Marion Pollack

Doug Miller 00:04

I’ll just start, Marion, I’m Doug Miller here in Montreal, I’m with Marion Pollack in Vancouver, I believe, and Jane Armstrong and Ken Luckhardt in Toronto, Marion was an activist with the Canadian Union of Public Workers above postal workers in the, in the 70s, I presume it was an, 80s, and so Marion, we sent you a consent form, and we’d ask you to acknowledge verbally here on online that that you’ve read it, you understand and agree.

Marion Pollack 00:45

I read it, I understand, and I agree, and I give consent.

Doug Miller 00:49

Okay. Thank you so much. So, Marion, just, just –

Marion Pollack 00:53

It’s Marion, M A R I O N,

Doug Miller 00:56

Marion, Marion. Okay, Miriam, Marian, I saw that, and I

Marion Pollack 01:01

I’ve been called way worse, so don’t worry.

Doug Miller 01:06

Marion. I just wanted to ask you, if you wouldn’t mind introducing yourself, a little bit about your background, where you come from, and how you got involved, both in union and what you understood, maybe of apartheid and SACTU, how you got there, and in the beginning.

Marion Pollack 01:32

Okay, I joined, I became an employee at the post office in 1974. I was on afternoon shift, and six months after the day I completed probation, is the day I became a shop steward. I was put in a union work area because I think that management thought I was slow, and they were trying to, they were very consciously trying to break the union and network area, so they put me in because they thought I had limited intellectual capacity, and they, and so, and so they surprised me, they, I surprised them by becoming a steward the day after I got off probation.

I’ve been out, I was active in CUPW on a variety of levels from the day I started to 2012 when I retired, and now currently I assist people who are retiring with their pension paperwork. I do pension courses for the union and stuff like that, and I mentor some of the younger, newer activists. What I remember about SAC, too, was firstly the two Kens, that’s what you know, but what I remember is that SACTU was a rally-based trade union group, and so you know, support, you know, supporting workers in South Africa and fighting against apartheid, you know. In hindsight, I would say, I mean, now you know, 40, 50, years later, I question whether or not there was a strong gender analysis coming from faculty, but that’s, you know, that’s 50 years of hindsight, not, you know, not time, and not, not time, not, not time in the present.

I also, at some point, became a delegate to the Vancouver District Labor Council, and it was, you know, we were meeting every two weeks in, and it was sort of, there were a lot of leftists, a lot of people who were either members of or very influenced by the Communist Party, but they were primarily men, and I mean, they would take on the heavy issues, but sort of, you know, none of that kind of gender issues. And then we had the CLC reps, you know, who were there all the time, and every time we mentioned SACTU, they would intimate, you know, “we can’t deal with them, they’re, you know, they’re communist”, you know, and that’s what I remember really clearly, and I also remember that the more they raised it, you know, the CLC rep said we can’t raise it, we were young, we were kind of unstrategic, and the more they raised it, the more they tried to tell us not to raise it, we raised it.

Doug Miller 05:02

We raised it tremendous. And what these were debates, or they were resolutions, or they were actions?

Marion Pollack 05:13

Resolutions, mostly, you know, because you know, or reports, you know, because you could give union reports. Yeah, they were just very reluctant for us to raise it.

Doug Miller 05:27

Wow, that’s amazing. Ken, or Ken, you did you have any other?

Ken Luckhardt 05:34

Yeah, just a couple things. Since I did a lot of the work in BC, I do remember the importance of BDLC, Vancouver District Labor offense, and supporting us, which meant that wasn’t just that organization, it was all of the affiliates to the Labor Council, which is how the CLC can bring people together. So it’s a directly chartered institution of the CLC itself, and jumping right to the politics that Marion has gotten us into which I think is great.

It’s definitely the case that the CLC had its reps all over the country advising local leaderships and labour councils to stay away from SACTU solidarity committee, because we had already proven ourselves capable of organizing better around South Africa than they could. That was the main reason, I think, and we were out fundraising from our own work with no paid staff, out fundraising the CLC. So every time we went to a labor council meeting, we were likely to run into a CLC rep who was telling the local affiliates to stay away from us, yet when we made the presentation, the response was always very positive, and so then it was a matter of the politics of the Labor Council, what they wanted to do, but I can certainly say that the Vancouver District Labor Council was fully on side.

Ken Luckhardt

Now, I don’t think I spoke when, when you were president, Mary, I think it was before you became an officer. I remember Frank Kennedy.

Marion Pollack 07:04

Yes, I was never president. I was for first vice, and I chaired meetings, but I was never president.

Ken Luckhardt 07:11

I got that wrong. Frank Kennedy was the president when I was invited to speak, I think.

Marion Pollack 07:18

And Frank was a good, you know, you know what’s in the longshore, had good leftist politics,

Ken Luckhardt 07:27

That’s right.

Marion Pollack 07:28

Women, less so, but yeah, good leftist politics, and he actually, I mean, one of the things, I mean, actually, and this relates one of the things that was always important and very much influenced the VDLC was that we’re a port city, so we, for ever since I remember going to Labor Council, we always had reports from the ITF inspectors, International Transport Federation inspectors, about conditions on ships and stuff that came to Vancouver, and what that did is it actually predisposed us to being much more in support of international solidarity from the VDLC and people like Frank, who was along, that came home a longshore, because we always got, you know, reports from the, you know, from the ITF inspectors about ships and stuff, and how appalling, you know, those conditions were for workers on ships.

Ken Luckhardt 08:38

That’s such an important point, because Jerry McCullough, who was the ITF rep in Vancouver that worked with Longshore, he’s the person who arranged for us to get the data, the transcripts, and the manifests of all the South African ships that came into port.

Marion Pollack 08:53

I don’t remember Jerry, I remember Dave Crane, Tommy, Tommy McGrath, Peter Lahay and someone else in between, but yeah, but it was really, I mean, I think that was really critical to the VDLc being in support was the long-standing relationship with the idea.

Ken Luckhardt 09:20

Now, was it only South Africa with the CLC reps gave you problems, or was it on other issues like Nicaragua and others?

Marion Pollack 09:27

Nicaragua CPW women, women, you know, women like, you know, we could go on and on, right?

Ken Luckhardt 09:40

Yeah, okay.

Marion Pollack 09:41

I mean, I remember. I mean, let’s talk about this time, you know. In 78 you know, I mean, you know what’s, you know, we went on strike, CPW went on strike, and we defied legislation, and Dennis McDermott, then the CLC president, he brutally attacked us verbally, you know. I mean, he called us dinosaurs, etc. The VDLC, you know, came on and supported us, and things like that.

But so the CLC reps on almost a lot of issues didn’t like us, you know. Pro-choices, you know, was one of the other ones, you know, Sid Thompson was also involved, and Sid was on the IWA, which no longer exists now, and you know, in retrospect, he was more progressive than a lot of the IWA workers were, and he certainly was incredibly well respected by his membership, but oh, he was anti-choice, and we used to just get up and speak about choice and just see him to make him squirm.

Doug Miller 10:57

So gender was quite a struggle, then I mean?

Marion Pollack 11:02

I think Jane can answer that even more, but in the early, yeah, yes, of course, the trade union movement was, you know, I mean, I still think it’s a struggle now as is race, but the trade union movement was very white male when I started, and you know women weren’t treated equally, and that’s why I’ve come to say that in retrospect, and it’s only retrospect, you know, that you know staff to talk to, you know, about you know, did not you know, I, you know, I learned about the conditions of workers in South Africa, I learned about the conditions of apartheid in South Africa, and I learned about how appalling it was, but, but we’ve never talked about issues like gender or things like that, we talk about class and race, but this is retrospect, not I didn’t think that at the time.

Doug Miller 12:13

I think that’s fair comment, and I think it representative that you, as one of the women, and Jane, for that matter, and Brenda, and many others were struggling to make that place for women in the movement.

Marion Pollack 12:26

Yes, yeah.

Doug Miller 12:29

I saw that the tribute page that that they put together with you and others in it for the I can’t remember what organization it was. Oh, yes, for CUPW, yeah, Trailblazing women of CUPW, you, you feature in there. And that, I mean, it’s a tribute to today that this kind of recognition is being acknowledged as a part of the struggle of the labor movement.

Marion Pollack 12:55

Right, but I also think that one of the things that SACTU did was they talked about sort of reality. It wasn’t just sort of politics, they talked about the reality of people’s lives in South Africa, and that made it way easier for, you know, for postal workers, you know, to be able to understand what was going on when you hear, you know, when you hear stories of workers, you know, you know who could you, who could be you, could be your friends, could be your neighbors existing in South Africa, rather than just sort of like, and I think that was one of the strengths of SACTU, rather than just talking about how appalling, and how dangerous, and how cruel an anti-worker apartheid was, or is. We also, you know, we also sort of heard about it from real people and real issues, and I thought that was really one of the strengths.

Doug Miller 13:59

Did you, did you ever meet any of any South Africans in this process?

Marion Pollack 14:03

Yes, I think Evert talked about… I haven’t talked to him, but when I talked to him before about this, we had a big meeting with somebody from in our local from CPW Vancouver local with somebody from South Africa, and it blew people’s minds. I mean, it really did, because it was like, here’s a real-life person talking about their real-life experiences, and I mean, and I actually think those kind of things really influenced me about how to do international solidarity, you know, you know, on an ongoing basis, the real stories of real people are really critical.

Ken Luckhardt 14:52

Marion, we talked about that yesterday with Evert, and it was when that meeting, your local union meeting in Vancouver in 1981 on Richmond Street, Richard Street, that’s where I met you, that’s where I met Sherry Hillman, that’s where I met Evert. We had Zola Zembe with us, who was a national officer of SACTU, based in London, in England. He was on tour, he addressed the labor, your local meeting that that month, and that’s so –

Marion Pollack 15:22

I thought Sherry was fired by then. I swear, she was fired by then.

Ken Luckhardt 15:30

Okay.

Doug Miller 15:31

Anyway, Jane, any comment?

Jane Armstrong 15:36

Oh, I just can echo everything that Marion is raising around so many issues. We were fortunate, though. Phyllis Altman came from SACTU, from southern Africa to Canada, and as I recall, we took her to a few events, including the Port Elgin at that time UAW Education Center in the early 80s to meet with leadership up there, and but we couldn’t get her across the country, as I recall, I think she was pretty much in Ontario, but yes, what’s that old slogan, Ken? When you’ve struck a woman, you struck a stone, rock.

Ken Luckhardt

A rock.

Jane Armstrong

A rock, and the women in South Africa, those that we met talked about the struggle within the movement, we had some intersection on that scale, but Laurel Ritchie, who you’ll remember well, we’ve done an interview with her. She has a T-shirt, Women Against Apartheid, that she’s kept from those years, and she also raised, you know, the same issue about women in the labor movement in general, but also in the context of the struggle in South Africa, and there were some similar statements about, you know, sort of when you win the class struggle, we’ll deal with women’s issues after that.

Ken Luckhardt 17:33

But I think another point that needs to be added to this discussion, and Doug, I think you’ll probably have something to say about this. Most of the exiled South Africans were men, and so our opportunity to bring black South African trade union women to Canada was limited, as compared with on the gender question. Not totally, we did have some opportunity, but it was very rare.

Marion Pollack 17:56

And I think, and I also think that it reflects um contradictions that some of us have always felt about international solidarity, which is, you know, the issue is so important, you know, and I feel, you know, like 50 years later I feel different, but the issue is so important. Do I want to go and sort of diminish the issue by talking about women?

And I think it’s, you know, I think it’s always a contradiction in terms of how you go about international solidarity, and you know, we saw, I mean, or I saw, you know, the struggle against apartheid so critical that you know that it’s hard in some ways to say during the, you know, during the thick of it, and there’s, you know, they’re not good on women, or you know, where are the women, whereas now you know 50 years later it, you know, it’s easier to do in retrospect, and it’s easier to do after 50 years of struggle around women, so I mean, I just want to, you know, I think it does reflect, though, some of the contradictions around international, doing international solidarity in general, you know, and this is not a criticism, it’s just like a learning for me.

Doug Miller 19:21

Well, and that it was very much the climate, social and cultural climate of the time that those issues were fomenting, but they weren’t on the top burners or the front burners. Today, now when we deal with whatever issue it may be, Palestine, there are Palestinian women, Colombia, there are Colombian women. They even internally movements that are activists are including women much better than they did in the past, and much more fully.

Marion Pollack 19:51

I would say during those times women were organizing on those issues. They were on our front burners, but they weren’t necessarily on the front burners of the leadership of the trade union movement, and even the left leadership of the trade union movement. I mean, you know, I mean, I would go to action caucus meetings a lot, and you know, certainly, you know, there was sort of sexism and discrimination, and, and not, not a willingness to take up on, gender issues, but certainly, you know. But, but I would also say that without the action caucus, we couldn’t have got through many resolutions and many issues we did at the CLC, so you know, none, it’s not like it’s you know it’s all nuanced.

Doug Miller 20:47

Well, I, and I probably articulated that wrong, but I meant exactly what you said there. It took the energy of powerful women and determined women like yourselves to push those forward to make them front burner. Well, okay. Where to here? Ken, Jane?

Jane Armstrong 21:06

I’m just wondering, Marion, if you remember at all the year 1986? At that point we had called as the SACTU Solidarity Committee for a week of action across the country in March, and I don’t know whether you remember actions taken in Vancouver with the Vancouver District Labor Council, but also with CUPW. Does any of that ring a bell?

Marion Pollack 21:40

I think in partially working at the Vancouver local office in not the full time but in part and yes we talked, Jean Claude Perot talked about not sending mail to South Africa. I remember that really clearly, but it’s sort of important by not sending mail to South Africa, you de facto are, because if you sort it and you put it all in one pile, South Africa, you are, but I remember a lot of discussion on the floor.

And unlike other international solidarity action, people knew that they were going, you know, they could get in trouble with it, and they knew it was kind of impossible, but people supported it because they were so appalled by apartheid, and I think that the longshores talk about, so yeah, I remember that really pretty clearly. And also, we weren’t one of Vancouver, there’s a couple hubs that mail for South Africa went out of. I don’t think Vancouver was one of them, but, but I remember a firm on us while there was sort of reluctance because you knew you would get in trouble and you knew that the employer would be really looking closely at the activists, you know who were sorting. There was still a lot of support for it because people understood the need for solidarity, and you know, and the, you know, the direness of the situation. And I think that the longshore refused to load or unload ships, you know, going to or coming from South Africa, and the VDLc was active in supporting that,

Ken Luckhardt 23:41

Right.

Doug Miller 23:43

Thank you. Well, Miriam, Marion, I really think you’ve, you’ve provided some wonderful insights here, and I thank you.

Jane Armstrong 23:57

Do you also remember in 1986 the Canadian Labor Congress convention, where Jay Naidoo from COSATU spoke? Does that ring a bell at all?

Marion Pollack

No.

Jane Armstrong

Okay.

Marion Pollack 24:13

No, no,

Jane Armstrong 24:16

That’s okay. We’re all challenged. This is 35 years ago.

Marion Pollack 24:22

No, I remember. No, I don’t.

Doug Miller 24:27

No problem.

Marion Pollack 24:30

Well, I remember hearing him speak, but I could not, until you said it was at a CLC. I would not have remembered.

Jane Armstrong 24:41

And can you talk about what kind of impact the anti-apartheid work within your union might have had on I don’t know whether CUPW established Black and Aboriginal caucuses or whether the anti-apartheid work influenced anti-racism work going forward into the 90s. Do you have any recollection of that?

Marion Pollack 25:12

What I would say, well, firstly, when I became a member of CUPW in our national constitution, we didn’t have that many policies, and we didn’t have that many policies on international solidarity. But the one policy, one of the few policies we had, was on staff to supporting, supporting, you know, soft do and opposing, opposing apartheid in South Africa, that I know for sure.

You know, I think in terms of that, you’d have, you know, in terms of the issue of people of color in the union. I think you’d have to talk more to them, but I do know that in 2008 at the 2008 convention, we passed a resolution supporting BDS boycott, divestment, and sanctions for Israel as a result of their occupation of Palestine, and I think that that could not have happened, that happened for a variety of reasons, including, you know, a fair amount of work done by people, but I also think that the history of the union supporting SAFTU and opposing apartheid in South Africa was a real, it was a critical backdrop to that, and critically informed that the, you know, the activists.

You know, my generation of actives had all either participated in some form or another with SACTU or knew about it, and therefore we were able, sort of, you know, to talk about the, you know, the problems with apartheid and the importance of solidarity.

Doug Miller 27:00

Wow, that’s great.

Ken Luckhardt 27:02

Can I use that opportunity, Marion, to let you know that we, you and I, have been on a couple of conference calls around the question of labor committees within the Independent Jewish voices, etc. I had a very productive two hour conversation last night with Labour for Palestine. They had approached me to want to find out more about the work of the Secretary Committee. Very good discussion, and I, we were encouraging them to get together with the IJV Trade Union Committee to, you know, put forward a common front in the labor movement, and I think there may be something coming from that.

Marion Pollack 27:38

And that’s Hassan and Chelsea, mostly.

Ken Luckhardt 27:41

Yes, yes.

Marion Pollack 27:42

Yeah. I work with both of them,

Ken Luckhardt 27:44

Yeah. Also, what’s his name? Aiden, Aiden McDonald.

Marion Pollack 27:48

Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. I know Ethan’s dad, John McDonald.

Ken Luckhardt 27:53

Yeah, he organized it. He organized the call.

Marion Pollack 27:56

John?

Ken Luckhardt 27:57

No, Aiden did.

Marion Pollack 27:58

John McDonald, for a long time, worked for CUPW.

Ken Luckhardt 28:02

Okay.

Marion Pollack 28:03

He was one of staffers responsible for what we would call our appendix T projects. When Aiden went to Israel, and he got, they wouldn’t let him out or wouldn’t let him in, and I can’t remember, and he lied to his teeth to get in, and I went to his dad, who was still working for CUPW, and I said, you must be proud of how good your boy can lie, but he was right to do it, because it was the only way he could do what he had to do, right. Yeah, but I actually think, but I want to, I mean, I really do think, and I just need to emphasize that, that one of the reasons we could have had, we passed the BDS resolution, which was historic, was because of the experience with South Africa, and you know, with SACTU.

Doug Miller 29:08

A tremendous insight. Thank you so much for that. Well, okay. Well, Marian, if you had any last comments before we…

Marion Pollack 29:18

No, I can go back to have mine out now, Maria. on Vancouver Island, or did I just make that up?

Speaker 1 29:28

Jane, I thought you were on Vancouver Island, or did I make that up?

Ken Luckhardt

I’m sorry.

Jane Armstrong 29:33

You did not. I was there in Port Alberni for about seven years.

Marion Pollack 29:39

Okay,

Jane Armstrong

Fighting a new coal mine called the Raven Coal Mine the majority of those years, but I moved back a few years ago to Toronto. My son is here, and it’s too many miles of, you know,

Marion Pollack 29:56

And I mean, I like Port Alberni to visit, not to live.

Jane Armstrong 30:00

Yeah, you, and quite a few others. I used to joke that I thought Trump could get elected there by about 51% but they’ve been through a lot of tough times.

Doug Miller 30:14

Well, let me, let me turn the recording off, so we can socialize. Is that okay, Marian? Just on behalf of the SACTU Solidarity Committee and the Canadian Anti-Apartheid Activist Project, I want to thank you very much for your contribution, and, and it was invaluable, I must say, and very insightful and helpful. Thank you so much. So, I’m going to turn recording off now, and then we can just yak away as long.