Workers at Tropicana Community Services have entered their fourth week of a strike after taking to the picket lines on Nov. 9. After 39 years of providing support for the Scarborough area, the workers at Tropicana voted to join the Service Employees International Union (SEIU) Local 2 back in July 2019. Since then negotiations with management have failed to reach an agreement on what will be the first contract for the Tropicana workers post-unionization. The breakdown of these talks led to the Oct. 21 strike vote, where workers voted in favor of striking.
Tropicana is a non-profit community service organization whose mission “is to offer culturally aware and supportive programs to those in need, including but not limited to counselling, settlement services, childcare, education, personal development, and employment services, with a predominant focus on the Caribbean, Black and African Communities of Toronto.” While Tropicana prides itself on helping those in need it has no problem forcing its workers, many of whom come from marginalized sections of the population, into the same situations that it lifts people out of. In the last year alone, 30 people have left Tropicana because of the stagnating wages and low standard of living that come with the job.
The question of wages is the main demand of the strike. Some of the staff have gone 15 years without a wage increase, and with the contract proposed by management could go another three or four. This is an absolute slap in the face to all Tropicana workers who have effectively taken a pay decrease over the last period, as inflation withered away what little wages they received. It should also be noted that the frontline workers at Tropicana have received no “hero pay” either during the COVID-19 pandemic and that along with the wage freeze the proposed contract removes paid time off for statutory holidays as well.
To plunge the knife in deeper, since the workers have taken to the picket lines, they have learned that in 2019, the board voted to give one manager a $3,000 bonus. As is always the case, the workers are told there is no money in the budget for things like better wages and improved working conditions, while board members and management pat themselves on the back and line their pockets. For this reason, any fight for decent wages must be combined with full transparency of all the financial comings and goings of the organization.
Management is citing Bill 124 as the limiting factor that is preventing them from going forward with wage increases. Bill 124, which the Ford government pushed through back in November 2019, limits wage increases for all public sector employees to one per cent. Also included in this category are organizations which receive more than $1 million in funding from the provincial government. The latter is where Tropicana comes in, as it receives funding from all three levels of government in Canada. As we stated at the time, Bill 124 represents a direct attack on the right to collective bargaining here in Ontario and must be fought with the full force of the labour movement. In recent talks Tropicana workers countered the wage freeze by agreeing to accept the one per cent wage increase. While a one per cent increase might seem like an improvement after 15 years of unchanging wages, inflation would quickly wipe away any benefits seen by the workers. Fighting for a living wage that exceeds inflation is the only way to ensure a good standard of living for all Tropicana workers. During the pandemic, the fight for decent wages must be combined with the fight for double hazard pay for all essential frontline workers.
The issue of scabs has also presented itself. Since the first day of the strike Tropicana has brought in scab labour to run their child-care programs. This not only shows the lengths to which Tropicana is willing to go to break the strike, but also directly impacts the quality of service that has been provided by the Tropicana workers for years. As one parent mentioned, “I don’t feel comfortable with it. I know most of the childcare staff at Tropicana’s daycare. I really like them. They are amazing educators.” Throughout the negotiation workers have been pushing for more control over the practices of Tropicana. As an article from Tropicanastrikes.ca put the issue: “The workers feel frozen out of the organization’s operational decisions, with their insight and expertise from working the frontlines consistently disregarded by management.” There is a common saying that “those who do the work know how best to do the work” and the workers at Tropicana are no exception to this rule. Pushing for democratic workers’ control over the practices of Tropicana is the best way to ensure its services are protected from any attack on their quality.
In a recent speech on the picket lines one worker highlighted the hypocrisy of management during the pandemic, stating, “One of the best sayings right now is that all of us are in this together in the time of COVID. But we all know it’s not true. Because if that were true you couldn’t have employers and board members who are still sitting down and trying to gouge workers.” This is a very accurate appraisal of the pandemic and its dual nature. There is one pandemic for the bosses and management, as they stay at home and collect their profits, and another pandemic for the poor and working class who are forced to work in unsafe conditions and take home little in compensation. Fightback stands in full solidarity with the workers at Tropicana against the attacks of management.
Victory to the Tropicana workers!
