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The federal governemnt and
big corporations have banded
together to declare war on B.C.
fishermen. The new weapon they
have forged to carry through their
aggression is the Pearse report, a
report commissioned by Ottawa,
which has now been made public.

Briefly, the report recom-
mended that the government:

@ Do away with public
ownership of lakes, rivers,
streams, and the ocean along our
shores and turn them over to big

Harry

Rankin

private corporations to enable
them to develop what is called
“ocean ranching”’.

The right wing author of this
report doesn’t hide his dislike of
public ownership of resources.
“The free enterprise system
depends on someone having con-
trolover. . .naturalresources’’,
he states, ‘‘and ensuring that they
are used in the most profitable
way. Common property
resources have no place in the
market system ... common
property is repugnant. . .’’.

@ Force fishermen to sell 10
percent of their licenses each year
tothe highest bidder to reduce the
fishing fleet to 500 vessels by 1993
and enable big corporations to
centralize ownership of all
licenses in their own hands.

@ Abolish the Fisheries Act

Fishermen needed support
lin request for moratorium

and with it all protection of the
environment and the fish habitat.
The corporations could then do
as they please and to hell with
public concerns over preserving
the environment from pollution
or preserving fishing grounds.
Present federal programs on fish
stocks would also be abandoned.
(The 1983 budget for salmon
enhancement has already been
slashed from $24 million to $1.5
million).

If this Pearse report is adopted

5!

and implemented by the federal
government it would be nothing
less than a calamity for thousands
of B.C. fishermen (including
hundreds of native Indian
fishermen), for the hundreds of
businesses now servicing the
fishing industry and for the whole
B.C. economy.

The whole issue came before
city council Jan. 4. The 8,000
member United Fishermen and
Allied Workers Union sent a
delegation explaining that ‘‘im-
plementation of the Pearse
Report would cause irreparable
damage to the social, economic
and environmental fabric of
British Columbia.” It pointed out
that it took Pearse two years to
prepare his 269-page report, yet
fishermen are being given only

and fisheries minister Pierre de
Bane is threatening to move im-
mediately to implement the
report. (Some of its proposals
have already been implemented).
The union also noted that several
fishermen’s organizations have
rejected the report and none of
them has endorsed it.

The union did not ask city
council to pass judgment on the
report. All it asked was that city
council join with it in requesting
that Ottawa declare a one-year
moratorium on its implementa-
tion so that all concerned have an
opportunity to study it in depth
and estimate its effects.

But council reacted to this most
reasonable request with hostility.
On a motion of alderman
Marguerite Ford of TEAM, the
issue was tabled which means it
was killed. Joining Ford to vote
down the request of the fishermen
were alderman Brown of
TEAM, aldermen Bellamy, Puil
and Kennedy of the NPA and
alderman Yee. Voting for the re-

quest were mayor Harcourt, and’

the four COPE aldermen —
Yorke, Davies, Eriksen and

Alderman Yee’s vote in favor
of the corporations and against

fishermen will, I am sure, be
noted by the labor movement.

He was elected only because he
had the support of the Vancouver

and District Labor Council and

the many individual unions who
supported the labor unity slate, as
well as COPE.

until the end of February to reply

ES since the capitalist economies began to fall
into an ever-more crippling slump, the reports
referring to economic problems in the Soviet Union
have become more numerous, each surpassing the
previous one in recounting the economic travails of
socialism. Several months ago, there was U.S. presi-
dent Reagan — demonstrating his usual mastery of
the language — referring to the Soviet economy as
“a basket case.’” Maclean’s, in a report last
November termed the Soviet Union ‘“‘a nation rife
with economic crisis . . .”” The Vancouver Pro-
vince, in a story only Monday referred to the “ailing
Soviet economy.’’ In fact, that it is the prevailing no-
tion, perpetuated by scores of reports that often
quote each other.

It’s perhaps inevitable that, at a time when the free
enterprise economies of the west are wracked with
Massive unemployment, declining investment and
production and mounting poverty, every economic
problem in the socialist economies, particularly
those in the Soviet Union, would be trotted out to
“‘prove’’ the world-wide nature of the depression.
The only flaw in the story is that the Soviet
economy isn’t ailing — and if the Soviet’s own word
isn’t enough, there is now a 401-page report which
Says exactly that, prepared by none other than
the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency.

Entitled USSR: Measures of Economic Growth
and Development, 1950-1980, it was released last
month by Democratic Representative Henry Reuss,
the chairman of the Congressional joint economic
committee. And it offers a dramatically different
| view from that presented in hundreds of news

“The Soviet Union,”’ it states, ‘‘has experienced
steady economic development and improving stan-
_ | dards of living over the past 30 years, . .””

= Not surprisingly, the report discards the Soviets
own published figures regarding gross national pro-
duct (GNP). But even using their own estimates, the
report’s authors conclude: ‘‘. . . in comparison
with the United States, the Soviet Union consistently
enjoyed a higher growth rate until the later 1970s.
The average annual growth rate of Soviet GNP is a
_| full percentage point higher than that of the United
States for the entire 1951-79 period.”

_ The share of Soviet GNP allocated to investment
is also significant, rising from 14 percent in 1950 to
| 32 percent in 1979, a figure only exceeded by Japan
_ | (which invested 33 percent). By contrast, the U.S.
share going to investment declined from 17.5 per-
Leent in 1950 to 13.8 percent in 1980. ;

undergoing surgery following a heart attack last

PEOPLE AND ISSUES
(SuSE Se SS Cea re ie eS

Perhaps most important, the report demonstrates

that arms spending retards economic : growth]

whether in the Soviet Union or in the U.S. — a point
underlined by Reuss in releasing the report. The
study, he said, ‘‘illustrates that a real arms control
agreement would be as much in the Soviet national
interest as it would be in ours.’’ :
Bear it all in mind the next time you read the Pro-
vince, or Maclean’s or the Globe or. . .
* * *
I; is a good measure of the vitality of Tribune
mailer Hamish MacKay that, despite his 70-odd
years, he continues to do his own auto repairs, keep-
ing his old van in top running order while others of
its vintage have been hauled off to the scrap heap.
He was even back at his tools only weeks after

year. °
In fact, it wasn’t his heart condition or his age
which put him back in hospital late last month — it

was the van. As Hamish was working underneath, |

the vehicle slipped off its blocks and fell on him,
leaving him with a painful pelvis fracture and the
prospect of a lengthy hospital stay and subsequent
convalescence. He is now in Rm. 481 in Burnaby
General Hospital.
We all wish him a full and speedy recovery.
* * *

oO”: of the links with the early progressive Ukrai-
nian movement was broken last month with the
death of Ann Showsky (Clozza) who passed away
Dec. 4 after a lengthy illness. :

As a waitress during the 1930s she helped organize
the Hotel and Restaurant Workers’ Union, at the
same time working to help woodworkers, miners,
seamen and others to build their own unions.

_ One of those she befriended was Ol’ Bill Bennett, |.

then a Communist Party organizer. For a time, he
lived in the Clozza home. =

Mona Morgan, John Chitrenky and Harry
Hoshowsky paid tribute to Ann at a memorial ser-
vice and later reception, noting her early life in
Alberta where she was born and her work in the
Ukrainian movement in Vancouver.

Although ill health had limited her activity in re-
cent years, she continued her commitment with
generous donations to both the Communisit Party
and the Association of United Ukrainian Cana-
dians.

Spouse's exemptio!
removal could mea
six percent pay cut

The elimination of the spouses
deductionj from income tax provi-
sions — proposal floated by Judy

- Erola, federal minister responsible
for the status of women — would
have an immediate and drastic ef-
fect on more than 1.5 million work-
ing families across Canada, effec-
tively cutting their take-home pav
after tax by six percent or more, ac-
cording to current taxation
Statistics.

The notion of eliminating or
reducing the spousal deduction,
which enables taxpayers to reduce
their taxable income by up to
$3,300 by claiming a spouse as an
dependent, was suggested by Erola-

during. a television interview last_

weekend.

The proposal was clearly part of
the Liberal government’s search
for new tax revenues. But it cleverly
used the status of women minister
to float the idea, under the guise of
assisting women, since some of the
money saved could be channelled
into the dismally inadequate child
care deduction.

In her interview, Erola said:
“Women ... are allowing a
spousal deduction which I consider
enormous. . . to slip out of our
hands when, in fact, those families
who are able to use the spousal
deduction are up at the top end of
the income scale.

“Tt’s only the more affluent
families in our society that allow a
woman to stay at home,’’ she

claimed, ‘‘and I feel that we should

examine that and perhaps
somewhere down the line re-
channel some of that into where I
think the critical areas are, in child
care”

But according to Revenue
Canada’s taxation statistics for
1979, the most current figures
available, the majority — 61 per-
cent — of the 2,570,774 people
who deducted a spouse as a depen-
dent earned less than $22,500 an-
nually. That income is roughly the
average earned by unionized
manufacturing workers in 1979,

The number of people claiming
the deduction is down about nine
percent from 1975, an indication
that more and more families re-
quire two incomes to maintain their
standard of living.

But at a time of: massive
unemployment, more families are
being forced to live on one income
and for them, the elimination of
the deduction would mean a major

_ hardship.

For someone earning $20,000 a
year in 1979, the elimination of the
spousal deduction would have
resulted in a tax increase of $16.10
per week — a five percent cut in

take-home pay.

For someone earning $2(
annually in 1983, eliminationo
deduction would mean a six
cent cut in take-home pay -
$1,045 more per year in federa
payable.

Moreover, the scheme, even

-were coupled with increase:
child care deductions, would
nothing for single parent fam
whose interests Erola purporte
champion.

Current tax provisions a
single parent families
“equivalent to marr
exemption’? enabling them
deduct a relative, usually a chilc
if he or she were a spouse.

In 1979, almost 400,000 C:
dians used that deduction — an
percent of them earned less t
$20,000 a year.

In most cases, the deduction
child care expenses would hav.
be increased fourfold for then
recoup what they lost thro
elimination of the equivalent
married exemption. The pros]
of that happening under the <
rent Liberal government
something less than remote.

When it was first suggested
Erola, the proposal met a storm
protest from B.C. NDP N
Margaret Mitchell and Nel.
Riis, as well as representatives
women’s and welfare groups :
some unions.

Although she was out of |
country immediately following |
television interview, Erola calle
press conference in Ottawa Tu
day to head off the mounting
position, assuring reporters tl
there would be no changes to 1
exemption in the next fede
budget.

But her comments lent furtt
credence to suspicions that,
making the proposal in the fi
place, she was floating a tr
balloon for the government
gauge public opinion. And u
doubtedly the Liberals will co
tinue to look for ways to get at lec
some of the $1.4 billion tot
revenue that could be generated
the exemption were eliminated.

The deduction is of great
benefit to those at the top end of t!
income scale but there are oth
means of balancing that inequi
without altering universality.

The federal government h
been pressed for years to impo
higher taxes on upper incon
eamers and to eliminate or redu
the hundreds of tax benefits th
enable many of those earnir
$100,000a year to avoid incomet
completely.

Post-Election
Conference

Saturday, Jan. 15, 1983

Russian Hall, 600 Campbell Ave.
Workshop on Campaign ‘82, 10 a.m.-12
Plenary 1-2 p.m.

COPE between elections/Objectives for ‘83 _
2-3 p.m.
Special Hardtimes Luncheon

Committee of Progressive Electors
3 - 2414 Main, 876-2615

PACIFIC TRIBUNE—JANUARY 14, 1983—Page 2

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