British Columbia Maritime Employers' Association
Encyclopedia
The British Columbia Maritime Employers Association is an association representing the interests of member companies in industrial relations on Vancouver's and other British Columbian seaports.
The BCMEA currently consists of sixty-seven member companies with commercial interests based on the waterfronts of Vancouver
and other seaports in British Columbia
. The BCMEA is the Employer Association of companies that employ longshoremen, who in turn are represented by the International Longshore and Warehouse Union
to bargain with the BCMEA on their behalf. In addition to collective bargaining, the BCMEA handles everyday labour matters, such as administering the collective agreement, payroll services, discipline, and grievance and arbitration hearings on behalf of its members.
Formed after World War I
to handle the rapidly growing commercial traffic on the waterfront, it was originally called the Shipping Federation of British Columbia, comprising shipping and railway companies, terminal and storage operators, and container companies.
in Canada in 1918 following the police killing of union leader, Ginger Goodwin. The following year a longer and more extensive general strike was called by the Trades and Labour Council in sympathy with the strike in Winnipeg. Longshoremen were among the first to walk out, but were quickly replaced by strikebreakers who were mainly university and high school students.
By the time the next strike erupted on Vancouver's waterfront, the Shipping Federation had adopted an even more rigidly anti-union policy, influenced by its recent association with counterparts in the United States, who were following what had been dubbed the American Plan. It then set out to break the union completely and establish a company union. Again, it recruited strikebreakers both as replacement workers and as special constables
. The CPR
's ocean liner, the Empress of Japan
, was used to house strikebreakers for the duration of the strike. The strike was quickly brought to an end after the Federation took over the duties of despatching work gangs from the union and refused to negotiate with the union, the International Longshoremen's Association
. It established the Vancouver and District Waterfront Workers' Association
to replace the ILA as a company union.
Almost a decade of peace followed the 1923 strike. It was not a lasting peace however, and in 1933 the Shipping Federation discovered that not only had the union been transformed by Communist Party
organizers into a militant union, but also that agitators were planning a general strike for the province to begin on Vancouver's waterfront in 1935.
Communists were active both on the waterfront and in the government relief camps for the unemployed, as well as several other industries, organizing workers into unions affiliated with the Communist trade union umbrella, the Workers' Unity League
. During this era, the Comintern
, or Communist International in Moscow was prescribing a policy of dual unionism. The Shipping Federation was thus centrally positioned during what was effectively another Red Scare
in 1935.
The general strike never happened in 1935, and striking relief camp workers left the city shortly after the waterfront strike finally was called for the On-to-Ottawa Trek
. Technically it was a lock-out. The union voted to take back control of despatching work gangs because discrimination, blacklisting, and the arbitrary allocation of work had long been a major grievance for longshoremen. According to the most recent contract however, the Federation was to handle dispatching, and therefore treated the union's action as a breach of contract.
The 1935 strike had seeped into the political realm much more extensively than the 1923 strike had. The civic administration of Mayor Gerry McGeer, along with his chief constable, Colonel Foster
had joined with the Shipping Federation to defeat the Communist threat. The Communists had been planning to merge the waterfront and relief camp strike, and hopefully other industrial workers into a general strike. Although these various groups of worker's were willingly under Communist leadership, they primarily were pursuing resolution to their own workplace grievances, not a proletarian revolution
.
The strike peaked with the July 18, 1935 Battle of Ballantyne Pier
, where the police clashed with strikers and their supporters who had attempted to march down to the harbour. Three levels of police were on hand, plus a plethora of special constables, organized in part by the Shipping Federation's Citizens' League of British Columbia, a vigilante group it funded to fight the strike and generate anti-strike/anticommunist propaganda. Again, the strike was broken, and the union replaced with a company union.
The Communists shifted away from the dual unionism
strategy and dissolved the Workers' Union League. Agitators now put their organizing energy behind the CIO
industrial union movement. The Shipping Federation stepped back from it overt anticommunism, but continued to fund a variation of the Citizens' League, the Industrial Association of British Columbia under the leadership of Colonel C. E. Edgett
, former police chief, prison warden, and leading local anticommunist polemicist. Nevertheless, workers managed to establish and sustain an independent union under Harry Bridges
's new International Longshore and Warehouse Union
(ILWU) that still exists today.
The BCMEA currently consists of sixty-seven member companies with commercial interests based on the waterfronts of Vancouver
Vancouver
Vancouver is a coastal seaport city on the mainland of British Columbia, Canada. It is the hub of Greater Vancouver, which, with over 2.3 million residents, is the third most populous metropolitan area in the country,...
and other seaports in British Columbia
British Columbia
British Columbia is the westernmost of Canada's provinces and is known for its natural beauty, as reflected in its Latin motto, Splendor sine occasu . Its name was chosen by Queen Victoria in 1858...
. The BCMEA is the Employer Association of companies that employ longshoremen, who in turn are represented by the International Longshore and Warehouse Union
International Longshore and Warehouse Union
The International Longshore and Warehouse Union is a labor union which primarily represents dock workers on the West Coast of the United States, Hawaii and Alaska, and in British Columbia, Canada. It also represents hotel workers in Hawaii, cannery workers in Alaska, warehouse workers throughout...
to bargain with the BCMEA on their behalf. In addition to collective bargaining, the BCMEA handles everyday labour matters, such as administering the collective agreement, payroll services, discipline, and grievance and arbitration hearings on behalf of its members.
Formed after World War I
World War I
World War I , which was predominantly called the World War or the Great War from its occurrence until 1939, and the First World War or World War I thereafter, was a major war centred in Europe that began on 28 July 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918...
to handle the rapidly growing commercial traffic on the waterfront, it was originally called the Shipping Federation of British Columbia, comprising shipping and railway companies, terminal and storage operators, and container companies.
History
The Shipping Federation was established during what Canadian historians have called the Canadian Labour Revolt in the period following World War I, which peaked in Canada with the Winnipeg General Strike in 1919. Employers felt they needed to band together, not only because port operations were becoming increasingly complex, but as a bulwark against unionism generally, and union militancy in particular. Vancouver hosted the first Canadian General StrikeGeneral strike
A general strike is a strike action by a critical mass of the labour force in a city, region, or country. While a general strike can be for political goals, economic goals, or both, it tends to gain its momentum from the ideological or class sympathies of the participants...
in Canada in 1918 following the police killing of union leader, Ginger Goodwin. The following year a longer and more extensive general strike was called by the Trades and Labour Council in sympathy with the strike in Winnipeg. Longshoremen were among the first to walk out, but were quickly replaced by strikebreakers who were mainly university and high school students.
By the time the next strike erupted on Vancouver's waterfront, the Shipping Federation had adopted an even more rigidly anti-union policy, influenced by its recent association with counterparts in the United States, who were following what had been dubbed the American Plan. It then set out to break the union completely and establish a company union. Again, it recruited strikebreakers both as replacement workers and as special constables
Special Constabulary
The Special Constabulary is the part-time volunteer section of a statutory police force in the United Kingdom or some Crown dependencies. Its officers are known as Special Constables or informally as Specials.Every United Kingdom territorial police force has a special constabulary except the...
. The CPR
Canadian Pacific Railway
The Canadian Pacific Railway , formerly also known as CP Rail between 1968 and 1996, is a historic Canadian Class I railway founded in 1881 and now operated by Canadian Pacific Railway Limited, which began operations as legal owner in a corporate restructuring in 2001...
's ocean liner, the Empress of Japan
CP Ships
CP Ships was a large Canadian container shipping company, prior to being taken over by Hapag Lloyd in late 2005. CP Ships had its head office in the City of Westminster in London and later in the City Place Gatwick development on the property of London Gatwick Airport in Crawley, West Sussex.The...
, was used to house strikebreakers for the duration of the strike. The strike was quickly brought to an end after the Federation took over the duties of despatching work gangs from the union and refused to negotiate with the union, the International Longshoremen's Association
International Longshoremen's Association
The International Longshoremen's Association is a labor union representing longshore workers along the East Coast of the United States and Canada, the Gulf Coast, the Great Lakes, Puerto Rico, and inland waterways...
. It established the Vancouver and District Waterfront Workers' Association
Vancouver and District Waterfront Workers' Association
The Vancouver and District Waterfront Association was the union for longshoremen working on Vancouver's waterfront between 1923 and 1935.It was established as a company union by the Shipping Federation of British Columbia after it defeated a strike and broke the local of the International...
to replace the ILA as a company union.
Almost a decade of peace followed the 1923 strike. It was not a lasting peace however, and in 1933 the Shipping Federation discovered that not only had the union been transformed by Communist Party
Communist party
A political party described as a Communist party includes those that advocate the application of the social principles of communism through a communist form of government...
organizers into a militant union, but also that agitators were planning a general strike for the province to begin on Vancouver's waterfront in 1935.
Communists were active both on the waterfront and in the government relief camps for the unemployed, as well as several other industries, organizing workers into unions affiliated with the Communist trade union umbrella, the Workers' Unity League
Workers' Unity League
The Workers' Unity League was created in 1929 as a labour central operated by the Communist Party of Canada on the instructions of the Communist International....
. During this era, the Comintern
Comintern
The Communist International, abbreviated as Comintern, also known as the Third International, was an international communist organization initiated in Moscow during March 1919...
, or Communist International in Moscow was prescribing a policy of dual unionism. The Shipping Federation was thus centrally positioned during what was effectively another Red Scare
Red Scare
Durrell Blackwell Durrell Blackwell The term Red Scare denotes two distinct periods of strong Anti-Communism in the United States: the First Red Scare, from 1919 to 1920, and the Second Red Scare, from 1947 to 1957. The First Red Scare was about worker revolution and...
in 1935.
The general strike never happened in 1935, and striking relief camp workers left the city shortly after the waterfront strike finally was called for the On-to-Ottawa Trek
On-to-Ottawa Trek
The On-to-Ottawa Trek was a long journey where thousands of people had unemployed men protesting the dismal conditions in federal relief camps scattered in remote areas across Western Canada. The men lived and worked in these camps at a rate of twenty cents per day before walking out on strike in...
. Technically it was a lock-out. The union voted to take back control of despatching work gangs because discrimination, blacklisting, and the arbitrary allocation of work had long been a major grievance for longshoremen. According to the most recent contract however, the Federation was to handle dispatching, and therefore treated the union's action as a breach of contract.
The 1935 strike had seeped into the political realm much more extensively than the 1923 strike had. The civic administration of Mayor Gerry McGeer, along with his chief constable, Colonel Foster
William Wasbrough Foster
Major-General William Wasbrough Foster DSO CMG VD was a noted mountaineer, Conservative Party politician, business man, and chief constable in British Columbia, Canada in addition to his distinguished military career....
had joined with the Shipping Federation to defeat the Communist threat. The Communists had been planning to merge the waterfront and relief camp strike, and hopefully other industrial workers into a general strike. Although these various groups of worker's were willingly under Communist leadership, they primarily were pursuing resolution to their own workplace grievances, not a proletarian revolution
Proletarian revolution
A proletarian revolution is a social and/or political revolution in which the working class attempts to overthrow the bourgeoisie. Proletarian revolutions are generally advocated by socialists, communists, and most anarchists....
.
The strike peaked with the July 18, 1935 Battle of Ballantyne Pier
Battle of Ballantyne Pier
Ballantyne Pier was the site of a docker's strike in Vancouver, BC, in June 1935. It was a federally owned dock built by the National Harbours Board In 1923, and named for the head of the Harbours Board. There were ongoing strikes on the West Coast of North America in the Depression and it led to...
, where the police clashed with strikers and their supporters who had attempted to march down to the harbour. Three levels of police were on hand, plus a plethora of special constables, organized in part by the Shipping Federation's Citizens' League of British Columbia, a vigilante group it funded to fight the strike and generate anti-strike/anticommunist propaganda. Again, the strike was broken, and the union replaced with a company union.
The Communists shifted away from the dual unionism
Dual unionism
Dual unionism is the development of a union or political organization parallel to and within an existing labor union. In some cases, the term may refer to the situation where two unions claim the right to organize the same workers....
strategy and dissolved the Workers' Union League. Agitators now put their organizing energy behind the CIO
Congress of Industrial Organizations
The Congress of Industrial Organizations, or CIO, proposed by John L. Lewis in 1932, was a federation of unions that organized workers in industrial unions in the United States and Canada from 1935 to 1955. The Taft-Hartley Act of 1947 required union leaders to swear that they were not...
industrial union movement. The Shipping Federation stepped back from it overt anticommunism, but continued to fund a variation of the Citizens' League, the Industrial Association of British Columbia under the leadership of Colonel C. E. Edgett
Charles Edgar Edgett
Colonel Charles Edgar Edgett was the warden of the British Columbia Penitentiary , the Chief Constable of the Vancouver Police Department , an active anticommunist and opponent of organized labour in Vancouver, Canada.Colonel Edgett briefly served in the North West Mounted Police before receiving...
, former police chief, prison warden, and leading local anticommunist polemicist. Nevertheless, workers managed to establish and sustain an independent union under Harry Bridges
Harry Bridges
Harry Bridges was an Australian-American union leader, in the International Longshore and Warehouse Union , a longshore and warehouse workers' union on the West Coast, Hawaii and Alaska which he helped form and led for over 40 years...
's new International Longshore and Warehouse Union
International Longshore and Warehouse Union
The International Longshore and Warehouse Union is a labor union which primarily represents dock workers on the West Coast of the United States, Hawaii and Alaska, and in British Columbia, Canada. It also represents hotel workers in Hawaii, cannery workers in Alaska, warehouse workers throughout...
(ILWU) that still exists today.
Member Companies
- Anglo Canadian Shipping Company
- APL Canada
- Associated Stevedoring Co. Ltd.
- Barwil Agencies (N.A.) Inc
- Cerescorp Company
- CP Ships (Canada) Agencies Limited.
- China Ocean Shipping Co. (Canada) Inc.
- China Shipping (Canada) Agency Co. Ltd.
- Coastal Containers Ltd.
- Colley West Shipping Ltd.
- Compass Marine Services Inc.
- Dubai Ports World (Canada)
- Dominion Shipping Co. Ltd.
- Empire Grain Stevedoring Ltd.
- Empire Shipping Company Limited
- Evergreen America Corporation
- Fairmont Shipping (Canada) Limited
- Fesco Agencies N.A. Inc.
- Fibreco Export Inc.
- Fraser Surrey Docks LP
- Gearbulk Shipping Canada Ltd.Gearbulk Holding LimitedGearbulk Holding Limited is an international shipping company headquartered in Hamilton, Bermuda. The company operates the world's largest fleet of open hatch gantry and semi-open jib craned vessels. These vessels specialise in carrying unitised breakbulk cargoes like forest products, non-ferrous...
- Greer Shipping Ltd.
- Hanjin Shipping Company Limited
- Hapag-Lloyd (Canada) Inc.
- Hyundai America Shipping Agency (P.N.), Inc.
- International Chartering Services Ltd.
- Interocean Steamship Corporation
- Island Shipping Limited
- Kerr Norton Marine Canada
- Louis Wolfe & Sons (Vancouver) Ltd.
- Maher Terminals of Canada Corp.
- McLean Kennedy Inc.
- Maersk Canada Inc.
- Maple Shipping
- Mason Agency Ltd.
- Montship Inc.
- N Y K Line (Western Canada) Inc.
- Neptune Bulk Terminals (Canada) Ltd.
- Norasia Container Lines Canada Ltd.
- Norsk Pacific Steamship Canada Limited
- North Pacific Shipping Company Ltd.
- Norton Lilly International
- Oldendorff Carriers
- OOCL (Canada) Inc.
- P & O Nedlloyd Limited
- Pacific Coast Terminals Co. Ltd.
- Pacific Northwest Ship & Cargo Services Inc.
- Pacific Rim Stevedoring Ltd.
- Pacific Stevedoring & Contracting Co. Ltd.
- PacNord Agencies Ltd.
- PCDC Canada Ltd.
- Saga Forest Carriers International (Canada) Ltd.
- Sanko Kisen (Canada) Ltd.
- Seaboard International Shipping Company Limited
- Seabridge International Shipping Inc.
- Sinotrans Canada Inc.
- SMI Marine Limited
- Squamish Terminals Ltd.
- Star Shipping (Canada) Ltd.
- Terminal Dock Limited
- Terminal Systems Inc.
- TFL Forest Limited - Stuart Channel Wharves Division
- Trans-Oceanic Shipping Co. Ltd.
- Vancouver Shipping Agencies Ltd.
- Vancouver Wharves Ltd.
- Westcan Stevedoring Ltd.
- Westcan Terminals Ltd.
- Western Stevedoring Company Limited
- Western Stevedoring Terminal Operations Ltd.
- Westward Shipping Ltd.
- Weyerhaeuser Canada Ltd.
- Zim Integrated Shipping Services (Canada) Ltd.