TRUCKERS HAD A GOOD DAY in Brampton, Ontario last week—and it had nothing to do with convoys or vaccine mandates. They stood up to their boss and won—twice.

They got a boss to finally pay a driver what he owed him. And a Superior Court judge ruled a trucking company owner had no grounds for his $250,000 claim against them for defamation.

The truckers are supported by the Naujawan Support Network (NSN), a mutual aid group in the Brampton area, who work to prevent the exploitation of international students and workers. The truckers are immigrants from south Asia. This thread from the NSN Twitter page captures the exhilaration of the recent win for the truckers and how they themselves made it happen.

Twitter thread tells the story

“This is a good day for NSN members and for all working class people organizing to stop exploitation, abuse and disrespect by those with power over our lives.

“Last summer, Buta Singh (owner of Flow Boy Haulage) stole Gagandeep’s wages for 194 hours working as a dump truck driver.

“Our response: get organized. We reviewed Gagandeep’s evidence, sent Buta a demand letter, protested three times, postered, and never wavered in our commitment to truth.

“After we protested in front of his home, last September Buta launched a $250,000 lawsuit against Gagandeep and other members of NSN.

“Buta claimed our protests demanding payment of Gagandeep’s wages were defamatory and illegal.

“In response, NSN’s legal team filed a motion to dismiss Buta’s lawsuit on a preliminary basis. We argued that the lawsuit was an attempt to punish NSN for telling the truth about the wages Buta stole from Gagandeep, and to crush our organizing against wage theft in Brampton.

“A court hearing on NSN’s motion took place this Jan 19. A few weeks before, Buta had actually paid Gagandeep’s wages to the Ministry — proof he’d committed wage theft. The fact that Buta maintained his lawsuit even after this admission reveals his true motivation: to silence NSN.

“We refused to be silent. We fought Buta in court and won.

“Thank you to our supporters for attending our protests and contributing to our legal defence fund, to journalists and radio hosts for covering NSN campaigns, and to our lawyers for fighting and winning in court.

“The struggle continues.”

Wage theft, not vaccines

Attar Sodhi has been a truck driver for 12 years. He is a member of the Naujawan Support Network. He says many truckers are living paycheque to paycheque and desperately need the government to do much more to investigate the wage theft issue.

Sodhi says that for truckers in the greater Toronto area there is less concern about vaccine mandates and more worries about “the issues of wage theft, safer roads and community safety.”

Attar Sodhi and his friends in the Naujawan Support Network are standing up to their bosses, and winning something for themselves—and all working people—in ways far beyond the understanding or desire of all those other truckers on Parliament Hill.

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