Rally Against Corporate Greed
--- Notice to members of OSSTF District 21 ---
Nearly 70 buses already booked for Saturday rally to support Electro-Motive/Caterpillar workers. Saturday’s rally against Electro-Motive Canada and its parent company Caterpillar Inc. is expected to be the largest ever to take place in London.
Dubbed a “London Day of Action Against Corporate Greed,” the rally to support the members of Canadian Auto Workers Local 27 is slated to start at 11:00 am on Saturday, January 21 at Victoria Park in downtown London, Ontario. The park was the site of last year’s Occupy London tent city and serves as a powerful symbolic connection to a movement inspired to defend the interests of “99 percent.” The protest will target Electro-Motive/Caterpillar, which locked-out workers at its London-based diesel train plant on New Year’s Day in an attempt to slash benefits and cut wages in half, after a year in which Caterpillar enjoyed billion dollar profits and a 20 percent boost in productivity.
The audacity of Caterpillar in demanding a $30 million annual cut from these workers, their families and our city has inspired the community to come together to say ‘enough is enough,’” said Patti Dalton, President of the London and District Labour Council. “Caterpillar thought they could simply bulldoze the 500 employees at their London plant, but they didn’t anticipate how passionately other Canadian workers and community members would support these workers.”
