scrub

The concert will feature performances from some amazing local and international hip hop artists:

Agricultural Deaths Preventable: Migrant Advocacy group calls on Provincial Government to Protect Workers: Snap inspections, Coroner’s Inquest, and Criminal Investigation needed to show Zero Tolerance for Migrant Fatalities

Toronto – Justicia For Migrant Workers (J4MW), a migrant worker advocacy group is saddened to learn of the latest tragedy facing the migrant worker community. On Friday September 10, 2010 J4MW learnt that two Jamaican migrant agricultural workers died as a result of workplaces injuries suffered at Filsinger Farms near Owen Sound, Ontario. “We are aggrieved by this tragedy,” states Tzazna Miranda Leal an organizer with Justicia for Migrant Workers, “We mourn this loss, and we send our condolences to the families of these workers” continues Miranda Leal.

While details of the fatalities are pending due to an ongoing investigation by the Ministry of Labour, the Jamaican government is reporting that Ralston White and Paul Roach may have died from the inhalation of toxic fumes. Health and safety violations are an everyday occurrence for migrant workers. From chemical and pesticides exposure, to faulty equipment, to workplace bullying and harassment, migrant workers from across the province have described countless examples of dangers while working.

It is critical to examine whether or not these men received safety equipment, what education and training they received or if they were provided information relating to their rights under the Occupational Health and Safety Act. J4MW further argues that the structure of the Seasonal Agricultural Worker Program (SAWP) and the Temporary Foreign Worker Program (TFWP), which employ approximately 30,000 migrant farm workers in Canada, denies migrant agricultural workers labour mobility and the ability to exert rights. Fear of reprimand–firings, repatriations/deportations and permanent disbarment from working in Canada–is a constant concern for many workers, whose employment and ability to work in Canada depends largely on their employers’ approval.

J4MW is urging the Minister of the Labour to consider the following options in addressing this tragedy: Snap inspections for all workplaces and accommodations where migrant workers live and work; a coroner’s inquest into the details relating to these workplace deaths; an appeals mechanism built into the SAWP and TFW so that migrant workers cannot be arbitrarily and unilaterally repatriated to their homeland (anti-reprisal protection); increased labour rights and protections for all migrant workers;  and a criminal investigation into this workplace fatality as mandated by section 217.1 of the criminal code of Canada. The code states that:

Everyone who undertakes, or has the authority, to direct how another person does work or performs a task is under a legal duty to take reasonable steps to prevent bodily harm to that person, or any other person, arising from that work or task.

Every year over 300 workers die in occupational related fatalities across Ontario.  Countless others are maimed or injured. Agriculture remains one of the most dangerous occupations across Canada. Since 1999 there have been 33 reported deaths of migrant workers employed under the auspices of the Seasonal Agricultural Workers Program in Ontario and 1,129 medical repatriations of SAWP migrants (workers who left Canada because of illness or injuries sustained while in Ontario). The numbers of migrant workplace injuries and deaths are underreported because of premature repatriations and workers dying in their home countries as a result of injuries sustained while working in Canada.

For more information please contact Chris Ramsaroop 647 834 4932- ramsaroopchris@gmail.com
Shane Martinez (416) 971-8832. martines@lao.on.ca

Context and perspective are what we should always keep in mind. This is a wonderful article in that it reminds us of both – frank

John Moore, Special to the National Post · Wednesday, Aug. 18, 2010

You’re shivering in the sharp cold of a winter’s night outside of the hottest club in town. You try your hardest to attract the attention of the doorman. You smile and say clever things to your friends in a raised voice to look more deserving than everyone else in line. Eventually — if you’re lucky — he unclips the velvet rope, the door swings open and you’re swept into the party. He refastens the rope. Now everyone behind you is a sucker.

Every immigrant to Canada thinks he’s the last good newcomer. It’s been like that since the arrival of the first settlers. The natives thought little of the French. After the conquest, the English were reviled as inferior, maladroit rubes. As the countries of origin of our newcomers became more diverse, each new wave was regarded as lazy, grasping, unwashed and unwanted. Trace your family’s roots and not only are you guaranteed to find an immigrant but also likely an ethnic or cultural community that was denigrated in its time.

And how soon we forget it. Every year we throw glorious parades to celebrate the Irish. In the 1850s the Irish were so hated, the city of Toronto struck a committee to figure out how to stop them from destroying the fabric of its culture. George Brown described the travail of being waylaid by Irish beggars in the pages of The Globe and Mail: “They are as ignorant and vicious as they are poor. They are lazy, improvident and unthankful.”

With the arrival of a boat load of Tamil refugees, those of us already inside the velvet rope have a new minority to fear and demonize. The charges are always the same. “They’re terrorists!” one listener to my radio show wrote to me. “And they will import their civil war to Canada.” The listener can be forgiven for forgetting that the Irish spent years fighting out their sectarian conflict in the new world and shaking down ex patriots for money to fund the war at home. One of only two political assassinations in our country’s history — that of Thomas D’Arcy McGee — was carried out by Irish terrorists.

True these might be valid arguments against letting in anyone from a country torn by civil strife, but I wonder how many of those descended from the Irish think it was a terrible mistake to let their forefathers in?

When I described to my listeners how the Italians were tarred following the Second World War and yet today we celebrate the enclaves where they continue to live in large concentrations, a man named Mario texted me: “Yeah but Italians look after their neighbourhoods. These filth have no respect for where they live.” He might want to ask his parents or grandparents how many times they were referred to as “filth” back in the day.

A caller named Marion upbraided me for being out of touch with the spirit of the people. “You pay for these immigrants if you want them. Everybody here is losing everything; their health care [and] the roads are in poor condition.”

One of my colleagues has griped indignantly that by raising our history of intolerance toward newcomers I am necessarily calling anyone with concerns about the arrival of the MV Sun Sea a racist. Not at all. But if Public Security Minister Vic Toews and others who like to stir up panic over this latest arrival of refugees find themselves sharing political terrain with unabashed racists, that’s their burden to shoulder.

This doesn’t mean we don’t need to have an adult conversation about whom we welcome and how we integrate them into our national culture. But as long as people don’t even know what the difference between an immigrant and a refugee is, one has to question just how adult a conversation it’s going to be.

But it is good to be inside the velvet rope isn’t it?

-John Moore is the host of Moore in the Morning on Toronto’s News-Talk1010 AM. His people came from England, Ireland and the United States.

Read more: http://www.nationalpost.com/todays-paper/soon+forget/3411881/story.html#ixzz0wy4APxkK

Extrajudicial killings of two lay leaders of Iglesia Filipina Independiente (Philippine Independent Church), Benjamin Bayles and Joselito Agustin, journalists Desiderio Camangyan and Nestor Bedolido, labour union leader Edward Panganiban and farmers Julio Etang and Borromeo Cabilis a month before Noynoy Aquino’s inauguration as president; the murder of Aklan Bayan Muna coordinator Fernando Baldomero, 78-year old farmer Pascual Guevarra, public school teachers Mark Francisco, Edgar Fernandez, and Josephine Estacio in the 10 days following this Philippine president’s inauguration.

Meanwhile the number of jobless and unemployed Filipinos grew to 11.4 million in January 2010, the number of poor families reached 4.7 million and the number of poor Filipinos reached 27.6 million in 2006, national debt has ballooned to P4.36 trillion in February 2010, or more than double the P2.17 trillion debt inherited from the Estrada government.
And President Benigno Aquino III is delivering his first State of the Nation Address on July 26, 2010. What will he say? More importantly, what action will he take?
Join us as we address and push forward people’s rights, social justice,  economic development, national sovereignty

STATE OF THE NATION: THE FILIPINO PEOPLE’S AGENDA
5 PM. Saturday, July 24, 2010
Ontario Institute for Studies in Education, 5th Floor, Rm 5-250
252 Bloor St. West (just above the St. George subway)

Our guest: Dr. Constancio ‘Chandu’ Claver Chairperson, National Organizing Committee, Bayan-Canada
With cultural presentations, solidarity messages, a tribute to people’s heroes, survivors of the state’s human rights violations and a call to action.
Sponsored by: Bayan Canada in Toronto, Migrante Ontario and the Philippine Solidarity Network-Canada
For information:  migrante.ontario@gmail.com or justpeacenet@yahoo.ca

By Carrie Stetler

June 26, 2009, 4:31PM

http://www.nj.com/homegarden/design/index.ssf/2009/06/julia_cooper_commemorative_sta.html

from sister Salimah Valiani

Dear friends,

I am pleased to be able to send you information about a cross-Canada speaking tour with visits in most of your cities, for a change. [snip]. It is rare that I can send events relevant to you all given the limitations of most events and the spread of all those in this list.
You will no doubt recall the case of Abousfian Abdelrazik, who though now returned home to Canada, is still not able to move around freely and fully settle back in. He will share his experience in the tour, so please circulate these dates widely.

IN solidarity,
SV

To break the silence and end the fear Read more…