CALM Columns

COLUMNS

* The Finn Line: Look upstream to see why folks are drowning
* Labour Law 101: Capital punishment in the workplace

Look upstream to see why folks are drowning

ED FINN / CALM -- Every day, it seems, there comes another appeal from an organization whose members have been hurt by some kind of government cutback. Whether it's the poor, the sick, the homeless, single mothers, seniors, students, Friends of the Earth or Friends of the CBC -- they all have valid claims on our support.

What puzzles me is not that so many groups are being victimized by the corporations and the politicians. If you're not a member of the business or financial elite, or an affluent professional, you're bound to make the hit list sooner or later. What I find disturbing is that each group seems to think its concerns are the only ones that matter. They don't seem to realize that the attacks on all are being masterminded by the same few. And that the only way to stop them is by pooling resources and launching a counterattack.

It's like a river

The present situation has been compared to a river in which many people -- old, young, men, women, white, black, aboriginal, etc. -- are being swept downstream towards the rapids. Strung out along each bank are various rescue teams, one for each sub-category of victims. The seniors' group pulls out the drowning seniors. The anti-poverty group tries to rescue the poor. The women's group hopes to save women. And so on.

Each organization has some strong swimmers, and is equipped with ropes, poles and life rings. It prides itself on how many people it saves. Not all of them, of course. Many are carried away downstream, and drown. But to rescue even some is considered a great achievement.

These organizations exist to pull people out of the river. Their activities are reactive, not pro-active. This is not to say that their leaders are unaware that somewhere upstream there are other groups -- the heavers and chuckers -- whose purpose it is to throw people into the river. They know that, and sometimes they criticize the chuckers, or go and try to reason with them (this is called, "lobbying").

Who's paying the heavers and chuckers?

But that's as far as they will go. The won't seriously try to find out why so many people are getting dunked, or who is paying the heavers and chuckers. If they did, they'd find there was a privileged minority whose members were never in danger of getting wet -- mainly because they were rich and powerful. They were so rich that they could easily afford to pay the heavers and chuckers (sometimes called "politicians") to throw everyone else in the river, so they wouldn't have to share their enormous wealth with them.

It's a pathetic sight when delegates from one of the rescue groups hike up the river to argue with the heavers. "Please stop throwing so many people in the river," they beg -- usually on bended knee. The chuckers promise to stop eventually. Maybe next year. Or the one after that.

They promise to stop chucking

But they never do. Or they say they have no choice but to keep filling the river with throwaway people, because there's not enough food or jobs for everyone in a system based on survival of the fittest. Some have to be discarded, and it's only fitting that they be the weakest and most helpless.

The rich and ruthless minority will sometimes fool the rescuers by replacing one bunch of chuckers with another. "Surely," the rescue organizations tell themselves, "this new gang won't throw in as many as the last." And they don't. They throw in more.

It never seems to occur to the rescue groups to try to find out why all the politicians up the river, no matter what they call themselves, continue to keep throwing people in. Or why all the people with the biggest incomes are never sacrificed.

Cry me a river

Now, admittedly, saving people from drowning is a noble exercise. But preventing them from being tossed in the river would be even nobler. To continue to tolerate a system in which civility and compassion have been displaced by the law of the jungle is to concede that there is nothing to be done to change this brutal system -- except to rescue and comfort some of its victims.

Cry me a river.

* Ed Finn is a research associate with the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives.

Capital punishment in the workplace

JUDITH McCORMACK / CALM -- "The capital punishment of the workplace" -- that's how some labour arbitrators characterize being fired. And no wonder. A fired worker faces the loss of his pay cheque, exile from the work-place, and sometimes damaged self-esteem as well.

That's one reason why the law says employers must take a series of smaller steps before a unionized worker can be fired. Called progressive discipline, this idea generally means that the employer must start out by warning a worker who is misbehaving on the job. If that doesn't work, he can be suspended next time. And if the misconduct continues, firing may be the eventual result.

The punishment must also fit the crime. If the problem is serious enough the worker might get the axe right away. On the other hand, if the misdeeds are minor, firing may not be in the cards, even if the employer has gone through the earlier steps. But the idea is this: the consequence for misbehaviour should be a series of gradually tougher measures.

Workers treated like children

Only part of the reason for this approach is the seriousness of being fired. The other assumption behind progressive discipline is that warnings and suspensions should be aimed at correcting the worker's behaviour, rather than punishing her. She should be given the chance to improve or change before the ultimate penalty is delivered.

At first glance this seems fair. It's certainly better than not getting any warning at all. But it also reflects a view of workers as unruly children who must be trained and disciplined -- not equal human beings who play a critical role in the workplace.

This goes back to an old-fashioned idea, that management is smarter or morally superior to workers, and that a big stick must be used to keep them in line. What's missing here is any sense that the complex difficulties people face require intelligent, sophisticated solutions. Or even that there might be something wrong with the work-place, not the worker. Now there's a novel idea.

* Judith McCormack, a former chair of the Ontario Labour Relations board, is now a labour lawyer with the firm of Sack, Goldblatt, Mitchell in Toronto.

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