aggression.
— page 6

FISHING RIGHTS:

Native and non-Native fish
workers need to resist
attempts to divide them, and
should discuss aboriginal title
and fishing rights.

VIOLENCE IN S. AFRICA:
Strife in Natal province must
end, says ANC representative.
But ‘pro-apartheid’ Inkatha
movement must stop its

— page 8

August 27, 1990
50 cents
Volume 53, No. 29

Socreds hit for hospital woes

Workers hold line at Comox Clinic

TRIBUNE PHOTO —SEAN GRIFFIN

Medical workers Donna Messer (1), Diane Leakey and Eileen Hiebert maintain sioket outside Comox medical clinic. Strike
is headed for its first anniversary, but the 10 employees are vowing to win a first contract. Story page 3.

blockades of CPR. and CN lines” in

_ to press various land title issues.

Mount Currie Band manager Ray
Pierre said the government response was

ug. 21 and carted off 35 members of
ches fine wes ies yet

 edto include the Mount Currie action, and
. the band ended the blockade shortly after :
: RCMP officers arrived at 2 pee ite eile

“A subsequent péchoor peckads - BC
il tracks by the Mount Currie Band, and _

| Mohawk-government confrontation and —

ys “the umal thing. They won't ako us 5
_ Tong as the blockades are up. But then, —
they CIE our aie a Be :

lowing day. :

eon the last iu ‘bath ioe asked e
meet (indian Affairs Minister) Tom Sid-

don. They said they’ll send a minister of
some sort to talk with us about alternative
funding arrangements, or municipal gov-
emment status” — which has nothing to

‘The band blocked BC Rail tracks at 4
pan last Tuesday, hours after the Seton _
Portage barricade was dismantled by the _
i who delivered a court injunction. _
- The injunction was subsequently amend-

ae ithe the ¢aueton of 3 sbsign ttle,

Pierre said.

. Jerry Oita, Indian eee a .
visor to the Lil’wat Tribal Council, re-
ported that Native ‘supporters ‘marched —
along the main street of Lillooet after the
Dapedice ra were released. -

"He said tires have been slashed and the
ee were pelted by a few bottles, the
result of some white backlash organiza-
bod ce miiccamee dees :
the blockades... Zs -

“Injunctions escted eee in

tet so Ont., and Natives from the Pays

Plat band immediately erected another at
Schreiber, on Lake Superior east of Thun-
der Bay. Another blockade was erected at
White River, Ont.

Revelations about lengthy delays in cru-
cial patient care at two B.C. hospitals last
week underscored what the province’s
major health care union calls acrisis brought
about by provincial government underfund-
ing of health care.

The Hospital Employees Union held a
press conference Aug. 20 outside Burnaby
General Hospital, and three days later re-
leased an internal medical staff report warn-
ing about a care crisis in Surrey Memorial
Hospital.

The union charges that Socred under-
funding and poor staffing decisions have
meant nursing and general staff reductions

in B.C. hospitals, and has called on the prov- -

ince to immediately remedy the situation.

“In talking to our members at Surrey

Memorial, we found it’s the whole gamut of

staff shortages that is the problem,” said
HEU assistant secretary-business manager,
Chris Allnutt.

“At Burnaby General, it’s nursing short-
ages, ” he said, pointing to the elimination of
nursing teams involving Licensed Practical
Nurses in the hospital’s acute care wing.

Last Monday the union called unaccep-
table lengthy waiting periods suffered by an
unnamed boy and 60-year-old Shirley
Chapman. In the former case, the boy waited
seven hours for treatment before being re-
ferred to Children’s Hospital because Bur-
naby lacked staff. Chapman waited 71/2
hours with a broken wrist, only to be told she
would have to stay overnight for care.

Hospital president Norman Barth later
apologized to Chapman, who received im-
mediate treatment at Vancouver General.
And Barth acknowledged that the practice
of eliminating LPNs, members of the HEU,
with Registered Nurses that was prevalent
during the Eighties, required reconsidera-
tion.

The Burnaby situation pales however,
when compared to that at Surrey Memorial,
where four doctors on the hospital’s budget
committee stated in a report: “It has almost
become dangerous to practise medicine in
Surrey Memorial Hospital.”

The report from doctors Ching Lau, Peter
Doris, Welden Hoogee and Rennie Chong-
kit said their review of the proposed budget
last May made them “extremely concerned,
as implementation of that budget would
result in decrease of care to patients.”

“The medical representatives have re-
peatedly reiterated and reaffirmed that the
money allocated by the Ministry of Health
is totally inadequate,” it stated.

The doctors warned that the “gradual
erosion of the quality of care due to chronic
underfunding” has reduced Surrey Mem-

orial to the role of an ead department
see CARE page