Asbestos issue continues to divide Canada's labour movement

[1]

The campaign to ban asbestos world-wide has been growing in intensity over the past year, in large part due to Canadian campaigner Kathleen Ruff. The former head of the B.C. Human Right Commission and a former director of the Court Challenges Program, Ruff has been instrumental in putting the issue on the front burner in federal politics.

As a result of the campaign both the NDP and the Canadian Labour Congress have come out in favour of a ban and Liberal leader Michael Ignatieff has stated his personal opposition to exporting asbestos. The Harper Conservatives have given no indication of reviewing their support for the industry.

On Canada Day anti-asbestos demonstrators in four countries -- France, the U.S., Australia and Britain -- demonstrated in front of the respective Canadian Embassies demanding that Canada end its role as lead propagandist for this lethal industry. The International Metalworkers Federation (which includes the Canadian branch of the United Steel Workers – the union representing asbestos workers in Canada) has launched an international campaign specifically against Canada.

rabble.ca Guest Senior Contributing Editor Murray Dobbin spoke to Kathleen Ruff about the current state of the campaign and why it is so important.

Murray Dobbin: You’ve been campaigning on the asbestos issue for about a year now.  Could you describe where the campaign is at right now, specifically what the positions of the political parties are and what the next step is?

Kathleen Ruff: We’ve made a lot of progress over the past year.  We started off a year ago when there was not a single political party in the House of Commons that would support ending Canada’s asbestos trade. The Canadian Labour Congress refused to take a position. So we were really starting off from rock bottom, zero support. After a year we now have the NDP with a clear policy to end Canada’s asbestos exports.  We have the Canadian Labour Congress adopting the same position. We have Michael Ignatieff, leader of the Liberal Party, expressing a clear personal view that Canada should stop exporting asbestos and assist the remaining asbestos miners in Quebec.

We seem to have the Liberal Party in disarray on the issue.  There clearly is a wish on the part of many Liberals to suppress the issue.  And that’s always been the policy followed by all the politicians in English Canada -- to not talk about asbestos, to not allow the issue to get on the radar screen, because they knew their position was indefensible. So you had in the past the politicians praising and vowing their total dedication to asbestos when speaking in Quebec and being utterly silent when they were in English Canada.

We now have the Liberal leader taking a position, which is an incredible breakthrough, and we also have the entire Liberal health committee on side, which includes the three MPs who are medical doctors. We have Bob Rae, and we also have a Quebec Liberal MP, Raymond Folco, who has taken the same stand -- that Canada should stop exporting asbestos.

MD: Is there any movement that you can discern on the part of the Harper Conservatives.

KR: The only movement that I’m aware of is the fact that MP Chuck Strahl, who personally has mesothelioma caused by working around asbestos.  He has always refused to speak out about asbestos or about his personal situation, which is very sad. But now, I think because of the CBC documentary which showed clearly the appalling condition of workers in India handling asbestos, he seems to be shocked by that. He’s commented that maybe this issue should be looked at by the Harper government.

MD: Canada’s exports of asbestos are relatively small compared to levels in the past -- and to other exporters.  Why is Canada such an important player in the asbestos trade?

KR: Canada used to be the major exporter of asbestos. It’s a major player today because it’s the voice of the asbestos industry.  It’s the cheerleader for the industry.  Because we have more credibility in the world than the other exporting countries like Russia and Zimbabwe. Our government and the industry put out this shameful propaganda that asbestos is safe and we are trusted -- when we shouldn’t be.

MD:  I’ve heard that the Canadian asbestos industry is actually very inefficient compared to its competitors.  How does it maintain any share of the market, if that’s the case?

KR: There was an agreement that got revealed under access to information whereby the other asbestos exporting countries agreed to maintain the price at a certain level to make it viable for the Canadian asbestos industry and in return, Canada would continue being the global propagandist for asbestos. 

MD:  Tell us about the Canadian Chrysotile Institute [formerly the Asbestos Institute] and its role -- and its connection with organized labour.

KR: The Chrysotile Institute is a registered lobby group on behalf of the asbestos industry. It’s funded by the Canadian government, the Quebec government, and the asbestos industry. The past and current presidents of the Institute were former presidents of the Quebec Federation of Labour. So the current president of the Institute is Clement Godbout who was president of the Quebec Federation of Labour. This means there has been this tight nexus between the asbestos lobby group and the Quebec Federation of Labour, which has been extremely aggressive in intimidating anyone who would speak up about the dangers of asbestos.

The Quebec Steelworkers represents workers in the asbestos mining area and they put out a press release when the first Quebec MP ever -- NDP MP Thomas Mulcair  -- said the asbestos trade should end.  Their press release, which was widely covered by the Quebec media, said that they would destroy the NDP in Quebec. 

MD:  What is the argument made by the Chrysotile Institute that the asbestos it mines is safe?

KR: The information they put forward is completely unfounded.  They say that science shows that chrysotile asbestos can be safely used.  Chrysotile asbestos is the only form of asbestos sold in the world today.  Every scientific body that’s examined it has said it’s deadly -- a Class 1 carcinogen -- and should be banned.  The Chyrsotile Institute has paid people, some of whom are totally lacking in any scientific qualifications, to travel the world and say that science shows it can be safely used.  The Institute claims to put forward the most up-to-date scientific information but, in fact, they do the exact opposite. They totally exclude all the scientific evidence from Quebec itself and from around the world that unanimously says asbestos is deadly and the use of it must be stopped if we are to end the worldwide epidemic of asbestos-caused disease and death. 

It’s very disturbing to see the kind of misinformation that’s being given to people and to importing nations. Canadian taxpayers are paying for the Chrysotile Institute to put out politicized science.  Over the past 20 years, the federal government has given the Institute over $20 million. Just a few months ago, we gave them another quarter of a million dollars to continue promoting industry-funded, scientific misinformation.

MD:  Asbestos mining is an iconic industry in Quebec with deep political significance.  Does that still play a role and help explain the reluctance of the union movement to deal with it?

KR:  The history of the industry is very much connected to the famous four month Asbestos strike [2] that took place in 1949, which was extremely heroic and supported by upcoming political leaders like Pierre Trudeau, Jean Marchand and Gerard Pelletier who backed the workers against the U.S. and Anglo-Canadian corporations that were running the mines.  So there’s a lot of pride and respect for that part of Quebec history, which is completely justified.

What’s happened since then is that there’s been a censorship of information in Quebec so that the media and the union movement have prevented information getting out to the Quebec public.  For example, the worldwide trade union movement, the International Confederation of Trade Unions, representing 160 million workers in 120 countries, have come out demanding for a ban on asbestos use. The Canadian Labour Congress has also taken that position.  Studies done by Quebec health authorities repeatedly show that there is a virtual epidemic of asbestos disease in Quebec, that it cannot be safely used, and that it is not being safely used in Quebec itself. 

In fact, the asbestos mining industry in Quebec now employs just a fraction of the people it once did, fewer than 400 miners. Even the mayor of Thetford Mines says that one of the great untold stories is how successful the area has been in diversifying away from asbestos mining.

MD: While the Canadian Labour Congress has taken a position, you don’t hear much about this.  Do you think they could be doing more to raise the issue?

KR: I think there is the problem of the Quebec Federation of Labour putting pressure to try to silence the issue in the union movement.  For example, if you go to the web site of the CLC, they have a whole section on how to prevent cancer.  It’s called “A Call to Combat a Workplace Epidemic.”  It talks about the urgent need to eliminate carcinogens in the work environment. Yet there is not a word anywhere on their website about banning asbestos, which is the biggest occupational killer in Canada.  So, despite their official position, the CLC is effectively silent on the issue.

MD: What about other unions?

KR: We need to have a strong visible fight led by the union movement, and we haven’t yet really seen it. They have policies on the books, but what is needed is strong public and political action. The building trades are speaking out because asbestos is killing so many of their members, with construction workers being among the most vulnerable. 

We certainly need more leadership. The Saskatchewan Federation of Labour is providing a good example, where they are campaigning for an inventory of asbestos in all the schools.  It’s the only place in Canada that I know of where organized labour is making a strong, public effort to address the asbestos calamity.

MD: I understand that in B.C. alone, 300 people die every year from asbestos-caused diseases.  But numbers from other provinces are hard to come by -- why?

KR: It is completely inexcusable that here in Canada we do not have a national registry of the numbers of people who are suffering from asbestos-related illnesses. This is one more way that the government ties to silence the issue. Most other industrialized countries have such registries.

Because there is no national registry, and which figures are kept and how they’re kept varies among the provinces, the number of those affected is vastly underestimated.  Only a small number of workers suffering from asbestos-related disease are getting the compensation they are entitled to under Workers Compensation law.  It’s estimated that only 40 per cent of workers who have an asbestos-caused disease are making a claim.

What this does is not only punish the worker even more than they’re already being punished, but it also means that the full cost of asbestos-related harm is paid for out of the public health system when it should be paid by the compensation system that employers help to finance. So it’s a great transfer of the costs to the public.  

Removal of asbestos from buildings or remediation is enormously expensive.  In B.C., this means that action to deal with asbestos problems only occurs in schools that have the highest asbestos threat rating.  Schools that are not the worst, but where the presence of asbestos is still a serious hazard, are not being dealt with because school boards can’t afford it.

MD:  What’s happening internationally?

KR:  There’s outrage internationally for Canada being the linchpin for the industry.  The demonstrations against Canada at its embassies are one indication. And at the meeting of the International Metalworkers Federation, they called for a worldwide campaign from the trade union movement against Canada.  That was launched just last month.

It would be great to see the Canadian labour movement throw strong support behind this campaign. If Canada can be stopped from its shameful role in promoting asbestos, that would be a huge gain for workers and people around the world.

Murray Dobbin is a guest senior contributing editor for rabble.ca.

rabble.ca is a member supported non-profit media site -- please become a member today [3] and get some great 'thank you' gifts, including a signed book by your choice of leading Canadian authors.

Comments