The shop steward’s contribution was not appreciated

With the votes now counted and the winner declared, it’s time for the post mortems of the election campaign in Skeena - Bulkley Valley and for the Liberal candidate that means a calling to account of the union movement, for their participation in the electoral process in this year’s election.

Corinna Morhart outlined her frustrations with her own union CUPE in Thursday’s Daily News, expressing her dis-satisfaction in their intervention in the electoral process with a call for union members to place their votes strategically with the NDP candidate Nathan Cullen.

She particularly found it “offensive” that her union dues were used to promote another party.

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Now on that point she may have a debating point, union members may not necessarily subscribe to the full binder of NDP policy papers and should have the right to see their dues used for other measures of the democratic process other than partisan politics, something that she may wish to bring up at the next union conclave.

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But as far as the actual union recommendation goes, it would seem that she’s misdirecting her frustrations.

While union’s have been endorsing the preferred labour oriented candidates for years, there’s little in electoral evidence to suggest that the actual rank and file march in lockstep. More than capable we suspect to weigh the pros and cons of the candidates in their ridings and making their own informed decisions.

In fact considering the seldom changing level of support that the NDP receives, compared to the numbers of Canadians in unions, it would seem that a good portion of the labour vote doesn’t always take the advice of their shop stewards and union leaders.
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If they did, Jack Layton might very well have realized that fanciful dream of his to be the next Prime Minister of Canada.

As it is, if Ms. Morhart wants to find someone to be held accountable for her electoral misfortune, perhaps she should fire off a letter to the Liberal headquarters and ask why they didn’t do more to aid her in her quest to be the MP for Skeena- Bulkley Valley.

The Liberals seemed to have left her twisting in the northwest winds this election, there was little in the way of visible support, no Liberal MP’s made the journey to help out (no doubt fearful for their own seats, justifiably so it would seem), there was precious little information about her platform, or the Liberal one for that matter provided for in the riding.

At Podunk central we received flyers in our mailbox from the NDP, Conservatives and Christian Heritage candidates and had more than a few phone calls from NDP support staff, we even think we glimpsed Conservative candidate Sharon Smith wandering towards our end of the block at one time (no doubt gauging the interest in her attending a debate here), but strangely enough there was no knock on the door.

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However, in the five weeks of campaigning, we never personally saw one piece of information, nor even a rumour of the Liberal campaign at any time.

In short the other parties appear to have been far more organized and ready for this election than the Liberals, and that seems to have been a trend reflected across the nation.

That perhaps is where the Liberal campaign went off the rails, with all the other concerns merely a sideshow. While she is to be commended for taking on what in this election seems to have been a lost cause, taking a point of view that the unions are too involved in the process and may have been responsible partially for her defeat seems a tad hard to fathom.

If you break down the disappearance of the Liberal vote combined with the totals of the other candidates, you will note that the NDP actually didn’t see much movement in this election while the Green and Conservative vote picked up the majority of the percentage of that vote lost by the Liberals.

Can’t really blame the unions and their advice for that one, it was a classic split of the Liberal voter, the left leaning went towards the Greens, the ones that tend to drift to the right went to the Conservatives. It’s a split that has been ongoing through the last number of elections since the eighties, with the NDP benefiting from the Liberal exodus to a degree before the Greens began to seek office.

During that evolution the voters seem to have drifted to where they felt most comfortable, either left or right, if they were union members, they weren’t particularly listening to their shop stewards…

The Daily News outlined Ms. Morharts concerns over union over involvement in Thursday`s paper.

Candidate attacks union’s role
Corinna Morhart says CUPE should not tell members how to vote
By George T. Baker
The Daily News
Thursday, October 16, 2008
Pages one and two

She claims it isn’t sour grapes, but Corinna Morhart thinks her own union undermined her campaign.

Morhart, who is a member of the Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE) of B. C., said on Wednesday that she is upset with the way her union, asked people to vote strategically for the New Democratic Party’s Nathan Cullen, even though Cullen has said in the past that voting strategically was not the best policy.

``Union members pay their union dues and this kind of thing is not in the collective bargaining agreement,`` said Morhart who found it offensive that her union dues were used to promote another party.

In a letter sent to union members, CUPE BC president Barry O’Neill urged members to vote for the NDP and Jack Layton, even going so far as to say they would like to see members get involved with Layton’s campaign.

``Would you like to get involved in supporting Jack Layton, take a lawn sign, make a donation, or work on the campaign?`` asked O’Neill. ``If you would like to work on our member to member campaign, please contact us with your name, address, and phone number.``

The Liberals lost almost 3,000 votes this year compared to the vote from 2006 but Morhart doesn’t think that CUPE Backs blunt support for the NDP directly affected her totals. She’s just mad about the direct involvement that labour unions tried to play in the campaign and feels that it has hurt the electoral process.

``I wonder what this means about the democratic process when the unions are telling people how to vote,`` said Morhart.

Green Party candidate Hondo Arendt said that he was not surprised that a union threw its weight behind the NDP, saying that this kind of support was pretty normal.

Arendt added that as union member, even he too in the past has faced a lack of support from his own union.

`The campaign for Life will advise their members to vote for the Christian Heritage party and the Sierra Club will advise its members to vote for the Green party and some unions even did like the Canadian Auto Workers,`` said Arendt.

The Green Party was the only party in the Skeena-Bulkley Valley to gain votes this election, tallying up an extra 542 votes from 2006.

Update:

Daily News Correction

Monday, October 20, 2008

Page Three

CORRECTION

The Daily News would like to clarify an article that appeared on Thurs. Oct 16, 2008, regrading Corinna Morhart and CUPE's recommendation to vote for the NDP. Morhart is not a member of CUPE and was referring to Liberal party supporters who are members of that union.