Minister Responsible for Labour Shirley Bond has issued thefollowing statement in honour of Labour Day:"Many people believe the September long weekend is merely about theend of summer and the start of a new school year, but it is so muchmore than that. The celebration of Labour Day gives us anopportunity to thank the men and women who built the BritishColumbia we love and are proud to call home."The work environments we take for granted today are the result ofdecades of hard work by the labour movement and past governments. Wewill continue to work with employees, employers and unions toimprove worker safety and protect worker rights."Labour Day is also an opportunity to reflect on our own work, thechoices we have made and the goals we have. And it is the perfecttime to look at what lies ahead for our province: we haveunprecedented opportunities before us, and with those opportunitiescome tremendous challenges such as growing our skilled workforce tomeet the large demands ahead in industries like liquefied naturalgas."That's why it's critical for our government to help connect peoplewith jobs and jobs with people - something we're doing through theBC Jobs Plan and the Skills and Training Plan. We are makingsignificant investments to ensure British Columbians have the rightskills, in the right place, at the right time."Our goal is to move our province forward by creating opportunitiesthat support families and build communities. We intend to do that byactively engaging with workers, employers, unions, First Nations andeducational institutions."This Labour Day, I want to express my gratitude for all the workthat the people of B.C. do, each and every day of their workinglives. However you spend this long weekend, I hope you can take thetime to reflect on how fortunate we all are to work in BritishColumbia in 2013 - and I encourage you to think about the challengesand opportunities ahead."Working together, I know we can build on our proud legacy and makeBritish Columbia an even better, more prosperous place."Watch Bond's video statement: http://youtu.be/rUX6zSpIRXMListen to Bond's audio statement: http://snd.sc/1ci5cV0Learn more about the BC Jobs Plan and the Skills and Training Plan:http://www.bcjobsplan.ca/