International Women’s Day 2022 is an opportunity for working-class women to celebrate and reflect on our accomplishments as well as gather strength for the fights that lay ahead.

For more than 100 years, women in the labour movement across the globe have marked March 8 by celebrating collective achievements and recommitting to the fight for gender equality.

Although 2022 finds us still solidly in the pandemic, it also marks a year that brings many wins for women in our union to celebrate. Gains like pay equity and child care – that women have been fighting to achieve for decades – have passed into federal legislation and are now within reach for a new generation. These wins cannot be understated and can inspire us all to aim even higher.

A better world is possible!

In every workplace and community across Canada, there remains important work to be done to end racism and violence against women and girls. It will require a determined focus to bring these significant gains to the lives of working-class women.

As the pandemic continues, so does the inequity that has disproportionately impacted women. Women of colour, Indigenous women, queer and trans women, and women living with disabilities have been affected in ways that further deepened the gaps they experience every day. Building back better must be achieved through this lens of inclusion.

Our work together continues to advance equity in all of our workplaces and communities, despite the real pressures women are facing at home and at work.

We continue to prove in the most challenging times that Sisters in Unifor are indeed unstoppable.

This last year has shown Unifor:

• fighting for women in health care at the Respect Us, Protect Us, Pay Us event at Queen’s Park, and provincial and federal lobbying;
• demanding Fair Pay Forever for essential retail and grocery store workers;
• pushing provinces and territories forward on affordable, accessible child care;
• mobilizing around an Anti-Racism Manitoba plan;
• continuing our annual support of women’s shelters across Canada with $158,000 in donations;
• and working every day to support and encourage more women to become active in their Locals and bargaining committees.

In 2022, women need real progress toward gender justice and that means celebrating our historical wins while continuing to fight together toward equality. This year we recognize the work of so many women in our union and our collective determination to deliver significant improvements to our everyday lives.

Together, we are unstoppable.

Download this statement from our website.

Black History Month in Canada

Black History Month is observed across Canada every February. Black History Month in Canada provides an opportunity to share and learn about the experiences, contributions and achievements of peoples of African ancestry (see Black Canadians). It was initiated in Canada by the Ontario Black History Society and introduced to Parliament in December 1995 by Jean Augustine, the first Black woman elected as a member of Parliament. Black History Month was officially observed across Canada for the first time in February 1996 (see also Black History in Canada).

In Solidarity,

Equity Committee 1996-O,

1996-O Executive

Unifor statement on Ukraine invasion

Working people bear the brunt of any war.

They are the ones sent into battle. Their neighborhoods in war zones are left in ruins. Families are devastated, even far from the frontlines, as sons, fathers, daughters and mothers are sent into battle, never to return. Or returning broken.

With the invasion of Ukraine by Russia, working people will pay that price once again.

Unifor condemns this invasion, and we express our deep concern that further escalation of military conflicts will bring the world to the brink of war with enormous humanitarian consequences.

There is no such thing as a foreign war. Many Canadians have their roots in Ukraine, and still have families there. When a major power such as Russia invades another country, the resulting instability threatens us all.

Unifor stands with our trade union organizations in Europe to call for urgent dialogue and political solutions to ensure a stable outcome for Ukraine and guarantee security in Europe.

Unifor joins with IndustriALL and the European Trade Union Federation in calling for trade union solidarity across borders, and endorses their statements that only peace and security can ensure both the sustainable economic recovery workers need and the social justice programs working people and their families rely on.

We must spare a moment, too, for the journalists covering this and other wars. War correspondents put their lives on the line to keep us informed.

In solidarity,

Lana Payne, National Secretary-Treasurer
Renaud Gagné, Québec Director