Could the union-busting efforts currently afoot in some U.S. states catch on in Canada? An Alberta union leader fears the thin edge of the wedge is beginning to show.
Gil McGowan, president of the Alberta Federation of Labour, is concerned about the wellbeing of the collective bargaining process in light of the fact that Koch Industries Inc., an influential U.S. conglomerate with links to the U.S. Tea Party movement, recently registered to lobby the Alberta government.
In addition, a think tank is calling for labour policies similar to those advocated by the notoriously anti-union Tea Party movement at a time when the Alberta government is currently at the bargaining table with some of the 27 unions within the AFL.
Marcel Latouche, president and CEO of the Institute for Public Sector Accountability, wrote in a recent op-ed that governments, burdened as they are by increasing debt, should look at the costs of union collective bargaining.
“To alleviate the tax burden, governments at all levels should look at the costs of union collective bargaining. In the U.S., after years of growing taxes, some governments are eyeing curtailing the collective agreement process,” IPSA president and CEO Marcel Latouche wrote in an op-ed.
Union members are even more worried about Koch, which registered to lobby policymakers in the areas of “agriculture, economic development, energy, environment, finance, forestry, taxes,” according to the provincial lobby registry.
The Kansas-based company has hired Canadian lobby firm Global Public Affairs and consultant David Keto, a former project manager with Alberta Finance. Keto was also executive assistant to cabinet minister David Coutts from 2001 to 2003.
