AUPE, NDP, and The Co operative Model

Since AUPE launched it's attack on ARTSPACE, where SAIL is the main focus of their fight, they seemed to have taken over the Whole ARTSPACE Co operative.  Often heard from the Picketers is "This is our place now!" And while no one has been opposed to them picketing the SAIL office (a proposal AUPE rejected), they attack instead the whole Co-operative and it's members.  There are more Co-op members than SAIL users and Staff combined!

A bit of Background on Co operatives :
There are many kinds of co-operatives: food co-ops, co-op daycares, credit unions, retail co-ops, worker co-ops and housing co-ops. Any group of people can form a co-operative. The members own the co-operative and the co-operative provides a service they need. Housing co-operatives provide housing.

Since the 1930s, Canadians have been building and living in housing co-ops. The people who live in the housing are the co-op’s members. They elect, from among themselves, a board of directors to manage the business of the co-op.

Each member-unit has one vote. Members work together to keep their housing well-managed and affordable.

Over the years, federal and provincial governments have funded various programs to help Canadians create non-profit housing co-ops. The co-ops developed under these programs provide good quality, affordable housing.

As a co-op member, you have security of tenure. This means that you can live in your home for as long as you wish if you follow the rules of the co-op and pay your housing charge (similar to rent).

As a co-op member, you have a say in decisions that affect your home.

You and your neighbors own your homes co-operatively.  Members form a community that works together to manage the co-op.

Co-op communities are made up of all kinds of people - people with different backgrounds and incomes and special needs. These diverse and vibrant communities are the unique strength of the co-op housing movement.

So is it not hypocritical that AUPE flaunts members of the NDP Party to show support for them? The late Jack Layton and his wife Olivia Chow lived in a Co-op.  Our NDP MLA for Norwood-Highlands, Brian Mason and his family, lived in a Co-op (Sundance).   Niki Ashton, who  is the New Democratic Member of Parliament for the electoral district of Churchill in Manitoba, Canada, ran in the last NDP leadership campaign.  A resident of Thompson, Manitoba, she is the daughter of Manitoba provincial NDP cabinet minister Steve Ashton. She has been an instructor at the University College of the North, was a firm believer in Co-op Housing.

So it seems prominent NDP members value the Co-op idea show up, not at the SAIL office, but for photo ops in front of the Co-op entrance, using bullhorns at times, supporting the ones from AUPE who are terrorizing and have loudly said, on more then one occasion "This is our place now!"

Irony?