Thursday, November 6, 2025

CLAC’s Global Connections: Strengthening Worker Justice Worldwide

As part of the World Organisation of Workers, CLAC builds relationships, shares expertise, and advances collaborative labour relations across continents.

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Andrew Regnerus, International Representative and Ontario Construction Coordinator

CLAC is an all-Canadian, national union. At the same time, we are a member of the World Organisation of Workers (WOW)—a global federation of like-minded trade unions that come from all continents (except Antarctica, of course).

If you read our recent article, “CLAC Leaders Meeting with International Partners,” you know that I recently attended the WOW World Congress. It was a privilege meet with eminent trade union leaders in the beautiful setting of Porto, Portugal. Several meetings took place to conduct the business of the federation, as well as a seminar about the impact of AI on workers.

Why does CLAC—an independent Canadian trade union—belong to WOW?

It is beneficial to CLAC to be part of a bigger group of unions that share the same values and principles. Because these values and principles inform our actions, we can learn best practices from each other. I have taken away several new ideas for union-employer dialogue from WOW events. Further, WOW has member unions in developing countries that benefit from the federation’s economic assistance as they get started. Many of them do a lot with limited resources and low initial cash flow of union dues.

CLAC now has two staff members that serve as part of WOW’s governing body (see “CLAC Leaders Elected to Key Roles in International Trade Union Federation). Wayne Prins, CLAC’s executive director, serves as president of WOW’s world board. It is a testament to CLAC’s successes and Wayne’s leadership that he has been re-elected for a third term in the role. Andrew Regnerus (that’s me) was appointed as CLAC’s international representative earlier this year to share some of the international workload with Wayne. That led to my attendance at the congress, and there I was appointed to the WOW world board as well. In this role, I am privileged to represent CLAC at the annual board meeting.

So, what does CLAC’s international representative do?

In this role, I work with trade unions leaders around the world to support them, and also to learn best practices from them.

I have been in touch with union leaders in Liberia, a west African country. There, a federation of unions is organizing workers in primary industries such as the fish and aquaculture business. They are sincere about their work and manage to do a lot with limited resources. With WOW’s support of a few thousand dollars, they bring many workers to organizing seminars where they educate them about worker rights and how unions can support them.

I have met European union leaders who have much success using “social dialogue”—collaborative strategy and problem solving among workers and employers. As the Europeans are a bit ahead of CLAC in this, we can learn and be inspired.

I also coordinate aid efforts with the CLAC Foundation, CLAC’s charitable arm. It evaluates requests for support from developing unions and funds approved projects.

Building relationships with like-minded unions is beneficial to all parties. It provides CLAC with the opportunity to share important success stories with other unions and learn from their best practices. We inspire each other to do our work in confidence, knowing that worker justice in collective bargaining can happen very well using a collaborative approach that honours the dignity of all workplace participants.

CLAC’s Global Connections: Strengthening Worker Justice Worldwide

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