1999 programs

#134 Canada Labour News / 1998 Wrap

Canada Labour News - a look at the work of Eugene Pawliuk and Donalda Cassel, an Edmonton couple whose web activism, including the website Canada Labour News, have made an important contribution to labour communications. Feedback - your calls on our Holiday's With A Conscience series, and
1998 Wrap - our favourite segments from the year that's passed.

#135 The MAI: Labour Speaks Out!

CLC President Bob White, BC Fed Secretary-Treasurer Angela Schira, Barry O'Neill ( CUPE BC), Jef Keighley (CAW) and Tom Sigurdson ( Building Trades) at the BC Legislature's Special Committee on the MAI, "Expert Witness Hearings" in October 1998.

#136 Waterfront protest to
"Turn the Tide With Union Pride"

A full length feature on the recent protest, led by rank and file dockworkers, which shut down the port of Vancouver for 8 hours. Nearly 1200 members and supporters of the International Longshore and Warehouse Union (ILWU) rallied February 2 1999 at Portside Park in dowtown Vancouver. They were protesting attempts by maritime employers to contract out union work and erode ILWU jurisdiction: part of the same "globalization" agenda responsible for recent attacks on dockers in Liverpool England and in Australia. Vancouver ILWU members are fighting back and are determined to "turn the tide with union pride".

#137 BEYOND McWORLD
Challenging Corporate Rule

A new video from Dave Robbins in Toronto, produced with funding from the Council of Canadians and the Polaris Institute, called Beyond McWorld: Challenging Corporate Rule. This video comes out of Project 2000, a new program designed to equip student and youth activists with the tools necessary to tackle issues of economic justice and environmental sustainability in this era of globalization and corporate rule.

#138 Public Forum on the
Vancouver School Board Budget (1st of 3)

The first of a series of 3 programs taped at the March 24 1999 public meeting to discuss the Vancouver School Board (VSB) budget, at Langara College in Vancouver, sponsored by the Vancouver Elementary School Teachers'Association (VESTA)and the Vancouver Secondary Teachers' Association (VSTA). The teachers'organized the meeting because the current VSB has shut down public input into the budget making process. This is in the context of years of budget cuts and staff layoffs. The teacher unions organized the public forum to hear from parents, teachers, school support workers and any citizen interested in a school board budget that best meets the needs of Vancouver children. Speakers in this first program include Barb Parrott for the VESTA; Jean Dandrea from the Canadian Union of Public Employees Local 15; Donna Peterson, a parent, from the group Education is a Right; and Noel Herron, from the Education Committee of the Committee of Progressive Electors, COPE.

#139 Public Forum on the
Vancouver School Board Budget (2nd of 3)

see #138 above. Speakers in this program include Irene Lanzinger for the VSTA; David Sellers from the Vancouver Teacher Librarians Association; parents Schula Leonard and Judy Salzman, ; Sam Fillipoff from the VESTA Inner City Ad Hoc Committee; and Leo Hutchinson from the Vancouver Adult Educators.

#140 Public Forum on the
Vancouver School Board Budget (3rd of 3)

see #138 above. Speakers in this program include Pat Gudlaugson from the VESTA Professional Development Committee; Gerda Trefoli from the Vancouver Teacher Counsellors; Anastasia Mirras from the Vancouver Teacher Psychologists; David Lyost from the Vancouver Speech Pathologists; Lois Sanford from the Vancouver Association of Secondary Alternative Programs; and Ted Sharples from Technical Studies at Britannia Secondary.

#141 Free Mumia Abul-Jamal!
and our recent paying video jobs including
Ontario Construction vid & CUPE BC Pay Equity vid

Millions for Mumia: Hundreds of thousands rallied around the world - including a group in Vancouver - to demand freedom and a new trial for Mumia Abul Jamal. He is an American political prisoner and black activist who has spent 17 years on death row for a murder he did not commit.

#142 Check Your Head conference
Winnipeg 1919 General Strike video

Six Weeks of Solidarity - To mark the (May 15) 90th anniversary of the 1919 Winnipeg General strike we air this fine video from the Manitoba Labour Education Centre.
Check Your Head- a report by Dennis Porter on this recent conference on Globalization, by and for activist youth.
Projectionists Struggle continues - locked-out for 6 months now, 60 B.C. Projectionists continue their "David and Goliath" struggle against two of the most powerful multi-national corporations in the world.

#143 Labour Online Special
Water Privatization series
Stoney remembered

Labour Online segments - This week we begin regular weekly webcasts ( in RealAudio from www.workingtv.com ) of Union Made, "labour's power hour" from Vancouver Co-operative radio To mark this event we look at labour communications "cyber-pioneers" including LabourStart in Britian, FreeSpeech Internet Television in Boulder Colorado, and Canada Labour News in Edmonton, Alberta.
The Private Drain on Our Public Water- Barry O'Neill, from CUPE BC from the April 21 Council of Canadians event.
Stoney Remembered - a brief tribute from our tape library to Gerry Stoney, the B.C. labour and NDP leader, who died of cancer May 14.

#144 Education Special - Part 1 of 2
Stop the Cuts!

A focus on local Vancouver issues in this two part series on the 1999 / 2000 Vancouver School Board (VSB) budget. This budget, passed in late April 1999, cuts $5 million in Special Education funds resulting in layoffs for 200 VSB employees beginning September 1. The result will be dramatic cuts in services to Vancouver's most vulnerable children, children with special needs. These cuts are in addition to the $16 million and 350 staff cut by the VSB in 1997. This program features VSB Blues, a new video we have just produced for VESTA, the Vancouver Elementary School Teachers' Association. And from our archives, we'll look at Mainstreaming of Special Needs Children, the very programs now being cut by the VSB.

#145 Education Special - Part 2 of 2
Stop the Cuts!

Continued from last week, part two of this two part series reports from the rally at the Vancouver School Board (VSB). Several hundred parents, students, teachers and other education workers rallied to Stop the Cuts! Saturday June 5.

#146 The Private Drain On Public Water
Part 1 of 2

Possibly the most important program we have ever broadcast, a warning about the coming global water crisis. This week with an introduction by Barry O'Neill, President of the Canadian Union Of Public Employees - BC Division (CUPE BC) and featuring Maude Barlow, Chair of the Council of Canadians. Also availabe as a one hour "special" (see below).

#147 The Private Drain On Public Water
Part 2 of 2

Possibly the most important program we have ever broadcast, a warning about the coming global water crisis. This week featuring Maude Barlow, Chair of the Council of Canadians. Also availabe as a one hour "special" (see below).

#148 Talking Union series
1 of 3 - with ex-B.C. Premier Glen Clark

Recorded July 22 1999 at the Hospital Employees' Union Summer School, then-Premier Glen Clark, up close and candid, amongst friends with unionized health care workers. In this program, Clark takes on the right's latest vote getting ploy: tax cuts.
Also - Projectionists Update: a report from a mass rally held July 27 to support 60 B.C. cinema projectionists, locked out by Famous Players and Cineplex theatre chains.

#149 Talking Union series
2 of 3 - with ex-B.C. Premier Glen Clark

Recorded July 22 1999 at the Hospital Employees' Union Summer School, then-Premier Glen Clark, up close and candid, amongst friends with unionized health care workers. In this program Clark answers audience questions about a range of issues.
Also in this program - Projectionists Update: a report from a mass rally held July 27 to support 60 B.C. cinema projectionists, locked out by Famous Players and Cineplex theatre chains.

#150 Talking Union series
3 of 3 - with the new President of the B.C.
Federation of Labour, Jim Sinclair

Recorded July 23 1999 at the Hospital Employees' Union Summer School, Jim Sinclair Clark, on the Global trade and his experience in the fishing industry with "free" trade agreements.
Also in this program - Your Feedback: our previous two programs with Glen Clark got a lot of resonse. We put your phone messages and e-mail on air.

#151 Bitter Paradise

Part 1 of 2 programs, plus one hour Special broadcast of complete video, see below
Bitter Paradise: the Sellout of East Timor A fine video by local filmmaker Elaine Briere, which documents the human rights situation in pre-independence East Timor, and the Canadian government's shameful complicity with the business interests responsible for keeping it that way.

#152 Bitter Paradise

Part 2 of 2 programs, plus one hour Special broadcast of complete video, see below
Bitter Paradise: the Sellout of East Timor as above

#153 Burma General Strike & Labour Day

Part 1 of 2 programs, plus one hour Special broadcast of complete video, see below
Labour Day Global: Burmese workers attempted to organize a General Strike on September 9, 1999, a very dangerous act in a country that has been ruled by a brutal and oppressive military junta since 1962. The Vancouver Burmese community organized a rally on Labour day, to build support for the "9-9-99" action. We report on the rally and feature video on the slave labour and child labour the Burmese are forced to endure..
Labour Day Local: highlights from the annual Union Label Committee Labour Day picnic at Confederation Park in Burnaby.

#154 Privatization Across Sectors

From the May 12 1999 Vancouver & District Labour Council Forum, organized by the council's Environment Committee, featuring, Fred Muzin, President of the Hospital Employees' Union, on the privatization of health care, and George Heyman, President of the B.C. Government and Service Employees Union, on the privatization of natural resources and the decrease in provincial government regulation of resource extraction.

#155 "Mouseland" & "Global Pillage"

"Mouseland" featuring the voice of Tommy Douglas, the first leader of Canada's NDP. The classic tale of mice in a country called Mouseland, who grow tired of a government made up of cats. Airing this week to celebrate the election of Gary Doer's NDP Government in Manitoba. "Global Pillage" from the Canadian Labour Congress, a primer for consumers in the new Global economy.

#156 Music Videos & Activist Updates

Hosted by Glen Clark, this program was produced during a busy period of paying work for working TV. It features brief activist updates on