Félicitations, monsieur Arnold August, pour ce prix Félix Elmuza et pour la reconnaissance de la part des journalistes cubains que cela signifie!

The danger with the legal situation is of course piecemeal enforcement, and I am sure the Conservatives are particularly concerned with the notion that one judge can prioritize the legislative process.

I worry that there is little political will for a discussion of new and less Draconian national scehemes in the regulation of prostitution (i.e. not criminalization). Harper would not want to risk the no-confidence vote, nor would he want to alienate his base.

So far now it would seem all federal eggs lie in the appeal basket, and by the end of the process we will have either a piecemeal solution or the status quo.

If the conservatives ultimately do not achieve a win at the highest courts, expect a national debate and a swift election (if the appeal process is fast tracked, otherwise the appeal process could drag on longer than Harper’s time in office).

More interesting is that the nature of prostitution has changed over the last ten years dramatically, with internet marketing being much more prominent. Thus the key issues may be in flux in a way that has yet to be considered by any court – see http://www.winnipegfreepress.com/opinion/westview/perceptions-of-prostitution-dated-104065544.html

In the eyes of many people the union movement no longer symbolizes a movement fighting for social change for all. This perception is a reflection of what it to a large extent has become in reality, combined with right-wing anti-union ideology. Just look at what top union officials have and haven’t done around the Toronto G-20 protests and the defence of the hundreds of people arrested. The CLC president’s June 26 statement (http://www.canadianlabour.ca/national/news/statement-ken-georgetti-president-canadian-labour-congress-vandalism-surrounding-toron) urging governments “not to move too quickly to austerity measures” and condemning attacks on property while saying nothing about the early morning targeted arrests of community activists that day says a lot about the upper ranks of the labour officialdom. The open letter in response by left-wing union activists (http://www.g20.torontomobilize.org/node/422)
was heartening, but the radical left is very weak in unions today.

I think that it’s important to try to build Labour Day and May Day events as joint efforts of unions and community-based organizations (anti-poverty, anti-racist, ecological groups, tenants’ groups, groups that advocate for the workplace rights of non-union workers etc.). Hope for the working-class movement lies in trying to change unions from below and build new workers’ organizations, as I argue in the book I’m writing on the movement in Canada today.