CONTENTS

1. CALLS TO ACTION
2. EVENTS
3. ARTICLES
4. CALLOUT

Nurses Fighting for Change

The pandemic and years of underfunding have taken a heavy toll on nurses, healthcare professionals, and our healthcare system. Now we’re facing critical health-staffing shortages, surgery and treatment backlogs, and shuttered emergency rooms.

Nurses and healthcare professionals warned this would happen, but the government didn’t listen. We need a government that will listen to nurses and make positive changes to end the health-staffing crisis and rebuild our public healthcare system for everyone.

nursesfightingforchange.ca

WTF is Going on in Latin America

When: December 22nd, 7:30pm

Deconstructing the Anatomy of “Forgetting”, an encore broadcast with journalist, author, activist and educator Roberto Alvarenga Lovato.

youtube.com

Our City, Our Budget

When: January 9th, 5:30pm

Join Social Planning Toronto on January 9 to learn more about Toronto’s budget, the budget process, and how the budget affects the services you use every day — such as affordable housing, transit, community programs, libraries, and recreation.

We will cover the basics of the 2023 budget process, key dates, and how you can make your voice heard regarding the services and priorities important to you. You will hear from newly elected City Councillor Alejandra Bravo about the recent “strong mayor” change and how it affects Mayor Tory’s and Councillors’ powers, as well as the power that communities have to create change.

socialplanningtoronto.org

Leo Panitch School for Socialist Education

When: January 13th, 7pm
Where: 720 Bathurst St.

Curious about socialism? Interested in a discussion of whether it is really possible and a sober look at the problems it will face? Wondering why socialists put so much emphasis on the working class?

In these uncertain and dangerous times, the Leo Panitch School for Socialist Education is a space to listen, discuss and challenge the contemporary relevance of socialism. The school will provide an introduction to socialism, as well as a variety of courses and events that seek to expand on key aspects of socialist thought and practice. It will be a gathering place for both those already sympathetic to socialism but looking to learn more and those new to socialist ideas and full of questions.

As such, we are thrilled to officially announce the launch of the school at a very special event on January 13, 2023, 7pm. Featured will be an introduction of the school and a guest lecture by Bryan D. Palmer, Professor Emeritus at Trent University, on the topic of “Capitalism, Colonialism, and Canada: How the past is before us.”

eventbrite.com

Ontario Hospital Workers: Declining Compensation but Conservatives Want More Austerity

By Doug Allan

The Doug Ford government in Ontario suggests it must reduce the real wages of hospital workers via Bill 124, and now even proposes to appeal the court decision that found the legislation unconstitutional. However, no such need exists – quite the opposite. Spending on compensation has been shrinking as a portion of hospital budgets for many years. The result of this shrinkage? The short staffing, workplace violence, staff burn-out, and falling real wages that are currently hobbling hospitals.

Source: The Bullet No. 2748

The Israeli Elections and Their Aftermath

By Uri Weltmann

The troubling results of the recent elections to the Knesset (the Israeli parliament), held on November 1st, has generated interest around the world for their possible repercussions for the situation in the Middle East and the danger they pose to the cause of Palestinian freedom. Benjamin Netanyau, the staunch right-winger who was Prime Minister from 2009 to 2021, will return to office after a year and a half in Opposition. His major coalition partner, for the first time, will be the party of the extreme right, having gained enough votes to become the third largest faction in the Knesset.

Source: The Bullet No. 2749

Iran: Secular Revolt against Clerical Tyranny

By Saeed Rahnema

The Islamic regime in Iran is occupied with the brutal crackdown of the latest uprising of Iranians, who are fed up with 43 years of repression and are demanding change. The Iranian Revolution of 1979 was a mass popular reaction to the Shah’s dictatorship with hopes for democracy, political freedoms, social justice, and national independence. Though both secular and religious forces participated, in the absence of secular leadership, particularly among the left, many of whom had been eliminated by the Shah’s regime, the religious forces, with the support of liberals, gained the upper hand and claimed it as an “Islamic Revolution.” A good part of the left, infatuated with the populist anti-imperialist rhetoric of the new regime, particularly following the hostage-taking at the US embassy, assisted in their own further demise.

Source: The Bullet No. 2750

Building a Collective Movement Could be a Solution to Transit Woes

By H.G. Watson

Ottawa’s light-rail transit system has made headlines in the last years – but not for any good reasons. Trains don’t work in the cold. Technical problems cause frequent delays, and a derailment once led to all the trains being taken out of service for weeks. On top of this, Ottawa’s city council voted to increase fares. As these events unfolded, a grassroots group was beginning to fight for better transit. Free Transit Ottawa (FTO) had its first meeting in February 2020, bringing together transit users and workers, union members, students, and climate activists.

Source: The Bullet No. 2751

Liberal Democracy, Authoritarian Statism, and the New Finance Capital

This symposium at Carleton University, looked at the legacy of Leo Panitch’s scholarship, education, and activism, featuring roundtables and a keynote address by Institute of Political Economy (IPE) visiting professor, Stephen Maher: “Liberal Democracy, Authoritarian Statism, and the New Finance Capital.”

Source: LeftStreamed

Call for Online Survey Participants 

PhD candidate Sirena Liladrie is looking for participants to complete an online survey investigating retirement barriers faced by racialized immigrant seniors experiencing low-income in Ontario.   

The study is specifically interested in surveying adult children in order to better understand the realities their parents are experiencing with retirement, and how that may in turn affect them. Inadequate pensions and reliance on adult children to fill the gaps is a social justice issue in Ontario that needs to be addressed.

This study has received ethics clearance from the University of Toronto.

Survey Link.