A very special night was had on the Drive last night, albeit with a realistic and political tone, a type of night that is often presumed as lacking in what some call Vancouver’s laid-back attitude: I speak of May Day 2007. This nite is a good shocker to that misconception of laid-back. In keeping with May Day, its non-offensive yet militant tradition was celebrated accordingly, when hordes of Vancouverites stood to oppose the vast exploitation and oppression of immigrant, migrant, and refugee workers around the world.
I was there when flocks of Vancouverites gathered at Clark Park (@ Commercial and East 14th Ave.) and began a march to Grandview Park (@ Charles and Commercial Dr.) for a gathering that commenced at 19:30. For more than 100 years “May Day” has come to symbolize the shared struggles of workers around the globe. Under the general title “May Day” you can find numerous annual gatherings around our continent (also see Links below!) coinciding with marches in North America, as people collectively stand up for immigrant rights.
The theme of this gathering: MARCH FOR WORKERS’ RIGHTS: SOLIDARITY WITH ALL IMMIGRANT, MIGRANT & UNDOCUMENTED WORKERS! Specific issues (and obviously Realities) that were discussed openly (and sung about beautifully) included predominately concerns about (1) workers’ rights, including hard-won wages, benefits and social services that are continuously being eroded as Canada joins and maintains its membership with other Imperialist countries, thus forcing increased labour flexibility in the name of ‘free-trade’ and the Neo-Liberal agenda.
The second (2) concern in this Solidarity march was workers’ right to Unionize and Organize, and how such privileges are continuously being attacked and stripped by our Government. Other issues on the agenda were (3) Canada’s increasing exploitation of immigrant labour to fill its relentless demand for cheap labour, private profit, labour mobility, and labour flexibility. All these are evident in Canadian state’s thrust to expand the country’s “Temporary Foreign Workers Program.”
It was made very clear that (4) many immigrants (with “landed” or “non-landed” status), migrants, and refugees - while being the most exploited at the workplace and often the ones to perform the hardest and most dangerous labour - constantly live without “status,” without sufficient access to health care or education, and live in poverty whilst facing the constant fear of being deported or detained. In short, while Canada boasts of a near 30-per-cent Unionized labour force, many many of our “workers” have access to NO such protections.
More generally about the evening, from a birds-eye standpoint, the gathering as a whole included music and food offerings with a family-friendly air, hence catering not only to the uber-political youth or activist groups but across and beyond such groups.
Acknowledgements: I’d like to thank the S.T.A.T.U.S. Coalition and the May Day 2007 Organizing Committee for a brilliant evening on the Drive.
More Links on May Day in North America:
http://www.anarkismo.net/newswire.php?story_id=371
http://www.marxists.org/subject/mayday/articles/north.html
http://www.socialistproject.ca/inthenews/MayDay.html
Photo from Peace Buttons.
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