The annual convention of the BC Federation of Labour was disrupted last week by the walkout of the delegation representing one of its largest member unions, the Canadian Union of Public Employees, B.C. (CUPE BC).

The CUPE BC decision was triggered, president Barry O'Neill told the Tyee, by a statement issued on November 25 by the National Union of Public and General Workers (NUPGE).

The NUPGE statement announced that the executive board of the national umbrella group of eleven unions representing over 340,000 provincial government employees and other workers was withdrawing from its participation in the Canadian Labour Congress.

The CLC, the NUPGE letter charged, had failed to adequately deal with the issues created when member unions raid each others' memberships.

CLC president Ken Georgetti was at the BC Fed convention this week but declined to be interviewed. His office provided a statement from Georgetti that read:

"The Canadian Labour Congress regrets a decision announced on November 25 by the National Union of Public and General Employees (NUPGE) to leave the CLC. 
Officers of the CLC remain committed to working with NUPGE to resolve any outstanding issues and the lines of communication remain open. It is unfortunate that NUPGE's National Executive Board has decided to withdraw from the wider labour movement at a time when public sector workers and services are under increasing attack by governments and private interests."  

NUPGE's president James Clancy told the Tyee that his organization had been withholding some of its dues from the CLC to help defray the costs to NUPGE created by raids. In response, he said, the CLC had refused to allow NUPGE to be seated at its last convention in 2007.

In an emotional scene at the Monday opening of the Fed convention, CUPE BC's O'Neill took the position that B.C. unions that are components of NUPGE -- most significantly the B.C. Government Employees Union and the Health Sciences Association of B.C. -- should not be allowed to participate in the Fed convention because their parent organization had withdrawn from the CLC.

Unless the NUPGE-linked unions were removed from the Fed convention, which O'Neill told the Tyee was required by the CLC constitution, CUPE BC was required by its respect for the constitution, O'Neill said, to withdraw and caucus separately.

In a November 26 letter to NUPGE's Clancy obtained by the Tyee, CLC head Ken Georgetti wrote:

"I wish to advise you that the Executive Committee has met and effective January 1, 2011, no Component of the National Union can remain affiliated to any Provincial or Territorial Federation of Labour or District Labour Council."

Clancy told the Tyee that his organization had been concerned with CLC policy on member unions raiding other members' locals for more than two decades.

"It goes back, really to the 1980s, when the Canadian labour movement was nearly torn apart by raids between private sector unions," he said. Pointing to NUPGE dissatisfaction with CLC actions when the Teamsters raided a NUPGE component in Manitoba in 2005 and when the BC Nurses Union tried unsuccessfully to raid their B.C. component, BCGEU, Clancy branded CLC raiding policy as "ineffective and unevenly applied."

No surprises here for UBC Sauder School of Business professor emeritus and expert on labour matters Mark Thompson.

"The CLC hasn't ever done much about raiding," he told the Tyee. "The problem is really structural. The worst the CLC can do is to expel a raiding union. That's like throwing a pirate out of the navy."

But in the last analysis, Thompson doesn't share the distaste for raiding that is common in the labour movement.

"Members should choose what union they want to belong to," he said.

BCGEU media spokesman Brian Gardiner told the Tyee, "Discussions are ongoing and resolution is hoped for. Beyond that we have no further comment."

On Thursday, December 2, Fed president Jim Sinclair, newly returned to his office in an uncontested election on a convention floor with sections of empty chairs where the CUPE BC delegation should have been, told the Tyee that he was "upset and worried" about the dispute with CUPE BC.

"The Fed isn't whole without CUPE and NUPGE," he said. "We miss them."

Describing the situation as a "rift that started in Ottawa when NUPGE left the CLC," Sinclair indicated he hoped it would be resolved soon. In a later interview, CUPE BC president O'Neill expressed similar hopes.

Tom Sandborn reports regularly on labour and health policy issues for the Tyee . He welcomes your story tips and feedback at [email protected]