Photos by striking Calgary Herald photographers

Calgary Herald strikers and supporters, clad in scab yellow, take to the streets during the National Day of Protest to promote the boycott of the National Post.

"Today is day 100, and we're as strong today as day one."

That was the message from Alberta 34M Pres. John Webster on the picket line of the Calgary Herald, where 230 members of Local 34M and Communications, Energy and Paperworkers (CEP) Local 115A struck Nov. 8.

"Solidarity is great; the mood is still positive and upbeat," Webster said. "I find it quite heartening with the solidarity we're receiving from the rest of the labor movement that we've been able to maintain this type of action."

Local 34M's unit of 67 distribution, loading dock, machine shop and press cleaning workers and Local 115A's unit of journalists walked out after management refused to bargain in good faith on first contracts. Local 34M also represents pressroom workers at the 117-year-old newspaper, and they are now in negotiations for a successor contract.

GCIU Rep. Alan M. Tate, who is assisting Local 34M with the strike and pressroom negotiations, said support continues to pour in from around the world. "It's quite incredible how fast news spreads on the locals' e-mail chain and World Wide Web site," he said. "We've had e-mails from journalists in the United Kingdom, Nepal, Switzerland, Brazil, the former Soviet republics, and from the Jerusalem Post," which, like the Calgary Herald, is controlled by media mogul Conrad Black.

Walking the Calgary Herald picket line on a warm winter day are front, from right, Alberta 34M Pres. John Webster and Winnipeg 900M Pres. Colin D. Lang. Behind them from right are GCIU Rep. Alan M. Tate and Canadian Organizing Coordinator Duncan K. Brown.

On Feb. 8, the unions and their allies staged a "Day of Action" to support the boycott against Conrad Black's National Post. In addition to Calgary, rallies and demonstrations were held in Ottawa, Vancouver, Toronto, Winnipeg, Regina, Windsor, and other cities with Conrad Black's Hollinger/Southam chain newspapers.

Tate said the Day of Action proved a success in increasing Canadians' awareness of Black's union-busting strategy. "Black has made it clear that he wants to get rid of unions and that his actions in Calgary are a signal to workers at his other newspapers," Tate said. "I think people at Black-owned newspapers are realizing that if we don't draw the line in the sand in Calgary, they will be his next target."

In conjunction with a strike support meeting of the national Inter-Union Newspaper Council in Calgary, Aidan White, the Brussels-based chief of the International Federation of Journalists, spoke at a picket line rally.

The Calgary dispute concerns issues "which are important to journalists and media workers throughout Canada and the world," White said. Media tycoons like Black, who owns 65 percent of Canada's newspapers, are "seeking to use media to satisfy their ideological and commercial interests, rather than the mission of journalism – the public interest. . . . Conrad Black and his big brother, Rupert Murdoch, represent a trend in world journalism which is dangerous."

"Here in Canada you are witnessing the process of media concentration on a scale that has not been seen before," White said. "And there is not enough urgency in the political response to that process."

White told the Calgary strikers: "Your dispute is important because we see resistance beginning to emerge. . . . We see workers on the ground having the confidence to take on management, to say to people like Black and the management of the Calgary Herald: 'You will not intimidate us. You will not stop us from demanding our basic workers' rights. We will stand together. Solidarity means something.'"

Help Calgary strikers GCIU Vice Pres. James J. Cowan said the strikers at the Calgary Herald urgently need the support of all GCIU locals and members. All financial contributions will be put into a joint GCIU/CEP account and "will be used to finance the campaign to expose and stop the union-busting tactics of Conrad Black," he said. Checks, made payable to GCIU Local 34M Strike Fund my be sent to 3424 26th Street, N.E., #2A, Calgary, Alberta, T1Y 4T7.

One of the reasons cited by Calgary Herald journalists in choosing union representation were complaints that stories were rewritten by management to fit Black's ultra-conservative political bent and to tie in with marketing strategies.

Black's bias was made clear in a letter he sent to British Columbia Federation of Labour Pres. Jim Sinclair in which he called the strike "an attempted left-wing coup d'etat in the newsroom of the Calgary Herald." Black said the "basic rights of workers" include "the right not to be used as industrial cannon-fodder by corrupt union leaders."

Sinclair said Black's remarks "are so far from reality that they would be funny – if he didn't own a majority of Canada's newspapers."

British Columbia reporters and photographers at Hollinger newspapers, including the Vancouver Sun, held a by-line strike to support their brothers and sisters at the Calgary Herald.

In addition to good support for the unions' advertising and subscription boycotts, Webster said, the unions are getting welcome assistance from other unions, the community, and religious leaders. The unions are supplementing strike pay with a food bank. "You never know how much macaroni and cheese costs until you can't afford to buy it," he noted.

Webster said he and CEP leaders have received solid support during their appearances at union gatherings around Canada. "We're asking the rest of the GCIU to help us sustain this drive so other papers don't end up like this one," he said.

This kind of solidarity is driving those involved, Webster said. "This strike has really evolved, and the people have evolved with it," he said. "I've seen them countless times in random acts of courage that really bring you great joy to see the best side of people and get a glimpse of their inner strength," he said.

Meanwhile, Tate said, the unions are waiting for the Alberta Labour Relations Board to decide on the GCIU's charge against the Herald of bad faith bargaining. In December, the board adjourned the hearings and ordered Local 34M and management back to the table. Following two days of surface bargaining by the company, Tate said, the union returned to the board and hearings proceeded in January. Tate said the board is expected to announce its decision in late February.