People's Democracy

FOR the first time in three decades, the Communist Party of Canada will be issuing a new programme this spring. Meeting in Toronto on February 8-11, delegates to the Party’s 33^rd Central Convention debated hundreds of amendments before voting unanimously to adopt the programme entitled, "Canada’s Future is Socialism."

Despite blizzards which delayed many delegates and guests and prevented a few from arriving at all, the Convention completed its most important work, including the election of a new Central Committee, and the re-election of Miguel Figueroa as Party leader.

About 45 delegates made it to Toronto, as well as many alternative delegates, observers, and guests. Taking into account the large number of delegates, the convention was fully bilingual, English and French, with simultaneous interpretation of all proceedings, and translation of all written material.

Nobody was completely surprised when the opening of the convention was postponed by the weather; after all, it was held in Toronto in mid-winter. But few expected the storm to come indoors the next day. On the morning of Friday, Feburary 9, delegates, observers and guests arriving to register, found buckets scattered around the downtown hotel’s meeting room to catch leaks from the ceiling.

After that inauspicious beginning, the Convention kicked off with a powerful keynote address, delivered by Figueroa on behalf of the Party’s outgoing Central Executive Committee.

Many delegates joined in the wide-ranging discussion which followed, reporting on recent working class struggles in their areas, or responding to the ideas and proposals raised in the keynote.

From there, the Convention moved to the main agenda item, the 45-page Draft Programme, the focus of discussion by members, since last spring. By the January 23 deadline, 272 amendments and a number of general proposals had been received, from Party clubs and committees, provincial nomination conventions, and individuals.

As Figueroa stressed in his closing remarks two days later, no other political party in Canada does more to involve all its members in such a thorough exercise in democracy. Each amendment was reviewed by the Party’s Programme Commission, which presented recommendations to the delegates. Many amendments were adopted as presented, or voted down, rarely without debate at the microphones. Others were fashioned by the Commission into composite amendments, with the aim of improving the final programme.

The most extensive debate took place around Chapter 4 of the Draft, which outlines the CPC’s views on the National Question in Canada. The final version of the chapter develops the key concept raised in the initial Draft, namely, the position that Canada is a multi-national country, including Quebec, English-speaking Canada, Aboriginal nations, and the Acadiens and Metis.

Debates on this and other chapters took more time than originally planned, but by the final afternoon, over 260 amendments had been dealt with by the delegates. The remainder, mainly minor editorial changes, plus some referrals on earlier amendments, will be incorporated into the completed programme.

For the first time, a member of the Canadian Labour Congress executive committee addressed a Communist Party convention, when CLC Vice-President Jean Claude Parrot, spoke to delegates on the Saturday afternoon. Parrot noted that his views on the role and nature of Canada’s trade unions were similar to those expressed in Chapter 5 of the draft programme, which deals with the labour and people’s movements.

A second labour leader to speak at the convention was Malcolm Buchanan, general secretary of the Ontario Secondary School Teachers’ Federation. Buchanan blasted the provincial Tories as an "increasingly totalitarian" party, "interested only in the bottom line, and in destroying public services."

Cancelled flights prevented two other guest speakers from addressing the delegates: Green Party leader Joan Russow, and Paul Rose, leader of Quebec’s PDS, who sent written greetings.

Another highlight of the convention was the participation by dozens of delegates and observers in a noon-hour rally in solidarity with the striking workers at Victoria Daycare in downtown Toronto. Hundreds of CUPE members and social justice advocates gathered outside City Hall on Feburary 9, as speakers blasted the management of the province’s oldest daycare for closing it down rather than negotiate a fair union contract.

On the evening of Feburary 10, an overflow crowd of more than 200 people packed the Metamorphosis Hall in east Toronto for the convention banquet. After a round of Greek music and dinner prepared and served by hard-working volunteers, the banquet heard from Terri Brown, President of the National Action Committee on the Status of Women, who is from the Tahltan First Nation in northern British Columbia. Brown noted how comfortable she felt among a crowd of people opposed to private ownership of wealth, and related how her life as an activist began when she took a course in Marxist economics.

The banquet was also addressed by fraternal guests from the international communist movement: Christos Karatsalos representing the Communist Party of Greece; Sam Webb, the new leader of the Communist Party of USA; and from the Communist Party of Cuba. In addition, 45 other Communist and Workers’ Parties and revolutionary organizations from around the world sent written greetings to the Convention.

A new Central Committee of the CPC was elected on the final afternoon of the Convention, including five members from Quebec, ten from Ontario, six from British Columbia, two from Manitoba, and one each from Alberta and Nova Scotia, for a total of 25.

The new Central Executive Committee, proposed by the CC and ratified in a secret ballot vote by the delegates, includes leader Miguel Figueroa, Liz Rowley, Dan Goldstick, Helen Kennedy, Andre Parizeau, Darrell Rankin, and Kimball Cariou.