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Bian,

ALBERTA
PLUMBERS
SETTLE CONTRACT

ALBERTA — The 3,000 mem-
bers of Local 488 of the plumbers
and steamfitters union have rati-
fied a new contract which will give
them an increase in wages and
fringe benefits over two years of

1.63 an hour. The increase, to be
broken down to 91 cents in the first
year and 71 cents in the second, is
Tetroactive to May 8.

CONTINUED RISE |
IN UNEMPLOYMENT

, OTTAWA — There were
000 more unemployed in July of
this year than in the previous
Month according to Statistics
Canada. A total of 927,000 people
are now officially unemployed, the
figure for the corresponding period
year was 878,000. Only 62.8%

of working age Canadians are ac-
tually in the work force. Unem-
_ Ployment among young people be-
tween 15 and 24 stands at 14.2%.
The official figures do not reflect
real unemployment. ‘Calculations
by labor economists place the real

figure as nearer a million and a
half,

TENTATIVE PACT
AT MEAT PACKERS

TORONTO — A tentative
agreement has been reached be-
tween the Canadian Food and Al-
lied Workers and the Swift and
Canada Packers. The agreement
covering 2,000 workers at Swifts
and 6,000 workers at Canada
Packers is now before the mem-
bers for ratification.

Terms of the proposed settle-
ment provide for a wage increase
of 60 cents per hour in each year
of a two year.contract, plus im-
proved pension and vacation pro-
visions. The total package is cal-
culated in excess of 10% a year.

OFL CRITICIZES
MINIMUM WAGE |

TORONTO — The Aug. 1,
minimum wage rate increase to
$2.85 has been characterized as
‘‘mean in spirit and ineffectual in
economic impact’’ by the Ontario
Federation of Labor.

,OFL president Cliff Pilkey
noted that Ontario’s minimum
wage is the lowest in Canada out-
side the Atlantic provinces. The
Federation is calling for a
minimum wage of $4.40 an hour,
tied to the cost of living index.

8

TRIBUNE

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EIDITORILAIL
COMIMUBINT

Strange group of allies

On June 29 Parliament unanimously
passed a resolution to nominate the
“Helsinki monitoring groups in the
USSR” for the 1978 Nobel Peace Prize.
Among the seconders to the motion was
NDP member for Greenwood Andrew

_ Brewin.

On July 28, in a large ad in the To-
ronto Globe and Mail, the “Ukrainian
Canadian Committee” (Toronto
Branch) dragged out all its organizations
in print and went further. It demands

the immediate release of persons con- °

victed in the USSR recently for espion-
age and other criminal acts. It calls on
Canada to retract its ratification of the
1975 Helsinki Accords, stop all cultural,
trade and scientific relations with the
Soviet Union, withdraw from the 1980
Olympic games, etc.

Added to the more or less routine .

types of Ukrainian groups under the
“Ukrainian Canadian Committee” um-
brella (youth, businessmen, religious)
are others with strange-sounding names
and even stranger histories.

There’s the “League for the Libera-
tion of the Ukraine”, the “Association for
the Liberation of the Ukraine”, “The
Ukrainian War Veteran’s Association”
“Ukrainian War Veteran’s League”,
“Ukrainian Free Cossack Society” and
more.

Right up there is the name “Brother-
hood of Veterans of the Ist Division
UNA”. This cozy club is what is left of the
S.S. Division Galicien, a formation of Uk-
rainian fascists organized by the Nazi oc-
cupation army in the Ukraine. It took
part in military actions and was used as
part of the terror campaign against the

Ukrainian people during the occupa-
tion. Itoperated completely under direct
Nazi military command and many of its
members fled here after the defeat of
fascism.

The S.S. Division Galicien and other
Ukrainian fascist military formations
have a long and dirty history. They were
of considerable value to Hitler and here’s
what one pro-nazi journal in Lvov wrote
at the time: “The long-awaited moment
has arrived. The Ukrainian people will
once again have the opportunity to take
up arms and enter the fight against their
worst enemey — Moscow-Jewish-
bolshevism .. .”

We'll not repeat this history here,
much has been written about the subject
and it is fully documented. But to see this
“organization” and other similar old sol-
dier clubs re-living the old days and rais-
ing their senile little voices in a call for
“human rights” in the USSR is really
obscene.

Their contribution to “human rights”
was scorched-earth, murder, torture and
fascism. Today’s concern by them over
“persecution of Jews” evolves from
yesterdays mass annihilation of Jews.
Today’s cries for the “liberation” of the
Ukraine comes from yesterday’s reign of
terror and collaboration.

Persons (such as Brewin and others)
who find themselves singing together in
the anti-Soviet “human rights” chorus

with the likes of former fascist soldiers:

may want to look again. Because, even if
they don’t realize this campaign is de-
signed to torpedo détente and bring
back cold war confrontation, the old boys
of S.S. Division Galicien sure do.

Five million more tons ...

Who could be unchivalrous enough to
suggest the Ontario Tory government is
in collusion with big business? What evi-
dence could there be that the boys at
Queen’s Park are having a love affair
with their friends at Inco? :

The trusting Ontario citizen must be
puzzled at the latest gift made on his
behalf by the province’s Environment
Ministry. to Inco at Sudbury in the form
of a withdrawal of an order to have Inco
cut back its sulphur dioxide emissions
from 3,600 tons a day to 750 tons.

The order, issued eight years ago, was
revoked until 1982 — giving the corpo-
ration a free hand to drop some
5,250,000 tons of pollutants on the pro-
vince. Still worse, the new ruling
doesn’t even spell out what the com-
pany’s responsibilities are after 1982.

There’s really nothing to be puzzled
at. The company simply applied the
pressure and Queen’s Park collapsed.
Data showing the 1,250-foot stack spews
out acid rain that covers some 400 kilo-
metres (reaching Toronto’s outskirts)
and warnings that acid loads on lakes in
south-central Ontario pose a long-term,
serious environmental threat fail to
bother the government.

Speaking on CBE, -Inco’s vice-
president darkly warned that clean air
means a loss of jobs. He commended the
poyenment as “realistic” and forward-

ooking. He termed environmentalists

uninformed and idealists. He’s probably
laughing all the way to the bank.

Since when has Inco worried about
workers’ jobs? During the years it was
dumping millions of tons of poison on
the province it still managed to dump
some 4,000 workers out of their jobs.
Anyone who doubts the effects of such
polnion should drive through the Sud-

ury area and see why the U.S. chose it to
train astronauts for their moon voyages.

Swimming honors.

Graham Smith, Bill Sawchuk, Robin
Corsiglia, Cheryl Gibson and the other
members of Canada’s championship
swim team at the Commonwealth Games
in Edmonton have certainly done them-
selves and Canada proud. In winning
against Australia for the first time in
Games history, the swim team showed
that this country is a force in world
swimming. It shows, once again,. that

_ given the proper training and facilities,

young Canadian athletes can rank up
there with other nations.

Canadians will wish them luck in the
upcoming World Championship later
this month in Berlin where they will meet
the world’s best — the Soviet Union, the
USA and the German Democratic
Republic.

PACIFIC TRIBUNE—AUGUST 18, 1978—Page 3

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