Victory to Toronto Campus Strikes!

MARCH 7—Nearly 10,000 unionists at the University of Toronto and York University began strike action in the first week of March. U of T teaching assistants in Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE) Local 3902 Unit 1 overwhelmingly rejected an insulting “tentative offer” at a February 27 mass meeting then set up picket lines around the campus starting March 2. A day later, York TAs and sessional instructors, organized in CUPE 3903, began a strike of their own, leading the university to suspend all classes. As we go to press, CUPE 3903 has announced a tentative agreement at York, while the U of T administration is refusing to reopen negotiations.

Key issues in both strikes include job security and salaries, which currently fall well below the poverty line. All but the most privileged students are familiar with the hardship and precariousness of low-paid employment on short-term contracts. Instructors at York have also taken aim at the exorbitant tuition fees demanded from international graduate students. Undergrads from working-class and immigrant backgrounds thus have a particular stake in the unions’ struggle, and could play a vital role in mobilizing broader support. Victory for both strikes hinges on a perspective to shut the campuses down completely.

Trotskyist League supporters have joined picket lines and strike rallies at U of T’s downtown campus, where many classes are continuing. While distributing Spartacist Canada and Workers Vanguard to strikers and undergrads, our comrades have urged students to boycott classes and join the pickets. We have also motivated opposition to the policy pushed by the leaders of multiple campus unions, whereby members are instructed to cross the CUPE 3902 picket lines and go to work. The labour movement was built on the understanding that picket lines mean don’t cross. It is in the vital interests of all workers, organized and unorganized, to rebuild the labour movement with such a fighting perspective. Victory to the Toronto campus strikes!