35 People packed themselves into the Toronto and York Region Labour Council (TYRLC) boardroom on Thursday, 5 November, 2026 to hear about the Labour movement in Hong Kong and the authoritarianism under which it must survive.
Hosted by the Asian Canadian Labour Alliance (ACLA) , Unifor, TYRLC, and the Canadian Labour Congress (CLC), the meeting started with a land acknowledgement and a round of introductions.
Our featured speaker (whose identity we cannot reveal for fear of reprisal), talked about his own experiences as a trade union activist, but also the challenges of his union and the Labour movement in Hong Kong in general.
Mung Siu Tat, now living in exile, asid, “In a city of 7.5 million people, more than 2 million took to the streets to protest the heavy-handed government.” The country which was supposed to be ‘one country, two systems’, a promise by the Chinese government, became ‘one country, one system.”
Authoritarianism Beyond Borders
The speakers also addressed the authoritarianism China has implemented in other countries in their efforts to stymie activists. Immigration and border control agents in foreign countries are working on behalf of the Chinese government, abrogating the laws and democratic principles of the host country.
Foreign investment also ignores the laws of the country being invested in. The speakers urged attendees to keep the issue alive by bringing it up at union and community meetings. In this way, we can get the Canadian government to maintain pressure on China about their human rights record.