The best article on the first day of Toronto's dumbest-ever strike was written by Peter Kuitenbrouwer in the Post's Toronto section. Why, you want to know, would the city's coddled union members go on strike at the height of a recession, in the face of near-unanimous opposition, over a benefit only the most anal could consider anything more than a costly extravagance?
Peter has the answer, and it actually makes sense. Mayor David Miller is the most union-friendly mayor anyone can remember. Throughout his years in office he has supported labour without question. He has never signaled the slightest reluctance to spend money he doesn't have, or jack up fees and charges to city residents to finance his personal pet projects, or commit to spending the city couldn't really afford. He has argued consistently in favour of high wages for even the least skilled city job on the basis that civic employees should be able to afford to live in the community that employs them.
So why, after all that, would he choose this particular bargaining session to "get tough" on a group of employees, when he has never done anything but encourage their expectations in the past?
It's a logical argument. It's ridiculous, of course, but it's logical. It's ridiculous because the mayor's serial irresponsibility is no justification for rebellion when he finally does something sensible. The 24,000 inside and outside workers might rue that their contract happened to come along just as the mayor's unexpected awakening occurred. That's bad luck. But it's no excuse for demanding city negotiators buckle to their demand that the insanity continue. If the mayor was on heroin and finally kicked the habit, we would rejoice, not insist he continue shooting up because that's what he's always done in the past.
The unions, naturally enough, don't see it that way. Their inability to do so probably has something to do with the mentality of organized labour, which fixates on itself to the exclusion of all else. As Kuitenbrouwer pointed out, Miller has set a very bad example.
"Over the last six months, we passed a budget with the biggest spending increase in history," notes Councillor Karen Stintz. "We hired 1,300 new people, and councillors took a raise. At no point in the last six months did they communicate that the city was in a difficult financial position."
Miller has spent the recession acting as if there was no recession. He didn't let it interfere with his record budget. He didn't let it get in the way of pay rises for the TTC, police, firefighters or anyone else. He didn't let it stop council getting its own increase, and he opposed an effort to have councillors give it back. He's been out promoting huge expenditures on transit, on bike paths, on "beautification" projects that are anything but necessary but are dear to his little green heart. He acts like he can't believe what he's hearing when the federal or provincial finance ministers suggest this might not be the moment for his latest billion-dollar scheme.
So why should he expect the people on the city's payroll to accept his sudden bleats of poverty just because he doesn't want to pay them for sick days they don't use?
Sure it's an extravagance. Sure it's totally unnecessary. Sure they could live without it.
But why should they? Miller never does.
National Post
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