Operation Solidarity
In 1983, labour and activist organizations alike across the province, including unions, environmental, religious, social justice and women’s rights groups, came together over the course of several weeks through escalating actions in what would effectively become the largest political protest in BC’s history. It was in response to the most sweeping assault on rights in Canadian history by the newly re-elected Social Credit government.
Recession in British Columbia
In the early 1980s, Canada experienced the worst economic downturn since the Depression. The economic conditions were particularly hard on resource-dependent British Columbia.
To help unemployed workers during this tough economic time, the BC Federation of Labour set up Unemployment Action Centres around the province. They functioned as food banks, career counselling services, and organizing centres.
Credit: Thompson Rivers University
Bill Bennet, leader of the Social Credit party and premier of B.C. saw the recession as an opportunity to slash spending and curb the power of unions. They went into the provincial election of 1983 on a platform of economic restraint.
Social Credit Government Re-elected
Despite a strong and popular campaign by NDP leader Dave Barrett, Bennet’s Social Credit party won the 1983 election. British Columbians had voted for his promise of “restraint,” but had no idea what was to come.
Black Thursday
Budget Day came with a crash. One by one, ministers rose in the legislature to introduce a new bill. When they were done, 26 pieces of legislation had been introduced, alongside a budget that slashed funding for core social programs across the province. In an instant, the Human Rights Branch and the Human Rights Commission were shut down.
Credit: Joey Hartman file, BCLHC Solidarity Collection
Two of the bills targeted working people directly. Bill 2, the Public-Sector Labour Relations Act, removed contract rights such as seniority, layoff protection, and more. Bill 3, the Public-Sector Restraint Act, was even more shocking. All public-sector employers in the province, including the government, had the power to fire employees without cause.
Laid off!
1,600 provincial employees received layoff notices the very next day. Nearly everyone in BC was affected: the cuts affected services that supported women, children, faith groups, people with disabilities, renters, workers, and more.
Organizing Against the Budget
George Hewison of the United Fishermen and Allied Workers’ Union called a meeting at the union hall, and more than 100 people turned out to form the Lower Mainland Budget Coalition. Affirming that “An injury to one is an injury to all,” they set out to build equitable coalitions across the province to fight the legislation.
In communities across the province, community coalitions and action caucuses started to build.
Operation Solidarity is formed
The B.C. labour movement set aside any internal disagreements to unite under the banner of Operation Solidarity, an alliance of 400,000 union members. A steering committee of the BC Federation of Labour executive, as well as representation from non-affiliated unions, is given the authority to call a general strike and a 1 million dollar budget.
Credit: BCLHC Solidarity Collection
Heating up
Two major events happened on this explosive day. The first of many pro-Solidarity rallies to occur that summer took place in Victoria, where 6,000 people attended a hastily called meeting at Memorial Arena.
Credit: Pacific Tribune Photo Collection
Things were also happening in Kamloops. The provincial government had announced the closure of the Tranquille Institution, without making any plans for the 300 residents with physical and mental disabilities.
The employees, many of whom had worked with the same residents for years, decided to take things into their own hands. A hand-painted union flag was raised, locks were changed, managers evicted, and workers took control of the facility. The occupation lasted 22 days and came to an end with an agreement from the government.
20,000 March in Vancouver
More than 20,000 demonstrators marched in Vancouver in a rally organized by the Lower Mainland Budget Coalition.
20,000 March in Vancouver
More than 20,000 demonstrators marched in Vancouver in a rally organized by the Lower Mainland Budget Coalition.
25,000 Rally at the BC Legislature in Victoria
In the largest protest ever held at the legislature in Victoria, twenty-five thousand citizens expressed their widespread anger at the Social Credit government’s budget.
Credit: Pacific Tribune Photo Collection, Simon Fraser University
First Meeting of Solidarity Coalition
The aim of the Solidarity Coalition was to bring together the various action groups across the province in a broad and concerted opposition. It was jointly chaired by BC Federation of Labour president Art Kube, fired Human Rights Commission staff Renate Shearer, and theologian Father Jim Roberts.
Credit: Pacific Tribune Photo Collection, Simon Fraser University
They connected environmentalists, diverse faith communities, 2SLGBTQ+ activists, seniors, tenants, people with disabilities, students, and many more.
Credit: City of Vancouver Archives
40,000 rally at Empire Stadium in Vancouver
The feeling at Empire Stadium that afternoon was that “anything was possible.” Forty thousand British Columbians came together in solidarity at the Empire Stadium. Musical and dramatic performances and speeches came from the stage, while wave after wave of people filled the stadium near to capacity. Just when it seemed the stands couldn’t hold any more, in marched several hundred uniformed firefighters, played in by the Firefighters’ Brass Band.
The energy from this incredible event continued to animate protests all through the summer.
Credit: Pacific Tribune Photo Collection, Simon Fraser University
Creative Resistance
From August through October, resistance continued and took on many forms. Rallies in small communities gathered thousands of attendees. Women Against the Budget held a “Stone Soup Luncheon” outside a cabinet minister’s home. The BC Teachers’ Federation set up “Streetcorner Schoolhouses” to educate the public. The Solidarity Coalition held candlelight vigil as the budget was being debated in all-night sessions. Workers signed petitions and wore Solidarity buttons to work, even as they were punished for doing so.
Credit: United Food and Commercial Workers Union
Vancouver Cabinet Offices Occupied
87 people, including unionists, community and tenants’ rights activists and representatives of faith organizations, occupied the provincial cabinet offices in Robson Square in Vancouver for twenty-seven hours to take the province-wide demand for withdrawal of the twenty-six pieces of legislation directly to the government.
The occupiers emerged to boisterous support from more than 2,000 people who had been staging a demonstration against cutbacks at the Ministry of Human Resources several blocks away.
Legislation by Exhaustion
To pass his controversial bills, Premier Bennett resorted to holding back-to-back all-night sittings of the legislature, in a move that critics called “legislation by exhaustion.” NDP members slept in shifts, in their cars or on mattresses brought from home, and used up every minute of their allotted time in debate. Every forty minutes an NDP member would vote to adjourn, forcing the Socred members to stay nearby and available to vote.
MLA Gordon Hansen (NDP-Victoria) filibustered for nine hours, saying later that “fatigue is nothing when you consider what the government is doing to 250,000 families.”
65,000 March in Vancouver
After so many demonstrations across the province, there was some worry from labour leaders that supporters could be suffering from “protest fatigue.” Despite these fears of the movement slowing down, the Coalition managed to convince reluctant Operation Solidarity leaders to jointly sponsor a public protest in the streets of Vancouver. A massive feat of organization brought over 60,000 citizens downtown to encircle the Hotel Vancouver where the Social Credit Party was holding its convention.
Credit: Vancouver Punk Rock Collection, Simon Fraser University Special Collections
Also on this day, the Solidarity Times began publishing. It was a weekly newspaper, financed by Operation Solidarity and the BC Teachers’ Federation.
BCGEU Strike Begins
The BC General Employees Union (BCGEU) master agreement was set to expire October 31, and contract talks had been ongoing since early October. The union was determined that there would be no new agreement without an end to two of the most pernicious bills. When the date came, BCGEU went on strike.
A Program of Action
Operation Solidarity had a plan: an escalating province-wide walkout that would begin if the BCGEU was still on strike by November 8. First, the education sector would strike. A few days later, the unionized workers at the province’s crown corporations would follow. Then BC Ferry workers and municipal workers, then all public transit workers. Finally, at the end of the week, the province’s public health sector hospital workers would come off the job. By then, a total of 200,000 people in the province would be on strike.
The plan was audacious and relied on workers who had never struck for long to be committed to the action. They were.
Credit: BC Teachers’ Federation
Accord Reached
BC Federation of Labour leader Art Kube was struck with pneumonia, unable to work. Representation of Solidarity fell to the BC Federation of Labour’s Mike Kramer and Jack Munro. The government was primarily represented by Deputy Minister Norman Spector, who went back and forth between BCGEU negotiations and those with Munro and Kramer.
By the weekend, Operation Solidarity appeared ready to accept a deal that would see an end to Bill 2, exemptions to Bill 3’s layoff provisions, a commitment to keep savings from the teachers’ walkout in the education system and promises of community consultation on the bills that covered tenant and human rights.
Jack Munro and Norman Spector flew to Kelowna to meet Premier Bennett in his living room. The province held its breath for the next 3 hours, while Munro made calls back and forth to the BC Federation of Labour steering committee to report. On behalf of Operation Solidarity, the committee voted to accept the deal, now known as The Kelowna Accord, though it was not a unanimous decision.
Credit: Pacific Tribune Photo Collection
The Aftermath
The Kelowna Accord was a controversial and anti-climactic end to the summer of action. Rank-and-file members of the Solidarity Coalition had put so much into this four-month fight and were not consulted or even aware of the private negotiations that quickly put an end to the “general strike”. Teachers had not voted to end their strike yet found themselves back at work on Monday.
Many activists believed they had been on the picket lines for more than labour issues and were not satisfied with a labour-focused resolution.
The end to the Solidarity movement of 1983 tends to overshadow what was one of the most significant moments in BC labour history. The government was forced to back down on their attack on labour rights, and it was a formative time for the labour unions involved. Most importantly, it saw labour and community activists truly working side-by-side in new and exciting ways.
The timeline below has been adapted from our Digital Museums Canada exhibit “Solidarity: The Largest Political Protest in British Columbia’s History.”