LabourStart: Where trade unionists start their day on the net.

Solong is the general secretary of the United Textile Employees Union in Lesotho -- a union currently involved in a major struggle for workers' rights and dignity at Quantum Apparel. In this interview, he tells us about a whole series of abusive (and illegal) practices at the company, including forced over-time, short-term contracts and union-busting. To learn more, and to show your support for the workers, check out the LabourStart campaign. Support the show

This week we talked with Paul Finch at a particularly interesting moment. His union, the largest in the Canadian province of British Columbia, is on strike. The employer in this case, the provincial government, is a social democratic party -- the NDP. Paul explains why the union is on strike and their strategy to win. He even broke the news to us that just a few minutes before the interview began, the union had shut down large numbers of public liquor and cannabis stor...

The Alberta Federation of Labour and some 25 Alberta unions, representing more than 300,000 workers, recently unveiled the Solidarity Pact, a commitment to collective defence against any attack on workers by public- or private-sector employers. The Solidarity Pact is intended to remain in force indefinitely. "The purpose of the Solidarity Pact is to let employers know that an attack on one union will be viewed as an attack on all unions and that Alberta unions will fight together—all for one,...

Luc Triangle, General Secretary of the International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC), was LabourStart's guest this week on our podcast. The ITUC represents around 200 million workers in 169 countries and territories and has 340 national affiliates. LabourStart's Eric Lee interviewed Luc about the vicious attacks by the Lukashenko dictatorship in Belarus against trade unionists -- and what the international trade union movement is doing to fight this. Luc spoke about the upcoming...

This week, LabourStart's Pat Bulmer interviews Mark Hancock, national president of the Canadian Union of Public Employees -- the largest union in the country. Mark was asked to speak about the union's recently-adopted "Montreal Declaration" which was drafted in response to US President Donald Trump's threats against Canada. “The declaration acknowledges the formidable contribution that the labour movement has made to building what makes us proudest to be Canadian: our public health care...

This week's LabourStart interview is with Kıvanç Eliaçık from DISK, one of Turkey's national trade union centres. We talked about workers' rights in Turkey, the role played by LabourStart and global unions, what individuals can do to help -- and about the central role that workers in struggle are playing in all this. We also discussed a new LabourStart campaign being launched this week in support of striking workers at Telus, in Izmir. A must-listen podcast this week, in our...

The LabourStart Podcast this week -- our first in 2025 -- is an interview with two Canadian writers who've written an important new book about one of the country's largest trade unions. Stephanie Ross is an associate professor in the School of Labour Studies at McMaster University in Hamilton, Ont., and founding president of the Canadian Association for Work and Labour Studies. Larry Savage is a professor in the Department of Labour Studies at Brock University in St. Catharines, Ont. LabourS...

"We were dying," says Sultana Hossain, describing the conditions that led thousands of Amazon employees in New York City to begin organising into a trade union. Initially, their union was independent and had no backing from anyone else -- and yet the workers were able to force an election in the workplace, win a majority and inspire millions of workers with their story. Click here to learn more about that union and its amazing story. For full coverage of workers' struggles at Ama...