The British Columbia Maritime Employers Association is an association representing the interests of member companies in industrial relations on Vancouver's and other

British Columbian British may refer to: Peoples, culture, and language * British people, nationals or natives of the United Kingdom, British Overseas Territories, and Crown Dependencies. ** Britishness, the British identity and common culture * British English, ...

seaports. The BCMEA currently consists of sixty-seven member companies with commercial interests based on the waterfronts of

Vancouver Vancouver ( ) is a major city in western Canada, located in the Lower Mainland region of British Columbia. As the List of cities in British Columbia, most populous city in the province, the 2021 Canadian census recorded 662,248 people in the ...

and other seaports in

British Columbia British Columbia (commonly abbreviated as BC) is the westernmost province of Canada, situated between the Pacific Ocean and the Rocky Mountains. It has a diverse geography, with rugged landscapes that include rocky coastlines, sandy beaches, ...

. The BCMEA is the Employer Association of companies that employ longshoremen, who in turn are represented by the

International Longshore and Warehouse Union The International Longshore and Warehouse Union (ILWU) is a labor union which primarily represents dock workers on the West Coast of the United States, Hawaii, and in British Columbia, Canada. The union was established in 1937 after the 1934 West ...

to bargain with the BCMEA on their behalf. In addition to collective bargaining, the BCMEA handles everyday labour matters, such as administering the collective agreement, payroll services, discipline, and grievance and arbitration hearings on behalf of its members. Formed after

World War I World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...

to handle the rapidly growing commercial traffic on the waterfront, it was originally called the Shipping Federation of British Columbia, comprising shipping and railway companies, terminal and storage operators, and container companies.

History

The Shipping Federation was established during what Canadian historians have called the Canadian Labour Revolt in the period following World War I, which peaked in Canada with the Winnipeg General Strike in 1919. the Employers felt they needed to band together, not only because port operations were becoming increasingly complex, but as a bulwark against unionism generally, and union militancy in particular. Vancouver hosted the first Canadian General Strike in Canada in 1918 following the police killing of union leader,

Ginger Goodwin Albert "Ginger" Goodwin (May 10, 1887–July 27, 1918), nicknamed Ginger for his bright red hair, was a migrant coal miner who advocated for workers' rights and promoted the cause of trade union, unions in British Columbia, Canada. Angered by ...

. The following year a longer and more extensive general strike was called by the

Trades and Labour Council A labour council, trades council or industrial council is an association of labour unions or union branches in a given area. Most commonly, they represent unions in a given geographical area, whether at the district, city, region, or provincial or ...

in sympathy with the strike in Winnipeg. Longshoremen were among the first to walk out, but were quickly replaced by strikebreakers who were mainly university and high school students. By the time the next strike erupted on Vancouver's waterfront, the Shipping Federation had adopted an even more rigidly anti-union policy, influenced by its recent association with counterparts in the United States, who were following what had been dubbed the American Plan. It then set out to break the union completely and establish a company union. Again, it recruited strikebreakers both as replacement workers and as special constables. The

CPR Cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) is an emergency procedure consisting of chest compressions often combined with artificial ventilation in an effort to manually preserve intact brain function until further measures are taken to restore sponta ...

's ocean liner, the ''Empress of Japan'', was used to house strikebreakers for the duration of the strike. The strike was quickly brought to an end after the Federation took over the duties of despatching work gangs from the union and refused to negotiate with the union, the

International Longshoremen's Association The International Longshoremen's Association (ILA) is a North American labor union representing longshore workers along the East Coast of the United States and Canada, the Gulf Coast, the Great Lakes, Puerto Rico, and inland waterways. The ILA h ...

. It established the Vancouver and District Waterfront Workers' Association to replace the ILA as a company union. Almost a decade of peace followed the 1923 strike. It was not a lasting peace however, and in 1933 the Shipping Federation discovered that not only had the union been transformed by

Communist Party A communist party is a political party that seeks to realize the socio-economic goals of communism. The term ''communist party'' was popularized by the title of ''The Manifesto of the Communist Party'' (1848) by Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels. ...

organizers into a militant union, but also that agitators were planning a general strike for the province to begin on Vancouver's waterfront in 1935. Communists were active both on the waterfront and in the government relief camps for the unemployed, as well as several other industries, organizing workers into unions affiliated with the Communist trade union umbrella, the

Workers' Unity League The Workers' Unity League (WUL) was established in January 1930 as a militant industrial union labour central closely related to the Communist Party of Canada on the instructions of the Communist International. This was reflective of the shift in ...

. During this era, the Comintern, or Communist International in Moscow was prescribing a policy of dual unionism. The Shipping Federation was thus centrally positioned during what was effectively another Red Scare in 1935. The general strike never happened in 1935, and striking relief camp workers left the city shortly after the waterfront strike finally was called for the

On-to-Ottawa Trek The On-to-Ottawa Trek was a mass protest movement in Canada in 1935 sparked by unrest among unemployed single men in federal relief camps principally in Western Canada. Federal relief camps were brought in under Prime Minister R. B. Bennett’s ...

. Technically it was a lock-out. The union voted to take back control of despatching work gangs because discrimination, blacklisting, and the arbitrary allocation of work had long been a major grievance for longshoremen. According to the most recent contract however, the Federation was to handle dispatching, and therefore treated the union's action as a breach of contract. The 1935 strike had seeped into the political realm much more extensively than the 1923 strike had. The civic administration of Mayor Gerry McGeer, along with his chief constable, Colonel Foster had joined with the Shipping Federation to defeat the Communist threat. The Communists had been planning to merge the waterfront and relief camp strike, and hopefully other industrial workers into a general strike. Although these various groups of worker's were willingly under Communist leadership, they primarily were pursuing resolution to their own workplace grievances, not a

proletarian revolution A proletarian revolution or proletariat revolution is a social revolution in which the working class attempts to overthrow the bourgeoisie and change the previous political system. Proletarian revolutions are generally advocated by socialists, ...

. The strike peaked with the July 18, 1935

Battle of Ballantyne Pier The Battle of Ballantyne Pier occurred in Ballantyne Pier during a docker's strike in Vancouver, British Columbia, in June 1935. The strike can be traced back to 1912 when the International Longshoremen's Association (ILA), began organizing t ...

, where the police clashed with strikers and their supporters who had attempted to march down to the harbour. Three levels of police were on hand, plus a plethora of special constables, organized in part by the Shipping Federation's Citizens' League of British Columbia, a vigilante group it funded to fight the strike and generate anti-strike/anticommunist propaganda. Again, the strike was broken, and the union replaced with a company union. The Communists shifted away from the dual unionism strategy and dissolved the Workers' Union League. Agitators now put their organizing energy behind the CIO industrial union movement. The Shipping Federation stepped back from it overt anticommunism, but continued to fund a variation of the Citizens' League, the Industrial Association of British Columbia under the leadership of Colonel C. E. Edgett, former police chief, prison warden, and leading local anticommunist polemicist. Nevertheless, workers managed to establish and sustain an independent union under Harry Bridges's new

(ILWU) that still exists today.

Member Companies

*Anglo Canadian Shipping Company *APL Canada *Associated Stevedoring Co. Ltd. *Barwil Agencies (N.A.) Inc *Cerescorp Company *CP Ships (Canada) Agencies Limited. *China Ocean Shipping Co. (Canada) Inc. *China Shipping (Canada) Agency Co. Ltd. *Coastal Containers Ltd. *Colley West Shipping Ltd. *Compass Marine Services Inc. *Dubai Ports World (Canada) *Dominion Shipping Co. Ltd. *Empire Grain Stevedoring Ltd. *Empire Shipping Company Limited *Evergreen America Corporation *Fairmont Shipping (Canada) Limited *Fesco Agencies N.A. Inc. *Fibreco Export Inc. *Fraser Surrey Docks LP * Gearbulk Shipping Canada Ltd. *GCT Global Container Terminals Inc. *Greer Shipping Ltd. *Hanjin Shipping Company Limited *Hapag-Lloyd (Canada) Inc. *Hyundai America Shipping Agency (P.N.), Inc. *International Chartering Services Ltd. *Interocean Steamship Corporation *Island Shipping Limited *Kerr Norton Marine Canada *Louis Wolfe & Sons (Vancouver) Ltd. *Maher Terminals of Canada Corp. *McLean Kennedy Inc. *Maersk Canada Inc. *Maple Shipping *Mason Agency Ltd. *Montship Inc. *N Y K Line (Western Canada) Inc. * Neptune Bulk Terminals (Canada) Ltd. *Norasia Container Lines Canada Ltd. *Norsk Pacific Steamship Canada Limited *North Pacific Shipping Company Ltd. * Norton Lilly International *Oldendorff Carriers *OOCL (Canada) Inc. *P & O Nedlloyd Limited *Pacific Coast Terminals Co. Ltd. *Pacific Northwest Ship & Cargo Services Inc. *Pacific Rim Stevedoring Ltd. *Pacific Stevedoring & Contracting Co. Ltd. *PacNord Agencies Ltd. *PCDC Canada Ltd. *Saga Forest Carriers International (Canada) Ltd. *Sanko Kisen (Canada) Ltd. *Seaboard International Shipping Company Limited *Seabridge International Shipping Inc. *Sinotrans Canada Inc. *SMI Marine Limited *Squamish Terminals Ltd. *Star Shipping (Canada) Ltd. *Terminal Dock Limited *TFL Forest Limited - Stuart Channel Wharves Division *Trans-Oceanic Shipping Co. Ltd. *Vancouver Shipping Agencies Ltd. *Vancouver Wharves Ltd. *Westcan Stevedoring Ltd. *Westcan Terminals Ltd. *Western Stevedoring Company Limited *Western Stevedoring Terminal Operations Ltd. *Westward Shipping Ltd. *Weyerhaeuser Canada Ltd. *Zim Integrated Shipping Services (Canada) Ltd. {{Vancouver Corporations

References

*Andrew Parnaby, "On the Hook: Welfare Capitalism on the Vancouver Waterfront, 1919-1939," PhD thesis, Memorial University, 2001 *Paul A. Phillips, No Power Greater: A Century of Labour in British Columbia. Vancouver: BC Federation of Labour/Boag Foundation, 1967. *Andrew Yarmie, "The Right to Manage: Vancouver Employers' Associations, 1900–1923," BC Studies, no. 90 (1991): 40-74.

External links

BC Maritime Employers' Association website
Employers' organizations Shipping trade associations Business organizations based in Canada Organizations based in Vancouver Labour relations in British Columbia