y/ yy JAGR Mi i C A : 3 : \ Y i é THE COLUMBIA SCANDAL —See editor's article, pg. 12 SeOPR 50 [COUNCIL > wes Sa VOL. 33, No. 12 Tribune _T9° By NIGEL MORGAN, B.C. Leader, Communist Party The Socred government has forged another link in the chain through which they’re attempting to strip the working people of fundamental democratic rights and living standards, won over the years in difficult and often bitter struggle. The basic aim of the new amendments to the ‘‘Trade Unions Act’’ (Bill 88) is to cancel out in one stroke union security concessions won over the years and sheer the labor movement of a major part of its collective bargaining power. Bill 88 gives the employers precisely what they've been demanding in the current wage and contract negotiations. While it cannot but have a major impact on deadlocked nego- tiations of 60,000 building trades workers, make no mistake it is aimed at the entire labor move- ment. It’s effect will be felt far beyond those it appears to directly hit at. If the Socreds succeed in clamping Bill 88 on B.C. labor, it will have a disastrous effect on a wide range of wages and working conditions. Bill 88 is one of the most divi- sive and explosive pieces of anti- labor, CLASS legislation yet introduced on the North Ameri- can continent. It tears to shreds long-standing provisions of labor-management contracts on job security, union shop, union hiring, etc. It makes it illegal to refuse, or even attempt to persuade anyone not to work for, or not to do business with, any firm or individual no matter how much they engage in unfair, scab-herding, union-busting activities. Bill 88, voids all clauses in existing management-labor con- tracts providing unions the right to decline to work with ““unfair-to-labor,’’ or ‘‘scab’’ products, or to refuse to cross legitimate picketlines. It makes all contract clauses illegal which restrict in any way a 3rd party and it opens the way for anti-union challenges in the courts to trade union organi- zation and basic rights. The employers bias in the Socred’s latest bill is well demon- strated by B.C. Employer’s Council president, F.G. Peskett, who is quoted as declaring B.C.’s big bosses are ‘‘so happy with Bill 88’ that although they had discussed the subject. with Chabot (Minister of Labor), the Employer’s Council ‘‘would not be making any formal presen- tation at this time.’’ They “‘applaud”’ Bill 88. Peskett said the Bill upsets the unions because it takes away their ‘‘clout,’’ and what has been an effective ‘‘organizing tool.” “‘What the government is saying’ now, he stated, is “‘we’re going to stop what you have been doing for 13 years.” Precisely Czar Peskett, for Bill 88 strikes at the very centre of trade unionism and threatens to cripple the entire labor movement! Bill 88 cannot be viewed in isolation from the earlier Media- tion Commission Act (Bill 33)}— See BILL 88, pg. 12 B.C. Fed crisis parley Hundreds of trade union delegates from all parts of B.C. meet Friday, March 24 at the Bayshore Inn in a special one-day conference called by the B.C. Federation of Labor to deal with “‘the dangerous implications” of Bill 88. The BCFL call says the meeting will also ‘“‘discuss ways and means of combatting the legislation.” Tuesday night Vancouver Labor Council blasted Labor Minister Chabot’s ultimatum (see pg. 12). Also on Tuesday night a mass meeting in Victoria attended by over 700 people in the Empress Hotel condemned Bill 3. Hundreds staged a candlelight march from the rally to the Legislature. Busloads of teachers from North Vancouver, West Vancouver, Coquitlam and Burnaby took part in the protest. Mass protest meetings are scheduled in Kamloops and other B.C. centres. On page 3 the PT prints major portions of the BCFL brief against Bill 88.