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Hello Sisters and Brothers,

Attached is the agenda for the upcoming “All Presidents Meeting” being held at the Executive Royal hotel in Calgary on February 3, 2017.

In addition to a report of approximately 5 minutes outlining the happenings in your Local, we have another section on the agenda where we would like highlights on any community outreach campaigns your Local has done.  As CUPE we do a lot of things in the community that we do not celebrate or share with each other.

I look forward to seeing everyone on Friday.

In Solidarity,

Marle Roberts

Click here for the agenda

On behalf of the CUPE Alberta executive I’d like to send the warmest of Christmas greetings to our 35,000 members across the province.  I hope you have time to celebrate with family and friends and have the opportunity to relax and rejuvenate before 2017.

As a union of public sector workers, we take seriously the Christmas message of concern for our fellow humans.  It goes to the basics of what we are about, and appeals to the best in each of us.  We are the union of community builders and we are only as strong as our weakest brothers and sisters. As the old saying goes, we all do better when we all do better.

Your union will be busy next year working to build better working conditions for our members, making our communities stronger, and ensuring we all prosper together.

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

Marle Roberts, President

FORT MCMURRAY – The Canadian Union of Public Employees handed cheques totalling over $200,000 to four local organizations helping local residents rebuild their lives after the wildfires swept though this city last May.

CUPE Alberta President Marle Roberts said the money was collected from locals across the country. With over 600,000 members, CUPE is the largest union in Canada.

“We put the call out and CUPE Locals and their members delivered,” said Roberts. “CUPE is about helping each other, and there is no better time to put that to the test than after a natural disaster like the wildfires.”

The funds were divided equally between four local organizations, Stepping Stone Youth Home, Pastew Place Detoxification Centre, Unity House and the Wood Buffalo Food Bank. The funds will go towards local programming in each of those organizations.

“Alberta is strong and Albertans are strong,” said Roberts. “We’re already seeing the community rebound, and CUPE will do what we can to help with that recovery.”

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Every year on December 6th, women and men and families gather across the country to commemorate the 14 young women who were murdered by a gunman chanting “I hate feminists” on December 6, 1989 at École Polytechnique in Montreal.

In 1991 the Parliament of Canada established the National Day of Remembrance and Action on Violence Against Women in Canada as an annual day of mourning and remembrance for those 14 young women and all the other victims of gender based violence.

The statistics are horrifying:

• Half of all women in Canada have experienced at least one incident of physical or sexual violence since the age of 16.
• Approximately every six days, a woman in Canada is killed by her intimate partner. Out of the 83 police-reported intimate partner homicides in 2014, 67 of the victims—over 80%—were women.
• On any given night in Canada, 3,491 women and their 2,724 children sleep in shelters because it isn’t safe at home.
• On any given night, about 300 women and children are turned away because shelters are already full.
• There were 1,181 cases of missing or murdered Aboriginal women in Canada between 1980 and 2012, according to the RCMP.  However, according to grassroots organizations and the Minister of the Status of Women the number is much higher, closer to 4,000.
• Aboriginal women are killed at six times the rate of non-aboriginal women.

CUPE Alberta is committed to recognizing and combatting gender based violence in all its forms. We ask you to do what you can as well.

Cyber violence, which includes online threats, harassment, and stalking, has emerged as an extension of violence against women. Young women are most likely to experience online harassment in its most severe forms, including stalking, sexual harassment and physical threats.