The 2012 student movement in Quebec: fair shares, commodification and saucepans

Clara Lea Dallaire-Fortier

In 2012, a policy to increase university tuition fees, and a large student mobilisation against it, led to a broad debate on education, accessibility and public institutions in Quebec.

The education system in Canada falls under provincial governments’ jurisdiction. Tuition fees in Quebec are below the Canadian average and its institutions are relatively underfunded. In other provinces, the debate on the public education system had no repercussions and the basis of the student struggle was perceived as foreign to their societal priorities. In Quebec’s debate on public education, citizens influenced by the rise of neoliberalism were at odds with the values of others who thought the increases undermined notions of collectivity.

The right-wing Liberal Party in Quebec had planned two consecutive hikes in university tuition fees, the first by 30% from 2007 to 2012. This increase was not publicly discussed: some media even claimed there was no increase (Nadeau-Dubois, 2013). The second increase of 127% was planned for the period of 2012 to 2017. This would have raised the cost to CA$3 793 (about US$ 2 880). Between 2007 and 2011, students began to plan actions for 2012. Student associations undertook extensive research on accessibility and university finances, and mobilised in universities and CEGEPs, the general and vocational colleges which teach a post-school degree unique to Quebec. 

The Australian model of cross-jurisdictional supply chain regulation

Katherine Moloney

The 105th session of the International Labour Conference considered decent work in global supply chains. During the general discussion on governance systems and measures, the Australian model was presented as an international example of good practice in cross-jurisdictional supply chain regulation (Passchier, 2016). The Australian model is paradigmatic. This article considers the core characteristics of its conceptual framework and its contextual adaptation in the Australian domestic textile, clothing and footwear (TCF) industry.

What is the Australian model?
The core characteristics of the Australian model can be summarised as follows.

Transparency and traceability through all tiers of the supply chain: The Australian model addresses human rights due diligence by mapping the flow of work and the associated transfers of money and goods in order to monitor contractual arrangements.

Contractual arrangements and cross-jurisdictional coverage: The Australian model conceptualises contemporary supply chains as a series of commercial contracts which govern the entire supply chain. Commercial influence is typically concentrated at or near the apex of the supply chain and exerted through complex, pyramidal contracting arrangements, often spanning legislative jurisdictions. Lead firms exercise commercial influence to ensure their commercial interests, notably in terms of price, time and quality. The capacity for commercial leverage is often incrementally curtailed with each successive tier down. Working within existing supply chain structures, the model therefore seeks to embed human rights due diligence protections and provisions in contractual arrangements. In this manner, businesses operating in a jurisdiction, as well as all subsequent tiers of the supply chain - even those outside that jurisdiction[1] - are governed by mandatory legal obligations, including compliance mechanisms and commercial remedies.

The NHS: safe in our hands?

Claire Sullivan

It is not unusual to hear the UK’s National Health Service (NHS) described in terms such as ‘The envy of the rest of the world’, ‘Britain’s best-loved institution’ or ‘The Labour Party’s greatest monument’. So, is the nearly 70-year old NHS now under threat, and if so, is it worth fighting for, and if so, how?

The NHS was created in July 1948, one of the commitments made by the Labour government before its surprise landslide election victory at the end of WWII in Europe.

The NHS – key in an optimistic vision of a comprehensive welfare state – was founded on three principles: first, it would meet everyone’s needs; second, it would be free at the point of use; and last, it would be based on clinical need and not the ability to pay. The creation of an NHS available to all, regardless of wealth, was both intensely romantic and intensely practical in its ideals and aims.

The NHS is the largest and oldest wholly publicly funded healthcare system in the world, and remains one of the most efficient, egalitarian and comprehensive. While 11% of the UK population uses private healthcare (The King’s Fund, 2014), this is mostly to supplement rather than replace NHS services. The creation of an enduring national health service is indeed an achievement to be celebrated, for which millions of people have worked over its lifetime. The Labour Party and the people of Britain can rightly be proud, but it is important not to look at the NHS’s history only through rose-tinted spectacles. The creation of the NHS was bitterly opposed by some health professions, notably doctors, and the rows over what ‘comprehensive’ access to free services really meant started early, with charges for dental services, eye glasses and prescriptions being reintroduced as early as 1952 amid concern over soaring costs.

Global crisis, Neoliberalism, and left alternatives

Alfredo Saad-Filho

The certainties that turned neoliberalism into the “common sense” of our age are melting into the air. Tried and tested policies such as privatisation, marketisation, financialisation and trade liberalisation have lost traction, and established political systems haemorrhage legitimacy. Mass protests spring in unexpected places and take new forms. Even the steadiest political hands have lost their grip on the levers of power, which, themselves, increasingly lack effectiveness. The economic turmoil in global neoliberalism is morphing into a wholesale political crisis.

A dysfunctional economy…
Neoliberalism created conditions favourable for capital accumulation that were unprecedented since the early 1980s. The ensuing economic growth supported a steep concentration of power, income and wealth, in which unparalleled prosperity for the wealthy coexists with old and emerging patterns of poverty and exclusion. Yet accumulation in the “core” countries of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) face declining rates of investment and Gross Domestic Product (GDP) growth, mounting instability, and increasingly frequent finance-driven crises, culminating in the deepest and longest economic contraction since the Great Depression. Recoveries have also become increasingly sluggish: a Great Stagnation now engulfs the world economy, with no end in sight.