Youbou report an incomplete ‘farce’ It was the report that wasn’t. Commissioned by the provincial overnment to investigate what appened to the infamous “Clause 7” -a legal clause which tied timber from TimberWest’s TFL #46 to the company’s now defunct Cowichan Lumbermill in Youbou - Victoria lawyer and report author Daniel Gelb said he didn’t have enough time to finish what government asked him to do. “We'd like to know what the hell is going on here,” reacted national president Dave Haggard. “How can they make the workers and their community wait for a so-called report that’s incomplete? This is a farce.” Gelb delivered his report on May 81, saying he ran out of time to examine 11 boxes of documents. He also claims he had insufficient time to conduct interviews on who or what left the clause out. In 1997, Clause 7 was deleted from the TFL when a renewal agreement was written. It wasn’t supposed to be, and that’s the vital link that would have forced TimberWest to operate a manufacturing facility. I.W.A. Canada Local 1-80 president Bill Routley said the government has an obligation to explain and be fully accountable on the Clause 7 issue. Even though the union launched a civil suit against the government on May 4 (see article on page eight), Routley says it’s up to the provincial government to give some straight answers. “Tt shouldn’t be up to the members in the I.W.A. to foot the bill (for the lawsuit) to discover what happened,” he said in an interview with the Lumberworker. He said Gelb could have been given more time or could have asked. for more help during his investigation period which began months earlier. “He had those 11 boxes (of documents) for a long time,” said Routley. “Certainly the I.W.A. would ask why he didn’t have enough time.” Gelb told the government he needed more money and time to do the job. The local union sent a letter to Premier Gordon Campbell, calling for a public inquiry under the Inquiries Act, which would give an inquiry commissioner the power to subpoena witnesses. The official version of the Ministry of Forests, as supplied by former minister of forests David Zirnhelt, and as filed in the government’s statement of defence, is that it was a bureaucratic error. “One bureaucrat who Gelb talked to said they (the Ministry of Forests) discovered the clause was missing and they would have put it in prior to signing the renewal over to TimberWest (in 1997), had they discovered it,” said Routley. The government actually has correspondence in which it wrote to the company, asking it to reincorporate Clause 7. It refused to. “By negligence or incompetence we believe the government or the government’s bureaucrats messed up and it’s our members who have had to pay the price,” said Brother Haggard. “It’s also the communities in the Cowichan Valley that pay the price and the province itself that pays the price with lost jobs and lost tax revenue from the economic activity those jobs created.” Routley noted that appurtenance clauses have been missed in license renewals on at least three occasions in recent years and that, in at least one case, a company agreed to put the clause back in voluntarily. “In the case of TimberWest when the government asked them the same question, the company refused,” he added. “We think it is inexcusable for the company to have acted in this way. They should have agreed to put the clause back in.” “It seems to me that, with all of the attention focused on issues surrounding the Youbou closure, now we would have a policy statement by the government (in writing) suggesting what government is supposed to do about appurtenance clauses when they come up for renewal,” he said. Since there has been no statement, Routley believes that there is no such policy in place, and that the clause may have been very well left out at the bureaucratic level, as per the government’s statement of defense. “That’s why we need a full public inquiry,” said Routley. “There should not be any guessing games on our part — the government must come clean.” The local union filed its lawsuit in the B.C. Supreme Court in early May. “If we can get the inquiry going it will shorten the number of paths that we need to take to discover the truth and seek fairness for our members,” said Routley. Union Sues Gov't continued from page two Brother Routley also said the government has, by its own admission through the Ministry of Forests, said that there is some form of negligence or that bureaucrats didn’t do their jobs. “They told us that it is government bureaucrats not doing their jobs and that’s why we lost the clause that’s connected to the Youbou mill, to the _ TFL and to the forest,” said Routley. “And now we’ve got these people out of work. And it’s irresponsible of government to say ‘we’ll tell you after the election.” In fact, the government’s own statement of defence to the I.W.A. lawsuit, filed on August 13, said people responsible for the drafting of the replacement licence inadvertently omitted Clause 7 from the appurtenance clause. “They (the preuncial government) have had all kinds of opportunities. It’s been a least 6 months since they've known that this (Clause 7) went missing,” said Routley on May 4. Routley noted the arrest of several workers and community supporters outside the Youbou mill just days before was an example of workers being taken to jail “in the passion of the moment.” He told the Lumberworker that the union is not condoning illegal acts but that it “completely understands the anger of the people impacted by these decisions” both with the company ramping up log exports and the government saying up, to that point, that the clause went mysteriously missing and it could only commisson a report. He noted that politicians in the Cowichan Valley Regional District from “all political stripes” have been in support of helping the workers keep the mill in Youbou. Routley said a report prepared for the provincial government indicated there was no urgent need to close the operation and that an investment of $10-12 million and a log flow from the public license would supply the mill and boost profits. Instead, Routley said TimberWest is exporting about 1 million cubic meters of wood annually while it is dislocating B.C. workers. Brother Haggard spoke out forcefully against the increase in log exports and TimberWest’s efforts to get rid of any log export restrictions on private lands. “It’s unacceptable that companies like TimberWest have been lobbying on a consistent basis for the right to export more off their private lands and they also want to do it (export) off their public land,” Haggard pointed out to the media. “It’s unacceptable and it should be unacceptable to the people of this province.” Also at the press conference were Ken James and Roger Wiles, members of the Youbou Timberless Society, a group of workers and community supporters founded as an entity separate from the union, during the last weeks of the Youbou mill’s operation, to represent displaced workers and forest- dependent communities in the Cowichan Valley. James, a former committee . member, mentioned that although TimberWest says that the Youbou mill has nothing to do with raw logs exports, he believes to the contrary — a belief consistent with many I.W.A. members. He said that TimberWest, if allowed to keep the TFL, can offer public logs to traditional private wood buyers. Those sales would meet sawmiller’s needs and allow the company to export surplus private logs. In an interview with the Lumberworker, Wiles said he has never been “that politically involved until now” and didn’t fully appreciate the importance of a union before. Now that he has lost his union membership due the Youbou shutdown, he’s putting energy into the Youbou Timberless Society. “What we are doing here isn’t just for the Youbou Mill,” he said. He said that the society is involved in the fight to save Youbou as both moral and social justice issues. “We've hit a nerve. It goes beyond the union movement. It encompasses social justice as a whole. The public is on side with us. Our membership is open to all.” “TimberWest has no idea of what true community is — with all their literature they talk about what a community-minded company they are,” said James. “They have no concern about what goes on in communities. Their only concern is in (the) investors’ bottom line.” a e On July 27, I.W.A. Local 1-3567 members from Fraser Mills delivered a petition to save jobs to B.C. premier Gordon Campbell's office at the Vancouver Trade and Convention Centre. Workers fight against Fraser Mills closure International Forest Products Limited is bound and determined to oversee the permanent closure of its Fraser Mills sawmill in Coquitlam, B.C. The operation, which is rooted deep in the I.W.A.’s history, is scheduled for permanent closure on October 31. It employs about 300 Local 1-3567 members. On April 18 Interfor president and CEO Duncan Davies, who is pushing for tenure and timber pricing changes in the province, announced the Fraser Mills closure. Interfor claims that an upcoming timber shortage due to the proposed “Great Bear Rainforest” on the central coast, will see log supplies drop off to Fraser Mills. ‘the union says Fraser Mills is a cost-effective sawmill and has grown frustrated over the new government’s inaction in assisting workers keep their jobs and run the operation. Either find logs to run the mill or force the company to sell it toa company that can buy the mill at a reasonable price, said Local 1-3567 president Sonny Ghag, in an interview with the Lumberworker. The local union is waiting for the government’s review of Interfor’s timber supply which was promised by outgoing president Ujaal Dosanjh during the April/May election campaign. “They (the government) have not completed the audit they were going to do,” said Brother Ghag. “We’ve been waiting for that.” Despite letters sent to premier Gordon Campbell from national 1.W.A. president Dave Haggard and Ghag, after its May 16 election victory, the government has remained silent on the issue. On July 27 about 100 workers and supporters from Fraser Mills joined with Ghag and local union financial secretary Brian Harder outside the premier’s office at the continued on page forty SS SEES] LUMBERWORKER/SEPTEMBER, 2001/9