Hargrove Addresses Bargaining Challenges at CAW Council Today

TORONTO and PORT ELGIN, ON - Hundreds of elected delegates to CAW Council from across the country will come together to meet in Port Elgin, Ontario at the CAW's Family Education Centre on March 28-30 2008.

On the agenda will be a speech by CAW President Buzz Hargrove on Friday, March 28 starting at approximately 9 a.m., where he will address the political, social and economic challenges facing the union to the 700 delegates gathered.

The speech is in anticipation of the union's Collective Bargaining and Political Action Convention to be held in Toronto June 10-13th as well as a major round of bargaining with the Big Three North American auto producers.

CAW Supports Locked Out Quebecor workers

Friday afternoon CAW delegates will hear from two locked out workers from Journal du Quebec, a Quebec City newspaper owned by Quebecor / Sun Media. Journal workers have been locked out since April 22, 2007 after negotiations broke down between the workers, represented by CUPE / SCFP, and Quebecor. Since then, workers have been producing a popular daily newspaper called MediaMatinQuebec. They recently published their eight millionth issue.

The presentation is part of a country-wide tour by the CUPE members to raise awareness about the nearly year-long lock out and the growing concentration of Canadian media. The tour began on March 12 in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan and will wrap up at the Canadian Labour Congress convention in May in Toronto.

Delegates will also celebrate Earth Hour in a special commemorative event on Saturday, March 29th at 8 p.m. All CAW local unions have been encouraged to participate in Earth Hour across the country.