Support

As many of our supporters know (and those who have been reading the blog since before we took down our old posts), Kathleen Smith aka Kikkiplanet was hit with a SLAPP suit from AUPE (along with a non-existent person and an Ontario businessman), claiming defamation, after she used social media to share this blog and our videos of what AUPE was doing to our home.

That suit is still ongoing.

These sorts of legal disputes can take years to resolve, and are very expensive.  For AUPE, this is no big deal.  They've got millions of dollars in union dues to finance their action.

Kikki, on the other hand, is a housewife with a twitter account, who just had to bury her son a short time ago.  She doesn't have a lot of money.  Which is the sort of thing that allows SLAPP suits to work; people just can't afford to defend themselves.

The smart thing for AUPE to do would be to drop this frivolous suit against her.

They haven't.

So one of her supporters has started a gofundme campaign.

Please support Kikki; visit this page and, if you can, contribute.  If you can't contribute, please share the page with as many people as you can.

Thank you.

Media coverage - Edmonton Woman's "Freedom to Tweet" article

An excellent article from Edmonton Woman about AUPE's attempt to silence Kathleen Smith for supporting us.

The article starts on page 10.

In a recent tweet Kathleen explained what makes Artspace special: "I walked into #Artspace and was immediately surrounded with warmth & love.  They shared their homes and their lives with me."

Artspace is a housing cooperative that is open to everybody.  However, it has a unique feature: 29 units have been adapted to meet the needs of residents with physical disabilities.  The dispute at Artspace is about the wages workers receive for the assisted living program.

The videos that Kathleen saw show AUPE members on the picket line using air horns, loud speakers and abusive language to the residents of Artspace.

Kathleen says that the residents have "fought their entire lives to live independently.  To not be institutionalized.  And in some cases, they have fought just to be permitted to live.  They have spent their entire lives fighting.  And no one was listening to their stories in all of this."

But Kathleen was listening.

Thank you, Kathleen, for listening.  There is no doubt that the relative peace we are "enjoying" right now is directly because of exposure in social media to what AUPE has been doing to our community.  No amount of calls to the police did it, and what little exposure there was in television or print media had little effect.  It took this blog, and social media attention, to finally get things to tone down, even if they aren't really all that much better; just less blatant.

It's a shame that, rather than admit their errors and take corrective action, AUPE has instead chosen file their SLAPP suit against you.

This is a powerful quote.

"One of the things I discuss online a lot," she says, "is freedom of expression in this country and how important it is.  And how much of an issue I have with those that think that freedom of expression or any charter rights only applies to people we approve of because that's not the way it works.  We all think we're fighting the great evil, but when we're actively seeking to deny others their rights, we're hurting ourselves.  And people need to wake up and start getting that message."

How very true.

Thank you, Kathleen, for standing up for Artspace, and thank you, Edmonton Woman, for such a well written piece.  You even got the description of Artspace right!

For those new to this page, here is the security montage video Kathleen is referring to in her interview.





This video was given to the media, months ago.  AUPE dismissed it, partially because, as they claimed, the footage was old, and did not reflect the reality of the picket line.

In response to that claim, here is a playlist of videos from August 2nd.

[update: AUPE videos are no longer available: as part of the agreement at the end of the labour dispute, AUPE removed videos and other online content related to the dispute.]





This next playlist of videos are from August 6; you can read more about it here.

Then there's this post, about events on the mornings of Oct. 16 and Oct. 22nd.

While this post includes video that shows some of what goes on in the wee hours of the morning.

AUPE cannot deny the reality these videos show.

You can still fix this, AUPE.

You can still save at least a few shreds of dignity.

Just walk away.

No sense

With all the stuff that's still been going on lately, many of us around here - and not just people who live here, but visitors, friends, family, etc. - are still asking one question.

Why are the picketers here?

At all.

It's not like they're accomplishing anything, other than give all unions a bad name.  As one person put it,

... all i know is that when we were on strike we were told the cops could arrest us for not continually walking, and for walking anywhere but on a designated area of the sidewalk outside the building we were picketing. this is ludicrous. ... and we complied because we didn't want to get in any trouble.

This, coming from someone who is a strong union supporter, and who loves their own union.

When it comes to what's happening here, there doesn't seem to be any "designated area" at all. They spend most their time in front of the West garden bed, but they'll also be in front of the driveways to the high rise parking (above and below ground), in the street, on the sidewalk across the street, in the curve of the street, where it turns to the side lane, and on the cul de sac at the back of the high rise, which is in front of people's private homes.  People who have no connection to Artspace, other than being geographically close.  They get to hear people shouting at the replacement workers in the wee hours of the morning, as well as have a bunch of people hanging out in front of their homes.

As for the folks outside, they don't even bother to walk around at all.  Usually, we have this - at least in the afternoons. 

It's not like the police are doing anything, as in this example, when an officer came for an unrelated manner.  

For some reason, AUPE isn't even being held to the same standards of behaviour as other unions, never mind basic human decency.

They're just sitting around, blocking the sidewalk.

If they're not sitting around, they're standing around.  They certainly don't walk continually.  And were would they be walking?  It's not like they're in front of the SAIL office to begin with. 

Let's take a look at the purpose of picketing; 

The purpose of picketing is to exert pressure on the employer by persuading other people not to do work for, or do business with, the employer. 

Well, the first problem with this is that they're not targeting the employer; they are targeting our home, the Artspace co-op.  With the SAIL model, most of this doesn't even apply.  The closest to meeting the above requirement is when they verbally abuse the replacement workers.  Yelling "garbage" and "scab" at the replacement workers isn't persuasion.  It's intimidation.

However, a picket line must be peaceful and cannot be used to forcibly prevent people from entering an employer's premises.

We can all see for ourselves how that's not been what's going on.  Especially since they've been blocking people from entering and exiting their homes.

Usually, striking or locked-out employees are only entitled to picket where they normally perform the work that's an integral and substantial part of the employer's operation and which is under the control and direction of the employer. 

Again, they're not picketing where they normally work.  People's private homes don't count, and the office is not where they are picketing.

Other operations of the employer may not normally be picketed. For example, if you operate your business at more than one location, your striking or locked-out employees are only permitted to picket the location for which their union is certified and at which they perform their work for you. They are prohibited from picketing your other locations if they do not normally perform work at those locations.

Once again, this doesn't apply.  SAIL has only one location; the office in unit 103.  It does not operate their business anywhere else.

As an exception to this general rule, picketing may also be conducted at other sites, with permission from the board, in circumstances where an employer attempts to have "struck work" performed these other sites. In other words, if you move work, normally performed by striking or locked-out employees, to another location in order to continue service or production during the strike/lockout, that location may be subject to picketing.

SAIL is not having "struck work" performed anywhere else; SAIL business is done in the SAIL office.  That the employees leave the office to enter people's private homes doesn't change anything; they are providing home care in the same way as other care workers who do home care, and those private homes are not part of the employer's work site.

Think of it this way; AHS funds home care all over the province.  Home care workers travel from home to home to provide this care.  Let's say that these home care workers decided to go on strike.  Who is the employer?  AHS (or, in the case of contract workers, the contracting company).  Not the people receiving care.  So the place to picket would be an AHS office, or the office of the contracting company.

With SAIL, there is only one employer location.  The SAIL office.

Similarly, striking or locked-out employees may be entitled to picket the place of business of an "ally" employer. 

SAIL does not have any "ally employer."  The closest to it would be AHS.

The board will declare another employer to be an ally of the struck employer in circumstances where the ally assists the employer in a lockout or in resisting a lawful strike. 

Does not apply.

Ally picketing is restricted to the site at which the ally performs work for the benefit of the employer who is directly involved.

Again, this does not apply, yet they are targeting our private homes.

Finally, where more than one employer carries on business at the same site (referred to as a "common site"), the board generally restricts picketing so that it affects only the employer involved in the labour dispute or the ally of that employer. 

Yet their actions are affecting an entire neighbourhood and community.

This restriction is relaxed, so that regulated picketing at a common site can occur and will affect third parties to some degree, in circumstances where the union has no other way of picketing at the workplace of the striking or locked-out employees.

AUPE could have picketed the SAIL office; they chose not to.

So here we have all these examples of how picketing is supposed to be done, none of which is actually happening.

Instead, they keep coming back, day after day, week after week, month after month.

For what?

There's just no point for them to be in front of Artspace at all.  We don't have any influence on the labour dispute.  Even the volunteer SAIL board members have no control over the funding, so they can't do anything, either.

They are accomplishing nothing out there.

They are in front of our private homes, so there is no persuading of people not to enter the place of business; even with the replacement workers, they're just harassing them.

There are no products of the employer to persuade people not to deal in or handle.

There is no one to convince not to do business with the employer.  The closest to is would be to ask the user members to refuse SAIL services, which doesn't work when the services involved are things like getting out of bed, eating or even personal hygiene.  As mentioned before, this isn't a coal mine or a factory, where production can be halted, or where people can go shop elsewhere.

So what are they accomplishing?

Well, there are a few things they are accomplishing.

They have alienated a lot of potential supporters.

They have given all AUPE members a bad name.

They are giving all unions a bad name.

AUPE probably cost the SAIL staff their jobs.  If SAIL were forced to accept AUPE's demands, which they can't afford, they'd go under, and the staff would lose their jobs.  If AUPE succeeds in bankrupting SAIL through frivolous litigation, again, the staff would lose their jobs.  There's no win here.  For anyone.

All of that doesn't count the damage they've done to people who live here, resulting in everything from increased in medication, to hospitalizations.

Every day they are out there, they make it worse.

For themselves.

It just makes no sense!

Support From the Outside

Following is a comment received from a supporter not associated with Artspace, SAIL or AUPE.

I have recently done a lot of reading and watching videos that have been shown in regard to incidents on the picket line. The Union dispute aside, I find the actions of the picketers absolutely mortifying. I am not sure what kind of community support they expect to garner with such actions but I can tell you this, I would never want a single one of these people ever caring for a disabled family member. If they treat these people so terrible in public view it frightens me to think of how they would treat them behind closed doors. 

I am not sure what I can do as an uninvolved person, I wrote a letter to AUPE and to the mayer and sent a message to the AUPE via facebook advising how disgusted I am by their members' behaviour and the apparent "approval" from AUPE as to this behaviour.
If there is a petition to sign or some other such thing please let me know.

I have a niece with disabilities; who is lucky enough to be able to remain at home with her parents but I shudder to think of what it would be like for her if she was residing in this community and subjected to this kind of abuse. 

You have my FULL support!