vere SEAT UCUUUDROANOOOUGOOUURRAROUDOUOGROROOOOUCQOOROGOOOONORROOOCOOODRNORAODDOROAOONNORODOaCaRAnOOOEF— SEND FOR A COPY OF IN THE MOVE! BULLETIN OF THE TRANSPORTATION BUREAU COMMUNIST PARTY OF CANADA 24 Cecil $2, Toronto 2B. UU ee 4 PUT PACIFIC TRIBUNE--FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 11, 1970-—-PAGE 6 - -be carried No need for loss of jobs By DON CURRIE The loss of jobs on the rail- ways, on the docks and as a re- sult of the drastic decline in Canada’s shipbuilding and civil aviation industries could be re- placed with policies that serve the interests of the working peo- ple and not the big monopolies. This is dramatically revealed in a brief by the CLC’s mari- time committee which calls upon the govérnment to take advant- age of the growing world de- mand for merchant ships and to revive and expand the sagging shipbuilding industry and. mer- chant marine. The CLC brief points out that less than one percent of our $22.5 billion foreign trade is moved in ships flying the Cana- dian flag. Although one-quarter of the nation’s 135 million tons of imports and exports are transported by ship, Canadian vessels handle less than one mil- lion tons annually. Twenty years ago Canada was a maritime giant. Today, as the CLC brief points out, we are a maritime dwarf. The reason for this decline js the drive for profit by Canadian raw material exporters. Canada’s maritime trade is carried mainly in ships from countries which institute “flag - of - convenience regulations.” Many of these ships are actually owned by Canadian firms. Through this arrangement, Canadian firms earn bigger profits on what they ship and these profits are also beyond the taxation of the fed- eral government. Many of these ships transporting raw material resources are built in Japan. Therefore the Canadian seamen don’t get the jobs, the govern- ment doesn’t get the tax reve- nues and the shipyard workers don’t build the ships. Exported raw materials should in Canadian-built ships with Canadian merchant marine manning them. The up- surge of demand around the world for Canadian resources could be translated into an up- surge of. employment in the shipbuilding industry, if the Tru- deau government was acting for Canadian workers instead of for the big resource monopolies. To bring the profiteering of the raw matetial exporters under control, and turn Canadian raw material exports into jobs in Canada for Canadian shipbuild- ing workers and seamen, de- mands the immediate nationali- zation of all raw material re- sources and their development under public ownership in the interests of the country. In the first place it requires the devel- opment of Canadian secondary industry, based on the process- ing of these raw materials in Canada, and the exporting of the finished goods and surplus raw materials in Canadian vessels manned by Canadian crews. What is required is an inte- grated transportation ~ policy ‘based on the interests of the workers in these industries. Such a policy will have to begin with the struggle by the trans- portation workers and all Cana- dians for public ownership of the transportation industry and in the first place the nationaliza- tion of the CPR. With the upsurge of develop- ment of pipelines to move all kinds of raw material resources there is an urgent need for the expansion of pipelines. under public control and on an east- west basis. The amount of pipe required for. a bigger trans- Canada pipeline system to trans- port oil, gas and possibly other materials in the future would create a surge of employment in the Canadian steel industry. The demand to expand civil aviation into Canada’s north goes along with the CLC’s de- mands for the revival of the ship-building industry and gov- ernment action to aid munici- palities to expand rapid transit systems and to integrate them with passenger service on the railways. The profit drive of the CPR and the giants in the raw mater- ial extraction industries with the connivance of the government is distorting the development of the Canadian transportation workers. Public ownership and a plan to develop the country’s vast wealth is the answer to. the big monopolies that are destroy’ ing the industry and weakeniNé the economic fibre of the cou) try. In this battle rail unions hav’ a big role to play. The rail ¥ ions are leading a fight for Pu” lic ownership, for the nationali- zation of the CPR and for an integrated public transportatiom policy to serve the Canadial people, could force a change ! the present state - monopoly handout policy of the Trudea government. At the moment the railway’ have reversed the long standitb | government policy governing development of the transporla ” tion industry which in words # least, but rarely in -practist maintained that railways firs] had to consider the public intel | ests and then profits. NOW 4 government, through Bill CH by. the establishment of the | Canadian Transportation COM | mission, has not only agreed Me | but actively implements i. “profits first”: policy of the ways. The government is doine this in the following ways: ; —by its failure to defend the interests of the workers in pension fund scandal and ©? pelling the companies to st their robbery of the pensi0 ‘ fund and to increase pensions: —by its continuing and ex yd panding program of subsidies * the railways in spite of the profit margins being shown ‘ the railways in almost all of th operations. Je 4 —by failing to protect 4! way workers’ jobs by halting | the plans of the railways to % tire more and more trains from Passenger service, for agreeine to the plans of the railway ca tralization of services, by me intervening to prevent the a from reducing its clerks by } percent. The government and th ¢ railways work hand-in-glov’ through the policy of “profits first.”