Celebrating

the life of

Muriel Collins

Speakers

Ainsworth Hamilton — CUPE Local 79 Vice-President, EquityJeff Rose — Past President, CUPE Local 79 & CUPE NationalSandra Jones — Friend of Muriel Collins, Local 79 member

Tim Maguire — CUPE Local 79 PresidentDon Styles — CUPE National Representative

Lynn Spink — CUPE Advisor; AuthorDawn Peters — Daughter of Muriel Collins

Peter Marcelline — Former City Planner & Co-Founder of CaribanaValerie Joseph— CUPE Local 79 member and resident in the Muriel Collins Co-Op

Materials

Muriel Collins Biography — Blogger ABIOYEMuriel Collins Profile — YWCA Toronto Women of Distinction Awards

Globe and Mail: Lives Lived: Muriel Jean Collins, 80 — Jeff RoseMeet Muriel — Downsview Services Community Newsletter

“I’m worried” pamphlet featuring Muriel Collins — CUPE OntarioMuriel Collins Housing Co-operative

City of Toronto Condolence Motion — Moved by City Councillor Pam McConnellPhotos courtesy of Lynn Spink

Special Guests

Fred Hahn — President, CUPE OntarioYolanda McClean— Diversity Vice-President, CUPE National Executive Board

Veriline Howe — CUPE Ontario Diversity Vice-President for racialized workers

In Appreciation

Thank you to the CUPE Local 79 Executive Board and Executive Committee for their continued support in the promotion of equity and diversity at all levels of our Union.

Thank you to Richie Allen — CUPE National Research.Thank you to Sandra Jones, former Local 79 member and friend for photos.

Thank you to Dawn Peters, for photos and shared memories of a wonderful woman and mother.

Special Welcome to members of the Muriel Collins Family who have travelled from distant parts to be in Attendance here this evening.

Celebrating the life of Muriel CollinsFebruary 25th, 2015 6:30— 8:30 pm

North York Civic Centre — Council Chambers

MURIEL COLLINS — MAY 19, 1933

Muriel Collins was born in Georgetown, (the capital city) Guyana on May 19, 1933 and has nine siblings. Collins arrived in Toronto, at Pearson International Airport on May 16 1963, from Guyana accompanied by her two small children. She now has four children after her twin boys were born in Canada. As a sole support parent she successfully raised her daughter and three sons while working as a city employee. She worked in several Homes for the Aged (including Fudger House and Kipling Acres) for more than 33 years before retiring in September 1998. She was an active member of the Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE) Local 79 which represents inside workers in the City of Toronto. She was a founding member of the Rainbow Committee (which represented racialized workers) now the Racialized Workers Committee, at CUPE National.

In 1989 Collins was honoured with a YWCA Women of Distinction Award for her activism and advocacy in the labour movement. She also chaired CUPE’s National Task Force on Women and was a member of CUPE’s National Executive Board (NEB) representing southern Ontario. As a member of the CUPE Ontario Executive Board, Collins spent many years working on equity issues and contributed profoundly to improving the working lives of CUPE members and all working people.

She spoke at Queens Park before the Standing Committee on Resources Development - on September 1, 1992, making a presentation on behalf of 410,000 workers from coast to coast in the public sector, including approximately 220,000 women in public services.

This biography of Muriel Collins was taken from the blog ‘BERBICIANGRIOT’, and written by the Blogger user ABIOYE.

Ms Muriel Collins, a worker from the Homes for the Aged, a member of the Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE) Local 79, which represents inside workers in the City of Toronto:

As a member of the Canadian Union of Public Employees for the past 25 years, there’s much that I have witnessed and many horror stories I could recount about the struggles working Canadian men and women face on a daily basis.

For the purpose of today’s presentation, though, I’m going to concentrate on just one incident back in 1983. I was involved with CUPE Local 79 in what was to be a long and bitter fight to organize the part-time workers in Metropolitan Toronto’s seven municipally run homes for the aged.

You may be wondering, “How many part-time workers could there be working in these homes? A hundred, a couple of hundred?” Would you believe it was close to 900? It may also be hard to believe that it was less than 10 short years ago that this very local became the first unionized group of part-time workers in the country.

We were faced with a situation in the homes where we basically had two classes of workers: The unionized full-time workers who enjoyed decent wages, benefits and job security, and non-unionized workers who enjoyed none of the above.

What this meant in the workplace for the residents of the homes was a dramatically high turnover of what were then called casual staff, many of them racial minorities and immigrant women who were being forced to live from day to day never knowing if they still had a job next week. For many of them, the uncertainty was too much and they moved on.

When we finally decided to organize these workers, we could not meet or talk to them anywhere near the workplace. We were forced to meet them in restaurants, at bus stops and so on. Many of the workers had been threatened with termination if they were seen talking with a union organizer such as myself. But we persevered and we were successful in getting the percentage of union cards signed. That turned out to be the easy part.

What followed was a full year spent at the bargaining table trying to negotiate a first contract, with the employer using all the stalling tactics in the book. Then we spent another two years going to an arbitration board. Two years these workers waited for their first contract after exercising their democratic right to form a union.

What has it meant for these part-time workers in homes for the aged? They have now moved a lot closer to having full equality with their full-time counterparts. They’re by no means all the way there, but they’re closer and they now have a level of job security which they had only dreamed of. More than anything, though, this unionization has stabilized the workforce in the homes, which now number 10 across Metropolitan Toronto. It has radically reduced the staff turnover rates, so the workers have benefited, but the residents have benefited in a big way and the employer has also benefited.

Looking back to 1983 and that organizing drive, I believe I can speak for those workers when I say all the headaches, all the intimidation and disruptions in their lives were worth it, because we were able to improve the quality of life for 900 working women and men. I thank you.

Collins was also part of a team from CUPE Local 79 making a presentation at Queen’s Park in opposition to the Ontario Provincial Tory government’s Bill 49 to the Standing Committee on Resources Development on September 10, 1996.

“Whereas Bill 49, the Employment Standards Improvement Act, introduced by the provincial Tory government, will make it more difficult for Ontario workers to get their minimum employment rights enforced by making it more difficult for workers to be able to make claims for moneys owed to them by bad bosses”.

Collins was named to the Ontario Federation of Labour’s (OFL) 1999 Honour Roll and an OFL scholarship was awarded in her name. The scholarships are awarded each year to children of unionists who are starting their first year of college or university.

This is information from the CUPE National website:

Collins named to Honour RollAug 31, 1999 08:00 PM

Muriel Collins – a former member of the National Executive Board and longtime activist and member of the executive of CUPE 79 – has one more accomplishment to enjoy in her retirement. She’s been named to the Ontario Federation of Labour’s 1999 Honour Roll.

As well, an OFL scholarship will be awarded in her name. The scholarships are handed out each year to children of unionists who are starting their first year of college or university.

Local 79 president Anne Dubas says, “Sister Collins may have retired in 1998, but after 33 years of public service and labour activism she continues to receive recognition and is very deserving of this distinction.”Livingstone Holder, a member of the CUPE Ontario Executive Board who spent many years working with Collins on equity issues, organizing and more says, “this is a sister who understood the struggle instinctively. In her own quiet but determined way, she was able to contribute profoundly to the working lives of CUPE members and all working people.”

The OFL Honour Roll can be added to Collins’ long list of achievements including the naming of the Muriel Collins Housing Co-operative in honour of her years of dedication and service to the community, CUPE regional vice president, co-chair of the CUPE Ontario Women’s Committee and a YWCA Woman of Distinction award.

As for Sister Collins, she says she’s thoroughly enjoying her retirement, spending quality time with her grandchildren and tending to her garden.

In May 1995 the Muriel Collins Housing Co-op named in her honour was officially opened. The housing co-op was named for Collins in recognition of her fight against racism and oppression. This amazing African Guyanese woman is one of our many unsung sheroes. I have only seen her name mentioned in one sentence in one book. There will be a celebration of Muriel Collins’ life and achievements on Monday, May 23 at the Muriel Collins Housing Co-op. The plan is to include singing of Guyanese folk songs, Kwe-kwe songs and Guyanese National songs. We shall have a fine time, fine time that night!

Muriel & a resident at Kipling Acres, where Muriel worked as a Nursing Assistant.

CUPE Local 79’s Executive (year unknown)

Below is a copy of Muriel’s profile in a book that was made in 1991 to celebrate the 10th anniversary of the YWCA Toronto Women of Distinction Awards. Our thanks go out to the YWCA Toronto for sharing this profile with us.

This is a scan of the Toronto Star article that featured Muriel being honoured as one of Metro YWCA’s Women of Distinction.

Trade union activist and pioneer, mother, friend. Born on May 19, 1933, in Georgetown, Guyana; died on Nov. 12, 2013, in Toronto, after a long illness, aged 80.

Muriel Collins had a beautiful spirit, an engaging laugh and a backbone of steel.

She arrived in Canada from Guyana in 1963 with two young children, and eventually found work as a nursing attendant at Kipling Acres, one of Toronto’s municipally run “homes for the aged.” Understaffing and supply shortages were endemic at the time, as were administrative arbitrariness, intimidation and pettiness. These so offended Muriel’s sense of fairness that she became a shop steward in her union, Local 79 of the Canadian Union of Public Employees.

There, she discovered her true vocation. Her co-workers trusted her as their representative. The home’s residents loved her. And when she took on management, all were dumbfounded by her personal courage. By 1980, Muriel had been elected to the Local 79 executive and become a member of the citywide bargaining committee.

Inspired by Muriel, Local 79 issued two public reports in the early 1980s that – with the support of the news media – forced city hall to redress the understaffing and mismanagement in Greenacres and other homes.

Turning her attention to 600 part-time homes workers who lacked workplace representation, Muriel then became a driving force in the local’s campaign to unionize and obtain a good collective agreement for them.

In the late 1980s, Muriel was named chair of CUPE’s nationwide women’s task force and a founding member of CUPE’s national “rainbow” committee on racism, discrimination and employment equity.

During the 1990s, she was twice elected to CUPE’s national executive as an Ontario vice-president – the first black woman to hold a top leadership position in Canada’s largest union.

Everywhere she went, people would be struck by her quiet dignity and powerful sense of purpose. You could see it in her eyes and hear it in her speech, its natural cadence calling to mind the voice of Nelson Mandela – deliberate, measured, firm and wise. And like Madiba, she could sum up things with a knowing chuckle, and her unpretentious laugh would light up the room.

In 1989, the Toronto YWCA named her as a Woman of Distinction. And when Local 79’s co-op housing project on Lombard Street in downtown Toronto was opened in 1995, it was named the Muriel Collins Co-operative in tribute to her character and accomplishments. When she retired in 1998, she was appointed to the honour roll of the Ontario Federation of Labour, with an OFL student scholarship bearing her name.

All these opportunities and tributes were well deserved. Yet she had sought none of them. There was not a shred of artificiality or personal ambition about her. She was purely and simply a moral force who sought to serve her fellow human beings and bring them a measure of equality, respect and justice.

Muriel Collins leaves an adoring family – including her children Roger, Gavin, Andy and Dawn, their spouses, her grandchildren, and her sisters and brothers. She leaves many trade-union sisters and brothers who adored her, too.

Jeff Rose is Muriel’s friend and colleague, first as president of Local 79 and then as national president of CUPE (1983-1991).

Muriel with Jeff Rose

Local 79 members & Lynn Spink during break from 1984 Arbitration for a first Collective Agreement for Part-Time workers in the Homes for the Aged.

“The Supremes” — women who were at the CLC conference in January 1988 when the Supreme Court announced the Morgenthaler decision. This group went up to the steps of the Supreme Court building during their lunch break.

Muriel and Linda Jewett (National Rep for Local 79) — Hydro1 picket, 1989

Muriel with her daughter Dawn Peters

The following article celebrating Muriel Collins was taken from the Downsview Services Community Newsletter, Winter 2013 Edition.

Here is a CUPE Ontario leaflet that features Muriel Collins urging voters to defend public services.

Muriel Collins Housing Co-operative

In May 1995, the Muriel Collins Co-operative, named in her honour, was officially opened and will be celebrating 20 successful years this year. Muriel was Vice-President on the Founding Board of the Co-op, the Board was comprised of all Local 79 members.

CUPE Local 79 was the sponsor of the Muriel Collins Housing Co-operative project and the union stayed the course during the early planning stages, submissions & proposals to government, delays caused by the countless approvals required by the province and the City, and finally construction.

From the very beginning this Co-op was special. It was the first Co-op to take on the special needs component that was required for approval by the provincial government. Part of the announcement when the Co-op received its final approval to proceed, included the news that 15% of the housing would be set aside to serve persons with disabilities and special needs, the remainder for singles, mixed families and seniors. The Founding Board later made the unanimous decision to provide safe housing for victims of abuse in high risk situations. The Co-op is more than just a building, it’s a community where everyone belongs.

The Muriel Collins Co-operative is a fitting tribute to a courageous trade union activist who spent her life fighting for justice, inclusion, fairness, and equality.

For more information on the Muriel Collins Housing Co-op, please visit:http://murielcollins.com/