The B.C. Federation of B.C. Fed rally Nov. 29 Let’s tell the Government we won't take it anymore! > ss rigrerem seston es ‘Deal with c U.S. intervention hit | Despite a torrential downpour which drenched parti Vancouver's Robson Square to voice their protest aga tral and Latin America. Several speakers cited stepped-up milita Salvador, Honduras and Guatemala as well as destabilization i Coup Chile. Organized by the Central America Support Commi Labor’s mass rall¥ against in- terest rates — organized in con- junction with the Canadian Labor - Congress | mass demonstration in Ottawa — has been set for Nov. 29 at 7 p.m. in the PNE Gardens in Van- couver. B.C. Fed rally co-ordinator Joy Langan said that plans are also being finalized for three regional rallies — in Kamloops, Nelson and Nanaimo — ten- tatively scheduled for Saturday, Nov. 25. Whey N(LIRLIUJLU WN ALLIUDUUC UN JIC ULLAL — Page 10 — NOW... TO WHICH ONE risis, cipants, more than 200 people turned up at inst growing U.S. direct intervention in Cen- ary aid to right wing regimes in El n Nicaragua similar to that in pre- ttee, the demonstration coincided = 2 a w z o* S E With other actions around the world in protest over U.S. involvement. With 10,000 members out of work in the current economic crisis crippling B.C.’s forest industry, an angry and frustrated regional con- vention of the International Wood- workers of America scorned, taunted and appealed to the prime minister and 10 provincial premiers meeting in Ottawa on the constitu- tion to take immediate action on the economic crisis. “Ten thousand of our brothers and sisters are out of work and fac- ing the bleakest winter since the depression. Unless_ there..is a dramatic turn-around soon, many~ thousands more will face the same dismal prospect. Those lucky enough to stay working face im- mense increases in mortgage and rental costs, added to all other in- creases,”’ stated a telegram dispat- ched to the first ministers by the 200 delegates as a first order of business Monday. : The debate was accentuated by the news a week earlier of the per- manent closure of the Western Forest Products mill at Honey- moon Bay on Vancouver Island, which has forced 357 workers to * geek alternative employment. IWA president Jack Munro left the convention Monday afternoon to meet with Socred forest minister Tom Waterland and Western Forest Products management, but returned to say that no progress has been made. Neither the company nor the government was prepared to do anything to put the mill back into operation. The employment situation in the industry will worsen significantly before Christmas, the Tribune ‘ IWA tells gov'ts foundin a survey of local unions at the convention. Loggers’ Local 1-71 president Ben Thompson reported that under 1,500 are presently laid off, but he said that by Dec. | there will be less than 3,000 of the 6,500in the local still working. Similar stories came from other parts of the province. Local 80 at Duncan has 600 presently laid off, but it expects the number of unemployed to soar to 2,000 out of a total work force of 4,800 before the end of November. Local 363 at -Courtenay=Campbell River has less than 200 out now, but that figure will hit 700 by Nov. 30. The large New Westminster local presently has 1,000 on lay off, but intermittent layoffs will affect another 1,800 before Christmas, president Gerry Stoney reported. However Vancouver Local 217 president Doug Evans expects the 1,000 laid off in that local to stay relatively stable. The picture in other parts of the province is no less bleak: in Prince George, Local 424 has 800 laid off out of 6,000 members, and 3,000 other members working a short week; in Kamloops, Local 417 has 500 out of 2,700 members laid off; in Port Alberni, Local 85 has 800 laid off and another 400 at the pulp mill working two weeks on and two, weeks. off; in Cranbrook, Local 405 has 1,000 workers out of work, one third of its 3,000 membership; in Victoria, Local 118 has 600 out of 2,000. members laid off; in Maple Ridge, Local 367 has 500 presently unemployed and expects the number to increase to 1,000 by See FOREST page 3 a The small boats and rubber Tafts in English Bay last Friday Were more than dwarfed by the €normous bow of the aircraft car- Tier USS Ranger but depite the handicap, the protesters got their Message across clearly: the visit of the nuclear warship is an insult to all Canadians. And Patrick Moore, president Of Greenpeace, which sent its Small craft into English Bay for € at-sea protest, commented that the presence of the 88,000 ton Carrier was yet another example” ty of U.S. “gunboat diplomacy.” The Ranger, together with two other U.S. vessels which are both docked in Victoria, arrived in this province in the middle of United Nations Disarmament Week — timing that only U.S. president Reagan and the Pentagon could insist was coincidental. Making the insult worse was the Ranger’s formidable nuclear arsenal although Ranger Captain Dan Pederson sought to soft- pedal that aspect, stating that he would neither ‘‘confirm nor deny’? the presence of nuclear weapons. But according to the authoritative U.S. Centre for Defence Information, the carrier carries several classes of aircraft, four of which are fitted to carry nuclear bombs or depth charges. Two of the aircraft — the Vought A-7 Corsair and the Grumman A-6 Intruder — carry bombs with an explosive force of 200 kilotons — more than 100 times the force of the bomb drop- ped on Hiroshima in 1945. thet Greenpeace demonstrators prepare to take their rubber raft out to join the protest against aircraft carrier. TRIBUNE PHOTO—FRED WILSON AC TROON al Ra: