Operation Solidarity

Operation Solidarity refers to a series of campaigns in 1983 in British Columbia, Canada, to protest and overturn the most regressive neoliberal program yet imposed on working people in the West. It brought together a coalition of social movement groups who organized rotating demonstrations to raise awareness of a program of fiscal restraint and social devastation wrought by the Social Credit government of British Columbia under Premier Bill Bennett. For 130 days, in the summer and fall of 1983, the province of British Columbia experienced a series of militant rallies, marches, and protests not seen since the mining struggles in the resources towns of the 1940s. These mobilizations threatened to culminate in a general strike involving hundreds of thousands of workers. This event, however, never materialized because reformist organizations and union leadership capitulated on the [Page 1059]demands of Operation Solidarity and accepted a government-contrived plan assembled in Kelowna, the premier's hometown. At that meeting, the “labor leader” of the coalition, Jack Munro of the International Woodworkers of America, settled for an agreement that only marginally differed from that which had been originally imposed by the government and had been resisted by social activists and workers of British Columbia.

Premier Bennett's government program was seen as the most extensive and aggressive attack on the working class of the era. Not even the neoliberal programs of Ronald Reagan or Margaret Thatcher entailed the comprehensive assault contained in the social and labor legislation introduced by the government. On July 7, 1983, the restraint program was made public. It included 26 bills designed to attack the social and labor rights of the working class and further menace those living in poverty. The bills sought to smash public- and private-sector union collective bargaining, eliminate commissions and regulatory bodies, cut services, and centralize authority in the hands of politicians and bureaucrats. The most contentious bills in the legislation were Bill 2, which removed the right of government unions to negotiate anything but wages; Bill 3, which enabled the government to fire workers at the expiration of a contract without cause; Bill 5, which abolished the Rentalsman's Office and rent controls; Bill 11, which limited public-sector wage controls to +/−5% (in a time of 11% inflation); Bill 24, which allowed doctors to opt out of publicly funded medical care and enter into private practice; and Bill 27, which repealed the Human Rights Code and eliminated the Human Rights Commission. In addition, minimum employment standards were reduced, public-sector pension plans undermined, and taxation authority removed from local governments and installed in the premier's office.

The Solidarity Coalition was formed in response to this neoliberal program and took the name Operation Solidarity. The coalition consisted of a disparate group of 50 community and political organizations and activists and labor unions. The BC Federation of Labor, led by Art Kube, provided funding and organizational support for the coalition. The New Democratic Party opposition was vociferously fighting the bills in the provincial legislature, eventually leading to the physical removal and barring of former Premier Dave Barrett from the government chambers. Massive rallies were held outside the legislative building of the capital city of Victoria and downtown Vancouver. The first of these rallies consisted of 20,000 people in Vancouver, quickly followed by another of 25,000 activists on the lawn of the legislative buildings in Victoria in July 1983. On August 10, 1983, another 40,000 union members and community activists rallied in Vancouver, followed by a march of 60,000 in front of the Social Credit Party's convention in Vancouver on October 16, 1983. These protests were not just for the experienced and veteran militants of the labor movement and community organizations, as was shown by the 42,000 education workers (which included 25,000 public school teachers) who joined other government workers on strike on November 8. On November 15, 1983, 140,000 nurses and doctors, college and university instructors, ferry workers, transit employees, and local government employees were set to join the strike. Private-sector unions were to join a provincewide general strike in the third week of November. But they moved slowly as a result of the government's threat to legislate workers back to work or face fines and jail terms for failing to comply.

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