Unions, advocacy groups call for better treatment of workers ahead of May Day

Dozens of unions and advocacy groups gathered in downtown Toronto on Sunday to commemorate and celebrate International Workers' Day while calling for better treatment of workers.

Daniel Tarade, chair of the Labour May Day Committee, said the "struggle" continues to build unity among workers and oppressed peoples and to build collective power to fight for what they deserve.

"Coming out of the pandemic, which isn't over, we've seen workers constantly facing safety at work, death at work," Tarade told CBC Toronto, ahead of workers' day which is marked officially on May 1. 

"With the inflation crisis, we know it's just getting harder to get by. Rent [is] skyrocketing, food [prices are] skyrocketing, wages have not kept up with either the inflation and the cost of the goods we need to buy or in terms of the productivity of the working class as a whole. 

"We're getting swindled here by a very tiny [part] of society that is making billions off of our collective work, and so it's getting harder and harder," he added. 

Sunday's event started with a rally at Nathan Phillips Square, followed by a march to Queen's Park.

Tarade said with a recession looming, workers and oppressed peoples are going to be the ones "thrown to the wolves." 

"We're gonna be the ones evicted from our homes. We're gonna be the ones relying on food banks," he said.

ATU Local 113 president Marvin Alfred said workers need to be supported against governments and against organizations that treat them "as a disposable or renewable resource."

"We need support, we need safety, we need funding, we need to not have to beg in order to be kept in the workplace," he said.

Alfred said unions need governments, "especially the federal and provincial governments, to provide resources and not have them cut things like safety as a mechanism [for] making ends meet.

"The public is tired of being mistreated by how they're not paying attention to the core elements of safety," he said.

Rin Simon, who is Anishinaabe and from the Niagara Region, said they made the journey to Toronto to support "people who are fighting for their working rights, which is really important in today's society."

"As Native people, we're forced to engage in a working class that is very predatory toward us," Simon said.