The Federation is campaign-
ing for a minimum wage of $15
an hour, a big jump from the
current $10.25. Won't that cause
hardship for many struggling
small businesses?
We had a small businesswoman
at one of our rallies. She runs
a food truck. She believes in pay-
ing her employees more than
the minimum wage—$13 to $14
an hour. But she said it's difficult
for her to compete with fast food
restaurants paying minimum
wage. So when you raise the
minimum wage, you actually
create an equal playing field
for the people who want to pay
people better. Fundamentally,
this is also a plea to make sure
people who work full-time in
B.C. are above the poverty line.
We need a $15-an-hour mini-
mum wage to do that. Our poll-
ing shows a lot of support for it.
How would you characterize
relations with the business
community? They are not gen-
erally your friends.
I do not regard employers as
the enemy. Sometimes we
have corporations that behave
extremely badly, and we will
say some very harsh things
about them when we feel they
are trampling on workers'
rights. But frankly, things are
best for workers when unions
and employers work together,
settle a collective agreement
without a strike. Isn't that what
we all want—good wages and
benefits and people contribut-
ing to their communities? Some
employers and some compa-
nies do want that. There are
good employers out there. They
are not making the media, but
there are lots of them. There
are even a few who respect
unions.
Do you have one particular
passion that drives you even
more than the many other
causes the labour movement
takes on?
My big passion is fighting
inequality. It's fighting poverty.
I think that unions make the
world a more equal place. Many
economists have talked about
how higher rates of unioniza-
tion and fair taxation lead to
a more equal society, because
those are the ways we force the
rich to share their wealth. We
have a terrible problem in this
province around poverty. That
requires a poverty reduction
plan, with targets and timelines.
We are doing our bit with the
minimum wage campaign. We
need government to do the
other pieces: raise welfare rates,
more social housing. That's
why I'm so passionate about
my work in the labour move-
ment, because I think it makes
the world a better, more equal
place. It raises people up out of
poverty, and we have to do that
way more than we have been.
•
b.C. private
seCtor
unionization
rate
1997 ..... 24%
2001 ..... 22.8%
2007 ..... 19.5%
2013 ..... 18%
% of b.C.
unionized
WorkforCe
in private
seCtor
1997 ..... 51.7%
2001 ..... 48.8%
2007 ..... 47.5%
2013 ..... 43.7%
march 2015 BCBusiness 25
