EDITORIAL | COPE, Vision and Labour’s Plan of Action

Nathan Crompton June 24, 2011

I have recently been involved in the campaign for an independent COPE. There have been many arguments for a coalition with Vision Vancouver, but all of them boil down to a financial argument: if COPE separates from Vision, there will be no money from labour to run against Vision’s unlimited developer backing and strong foreign campaign donations. But honestly, do the members of Vancouver’s unions agree with the idea that their leadership will fund only Vision?

I have been asking everyone I talk to: do rank and file union members really agree with corporate tax cuts? Do members of CUPE 315, for example, agree with staff layoffs, P3’s and service cuts at a time of growing inequality? Do members of COPE 378 agree with the three years of neoliberal reforms that have worsened the situation for everyone except the richest Vancouverites? Do the diverse members of the Vancouver District Labour Council really agree with the massive demolition and sell-off of social housing in our city? As poverty deepens, do rank and file union people agree with a developer-driven planning agenda that worsens the already-dire affordability crisis in Vancouver? Do they agree with closed shelters, and a homeless rate that increases year after year as people are pushed out the bottom in the world’s most unaffordable city?

No, they don’t agree. If there is a plan of action, union members and working people will break with conservative deals and go with what is possible: an independent COPE to win the November elections.

Above all, it is a strategic choice for COPE to reject a coalition with Vision. Currently it is COPE who is forced to argue that “if you can’t beat ’em join ’em.” This is the attitude that has allowed for a coalition despite the wide ideological gap between COPE and Vision. But if COPE takes a stand and refuses to go along with the game, it is Vision who is forced to adopt the survival attitude of joining opponents, and it is a much smaller ideological gap separating the opponent. Vote after vote, decision after decision, Vision and the NPA come together on the big issues, whether it’s corporate tax cuts, property upzoning, or the demolition of public housing.

Let’s face the voting record and compare the NPA term of 2005 – 2008 with the Vision term of 2008 – 2011. By every standard, Vision’s term has been a continuation of the NPA’s mandate, except that in many cases it has been worse. Take at least three areas that matter: taxes, housing, and public sector employment.

Taxes: Since being elected, Vision has lowered corporate taxes three times, so that now they are the lowest in the world.

Public sector employment: Disagreement between the NPA and CUPE over the size of a wage increase package and over the role of outside advisers did lead to a strike in 2007. And though the NPA showed a reactionary and confrontational attitude toward unions, the fact is that the NPA did not introduce significant layoffs. On the contrary, Vision moved quickly to layoff massive numbers of CUPE staff, decimating many departments. For example, the housing and social policy departments were almost totally liquidated, rendering them utterly incapable of grappling with our city’s core problems.

Housing: In its term the NPA provided 12 sites for social housing free of charge to the province on the condition that the Province build social housing on the site to address the growing housing crisis. By contrast, Vision has bought almost zero land and introduced no new no housing initiatives, acting instead as the on-the-ground spokesperson for BC Housing’s delays on the 12 sites. Vision has only carried out counter-productive actions on behalf of the Province, such as demolishing hundreds of units of housing at Little Mountain and closing the homeless shelters.

The point in this is not to show that the NPA is progressive. (NPA was not good for labour and the strike is only one example among many, even if the NPA only added city union workers during their time in government). On the contrary, it is to show that if COPE is strong, it is Vision and the NPA who will be splitting votes in the upcoming elections.

Could COPE win against a super-funded Vision/NPA? I think they can, because of the housing crisis and the need for progressive action in this city. Every single poll completed in the past 6 years has shown that affordability is the number one issue for the residents of Vancouver. After three years of broken promises and inaction by Vision, people want real progressive change. The majority of Vancouverites can’t get behind reductions in corporate taxes, reducing services, diminishing the public sector, losing shelters, losing our affordable housing, and giving a blank slate to developers in neighborhoods where renters are already paying up to three quarters of their income on rent.

In 2008, we could not have known that Vision Vancouver would break their progressive promises. It was difficult to argue that COPE could win on an independent slate, because there was the possibility of splitting the left vote. Today, the situation could not be more different. Vision has proven themselves to be a pro-business, right wing party. If Vision councillors believe in passing right-wing reforms merely in order to have the “ear” of the provincial government, they can do it well or even better through the NPA. COPE, on the other hand, is a party for progressive change and real solutions.

9Comments

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1

LTD.Edition on June 24, 2011 at 4:00 pm
Reply

Heard you talking on Wake Up with Co-Op this morning on the issue. Good stuff.
2

Kimball Cariou on June 24, 2011 at 7:33 pm
Reply

A couple of days ago, I circulated an email to friends and contacts urging COPE members to vote “Yes” on Sunday, June 26, for the proposed COPE/Vision electoral cooperation agreement.

Following up on some other commentaries, here is a slightly updated and amended version of that message.
The debate over progressive strategies and tactics is extremely urgent, especially in light of the federal election, which saw the Harper Tories win a majority in Parliament, even though nearly 60% of Canadians voted for parties which (to varying degrees) campaigned against Harper’s far-right agenda. The example of Toronto – where the anti-labour bigot Rob Ford is now Mayor – should also be on our minds as we consider the upcoming Nov. 19 civic election in Vancouver.

At a time when the working class is under intense attack, our strategy must be based on finding ways to achieve greater unity, not on further dividing working people. I believe that most COPE members understand this imperative, and that we will work to create the best possible conditions to resist the corporate agenda in the years ahead.

Earlier this week, COPE’s former executive director, Rachel Marcuse, published a message urging full support for the cooperation agreement. Nobody knows the membership and activities of COPE better than Rachel. Her outstanding work was crucial in our efforts to rebuild a civic party which had been badly mauled in the 2005 campaign. In particular, she led the way in reaching out to youth activists, people in the cultural industries, and others who were little represented in COPE, especially at the leadership level. And Rachel did this while working closely with our entire executive, our dedicated elected officials, and our longstanding supporters in the labour movement and other important sectors. Under very complicated and difficult conditions, she was among those who ensured that COPE took a principled position for unity against the NPA, while at the same time staking out our civic party’s independent positions honestly and without engaging in personal attacks when we differ with our partners.

Rachel writes that “In terms of practicalities, voting down the deal will mean COPE will elect fewer, not more candidates.” This is a view based on her comprehensive understanding of the civic electoral system in Vancouver. It would be a terrible mistake to ignore such wise advice.

We need to think very carefully before gambling the future of COPE and our city on a poorly-considered proposal to make attacks against Vision the basis of our 2011 civic campaign. Those who argue for this concept (and I have spoken in person to a number of them) seem to believe that simply nominating more COPE candidates for council, school board and park board will result in winning more positions. A careful review of COPE’s history and voting patterns in Vancouver quickly shows that there is no relation between the numbers of nominees and winners. But there is a relation between COPE’s ability to help forge broad tactical alliances, and our electoral successes.

Think about this further. Why is it that the NPA and its bloggers are heavily promoting the view that COPE is about to split or reject the cooperation agreement? Could it be that they have a direct interest in promoting such a turn of events? To ask is to answer – YES. The NPA desperately hopes that turning this election into a three-way fight will give them an undeserved opportunity to retake city hall and the school board.

What would be the consequences? Most likely another brutal, protracted lockout of civic workers, as happened during the Sam Sullivan regime. Also the shattering of the COPE/Vision school board which has been a beacon of opposition in this province against the Liberal government’s campaign to undermine the public education system. I’m sure you can think of others.

Yes, COPE’s cooperation with Vision is an uneasy and complex process. If we are able to re-elect majorities, the next three years will see many occasions where the two parties see eye-to-eye – and many occasions where we will not. I wish we lived in a city where COPE had a strong majority among voters. Political life would be simpler – although we would still face the reality that the political powers of city councils and school boards are quite limited. But today, a “go-it-alone” strategy or an alliance with smaller parties is a virtual guarantee of defeat.

Why? Consider some of the “practicalities” of this campaign. Rejecting the agreement would mean adopting a very different electoral tactic less than five months before voting day. It would mean telling the largest single base of COPE support – progressive sections of the labour movement – that we do not wish to continue our historic civic project. It would mean frantically spending the summer trying to cobble together a campaign with an undefined new group of partners, nominating an unknown set of candidates, raise sufficient campaign funds, rent offices, etc., all in time to hit the ground running just two months before voting day. To be perfectly blunt, this is a recipe for chaos and disaster.

Such a turn of events would not only alienate our key labour supporters. It would alienate the entire current COPE executive, our entire group of elected officials, the COPE staff, and huge numbers of our members and friends. It would alienate NDPers, in a city where the NDP picked up a third of the vote in the May 2 election (far ahead of the Greens or Communist candidates such as myself). Without question, it would cost COPE much of our campaign funding, many volunteers, possibly even some of our most popular candidates.

Think about that for a moment. For example, if COPE rejects the agreement, what would we expect our incumbent school trustees to do? Campaign against the Vision trustees with whom they have forged a strong working alliance to challenge the provincial Liberals? Seriously? Have any of the “independent COPE” folks even asked our electeds their views? Or are these proven electable leaders of our organization seen as disposable? (Some have even gone so far as to accuse them of being “b****s” or “concubines”. I suppose that from such a sexist, misogynist perspective, our incumbents are best dumped overboard anyway. Good luck replacing them with candidates who have the same popular appeal.)

There is a related problem, arising from the nature of Vancouver’s unfortunate at-large system. Not only does this system require large campaign funds, it imposes certain unavoidable voting patterns. The “three-cornered” strategy advocated by the “independent COPE” folks would essentially mean three competing parties nominating full or nearly-full slates for City Council. Even assuming that a new COPE-something alliance could somehow overcome a bitterly divisive internal struggle, it would still go down to defeat unless it could somehow attract close to 40% of the overall votes in November, leaving the NPA and Vision with perhaps a bit over 30% each. This is simply a fantasy, based on the hope that broad public support for certain important progressive policy ideas will automatically (perhaps “magically” would be a better word) translate into tens of thousands of votes for COPE-something on Nov. 19, but not for Vision.

Finally, consider the future of COPE itself. On June 21, the Vancouver and District Labour Council voted unanimously to support the cooperation agreement, and also voted to urge labour backing for COPE. This decision took into consideration the need for a Vision/COPE majority on city council to prevent another NPA attack against municipal workers. Voting down the agreement would be a signal to abandon the historic basis of our progressive civic movement – de facto unity between the labour movement, community groups, and activists on the broadly-defined political left. If COPE and Vision run competing campaigns, what reason would the labour movement have to give financial and volunteer support to either party? This is not a matter of “big labour” supposedly dictating its views – it is a solid and realistic calculation that if a split between COPE and Vision allows the NPA to win, civic unions will need their resources for urgent problems from fighting grievances all the way up to building strike/lockout funds. If we do turn our backs on the labour movement, it would be extremely difficult to rebuild trust and support in future. This would be a tragic ending for a civic party which has its origins in the 1968 meetings convened by the Labour Council to establish COPE.

For all these reasons, I have confidence that COPE members will give solid backing for the cooperation agreement on Sunday – not because we have illusions about Vision, but because we believe that this tactic creates the best chances to unite working people and to build a stronger COPE over the next three years.

(Kimball Cariou is the editor of People’s Voice. He has been a volunteer activist in every COPE campaign since 1993.)
- 3
  
  Kim Hearty on June 25, 2011 at 4:47 am
  Reply
  
  Kimball,
  
  you make a lot of good points. But you may as well be arguing for a COPE-NPA alliance, to those of us who have no “illusions about Vision”. And if voting for COPE in November means supporting the essentially right-wing policy of Vision, then progressive, politically aware people will have no one to vote for.
  
  In considering whether to repeat a Vision-COPE alliance, the fact that it didn’t work the first time should be front of mind. Terrible policies were put in place. Vision did not co-operate with COPE. COPE is not in a strong position. The left was not galvanised – it is now divided threeways between people who believe what Vision says about itself, people who know better, and people who would rather win the game than change it. You might think that you have to win to get in a position to change this system, but the only political power that can be acquired through an undemocratic system is the power to perpetuate it. Challenge free-market ideology and you will be cut down by corporate media, the majority they “inform”, and politicians beholden to corporate interests as represented by the misinformed+/disenfranchised electorate.
  
  Or stand up for what you believe in and be prepared to lose alongside justice and freedom. I’d rather risk this than give up on the possibility of genuine victory. This victory will happen when more people stand up for humane ideals and refuse to cooperate with bullies. That is the victory at stake this Sunday, in a small and significant way.
  
  Please respond to my comment if you have the time. If my logic is flawed, I want to know.
  
  Kim
  - 4
    
    Kimball Cariou on June 25, 2011 at 9:06 am
    Reply
    
    Let me give just one example of the flaws in your argument. You state: “Terrible policies were put in place. Vision did not co-operate with COPE.” Even at the city council level, this is exaggerated. For example, Vision did not lock out civic employees in a vicious union-busting attack, as did the NPA’s Sam Sullivan (the favoured 2005 candidate of Tim Louis). At school board, the COPE/Vision majority has cooperated very closely, defending public education, and playing a key role in the province-wide resistance against the Liberal government’s pro-private school policies. Meanwhile the NPA is gearing up for a campaign at the school board level based on demonising students and teachers, going along with underfunding, closing schools, etc. etc. This seems to be irrelevant to the “independent COPE” crowd. In fact, the leader of this group, Tim Louis, literally sunk the last COPE majority on the Board in 2005 with his late campaign flippant comments which cost our candidates crucial votes and campaign supporters. In other words, the argument that there is no difference between the NPA and Vision is just wrong.
    - 5
      
      Kim Hearty on June 26, 2011 at 12:14 am
      Reply
      
      Kimball,
      
      you imply that there are more flaws in my logic, so it’s only fair to give more than one example – but don’t exert yourself now for my sake. Everyone who participated in this generally respectful debate have already helped me make up my mind. I’ll be voting for an independent COPE. See you tomorrow!
      
      Kim
6

Tim Louis on June 25, 2011 at 11:24 am
Reply

Kimbal,

You state “In fact, the leader of this group, [Independent COPE] Tim Louis …”

Let me be absolutely clear, I am not and never have been involved in “Independent COPE” in any way other than posting comments in reply to articles published in the Mainlander.

I certainly subscribe to the views of the Mainlander with regard to the issue of a COPE-Vision alliance. I also find them to be very careful to never personalize or attack when presenting their well-thought-out and well-articulated views.

I would also like to note, with respect, that you are incorrect when you imply I supported Sam Sullivan in his campaign for Mayor in 2005 “… the NPA’s Sam Sullivan (the favoured 2005 candidate of Tim Louis).” At no time during the campaign was I ever quoted on the record or off the record offering any comments even remotely supportive of Sam Sullivan.

I would also like to address your earlier projection that if the membership decides against the proposal, “Such a turn of events would not only alienate our key labour supporters. It would alienate the entire current COPE executive, our entire group of elected officials, the COPE staff, and huge numbers of our members and friends. It would alienate NDPers,…” COPE is a membership-driven party. As such, the executive, elected officials, and COPE staff follow the wishes of the membership. No matter which way the vote goes on Sunday I am very confident that we will all pull together to to implement the members’ wishes.

Tim
7

Glissando Remmy on June 25, 2011 at 3:29 pm
Reply

The Thought of The Day

‘COPE Deserters have turned their backs to their own family of voters,and joined VISION because the new found family had a bigger house, more money and a big boat moored in the Marina. They behaved just like a bunch of frustrated, pimpled teenagers with too much Reality-TV on their hands and no Reality What-So-Ever.’

The same way R Louie, J Green, L Campbell, T Stevenson back-stabbed COPE, then later A Jasper and S Gregson jumped on to the VISION deck, the same way D Cadman and E Woodsworth sink the COPE ship by voting accordingly with Vision in Council.
The only way COPE will regain some credibility is on their own. Period.
It will take some time. Good luck with that.

Kimbal buddy,
You are a joke, let me tell you that. You wouldn’t recognize Communism from Capitalism if it would hit you in the head.

‘You are not a Communist until they put you in jail for being a Communist. Advocating for Communism from behind a sheltered life in Canada doesn’t cut it. So, to me, a Pretend Practicing Communist advising COPE to take the deal from Vision is like a Horny Adam advising Eve to take the forbidden apple from the slimy Serpent.’

What is funny though, is the fact that you, an advocate for labor movement is endorsing a deal with a group of people born in privilege, they’ve seen not one day of honest work (as workers) in their entire lives, that they are in fact the beneficiaries of decades of decadence and capitalist exploitation of the exact workforce that you the advocate is trying to represent… and which means one thing… it is all Bullshit folks!

The only outcome I en-Vision from this COPE-ulation is that sooner than later someone is going to get dumped as a Single Party with… Debt.
And as all single parents out there, they know, it is a hard life.

One more thing. COPE seized to exist long time ago, here:

THE METAMORPHOSIS OF COPE

COPE
COPE Classic
COPE Classic & Lite
COPE Lite & Classic
COPE Lite & Classic & Friends Of Larry
COPE Lite & Friends of Larry & Classic
COPE Lite & Friends of Larry
COPE Lite & Friends of Larry’s VISION
COPE & Friends of Larry’s VISION
COPE & Hollyhock Friends of Larry’s VISION
COPE & Hollyhock Friends of VISION
COPE & Hollyhock VISION
Hollyhock VISION & COPE
Hollyhock VISION
VISION

Sorry COPE comrades, but COPE is ‘damaged goods’ right now in this present arrangement, it is a ‘toxic brand’ like cigarettes if you may, COPE is like Camille Cansino … in eternal denial.

We live in Vancouver and this keeps us busy.
- 8
  
  Kimball Cariou on June 25, 2011 at 5:57 pm
  Reply
  
  Witty repartee indeed, Glissando. I sincerely apologize for growing up in central Alberta rather than in Nazi Germany. Although some of my neighbours adhered to a similar ideology, it is true that they did not put me in jail… except for that one time when I had the cheek to help protest against a South African-backed cricket team.
9

Bob on June 25, 2011 at 9:24 pm
Reply

Reading this, I can’t help but contemplate: did COPE sow the seeds of it own marginalization by inviting Larry Campbell to be its standard bearer in 2005? Certainly nothing Campbell has done since that fateful point in time convince me he shares the views of the majority of COPE members. It may well have been better for COPE to let Jennifer Clarke take the mayor’s chair and be content with holding her on a short leash by taking the majority of seats on council. Instead a trojan horse was invited into the party itself.

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