IWA joins attack
on U.I. cuts

“What they (the Tories) are trying
to sell us is a crock of b.s., and we
aren’t buying it,” said Joe Leclair toa
protest rally in Vancouver on Septem-
ber 12. Brother Leclair, first vice-
president of IWA Local 1-357, was
addressing a crowd of 150 workers
protesting changes to the Unemploy-
ment Insurance Act.

Brother Leclair also told the crowd

that the Tory Agenda “is to bring;

Canadian (social) standards down to
American standards” ... for a new
level playing field in the new era of
Free Trade.

New Democrat MP Joy Langan
(Mission-Coquitlam) told the pro-
testors that the Tory Agenda “is
the same Tory Agenda as Margaret
Thatcher has in England, (and) that
Ronald Reagan’s successor has in
the United States.”

On that date a nine member House
of Commons Committee, including
Ms. Langan, was in Vancouver for
public hearings on proposed changes
to UIC (Bill C-21).

e Joe LeClair

IWA-CANADA, in a submission to
the committee, assailed the Tory gov-
ernment for the proposed changes to
take effect in January of 1990.

The IWA’s was one of the limited
number of submissions being heard
by the committee. Over 200 submis-
sions across Canada were turned down
by the Tory controlled committee
which set its own rules of operation.

“That there are many persons and
organizations who have not been per-
mitted to appear before you adds to
the grave injustices proposed,” said
the IWA’s Clay Perry in the union
submission.

The IWA submission also said its
members are “subject to frequent,
and sometimes disastrous periods of
layoff that are triggered by various
(government) policy and administra-
tive decisions.”

Brother Perry took time to hammer
the Conservatives for their policy of
“Jarcenous interest rates” which are
“ruinous to [WA members.”

The House of Commons Commit-
tee, headed by MP William Kempling
(Burlington, Ontario), parliamentary
secretary to Employment Minister
Barbara McDougall, was on a three
week cross country tour to hear hand-
picked submissions.

Kempling has said that UIC rates
in parts of Canada are generous and
has made comparison with those rates
to workers’ wages in Tennessee.

The Tories have been criticized by
labour and coalition groups for not
holding extensive public hearings to
receive input from all interested
Canadians.

Seasonal workers, such as loggers,
fishermen, and farm workers will be
hit hard by the proposed changes.
Reductions in benefits, increases in
qualifying times, and cuts to length
of entitlements will all have a drastic
impact on IWA workers.

The IWA submission cited the gov-
ernment’s phoney “war on inflation”
as a major factor in layoffs for union
members.

Reduced markets for lumber due to
high mortgage rates, and decreased
foreign demand for Canadian forest
products due to an artificially high
dollar, were cited as factors in unem-
ployment for IWA members.

The proposed cuts will rob over
$750 million from workers’ pockets to
pay for job training schemes which
have yet to be defined. It is believed,
by IWA officials, that some training
allowances will apear as subsidies and
handouts to employers.

Presently many “make work” refor-
estation programs are subsidized by
agreements with the Unemployment
Insurance Commission. It is believed
that such further job retraining funds
will allow forest companies to use
workers’ money to escape silvicultural
spending obligations and bolster their
profits even higher.

Where IWA members are in regions
of high unemployment, cuts will be
just as severe. The Conservatives, in
addition, are presently redrawing the
country’s current 48 economic regions
and the new boundaries will be intro-
duced after the UIC changes take
effect in 1990. Workers in high unem-
ployment regions could then be
affected if they are reclassified into a
region where benefits are lower or
qualification and entitlements
change.

The UIC cuts, announced in April
of this year, will cut $1.5 billion in
federal contributions to the $13 bil-
lion program which will be totally
funded by workers and employers.

Although the federal government
will contribute no money to the pro-
gram in 1990, it will force regulations
on those workers contributing to it.

© Joy Langan

A poll released in April of this year
to the Federal Government and
obtained by the Globe and Mail under
the Access to Information Act reveals
that 61% of Canadians would be
“somewhat upset or very upset” by
any reductions in federal contribu-
tions to unemployment insurance.

In addition, 41% of Canadians felt
that UI cuts would be done for deficit
reduction and not for job retraining, as
the government now claims.

HI-LITES OF
UIC REFORM

e cuts will affect 530,000
Canadians.

e 30,000 Canadians will be
unable to qualify.

e cuts in average UI entitlement
will be 544 weeks.

e claimants who apply more
than once in one year will have
to wait for up to 6 weeks for
another claim to kick in.

e changes in penalties for those
who quit without “just cause”
from the present 2-6 weeks to
7-12 weeks.

e reduction in payments for
those who “quit” work.

e entrance requirements move
from 10-14 weeks to 10-20
weeks.

Included in the CLC-IWA produced video is footage from a June 1989 protest rally in
front of the Zeidler plywood plant in Edmonton.

CLC helps with video

The Canadian Labour Congress has
joined with IWA-CANADA to pro-
duce a video about the prolonged
Zeidler strikes in Alberta. The
18-minute video, entitled “Until Jus-
tice Comes” explains the history of
the strikes and publicizes the CLC’s
national boycott of Zeidler products.

Written, produced and directed by
Jane Burton, a national representa-
tive with the CLC’s communications
department, the video is a powerful
indictment of Zeidler’s union-busting
efforts aided by police and an indiffer-
ent government.

In the video, IWA President Jack
Munro says that “... government
has a role, as government of all the
people and not just the corporate
community, to intervene in a positive
way to get the parties together and
keep them at the table and help assist
in working out a solution.”

Brother Munro also says: “We have
to say to the strikers at Zeidler’s that
the trade union movement was seri-
ous when we committed to no conces-
sion bargaining.”

Alberta Local 1-207 Mike Pisak
says a government-appointed Dis-
putes Inquiry Board gave Zeidler’s
Slave Lake Division most of its
demands in October of 1986 and rec-
ommended reinstatement of striking
workers.

The company rejected the Board’s
proposals, then asked union negotia-
tors for a further $2.00/hour wage
cut.

Two weeks after demanding the
wage cuts, Zeidler fired 23 workers for
picket line activity.

Strike breakers were brought in by
police as early as June of 1986, only
two months after the union members
struck. The combination of scab herd-
ing by police and government indiffer-
ence has made the strike last for more
than three and one-half years.

At Zeidler’s Edmonton plywood
plant negotiations broke down in 1987
as the company refused to grant suc-
cession rights to the then newly-
formed IWA-CANADA National
Union. In March, 1988 the plywood
workers walked out, refusing to sub-
mit to wage cut demands and the
gutting of full-time wages and bene-
fits in their contract.

Striker Arne Christensen says that
the company was attempting to roll
back contract language they had since
the mid-1950’s.

During the video, Edmonton striker
Al Henry says that police have come
in droves and chased strikers outside
the plywood plant.

Up in Slave Lake, striker Dorothy
Johnson says “... most of us never
knew what a labour strike was before
this started ... we do now.”

The CLC boycott is aimed at
Zeidler’s spruce plywood and 2x4
studs. Boycott Organizer Benny Lum
says a letter campaign to labour
councils in Ontario, asssisted by the
Ontario Federation of Labour, has
helped in persuading some major
retail outlets to refuse handling of the
scab products.

In Quebec, where most of the
Zeidler products are sold, the Quebec
Federation of Labour, through the
assistance of Boycott Organizer
Girard Rowe, is stepping up its pub-
licity campaign.

QFL President Louis Laberge says
that if Zeidler were in Quebec, they
would not be able to produce the wood
because the province prohibits scab
labour. ‘

The tape includes highlights of a
rally in Edmonton on June 8 where
building trades’ affiliates pledged
SuppOrg for the striking [WA mem-

ers.

CLC President Shirley Carr told
the rally that the trade union move-
ment is committed to help the strik-
ers on the picket line “until justice
comes” — in the form of a proper
collective agreement.

Anna Gardiner, plant chairman in
Edmonton, said that the strikers,
while they are hurting bad, are pre-
pared to stay out as long as it takes.

Rally supports
local strikers

EDMONTON, ALBERTA — More
than 600 demonstrators organized by
the Alberta Workers’ Rights Action
Committee were here outside the
Zeidler plywood plant on September
9, to speak out against the provincial
government and its anti-worker lab-
our legislation.

A new Alberta Labour Code, intro-
duced in November, 1988 has mobi-
lized Alberta Federation of Labour
affiliates. In the spring of this year,
the A.F.L. formed the Action Com-
mittee to assist affiliates in a strike
situation and in organizing drives.
The Committee consists of represen-
tatives of all A.F.L. affiliates.

The new labour law changes now
says that a strike will be terminated
after two years along with the collec-
tive agreement.

Certification votes are tougher to
get as the Alberta Labour Relations
Board has no power to authorize auto-
matic certifications in any case of
employer interference.

“The protest was organized to bring

(Continued on page 3)

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2/LUMBERWORKER/SEPTI EMBER, 1989

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