Vol. XLX No. 1 VANCOUVER, B.C. Photo by John Vernon Three members of Local 1-357 IWA, New Westminster, show their support for their fellow WA members during the representation vote at the Hammond mill March 4th. From left, Ralph McMillan, Dave Roosa, and Bruce Elphinstone. IWA DEFEATS PPWC RAIDS The IWA has decisively defeated raids by the Pulp, Paper & Woodworkers of Canada (PPWOC) at B.C. Forest Products Hammond Division in Local 1-367, Haney, and at the Pacific Forest Products Ladysmith Division in Local 1-80, Duncan. a The Canadian Pulpworkers Union also soundly defeated a PPWC raid at CPU’s Cariboo Pulp & Paper Mill at Quesnel. The PPWC, which has never organized an unorganized operation, commenced the raid at Hammond last fall. This was followed in mid-December by the raid at B.C. Forest Products. The PPWC has raided the IWA twenty- one times over the past twelve years and has only been successful in gaining 503 class classe Third Troisieme PERMIT No. 2075 VANCOUVER, B.C. i g « z E i a 5! 83 a8 33 zs 3 3 © re FS members. During the same period the IWA has organized 14,620 unorganized workers. Unfortunately, the National officers of the PPWC prefer attacking other unions to organizing the unorganized. The main reason for thisis that they would be forced to negotiate a new collective agreement for any operation they organized and this is something they are incapable of doing. The PPWC has never once been the pace setter in negotiating master agreements in British Columbia. Their officers prefer to rant and rave at the bargaining table knowing full well that their Union will be given the same wage increases and fringe benefits negotiated by the IWA. Two classic examples are the forest indus- try pension plan and major rate revisions negotiated by the IWA. These were handed to the PPWC by the industry without that Union lifting a finger. However, there are two things that the PPWC officers are good at and that is flag waving and wasting their membership’s money on futile raids. The constant raiding of both Interna- tional and Canadian unions by the PPWC has given the organization a black name in the labour movement. It is the hope of the IWA that the PPWC membership will come to realize the harm their officers are doing to seloy. unionists and order a stop to these raids. If they are not stopped PPWC operations will also be attacked. This would be unfortu- nate because the only people who would benefit from union fighting union would be the employers. Heading up the IWA campaign in thefield were Regional organizers Nick Worhaug, John Smithies, Pat Bell, Gil Johnson and Larry Rewakowsky. Regional first vice-president Bob Blan- chard and International Assistant organ- izer Frank Stich directed the overall stra- tegy. A number of IWA locals contributed money and volunteer helpers. Helpers included Shiv Garsha, Local 1-424; Joe LeClaire, Local 1-857; Dave Toens and Jack Mack, Local 1-367. ISSN 0049-7371 U.S. BILLS COULD EASE UNEMPLOYMENT By DOUG. SMYTH Regional Research Director During the past few months between one-fourth and one-third of [WA membersin western Canada have been unemployed. And in the Pacific Northwest region of the United States over 40% of all woodworkers have been on layoff. Because many of those employees have been out of work for over two years, there can be no question that the current downturn is the worst that the industry has experienced since World War Il. The current layoffs are a direct result of the severe decline which has taken place in the U.S. housing industry. That industry consumes two-thirds of Canadian lumber during a normal production year. However, starts of new homes have fallen drastically, from 2 million units in 1978 to only 1.1 million in 1981. That decline was caused by the record jump in interest rates which took place over the same time period. Fortunately, mort- gage rates have begun to fall during the past 6 weeks. But the national average mortgage rate is still almost 17%, or 3% above the 14% rate at which most U.S. homebuyers can afford to purchase a house. In spite of the recent declines in mortgage rates, it will take a few months to return to the so-called threshold rate of 14%. Because the situation has become desper- ate, U.S. homebuilders have proposed a stopgap measure which will permit the federal government to subsidize housing starts until mortgage rates come down to reasonable levels. There are currently before the United States Congress two bills which will provide homebuyers with a buydown of mortgage rates during the first few years of the mortgage. Here is how a typical buydown would work under the bill now being considered by the U.S. Senate. If the normal mortgage rate is 154%, the government will “buy down” the rate by a full 4 percentage points. That is, the govern- ment would provide a 4% subsidy, sothat the homebuyer would only pay 11'4%, or just 75% of the normal monthly payment. At 114% most homebuyers would qualify for a mortgage under the rules that lending institutions use to determine eligibility for such loans. Typically, monthly payments cannot exceed 30% of the homebuyer’s gross income. As time goes by it is expected that the homebuyer will increase his earnings because of job advancement and the impact of inflation on wages. Heshould therefore be able to afford higher monthly mortgage payments in succeeding years. It is for this reason that the proposed legislation requires the government to gradually reduce SEE “BILLS” PAGE TWO APRIL, 1982