see:

By PETER TEMPEST

ae € 15th Soviet Trade Union
Heress, which met in Moscow
ut March 10 to 24, was an
Sion of international im-
Mce as well as a major

it in the life of the USSR.

Rost 5,000 delegates repre-
ng a trade union movement

fp illion strong gathered in
ik Kremlin’s magnificent Pa-

dig Of Congresses. They met to

eh

IScuss ‘their current economic
. 0Cial tasks, to show their
World desire for unity of the
.« trade union movement. A
dees number of 137 fraternal
count “ons came from 103

Ties, as well as represen-

ti pebbe ;
ba ves of nine international or-
Nizations,

pee zie first time delegations
ee three international
= ations —the Pan-African
dod Congress, the Brother-
the cian Trade Unions, and
Centra M-American Trade Union
thade of Workers. The national
any union centres of West Ger-
Malte New Zealand, ‘Iceland,
ie ae the Philippines,
oe San Martino, Laos

Sj Ons, Hong Kong and
mie srore sent fraternal dele-
Cow ys. the first time to Mos-
at king its first appearance
ine .w2i0r international gather-
delegate @ national trade union
d 1on from newly inde-

€nt Bangladesh.

Lions Tepresentation of many
tional affiliated to the Interna-
Tra Confederation of Free
Warm} Unions (ICFTU) was

Dro,

a toward restoring unity

Union mM of the world trade

Ault taavement. “This is a dif-
. *sk—but a start has been

Y Welcomed as confirming

made and that’s the main thing,”
Alexander Shelepin, President of
the All-Union Central Council of
Trade Unions (ACCTU) told the
Congress in his report. Of the
260 million in the world move-
ment today, he pointed out, 154
million are in the rapidly grow-
ing unions affiliated with the
World Federation of Trade
Unions and about 50 million in
ICFTU-affiliated unions. “Ideo-
logical differences,” he said,
“cannot. be an obstacle to col-
laboration between unions of
different orientation, because
the aim of their activities is the
same—defending the vital in-
terests of working people . . .”

_Alex Kitson, leading the Scot-
tish TUC delegation, conveyed
thanks of Upper Clydeside Ship-
building workers “for the great
assistance given to them by the
Soviet workers, not only for
messages of solidarity but also
for the great financial assistance
that helped to carry on the
fight.”

Jim Cox, president of the
Irish TUC, said Irish workers
would feel strengthened by

. Soviet support “in our efforts to

prove to the politicians that
there is no great power than a
united trade union movement.”

Of the three emergency reso-
lutions which the Congress una-
nimously adopted, one was on
Northern Ireland, demanding
“an end to the use of the armed
forces, the immediate release of
all political prisoners and in-
ternees and the taking of meas-
ures to satisfy the just demands
of the people of Northern Ire-
land.” The other two resolu-
tions called on workers in all
countries to halt U.S. aggres-
sion in Indochina and urged a
peaceful settlement in the Mid-
dle East.

LABOR SCENE

| *Y GRuce Magnuson

Labor Scene by Bruce Magnuson

will appear
again in our next issue.

Trade unionists meet in Moscow

4

e
(lightly abridged from Labour
“ Monthly, May/72)

Bangladesh trade union leader
Chowdjury Harun spoke for all
the guest detegates when he told
Congress: “You have set up a
special system that is an inspi-
ration to the working people of
the entire world, a source of
strength for all fighting for
peace, democracy and_ social
progress.”

The assembly of 5,000 dele-
gates (40% of them women) in
the Kremlin hall in itself was
an inspiring sight. Here were
veterans of socialist industry —
among them the legendary
miner Stakhanov, still active in
the Donbas—and younger gene-
rations. of productivity pace-
setters, such as Leningrad en-
gineering worker Kozlov, whose
team does its five-day task in
four. Here from Ivanovo was
young spinner Shmarova, a
Russian Federation MP: her mill,
one of the oldest in the country
has the highest productivity in
the USSR...

This was a delegate gathering
of the Soviet Union’s ruling
class. They spoke for all who by
exerting their energy, skills and
intelligence are doubling their
country’s wealth every 10 years,
raising the living standards of
all by leaps and bounds. For
them the plans to advance to
communism take the material
form of specific targets, in the
current five-year plan to raise
annual production of electricity
to a trillion kilowatt hours, of
coal to 650 million -tons, of oil
to 496 million tons and of steel
to almost 150 million tons. They
are proud to have rehoused 110
million people over the past 10
years and are now in the pro-
cess.of providing better housing
for 60 million more by 1975.

These grandiose projects, re-
quiring effort and time to ‘ful-
fill, imperatively need a peace-
ful world. Peace was the ever-
present concern of delegates. It.
was the main theme of Leonid
Brezhnev’s important foreign
policy statement at the Con-
gress.

Need publicly-owned
pipeline Ottawa fold

e
tenga of lowing letter in de-
N the 4° Canadian gas pipeline
Macdon orth Was sent to Donald
anq oa Minister of Energy
Central Ural Resources, by the
the “ Executive Committee of
4, ~°™munist Party on June

You pobe and Mail reports
Oi] ang Ming the major U.S.
hort yes companies in the
TUltimin, Seeking to build the
giley pact dollar MacKenzie
hoyig 88S Pipeline, that they
looking to Canadian
and construction

’ » ho
Moin ane firms, as they are
ee Struct the pipeline.
atk aa burden of your re-
a Mail the story in the Globe
Pbeal t — to be a plaintive
Me b Consortium to give

Sule OF
titin oa to Canadian con-
ns, Workers and construc-

With ® is an_
th a, 22 odd way to deal

fj Sineerin

t 2 development of
0 the strengthen-
Penden ce op vereignty and inde-
The real Canada.
Question involved is

n

not whether Canadian consult-
ing engineers and other Cana-
dians will be used or not, but
who will own, control and oper-
ate the pipeline. If the consor-
tium builds it, it will be built to
serve its interests and that of
U.S. imperialism; if it is owned,
controlled and operated in Can-
ada, it stands to reason that
Canadian consulting engineers,
construction workers, Canadian
material will be used to build it.

It requires no act of genius to
know that the consortium was
established not to protect or
advocate the sovereignty and
independence of Canada but to
extract a fast buck, and along-
side it, to control the pipeline in
ways which will serve the inter-
ests of U.S. imperialism.

This cannot be the aim of
Canada and the Canadian people.

The Communist Party urges
that a pipeline be built which
will be publicly owned and
constructed in line with the im-
mediate and long term needs of
Canada. Only in this way will
Canadian control be assured and
the interests of the Canadian
people be truly served.

Instead of an unseemly spar-

-vance proposals

ring match between you and the
consortium whose end result as
we have seen on other issues,
has been abject capitulation to
U.S. pressures and U.S. inter-
ests; instead of a cap in hand
approach, the Canadian people
expect the Government to ad-
directed to
achieve an all-Canadian public-
ly-owned pipeline along the
MacKenzie Valley route with
due regard to safeguarding the
rights of the native peoples and
the ecology of the area.

This ought to be the beginning
of a process directed to achieve
public ownership of, natural re-
sources, their processing in Can-
ada, and the building of second-
ary industry on that basis.

It is along these lines that
Canada can be put back to work
and the sovereignty and inde-
pendence of the country
strengthened.

ALBERTA HONEY

Alberta beekeepers produce
about 20,000,000. pounds of
honey a year, 80% of which is
sold outside the province.

See

Premier Fidel Castro being greeted at Moscow airport by Com-

munist Party general secretary, Leonid Brezhnev at the beginning of

Cuban-Soviet talks.

Soviet-Cuban ties
strengthen solidarity

MOSCOW (TASS) — Soviet
Premier Alexei Kosygin, speak-
ing at a reception at the Cuban
Embassy on July 2, stated that
“the Soviet Union’s line in rela-
tions with fraternal Cuba is in-
variably directed at assisting

‘the-creation of the most favor-

able conditions for a successful
building of socialism in Cuba.”
The reception was given by
the First Secretary of the Cent-
ral Committee of the Commun-
ist Party, Prime Minister of the
Cuban government, Fidel Castro.

“We want to, and we are, do-
ing everything possible for our
relations to become even strong-
er, for the utmost growth of
the effectiveness of our econo-
mic cooperation and for the
Soviet Union and Cuba always

to come out closely together on

the international scene,’ Kosy-
gin said.
Aid to Indochina

“The internationalist solidarity
of our parties and peoples is a
mighty factor in the struggle
against imperialism. It vividly
expresses itself in the support
given to the heroic Vietnamese
people, the patriots of,Laos and
Cambodia who are repulsing the
American aggression and up-
holding their right to indepen-
dent development in accordance
with the will and aspirations of
the peoples,” he stressed. “There
is no doubt that the people of
Vietnam, just as the peoples of
other countries of Indochina,
will secure a full triumph of

their just cause — the cause of
freedom, assertion of - sovere-
ignity and development along
the road of peace and progress.”

The Soviet Premier stated
that ‘‘The policy of peaceful co-
existence pursued by the Soviet
Union in relations with coun-
tries having a different social
system proceeds from the im-
permissibility of using force in
the solution of disputes between
states. But,” he added, “by no
means does this signify a rejec-
tion of the right of peoples arms
in hands, to oppose aggression
or to press for liberation from
foreign oppression.

Big Political Event

“Our solidarity is directed at
supporting the efforts of the
peoples of Arab countries in the
Struggle against the Israeli ag-
gression and for the liberation
of all occupied Arab territories,”
he said.

Alexei Kosygin said Fidel
Castro’s visit to the USSR was
“a big political event in Soviet-
Cuban relations. The importance
of this visit is especially em-
phasized by the results of the
current talks in Moscow on the
further development of friendly
Soviet-Cuban cooperation.

“We highly appreciate the
extensive community of views of
the Communist parties and gov-
ernments of the Soviet Union
and Cuba,” he said, asserting
that “we treasure the mutual
trust and understanding that
exist between us.”

Insulin sale for profit

Fears of an increase in the
price of insulin to about 130,000.
people who need it daily, were
expressed by the Canadian: Dia-
betic Association opposing. the
sale of Connaught Medical Re-
search Laboratories, owned by
the University of Toronto, to the
Canadian Development Corpora-
tion.

Dr. A. M. Fisher, retiring as-
sociate director of Connaught,
and a leader. of the diabetic as-
sociation, said the CDC has
stated it intends to pay dividends
to shareholders within five years
of taking over.

Where is this easy money to
come from? Says Dr. Fisher: “If
you are working for a profit one
of the things you do is sell for
what the market is.”” He would
like to see it remain a non-profit

organization he said. The lab re-
portedly sells insulin at 25 to
35% less than U.S. companies
sell to their diabetics.

Syrup-like assurances from
the CDC says there’ll be no
change in insulin prices “in the
foreseeable future,” whatever

that may be in profit-making -

terms.

“No change?” Well, a Globe
and Mail report says the CDC,
in a two-month campaign to woo
government approval promised
they ‘will not drastically in-
crease prices.” Not drastically?
Well ..;

Anthony Hampson, chairman
of CDC, said products would be

sold “at reasonable and compe-

titive prices.”
Oh, competitive!

PACIFIC TRIBUNE—FRIDAY, JULY 7, 1972—-PAGE 5