’

When Canadians go to the polls on May 22, one large, and identifiable section of them will be voting for the

first time.

: Who are they? The chances are that they are dis
Parties. They are quite likely to attend university,
Or maybe they would like to buy a house, but the current prices ma
quite a bit about the other things in their life, their recreational an

anada, the chances of nuclear war.
They are the young voters, whose voting for either the first or second time.

- The Liberals and Tories are

Paying a lot of attention to these

_ Voters. They’ ve hired ‘‘youth or-
~ Sanizers’’ who canvass the uni-

Yersities, hire rock bands to pro-

‘Mote their candidates, descend

_ 4Pon high schools wooing student
-©0uncil presidents. But some-

‘What to the concern of the old line

_ Parties, this approach has not

€n working too well, and for

One good reason, many of the
“young voters are not so con-

Cerned with the images being
Pushed as they are with the issues
ehind the image. Most, in fact,

fe concerned over what they

have at stake in this election, and
I's a great deal.

hile it is widely recognized
that the economy as a whole is in
deep trouble, it seems that it’s
young people who fel! it more in-
tensely. They are unemployed at
4 rate that is two and a half times
that of the general population. If
they are working, more often than

_ Rot they’re working in a low pay-

Ing job, without the benefit of
de union protection.
System that Failed
Inflation, which neither the
federal Liberal government nor
any of the Conservative provin-

_ Clal governments have been able

_ keep up the mortgage payments). .

to keep in check, eats away at

‘their standards, making things

such as homes just wild dreams.
(In Toronto alone last year 1,500
Couples, mostly young, lost their
homes because they couldn’t

hey are a big worried about the
Prospect of medicare being dis-
Mantled, not only for today, but
for their future.

In short, many of the young"

Voters feel that the system has
ailed them and they’re looking
Or alternatives. They've had
€nough of the tough guy image of
Pierre Trudeau, and Joe Clark’s
Magic grab bag of promises. They
are distrustful of the politics
Which they stand for, and don’t
trust the multi-nationals behind
them.

They are often angry and frus-

_ Canada is highly integrated
Into the world economy — espe-
Cially the American economy.

bout one-quarter of our gross
National product involves traded
800ds and services (70% of our
trade is with the U.S.), and more
than half our resources and 60%
of our manufacturing is foreign-

Owned (80% of this foreign

Ownership is American).

The state of Canada’s manufac-

turing industry is seen in the fact ~

t only one in five Canadians
Work in the manufacturing sector.

- Successive Liberal and Tory
 80vernments have pursued a pol-

icy of “Canada-U.S. integration”

and this has led to a stage where —

- 60% of our imports are manu-

factured goods while only 30% of

Our exports fall into this category.
Canada now has a deficit of

trated, looking for a vehicle by
which to express their frustration.

It’s on this basis that many
young people will decide how to
cast their ballots, on the basis of
how the parties stack up on the
issues, not the images.

Let’s have a look at the issues
facing the young generation in
1979.

e Unemployment. The track
record of the Liberals is not about
to inspire much confidence
among the young generation, and
neither is Prime Minister's at-
titude toward them (get off your
asses and find a job). Since Pierre
Trudeau took office in 1968,
unemployment has more than
doubled, and the unemployment
rate gone up just as much. On the
other side of the coin, protection
of the unemployed has dwindled,
with UIC now being harder to
qualify for, and payments re-
duced.

The Conservatives have not
proven themselves able to come
out with anything of an alterna-
tive, either in the House of Com-
mons, or on the election trail, and
in fact many of their spokesman
have called for the outright aboli-
tion of unemployment insurance.

Alternative — a Million Jobs

The alternative, and there is
one, calls for immediate
emergency measures to create
one million new jobs, to be done
through the launching of massive
low-income housing projects
(each unit of housing build in
Canada provides three jobs for
the period of one year), nationali-
zation of the key resource indus-
tries, starting with energy and the
creation of secondary industry
under public ownership: to pro-
cess these resources and stop the
export of jobs. Other parts of the
alternative program call for the
rebuilding of Canada’s merchant
marine, expanded apprenticeship
and vocational training programs,
and the creation of an all-
Canadian development invest-
ment fund to oversee the recon-
struction of urban areas, and

$11-billion in highly-manu-
factured goods. Translated into
jobs, this is almost 200,000 jobs.
This means, excluding automo-
tive trade, each dollar of our ex-
ports is matched by three dollars
of imports. In the atuomotive
trade we have a deficit of almost
$3-billion and this consists almost
entirely of imports by the Big
Three (from their own plants in

trustful of politics in Canada as represented by the old line
but find with the financial squeeze on they can’t afford to;
ke that impossible. They probably worry
d social lives, the prospects for a united

improvements to our trans-
portation system. Until all-of the
jobs needed can be provided, the
alternative promises full
unemployment insurance cover-
age, at 90% of regular wages, for
the full duration of unemploy-
ment. The alternative is the job
creation program of the Com-
munist Party of Canada.

e Education. Federally, the
Liberals have ducked their re-
sponsibilities to post secondary
education financing, sharply cut-
ting back on the money passed on
for post secondary education.
Provincially, the Conservatives
have tried to do them one better,
and in some cases have provided
increases in operating grants to
universities and colleges of as lit-
tle as 4% to offset the effects of.a
17% institutional inflation rate.

The alternative? The federal
government must cover 50% ofall
education costs, must work to-
gether with the provincial
governments to ensure an
adequate level of financing, must
begin the Canadianization and
democratization of our cur-
riculum, must move toward the
complete abolition of tuition fees,
and the institution of stipends.

Again, the alternative is the
program of the Communist Party
of Canada.

Severe Cutbacks

e Social services. The Liberal
government last fall introduced
one of the most severe series of
cutbacks to social services ever
seen in this country. Nearly
$2.5-billion was trimmed from the
federal budget in departments
such as the Canada Council, fam-
ily allowances, the CBC,
unemployment insurance, medi-
cal care, etc. The Conservatives
applauded and called for more,
for a balanced budget which
would entail even more cutbacks.

The alternative on this one is
for an expansion of social ser-
vices, including the expansion of
medicare into things such as
pharmacare and denticare, with-
out premiums. The alternative in-

the U.S.) of capital-intensive
parts. ;

At the end of 1977 Canada had
$0,000 fewer jobsin manufacturing
than it had at the end of 1974.
Eighty per cent of our industry is
located in Quebec and Ontario
(with less than 60% of our popu-
lation) — 92% in electronics, 88%
in chemicals, plastics and rubber;

cludes demands that the budget of
corporations such’as the CBC be
ensured the type of money that
will allow the full development of
our cultural and artistic heritage.
It means an increase in pensions,
immediately by 25% and fully in-
dexed. Again, the program of the
Communist Party of Canada.

e Foreign policy. The Liberals
are currently spending $4.4-bil-
lion per year on arms, and have
promised to spend $31-billion
more in the next 12 years. The
Tories are calling for an increase
in the arms budget so that it ac-

counts for 20% of our total

budget, and an increase in the size
of the armed forces. The Tories
have promised to recognize
Jerusalem as the capital of Israel,
despite the attitude of all other
countries in the world, including

_ the United Nations.

The alternative? A commit-
ment from the federal govern-
ment that Canada adopts a foreign
policy based on peace, detente

‘and disarmament, an immediate

reduction of 50% in the arms
budget, the withdrawal of Caaada
from NATO and NORAD.
Again, the program of the Com-
munist Party of Canada.
A New Constitution

e The Constitutional Crisis.
The Liberals have paraded na-
tional unity as ‘‘the’’ issue in this
election, but their approach to it
has been on the basis of bilin~
gualism, and no real change in the
status quo. The Conservatives
have said that they will ‘“‘not allow
Quebec to separate”’ even if a

87% in transportation equipment,
83% in machinery.

Quebec has twice as many
workers as Ontario in the clothing

‘industry (clothing, textiles, leath-

er, knitting mills); Ontario has
three times as many as Quebec
in the sector which includes
machinery, transport equipment,

electrical products and chemi-

cals.”

DEGREE OF FOREIGN CONTROL, BASED ON SALES, 1974
(Note that higher technology sectors have more foreign control)

Petroleum & Coal 99% Textiles 0%
Rubber 91% Paper & Allied 45%
Transport Equip — 89% Food 38%
Chemicals 83% Beverages 35%
Machinery 70% Furniture 16%
Electrical 65% Clothing 12%

og MILLIE)

JOBE

majority of the people of Quebec
indicated in a clearly worded bal-
lot that that was their wish. Both
exacerbate the. problem. Both
base their approach on the con-
cept of Québec as a conquered
people, and on a constitution of
inequality.

The alternative is a new con-
stitution for Canada, based on the
principle of Canada as a bi-
national state, French Canadian
and English Canadian, which are
bound together in a voluntary and
equal partnership with each na-
tion having the right to self deter-
mination. Again, this is from the
program of the Communist Party.

On an .issue by issue basis,
there is an alternative to the
young voters, fed up with the cur-
rent direction of the federal
government, which goes out of its
way at every turn to meet the

needs of the corporations and the

multi-nationals, but it’s an alter-
native that all too often may be
overlooked in the media circus
which elections in Canada have
become.

But, with their future at stake,
with the issues laid out before
them, many young voters seem to
be having a look at the full pro-
gram for real change that has been
offered them, a program, which
the Communist Party says, will
liberate Canada economically
from the power of the multi-
nationals and will Canadianize the
economy. The choice for change -
is « more attractive possibility for
many young voters than ever be-

-fore.

w? — election facts

Australia ranks second to
Canada in the extent of foreign
control amongst the more ad-
vanced economies; it has less than
half the foreign control we have.

A study by Statistics Canada of
29,812 manufacturing companies
shows that 100 of these com-
panies (1/3 of one per cent) ac-
count for almost half (46%) of all
business activities. Two-thirds of
these top companies were
foreign-controlled; most of the
rest are Canadian multi-nationals.

A sector by sector comparison of
the Canadian and U.S. economies
in 1974 found that in durable goods
— where we have a huge trade de-
ficit — our productivity was about
95% of U.S. productivity; consid-
ering all the problems in measur- -
ing productivity. In some indus-
tries — e.g., motor vehicles and
parts, iron and steel mills, saw
mills — our productivity surpassed
the U.S.

PACIFIC TRIBUNE—MAY 11, 1979—Page 9