Organize – Defend – Advance
By Dave Coles
President, CEP

“We have come together at convention to re-establish our principles and policies to help us move forward as a union willing and able to meet the challenges that we will face together as we move into the future.

“ What we do at convention lays the foundation for future generations to chart a course so that we will be able to maintain the wages and benefits we have fought for in the past.  The election of our National officers is an important part of what we do but it is the resolutions we consider and vote on that truly determines the direction we take.”

I couldn’t think of a more appropriate way to start off my very first message to you as national president than with the words above.  They are from a report which appears in the CEP Local 10-B newsletter on our recent convention in Vancouver and I think they are a true reflection of the solidarity felt by all delegates.

I quote those words not to single out one Local or one delegate but to illustrate the broad acceptance and determination demonstrated by delegates to rise to the many difficult challenges facing our union and our membership in the months and years to come.

Convention 2006, in other words, has laid a solid foundation for us and, as your new president, I want to assure you that the newly elected National Executive Board is equally determined to meet and overcome those challenges AND to ensure that CEP continues to progress across the spectrum of workplace and social issues important to us all.

How?

My pledge to you today is the same as it was before my election: we will direct all of our considerable energy and resources toward organizing, defending our members and advancing the union!

CEP is known across the labour movement as a strong, progressive and militant union.  Our collective agreements are second to none and our challenge is to make sure they stay that way.

Defending our agreements and our members’ rights on the job are key to our continued progress.  Convention 2006 provided us with the tools which will allow us to succeed.  Delegates endorsed strengthening our Defense Fund and laid the ground work for expanded co-ordinated and pattern type bargaining across the union.

Employers may as well know that we are in no mood and have no intention of caving in to concession demands at the bargaining table and that we have the solidarity and financial backing through the Defense Fund to progress --  not roll backwards.

Convention delegates also provided a clear direction for the National Executive Board in the area of organizing.  They recognized that CEP must grow not only in order to maintain the level of services to our membership but to provide non-union workers with the advantages CEP membership brings while protecting ourselves from unfair, low wage, non-union competition.

Delegates directed us to establish a task force on organizing which will be take an in depth look at strategic approaches to how and where we organize in order to strengthen our position in bargaining in our traditional jurisdiction as well as breaking new ground.
At the same time, the resolution adopted at convention  clearly directs that task force to come up with proposals to significantly increase the amount of per capita dues money designated to organizing.

While all of this work goes on, I fully intend to continue to advance the CEP cause by reaching out to our national, global and community allies and by striving to raise the union’s profile among our members and in our communities.  When we tell our stories on the public stage, corporations and governments are more likely to listen.

And when that happens, we make progress!

I intend to write to you on a regular basis but I would also like to hear your ideas and reactions.  You can e-mail me at cep@info.ca