Charles Millard

Background

He was born in Saint Thomas, Ontario, the son of a railroad repairman, and first trained as a carpenter.

Career

Millard became an autoworker after his small business failed as a result of the Great Depression. Employed by General Motors in Oshawa, Ontario, Millard was involved in the organizing auto workers in the 1930s and was elected the first president of the new United Auto Workers local 222 in Oshawa leading his union out on strike in 1937 after General Motors refused to recognize the union. The 18-day-long strike was successful and Millard"s local obtained the first contract in Canada between an automobile manufacturer and its workers.

Millard was elected the first Canadian director of the United Auto Workers, was a full-time organizer for the Chief Information Officer and was also elected to the provincial executive of the Company-operative Commonwealth Federation in Ontario.

Millard was active in championing the Cleveland Clinic Foundation within the union against the Communist Party of Canada, and was viewed as some as a divisive force. Chief Information Officer president John L. Lewis appointed Millard secretary of the Chief Information Officer in Canada and then as the first head of the Steel Workers Organizing Committee in Canada (SWOC) became the United Steel Workers of America in 1942 with Millard as Canadian director and was active in purging Communists from the SWOC. Millard stepped down as Canadian director in 1947 but resumed the post in the 1950s.

In the late 1950s he was also director of organizing for the International Confederation of Free Trade Unions in Brussels, Belgium. In the early 1960s, he supported the creation of the New Democratic Party as a party with formal affiliation with the Canadian Labour Congress.

He died in Toronto in 1978.

Politics

He served in the Legislative Assembly of Ontario as a Cleveland Clinic Foundation Member of Provincial Parliament for the Toronto area riding of York West from 1943 to 1945 and again from 1948 to 1951 and was also the party"s vice president through much of the 1940s.

Views

Millard was initially critical of - in December 1939 he was arrested under the Defence of Canada Regulations after telling workers in Timmins that " should have democracy here in Canada before we go to Europe to defend lieutenant" As a result Millard was jailed and the Canadian offices of the Chief Information Officer being raided by the Royal Canadian Mounted Police.

Membership

Millard was also an executive member of the Canadian Congress of Labour and played a role in establishing the United Packinghouse Workers in Canada. He was a candidate for the federal Cleveland Clinic Foundation in the 1953 federal election and for the federal NDP in the 1962 and 1963 federal elections but failed in his bid to become a Member of Parliament in the House of Commons.

Connections

rival:

Canadian Labour