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@ | CCL CONVENTION NOTES

By BERT WHYTE
atonest rank-and-file delegates
of Nding the Canadian Congress

 fough bor convention this week

of pat courageously for a program

: Wage Control, trade union unity,

ee and trade with all the world.

Con, didn’t sit well with Mosher,

couhad and the rest of the: top

ime Who propounded the doc-

4 fea of the CCF — red-baiting,

a with Splitting and collaboration

Ath the bosses in the war drive.

Eon nine a resolution on price

m ‘Tols (calling on the govern-

& back to reimpose controls, roll

D> zenti Prices, grant subsidies on es-

Ces, ‘al goods and introduce an’ ex-

ae Profits tax) two CCL leaders

eraycred off the subject and en-

pp. the realm of CCF politics.

is © election of a CCF government

Proble Only final solution of our

Kin ems,” opined Freeman Jen-

ac (United Mine Workers, Glace
Bay),

fpo Unitea Auto Workers delegate

We discussing price
political action?” he
know. “Any party that
War puPPort a five billion dollar
Slain ta8et, as the CCF did, can’t
par t° be fighting inflation. A

tty that wants. to fight inflation

© government.”
Z Trouble-shooter Pat Conroy
de: ‘ng to the platform mike to
pesh this heretic. ‘ou can’t
Bonect your union leaders to make
Baoan Contracts, and then go and
i on them at the ballot box,
Be Said, and launched into a, vig-
pric’ defense of the CCL-CCF
ce Control theory.’ ;

doz hen Conroy finished half a
Pregiy Wlegates tried to speak, but
eeeent Mosher turned his blind
the ©2 them and rushed through
he Vote,

Y don’t you let some others
acak instead of your own gang?”
ated up a voice from the packed

qoend I q onven-
tion hall © mean packed—c

* * .
Over. bunch of Shriners in
M alls,” is how Harvey Murphy,
the Mill representative, described
Moshe 4. executive board after
Dregj ‘" had complained in his
hay oe ntial address that employers
nepindered the elimination of
ooh unions” by signing “sub-
imandara ravseinen with them.
ing rae ien't a wage in the metal
hist TY. that isn’t $2.50 a day
‘r than any agreement Mosher
Ur ened anywhere in Canada,”
Wher ey informed the Sun reporter
ap: vas interviewing him.
* * ke ‘
th Minister Paul Martin
~~ © Burnaby Liberals in

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‘Yindsor jumped up to pro-|@

are also fight the war policy

Shriners in overalls’ |
|control CCL ‘convention

the Flame Supper Club Monday
‘night, and addressed an official
CCL banquet at Commodore
Cabaret Tuesday night. But when
the United Automobile Workers
delegation asked him to meet
the boys from Windsor and
Oshawa to discuss the critical
unemployment situation in those
areas, Martin refused point-

nl.
. blan : bu ¥:

Delegates unanimousiy passea a
resolution demanding re-certifica-

JIMMY SPEAL
His spiel irked Mosher

tion of Marine Workers and Boiler-
makers Union in 10 Vancouver

wooden boatyards.
* aks *

Jack Williams, CCL public rela-
tions director, had his hands full
looking after the press. More than
30 reporters and representatives
were at the press table—including
Joe Godson, labor attache, U.S. em-
bassy, whose presence at the TLC
convention in Montreal last year
drew protests from delegates there.

|

* * *

Should labor representatives sit
on government boards? Delegates
expressed sharply divided opinions
on this point.

“T object to this class collabora-

tion and I resent the fact that
CCL heads have invited Health

|ine Workers, Vancouver.) “Names

Minister Paul Martin a be ian
honored guest at our banquet,
said James Speal (UAW, Windsor).
Mosher’s pounding gavel forced the
speaker to relinquish fhe mike.

“We have had bitter ised Aa
in B.C. with appointees to conci ia-
tion boards,” said Bill White (Mar-

of the chairmen of these boards

-waxed sarcastic. “Our leaders on

i i irectors
usually read like a list of direc
of the BCTelephone Company.
Labor invariably finds itself be-
hind the eight-ball. I move we re-
fer the resolution back for strength-
ening.”

Ralph Allen (UAW, Windsor)

8) the govern-
the platform tell us t c
ment is no good, then ask us to

RAPID, _
BARBER SHOP
363 East Hastings Street
Always Good Service
GEORGE MALLOFF /

i

_PENDER

AUDITORIUM

(Marine Workers)

339 West Pender
LARGE & SMALL HALLS
FOR RENTALS
Phone PA. 9481

aol

Uiniig)
SULIT eh enema yarimyieiiniit

a

work with it. They tell us our
Political Action Committee will -do
the job, then tell us to go and
work with the Liberals.”

The resolution was passed, but
far from unanimously.

* * x

, Jimmy Speal (UAW, Windsor) «
roused the ire of Mosher on Tues-
day morning when he voiced-
objection to (Health Minister Paul
Martin as a CCL banquet speak-
er. On Tuesday afternoon Speal
was forced to leave the conven-
tion hall by two guards, acting
on the orders from Mosher. At
the time, Speal was lustily heck-
ling UAW’s Jack Taylor, presi-
dent of Local 200, for supporting
an executive council resolution
asking Canadian workers to raise

, money to “fight against Com-

munism in Southeast Asia.”

Speal was bounced by Mosher at
the conclusion of a regular rhu-
barb which followed the speech
of Paul Finet, first president of
the so-called International Confed-
eration of Free Trade Unions.
Finet had appealed for Canadian
cash to organize South East Asians
on anti-Communist lines.

Holding the floor for nearly 10
minutes, UAW delegate Lyle Dot-
zert of Windsor denounced the
wrecking activities of the TOFTU
and urged support for the World
Federation of Trade Unions.

* * Ps

During a debate on a2 resolu-
tion asking relaxing of federal
credit restrictions, Abe Modlin-
»Sky (QAW, Windsor) put in a
plug for free trade with al! the
world. “Take China,” he said.
“If we wanted to extend our |
trade with that great country of
475,000,000 people, it would keep

declares

on Wednesday night this week-

who have wrought havoc in Asia

Endicott said he was glad that
the peace forces in Vancouver
undertook to “challenge External
Affairs Minister Lester B. Pearson
in his lame duck report to the
Canadian people.

“Pearson’s foreign policy is based
on political insanity, that is, an
inability to see a great reality, a
reality of the People’s Republic of
China and the revolution in Asia
that has liberated 475,000,000 peo-
ple,” declared the Peace Congress
chairman. “As long as: this re-
fusal to recognize, the great fact
of the Chinese People’s Republic
continues to dominate Canadian

policy, we will continue to head
directly to the madhouse of war.”

U.S. policy in Asia, he stressed,
is to launch a military attack
and overthrow the People’s Re-
public of China, For this purpose
China is refused a seat in the
United Nations, so that UN
forces can continiie to be used
in “police actions.”

“Pearson, representing ‘Canada

jat Lake Success, recognized that

the resolution condemning China
was premature and unwise, but
the voted for it,” said Endicott.
“This was an act of shameless,
contemptible ‘hypocrisy. For
Pearson is not the victim of ig-

our factories humming for the
next 50 years.” : ;

Japanese pact :
long step to war,

Endicott

“The Japanese peace treaty is the most. serious step yet taken
towards war,’’ Dr. James G. Endicott, chairman of the Canadian
Peace Congress, told a capacity audience in, Pender Auditorium here

“This pact did not represent the free will of the people,” he con-
tinued. “It was a dictated peace drawn up by the carpetbagger John
Foster Dulles, and it restores the dictatorship of the Japanese militarists

for a decade.”

norance. He was a professor of
history, and I have personal let-
ters from his thanking me. for
detailed reports on China. Highly
informed people have told him
that the Chinese Republican gov-
ernment is a good government,
honest and efficient, that it has
been controlling floods, improving
the land, and in other ways ad-
vancing the welfare of the peo-
ple; and that it is, in fact, 2
great modern power,*and must be
dealt with as such.

“Pearson is deliberately blind
because he does not wish to see,
see, so he signs a pact in the vain
hope that the Japanese people
can become cannon fodger in a
war to suppress colonial libera-
ion movements.”

Hundreds of copies of ‘Ray
Gardner’s new pamphlet, The
Japanese Peace Treaty, were sold
at the meeting after ‘Dr. Endi-
cott had warmly praised it as a
skifful and’ reasonable analysis
of the current -situation.

Prior to speaking at the mass
‘meeting. Dr.

Hotel.

a

Halifax TLC convention
dominated by roadmen:

By CHARLES SIMS

breaks unity with CCL

HALIFAX

- The Trades and Labor Congress: 66th convention held here last week was the smallest in years
(some 300 delegates) and also the most reactionary. Dominated from beginning to end by the top leader-

ship, the delegates allowed TLC council to bar Charles Sims,’
table; and refuse a seat to Alex Gordon, delegate from the U

and a former ILC vice-president.

R. K. Gervin of Vancouver shook
the convention when he introduced
a motion from the officers Report
Committee to break off all coopera-
tion with the Canadian Congress
of Labor, Railway Brotherhoods
and Catholic Syndicates. A stormy
debate followed.

Delegate Charles Stewart (Street
Railwaymen’s Union, Vancouver)
urged “rejection, of this bad pro-
posal.” Labor needs more unity
to win peace and wages and curb
profiteering, he stressed.

Rank and file criticism was
strong and sharp, but the road-
men’s machine steamrollered Ger-
vin’s motion through in a close
vote.

Later in the convention, by a
vote of 117 to 116, on motion of
©. A. Webber of Liverpool, N.S.,
delegates reopened the unity
question. But the roadmen lined
up to block any debate. On Fri-
day afternoon President Percy
Bengough laid down the law, say-
ing: “Your vote determines noth-
ing. No good purposes will be
served by vour vote. In the final
analysis, the executive council
will decide.”

Canadian Tribune editor, from the press
nited F: ishermen and*Allied Workers Union

Harry Colnette (Painters \ Union.
Toronto) from among 20 delegates
who were at the microphone clam-
oring to speak.s Colnette moved
the previous question. Toronto
TLC president William Jenovese
rushed in to demand an immediate
vote. Bengough throttled any de-
bate, called the vote and declared
that Gervin’s anti-unity resolution
had carried.

From my seat on the benches of
Dalhousie Gymnasium, it looked
as though the unity supporters had
the ‘majority, but Bengough and
the roadmen hammered them
down.

Thus the Trades Congress reach-
ed the lowest point in its long
history. It is true to report that
the majority who spoke, and the
debates were mild and scanty, re-
flected the mounting opposition of
the rank-and-file back home
against the harsh effects of St.
Laurent’s war policies. The opposi-
tion smacked the top brass when
they elected Ken Green, a Halifax
CCF’er, as fraternal delegate to
the next British TUC convention,
defeating the roadmen’s nominee,
A. F. MacArthur, international or-

Then Bengough recognized

a

ganizer. i

PACIFIC TRIBUNE —

Labor Minister
evoked satirical laughter from dele-
when he declared: “We have pros-
perity in Canada.” He said that
the Trades Congress can take credit
for the present situation, and
lauded Bengough and Mosher for
their work in the Manpower Ad-
visory Committee, which, said he,
1s ready with a plan for national
registration. :

Les Hood (Postmen’s Union,
Toronto) answered Gregg while
speaking to a resolution: “Grege’s
prosperity remark is the opposite
of truth. Penury and want are
rife among workers. Profits are
sky-high.”

“United effort of all sections of
labor is needed to win higher
wages now,” declared Charles
Stewart of Vancouver.

One lesson of the 66th TLC con-
tion is that the rank-and-file must
unite and organize their opposition.
This lesson must be grasped and
acted upon by every trade union
progressive. For the
machine is taking the Trades Con-
gress down the path to splitting
and disruption behind the St. Laur-
ent war policy.

SEPTEMBER 21, 1951 — PAGE 7

Endicott had ad- ©
dressed a group of CCL convention |
sdelegates at a dinner in Georgia

Milton Gregg .

roadmen’s ©