© LUMBERUORHER DITORIA Politicians must listen to Call of unemployed masses nemployment was and is the number one _issue for Canadians in the pre and post election period. What are we going to do with the hundreds and hundreds of thou- sands of unemployed in this country? , In one form or another the voters in Canada spoke loudly of their frustration over gov- ernments who promise to help the unemployed but don’t have any success in helping workers. Canadi- ans want to work. We want to have the dignity of being gainfully employed. Fortunately during the election campaign the New Democratic Party made an issue of the Canada-U.S. Free Trade Agreement and the proposed North American Free Trade Agreement. The NDP tried ini- tially to link the issues of job loss to these so called “free trade” agreements. Canada is hurting now. Looking around and you'll see that thousands of Canadians are losing their jobs every month. Plants are closing. Jobs are going south, to the U.S. or Mexico. So who in their right mind would not link jobs to the FTA and NAFTA? We have to rebuild the NDP after the federal elec- tion. It is the only party that stands for full employ- ment and work to get out of those destructive free trade deals. Two terms of Tory government and now a Liberal government haven't and will not do much for eco- nomic justice in this country. The mark of unemploy- ment is felt everywhere. It is one of the most enduring legacies that we face in Canada. We have 1.5 million Canadians “official- ly” unemployed. Then we have another 700,00 who work part-time because they can’t find a decent full- time job. We have another 150,000 who are in work-share or reduced hours situations and finally we have about 300,000 workers who have simply given up and dropped out of the labour force. Add them all up and we have close to 2.7 million Canadians who can’t find a decent job to support themselves or their families. This is a disgrace for a country with the abun- dance of resources and the number of well educated people that Canada has. With high unemployment, bosses in every industry now have a bigger stick to use at the bargaining table. That's essentially what they've been doing for more than a decade with the help of Liberal and ‘Tory governments. With high unemployment, corporations can also exert tremendous influence over labour codes, employment standards, investment rules, environ- mental regulations, peel protection, trade liberal- jzation and a whole list of items which affect their interests. It is during these tough times of high unemploy- ment that we have to take stock in what is happen- ing. High unemployment and deficit reduction are no excuse for gutting social Brourans that we have fought so hard to establish. Too many important issues are getting buried in times of high unemployment. Just think - if Cana- da’s economy was running at full employment, would Canadian voters allow something as profound and as sinister as NAFTA legislation move through the House of Commons without a full and proper debate? Official publication of WA-CANADA ARCTA GERRY STONEY ... President Norman G: NEIL MENARD ... Ist Vice-President Editor FRED MIRON . . 2nd Vice-President WARREN ULLEY |. Srd Vice-President 5th Floor, HARVEY ARCAND - th Vice-President ‘TERRY SMITH . | Secretary-Treasurer THERE, THERE... HAVE ANOTHER IS e : : i ; 2 Clinton’s promise of NAFTA ratification in U.S. brings new assaults on Canadian sovereignty The Canadian public should not let the Liberal govern- ment’s honeymoon go on too long because the North Amer- ican Free Trade agreement is | right around the corner. On | November 17th the U.S. Con- | gress will likely vote to | approve the NAFTA which will | set a new economic constitu- | tion for our country for gener- | ations to come. | U.S. president Bill Clinton | has enlisted the help of U.S. | corporate heavyweights to push the NAFTA through Con- | gress. The big shots pouring increased millions into the |pro-NAFTA lobby include Ford, General Motors, Chrysler, and Goodyear Rub- ber. The lobbying in Washing- ton and across the United States is intense. Caught up in the U.S. style political deal making are two issues vital to Canadian inter- ests. In exchange for pro- NAFTA votes the Clinton administration is preparing to reward two particular lobbies with their way. Corporate interests in the state of California are driving | a deal with the Clinton admin- istration that will see intense | pressure put on Canadian cul- | tural industries for any pro- | tection that it may receive in ' the Canada-U.S. FTA and the | NAFTA. U.S. trade officials are | supporting California Repre- | sentative Robert Matsui’s pro- _ entertainment industry attack | against Canada’s resistance | against complete domination ' by U.S. movies, records, pub- | lication, software and intellec- ' tual property. Matsui says that “the issue | of (Canada’s) so called cultur- ‘al sovereignty is an issue of | freedom of speech.” Support for NAFTA is linked _ against new assaults against | Canada’s cultural sovereignty. | The U.S. will eventually penal- _ize us with countervails for _ protecting what Canadian cul- | ture industry we have left. In addition U.S. wheat pro- ducing states are linking their NAFTA support to counter- vails against exports of Cana- dian durum wheat to the U.S. market. Their NAFTA votes will depend on whether or not the Clinton administration promises to take countervails against the Canadian Wheat Board’s supply - management system. Former Canadian trade negotiator Mel Clark, while reporting on the dangers of the FTA and NAFTA for Coun- cil of Canadians, says the Canada-U.S. FTA is making our country an “outer shell” as discussions affecting Cana- da’s future are now being made in the U.S. “Canada cannot continue as an independent nation if it remains in the FTA/NAFTA,” said Mr. Clark in early Octo- ber. “The essence of the FTA/NAFTA is that it cedes to the United States and to the corporate sector vital powers that the provincial and federal governments have used to build an independent and humane Canada... . If negotia- tions of these agreements had been military battle they would have been the worst defeats in our history.” In an orchestrated fight back against the NAFTA the Ontario NDP government of Bob Rae has launched a legal battle to protect provincial sovereignty. Simply said, the Ontario government says that the NAFTA violates the divisions of power in the Canadian Constitution and the federal government cannot enact treaties to supersede provin- cial jurisdiction. The NAFTA obliges the fed- eral government to force provincial government to change their laws in areas such as financial services and investment, social services, and consumer and corporate regulations. NAFTA is an octo- LUMBERWORKER/NOVEMBER, 1993/5 pus that will strangle provin- cial sovereignty. To protect his province’s interests, the Rae government is demanding that the Nation- al Energy Board hold hearings on free trade in relation to Ontario energy supply. Rae is also pushing legislation which regulates electricity exports only after the needs of Ontario and Canadian indus- tries are met. Rae correctly said NAFTA “represents an effort to rewrite the economic consti- tution of North America” and attributes it’s success to the early efforts of former U.S. President Ronald Reagan’s “Enterprises for the America’s” initiative which envisioned a U.S. dominated trade zone stretching from the Arctic circle to the tip of South America. Even though Reagan was an old man, his vision was 20/20. The first South Ameri- can country to join NAFTA will be Chile where military dictator Augosto Pinochet sits behind the facade of a civilian government. In March of this year then International Trade Minister Michael Wilson lead a delega- tion of 50 powerful Canadian executives to Chile where he pronounced that Chile would possibly join NAFTA. In his report to the Council of Canadians Mel Clark focus- es back on the experience of trade disputes under the FTA. Of twenty disputes between the two countries Canada has won two. “The FTA in effect gives US. interests the right to take countervail and dumping actions on demand and virtu- ally assumes then that such actions will result in increased (U.S.) protection in one form or another,” said Mr. Clark. U.S. protectionism is increasing in spite of free trade and our sovereignty is eroding at the same time.