Mr. Speaker, May 1st is the day we acknowledge the kind of work world we live in.
In a changing economy, where workers' rights around the world are being whittled away, International Workers' Day recognizes the long hard road taken since the origins of this day, in the late 1800s, when workers organized to fight for an eight-hour work day.
Whether in Bangladesh or at Neptune Technologies in the Eastern Townships, the battles waged even today by labour movements to guarantee fundamental human rights are of the utmost importance. These organizations must remember what they have accomplished and why they are fighting for social justice and democracy.
Too many people lose their lives needlessly because of employers' negligence. That is why occupational health and safety is always a core issue, even in Canada, a modern-day industrialized country. Next, the right of association and its corollary, the right to collect union dues, must be protected because, brothers and sisters, we are fighting for a world free of violence, free of social inequality, free of social injustice and free of this Conservative government.