Activism and career
In 1945,at the age of 19,Huguette Plamondon started working as a secretary in the Montreal office of the United Packinghouse Workers of America (UPWA). [4] Shortly thereafter,she started organizing meatpacking workers in Montreal,and began a decades long career as a leading voice for food workers,and a trailblazer for one of North America's largest and most powerful unions.
She became an active member of the Montreal Labour Council (Conseil du travail de Montréal) in 1953,which at that time was affiliated to the Congress of Industrial Organizations (CIO). In 1955 she was elected president of the Montreal Labour Council,and served in that role until 1958, [1] [4] thus becoming the first woman in Canada to lead a major labour organization. [2] In 1956,she participated in the Rassemblement, [5] a short-lived political movement led by Pierre Dansereau and Pierre Trudeau.
In 1956,she was elected a vice-president of the Canadian Labour Congress, [4] thus becoming the first woman to achieve a Canada-wide union executive position. She held that office for 32 years,until 1988.
From 1961 until 1966,she was a member of the Quebec Council of Economic Planification (Conseil de planification économique du Québec). [1] In 1973,she was a member of the Economic Council of Canada. [1]
She was vice-president of the New Democratic Party,nominating Tommy Douglas for leader in 1961. [6]
She served as an International Vice-President of the United Food and Commercial Workers. She was also the president of UFCW Canada Local 744P in Quebec. [2] Near the end of her career,she was Executive Assistant to the UFCW Canadian Director,Clifford R. Evans. [4]
She was married to Romeo Mathieu,also a trade unionist. [2] She died of a heart attack in 2010,at the age of 84. [2]
The United Food and Commercial Workers International Union (UFCW) is a labor union representing approximately 1.3 million workers in the United States and Canada in industries including retail; meatpacking, food processing and manufacturing; hospitality; agriculture; cannabis; chemical trades; security; textile, and health care. UFCW is affiliated with the Canadian Labour Congress (CLC) and the AFL–CIO; it disaffiliated from the AFL–CIO in 2005 but reaffiliated in 2013. UFCW is also affiliated to UNI Global Union and the IUF.
T&T Supermarket is a Canadian supermarket chain that sells primarily Asian foods, including fresh produce, meat, seafood, and Asian packaged goods. It also sells kitchenware and gifts, and has in-store kitchens and bakeries. T&T Supermarket was founded in Vancouver in 1993 by Cindy Lee. It is currently led by CEO Tina Lee, who succeeded her mother in 2014. In 2009, T&T Supermarket was acquired by Loblaw Companies Limited.
Michel Chartrand was a Canadian trade union leader from Quebec.
The Groupe socialiste des travailleurs du Québec or GST was a far left political movement founded in 1973 by militants of the Fourth International in the province of Quebec, Canada. Involved in trade-unions, the GST worked for the creation, in 1974, of the Regroupement des militants syndicaux and, on the municipal scene in the city of Montreal, of the Montreal Citizens' Movement. The GST was also at the origin of the electoral coalition of the Nouveau Parti démocratique du Québec (NPD-Québec) and the Regroupement des militants syndicaux that contested seats in the 1976 Quebec general election. The GST also ran independent candidates in the 1981 Quebec general election.
The Confédération des syndicats nationaux is the second largest trade union federation in Quebec by membership.
The Fédération des travailleurs et travailleuses du Québec is the largest labour federation in Quebec in terms of its membership. It has over 500,000 members, who account for 44% of the unionised workers in Quebec. This ratio is 60% in the private sector, in which most members work. It also has many members in government agencies.
The Amalgamated Meat Cutters (AMC), officially the Amalgamated Meat Cutters and Butcher Workmen of North America, 1897–1979, was a labor union that represented retail and packinghouse workers. In 1979, the AMCBW merged with the Retail Clerks International Union to form the United Food and Commercial Workers (UFCW)
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Jean-Yves Duthel is an administrator and political spokesperson in the Canadian province of Quebec.
Madeleine Parent was a Canadian labour, feminist and aboriginal rights activist. Her achievements included her work in establishing the Canadian Textile and Chemical Union and the Confederation of Canadian Unions alongside her partner and fellow trade unionist Kent Rowley. She was a prominent figure in the 1946 Montreal Cottons strike. Retiring from union work in 1983 to Montréal, Parent continued her social activist role, focusing on women's rights. She became a founding member of the National Action Committee on the Status of Women (NAC) and has played an active role in addressing issues faced by immigrant and Aboriginal women.
Fernand Daoust was a trade unionist in Quebec. He was the secretary general of the Fédération des travailleurs et travailleuses du Québec from 1969 to 1991 and its president from 1991 to 1993.
Gustave Francq was a typographer, printer, trade unionist and journalist in Canada.
Romeo Mathieu was a Canadian trade unionist, progressive political activist, and leading solidarity builder for the Quebec labour movement.
Fred Dowling (1902–1982) was a Canadian trade unionist who is best known for leading the effort to organize meatpacking workers in Canada during the late 1930s and early 1940s. He was a founding leader of the United Packinghouse Workers of America (UPWA), and served the union as international vice-president and Canadian director for nearly 30 years.
Louise Toupin is a Canadian political scientist and specialist in feminist studies. She was a founding member of the Women's Liberation Front of Quebec and Éditions du remue-ménage, which were important sites of feminist activism in the late 1960s and early 1970s in Montreal. She then earned a PhD from the Université du Québec à Montréal, later becoming a lecturer at that same institution. Her research focused on collections and analyses of feminist theory from the recent history of Québec.
The Canadian Food and Allied Workers (CFAW) was a Canadian meatpacking labour union which existed from 1968 until 1979. It was created as a result of a merger between Canadian locals of the Amalgamated Meat Cutters (AMC) and the United Packinghouse Workers of America (UPWA). In 1979, it merged with the Retail Clerks International Union (RCIU) along with its American counterpart to form the United Food and Commercial Workers (UFCW).
Robert Dean was a Canadian politician and trade unionist. He was one of the few Anglophone Quebecers to join the Parti Québécois, which advocates for the independence of Quebec from Canada.
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