DITORI.

Hats off to the
e Ontario NDP!

a New Democratic Party of Ontario’s

stunning win at the polls on September 6
is incredible news for workers who have
long supported the party and fought for
the ideals that the NDP represents. IWA-
CANADA members everywhere should feel
a deep sense of pride for our fellow union

| members and the many others who have

t ‘actively supported the NDP in Ontario
through thick and thin.

Seventy-four of 180 seats went to Bob Rae’s New
Democrats, as the party received strong representa-
tion in all regions of the province. The election win
ended the myth that democratic socialism would never
take hold in Ontario.

An NDP victory also signals a newly emerging ide-
alogy amongst voters for the 1990’s. The election vic-
tory is only the fourth such instance in Canadian his-
tory where social democrats have formed a
government.

Bob Rae and his new government will be inheriting
an economy already sliding into recession. The
proposed federal goods and services tax will
doubtlessly plunge some sectors of the economy into
a full depression.

Voters rejected the incumbent Liberal government
because, among other things, it was unable to fulfil
its ’87 campaign promises of fighting the Free-Trade
Agreement, cutting pollution, reducing taxes, and
reducing auto insurance premiums.

Incumbent Premier David Peterson and four-of his
cabinet colleagues were dumped by the voters who
saw the summer election call as opportunistic.

As part of the NDP platform the new government
has promised to introduce a series of measures to ben-
efit workers.

Rae’s government has vowed to ignore the
Free-Trade Agreement and provide assistance to
workers and companies adversely affected by it. More
protection and retraining is to be provided for work-
ers whose jobs are affected.

Other parts of the pro-worker agenda include
increasing the minimum wage to an eventual 60% of
the average industrial wage, extension of pay equity
provisions, the indexation of private pensions, and
improved pregnancy leave.

During their tenure, the NDP have also vowed to
legislate rights for the re-employment of workers after
disabling injuries, improve protection against unsafe
workplaces, and extend health and safety laws to farm
workers.

During the campaign Rae said an NDP government
will incur a $1 billion deficit in the first two years of
its term as it will promote economic development of
the north, put additional monies into education, intro-
duce child care legislation, and eliminate provincial
taxes for people at or under the poverty line.

To increase revenue Rae will introduce a minimum
corporate tax which has been long overdue and move
to tax higher income groups. Just how fast or on how
many fronts the new NDP government will move, of
course, remains to be seen.

The way in which Mr. Rae tackles the oncoming
recession will, to a large extent, help determine the
fate of other prospective NDP governments across
Canada. The NDP must weigh the policies of the
party with other considerations once it takes office
and the realities of power set in.

»

N

© LUMBERUORKER

Official publication of |WA-CANADA

NORMAN GARCIA, JACK MUNRO... President

Editor GERRY STONEY . . 1st Vice-President
NEIL MENARD. . 2nd Vice-President
5th Floor, FERNIE VIALA . . 3rd Vice-President

1285 W. Pender Street BILL POINTON .

4th Vice-President

Vancouver, B.C. ROGER STANYER . 5th Vice-President
V6E 4B2 TERRY SMITH .. Secretary-Treasurer
BROADWAY CHBABR PRINTERS LTD.

TRAPPED IN THE SENATE,
OUTNUMBERED BY ENEMY LIBERALS
BRAVE TORIES FIGHT TO SUPPORT
THEIR FEARLESS LEADER AND FORCE
THE GST ON A WILFUL NATION.
WILL THE REINFORCEMENTS
ARRIVE. IN TIME
WS THE TIDE OF BATTLE?

yes A PARLIAMENT PRESENTATION
DIRECTED BY BRIAN MULRONEY

INGRID RICE FOR THE LUMBER WORKER

Cuts to Ministry staff
sets stage for rip-offs

During the past decade the
supervision of logging and
forestry activity on public
lands in British Columbia has
taken a definite turn for the
worse. The Socred govern-
ment has systematically pri-
vatized and contracted out
critical services in the Minis-
tries of Forests and Environ-
ment.

The government has given
private companies and their
contractors the responsibility
for cutting and scaling their
own timber. This government
has entrusted their corporate
friends to work on an “honour”
system which provides the
companies with so many op-
portunities to shortchange
the province that any decent
British Columbian would have
to be skeptical.

Ministry of Environment
staff have been cut back so
much — approximately 20%
in the past ten years — that
they feel they are unable to
perform their tasks as trust-
ees of the public.

Scaling logs for volume and
quality of timber has been
entrusted to private license
holders or their logging sub-
contractors.

In 1989 an Auditor Gener-
al’s report stated the inspec-
tion of logging operations by
Ministry of Forests staff was
so infrequent that ‘trees
could have been cut without
harvesting data being col-
lected and forwarded to the
Ministry.”

The, Auditor General also
charged that there’s also a
high risk of inaccurate or
incomplete data being received
by the Ministry which could
result in the province being
shortchanged.

In peak season, 85 govern-
ment check scalers, members
of the British Columbia Goy-
ernment Employees Union,
can only check up on 2 1/2-3%
of the work done by the com-
pany scalers. This figure falls
far short of the Ministry stan-

dards that 5% of the scaling
be checked.

In addition private compa-
nies virtually cruise all public
timber lands for inventory
data. Their annual cuts are
based on figures that they
themselves have helped sur-
mise.

In 1980 the government
spent only $60,000 on private
contractors performing super-
visory work. By 1989 the
amount awarded to private
companies to perform those
duties had increased to an
annual figure of $190 million!

In a submission to the For-
est Resources Commissions
in May of this year, the Minis-
try of Forests indicated that
in critical service areas such
as timber scaling and cruis-
ing, planting, weeding, site
preparation, nursery opera-
tion, fertilizing, stand tend-
ing, road construction, and
fire control, from 90 to 100%
of the work traditionally done
by Ministry staff has been
awarded to private interests.

Indeed many IWA -CAN-
ADA members haven't even
seen Forest Service staff, sup-
posedly the public custodians

of public timber, on logging
sites for several years. And if
there has been any presence
of such staff it has been for
very limited engagements.

Ministry of Environment

staff have been cut back so
drastically that at the same
commission hearings in May,
Richard Dalon, Deputy Min-
ister of Environment, admit-
ted that forest approvals have
gone ahead without sufficient
input by his Ministry.

According to the Deputy
Minister of Environment,
staff shortages have pre-
vented forest plan reviews
under the Socred’s Small
Business Enterprise program.
In too many cases, the Minis-
try has been unable to protect
environmental values.

There is something very
wrong in the forests of British
Columbia. The government
has held the gates open for
rip-offs from public lands and
degradation of environmen-
tal values. It’s high time that
both the Ministries of Forests
and Environment were res-
tored to their full strength so
they can look out for the pub-
lic interest.

An open letter
to Jack Munro

Dear Brother Munro,

Ihave been guilty of ignor-
ing the terrible pain that the
IWA collective has been going
through for the last twenty
years. The moye from men
and women workers to mach-
ines in the forest industry has
brought the proud, powerful
union, the IWA to its knees.
The history of the IWA is one
of real class struggle and
determination in the face of
the most powerful monied
group in the province of B.C.
— the forest companies.

But I think, Brother Mun-

ro, that there is a silver lining
on the more recent clouds that
have beset your union in the
form of demands for environ-
mental consideration. Sus-
tainable, sensible forest har-
vest is LABOUR INTEN-
SIVE. A shift to the type of
forest management that envi-
ronmentalists are demanding
will mean a mighty step for-
ward for forest workers. The
ranks of your union will swell
— and the bosses know it.
Sincerely,
Liz Thor-Larsen
Vancouver, B.C.

LUMBERWORKER/SEPTEMBER, 1990/5