Day Labo(u)rer

I'VE BEEN LUCKY enough in my lifetime to have belonged to three Labor organizations who protected my rights as a worker.

When I was a part-time instructor at Ryerson University, I was a member of the Canadian Union of Public Employees. The poor pay and high workload involved in instructing writing (you have to read a lot and you can't exactly give multiple choice tests) plus the fact that my writing career heated up a bit made it impossible for me to continue -- at least for now. But I still miss teaching, and the day to day contact it gave me with young and fresh thinking.

An academic institution is obviously a place of special trust, and there are many issues that could become quite serious if not dealt with in a timely manner. I never had need of my union there, but I was glad that they were working on my behalf. And even better was the fact that the steward, Don Elder, had been MY instructor in Television Production way back in the day.

While I worked at CityTv, until I left the union to become a Producer at the Space Channel, it was NABET, and later the Communications, Energy and Power workers who protected my rights.

That union was one I grumbled about while I was in it. Like a lot of people at CityTv, I was single and didn't have any kids, and every year we paid for the kids' Christmas Party (which only a grinch would sninch at) -- but there was also this family picnic that was, like, lame if you were one of the army of young people that kept that place going.

But though the union at Citytv didn't do much for me personally, I was very glad it was there. Because Citytv had a reputation for working their charges very hard and paying them poo-level wages. During my time at City, there was tremendous growth in the company -- and I heard many stories of the bad old days before the union. You simply couldn't believe what people made there. It was outrageous.

Later, even with the Union, there were managers at CHUM who, shall we say, proved themselves to be less than progressive. Nowhere was this more evident than when layoffs started. Inevitably, they would target a few individuals for firing not because of lack of skill, but because Citytv still had a bit of a high school environment. I know a couple of people for whom the "bumping" phenomenon actually saved a job that otherwise would have disappeared because of a whim or a personal score being settled.

When the restructuring of the stations at 299 Queen West, post sale to CTV went down, I knew several more people who were packaged out in as humane a manner as possible. In a non-union shop, this simply wouldn't have happened.

Now, of course, I am active in my third union, the Writers Guild of Canada. I became active in the WGC (I'm a Central Region representative on the National Council) because I had directly seen how the WGC had fought for me over the last few years.

In the last year, I've been the beneficiary of the last negotiated contract, which concerned New Media rights. I was paid quite fairly to write (along with my colleagues) interactive segments for The Border.

I was also involved in a credit arbitration, and sought advice on a show where I had accepted less than favorable terms. I didn't ultimately prevail in that, but the patient explanation from the staff member allowed me to take the lesson, and know how to never find myself in that position again.

Then there's the fact that I have health benefits again. Good ones.

And I'm forgetting the biggest one -- a grievance procedure that, settled in my favor, netted me a good six or seven thousand dollars I never thought I was going to see, ever.

That's why I became more involved. After fuzzy notions of how unions helped workers, I got to see up close in my own life how the organization benefited me directly. That's a slightly different take on how I usually talk about the WGC here. In most cases, there I'm talking about the organization's efforts to protect the collective rights of Canadian Screenwriters. Believe me...that side of it is even more impressive up close.

So on this Labor Day I think it's appropriate to thank the people who make me able to do what I do.

That brings me again to Maureen Parker, Exec Director of the Writers Guild of Canada, and her staff. They really do toil day in and day out trying to improve the lot of the Canadian Screenwriter, and I owe them a debt.

My agent is a guy named Glenn Cockburn at Meridian Artists. He's a friend and a sounding board, a clear-headed strategian and an advocate when I need him to be. He's pragmatic when I need him to be. He's a neurosis-killing machine when I need him to be that, too. Glenn is helped ably by his fellow agent Andrea Glenn (no relation...I know, I know, I just think that's funny.) In the last year, I've also gotten good advice from Lesley Grant when she was at Meridian, (she's since moved on) and the able phone stylings of two Chrisses -- Pare and Pozzebon.

Right now, as I finish up a second season on The Border, I'm helped with story problems and structure nightmares by my fellow writers -- Sarah Dodd, Greg Nelson, Janet MacLean, and David Barlow, who can look at your outline and fix the hole in it with a speed and fleetfooted-ness that I aspire to. James Battiston is our story department coordinator. Oh I kid him about being hapless sometimes, but the truth is that he's very often almost adequate. And the stuff that he does, if he didn't, we'd have to do. And TV writers don't need any other reason to stop work.

There are others in the Production Office who keep the machine of The Border moving - Alison Waxman, Geoff Ewart, Graham Scholes, Jennifer Chovancek, Matt Code, the scarily efficient Alex House, and PM Maribeth Daley who keeps my cheques coming, which is, like, awesome.

And finally, I guess the other two people I have the most to thank when it comes to seeing the right side of Labor is my mom, Anita, and my Dad, Denis.

I remember when my mom went back to work. I was about ten or eleven, and I think, shamefully now, that I wasn't so keen on the idea. I got over that, though. Over the years, my mom worked first in a real estate office, keeping that place humming -- and then she became the administrator, and later the Executive Director, of a small Charity that helped make the lives of Toronto Seniors better.

I watched through the years as my mom went from being a nervous speaker to the person the United Way would reliably call upon to knock 'em dead in speech situations. I watched my mom craft letters, plan events, troubleshoot and solve all manner of problems. She also didn't let people get away with bullshit, and clashed with her board of directors or with people encroaching on the needs of her seniors, when that's what needed doing. She fought always for the people she was trying to serve.

She also took too much of the job home with her and was a relentless perfectionist, so at least I know who gets the blame for that delightful little trait.

My Dad did many things through the years that were right, and foresighted in the raising of his kids. But one of the greatest, for me anyway, was one that I didn't even realize at the time.

When I was little, my Dad managed bottling plants for Pepsi, and later, Seven Up. He showed me two sides of the coin that would forever shape my view of Labor.

First, in Florida and then in Canada, there were a few times when my Dad took me to work. He showed me around the plant. He'd greet all the workers with a smile or a joke, and they'd joke back with him. It didn't matter what they did, whether their job was top tier or bottom of the assembly line. My dad had a moment for each. When he asked how things were going, he meant it. A couple guys actually brought up stuff that wasn't working right, and I remember my dad nodding and saying, "Don't worry, we'll fix that."

Later in the office, he explained different people to me and what they did and then he told me the most important thing: nobody is better than you, and you are better than nobody. People may work for you, but everybody plays their role, and you're making a mistake if you don't respect and understand their role.

My Dad was involved in several Labor negotiations in his time, and he said you had to approach them the same way.

Later, when I was a difficult teenager, my dad got me a job in the plant. Four days a week, ten hours a day, I'd wash the syrup tanks as they cycled through from various accounts. The water was hot and scalding, the lye that was used made your eyes burn. It was loud. The guy I worked with was an older Eastern European gent. I don't remember his name now. He did the job day in and day out without complaint. I lasted about four weeks.

We live at a difficult time for work, for Labor. Somewhere along the line in the last twenty years, a compact has been broken. All the studies show that employee productivity in the United States is on the rise, but companies that once upon a time felt a loyalty to their workforce only listen to shareholders. And sometimes, not even them. CEO compensation packages are obscene, and never have I seen a management force that's less connected to the workers they supervise.

Union membership is at a historic low in the USA, and in Canada it's not much better. I know that there are tons of people who'll have bad stories about unions, too, and I don't deny that. Any entrenched power structure is going to have problems.

But on the whole, there's a breakdown in things like service. There's a compact between employer and employee that seems frayed. The excesses of Enron -- which sparked such outrage -- seem now like just the prelude. There's more of that coming if we let it.

And somewhere in America, there are Wal Mart workers being intimidated and told how to vote this fall.

I'm not telling you to march, or to sing Solidarity Forever, or to pick up a torch or a brick. But maybe, on this late summer Labor Day, I'm just suggesting that you take a moment to reflect on the people who enable the fruits of your labor.

"Work is the seasoning of existence," Henri Amiel wrote.

Would that were true, now and forever.

Thanks to everyone who's enabled me to have this great job.