Alberta unions promise ‘big and bold’ response — but can they deliver?

Alberta’s labour movement is flirting with a tactic that its leaders say would be “big and bold and unprecedented,” but they’re still not quite ready to flip the switch.

Last week, labour leaders promised an “unprecedented response” to the provincial government’s decision to use the Charter's notwithstanding clause to force striking teachers back to work.

Days later, supporters and media congregated at Ironworkers Hall in Edmonton to hear more about what the Alberta Federation of Labour had up its sleeve. 

But if one was expecting concrete plans for a provincewide strike, as Gil McGowan, president of the AFL, had intimated was under consideration, the press conference that followed laid out a longer road ahead.

“General strike?” read one of multiple noncommittal signs on stage.

McGowan has said the labour movement needed more time to speak with union leaders and non-unionized workers about the possibility of enacting a general strike, which would see people across various fields refusing to work. 

There’s still much to work through nearly a week later.

“If we’re going to do it, it needs to be so big and so many people involved, that it would be difficult for the government to arrest and fine everyone,” McGowan told CBC Radio's Alberta at Noon host Kathleen Petty on Tuesday.

“In order to protect the people that are involved, it has to be big and bold and unprecedented —and that’s exactly what we’re working towards organizing.”

Jason Foster, a professor of human resources and labour relations at Athabasca University, said this moment is a significant one for the Alberta labour movement.

“Alberta does have an active and militant labour history … but it’s been much quieter in the last 20 to 30 years,” he said.

“And that’s why, I think, that makes the teachers’ strike and all the fallout that’s been happening in the days since quite significant.” 

But as history shows, maintaining early momentum will be no cakewalk, and Alberta’s labour landscape poses its own challenges.

Alberta has long had the lowest percentage of workers in unions in the country.