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April 19, 1943

B.C. LUMBER WORKER

Published Bi-Weekly, Every Second Monday by
B.C, DISTRICT COUNCIL, International Woodworkers of America

‘ Editor: NIGEL MORGAN ~
Managing Editor: B. J. MELSNESS

. Room 504 Holden Building — Phone PAcific 4151 — Vancouver, B.C.
Make Payments to: “LW.A., B.C. District Council”

INTERNATIONAL CONVENTION

eee ENZO, California, will be the scene of our Seventh

Annual Convention, undoubtedly the most important con-
vention in the history of the IWA. With the glorious victories
of the Soviet winter offensive and the Allies advancing in
Africa and preparing themselves for the European offensive,

the convention, through the democratic expression of elected

aa must forge a victory program based on all-out war
fort.

UA TELY, for our District, a serious bottleneck is
created by a few reactionary United States Immigration
officials who apparently are not concerned with the develop-
ment of a good neighbor policy and the stepping up of our war
effort, but are more concerned in denying elected labor officials
freedom as a good-will visitor in complete disregard of inter-
national understanding developed between these two great de-
mocracies.

ihe SPITE of this, a greater feeling of good-will and solidarity

has developed between woodworkers on either side of the
49th parallel. This is as it should be. The importance of inter-
national labor movements and international conventions can
be seen in the fact that our employers are internationally
business-minded. This applies not only to capital investment

in plants and equipment, but also markets and timber re-
sources, which obviously leaves no alternative than that labor,
in order to deal with employers on equal terms, must likewise
be international in scope.

wi the democracies involved in a world war against fas-
‘cism, with Canada and the United States within this con-
finent in the forefront of this struggle, our International Con-
vention becomes even more striking in its importance to the
international ealine of the democracies.

‘ARE now to elect your full quota of delegates. Take
all necessary steps to legally clear these delegates through
the Canadian and United States immigration service. In short,
prepare now to take your rightful place as a properly consti-
tuted union in the councils of our International to ensure the
democratic formation of a program that will guarantee the
armed forces of the democracies adequate and sufficient sup-
plies of everything that is needed in the coming offensive. Such

4 program must carry with it, to obtain the desired results, full
and complete labor-war partnership. ~

8 B.C. LUMBER WORKER

CIO Workers Keep
Production Pledge

WASHINGTON, D.C.—You can chalk this up on every
billboard in the nation—CIO men and women are concretely
keeping the pledge made by their representatives at the 1942
CIO convention, “to give everything we can in fighting men,
in production, in money and in patriotism to enable the United

SPURN THE SILLY SLOGAN

"ATS OFF to the 2,600 loggers of Vancouver Island who have
H condemned unanimously and wholeheartedly the stupid
and mischievous slogan of “No Beer—No Bonds.” In the words
of Mr. Nigel Morgan, representative of the International Wood- .
workers’ Association, “the unions feel the slogan is against tho
best interests of Canada, and of labor in particular; they have
pledged themselves to destroy these slogans wherever found.”

This should help to discourage those who.do not realize, as
they should realize, how vitally necessary it is for every Ca-
nadian—no matter what he or she thinks of this or that govern-
ment—to bend every conceivable effort toward insuring the com-

plete and speedy success of the Fourth Victory Loan, the books
of which will be opened by Minister of Finance Isley on April 26.

It is right and proper, however, to point out that the wood-
workers of the province advance a meritorious argument when
they remind the government at Ottawa that the average logger
is accustomed to eat between one and two pounds of meat a day.
‘This, of course, is meant to apply to all those men who are doing
heavy outdoor work which calls for energy-building foods—in-
eluding, by the wayy bacon and butter. °

It would be well for the authorities in the national capital
to note, in framing new rationing regulations, that what may
be quite sufficient for urban toilers in moro or less sedentary em-
ployment is totally inadequate to the bucker and the chokerman.
Everybody naturally understands the difficulties’ encountered as
a central organization attempts to meet the exigencies of any
situation with a blanket order. The case of the Worker in the
“heavy” industries, however, emphasizes the point which the wood-
workers’ spokesman makes,

L —Reprinted from the Victoria Daily Times,

Nations to smash forward into Eur-
ope until our drive ends in the heart
of Germany and the military de-
struction of the Fascist Axis has
been achieved.”

Here’s the record — part of it —
with lots more to come as Ameri-
can forces redouble their efforts to
carry out the Casablanca policy of
forcing “unconditional surrender’
of the enemy:

1. The United Steelworkers of
America, one of the CIO's largest
unions, announced that 186,236
members from this country are
serving in the armed forces. The
figures were compiled from xec-
ords of companies with unien
|. contracts, The CIO United Elec-
trical, Radio & Machine Workers
of America announce that 70,000
UE members likewise are serving
the nation.

2. The War Production Board
said this week that of 157 national
awards given in March for sugges-
tions to boost production, 63 of
them went to workers in war plants
where joint Labor - Management
War Production Drive Committees
have been established between em-
ployers.and CIO unions.

8. U.S. Treasury Dept. officials
said that CIO men and women last
year purchased a conservatively es-
timated billion and a half dollars
worth of war bonds.

The 63 production awards to
workers in CIO plants brought the
CIO total to 173, out of the 389
national honors which have been
bestowed to date by the WPB Drive
Headquarters Board. c

Thousands of man-hours and

many tons of critical materials will
be saved in hundreds of U.S. fac-
tories as the result of these new
ideas for victory, which will be
“plowed back” into all plants par-
ticipating in the War Production
Drive.

Two-thirds of this month's
awards went to men and women
workers employed right on. the
production lines, with only one-
third going to engineérs and
technicians. Only war workers
whose production ideas are certi-
fied to Washington from the
2,000 joint War Production Labor-
Management Committees, cover-
ing 4,100,000 workers, are eligible
for these national honors.

Continued

RATION SYSTEM

find out just how the quota is set
and give it some publicity.

“IT know we got no quota allow-
ance for two months for some rea-
son or other. The butter ration is
really the worst as it allows no
extra at all.

“T see R. J. Filberg and McKee
gave it publicity in the ‘Sun’ and
the ‘News-Herald’ So if enough
pressure is brought to bear, we may
get_an increase.

“When the two pounds a week
meat ration starts, well . .. the
boys will lose a cook as I’ll never
try it. Let the guy who figured
it out come and cook in my place.
I think the production will fall off

then as well.”

You may have heard of the Negro
congregation who assembled to
pray for rain, It appears that old
Pluvius had not shed a tear for
three months. The crops were
getting roasted and the congrega-
tion got panicky. Their Parson
called a special meeting especially
to pray for rain. He addressed
them as follows: “Brethren,” says
he, “we are assembled here this
evening to pray to the good Lord
for rain.” In chorus they answered,
“Yes, bless the Lord.” The Parson
continued, “Brethren, when We pray
for rain and pray long enough, we
get rain.” In chorus again they
answered, “Yes, bless the Lord.”
“Well, Brethren, when you pray
for rain you all expect to get rain,”
They all answered, “Yes, thanks to
our good Lord.” “Well, then,” says
the Parson, “if you expect rain and
believe you are going to get it,
how come only a few of you have
got your umbrellas?”

Well, boys, here is a bunch of
good citizens organized together
asking for rain and not prepared
to do much about it, While TWA
congregation can’t be classed as a
parallel case, still we see a bunch
of our members asking for union
recognition and not having their
union cards. You have to remem-
ber that you ask for union recogni-
tion but you must be prepared to
do something about it and you must
carry “that prerequisite” that
leads to union recognition, that is,
your union card. So if your union
is not getting there fast enough,
look around your camp and mill
and see that everybody at least
gets a paid-up union card.

Well, boys, since you last heard
from me, I have been doing some
research work in solving the fuel
problem in Vancouver City. I went
to work and got a couple of acres
of nice alder in the valley and
bought myself two young husky
beavers from the fir farmer. I fig-
ured out that if a man could get
a few gangs of beaver fallers to
work for him, he would have a real
scheme to present to the Fuel
Board. Well, I gets’ this alder limit,
There is a nice brooklet running
through it. An ideal place for beay-
ers to start work. I turns my set
of beavers loose in this ideal setting
and sits to observe them. I figured
they are going to get all excited
and start right away on a nice
green alder, but no. They start look-
ing around sizing up their working
conditions. They first look for a
bath house and there was one—a
real nice pool. They then proceed-
ed to size up the length of the
trees, to see how many chunks they
could get out of a tree; This looked
good to them. They then begin to
size up the grub situation and it

‘| must have looked fair to them be-

cause they started to work. ‘Well,
boys, I don’t know how this experi-
ment is going to work out, but T can
see that after a few days’ work
by that one gang (no buckers) I
can get enough wood for a good fire
in my little fireplace. Now, what
worrles me about this scheme is
that some unscrupulous timber man
is liable to get a whole bunch of
beaver sets to cut wood and hang
the speed-up sign on them. If the?
do not produce enough wood he is
liable to skin them, H

Now, boys, for my fan mail, I re-
ceived quite a few nice letters this
week. The one I enjoyed the best
come from someone who signed
himself as Bottoms Up. He gave
me a bit of advice. I'll pass it on.
He sald: Old timer with this Mquor
situation getting drier I'll give you
a tip on how to drink liquor. Never
pour water in Nquor; it wéakens
the liquor; always pour the liquor

in the water—it strengthens the
water,

Your Old Bull Cook,