by KRISTIAN GRAVENOR

Ah, the autumn is coming, and that means we can look forward to colourful leaves, cool breezes, woolly sweaters and irate picket-waving strikers blocking streets, paralyzing services, burning politicians in effigy and angrily chanting their demands.

This fall is slated to be the final Armageddon between the government and its workers, who want raises that the province says it can't afford.

The province will dig in its heels. It's unclear whether they'll dig in for real, like they did against the striking liquor workers, or if they'll just cave in like they did with the student strikers.

If the province doesn't buckle, then these massive, widespread and bitter labour disputes could become our Leningrad. Winter will be as tense as Ginette Reno without her personal massage kit.

As we await the monstrous spectre of labour diplomacy by other means, I thought it'd be an excellent - okay, sorta good - idea to identify some generals of the Quebec labour army who have led workers to past triumphs.

The nice thing about becoming a union boss is that you can have a lot of bad habits, little education, can make unpleasant ethnic insinuations, be a drunk, spout as many resentful, paranoid-conspiratorial declarations as you want, and it'll only help. Here are some of the archetypes that I've come across.

The Good Ol' Boy: The all-time most revered union leader in Quebec was Louis Laberge, who led the hard-working people of Quebec until quitting in 1991. Laberge sat proudly on his throne, although he'd occasionally fall off, such as the time he slumped off his chair at a job forum, a few years before getting busted for drunk driving. When an anglo dues-payer complained about Laberge's participation at separatist rallies, Laberge wrote the lowly electrician: "Your days of minority domination are over." The workers loved him.

The Weasel: André "Dédé" Desjardins was conceivably the best-ever union leader if you're judging by the ratio of work to pay. Under his stewardship, an Olympic Stadium construction "worker's" shift would often involve punching one's card in the morning and returning to punch it at night. Half of Montreal North, as they say, owes its debt to Desjardins, as so much of it was built with concrete stolen from the site. He eventually turned drug smuggler and loan shark before being gunned down in 2000. They say his estate in the Dominican was ransacked for the contents of its safe.

The Bureaucrat: Gérald Larose didn't get to the top thanks to good looks or charisma. The scraggly-haired, crooked-tooth former union leader is like Quebec's Joe Clark - not a whole lot of charm, but he seems to be around year after year. Larose's post-union tasks include heading the incredibly useless Estates General on language, at which you might've gawked to notice the freakish participation of a couple of anglos acting like Captured Prisoners on Parade. He's got something called the Sovereignist Council, run from an office presumably large enough for a small desk and a fax machine.

The Killer: The Confederation of National Trade Unions can count on the useful advice of consultant Paul Rose, who served 12 years in prison for the terrorist murder of provincial cabinet minister Pierre Laporte in 1970. Rose now draws a regular paycheque as an advisor. I used to phone and leave messages for him, but he never called back. I wanted to know what useful advice he might have on how to grab a middle-aged man tossing a football with his nephew and then sequester and kill him.

The Goosestepper: One old-school union leader named J. Anaclet Chalifoux controlled 85,000 members of the Quebec Federation of Labour Clubs, who he'd have chant, "Vive Mussolini, Vive Chalifoux." His glory was limited though: in Verdun, workers would pelt him with eggs. His idea to order thousands of fascist uniforms for the workers backfired when he was caught pilfering. He was turfed in March 1934. He launched his own Canadian fascist party thereafter, but nobody joined.

All of these men gave life and meaning to the rich history of labour solidarity in Quebec, plus a little entertainment too.

Comments? kgravy@openface.ca