands without homes, and a weak and slowly implemented dental program that won’t cover everyone. The […]
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After six years of BC’s public health emergency due to poison drugs things are much worse. The health emergency was declared following 474 deaths in 2015, yet in 2021 there were at least 2,232 drug fatalities. In contrast, there were 1,522 COVID deaths for all of 2021. After six years deaths are nearly five times […]
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It would be a grave mistake for the NDP and union leaders to assume that everything is back to normal now that the convoy has ended. It isn’t. The convoy provoked a decisive change in Canadian politics, with the alt-right pumped after the successful encampment and US border blockades. But more importantly, these actions have […]
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Capitalism’s overriding imperative is to extract wealth from the land and labour in order to enrich the elite. Workers struggle to survive or eke out a living as profits flow into the pockets of the wealthy. As capitalism replaced feudalism, the exploitation of both land and labour played out in countries around the world. As […]
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The “freedom” convoy has come and gone. It has had a major politicizing impact on Canadian society as well as having repercussions internationally. Unfortunately, it has disoriented some on the left — some have claimed it to be a working-class uprising aimed at the ruling-class elites while others have denounced it as a manifestation of […]
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A couple of days ago I asked my old friend Vladan, who taught me how to drive big rigs, about his thoughts on the so-called “truckers’ freedom convoy.” Vladan, who has been trucking long-distance for the last 25 years, answered with resignation in his voice. “What can I say? I waited at the Ambassador Bridge […]
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Now that the convoy has been cleared from Ottawa’s streets, it is worth remembering when desperate workers tried to take their protest to the federal government in Ottawa in 1935. The “On to Ottawa Trek” saw unemployed men housed in military relief camps travel by rail from Vancouver, stopping at towns along the way gaining […]
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Written by Socialist Alternative members in Alberta. Socialist Alternative interviewed Tanner Layton, a striking Faculty and Socialist Alternative member. On the morning of February 10, after failed negotiations between the University of Lethbridge Faculty Association (ULFA) and the University’s Board of Governors, the ULFA began legal strike action. How long have you been part of […]
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The cost of expanding the Trans Mountain Pipeline is out of control. When the government bought the pipeline from Kinder Morgan in 2018 for $4.5 billion, it was estimated that it would cost a further $7.4 billion to complete the expansion. Now the estimate has nearly tripled to $21.4 billion! The increased costs are partly […]
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While the convoy has been cleared from the streets of Ottawa, many questions need to be asked both about the role of former police and military personnel within the convoy, and the response of the police to the convoy and blockades. The police’s general motto is “to protect and to serve.” Ottawa’s police department expanded […]
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