Page Four

Convention Aims

N January 15 and 16 the organized loggers and sawmill]?

workers of B. C. will sit down in convention to lay plans
for the year ahead. This district convention of the IWA
will have a number of serious problems to ‘consider.

There is the question of wage increases. The delegates
to the convention will have to decide their policy in this
regard in preparation for the negotiations in April.

There is no doubt that the operators can well afford to
pay higher wages out of profits. When one company can
report, as the B.C. Forest Products did last week, a net
profit of $2,606,000 there is no question about them being
able to meet wage increases without price increases.

kk

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Bur whether they will or not is another matter. They

may be forced to grant a wage increase. Unless the
government acts to curb price increases we can be sure the
employers will pass any wage increase along to the con-
sumer and thus increase the cost of living and lower the
value of the dollar, leaving the worker where he was
before!

The lumberworkers will have to fight on two fronts.
Political pressure must be exerted on the government to
control runaway prices, and union pressure exerted on the
employers to force wage increases.

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qt is also time in the lumber industry to consider the mat-

ter of a guaranteed minimum annual wage. Everyone
hears about the high wages paid in the lumber industry.
People read of the daily earnings of some loggers, multiply

it by 365 and put the logger in the millionaire class. ic

They forget the short working year in the industry—|
snow in winter, and fire season in summer, cutting down
the-number of working days to less than 200 a year. |

The convention will also have to lay plans for co-operat-
ing with the rest of the trade union movement in its legisla-
tive program. Amendments to the ICA Act (Bill 39) and
to the Workmen’s Compensation Act should be on the
agenda for trade union action this year.

wk

But the most important matter before the convention
will be that of consolidation of the union. With 24,000 paid
up members the IWA has the big majority of the lumber-
workers of the province in its ranks. But there are still
more than 6,000 outside the union. A few of these are in
the phoney “WIUC”, but the bulk of them are not orga-
nized at all, having been neglected by the former LPP
officers.

After years of steam-roller domination by the LPP, many
IWA men are unfortunately apathetic and cynical about
union organization. Accustomed to seeing all opposition
ruthlessly suppressed, to rigged elections, and to packed
conventions, it will take some time to convince them that
times haev changed and that the International Wood-
workers of America is a real union, worthy of their sup-
port and not just a front organization for the LPP as it
has been in the past.

ASenseless Sentence

N another page we carry the story of the efforts being

made by the officers of Local 1-71 to have reduced the
sentences passed on the two young loggers convicted of
smashing $2,000 worth of window glass on Hastings
Street.

While neither the officers of Local 1-71 nor the B.C.

- Lumber Worker hold any brief for senseless destruction of

this sort, in this case the stupidity of the two culprits

seems to have been pretty well matched by that of the
magistrate who dealt with the case.

Three years in the penitentiary is not only a savage
sentence for an escapade of this sort, but is one which
might probably cost society far more in the long ran than
the $2,000 worth of window glass.

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\N top of it, the records of prison inmates indicate that

penitentiary terms in the sort of prisons we operate,
are more often than not, merely courses in the higher
education of crime.

When the gates of the penitentiary open to let these
two young men out again they may open to release, not
two foolish lads, but two hardened criminals.

This case raises doubts about the competence of the
magistrate involved. Sentences such as these suggest that
he is no longer capable of discharging the duties of his

OT long ago the H. R. MacMillan Co.
published a large advertisement telling

High Ginance aud Wages ‘

the MacMillan Co, suggests, wise peop
save some of their earnings to inere:

the world of the way their thrift and good
management had enabled the company to
grow from a small concern 30 years ago to
one employing 5000 workers today.

The advertisement didn’t mention the
profits distributed as dividends throughout
the years, but laid great stress on the
amounts re-invested out.of-earnings.

As an example of this thrifty re-invest-
ment of surplus earnings the company cites
the fact that most of the investment for
their new pulp plant on Vancouver Island
will come out of undistributed profits.

their capacity to produce wealth. But whose
are these surplus earnings that Mr. Mac-
Millan and his associates have been
wisely re-investing?

The MacMillan .Co. reports 5000 em-
ployees.. It also reported net profits last
year of $7,500,000. In other words each
Mr. MacMillan’s employees contribu
$1500, in addition to his year’s work, to Mr.
MacMillan’s fund for re-investment.

ICE for Mr. MacMillan and his friends
but it seems to be rubbing it in a bit —
when they ask us to be grateful for th

office with discretion and judgment and should be retired
before he can damage any more Les:

‘O one can object to this policy of re-
investing surplus earnings. It is the
way industrial development takes place. As

LET THE CHIPS FALL
by Woody Woodpecker

@ OLD FRIEND, H. R. MacMILLAN, doesn’t like
socialism. Who would, with $814 millions of profits? And
look how generous Mr. MacMillan has been. Why, he even
gave $18,205,492 to the workers in salaries, wages and
other benefits. That means that the employees, all 5,000
of them, got half as much again as Mr. MacMillan and his
shareholders. .

the title.

The boys-in the MacMillan plants and camps have done
even better this year than last with their contributions to
the MacMillan Benefit fund.

Last year they contributed only $1,500 apiece. This year
it’s gone up to $1,700. They’ll soon have Mr. MacMillan’s
declining years provided Ores

ke! ke

@ SPEAKING OF PEOPLE with lots of money, it
seems too bad that whoever got hold of the $200,000 of
IWA money reported by Nigel Morgan in October, can’t
spare a little for Don Barbour and Bert Melsness .

Last reports on these two worthy supporters
LPP line, were that they were down looking for ines
the waterfront,

a

*

© SEEMS AS THOUGH looking too long at that|4

phony picket line at Iron River has got the party
confused about picket lines, so they can’t even Aan a
a genuine one when they see it.

Sam Jenkins and Bill White, two LPP stalwarts
Boilermakers, never noticed the picket line in front of the
pet Provinces men Py, ceshelies An the other day

give a story to the scab pay ut the ruckus
Tabor Connell betwead deniers andl Mike Seleeansen ae

thrifty way they have invested our mi
in a piece of property to which they hold

Your Space,
Boys!

The Editor:

During the past few months 3
great deal has been said

the history of the IWA, Some —
people have interpreted this his-
tory to mean one thing, othe
see it differently.

Shop stewards and other inte1
ested members can get some
good background material from:

“Lumber and Labor”—Jensen.

“Trade Unions in Canada’.
Logan.

Tony Gargrave,

The Editor:

In reference to the article th
“WIUC” had in their last “J
Bee Gye the

ing held at
Logging. sais

s
of the| thar Bost

be Brother H
absoh re