OPSEU First Vice-President/Treasurer Eduardo (Eddy) Almeida led a large group of OPSEU members to a Conservative gathering in Niagara Falls on February 22 to tell the Ford government: no more!
“I’m a treasurer of a large union, so I get the importance of finances, but not at the expense of children and other vulnerable people,” Almeida told one of the many reporters gathered to cover the protest.
“Dollars and cents are important, but people are more important than that and, in the end, I think Ontarians understand. Kids matter, and the workers that take care of the kids matter.”
Almeida and the other OPSEU members joined thousands of other labour activists outside the Ontario Progressive Conservative Party’s policy convention.
The labour activists were in a fighting mood as they loudly denounced the Ford government’s irresponsible cuts to public services – services that every Ontario resident uses and depends on – in favour of tax cuts and other hand-outs to their rich friends and backers.
The President of the Ontario Federation of Labour, which organized the rally, told the Ottawa Citizen that the entire labour movement is united in the fight to save quality public services.
“Let’s make some noise … and let this government know we will hold them accountable for what they’re doing in Ontario,” said OFL President Patty Coates. “For what they’re doing to working families. For what they’re doing to the people in our communities.”