When Waterloo Region Labour Council (WRLC) President Ramzi Abdi took a stand against war profiteering, his members made sure he didn't stand alone.

In an attempt to get local businesses a piece of the war spending pie promised in the Federal Liberals last budget, Mayor Berry Vrbanovic and Senator Sandra Pupatello brought Defence Shift to Kitchener's Town Hall. It was billed as an informative session where local business owners were promised "the opportunity to speak directly with federal and provincial procurement officials".

Pupatello didn't expect to have to answer to 20,000 workers concerned about exactly what they'd be building. When pressed for answers, she fled.

The Senator had already done a similar event in Windsor - and no doubt has plans to hold more. She has been working hard to manufacture consent, get people bidding on federal defence contracts and pave the way for Carney's promised boost to the sector.

The Waterloo/Kitchener area is already home to multiple manufacturers of weapons and components used to commit war crimes in Palestine and Yemen. Companies like Colt Canada have been the focus of anti-war protestors since at least 2024, and it looks like those grassroots efforts now have a clear ally in their local Labour Council.

When their President when in front of them this week, to tell them he planned on disrupting attending, and possibly disrupting the Defence Shift event, WRLC members already knew his politics on Palestine. So although the unanimously passed motion to support him didn't exactly surprise Ramzi, it did move him. It meant something.

He was also able to garner the support of Regional Councilor Anna Meksavanh and Mayoral Candidate David Alton.

Ramzi sat down with host Jessa McLean to share how this all went down, and discuss how more workers are becoming aware of the political ramifications of their labour, and their pensions.

Call to Action: Join World Beyond War's efforts to Stop Canadian Militarism

Related Episodes:

• Not In Our Name: Divesting Pensions and Rejecting Carney's War Bank (April 2026) Activists talk about the tactics they're using to cut into the cash flow of weapons. manufacturers.
• UNIFOR's Hot Cargo: Labour Internationalism (Aug 2025) Reps from Labour for Palestine on their campaign to have any goods or services coming from, or going to Israel, declared 'hot cargo'.

More Resources:

• More on Canadian Militarism via World Beyond War
• ARTICLE: Kitchener factory blocked by protesters demanding arms embargo on Israel via CityNews
• Statement from City of Kitchener on Defence Shift Event

Be sure to get even more content on our SUBSTACK.

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Greetings, friends. My name is Jess McLean, and I'm here to provide you with some blueprints

of disruption. This weekly podcast is dedicated to amplifying the work of activists, examining

power structures, and sharing the success stories from the grassroots. Through these discussions,

we hope to provide folks with the tools and the inspiration they need to start to dismantle

capitalism, decolonize our spaces, and bring about the political revolution that we know

we need. Welcome back, Ramsey. Can you introduce yourself to everybody else? Thank you for

having me back. It's been a little while, but it's good to speak with you again. So for

everybody else, my name is Ramsey Abdi. I am a teacher here in Waterloo Region, but I'm

here today to talk a little bit about some things in another hat that I wear. So I'm the president

of the Waterloo Regional Labour Council. We're an organization that represents a number of

different affiliated unions here in Waterloo Region. and that would entail or be about 20,000

workers approximately within Waterloo region. That's bigger than I thought it was, but I'm

never good at estimating anything like that. You didn't wear that hat the last time I had

you here. So congratulations on taking on that role. It's always nice to know when we've got

that strong principled labor leaders in place. But, you know, I had to call you in today.

You had a great Facebook post up. and it was one every victory we get we celebrate. You

were in front of your council. You told them you were going to do something. I don't want

to steal your thunder. What did you post about today? And then and then we'll get into how

that went. Again, I'm fairly active and I'm out at different events around the community

and whatnot. And this past weekend I was at an event, the March for Palestine being held

in Kitchener, and someone came up to me and One of the things that is frequently discussed

is kind of weapons being sent overseas. And someone came up and said, did you hear that

the Kitchener mayor is hosting a conference and bringing weapons manufacturers in to Kitchener

this week to meet with local businesses to try and bring more weapons manufacturing to Waterloo

region. And for me, this did not sit well. This doesn't really align with my personal

politics. And for a lot of work that I do in labor council. and knowing the organizations

that I work with, it doesn't really align with a lot of labor values either. So it was a

real concern to me and I decided that I was going to register and go and speak some truth

to power and ask some hard and uncomfortable questions to the people who were there. And

so again, this was very short notice, but we had our labor council meeting last night. and

I'm giving my report as I normally do talking about some of the different things going on

and I mentioned there's this event going on and we're bringing weapon manufacturers into

the region to hopefully make connections and we want manufacturing jobs 100 percent we do

not want to be manufacturing things that are being exported and used to kill people or commit

war crimes that's not the type of manufacturing jobs that we And so I told the delegates at

the meeting that I would be attending and I would be speaking that truth to power. would

be, um, you know, seeing what I can do to make a difference in whatever way we can. And, uh,

they were actually very, very supportive and it was great to see that reaction. Again, I

think they understand my views about standing against. all kinds of oppression against hate,

against racism, and in this case, standing up against the export of weapons to be used for

oppression and suffering of other human beings. And I was a little surprised. They said,

well, one of the delegates said, if you're going, then I kind of look at it as you're going.

Not really us, yes, you're our president, but let's have a motion. And I was like, you don't

need one. They were pretty insistent. said, let's pass a motion that the organization stands

with you and we want you to go and speak against bringing manufacturing to the region. And

that was presented to the floor and it passed unanimously. Yeah, it was really, really moving

to see that level of support from, the organization. I'm standing on my principles and the labor

council stands with me. We stand together on this. We want to support workers. We want to

do better for our community, but we also want to do the right thing and take a stance without

any moral hypocrisy. There is a way that we can do that and as leaders in the labour movement,

you know, we have that responsibility. kind of wish leaders at other levels would also

take issues like this a little more seriously, but we are happy to be the voice in the face

of that, at least locally. That really is amazing news. I hope you share it with the Hot Cargo

campaign that is working to make that connection between workers and what they manufacture and

the power that they have when they put tools down or take ideological stance like this.

And surely it was much more powerful for you to be able to stand there at this event as

a representative of the entire region's labor council rather than just an individual. When

you say bring jobs into the region, there is no shortage, not no shortage. I mean, we always

need more well-paying jobs, unionized jobs, but there are already quite a few weapons manufacturers

or manufacturers involved with the broader arms trade in your region, right? Because there

have been active protests. against this. Do you want to talk about the work you've already

been doing before we get to you crashing the event? So within the region we have had a

number of protests. Colt is located here in Kitchener. There have been some protests there

but there are actually a number of different companies within the region. Some that provide

components to the aerospace industry which are used in the F-35s. There is a company here

in Waterloo that provides parts that are used in drones, which are being shipped overseas

and used to help, again, target and kill innocent civilians as part of a genocide. So we have

real concerns about what's being manufactured in the region. If it is only parts, it is still

part of that weapons pipeline. And while some people might like to say we're not connected

to it and we're not responsible for it. The reality is that everybody at every step has

to take some responsibility for the ultimate impacts and the effects of those weapons and

where they're used. this your labor council's first foray into being a part of that movement

or have they, have you been able to get some involvement in these actions with labor in

the area? In the community, actually, it's been a number of different community groups. and

organizations, grassroots organizing to identify who these manufacturers were and took the lead

on it. And so I can't take any credit for that. The Labour Council can't. It is grassroots

people, members of the community, recognizing what's going on, doing the legwork, doing the

research, reaching out, connecting with people. And then we see the effects of that and people

being called out, which is great. But I do listen to these things. And again, I am proud

to be an advocate and an ally and recognize this. I have my own personal connections to

it. And so when I hear about this and I have the opportunity, again, you said I'm in a new

role, I am in a new role. And I came into this role very clear in my position that we would

be taking principled stands on a number of issues. And so this was the first, at least that I'm

aware of. in a long time, but the Labour Council has taken a very principled stand against weapons

within the region. Now, we have attended things like the Canadian Labour Congress and the OFL

conventions and spoken on a number of different issues, including divestment from weapons manufacturer,

BDS, hot cargo, spoken on a number of those different issues there. And I spoke a number

of times there as a delegate and representative of the labor council. But in terms of actually

doing the work here on the ground and in the region and officially taking positions and

passing motions within our labor council, this would be a first step and it's a step I'm glad

to see us taking. We're glad to see you taking it as well. We're hoping other labor councils

will take note. We'll be sure to share. this as well with folks like World Beyond War who,

you know, work part and parcel doing this kind of work and raising this issue. And sometimes

that's a struggle within the labor movement because it does mean jobs. And, you know,

I know you're making the distinction of arms being exported. But in general, the peace movement

would be happy to see a lot of these arms manufacturers get a lot less funding and cooperation from

our federal government. So the event that you were going to was spearheaded by a senator's

office, is that correct? Correct. At the town hall? Correct. So this would be Senator Sandra

Puppetello. Why would she put on an event like this? She had previously hosted a similar

event down in Windsor. So she's a former elected representative down there. When she was sitting

in parliament before she became a senator, she was actually representing the Windsor area.

so she had previously hosted the same kind of meet and greet to bring manufacturers and

local businesses together down there. And our Kitchener mayor was aware of that. And so he

had reached out to her office and said, we should do something similar to this in Kitchener.

Thought it was a great idea, great for local businesses. And the reality is, it will probably

create some or bring some money into the region. War is profitable. Murder is profitable. But

is it all about the money or do we have to kind of put people before profit sometimes? And

that was really kind of the point that I'm trying to make. Local industry is important, absolutely,

but we do also have to make sure that we are acting in ethical ways that align with what

we would like to think of ourselves as a country. And for me as a dad, our kids and our grandkids,

when they look back and say, you know, what were you doing back in 2026? Are they going

to look at us and say you were prioritizing ethical good jobs or were you prioritizing

maximizing profit margins? And I would like my kids to look at me and say the former, not

the latter. Every time we kind of say that and embody that, it feels as though our kids are

looking back though. from a bad situation, you know, going, how did you let this happen for

a moment? Let us imagine they're asking us, how did you stop all of that? Right. How did

you shape this new world? Like, what role did you play? Because, yeah, it often feels a

little apocalyptic. So that event was today. Right. You this morning. Tell me how it went.

And did you go by yourself? So after I spoke about it at Labour Council, we did actually

have some guests in the audience, some local municipal candidates who were there for another

event that we hosted beforehand and some had stuck around. Yeah, after the meeting, connected

with a couple of the candidates. two of them were actually interested in coming, two actually

did come out. I'm very grateful that they did. Do you want to name drop those folks? Absolutely.

So one of the two, his name is David Alton. He is also running for the mayor of Kitchener.

He does a lot of amazing work locally on supporting marginalized communities and helping people

out. We know David. You know David. I know you know David. I believe I brought him on

with me one time to speak with you. Yeah, he brings me joy thinking about David. I'm going

to go back and listen to his voice again. Go on. Sorry. And the other one, and I feel really,

really bad. I'm going to get her name wrong. She is running for regional counselor. Her

name is Anna Merkavan. I am sure I'm pronouncing that wrong and leaving one or two letters out.

I'll link them both in the show notes so folks can see exactly who you're talking about.

Thank you. But again, I had an amazing conversation with her. Her backstory is absolutely fascinating.

overall a good, caring human being. And the fact that she wanted to step up for this was

not at all surprising for me. So how did it go? When I arrived, you know, they were doing

the registrations and we came in. I was wondering if there was going to be anything going on

outside, but this was not a well publicized event. The reality is the majority of the

people in the region have no idea that this was going on. This was a lot of industry insiders

and you know. only letting the select audience, the chosen few, know what was going on. So

I wasn't supposed to be there, but I found my way in. So they began with a couple of panels,

one which they call the primes, which are the large multinational corporations in the defense

sector who have the direct contracts with the government for whatever they're producing.

And then the tier one suppliers, and they're the ones kind of directly below them who provide

some of the pre-assembled parts or put the smaller pieces together before they go for final assembly.

So they had a panel with the prime contractors and then a second panel with the tier one suppliers.

What kind of things do they say? Everything that you would expect them to say. We're in

a conference where we're talking about defense spending and their trying to talk about all

of the things that don't include exporting weapons. And the reality is like an industry like Bombardier,

right? Like they are a huge company that has their hands in many different things. I believe

they produced our LRT trains here in town. They weren't talking about getting parts for LRT.

They were carefully dancing around that and the different companies, you like you need

to... make sure you get your security clearance. And we need to make sure we have this integration

top to bottom. And you need to make sure you can meet timelines for producing these things.

just kind of giving some warning and some advice to the local businesses. And again, it's not

only local. There were companies here from all over Southern Ontario. I met a couple gentlemen

down from Niagara. But these are just companies looking to make those connections to get access

to that money. And now that the federal government has committed to increasing spending on defense

by tens of billions of dollars, these people are trying to find ways to increase their business.

But the reality is how are we doing that? And the economic side of it is very interesting

because I'll use that example I had for a lot of these companies. The commercial civilian

business that they do has a profit margin that they operate in. domestic defense contracts

actually usually have a lower profit margin. The bidding for that is very competitive and

the profit margins are actually a little bit smaller. But where these companies make very

large profits is on weapons exports. And that's where they kind of offset the smaller margins

domestically through exporting weapons abroad. And we've seen that go to a number of different

countries. We saw a massive deal. for armored vehicles being sent to Saudi Arabia, I believe

it was a couple years back. But these are tens, hundreds, billions of dollar contracts that

these large companies are pursuing. And then again, that money just trickles down, but the

big profits are there. And these are corporations. Their focus is profit, and they are beholden

to their shareholders to maximize. One of the points I was trying to raise is we expect our

government officials to be beholden to us, right? They are responsible for our economy, but they

are also responsible for acting in the interests that align with what we would like Canada to

be or what we would like Canada to be seen as. So that was kind of what was going on there.

I tried to speak at both Q &A's. So there were two Q &A's and between the two Q &A's, they

took one question. That was rather interesting. Was it your question? Did you just shut it

down? Oh, no, it was not my question. I tried and everybody had a good chuckle and I kind

of cleared my throat rather loudly to see if I could get a question and no, they moved along

because they wanted to prioritize time to have the different businesses meet with these primes

and with the tier one suppliers. That was the whole purpose of it. So it wasn't really the

panel. It wasn't really the Q &A. It was for them to make those connections. So they didn't

want to hear my question. Afterwards, the Senator said, you know, if anybody has any

questions, come talk to me or a couple of these people over here. So I tried to go and ask

my question to her. And I went up and I asked her, you know, I introduced myself, said, you

know, I'm the president of the labor council here. represent a bunch of. unions, we represent

20,000 workers, we're really interested in getting good local jobs. But when I started to transition

towards the questions of ethics and exports, things got very, very awkward. And she noticed

that Anna who was there was actually recording the conversation. And she shut the conversation

down immediately, was quite upset that she felt that was being kind of ambushed. you know

what, like if she wants to have a conference on weapons manufacturing, then she should be

expecting questions about weapons manufacturing. She may not like the question, but that was

the whole purpose is to ask her the questions that make her think. And feel a little bit

uncomfortable. Exactly. Exactly. And again, she obviously did feel uncomfortable. did not

feel like she wanted to continue with that. Got a little upset, walked away. I talked

to her staff, they apologized for it and said, you know, she had other places to be in. said,

well, she doesn't need to be at her next meeting for a few minutes. And she walked away from

me a few minutes ago. So when I asked for two minutes of her time, she had two minutes.

But that is the reality of it. When when you start to ask uncomfortable questions, where

people are not expecting uncomfortable questions. They're expecting a fully pro-military crowd.

that one voice shows up and says, where are we sending these weapons to and why? They're

not necessarily prepared to answer. And they will feel a little bit upset to be challenged.

And that's basically what happened today. Well, it's good to know that they know that there's

opposition to it. to exist in a vacuum, be welcomed in by the mayor and to have this happen

seemingly unnoticed by the general public, that's manufacturing consent a little bit. Does your

community know what these jobs mean? And like you said, there's the big obvious arms manufacturers,

but sometimes there's such an ick factor involved with... the idea of them coming and giving

this how to get involved in the defense industry. Like in case you weren't already, you know,

here's how to make millions and join the ranks of war profiteers. And I imagine this is being

replicated right across the country with Carney's money. It's starting for me, it was helpful

for you to explain this to bits because on the ground at the community level, seeing how

this is going to play out politically. Right? So there's money to be spent and people aren't

asking the right questions. Right. It's just how many jobs, how many dollars into the region

and having the labor council oppose it is a big deal. Well, in the labor pipeline, there

are so many levels to it that it is very easy for people to disconnect from from the end

results. I'm not making these weapons. I'm just making a part for it. I'm just making

those machines, you know, make the weapons. I'm just building the parts to build the machine

that builds the weapons. Well, it's still all connected and it is all still ending up with

the same result. And I think that's what we need to recognize. And again, like, I don't

think anybody in the community would really object. to our armed forces getting the things

they need. I find it quite amusing. One of the things they kept talking about, none of

the companies that were there were responsible for the clothing of our military, but they

were like, oh, that's something that obviously we'll talk about because nobody's gonna complain

about a company making uniforms. That's defense sector funding. Well, that's not why we're

there. And that's not the concern. It's not what our military gets and what... they're

using to protect us. It's what's being used overseas. I'm not even going to touch on violence

within Canada and the risks involved with that. But the reality is the focus today was to

talk about exports. And we have seen Canadian weapons ending up being sent to Saudi Arabia,

used to oppress and suppress the population there. being used in Yemen, used ending up

down in Sudan, I believe some of the weapons had tracked there. And once the weapons get

out of Canada, it is really, really difficult to track. One of the local manufacturers had

parts that were used in drones that were being used in Gaza. Undoubtedly similar equipment

was being used in Lebanon and Syria. And again, we're talking about genocide. We're talking

about war crimes. And we're not okay with that. appreciate you taking a stand. You know,

willing to go just as a dad, a worker in the region and make your stand there. to have

the support of your Labour Council is very positive news that I'm happy to share with our audience.

So I appreciate you taking the time out of your busy day to come in and share this story with

us as well, Ramsey. much appreciated. no, my pleasure. And I think it's really worth

noting, right? This was not something that I, I led. I'm just reading the room. The reality

is I represent a lot of different unions and the unions out there are all taking different

positions on this. But, the message is the same. We hear about pension funds divesting

because workers don't want their pension to be funded by conflict. And that is a common

thread, right? People want to go to work, they want to collect their paycheck, they want to

work towards retirement and be happy in that. And they don't want to think about blood money

in their pension. That is a fairly common universal thing. And people often don't think about that

until they're forced to think about that. And unfortunately, in the last couple of years,

people are being poked and prodded and prompted to say, hey, are you thinking about this? Are

you thinking about where your money is going? And are you acting or investing ethically?

And this is kind of the end result of that. So many different organizations are taking

a stand. I represent many of those organizations. And the broader labor movement is standing

against war. One of the points you brought up earlier is in unions, it can be very difficult

because some of these actions do end up costing jobs. That's the reality of it. And if you

are in a union where you have an anti-war policy, but some of the workers you represent happen

to be in manufacturing and would be impacted by this, it does create that conflict within

the union. But for other unions, for myself, I'm in an education union. It's pretty clear

to us. We see families coming to us who are impacted by those wars. We see those kids and

people who are displaced and suffering from them. So for us, we see the effects directly.

And then when we think about our pensions and the OTPP, Ontario Teachers Pension Plan, is

one of the largest and most powerful pensions in the country. And we are seeing many different

unions who feed into that telling the OTPP to do better. And they have taken a lot of steps,

but there's a lot of other large investments, other pension funds that still need to follow

suit and listen to the public because nobody wants their retirement to be funded by war.

Yeah, we did an episode on that where folks talked about the organizing that takes place

against those pensions and the lack of response the heads of those pensions are giving to some

of these votes and motions and declarations by its members that they in fact reject this

kind of investment. I'll link that to this as well so folks can kind of get a better understanding

of the organizing that's happening there. But one of the things that's great about this story

amongst the other things we've mentioned and you alluded to it as well, but is that this

is, you know, the budget passed. Carney's war budget passed. He has lied to us about Canadian

weapons ending up in Israel. And it seems like a little bit unreachable. But this demonstrates

that in order for those funds to really manifest themselves, need to, there's other fronts

to fight them on, right? They're going to have to go into these communities. They're going

to have to convince or sign contracts with local manufacturers. There's room to change the narrative

and to add pressure to companies or to local politicians to say like we are doing with data

centers. No, no, but not here, you know, It's another front, but another chance, I guess,

to push back on this kind of war profiteering here in Canada. Yeah, I think if you think

of it like a house of cards, if it's well built, you can pull out a couple of cards and it will

still sit there and it will stay standing. But we need to be attacking that base at the grassroots

level and trying to have that impact. And the reality is, at some point, that support for

these, I'm going to say it plainly, these unethical and immoral policies will collapse. And the

people who aren't seeing it through that lens will eventually be forced to look at it that

way. That's good news, Ramsey. Thank you. Thanks, Jessi. That is a wrap on another episode of

Blueprints of Disruption. Thank you for joining us. Also, a very big thank you to the producer

of our show, Santiago Helu-Quintero. Blueprints of Disruption is an independent production

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