Yarrows lockout seen in company provoked jurisdictional dispute VICTORIA, B.C.—Complete shutdown of the Yarrows Shipyards at Esquimalt was _ threatened this week, after the management fired eight workers, members of the Marine Workers, Machinists and Boilermakers Industrial Union, (CCL), in an attempt to provoke a jurisdictional dispute with the AFL and lower wage and working conditions of workers in the yard. The dismissed men, who are Stee] checkers and rackers are not Covered by the AFL agreement in} the yard. The company dismissed the men for the alleged excuse that they refused to join the AFL Shipyard Workers Federal Union, Local 238. Officials of the CCL union term the company’s action a lockout, and have declared that ‘E 9 ree press sees only one side LONDON, Eng. — The British Press’ makes no effort to presnt both sides of controversial inter- National issues, but simply swal- lows and repeats the press hand- outs of the British Foreign Office, according to World’s Press News, British counterpart of the Ameri- Can Editor & Publisher. Among the facts cited in the article are that virtually the en- tire British press printed columns of material on Peasant party leader Stanislaw Mikolajezyk dur- ing the Polish election campaign, While the point of view of the Polish government was _ totally 18nored. In August 1946, when erican planes were forced down over Yugoslavia, no major Newspaper presented the Yugoslav Side of the case, the article says. any steel moved to the yard be- fore the, dismissed men are rein- stated will be declared ‘hot.’ The Yarrows firm has_ been working on orders from Canadian National Railways and the French government totalling $5,400,000. The CCL union charges that the company has signed ‘sell- out agreements with Local 238,’ which has resulted in wage classifications being changed to the detriment of the workers involved, and wage scales 20 cents an hour lower than in the Vancouver yard owned by the Yarrows firm, and where the CCL union holds an agreement. At a mass meeting of 300 AFL and CCL Esquimalt shipyard workers last Thursday, a resolu- tion was unanimously adopted which called for the reinstatement of the dismissed men at their orig- inal job classification and asked the Provincial Department of La- bor to intervene and settle the situation on the basis of a vote of the workers concerned, to de- termine which union the men de- sire to have represent them. The meeting further resolved to “condemn any attempt to fill the vacancies created by the dispute, as anti-union. We declare that we will support the policy of the Mar- ine Workers, Machinists and Boi- lermakers Industrial Union (CCL) in refusing to work with scabs or Anti-labor features of Bill 39 scored by VLC Bitter condemnation of the strait-jacket provisions in the Provincial government’s new labor bill, was expressed in two resolutions endorsed at the Vancouver Labor Council (CCL) last Tuesday night. The resolutions which were Submitted by locals of the Pack- Mghouse Workers Union and the A, proposeq means of rallying & Mass protest movement against the anti-labor features of the Bill. The Packinghouse resolution, Which was submitted by New Westminster Local 180, noted that “the reactionary representatives Of the CMA were able to force the government to steam- Toller a piece of rotten legislation througi. the House, knowr as Bill 39, for the special purpose of hamstringing the trade union Movement.” A special conference of all la- rt organizations, regardless of affiliation was proposed, the con-. ference also’. to include other Sympathetic community groups, to Plan for a broad against the legislation. The reso- lution also urged that May 1 be Proclaimed a holiday in protest against Bill 39. ‘ : Harolg Pritchett, IWA district President, informed council dele- Sates. that .a special meeting of ‘the BC. Federation: of Labor (CCL), for the purpose of map- Ping out a program, and formu- lating tactics to defend labor’s tights will be held on Apri} 27 in Vancouver. : Jack Greenall, representing Mis- Sion Local 3867 of the IWA, brought forth a resolution ask- hg the council to give “recogni- tion to the fact that spontaneous Strikes in support of negotiating Committees will undoubtedly oc- Cur very soon after Bill 39 is Proclaimed. . .” Greenall, in speaking on the Tesolution explained that the Walkout action would be as an alternative to a general strike. The resolution also called for ‘mass labor demonstrations on May 1st of this year.” Council delegates unanimously ®ndorsed an executive resolution Calling for the council to spon- Sor a wide conference of house- Wives’ and consumer groups to FRIDAY, APRIL i, 1947 campaign | ; Camille C hia u- Tr eason temps, former three-time Premier of France, whom .a French court has sentenced to five years impris- onment for.collaboration with the Nazis, Chautemps is re- siding in the USA and will thus avoid serving a_ well- merited sentence. Seems as if in the U.S? and Canada we can provide asylum for the quislings but have no wel- come for anti-fascist refugees. launch a fight against the Federal government’s policy of decontrol of prices on essential commodi- ties. John Turner, council secre- tary noted that the Toronto Housewives’ League had taken similar action and is considering the calling of a one-day buyers’ strike in the Toronto area. handle any material produced by scab labor.’ Petitions, embodying the con- tents of this resclution are being circulated in the shipyards and winning wide support from the workers, Loggers take ‘holiday’ on 40-hour week issue Logging operations in British Columbia camps came to an abrupt halt last Saturday, as- 13,000 loggers took the day. off, maintaining their new master agreement allows the continuation of the 40-hour week in the logging industry. The loggers will continue to work 40 hours until the decision of the government arbitration board is handed down. The board’s decision is expected on April 15. The master agreement, signed Saved from communism The U.S. decision to bolster up the Turkish regime is not to aid Turkey’s 18-million poverty-stricken people who live under a ruthless dictatorship, but to create a new reactionary base against the Soviet Union. A common sight in Istanbul, Turkish capital, is this water-carrier, shown pouring out a glassful. He must be ‘saved’ says Truman. by the International Woodwork- ers of America (CIO) and the lumber operators, states that the men shall work a 40-hour week for six months of 1947 and for the remaining six months of the year, the men are not to work more than 48 hours. The IWA interprets the agreement to mean that the men, who are not to work more than ‘48 hours, shoulg con- tinue working 40 hours. The operators, represented by Stuart Research Limited, desire the men to work a 48-hour week for the remaining six months of the year, basing their claim on Chief Justice Gordon Sloan’s in- terpretation of the strike settle ment formula last June. IWA of- ficials point out that this settle ment agreement, a_ three-party agreement between the operators, union and government, was only an interim one, in effect only un- till the present master agreement came into effect. For this rea- son, the IWA maintains that the master agreement is the govern- ing one. The Port Alberni IWA Local 185 reported that 1,500 men in the cistrict diq not report for work in the woods last Saturday, and at Comox and Ladysmith, 950 workers employed at the Comox Logging Co. remained off their jobs, in order to maintain their 40-hour work week. Reports from otner districts confirm the wide spread nature of last Saturday’s ‘holiday’ in the woods. A workingman’s car LONDON “A new Morris car is now being built for home and overseas which will be the first “People’s Car” for Britain. It is a four-seater saloon capable of 60 miles per hour and will do 60 miles to a gallon. Sir Miles Thomas of the Nuffield group has stated that his company al- ready has overseas orders worth $48,000,000. BCTF convention critical of press coverage on legislation By BRUCE M.CKLEsURGH The 1947 convention of the B.C. Teachers’ Federation this week unanimously adopted a scathing condemnation of the commercial press presented as part of president C. J. Oates’ report. While the recent session of the Legislature granted the BCTF ‘automatic member- ship’ demands (i.e., all teachers must belong to the Federation as a required qualification for teaching), Oates reported that the campaign was very nearly upset by the daily press. “Many sections of the press showed such Rupert citizens collect for China PRINCE RUPERT, B.C.—A committee headed by Mrs. Alex Gomez, to collect funds for the Bethune International Peace Hospital of North China, has raised nearly $100.00 and it is expected much more will come in before the campaign winds up. The proceeds,- amounting to $35.00, of a very well attended tea and sale of home cooking at the home of Mrs. Gomez, started the fund. The rest of the amount has been collected by canvassing and through collection books in stores. ; People have again donated gen- erously because they know that these funds will be used to help those who have suffered so much under fascist aggressors and that it is also a tribute to the great Canadian, Dr. Norman Bethune, who died serving the people of North China. an unbelievable degree of irre- sponsibility, if not deliberate dis- tortion of- the intent, and degree of editorializing in what ought to have been straight news copy, that your table officers felt it essential to resort to paid adver- tising to cambat the misrepre- sentation of fact and misrepre- sentation of intent.” Oates detailed the press ca- lumnies as follows, “many news- papers seriously suggested that we expected the government to! | pay our fees, that .we requested a closed shop, that we intended to usurp the powers of the Coun- cil of Public Instruction and the power to issue certificates, and that the legislation requested was ‘radical.’”” : The ‘radical’ denunciation, de- livered by the press in the con- text of a red-smear campaign aimed at labor and all progres- sive proposals generally, was termed ‘particularly invidious’ by Oates, who detailed the passing of similar legislation by “either a Liberal or a Conservative govern- ment in Saskatchewan in 1942, by a Liberal government in New Brunswick and a tory govern- ment in Manitoba in the same year, and by a Liberal govern- ‘ment in Prince .Edward Island ang a Union Nationale govern- ment in Quebec in 1945. “Finally,” he said, “the act upon which we patterned. our propos- als was passed in Ontario in 1944 by the Conservative government of Premier Drew. Surely the press of British Columbia is not so re- actionary as to believe that such jlegislation, passed in the Con- {servative east by - Conservative i governments, is. deserving of : the term ‘radical’. : “Unfortunately many of the MLAs and the public have a ; tendency to place, as once did your table officers, some confi- dence in the reports of the press, and, consequently, a fair consideration of the proposed legislation by° the members of the government was made more difficult.” Federation secretary C. D. Ov- ;ans joined in taking the dailies | to task, ‘branding as “completely false” statements made in a Van- ;couver Sun editorial against auto- ‘matic membership. PACIFIC TRIBUNE—PAGE 3