CONTENTS

1. CALLS TO ACTION
2. EVENTS
3. ARTICLES

Stop the privatization of Ontario Healthcare

The people of Ontario demand that healthcare be fully funded by the Ford government and not privatized for special interest groups lobbying our Premier. The crisis in our healthcare system was created by this government as a prelude to privatization. The FAO report clearly shows a pattern of underfunding, wage suppression and unallocated funds in the midst of a global pandemic. The Ontario government has adequate resources available to support the healthcare portfolio without exploring privatization. In fiscal year 2021- 2022 – at the height of the Covid-19 pandemic – the Ministry of Health reduced spending on healthcare by 1.8 billion for acute care in hospitals and emergency services. Data from Ontario’s Financial Accountability Office shows the following cuts to investment in public healthcare.

change.org

The Making of a Black Bolshevik

When: November 17th, 7:30pm
Where: Another Story Bookshop, 315 Roncesvalles Ave

Featuring a conversation with Winston James and Ronald Cummings. Remarks by Andrea A. Davis.

One of the foremost Black writers and intellectuals of his era, Claude McKay (1889–1948) was a central figure in Caribbean literature, the Harlem Renaissance, and the Black radical tradition. McKay’s life and writing were defined by his class consciousness and anticolonialism, shaped by his experiences growing up in colonial Jamaica as well as his early career as a writer in Harlem and then London. Dedicated to confronting both racism and capitalist exploitation, he was a critical observer of the Black condition throughout the African diaspora and became a committed Bolshevik.

Facebook

The Union Show

When: November 17th, 8pm (doors open at 7:30pm)
Where: SoCap Comedy, 154 Danforth Ave, 2nd floor

Come join in the laughter with this ragtag bunch of union organizers who all happen to be improvisers!

All are welcome! Especially union members and supporters in need of a good night out filled with laughs and celebration.

eventbrite.ca

Workers’ Bowl 2022

When: November 19th, 12pm
Where: 115 Rexdale Blvd, Etobicoke

The Ontario Employment Education & Research Centre (OEERC) is hosting its 11th annual Workers’ Bowl in-person on Saturday, November 19, 2022!

All funds raised at the Workers’ Bowl go directly to the OEERC Education and Leadership Fund for Workers in Precarious Employment, to create collaborative community leadership development and educational projects with the Workers’ Action Centre (WAC), an organization committed to improving the lives and working conditions of people in low-wage and precarious employment in Ontario.

workersbowl.ca

Toronto Workers’ History Project CLiFF Screening

When: November 19th, 2pm

One hour, three films:

1. A World Free of Crisis
2. Nu Ulew (My Homeland)
3. Opera Trans*formed

watch.eventive.org

Solidarity Beyond Bars

When: November 21st, 7pm
Where: Type Books – The Junction, 2887 Dundas St W

Prisons don’t work, but prisoners do. Prisons are often critiqued as unjust, but we hear little about the daily labour of incarcerated workers — what they do, how they do it, who they do it for and under which conditions. Unions protect workers fighting for better pay and against discrimination and occupational health and safety concerns, but prisoners are denied this protection despite being the lowest paid workers with the least choice in what they do — the most vulnerable among the working class.

Fernwood Publishing and TYPE Books (Junction) welcome you to the launch of Solidarity Beyond Bars by Jordan House and Asaf Rashid.

Facebook event

Hospital Emergency Town Hall Meetings

When: November 21st to December 1st
Where: Several locations across Ontario
(Toronto: November 29th, 7pm)

All across Ontario people have banded together for a century or more to build up our local public hospitals. We have volunteered, fundraised and donated from our pay cheques because these are vital services for our communities. The Ford government’s plan would dismantle our local public hospitals, taking the profitable services out to for-profit corporations, robbing public hospitals of desperately needed staff and funding.

We must force the Ford government to address the crisis and take urgent action to support our local PUBLIC hospitals. We CAN do this, but everyone needs to help to make it happen.

ontariohealthcoalition.ca

National Housing Day

When: November 22nd, 12noon
Where: David Crombie Park, (Baseball Diamond at Sherbourne/Esplanade)

Housing in Canada is deeply unaffordable and the crisis escalates every day. Across the country from Kingston to Vancouver, Iqaluit to Montreal, people are being priced out of rental stock, losing their housing, and sleeping in tents, bus shelters and ravines because they cannot access housing or shelter.

The Shelter and Housing Justice Network (SHJN) is calling for a mass rally to send a loud message to all levels of government: leaving people to suffer and die from lack of shelter and housing cannot be allowed to continue. All level of governments MUST build social housing now!

shjn.ca

Jane-Finch Education meeting

When: November 23rd, 6pm

#Bill28 just got repealed. But what else is still happening at Queen’s Park in relation to the #publiceducation system? A community conversation on issues at stake for students, parents, workers and our communities.

With Jess Lyons, Matias de Dovitiis and Anna-Kay Brown

Facebook | zoom.us

Offloading Climate Responsibility on the Victims of Climate Change

Nnimmo Bassey interviewed by Steve Taylor

In this interview, Nnimmo Bassey, a Nigerian architect and award-winning environmentalist, author, and poet, talks about the history of exploitation of the African continent, the failure of the international community to recognize the climate debt owed to the Global South, and the United Nations Climate Change Conference that will take place in Egypt in November 2022. Bassey has written (such as in his book To Cook a Continent) and spoken about the economic exploitation of nature and the oppression of people based on his firsthand experience. Although he does not often write or speak about his personal experiences, his early years were punctuated by civil war motivated in part by “a fight about oil, or who controls the oil.”

Source: The Bullet No. 2722

After Lula’s Narrow Victory

By Jorg Nowak

After a tough campaign, centrist candidate Lula da Silva of the Workers Party (PT) won the second and final round of the Brazilian presidential election on October 30 with 50.9 percent of the vote, 2.1 million votes more than his extreme-right adversary Jair Bolsonaro of the Liberal Party (PL). This was the closest result for a Brazilian presidential election since 1989. Lula promised a return to democracy and normality in his victory speech on the packed Avenida Paulista in the center of São Paulo where tens of thousands assembled to celebrate. Bolsonaro remained silent for two days after the election, making only a very brief statement that made clear he would not contest the results.

Source: The Bullet No. 2723

Drought, Heatwave and Revolution

By Daniel Tanuro

Global warming, extreme severity of drought in Europe, heatwaves, snowball effect (or cascading reactions) among all these crisis factors… Risk of sudden changes in ocean circulation with incalculable consequences… This article addresses three points: the explanation of this incontestable observation, the possible evolution, and the policies to be implemented. It is useless, within the framework of this article, to list facts and figures demonstrating the extreme seriousness of the drought affecting the European continent. Even those who hardly follow the news have seen the frightening images of the Po River (Italy) drying up, the Loire River (France) reduced to a trickle of water, the River Thames (England) dried up at the source and for eight kilometres, the Rhine River (Europe) so low that navigation becomes impossible there.

Source: The Bullet No. 2724

Pakistan: Dangerous Interregnum, Catastrophic Equilibrium?

By Ayyaz Mallick

On 3rd November, while leading a Long March to the federal capital demanding fresh elections, former Prime Minister Imran Khan was the target of an assassination attempt. Thankfully, given Pakistan’s long history of violently disposing former Prime Ministers, Khan survived with minor injuries. In subsequent speeches, he has directly named and blamed the military establishment of trying to get rid of him.

Source: The Bullet No. 2725

Pandemic Lessons for Rebuilding Canada’s Welfare State

By Chris Webb

In what now seems like a distant memory, the early stages of the pandemic gave rise to a host of hopeful prognostications about the urgency of rebuilding of our social safety net. Arundathi Roy envisioned portals to potentially more humane futures. Even the Economist called for more robust social safety nets to shield us from future shocks. Much of this enthusiasm stemmed from the sudden and significant increases in spending on income support programs. Almost overnight, governments found money to pour into critical social protection programs that prevented massive layoffs and supported households through periods of unemployment. While temporary, these measures were some of the most significant investments in social protection we have seen in generations.

Source: The Bullet No. 2726