Back from the Phillippines after more> than three , years of

guerilla warfare against the J

and John Scott, members ©f Marine Cooks & Stewatds
(CIO). They joined the guerilla units, when they were left
behind by their ship in Manila, and now they're only taking

time out for a rest before

apanese are John Williams, left,

they ship out again.

Lascar Seamen Ask Aid
To Maintain Standards

Lascar seamen, billetted at the Manning Pool in the old
army barracks at New Westminster, are protesting the fact

that they are forced to accept
ing to. Canadian seamen, in the
fear that they will be responsible
for the lowering of existing wage
standards, P.A. has been in-
formed this week.

A lLascar spokésman for the
Indian seamen told P.A. that the
Indo-China Navigation Company
is at’ present recruiting East
Indians in Bombay and Calcutta
to man ships leaving Asiatic
ports. The Lascars are not in-
formed that they are sailing into
dangerous waters, and are lured
on by tales of high wages and
ideal living conditions. The .Las-
cars, to escape the struggle for
existence in India, sign on with
the company for the period of a
year at $52.00 per month as
ordinary seamen, and no provis-

ion is made for wartime or
danger bonuses, our informant
stated.

The seamen sail from India to
Halifax and are then sent to
New Westminster and held in the
old army barracks, which is op-
erated by the Manning Pool as
a clearing house for the assign-
ment of crews. We are informed
that the conditions existing in
the camp are far from the best.
The,seamen sleep in double rows
of double-decker bunks and. clean
linen is doled out to them every
six weeks. The seamen complain
that if white crews were com-
pelled to live under the condi-
tions prevailing in the Royal
City there would be considerable
protest. -
CONDIIONS DECLINING

The seamen do not only pro-
test living conditions, but also
complain that further exploita-
tion should be investigated by
the Seamen’s Unions of Canada
and the USA. They state that
since the time the first Lascar
crew arrived in May, conditions
at the Manning pool have stead-
ily declined. It is claimed that
cooks, who were first paid at the
rate of $4.00 per week have had
their pay reduced to $2.00; and
the men claim that instead of
the bank quotation of $4.43 per
pound sterling, they are paid only

$4.00. They claim that by this
means they have been defrauded
of a considerable amount of pay.

lower wages than those prevail-

state that they are dissatisfied at
being duped into accepting lower
Wages than Canadian seamtn.
They state emphatically that the
rate of pay they expect is the
same scale and conditions that
apply to Canadian seamen, and
express resentment at the fact
that they! may be jeopardizing
the wage standards of Canadian
seamen,

The Lascar seamen are asking
Canadian and U.S. unions to help
them in their fight to raise their
living standards- and to protect
the standards of Canadian sea-
men. We are informed that the
Lascars are attempting to have
a standard scale introduced that
will assure the maintenance of
decent wage and living stand-
ards, without jeopardizing- the
standards of seamen in other
lands.

e

Stay On Job!
Loggers Urge

Harold Pritchett, district presi-
dent of the International Wood-
workers of America, urged the
members to “stay on the job to
the fullest extent possible in or-
der to speed lumber ‘production
and so aid the wat effort.”

Timber control, operators, or
the union, have not yet taken

any steps to have workers give

up a week of_their holidays, as
has been reportedly asked in the
Washington and Oregon camps.
In the USA, the War. Production
Board released a statement de-
claring a shortage of lumber,
which is eritical war material,
would delay the Pacifie war and
also fail to meet urgent civilian
needs unless production is
speeded.

Jt has been reported that most
of the loggers in the Seattle area
have signified their willingness
to give up their vacations, or part
of them, to keep the supply of

The Lascars are members of
an Indian Seamen’s Union, and

fence -headquarters

There is one thing certain —
the problem can’t be met in the
manner suggested by Clarence
Wallace, head of the big Burrard
Drydock Company, in a speech
last week before the Vancouver
Board of Trade. Mr. Wallace is
apparently among that company
of industrialists who have one
ready-made answer—throw the
main burden of reconversion di-
rectly on the worker in the form
of wage cuts and speedup. Coast
shipbuilding is going to have to
enter into fierce competition,
Wallace maintains, and the only
way local yards can compete is
by having their employees work
harder and accept less pay,
which will bring construction
oests down to the necessary com-
petitive minimum.

NATIONAL NECESSITY

The’ president of the Burrard
company is wrong on two counts.
First, he infers that shipyard
workers have not been putting in
a “fair” day’s work-up. to now,
though the record ot Coast yards,
with 60 percent of Canada’s war-
time shipping built here, contra-
dicts that inference.

Second, he- maintains that
wage costs are the principal
stumbling block to continuance
of the industry here, whereas the
whole - experience of wartime
shipbuilding in Canada proves
that national necessity was the
overriding reason for establish-
ing the industry in the first place.
Shipyard unionists have chal-
ienged Wallace and the Board of
Trade for permission to present
labor’s point of view to the pub-
lic. In their opinion, wages are
far from an important factor in
maintaining the shipyards on the
B.C. coast. Malcolm MacLeod,
president of the Shipyard Gen-
eral Workers Federation, asserts
that. the question has to be
tackled from the point of view of
whether Canada intends to main-
tain its present export trade in
the postwar and ship her goods
on freighters built in Canadian
yards and manned by Canadian
seamen. If. government policy
goes in that direction—and labor
will fight to shape such a policy
—then the maintenance of ship-
building on -the Coast can be
guaranteed and main part of
B.C.’s reconversion and employ-
ment problem will be met.
“Wages simply don’t enter in
the matter and the new argu-
ments of cheap labor and ration-
alization can’t be sustained in the
face of the facts,” MacLeod de-
clares. ~ ;

“Shipuilding -was_ estalished
here in conditions of dire neces-
sity through direct government
financial assistance and the or-
ganization of Wartime Merchant
Shipping, which took care of all
the related prolems of material
procurement, plans-and specifica-
tions, technical assistance and a
hundred other matters. Costs
were high because B.C. had none
of the supplying industries upon
which shipbuilding is based in
Great Britain and the United
States. But we could not have
carried on without government

legging materials flowing from
the woods.

PAGE 2 — PACIFIC ADVOCATE

aid.

announcement ‘that Canadian
at the rate of 30,000 a month.

Reconversion To Peacetime
Production--Major B.C. Task |

By AL PARKIN

(The First of a Series on Reconversion Problems) = 52
~ How is British Columbia going to handle the big problems of industrial reconversio:
from war to peacetime conditions. Up until VE Day this was more or less of an academi '
question. Today it’s right on our doorstep, its presence emphasized by the Ottawa de
t _ overseas veterans are returning. hom |

build a Canadian merchant
Canadian vessels?
then the shipyards must be
maintained as they have been
up to the present — through
government subsidies and as-
sistance. There is no other
way.”

MacLeod argues that there is
a future for shipbuilding even on
its present basis. There is no
reason why all coastal ships
could not be built here, and all

ized as to design and equipment
—such as river boats for the
Soviet Union, for which contracts
are hinted already to be let to
Canadian firms.

-“There is. still a big shipbuild
ing job to be done on a’ world
scale, and we can logically expect
some of that work to be done
here,” he concludes.

TRANSFORMING OUR
ECONOMY

Turning to industrial reconver-
sion as a whole, the same argu-
ments hold true in all wartime
industry—the will and determin-
ation to keep the wheels running
with government assistance if
necessary.

But British Columbia has this
special problem of transforming
our economy from that of a
primary producer to one of a
fully - developed manufacturing
province. And here the all-im-
portant question of a steel] in-
dustry enters the picture.

There is no doubt that our
basic industries — lumbering,
mining, and fishing—will provide
maximum employment- for at
least a considerable number of
years. But since 1939 thousands
of additional workers have flock
ed to the coast to work in air-
craft, machine and tool plants,
foundries and related. enterprises.
In addition, there are the 75,000
or so servicemen who must be
given jobs. Some of the slack
will be taken up through the
housing and construction pro-
jects already planned. But ona
long-term view, full employment
in the postwar will not be practi
cable unless B.C. ceases to be-
come merely a source of raw
material for eastern industry and
begins building up its own manu-
facturing plants.

This is the problem that also
faces the Pacific coast of the
United States. - But there the
problem is already being tackled.
Power is being provided through
the great Columbia River and
Shasta hydro developments. And
Henry Kaiser, who built the Fon,
tana steel plant in California. -to
supply his shipyards in San
Francisco and Portland, has now
applied for a loan of several
hundred millions of dollars from
the Reconstruction Finance Cor-
poration with which to greatly
expand the Fontana plant’s pro-
ductive capacity. These maves,
coupled with the recent freight
rates decision of the U.S. Sup
reme Court which has abolished

“Now the question is—jg we

the discriminatory rates on haul-

want to give continued employ« x
ment to thousands of workers; *

marine, and ship our goods on‘
If “we do, =

‘guarantee jobs and industrial re}

industrialist with the vision of : [3
such craft that are not standard- |

highest possible. capacity.

age ‘in effect against the wester
States, has placed. Washingtorg
Oregon and California in an exe
cellent position to meet postwa |
conditions in @ way that wil}

conversion.

STEEL INDUSTRY :

B.C. is going to have to take th |
same steps. And organized labo!}
is going to have to lead the figh
to begin transforming this proy
ince’s economy. For of every onl

Henry Kaiser, there are a dezei?
with the outlook of a ‘Clarene 71
Wallace who can see nothing bu fin
a return to the old conditions o fi
job scarcity and low wages. - |

The trade unions and especial @ai
ly their political action commit 3
tees are faced right now witi®
the task of putting the utmos #4
pressure both on industry an #
government to have reconversio: #
Plans removed, from the blue
print stage and got under way. |

From a short-range point o |
view, that means an immediat i
assurance by the governmen gn
that it intends to continue sucl fe
industries as shipbuilding at th &

From a long-ratige view, itp”
means the establishment of =f
steel industry in B.C. For -every #
plan for full employment in the ®
Pacific coast. province rests o1|—
the building of new manufactur
ing enterprises. And that in tur
rests on steel, produced righ E
here in B.C. ;

(The problems of Postwar em! hi
ployment and reeconversion ar: Bo
right on our doorstep. We. inyit:
our readers to contribute to th §
discussions of this vital probler @
We would be especially interest. }
ed to hear from trade-unionist: |
and servicemen—Editor).

[WA Certified
At B.C. Plywood:

Anrouncement was made a,}
Saturday, June 16, that certifi §
cation has ben received from th: &.
Department of Labor for the Ply §
woods Division of MeMillan In {
dustries Limited. This is the las i
of the major plywood factories ii
the province. Certification wa:
received after many months o:#i
effort, and is considered an out#
standing tribute to the desire o: 3
workers fer postwar security.

B.C. Plywoods, as the plant i: &
popularly known, was organizec §
in 1942, but as security legisla
tion was not in effect, the TWAS
was unable to establish bargain: #
ing rights.-- Results of the IWA
attempts to reorganize the plani a
since that time are considered an fe
example of the excellent working § .
conditions now established; 4
great change from conditions Sp
1942. ;

ls
ava
00.

A feature of the organizational
drive was the absence of active]
opposition from the company.

SATURDAY, JUNE 23, 1945.

ay a
¢