Warm and militant greetings of solidarity for this year’s International Workers’ Day from the sister organizations of the Magkaisa [Unity] Centre (Filipino Canadian Youth Alliance of Ontario, Philippine Women Centre of Ontario, & SIKLAB – Ontario). Since 1889, May Day has been celebrated all over the world to commemorate the victories and strides of labourers and working class peoples throughout history against exploitation, oppression and injustice. The first International Workers’ Day celebrations in Canada took place in Montreal in 1906 and were led by socialists, the industrial workers’ union and various social-democratic groups. Through many hard-fought struggles by labour movements across Canada, workers won to standardize the 8-hour working day, and all of the rights, protections, and benefits we as working people rely on today.
As progressive Filipinos, we at the Magkaisa Centre stand in solidarity with First Nations, Indigenous peoples and all racialized and marginalized communities and continue to uphold the working class struggle and help build socialism in Canada. We also stand in solidarity with all oppressed, displaced and disenfranchised peoples around the world in their struggle for self-determination, national liberation and for socialist societies. We denounce all wars perpetuated by capitalism, imperialism, and colonialism and call for a just and everlasting peace. Moreso, as neofascism continue to rise globally, we remain vigilant and steadfast in exposing widespread misinformation, historical revisionism, and all right wing propaganda.
Being part of a larger community of transnational workers, we have seen decades of profit-driven immigration and labour policies that push many in our communities into a cycle of temporariness, precarity and insecurity as labourers under the Canadian state’s Temporary Foreign Worker Program and the Live-In Caregiver Program (rebranded as the “Home Childcare Provider Pilot” and “Home Support Worker Pilot” programs). Through bolstering Canada’s economy and carrying out essential work in manufacturing, farming, health and care industries, a large portion of Filipino workers under these programs are made dispensable, temporary and unable to stay in Canada due to strict and restrictive immigration eligibility requirements. Built-in discriminatory policies within these labour import programs do not recognize foreign educational credentials and professional experience making it difficult for these workers to secure jobs within their fields. Even if they are able to remain in Canada, many Filipino and other racialized workers become deskilled and streamlined into a pool of highly exploitable and cheapened labour force.
This is largely why we at the Magkaisa Centre call for the scrapping of the Temporary Foreign Worker Program and the Caregiver Program and demand policies that prioritize genuine immigration programs that can facilitate the successful settlement and full integration of Filipinos and other transnational workers in Canada. Multiple generations of Filipinos now call Canada home, but as many in our communities continue to face job insecurity, rising housing costs, inadequate healthcare and childcare systems, and massive student debts, we see the ever-growing need for community organizing work to build political power and a community conscious of our working-class identity and rich history of resistance and progressive culture. In the spirit of equality, solidarity and internationalism, we at the Magkaisa Centre stand firm and embrace our role as part of the broader Canadian working-class and continue to fight against racism, colonialism, capitalism and imperialism towards a socialist Canada we can truly call home.
Contact Us For More Info:
Philippine Women Centre of Ontario
Filipino Canadian Youth Alliance – Ontario
SIKLAB-Ontario
