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TREEPLANTERS ©

By “Treeplanters’” CHRIS ROLFE
and NICK ROBERTSON

Treeplanters have decided to join theIWA
in an effort to halt and reverse their rapidly
deteriorating work conditions. At its Janu-
ary 28th annual general meeting the Pacific
Reforestation Workers’ Association, which
represents planters throughout B.C., voted
almost unanimously to work with the [WA
in organizing silviculture workers into
Local 1-217. This decision follows several
years in which the PRWA has looked at the
best means to organize silviculture workers.

Most treeplanters work for employers who
bid on planting contracts. For several years
these contractors have been engaged in cut-
throat bidding; every company trying to bid
lower than the others and keep their share of
the market. To offset this downward spiral
in bidding, planters’ pay is reduced and
camp standards lowered.

Some of tree planters’ most notable
grievances centre around camp condi-
tions. Camp facilities may not be supplied
even though the workers are in extremely
isolated areas, safe, reliable transporation
is seldom supplied; and the first aid equip-
ment and attendants required by the
Workers’ Compensation Act are often miss-
ing. Tree planters face work conditions in
many ways similar to those faced by loggers
before unionization.

Pay is another major grievance. Planters
are paid at a piece rate. Their income is
determined by the number of trees they
plant multiplied by an unregulated portion

FORESTS IN CRISIS

Continued from page 1 |

With current practice, the “backlog” grows every year.

With current planning, it would take thirty or forty years to eliminate the backlog.

This plantable backlog could grow 2 million cubic meters of wood annually worth between
$100 and $200 million, and create 2,500 direct and 5,000 indirect jobs as well as 10 or 15 thousand
person years of temporary employment in the reforestation work.

In 1983, 115 million seedlings were planted, with only 13 million on the backlog. The program
cost $85 million for the current and $3 million for the backlog.

Even this woefully inadequate program was carried out at the expense of other vital forestry
programs. The intensive silvaculture program, planned for our best lands, has been reduced by

90%.

The government recently laid off 400 people from a staff that was already far too small. The
current scandal re Shoal Island, which shows the public was short-changed by about 2 million
dollars, is just the tip of this iceberg. Vast stands are being “high-graded”, winter shows are
being mowed down in the best of weather, and more and more good wood is left to rot in the

woods.

Worst of all, we are losing our best forest land every day. Foresters predict the loss of a further

25%.

THE IMPLICATIONS

Unless we begin an immediate and comprehensive program of planting and stand-tending,
and most important, preserve our fertile land base, we will lose:

— Atleast 30,000 direct and 60,000 indirect jobs, then move huge publicrevenues that sustain
health, education and social services as well as financing roads railways, ferries etc.

Our children and grandchildren, who would otherwise have the same opportunities as we have
had, will be doomed to work in the low-wage sweat shops that McGeer is planning for us.

THE SOLUTION
. Money is the solution. Money to plant trees, to build and operate nurseries, to do practical
research, to thin and fertilize, and so on. Where should the money come from?
A PROPOSAL :

In the budget tabled by the provincial government on February 20th, the Socreds propose to

dump another 470 million dollars into the Northeast coal pit, a farce that has already cost us

hundreds of millions.

The Association of British Columbia Foresters has recommended as an absolute minimum
that we spend this year at least $90 million on basic silviculture, and at least $70 million on
replanting the backlog, for a total this year (minimum) of $160 million. The government has
budgeted $57 million. We could add the $103 million necessary. for the minimum forestry
program, cancel their proposed 8% income tax surcharge, (reducing revenues by $166 million,
and devote the remaining $200 million to restoring our health education and social services to a

civilized level.

THE BONUS *
Our children and grandchildren would have a decent choice of jobs, good publicrevenues, and

a good environment.

We would finally call a halt to the pouring of public funds into Northeast Coal’s bottomless pit.

JOIN IWA

of the bid price. In recent years this portion
has been declining. Inflation has further
reduced planters’ real income.

Despite legal requirements that workers
be paid every two weeks planters often do
not receive their pay until six weeks to three
months after the completion of work.
Employers maintain complete control over
any advances given out during the season.

As a direct result of not getting paid |
in full regularly, there have been a
number of recent cases where planters |
have still not been paid for work donea
year, two years or three years before.

Planters have also experienced unspeci- |
fied or illegal “fines”,insomecasesamount- |
| ing to over $1,000 over a six week perid.
These “fines” have often come without
warning and have not been fully explained
| by the employer. é
| The fines represent penalties for poor

planting quality, poor handling of seedlings
or wasted “perhaps stashed” trees which
the Licencee or Forest Service deducts from
| the contractors payment. These problems
stem from little or no supervision and low
wages. Yet the employers take no
responsibility and simply pass the
results of their low bids and/or incom-
petence on to the planter.

Because of problems such as these the
PRWA has been actively involved in refores-
tation workers’ needs and concerns for three
years. All PRWA work has bene voluntary
and included, amongst other things, the
publishing of a newsletter, looking into

Ses eee ee!

health’ effects of pesticides, working
improve camp conditions around the
vince, and generally educating/politici
tree planters. ey :

Unfortunately, the association has |
the power, energy or finances necessary
effect major changes in the problems faced
by tree planters and other siliviculture
workers. Since its inception the PRWA has
recognized the necessity of uniting workers
in a strong organization.

The PRWA has had up to500 members but
this is only a fraction of the total number of
planters working at the peak of the season
(April-July). At this time there are at —
least 4,000 planters working in small
crews of 10-30 each, scattered all over
the province and spilling into Alberta.

They are employed by a 100 or more con-
tractors some with several hundred on the
payroll, but the majority having 50 or fewer.
In addition the individual crew is often
“here today and gone tomorrow.” To be
working for more than a month out of one
location (usually a tent camp) is unusual.

There is a large core of experienced plan-
ters who do the work year after year. They
start on the coast as early as February and
move on into the interior — following the
spring break-up. They may find work six to
eight months of the year. They have been
the PRWA’s keenest supporters, because
they fully ‘appreciate the need to stand
together.

Another large portion of the workforce is
lured form Ontario and Quebec by the prom-
ise of higher wages. Many are putting them-
selves through school. They often find
themselves working for the worst contrac-
tors, badly underpaid, without camp facili-
ties and living on canned beans after 12
hours a day of stoop labour.

Ironically these are the people who
are most afraid to stand up for them-
selves. “Put up or shut up”, “if you
don’t like it, leave” is what they’re told.
They swallow the contractors’ b.s. and stay
away from discussions of their rights and of
a union. In the end this has allowed the
Ministry of Forests to get more and more
work done for less and less money. Contrac-
tors have bid even lower, knowing that they _
can find people to do the job.

Faced with the mammoth task of organiz-
ing such an industry the PRWA has turned
to the IWA for help and support. In the past,
various coastal locals have insisted that
contractors working on their claims sign
“me too” agreements. Sometimes, while
they were employed within the Local’s juris-
diction, planters have enjoyed the wages
and benefits that the IWA has won.

All too often, however, the planters were
not even aware of those arrangements and,
even if they were, did not apply to the Union
if the contractor failed to comply. They
knew that as soon as the crew moved and
they were no longer protected they would be
“down the road”.

We have come to the IWA because we
believe that the IWA will to its utmost
to protect us and win for us decent
wages and working conditions. As full
and active members of Local 1-217 with pro-
vincial certifications for silviculture con-
tractors we will have the opportunity to
work out collective agreements that meet
our needs and reflect the unusual character-
istics of reforestation work.

We expect to have to earn the respect
of our brothers and sisters in the IWA
and we look forward to the day when
with their support and by our own
efforts we will both improve our situa-
tion and turn around the sorry and neg-

lected state of forest mismanagement
in B.C.

2/Lumber Worker/Spring, 1984