justice award for Ontario Labour Leader

Benefitting from Armstrong and Upshaw good human rights work in labour movement

By William Doyle-Marshall

  Fred Upshaw, retired President of the Ontario Public Service Employees Union has been presented with the Bromley L. Armstrong. The first person of African heritage to head a major labour union received immense praise from his peers including Mohammed Baksh of the Steelworkers Union.

 Bromley Armstrong, retired labour leader after whom the award is named told Upshaw it was a great honour to make the presentation to him, being the first union president of African heritage.  Upshaw was obviously pleased that the Equity Committee of the Toronto and York Labour Council had selected him for the honour. “When you spend the hours, day in and day out, night in and night out that there is one person that’s in the background. They are not part of the work that you have to do except for the fact that they support you all the way. So I want to say to my wife Rosemary ‘thank God that I have a wife like you who allow me to do the things that I do,” Upshaw said

          Bromley Armstrong and Fred Upshaw

   “Bromley set a standard for a hell of a lot of us leaders. He set a standard that was tough for us to adhere to but he built in the labour movement and he put his rocks up there. I came along and I placed another rock a little further up and there are people behind me that will keep putting rocks up there and we’ll be going bigger and bigger and bigger,” Upshaw continued.

   “I have to admit that we are standing on big shoulders,” says Guyanese-born Mohammed Baksh of the Steelworkers Union. Because of Armstrong’s struggles and some of the groundbreaking things he has done Baksh concludes he and other visible minorities have been really encouraged.  The retired labour leader has inspired many to get involved and he continues to be an inspiration. Baksh regards the Labour Council’s decision to name the award after Armstrong ‘really amazing’. “I think it is really a good thing for us to look forward to and to participate,” he added.

   Upshaw is seen as an amazing individual who, as the head of OPSEU handled and resisted lots of attacks on visible minorities and came through successfully. “Fred has done some amazing things in the field of human rights and anti-racism for many, many years. I sat on a Canadian Labour Congress Committee with him and it was such an inspiration just to be there with him to hear his thoughts and his thinking and some of the ideas he came up with and it all goes toward the future generation because 25-30 years ago he was thinking of the people coming up then and today again, we are benefitting from all the good work that Bromley and Fred have done in the field of human rights in the labour movement,” Baksh continued.

   Marie Clarke-Walker, executive vice president of the Canadian Labour Congress warned trade unionists that they are living in a time when not just Conservative Governments, not just neo-conservatives and neo-liberals but everyone is attacking the trade union movement and progressive movements.

  John Cartwright, president of the Toronto and York Labour Council, believes it is really quite special to have the Bromley L. Armstrong Award go to Upshaw, the first Black leader of a major trade union in Canada. Thinking of Armstrong’s history and work Cartwright confessed “we always look at him as a ground breaker, as a pioneer, well Fred in his way, was very much a ground breaker and pioneer.”

  Reflecting on the 1990’s when Upshaw was at the helm of OPSEU, Cartwright noted recession was hitting Ontario. It was a time of terrible restraint. Initially there were lots of questions about the government response. The Rae Government decided to bring in the social contract and that immediately created a huge dilemma for Fred and others in the labour movement. “So it was very tough. It was like a fight inside the family and those are the hardest fights. But also Fred within OPSEU pushed to ensure that the human rights component was robust; it wasn’t just a token thing; that the entire membership and leadership of OPSEU embraced equity, embraced human rights, embrace an anti-racist understanding of who we are and where we are as a people,” Cartwright recalled.

   Past recipients of the include Bromley L. Armstrong Award included June Veecock, past human rights director of the Ontario Federation of Labour; Hassan Yussuff, secretary treasurer of the Canadian Labour Congress; Marie Clarke-Walker, executive Vice President of the CLC; Janice Gairey, current Human Rights Director of the Ontario Federation of Labour.

May 17, 2013