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BRITISH COLUMBIA

B.C. Communist Party leader Maurice
Rush last week called on the federal
government to cancel the war games
scheduled to take place at Cold Lake
Alta., this month.

An announcement from the Langley
U.S. Air Force base in Virginia said that
the military exercise was to involve both
U.S. Air Force jets and B-52 long range
bombers as well as Canadian and British
forces.

The fact that the announcement came

‘Cancel war games’ — Rush

from Virginia and not Ottawa “indicates
how far Canada is being enmeshed in
U.S. president Reagan’s nuclear war
strategy,” Rush charged.

“If Canadian officials did know about
it, why was the public not informed?” he
asked suggesting that widespread Cana-
dian opposition and the election cam-
paign were responsible for Ottawa’s
silence.

He called for cancellation of the war
games and of any further such exercises.

Brian Mulroney’s Tortes weren’t
elected on the strength of their campaign
or on the attractiveness of their election
platform. The two main factors that were
decisive to the Tory sweep were:

(1) The people were fed up with the
Liberal government which had no pro-
gram to provide jobs or get Canada out
of the depression. They wanted a change
for the better, and many people, includ-
ing working people, Were under the illu-
sion that the Tories would provide sucha
change. Brian Mulroney promised any-
thing and everything to create this illu-
sion, making scores of promises that his
Tory government will never fulfill.

(2) The corporate-owned media elected
the Tories. Both newspaper chains —
Southam and Thomson — supported
the Tories, as did CTV. The CBC went
along with that sentiment.

A survey taken during the election
campaign showed that not a single
important daily newspaper in Canada
supported the Liberals. Most were
openly Tory; a few pretended to be
neutral.

All of them slanted the news to dis-
credit the Liberals and paint Mulroney
as Mr. Clean and Mr. New. Their public
opinion polls were designed to secure the
results they wanted.

Early in July, when the election was

called, public opinion polls showed the
Liberals with 49 per cent support com-
pared to 39 per cent for the Tories. The
corporate-owned media set itself the task
of brainwashing the public to produce
the opposite result and they succeeded.
The Tories ended up with 50 per cent of
the popular vote while the Liberals went
down to 28 per cent.

To help achieve this result a Southam
poll conducted Aug. 19-22 even claimed
to have come up with a 56.5 per cent vote
for the Tories!

The distribution of seats in the new
House of Commons gives a completely
distorted picture of the relative strength
of the three major parties. It is one more
argument in favor of electoral reform, of
a system where party representation is
based on percentages of the popular vote
rather than individual constituencies.
This system is widely used in western
Europe. : ¢

Under such a proportional representa-
tion system of voting the Tories, with 50
per cent of the votes, would get 141 seats
in the 282 member House of Commons,
instead of the 211 they have today. The
Liberals with 28 per cent would get 79

Harry
Rankin

seats instead of the 40 they now have-

- Tories in action will
shrink vote majority

popular vote would get 54 seats, instead
of the present 30.

The Tory approach‘to social issues is
basically the same as that of the Bennett
government in B.C. — reduce the deficit
and increase military expenditures by
cutting social services (education, health,
unemployment insurance, the civil ser-
vice) increase taxes on working people
and reduce taxes on big corporations.

Most dangerous of all is Mulroney’s

intention to turn Canada into a military -

satellite of the U.S., with Canadian for-
eign policy just an echo of Reagan’s con-
frontationist policies.

But Mulroney won’t have it all his
own way. He was forced to promise dur-
ing the election campaign that he would
not cut social servcices and will be
quickly exposed and opposed when he
embarks on this course. Furthermore, he
cannot ignore entirely the fact that public
opinion polls show 75 to 80 per cent of
Canadians favor a nuclear freeze and an
end to the arms race.

The Tory sweep did not extend into S.

B.C. with nearly the same force it did in
other provinces. Here the Tory popular
vote went up by only five per cent, to 46
per cent, all of it at the expense of the
Liberals.

The NDP held its vote at 35 per cent,
neither gaining nor losing, although the

distribution of the vote cost it three seats.
The fact of the matter is that the Tories
did not get majority support in B.C.
I’m notat all disheartened by the elec-
tion results. I know that when the Tories
begin to implement their right wing poli-
cies they will be exposed to those who
voted for them in good faith. Their
majority support will quickly dwindle,
just as did Margaret Thatcher’s support
in Britain. :
Canadians are not disposed to allow
further cuts in their living standards or to

- have the whole burden of the depression

forced on their shoulders while corporate
profits are increasing. That sharp strug-
gles will develop against Mulroney’s
government is inevitable.

The next big electoral battle shaping
up is the November municipal election in
Vancouver. In the Sept. 4 election the
Tories, with the full support of the Social
Credit election machine, were able to win
only 46 per cent of the popular vote. The
progressive forces united around the
Committee of Progressive Electors and
the unity slate can defeat the Non-
Partisan Association, a slate run by the
Tory and Social Credit machines.

We can elect a progressive majority to
city council, the school board and the
parks board this year.

while the NDP with 19 per cent of the

2 e PACIFIC TRIBUNE, SEPTEMBER 7, 1984

COPE proposes city
plebiscite on cruise

A motion calling for a civic referendum
this fall on cancelling cruise missile testing in
Canada is set to go before Vancouver city
council Sept. 11, capping a month of peace-
related issues. :

Committee of Progressive Electors alder-
man Bruce Yorke served notice of. the
motion which if passed this Tuesday, will

_ ask Vancouverites to back city council in

requesting the federal government cancel
the tests of the first-strike weapon.

“Are you in favor of Vancouver city
council asking the federal government to
exercise its option under the bilateral
agreement with the U.S. government, to
cancel any further testing of the cruise mis-
sile in this country?” is the proposed word-
ing for the referendum suggested for the
Nov. 17 civic election.

Yorke’s motion is the latest of several
peace initiatives taken by council since the
election of the progressive, labor-backed
majority of COPE and independent candi-
dates in 1980 and 1982. Of these, most out-
standing have been support for a referendum
calling on the federal government to pro-
mote negotiations for bilateral disarma-
ment, the declaration of Vancouver as

 nuclear-weapons free zone, and moral and

financial backing for the annual Walk for
Peace event. =

Earlier this year, following the April 28
walk, council voted to urged the provincial
government to declare B.C. nuclear-
weapons free, and to press the federal
government for a national referendum on
cruise testing. Letters urging similar actions
were sent to councils of cities in the Union of
B.C. Municipalities, the Greater Vancouver
Regional District, the Federation of Cana-
dian Municipalities and major Canadian
cities.

According to a report made to the Aug. :

28 council meeting, 73 municipalities had
responded, with a majority favoring the
request.

An analysis of the responses by city staff
showed that of the cities favorably inclined

towards disarmament initiatives, several
had already taken some form of action —
either through disarmament referendums;
nuclear-weapons free declarations, OF
requests to some higher government —
provincial or federal — to take some peact
initiatives.

In British Columbia, 14 municipalities
either endorsed Vancouver’s two motions
— urging that B.C. be ‘nuclear-weapons
free, and that the federal government holda
national referendum on cruise testing — OF
passed similar resolutions. Another eight
councils endorsed nuclear-weapons free
B.C. only, while three cities favored the fed-
eral referendum.

Three cities — Toronto, Sarnia, Ont.
and Kitimat — noted they had beet
declared nuclear-weapons free, but declin
to support Vancouver’s motions. Fouf
other cities reported previous referendums
on disarmament.

_ Other cities declared their own forms of
support for peace: Windsor, Ont., reported

- it had endorsed a motion from the city oF
Stoney Creek, Ont., supporting all federal
disarmament initiatives. The city of York
Ont., passed a similar motion and Gatt
neau, Que., noted it had called on the
Quebec government to hold a referendum
on a world-wide nuclear freeze. i

In a related development, council
members also received copies of the declara-
tion made by Hiroshima mayor Takesht!
Araki on Hiroshima Day Aug. 6.

The declaration, sent with a covering let
ter to Mayor Mike Harcourt, noted Japa®
was the only country which suffered nucleat
bombing, and said the nation “shoul
adhere fast to its constitutional principles 0
peace, faithfully uphold its three non-
nuclear principles, and do its utmost 0
promote nuclear disarmament and the eas
ing of East-West tension.”

Vancouver representatives are set 10
attend the World Conference of Mayors fot
Peace through Inter-city Solidarity in Hiro
shima next August.

Non-union bids queried

The rising incidence of Vancouver city
parks jobs going to non-union contractors
— through a low-bid policy vigorously
pursued by the right-wing dominated parks
board — has drawn the concern of the
city’s progressive officials.

In the spotlight are three decisions relat-
ing to construction at various community
centres that have been taken by the parks
board in the last three weeks. In each case,
the board has favored a non-union contrac-
tor policy.

The question of one such contract — a
$1,450,000 extension to the Dunbar Com-
munity Centre awarded to the non-union
firm, Falk Brothers — will come up a city
council when it meets Sept. 11.

Council voted 6-4 at the last meeting to
hold off until then its decision on the con-
tract, following a motion and plea for more
information from Ald. Harry Rankin.

“J want to know what the wages are that
are being paid to the (construction)
workers,” he said, noting there was a

- $42,000 difference between Falk Brothers’

bid and that of the lowest-bid unionized
firm, Westmount Construction. —

“If that money was to be spread among
working people in wages, our economy
would be in much better shape,” said
Rankin.

Voting for Rankin’s deferral motion were
fellow aldermen from the Committee of
Progressive Electors Bruce Eriksen, Libby
Davies and Bruce Yorke, Ald. Bill Yee and
Mayor Mike Harcourt. Opposed were
George Puil, May Brown, Marguerite Ford
and Don Bellamy.

COPE parks commissioner Pat Wilso®
said later the Dunbar case is only one
several involving non-union encroachments
into parks-related construction. ©

Wilson said a $194,000 contract to build
additions to the Kitsilano Fitness Centfé
went to Key Construction Ventures, a nom
union firm set up by the unionized com
pany, Stratford-Hill.

Stratford-Hill, listed as the sixth highest
bidder on the Dunbar project, leases it
equipment to Key Construction under an
arrangement that has become known in the
construction industry as “double-breasting-

There were six bids below the unioniz
offer in the Kitsilano case, with a $16,5
difference between the lowest bid and thé
lowest bid from a unionized firm. Since thé
contract involved expenditures beloW

~ $200,000, it did not have to go to city coum
cil for ultimate approval, and passed pat
board with Wilson and commissioner Andy
Livingstone, a right-wing populist, votiné
against. :

City policy stipulates that contracts are

’ awarded to the lowest bidder, irrespective °

their workers’ organized status. COPE pol
icy calls for union construction of all city
facilities.

IRIBUNE

Editor — SEAN GRIFFIN
Assistant Editor — DAN KEETON Fi
Business & Circulation Manager — PAT O'CONNOR
Graphics — ANGELA KENYON

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