Becoming B.C.'s Minister of Labour in 2017 was "a dream come true" for Harry Bains, who won't seek re-election this fall in the Surrey-Newton riding he's held since 2005.
A longtime advocate for workers rights, sparked by a racist incident on the job 50 years ago, Bains has had the labour portfolio under two NDP leaders over the past seven years (John Horgan, David Eby), so Labour Day has added meaning for him.
"You know, when you are an activist all of your life before you enter politics, I was all about labour rights, human rights," Bains said this week. "And then there's an opportunity where a leader taps on your shoulder and says, 'Hey, I want you to be responsible for making all of the changes that you were talking about when you were activist, now you are the Minister of Labour. Now you get to do all those things.' I mean, how fortunate can one be when you're advocating for something, now you're in a position to make those changes."
Labour Day, says the 72-year-old Bains, is an important day for everyone in B.C. and Canada.
"I think it is important for us to pause on that particular day and look at the struggles that the workers went through in historical terms, and in recent terms, to appreciate the achievements the labour movement collectively made to make working places better and safer for workers," Bains declared.
"And it is a time to celebrate those successes and vow to continue to make changes, to make more changes that will help make sure that the working conditions are better, the wages and benefits are better, and that their work is valued and that the workers are respected at workplaces."
Bains says his path to politics began at age 21 when he worked at a sawmill in Vancouver in 1973, two years after moving to Canada from India.
"It was a huge sawmill, around 650 workers," Bains recalled. "We had a number of a lunch rooms, and in a smaller one we put our lunches on those baseboard heaters, which kept it warm. We would come back at lunchtime and one day we walked in there and there were three lines written: 'Hindu curry stinks. White men only. Hindus stay out.' That really struck our hearts, you know, what is going on here?
"The shop steward came, took swift action, brought the manager in, and I think a collective action by both the union and employer turned the whole operation around," Bains added. "Within a year or two in lunchrooms, you could notice people sharing lunches and becoming very cohesive, a strong unit. And that's when I realized that you can make a difference, and you can't just stand on the sideline. I was challenged by the shop steward, 'You can keep on complaining and stay silent or you get involved,' and I chose to get involved. It was being part of that change, and that's what led me to trade unions and then to politics."
As Minister of Labour, Bains is particularly proud of work in 2019 to eliminate the Employment Standards Branch’s so-called Self-help Kit, which he says created a barrier for workers who had concerns about proper treatment on the job.
"With the previous government," he charged, "when a worker in a nonunion operation went to Employment Standards, they were given a stack of papers that was called Self-Help Kit. They were told, 'You fill these forms up, then you go back to your employer who cheated you out of your rights in the first place,' and they tried to negotiate with them. Many workers gave up on that system because nobody wants to face the same employer. You know, I would say that the employer and the government of the day were successful in achieving their goal of having (the number of) complaints go down because of that, because people gave up. Now, the complaints are going back up again."
