THE WESTERN CANADIAN LUMBER WORKER

AT DELEGATED MEETING

Local 1-417 Reports
18% Membership Rise

A record 18 percent in-
crease in membership was re-
ported to the Sixth Annual
Delegated Meeting of Local 1-
417, IWA, April 25, in Kam-
loops.

The one-day meet attended
by approximately 100 dele-
gates, guests and visitors
dealt with thirty-five resolu-
tions and five officers’ recom-
mendations before going into
a closed session to discuss the
Local’s Wages & Contract de-
mands.

The local includes member-
ship from Canoe, Salmon
Arm, Revelstoke, Malakwa,
Chase, Westwold, Monte
Lake, Kamloops, Savona,
Merritt, Hefley Creek, Clear-
water, Vavenby, Avola, Blue
River, Clemina and Vale-
mount with total membership
for the year reported at 987.

The 1963 total marks a big
inerease from the 579 of 1957,
the officers’ report to the con-
vention showed.

The report said operations
organized during the year in-
cluded Perry River Lumber
Co. Ltd., Columbia Auto
Customs Ltd., Salmon Arm;
and Balco Forest Products
Ltd. at Hefflley Creek, and
listed agreements, new or re-
newals, with Netherlands

Overseas, and O’Neil and De-
vine Ltd., Merritt; Tappen
Valley Timber Litd., Perry
River Lumber, Savona Tim-
ber Co. Ltd., Kamloops Lum-
ber Co. Ltd., Blue River Saw-
mills Ltd. and Balco.

The meet endorsed a reso-
lution calling on the federal
government to eliminate the
waiting period for Unemploy-
ment Insurance Benefits
which now “denies the unem-
ployed worker a full week’s
benefits.”

The resolution pointed out
the Workmen’s Compensa-
tion Board had eliminated the
waiting period for those who
are off work a certain length
of time and called on the UIC
to follow the example.

The delegates also agreed
to press for establishment of
a technical-vocational train-
ing school in the Kamloops
area in a resolution submit-
ted by the Vavenby sub-local
and charged that it “appears
that the government of B.C.
will not build such a school
without prodding.”

The members also endors-
ed an executive board resolu-
tion urging the teaching of
trade unionism and labor his-
tory in public schools on the
grounds many young people

coming out of school and
faced with joining a union
“are not familiar with the
reasons and the background
of the labor movement.”

Public ownership. of “all
B.C. telephone companies”
was advocated in a resolution
from the executive board and
endorsed by the convention.

“The telephone is a public
utility the same as water and
electricity, which are both
owned and controlled by the
public,” the woodworkers
charge. “But these huge com-
panies continue to reap vast
profits.from this public serv-
ice.”

“We favor the idea of using
the excess profits on such
things as underground wiring
in our cities and supplying
outlying areas with this much
needed service,” they add.

The meeting was also crit-
ical of the Canadian Pacific
Railway which they describ-
ed in a resolution as having
“a monopoly on the railway
industry in many parts of the
country.”

Claiming the service “left
much to be desired,” the
membership urged national-
ization of the CPR to bring
both national railways under
one government commission

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IWA REGIONAL OFFICERS at the Interior Wages & Contract Conference held May 8-
9, in Kelowna. Group left, Bob Ross, 3rd Vice-President; Jack Moore, President; Jack Mac-
Kenzie, Ist Vice-President; Jack Holst, 2nd Vice-President; Fred Fieber, Secy.-Treasurer.

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ist Issue

"May, 1964

> =a

HOWARD WEBB, Regional Trustee and 1st Vice-President
of Local 1-424 and Vern Griffith, new organizer in the Wil-
liams Lake area for Local 1-424, are shown here paying close
attention to the debate during the Interior Wages & Contract

Conference.

to “cut costs, eliminate dupli-
cation and increase service.”

The delegates also urged
the provincial department of
labor to place more men in
the field because “the respon-
sibilities of the inspectors are
increasing year by year and
there are scores of unorgan-
ized businesses where mini-
mum wage laws and hours of
work are being violated.”

A copy of the resolution is
being forwarded to the B.C.
Federation of Labor.

Continuation of a Local 1-
417 campaign to boost the role
of cooperatives and credit
unions was also endorsed in
a resolution that stressed “the
trade union movement could
do a lot more to assist these
organizations, particularly
with regard to capital invest-
ment.”

Objections to the barring
for recreational use of areas
held under forest manage-
ment licence was also voiced
in a resolution that charged
such areas were guarded by
managers “as if they were
personal and private.”

“Management licences are
on crown land,” the resolu-
tion said, in a statement call-
ing for protest against bars to
public use and insisting “that
these areas be’left open to the
public on certain hours. each
day and both days on week-
ends.”

A fatality-free year in the
union-organized section of
the industry was reported by
the local’s ‘safety director,
Ken Sawka.

The report said Federated
Cooperatives Ltd., employing
nearlv 200 men had complet-
ed 1963 with only one com-
pensable injury and B.C. In-
terior Sawmills Ltd., with 50,
had gone the full year with-
out one.

Hiring of another full-time
business agent, Robert
Schlosser, was approved by
the local.

A record crowd of more
than 500 delegates, guests and
wives attended the wood-
workers’ ball in the Stock-
men’s Hotel in Kamloops that
wound up the convention.

Local Charges
Unfair Action

Local 1-423, IWA, has filed
charges of unfair labour prac-
tices with the Labour Rela-
tions Board against the Cooke
Lumber Company Limited,
Greenwood, for unjustly dis-
missing two employees.

The two men were fired by
the Company for union activ-
ity while the Local was at-
tempting to organize the

Plant. The Union has asked
the Board to re-instate the
men with all lost-time pay
and to order the Company to
refrain from interfering with
the formation and administra-
tion of a union.

The Local has been notified
that the Hearing has been set
for May in the Labour Re-

lations Board Room in Van-*

couver.

TO ALL MEMBERS OF THE I.W.A. in the
NEW WESTMINSTER & DISTRICT AREA

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