Britain gets trade These headlines graphically il- lustrate how British business leaders are seizing opportunities to extend trade with the Soviet Union and the Peoples’ Demo- cracies. But Canada continues to rely almost entirely on the in- creasingly uncertain U.S. market —with a resultant $500 million deficit. A spokesman for one of the British delegations in Mos- cow said his group “hopes to sell ships, cars, electrical equipment, machine tools, diesel engines, cables, cranes, woodworking ma- chinery and food manufacturing equipment” — all items that Can- ada too, could supply in return for chemicals and cotton, which we now import from the U.S. Sign Trade Pact #52 ux Brussels, Jan. 31 (Reuters).— Belgium and Russia today signed a new trade agreement wort} 5,000,000,000 Belgian franc# T ($100,000,000) in trade to eaqF e Seeking lectri¢ay Pe to Se 1] Ss, dj 1PMent oh Ngines, "4 ing m Shi OTTAWA ’ Despite Trade Minister C. .D. Howe’s earlier statement that he would welcome increased trade be- tween Canada and the Soviet Union, Prime Minister St. Laurent will make not a single approach towards this end on his current round-the- world tour. No member of the trade and commerce department is included in the prime minister’s entourage. He will visit 11 countries in Europe and Asia, making his long- est stay in India. Whatever other purposes he may have in conferring with govern- ment leaders in each country, trade is evidently not the objective. The government has made no announce- ment of any change in its trade policies which now restricts ex- change of goods to countries pos- sessing American or Canadian dol- lars. It is clear that St. Laurent con- tinues to submit to the Washington Ds, ca rs, St. Laurent ignores trade on world tour By HAL GRIFFIN The B.C. Electric has denied a rumor that it intends to remove the chairs from all its offices at Carrall and Main, with the exception of the board room — B.C. Electric directors don’t ride the trolleys. The rumor gained some credence this week after the B.C. Electric announced that it was placing 16 new-type trolley buses, with fewer seats and more standing room, on certain lines. The new buses are strictly on a trial basis. If. the public doesn’t like them they may be used as horse transports in the Fraser Valley. Like the railway cars of the First World War era they carry the legend, Quarante hommes ou huit chevaux, only the B.C. Electric considers neither forty men nor eight horses a satisfactory pay load. B.C. Electric employees, it was reported, were to be used as guinea pigs on the trial run. Their en- durance was to be tested by hav- ing them stand at their desks all day as part of their training for ‘!the arduous work of going home. Then, according to an unidenti- fied source at Vancouver City Hall, the B.C. Electric intended to ap- proach the council with its pro- posal for a new bylaw banning all chairs from offices in the down- town area. Another rumor going the rounds is that during rush hours (6 a.m. to midnight), no one weighing over 150 pounds or with a waist measure- ment of more than 34 inches will be allowed on a trolley .bus. The advantages of this are ob- blockade of trade with the USSR, China or the European countries under people’s democratic govern- ments. But the British government has officially opened a major drive in these countries, and British businessmen with the official backing of the Brit- ish Board of Trade (in Britain a cabinet post) are in Moscow, Pe- king, Warsaw, Bucharest, Prague, to secure new markets and Budapest. President Thorneycroft of the British Board of Trade, declared in the House of Commons on Janu- ary 29 that Britain wants to “ex- * * * tend trade with Communist coun- tries in Europe to the maximum consistent with security needs.” Why St. Laurent made no men- tion of this British move to expand markets in his House of Commons statement on January 29 before his departure, is a mystery to those concerned about the state of Cana- dian trade. presents THIRD ANNUA vious. The thinner the passengers, the more of them can be crowded on, the faster people can be moved out of the downtown area and, in- cidentally, the more fares can be: collected for each trip. It is reported that automatic weighing machines will be install- ed at bus stops and those people! who can’t qualify will lose weight while they wait because they’ll never get home in time for supper. They will be allowed to travel only on a regular type bus—the type in which you stand on some one else’s feet instead of your own. , One unspeakable source assured me that the B.C. Electric is now conducting experiments to deter- mine which méthod of loading is more efficient, vertical or horizon- tal. - Under the vertical loading plan passengers could be lifted out at their stops by a small mobile crane mounted on the roof. The hori- é ‘ INVITATIONS PACIFIC TRIBUNE — ‘Two-dimensional passengers’ No seats on trolleys so let’s abolish chairs zontal loading plan, while undoubt- edly more efficient because it utilizes the waste space near the roof created by the difference in passengers’ height, presents more difficulties. At the moment, auto- matic ejecting trays, arranged in layers, are -said to be under dis- cussion. _ All this, I was assured, is only a temporary measure, say for the next 50 years or so. By the end of the century the present trolleys will be costing more to repair than they return in fares, as was the case with the old streetcars, even allowing for the fact that they will have paid for themselves many times over. By that time too, other cities will have developed and tested helicopter and mono-rail services and the B.C. Electric, in line with its recently announced plans for future development, will be able to buy a fleet of second-hand heli- copters. In fact, it is now consider- ing the idea of having helicopters specially built for the new type of two-dimensional citizen that will have evolved by then. The plan is to lasso passengers in groups and transport them vertically, so that they will literally be standing on air. Unionists attend — Rossland school ROSSLAND, B.C. Meeting in the historic Western Federation of Miners hall here re- cently, 57 students from AFL, CCL and Independent unions attended a two-day labor school conducted by Mine-Mill Canadian research direct- or Lukin Robinson of ‘Toronto, Trail Mine-Mill president Al King and international representative Martin Walsh. j Taking part in the sessions were members of Local 213, Internation- al Brotherhood of Electrical Work- ers; Local 114, Tunnel and General Laborers Union; Local 405, Inter- national Woodworkers of America; Local 817, Tadanac Fire Fighters Union; Local 2474, United Broth- erhood of Carpenters and Joiners; ‘and Mine-Mill members from Trail, Kimberley and Nelson. Don’t miss the event of the year! | CHAMPION The Voice of Young Canada L FOLK CONCERT A program of music, songs and dances of the Canadian, Native Indian, Yugoslav, Russian, Ukrainian, Jewish and Gypsy peoples PENDER AUDITORIUM . 339 West Pender Street - Sunday, February 14,8 p.m. A COLLECTION WILL BE TAKEN AT THE DOOR FROM THOSE WITHOUT FEBRUARY 12, 1954 — PAGE 2 4