A parting shot in the foot

The CAW has announced its intention to formally cut ties with the NDP through a resolution of its National Executive Board. Which is fair enough, to the extent that one accepts the contention that Buzz Hargrove is the CAW. But while that portion of the resolution can at least be rationally justified, the recommendations to members can't be considered anything but overkill:

Recommend that the CAW Council encourage CAW local leadership, staff, CAW members, as well as CAW local unions affiliated to the NDP, to withdraw all support and affiliations from the NDP federally and in all provinces and territories.

Now, it should be clear enough from the subsequent text at the CAW's website that the matter is purely a personal one between Hargrove and the NDP, as Hargrove's reinstatement (along with what amounts to a promise that Hargrove and his ilk will not be asked to live up to the terms of NDP membership in the future) is explicitly stated to be the main precondition to any reversal by the CAW.

But there could be substantially more fallout on the CAW than on the NDP as a result of the decision - particularly to the extent that the CAW's choice goes beyond formal affiliations and also extends to trying to control the political activities of its members.

I'll be particularly interested in the response of the CAW's regional incarnations. Will a majority of B.C. members prefer to risk another term of Campbell at the helm in order to help Buzz show his outrage? Will Saskatchewan's unions consider a Sask Party gutting of the Trade Union Act to be a reasonable price for Hargrove's ego trip? For that matter, will the party be satisfied with a weakened federal NDP if the result is precisely the Harper majority that the CAW claims to want to avoid? And if any region or group chooses democratically to reject the executive's message, will the national council support the democratic will of each region which does so?

Ultimately, it is for the CAW to decide which ties it wants to keep - and as has oft been discussed, a less formal relationship between the NDP and unions such as the CAW may well have benefits for both. But instead of presenting a measured response, the CAW has done nothing but live up to the stereotype of a union looking to pick fights which are completely detached from the individual values of its members. And particularly if those individual members continue to act for the party which even the CAW still concedes to be the most progressive in Canada, today's call may be only to the NDP's benefit and the CAW's loss.