QUIPS and QUIRKS

By JOHN WEIR

1 exper President Spiro Agnew has announced that according to

light opinion (his own) he is fit to fill the President’s seat. In the

a of recent U.S. history “Tricky Dick” Nixon would be well
Sed to double his bodyguard.

Rane. editorially on’ a speech in Toronto by Canadian multi-
‘i Geuaire E. P. Taylor, chairman of the Argus Corp., in which
Offered advice on tax matters drawn from his wealth of ex-

mente and his experience of wealth.” The Globe’s comment:
| _ 10 deliver the lecture, of course, he emerged from the tax haven

d * x x
Even the big business Globe & Mail could not refrain from com-

in ”
the Bahamas to which he had retreated some years ago.
* * *

firmer prime minister Lester B. Pearson says he “would hate
Meni; any country deprived of aid because.of the kind of govern-
it has.” So long as it’s anti-communist, naturally . - -
i * x x
< Nator Edgar Fournier has come up with a truly unique reason
‘: nS free university tuition in Canada. “A lot of university boys
i Bre down because their parents have to pay for them,” he
ition Cates. “It is a deterrent. I can imagine that if university tu-
Tey wes free these students would jump in the boat and become
ij, Volutionaries.”
i! Burne?” ’em poor, ignorant and docile!” is the senator's motto.
“US'is the 20th century, senator, not the 17th.
t i Bees * x *
% ’
it disp Sch members of the Upper (class) Chamber as Fournier that
| for q ve the popular notion that the Canadian Senate is a morgue
fad politicians. Their voice comes from the past and they

ff
| mit the stench of dissolution, but they simply refuse to lie down.

fu * * *

! : . .
J i Re asked “Phoney” Fink, a piecard artist of our acquaintance,
ang ,.idn’t think that the whole comedy put on by big business
“infiat, vernments about “volutionary restraints” in the “fight against
Dublig was designed solely to confuse the workers and general
“| condi: » Make out that “labor won’t co-operate,” so as to create
| itlons that would compel us to accept mass unemployment
i a Wage cuts, and let them engage in union busting. —
It aga yy proney readily agreed. “But I’m going to fool them.” .
Ow?” we asked. He winked slyly and said: putin Oi aoc

ry Y; by co-operating with them, of course!”
et * x *

i so © are told that large-scale unemployment and frozen—in fact
H if there Wages are necessary in order to bring prices down. But
and prick ALY exists such a relationship between people’s income
tead ces, would it not be reasonable to freeze or reduce prices.

» and raise the incomes?

* * *

Y progitagements always tell us that they’re going broke when ap-
| Now t, €d about increasing wages. Government and bosses both are
Y tert nS to tell us that they are doing “their share” in the “aus-
i hile ppobram, contenting themselves with “modest” profits, etc.,
my © Fhe greedy workers aren’t doing their share.

dt Cont'd from pg. 4
Wh

ich
of ¢ the great labor movement

The overriding power of the
monopolies must be controlled.
Canada needs a policy of na-

he a » ee
ji rupee becomes organized to
Te

Or a policy of Cana-

4 x fPendence. tional economic development to
| S We h eRdaascrorcs ave t out of the trouble caused by -
I COngj ave get ou cau:

‘ wrsider that eid eslors Le U.S. monopoly domination, a
gst, 8 to state that only the policy that would expand our
4 ae lishment of a “social demo- home and foreign markets, and
i our manufacturing industries, to

Sible , State will make it pos-

| i i as fast as
ve dence” win back our indepen- crease employment as

the population grows. This is the
indispensable basis for main-
ate and : taining and increasing the stan-
ee work out a policy gard of living.
Pendenge une Canadian _inde-
| entra It will be one of the
Y Pol u tasks of the anti-mono-
ee matt ited front. It cannot be
t Whilst ter of propagandizing,
3 cae € wait the election of
<trug eet, government, The
Penetray; ernst U.S. monopoly
Fr ooo and domination of
t} to. day tty is part of the day-
{ People Struggles of the Canadian’
| bringin at are the means of
inely ane about that change —

M Canaan Way to socialism

A Al
yt 2 Of this underlines the need

sf
Beek r

The struggle for such a policy
dovetails with the struggle
against the desperate move by
U.S. monopoly to take over Can-
ada’s energy resources.

The Canadian Tribune will
be commenting on Mr. Go-
nick’s position on interna-
tional unions next week,
together with the report of
other panels in the teach-

In.

See for themselves

Quebec unionists visit GDR

As guests of the Confederation
of Free German Trade: Unions,
a group of Quebec trade union-
ists, members of the Confedera-
tion of National Trade Unions,
recently visited the German
Democratic. Republic. Richard
Daignault, director of informa-
tion services of the CNTU, re-
ported on the visit in this article
condensed for Kontakt, German
language magazine published in
Canada:

I was at once pleased and be-
wildered, minutes after stepping
off the plane from Prague and
into the airport building, to be
told to forget about formalities
and routine police checks and
to just come along to a waiting
limousine.

Pleased because there was no
long wait, no fuss, just warm
handshakes and pleasant words
from welcoming trade union of-
ficials. We filled in a brief form
handed us by one of the union
men who also asked us for our
passports (which were returned
to us with visas at 8 a.m. the
following day). That’s all.

But I was bewildered, too,
because I knew that visitors to
foreign countries (even friendly
ones) don’t just walk away free-
ly from border points or inter-
national airports with local
union leaders without encounter-
ing at least one police officer.

Suddenly I remembered our
luggage.

“Say, we almost forgot our
bags!”

“Oh, that’s already in the car,”
laughed one of the officials. :

I was stunned, How could’any-
one get luggage. without stubs?

It was all there, neatly laid
out in a second car. (Regulations
here limit baggage and number
of persons per car—and appar-
ently are very rigidly enforced.)

“That was amazingly fast,” I
remarked as we drove off.

“It’s the power of the unions!”

“That was supposed to drive home

something because the answer
was meant to be final.

The power of the unions?
Maybe. But then could it be the
unions were in power? Or again
perhaps the unions were simply
in the power of the government
of which many leading figures
are also important figures in the
Freien Deutsche Gewerkschafts-
bund (Confederation of Free
German Trade unions), better
known as the FDGB. For in-
stance, Walter Ulbricht, the poli-
tical leader of the G.D.R., is also
one of the top officials of: the
FDGB. Many of the union people
“we met wore the button of the
dominant German Socialist
Unity Party in their suitcoat
lapels.

I was part of a group of three
from the Confederation of Na-
tional Trade Unions who had
been invited to the G.D.R. by
the international relations de-
partment of the 7,000,000-mem-

ber FDGB.
Naturally, some of the ques-

tions in our minds were: Are

the unions free and independent
in a communist state? Do they
wield any power?

After travelling for three
weeks up and down the roughly
200 by 300 mile territory our
question seemed somewhat out
of context in the sense that here
was a country obviously at grips
with some brutal realities, tack-

ling peacetime living like a na-

tional emergency.

. There is no unemployment.
Something like 70 percent of
employable women are working.
Every 18-year-old male is con-

Women in the German Democ-

ratic Republic use the chance to
prove their abilities in the most
interesting and responsible voca-
tions. The state makes every effort
to promote women in their chosen
professions, ease the working
conditions and protect mother
and child. :

Rosemarie Schwechow, a ship
interior decorator, is one of mil-
lions of such women. Prior to
studying ship interior decorating,
she completed a one-year ap-
prenticeship as an upholsterer.
Mrs. Schwechow has been em-
ployed in the Warnow-Werft ship-
yards in Rostock for the past 9
years. The job of a ship interior

decorator goes far beyond what:

might generally be understood
by the laymen. In addition to the
aesthetical problems involved,

_ practical and functional conside-

rations require the decorator to
have a working knowledge of the
pperation of a ship and the needs
of its crew.

scripted into the army for 18
months.

Wages and prices are controll-
ed.
People seem to be terribly
busy and earnest.

The FDGB quite clearly is

geared to the national objectives
and its obvious power stems
from the fact that it links to-
gether more than 90 per cent of
the entire working force of the
G.D.R., including professionals,
teachers, and intellectuals.

The big accent is on every-
body agreeing. People seem to
avoid arguments.

“Doesn’t anyone ever dis-
agree?” I asked at one point.

“Yes, very much so. But argu-
ments take place before deci-
sions are made. Once decisions
are made, through agreement,
then these must be carried out.”

I don’t want to give the im-
pression that there is an atmos-
phere of oppression in East Ger-
many, or that it is as drab and
dull as has been written so
many times in the past. Maybe
this was the situation some years
back. We were a little appre-
hensive, in fact, because of what
we had read.

Actually we found East Ger-
mans to be a_ bouncy-looking
bunch, well fed, well dressed,
and having a very good time for
themselves.

It’s a neat well-behaved set-.

up. There is nothing wild, not
even a scribble or a dab of paint
indicating protest (after Mont-
real, Paris and Prague we could
not help noticing). There are
government slogans posted in
abundance, even in resort areas.

‘But there isn’t a trace or smear

on them.

Of the large cities we visited
East Berlin was the starchiest
in the plushy rebuilt areas and

the most tumultuous in the vast
areas now under reconstruction.

Dresden, the city of the arts
and of famous porcelain, was
the most beautiful city on our
itinerary. People in charge of
reconstruction here seem to be
extremely sensitive to tradition,
the warm, human dimensions of
urban life.

Leipzig manages to be attrac-
tive and lively all at once. This
is of course a big commercial
and industrial centre but it is
also a university town and stu-
dents brighten up its busy cafes
and terrace restaurants.

Earlier, I mentioned that there
were brutal realities behind all

- this bustle, the new: consumer

goods, the lovely stores, the
theatres, the race to build and
produce.

e East Germans feel they
must succeed in their recoh-
struction, in the creation of a
viable industrial complex, and
in rational reorganization of
their farm production—or lose
all self-respect. They ~-have set
themselves extremely ambitious
programs and there is a kind of
fierceness about the way in
which they go about carrying
these out.

There are women on construc-
tion jobs although their work-
loads are restricted and they
don’t tackle just any kind of job.

e This is the country of hat-
red for the nazi on a scale I
have not seen anywhere for a
very long time. Hating the nazis
is a daily affair here. 4

e Russian troops are station-
ed-on_the territory.

Those Russian troops which
we did notice were extremely
well. behaved and Germans
seemed to pay little attention to
them. |

Union officials had great
praise for Russian purchases of
East .German goods on which
their economy is apparently de-
pendent to a considerable extent.

e Finally, one last brutal
reality is the climate of war pre-
paredness that somehow lurks
behind the generally pleasant
over-all picture.

Berlin, for instance, is a pecu-
liar place because when you ar-
rive there and look over the city
and what. is called “the wall”
(it’s really a lot of barbed wire,
the river Spree, houses, anda
series of tank traps—very close-
ly watched but not in any visible

way) your initial reaction ‘is

that all the stories you read
about the tension are all one big
exaggeration.

It takes quite a few days to
grasp that the real world here
lacks the superficial hysteria
that we associate with tense
situations (lots of police, guns,
etc.).

The reality is much deeper,
much tougher, much more de-
manding, much less. tolerant,
much more critical.

There are, therefore, many ne-

gative and explosive aspects to
the total reality of this country
but they are not immediately
perceptible because the positive
reality, the construction, the in-

dustrial expansion, the produc-.

tion of consumer goods, the the-
atre, the music, the fashions,
the tremendous holiday prog-
rams, organized by the FDGB
for workers’ families, are the

big outlet for German self-ex-

pression. It is this positive
reality that fuels German enthu-
siasm, and gives life here a kind
of lilt that is very attractive.

<PAGIFIC TRIBUNE—MARCH 13, 1970>Page 9