Organizer coordinates
Zeidler boycott

TORONTO, ONTARIO — Since 1986
Zeidler Forest Industries Ltd. has
been producing scab plywood from its
Edmonton operation while IWA
-CANADA Local 1-207 members have
been out on strike in both Edmonton
and Slave Lake.

It has been a long bitter strike
which has been prolonged by certain
distributors of building materials.

Since June of 1988, National orga-
nizer Benny Lum has been on assign-
ment to co-ordinate a boycott of
Zeidler products in Central and East-
ern Canada.

Brother Lum says there has been
some degree of success during the
boycott but that the scab products
are filtering out all over parts of Que-
bec and Ontario.

Zeidler's product, spruce plywood,
is a product for which there is a lot of
demand in Canada. It is commonly
used in large volumes in residential
construction.

© National organizer Benny Lum.

The company, in order to sell the
product, has removed its “ZEDPLY”
logo off its product. It has also
removed, in some instances, its iden-
tification number given by the West-
ern Plywood Manufacturers Associa-
tion.

The Canadian Labour Congress has
widely publicized the Zeidler boycott
and all over the country, Provincial
Federations of Labour have been
pitching in to publicize the program
and get any of their building trades
affiliates to remove the product from
job sites.

Brother Lum says the activities of
three major distributors, namely
Noranda Building Materials, MacMil-
lan Bloedel, and Weyerhaeuser have
been instrumental in flogging the scab
products.

“One of the main reasons why this
strike has lasted this long is because
of these three companies,” says Lum.

A visit by the Lumberworker to
Noranda’s distribution yard in Bramp-
ton, Ontario revealed over 30 lifts of
unmarked Zeidler plywood.

MacMillan Bloedel has been ped-
dling the wood through its distribu-
tion outlets in Montreal, Ottawa and
Kitchener while its Weston, Ontario
operation has ceased to handle it.

Assistance given by IWA-CANADA
Local 1-700 President Tony Iannucci
has ensured that MacMillan Bloedel
won't touch the scab products in the
Toronto area.

Noranda’s many outlets in Quebec
have proved a real sore spot for the
boycott. After tackling distributors
in the greater Montreal area, the scab
plywood has popped up in centres like
Hull, Quebec City, the Lac St. Jean
area, and northern Quebec.

Whenever the boycott has cut it off,
the wood crops up in some other area.
The Quebec Federation of Labour’s
Girard Rowe has been working exten-
sively on the boycott.

At the QFL’s annual meeting in
November of 1989 a new strategy was
mapped out to deal with the boycott.
Unlike Ontario, the province of Que-
bec has relatively few labour councils
to assist in the boycott’s coordination.

During the first part of the boycott
in 1988, union estimates were that
more than 70% of the plywood was
going to Quebec.

The residential construction indus-
try in Quebec is practically all non-
union, which has made compliance
with the boycott more difficult.

The national letter campaign from
CLC affiliates has helped persuade
some major lumber retailers from car-
rying the Zeidler products.

Although only Beaver Lumber has
given a written response that it will
not handle any of the plywood, other
major retailers such as Cashway and
Lansing Buildall have reduced and
eliminated the product from their
stocks.

Weyerhaeuser, according to Lum,
has created more headaches over the
past 9 months, as the multinational
corporation has been shipping the
scab plywood directly to retail outlets.

Progress in
recycling slow

With all of the concern about the
environment and saving trees, it’s
hard to believe that Canada has only
one company which actually produces
recycled newsprint.

That plant, owned by the Quebec
and Ontario Paper Co., is situated in
Thorold, Ontario. Although a leader
among Canadian provinces for col-
lecting recyclable paper, doesn’t have
the recyling capacity to handle it
adequately.

The "Thorold plant’s 100% newspa-
per production produces 150,000 met-
ric tonnes annually which is nearly
two-third’s of the annual amount col-
lected through the Ontario ‘blue box
system introduced in the late 1980's.

Only three percent of Canadian
newspapers use recycled material.
The Toronto Star, St. Catharine’s

Standard, and Brantford Exposition
are leading the way.

Canadian newsprint producers are
facing new requirements from their
American customers. By 1995 most.
states will require at least 40%
recycled content in their newspapers.

The American Paper Institute esti-
mates that 8% of landfill sites in he
US. are filled with recyclable news-
print. It also says that recycled paper
will increase by an annual rate of 5.9%
through 1992.

In British Columbia, plans for
recycled production rests on commit-
ment for major paper producers.
Belkin Enterprises Ltd., plans to
build an $80 million recycled pulp
producer for operation in 1991 if it can
get MacMillan Bloedel and Fletcher
Challenge Canada to agree to buy its
product.

IWA-CANADA'’s national forest pol-
icy calls for the immediate establish-
ment of comprehensive recycling pro-
grams, assisted by senior govern-
ments. The policy also states that
operation of recycling plants should
be built into pulp mill licensing.

© Dozens of lifts of unmarked Zeidler tongue and groove spruce plywood at the
Noranda Building Materials yard in Brampton, Ontario.

Ontario locals call for

improved worker protection

THUNDER BAY, ONT. — In a sub-
mission to the Ontario government’s
Standing Committee on Resources
Development concerning Bill 208 —
an act to amend the Occupational
Health and Safety Act, IWA-CANADA
Fourth National Vice-President Bill
Pointon, on behalf of IWA locals in
this province, called for the upholding
of the integrity of the proposed legis-
lation.

The bill, which will among other
things, give employees more rights to
refuse unsafe work, is about to pro-
ceed into its second reading in the
Ontario legislature.

“It can only be hoped that the
government has listened to the con-
cerns that labour has identified,” says
Brother Pointon.

Bill 208 also calls for the training of
joint health and safety committees.
During the submission, IWA-CANADA
cited statistics that show the “internal
responsibility” for training workers is
a 78% failure in Ontario industry.

The IWA cited statistics from the
Forest Products Accidents Associa-
tion which revealed that between
1979-88 there were 89 fatalities within
the forestry sector in Ontario along
with in excess of 12,000 compensable
injuries.

IWA-CANADA represents about
14,000 members situated in central,

¢ National fourth vice-president Bill
Pointon.

southern, and northern Ontario.
About 60 percent of that membership
is spread between locals 1-2693 in
Thunder Bay and local 1-2995 in
Kapuskasing.

IWA members in Ontario work ina
large diversity of industries.

The submission cites several safety
and health concerns of [WA members
such as stress from machine noise,
employer productivity demands, daily
repetitive motion, health hazards
relating from continued use of toxic
substances and finishing materials
such as lacquers and fillers.

Area safety conference

THUNDER BAY, ONT. — Delegates
from IWA-CANADA locals across the
country will be converging here
between April 19-22 to deal with a
wide array of health and safety issues.

For the first time in IWA history
delegates from Ontario and the Mari-
times will be meeting in a special area
conference to discuss mutual concerns
in six geographical locals.

Following that delegates from all
union locals will be in attendance at

the traditional spring health and
safety conference.

Organizers are arranging for a pre-
sentation on falling and skidder train-
ing in Ontario, which has existed
since 1989. Also scheduled will be a
guest speaker discussing health and
safety education programs. Other
speakers are to be announced.

Following the first two conferences
health and safety delegates from local
unions will meet with individual dele-
gates from smaller local unions on
April 22.

LUMBERWORKER/MARCH, 1990/13