1. Resisting Precarity in the
21st Century
PEPSO Meeting, April 24, 2013
A COMMUNITY-UNIVERSITY RESEARCH ALLIANCE, LED BY:
By: Peter Brogan, Jenny Carson, Philip Kelly, Cammie Peirce, Supriya
Latchman, Conely de Leon, Karen Charnow Lior, Myer Siemiatycki

2. PEPSO CASE STUDY 2:
Collective Responses to Precarity
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• The potential of unions to improve the conditions of workers in precarious
employment
• Effectiveness of social movement/living wage campaigns in supporting precarious
workers
• Role and capacity of alternate forms of work relations to raise working and living
standards

3. Toronto Cleaners Push Back:
Collective Responses from Unions, Workers and the Labour-Community
Jenny Carson, Supriya Latchman & Myer Siemiatycki,
Ryerson University
“…Just because we pick up dirt,
doesn‟t mean we should be
treated like dirt”
Nezrene Edwards
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4. Pushing back against:
Ford‟s „Gravy Train‟
• Rob Ford Elected
Mayor, November
2010
• Ford announces plan
to cut 110 police
cleaners jobs, June
2011
• KPMG Report
released, July 2011
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5. City Cleaners: “The Punching Bags”
The most vulnerable targets
• City of Toronto employs 1,100 cleaners
• 110 cleaners work in Police stations
• Wages are nearly 50% lower in the private sector and no benefits
• Private cleaning sector: bidding and subcontracting characterized as
a “Dog eat dog sector”
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6. Justice and Dignity for Cleaners
Campaign, September 2011:
A Progressive labour-community response
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Main Goals:
1. Stop the outsourcing
of cleaning jobs
2. Start a dialogue about
what type of employer
the City of Toronto
should be
3. Promote democracy
and transparency of
decision making at
City Hall
4. Make labour/union
issues moral issues

7. Collective Responses on different fronts
Nov.2010
Rob Ford Elected
as Mayor for City of
Toronto
July 2011
KPMG Report issues
Core Services
Review
Jan. 2012
City Council
Budget
Committee
propose cuts to
city services
Sept.2011
Justice for Dignity
and Cleaners
Campaign launched
July 2010-
Sept.2011
Labour –community
push back in ‘Public
Services for All
Campaign’
June 2011
Toronto Police
Service Cleaners
Contracted out
Sept.2011-April
2012
Justice for Dignity
and Cleaners
Campaign lobby
City Council via
deputations and
Rally for Respect
April 12, 2012
City council votes
29:21 to prevent City
Management from
awarding contracts
for cleaning service
without Council
approval.

8. “A Qualified Success”:
Outcomes and Analysis
• April 11, 2012- City council votes 29:12 to reclaim
final decision over further contracting out of
cleaning services
• Slows momentum and potentially stops further
contracting out of cleaners
• Brought transparency and accountability to
contracting out decisions
• Challenge of sustaining fight back coalitions
• Success in re-framing the debate through a broad
community-labour coalition
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9. Hotel Workers Rising:
Collective Responses through local worker-led enterprises
Karen Charnow Lior & Peter Brogan
Toronto Workforce Innovation Group
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10. Hotel Workers‟ Training Centre:
A Hospitality Unionism and Labour
Market Adjustment Approach
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Hawthorne Food and Drink:
A „High Road‟ Approach
60 Richmond Street East, Toronto ON

11. Speaking with your fork:
Restaurant Opportunities Centre (ROC)
11Source: ROC United, New York City

12. Taking the „High Road‟: Three-fold
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Providing a
living wage
Maintaining
a Healthy
workplace
Developing
training and
internal
promotion
policies to create
career ladders
and stabilize a
very precarious
workforce

13. The „High Road‟ Approach:
Achievements and Obstacles
Where we Are
• Demonstrating that these
strategies do positively impact
the lives of workers
• Understanding the challenges
and pitfalls of a “high road”
training strategy
• Bringing the key actors – labour
and management together to
support industry-based training
and development
Where we hope to go
• Worker-owned, up-scale restaurants
that are competitive, market-value
and sustainable
• Collective agreements that ensure
workers have a living wage, benefits,
health insurance, job security and
access to training
• Campaigns that make conditions in
the industry visible and bring
workers together
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14. Live-In Caregivers:
Collective Responses to Precarity through Cultural Production
Conely de Leon and Philip Kelly
York University
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15. The Live-In Caregiver Program &
Precarious Employment
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Live-in
requirement
renders
contractual
conditions
largely
unenforced
Integration into
“open” labour
force in low paid
and insecure
employment
Impact on Quality
of Work, Life &
Community Well
being
Predominantly
women from
the Philippines
Increasing
levels of
education
Increasing
numbers,
peaking in
2007/2010
Labour force
Established,
1993
Requires 24
months of live-
in employment
Open Work
Permit, then
Permanent
Residency
LCP

16. The Role of Cultural Production as
Collective Response
• The creation of collaborative endeavours
• Awareness of common experiences/concerns
• Increasing consciousness of structural contexts
• Facilitating individual agency
• Fostering wider awareness
• The art of persuasion
• Varied forms of artistic creation and
collaboration
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17. Live-in Caregivers:
Collective Cultural Responses from Filipino Nannies & Community
Kwentong Bayan: Labour
of Love-Comic Book
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Kwentong Buhay Pinay –
Story Telling
The Nanny Project

18. THANK YOU
Myer Siemiatycki, msiemiatycki@politics.ryerson.ca
Jenny Carson, jcarson@history.ryerson.ca
Karen Charnow Lior, karen@workforceinnovation.ca
Philip Kelly, pfkelly@yorku.ca
www.pepso.ca
pepso@mcmaster.ca
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