As last Thursday’s horror
feature played itself out on the
television to a million or so stunned
viewers, and the TV pundits made
sure that none of us missed a step
in the victory stomp in Kelowna,
one newsman managed to draw a
telling comment that, in a way,
told the other side of the story. It
was down at NDP headquarters
and the newsman approached a
still smug, but by then ex-attorney
general, Alex McDonald with the
question, “‘What went wrong?”
“What went wrong,’’ McDonald
grimaced back, ‘‘is that we lost the
election.”

Right, except it was the people

' who were the losers and much
| more than an election was lost.

“And why,’ the disillusioned could
| justifiably ask the government,

“did you let it happen? Was social
| progress to be gambled with the
| roll of an election, and one that

didn’t have to be called in the first
| place and when all the signs
| pointed to the fated results?”

What went wrong canhot be
isolated to December 11. The sour
note of the year’s end had been
puilding throughout 1975, and not
only west of the Rocky, Mountains.

What a stark contrast this last
year drew between the forward
march of world events and the
reactionary direction B.C. politics
had been set upon. The liberation
of Vietnam, the Helsinki con-
ference and European security,
Communist gains in Italy, freedom
for Angola and Mozambique: could
anyone fail to see the quickening
pace of revolution?

But it was the other side of world
events; the Israeli bombs on
Palestinian refugee camps, the
resurgence of cold war spokesmen

Labor Party in Britain which opted
for wage controls and in Portugal
which moved perilously close to
counter-revolution. It was from
this pattern that the'shape of things
in B.C. was being cut.

Here was the dilemma for the
labor movement.: A certain
measure of progress was attained
in three years of social democracy
and then everything seemed
threatened. The labor movement
divided on whether to stand with
Barrett or on principle; but as the
debate was coming to a head, it
was cut off by the election call. The
armistice, however, had come too
Jate. Three years of indecision

| week election campaign. .

All of this is not in hindsight.
Throughout the year there was one
consistent voice, that of the
Communist Party, warning of the
possible outcome. By the first week
in March the CP had called its
memberstoaspecial conference to
discuss the danger of the right
wing offensive.

Even by that time the law and
order campaign, made _ par-
ticularly strident by the hysterical
demand for the death penalty, was

- well underway. In B.C., red neck
‘municipal politicians found a
‘special calling in clamoring for law
and order. Conferences of mayors
‘declared ‘‘juvenile delinquents”

the government for liberal law’
reforms and for closing juvenile
penitentiaries and. Brandon and
Willingdon reform schools. All
agreed that more police were
needed, but not to _ protect
| teenagers from goon-like vigilante
| squads such as had been formed
| around Vancouver’s Slocan Park.
| Neither were the added police
| intended to protect East Indians
| -who were assaulted in a series of

in America, the weakness. of. the .,

could not be overcome in a five-..—

» menaces tosociety and condemned .

Its policies contrasting sharply with the American AFL-CIO and the
British TUC; both of which accepted wage restrainsts, the Canadian
labor movement made clear from the beginning its opposition to
Trudeau's wage and price control program. Here, a unionist presents his
terse message to federal labor minister John Munro in a campaign
against the program which promises to continue well into 1976.

iN

AS

The first public employees to face attempts by municipal governments
to cut wage costs, CUPE members adopted new strategies in 1975
bargaining put parity with provincial employees — the central demand
— could not be achieved.

|

jee ie) ut
A refurbished Social Credit Party, eager to take over government again,
began its campaign early in 1975. These signs began appearing in
February as some Socred wag took a shot at NDP education minister
Eileen Dailly for her dismissal of Stanley Knight. | —Sean Griffin photos

racist attacks in south Vancouver
during March. Law and order and
racism teamed up like matching
gloves. Tory MP Ron Huntington
joined the clamor demanding the
return of the death penalty and
then claimed as the debate on the
Green Paper got underway that too
many East- Indians and Chinese
were being admitted into Canada.
His views on immigration were
echoed by Vancouver mayor Art
Phillips who proposed about the
same time that Vancouver should
double the size of its police force.

Spurred by the same right drive,
but instigated by big business, the
inflationary spiral reached new
heights by mid year. In August,
food prices in Vancouver were
found to be the highest in North
America, seven to fifteen per cent
higher than Toronto or Montreal.
The blame for the evils of the cost
of living increasingly and ef-
fectively placed on labor. It added
the class edge to the hatchet.

Certainly it was all fitting
together, a pre-fabricated struc-
ture of events. The direction of the
right was clear, but the left was
preoccupied with more basic
issues. From the first round of
negotiations between organized
labor and their employers, the
bosses were coming out on top.

Early March saw _ the
longshoremen strike over wages
and the container issue. But by the
end of March the federal govern-
ment had forced them back to work
— with NDP MPs supporting the
legislation. “‘It’s the most
repressive legislation we’ve seen,”’
ILWU president Don Garcia
commented, ‘‘We’ll groan under it
for two years.”

Not far from the waterfront, in
downtown Vancouver, another
bitter confrontation was _ taking
place. At radio station, CKLG,
workers had organized into CUPE
and had been on strike since mid
February for a first contract. By
the time the longshoremen were
sent back, the CKLG strikers had
been supplanted by scabs, had
criminal charges pending against
picketers and had received an ex-
parte injunction to limit their
numbers on the picket line. In May,
it seemed victory had been won
with the signing of a contract, but
the long struggle had taken its toll.
Union members were. forced out
one by one, until in November only

‘a handful remained and a decer-

tification vote was pushed through.

Two weeks later the anti-labor
crusade found its reflection in B.C.

_ with the passage of Bill 84, the new

labor code. The B.C. Federation of
Labor announced it had lost con-
fidence in labor minister Bill King.

The entire salmon fishing in-
dustry was struck by the United
Fishermen and Allied Workers
Union on July 25. Overcoming

_ company-inspired divisions within

the union and the splitting tactics
of the employer dominated Native
Brotherhood, the UFAWU led a
united'strike and won wide support
with its public salmon sales. The
effort was undercut, however, with
the serving of four injunctions in
the fourth week of the strike.
‘Injunctions are flying thick and
fast in a province where they are
supposed to be a thing of the past,”
UFAWU secretary Jack Nichol
exclaimed. The courts are making
a farce of the labor code.”

In the meantime, a major battle
had been taking shape. No increase
in wages was the arrogant position

- of the Forest Industrial Relations.

Workers in the IWA and the two
pulp unions responded with 82, 77
and 78 per cent strike votes. A joint
strike deadline was set for July 16,

but when the day came only th
pulp unions went out. Although th
IWA leaders retreated from th
fight, the combined effect ¢
layoffs and roving pulp unio
pickets shut down almost the er
tirety of B.C.’s major industry.

Enter into the picture the lockot
of retail food workers and th
closing of the supermarkets by th
newly formed Food Council for
brief period it seemed that th
province was strikebound. Th
fishermen settled in late Augus
after 27 days, but there was still th
OTEU strike at ICBC and th
disputes at the B.C. Sugar Refiner
and at Seagrams Distillery showe
no signs of resolution.

The stage was set for ‘th
dramatic events of Octobe:
Employers united as never befor
to impose a wage freeze and th
B.C. Federation of Labor warnin
that ‘‘workers will not bear th
burden of inflation,’’ somethin
had to break. The governmer
made the break with the labo
movement and the principles ¢
free collective bargaining. Bill 14
sent 60,000 trade unionists back t
their jobs without so much as on
cent increase in pay. ‘‘Bill 14
represents a complete betrayal ¢
the principles of the NDP. N
government has ever engaged i
strikebreaking on such a massiv
scale,’’ declared Len Guy i
condemnation.

Bill 146 sent out a signal and th
black Tuesday in Victoria wa
complemented the followin
Tuesday with the wage freeze. An
when Barrett gave his stamp ¢
approval to the wage contre
program, it was like a twist of th
knife.

It was clearly a year of bi
defeats and little victories eve
before Barrett sought to mak
quick political capital out of hi
anti-labor record. Semehow,
made sense to the premier that th
left could claim an election victor
by adopting the policies of th
right.

The whole story brings t
memory the statement adopted <
the March 1 conference of th
Communist Party. “‘We believe th
prerequisite for haltin:
monopoly’s offensive and blockin
the return of a _ big busines
government lies in energeticall
working to advance an anti
monopoly program and forgin
unity in action around the ir
mediate pressing needs of th
people,’’ the CP expressed. It wer
on to stress the need to “‘expos
and eradicate all tendencies t
class collaboration or retrea
before monopoly pressures.”

Those who understood th
processes at work are not amon
the disillusioned today. In fact
they can look back upon the year a
one in which elass consciousnes
grew substantially. They can poin
to the determination of the labo
movement for its political ir
dependence from the opportunisr
of the NDP. And it can be said wit!
pride that the Canadian labo
movement stands out in un
compromising opposition to wag
controls, -while other labo
movements have buckled under
_As for the Communis
movement, the struggles of th
year brought new recruits. Thi
newspaper, as well, felt th
benefits of struggle and the 40t

‘anniversary year was one o

successes, not least the raising o
$48,000 during the financial drive

Much went wrong in 1975. Yet no
a single issue is final. They al
remain to be fought again, and in:
certain way, with the experience
of the year well understood, we ar
farther ahead.

PACIFIC TRIBUNE—DECEMBER 19, 1975—Page §