THE WESTERN CANADIAN LUMBER WORKER MARCH, 1978 By Alderman HARRY RANKIN Have you been wondering ~ how Bill Vander Zalm, the minister of inhuman _ re- sources, was able to cut social welfare expenditures by $110 million last year? Well, here’s: one example. This man had a job in a mill at Castlegar. His marriage was in a crisis. He was faced with the choice of quitting his job and moving back to their home in Wells or losing his wife. He quit his job. After seven weeks he was cut off unemployment insurance. So he went to the nearest government office — in Quesnel — and applied for wel- fare. The government bureau- crat in charge there told him that in order to get welfare he would have to move to Quesnel, because the Wells area had been designated by Vander Zalm as a ‘“‘limited work op- portunity area’. People who move to such areas are not entitled to welfare under new yeh | 3 The United Auto Workers union says it will withdraw its money from banks and other institutions doing business with the white racist regime in South Africa. UAW international president Douglas Fraser made the an- nouncement Mar. 4, saying the South African government re- fuses to allow black workers even the most basic human rights. Blacks and other non- whites makeup 80% of the South African population. ieee ree ate Sg Y ABOUT PEOPLE— MORE IMPORTANT regulations issued by his majesty, the minister of in- human resources. When the applicant protested that he had no money to make such a move, he was told to make a loan! Can you think of anything more stupid? A man who is dead broke is told that he must leave his home and move to another area if he wants to get on welfare! This man has very good possibilities of getting work in Wells as ‘soon as_ spring arrives. And he explained this to the government bureaucrat. But it makes no difference. Vander Zalm has designated 255 areas in the province as places of “‘limited work oppor- tunity”. Anyone who moves to these areas is not eligible for welfare benefits from his department. I don’t know just why he has .picked on these particular 255 spots and not included Vancouver. I: have before me the Job Vacancy Bulletin for the Lower Main- land issued by the Unemploy- ment Insurance Commission. It shows there are 17 un- employed for each job vacancy. (Exactly a year ago the figure was 11 jobs for each vacancy). For 97 clerks, ex- perienced in financial institu- tions, there are three listings for jobs. For 270 elementary school teachers there are 14 positions open. Andso on. What will Vander Zalm do next — declare the Vancouver area out of bounds for destitute people? : Right now we have 99,000 people listed as unemployed in the province. Of these 47,000 are young people between the ages of 15-24. The actual figure on unemployment is at least 50% higher because many . categories of unemployed are support, Children’s Jubilee Summer Camp is eagerly anti- cipating another summer of happy camping for boys and girls, 6 to 12 years old. Located at Orlomah Beach on beautiful Indian Arm, the camp has pro- vided thousands of lower main- land children with memorable camping experiences since 1936. Set right on the water- front and bordered by lush west coast forest, the camp af- fords youngsters ample op- portunity for boating, fishing, swimming, hiking, nature lore, and countless other acivities; not to mention the good food and com ip which they are bound to enjoy. See eee a intended to give you, the workers who have been our mainstay for many years, the first choice at selecting a ses- sion during which you may wish to send your children to camp. The session dates for this year are: July 3 to 12; July 17 to 26; July 31 to August 9; and August 14 to 23. The all in- clusive fee is $100 for each ten day session, and each session is co-educational. To obtain registration forms, please fill in the attached coupon and return it to the address in- dicated. For general informa- tion, please feel free to call 526- 9933, 434-2034, or 524-2475. ed Number of Children You Would Like Forms For: .............. Please return to: Jubilee Camp, P.O. Box 3144, Vancouver, B.C. V6B 3X6 Atin: Registration Committee. not included in government statistics. Two things stand out clearly. One is that Vander Zalm saved $110 million last year in his department by taking it away from the poor, by deny- ing thousands of them even the minimum of food clothing and shelter. And he has every in- tention of continuing this policy. Secondly, this government has no intention of doing any- thing to create jobs, such as building secondary industry to process some of our natural re- sources at home. Of course Vander Zalm isn’t doing this on his own. He is acting as the enforcer for the group in power. The $110 mil- lion taken out of the pockets of the poor will be funnelled back to the big corporations in the form of tax cuts, new roads to service their industries and so on. The Social Credit party has never looked on the role of government as one of provid- ing services to people. Rather it looks on it as the agency to redistribute the wealth of the province in favor of the big corporations. This is what we will be up against in 1978 as long as this government is in power. LABOR BRIEFS ACROSS THE COUNTRY THOMPSON, Man. (CPA) — Some businesses here have been hit by reductions in sales between 50% and 75%, ac- cording to a survey conducted by the Chamber of Commerce and the Manitoba government here. The reason? Some 600 layoffs by the International Nickel Co. Real estate, banking, insur- ance and construction are the hardest-hit industries, ac- cording to the survey. * * % SAULT STE. MARIE, Ont. (CPA) — About 1,000 members of the 1,700-member United Steelworkers Local 2251 turned out recently to approve con- tract proposals calling for shorter working hours, early retirement benefits, a meaningful wage increase and an improved cost of living formula. - The workers are employees of the Algoma Steel Corp. * * * TIMMINS, Ont. (CPA) — The mayor of this northern Ontario town says he wants to use prison labour to clean the city’s streets this spring. Mike Doody, who recently welcomed a municipal workers’ strike because it saved the tax money that would otherwise have been spent on salaries, says he called for prison-labour pro- grams at last year’s meeting of the Association of Municipal- ities of Ontario. SAFETY SEMINAR Members of Local 1-367 IWA, Haney, who at- tended the Local’s two-day Safety Seminar last December. Purpose of the meet was to examine the Local’s safety record for the year and seek ways of improving the record in 1978. a mm < VIEW OF SOME the attending members who represented > specific areas of the Local Union. ; ow PP sb dab, p as Cap ‘ ' 2 7 yg ge yi r. OE BG? A SPECIAL FEATURE of the conference was a session on “Home -Safety’’ which was convened by local union staff members Alice Walsh and Sandra Williamson. The class which also included Diane Johnson, Linda Campbell, Pat Larsen, R. Bate, S. Bawa, S. Kuhar, Bev Gagnon, Alice Peterson, U. Nijjer and Diane Wall, was tutored by Max Salter, Regional Director of Safety and Health. =— WCB Inspector Al Anderson dealt with the subject of “People Problems” during the sessions chaired by Local Safety Director Gordon Claypool. Group left, Business Agent Mike Campbell, Al Anderson, Gordon Claypool, Regional Safety Council Secretary Verna Ledger. PREFAB. HOUSING &§ Two more major Japanese prefabricated house makers are moving into the ‘‘two by four’’ frame house market this year to cope with sluggish de- mand for prefab homes. This is the housebuilding method which originated in Canada and has now been accepted in Japan for its economy and quicker construction time. In fiscal 1976, newly built prefab houses totalled only 150,000 units which was far short of their targeted 10% of the total houses newly built during the period.