Co-operative Union of Canada National Historic Event
© Canadian Co-operative Association
The Co-operative Union of Canada was designated as a national historic event in 1984.
Historical importance: formed in 1909 by George Keen, Ontario and Nova Scotia Cooperative Societies.
Commemorative plaque: will be installed at MacNab Transit Terminal, 86, 1 MacNab Street South, Hamilton, OntarioFootnote 1
Co-operative Union of Canada
The Co-operative Union of Canada, the first organization to unite and represent Canadian co-operatives, was founded near here in 1909. Its advocates believed in mutual self-help and that farmers and consumers would benefit from collectively marketing produce or purchasing goods. Active across the country, the union earned great national support from co-operatives in 1944 when it contested a proposed federal tax that would have negatively affected wheat pool members on the Prairies. In 1970 it lobbied in favour of the first federal co-operative legislation, the Canada Cooperatives Association Act, which strengthened the national movement.
Co-operative Union of Canada
The Co-operative Union of Canada (CUC) was the first organization to unite and represent Canadian co-operatives. Founded in Ontario by advocates of mutual self-help, it was primarily a consumer pressure group before the First World War. In 1944 the CUC convinced the federal government to ameliorate tax changes that would have been damaging to co-operatives. In 1970 it successfully lobbied the federal government to pass the first federal co-operative legislation, the Canada Cooperative Associations Act.
© British Columbia Institute for Co-operative Studies
© Sandra Foreman / Canadian Co-operative Association
The CUC was founded in 1909 with the support of five Ontario and Nova Scotia co-operatives. The founders of the CUC had a national vision to become an affiliation of all the co-operative associations in Canada. The CUC had several presidents over the years, but the driving force of the organization was George Keen, its secretary from 1909 until his retirement in 1944. In the early 1920s, he travelled across the country to recruit co-operatives from the Maritimes, British Columbia, Alberta, and Saskatchewan.
The catalyst to reorganize the CUC came from outside the co-operative movement when, in 1943, the federal government proposed to tax the rebates that the wheat pools on the Prairies returned to their members. This prompted outrage and the CUC appeared to be the natural spokesperson in Ottawa for the co-operatives. Under its new structure, the CUC was composed of representatives of provincial councils and representatives of regional and national co-operatives. Angus Bernard (A. B.) Macdonald, the new secretary, coordinated the presentation of briefs to the Royal Commission on Co-operatives. The Commission recommended revisions to the tax, making it less damaging to co-operatives than the government’s original proposals.
In 1967, the CUC became a federation of regional and national supply, marketing, fishing, and dairy associations, credit union centrals, trust and insurance companies, and the Co-operative Housing Foundation. One of its first successes following this reorganization was to achieve the passage of the Canada Cooperative Associations Act in 1970, almost seven decades after Alphonse Desjardins, founder of the co-operative savings and loan company Caisse Populaire, had first tried to secure federal legislation. The act provided a legislative framework for the creation and operation of co-operatives at the federal level, implementing rules for their incorporation, the composition of capital, and the holding of meetings.
By 1984 the CUC had become a national organization whose role was to promote government relations with the co-operative community, to co-ordinate shared interests among co-operatives, to lead in communicating and promoting the activities of the co-operative sector, and to advance liaison with, representation in, and development of the international co-operative community.
© Co-operatives and Mutuals Canada
This press backgrounder was prepared at the time of the plaque unveiling in 2025.
The National Program of Historical Commemoration relies on the participation of Canadians in the identification of places, events and persons of national historic significance. Any member of the public can nominate a topic for consideration by the Historic Sites and Monuments Board of Canada.
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