Employer reprisals against workers who took part in the Canadian Labor Congress’ National Day of Protest will be met with “united and combined Counter-actions by the labor Movement’’ the CLC announced last week, The statement from the central labor body was issued following Teports that a number of em- Ployers across the country had Imtiated disciplinary actions, in Some cases outright dismissal, against union members who took Part in the October 14 protest. Art Kube, CLC coordinator for. the Day of Protest in this province told the Tribune that. generally Vol. 38, No. 43 most employers in B.C. “realized that the protest was directed against government policy ahd not the employers and have let the day go by without taking any action.” He did say that there were a few exceptions to that attitude, par- ticularly in the Vancouver post office and-a “couple of other employers” but - that these situations seem to have been resolved. The Vancouver post office suspended 15 employees for “‘activities on the picket line Oc- tober 13 and 14” but was forced to drop all disciplinary action after postmaster general Jean-Jacques Blais denied that they were being disciplined for their participation in the CLC protest. A similar situation existed in the Village of Hope where the village council suspended the entire works staff after they had all stayed away from their jobs on October 14, but it again was forced to retreat in the face of opposition from the workers’ union, the Canadian Union of Public Employees. Kube said that all situations of disciplinary action being taken against participants in the protest have not been resolved however. “Naturally I’m concerned over the, fact that the pulp and paper em- ployers have appealed to the Labor Relations Board to determine whether or not the pulp and paper workers violated their agreement with the companies in taking part in the October 14 demonstrations. But we’ll have to wait and see how the board rules.’’ As the Tribune went to press, the LRB had not handed down any decision. One case which Kube said he is “narticularly hot’ over involves an unorganized worker. ‘‘In this case, a woman working in the office of an organized shop, though the office was not organized, wrote her employers that in all con- science she could not work on the Day of Protest. However, the organized workers in the shop refused to take part in the demonstrations and when this woman returned to work on Oc- tober 15 she was told that she no longer had a job.” He said that the CLC had retained the services of former attorney-general Alex MacDonald to fight her case through the civil courts. “IT want to make it clear that the CLC intends to support each and every person who faces actions as aresult of taking part in the Day of Protest. We will take any action necessary to assist workers who have been unfairly treated by employers,’ Kube stressed. Though most B.C. employers have adopted a hands-off approach see REPRISALS pg. 12 Eight representatives of the Japan Council ag Members of the Pacific Life Community an Consulate Thursday demanding a ban of nuclear weapons. The en’ of the bombing of Nagasaki, also met with trade unionist APAn ainst A and H Bombs who visited Vancouver last week joined d the Peace Action League in a vigil outside the American delegation, some of whose members were s and others during their stay. (Story page —Sean Griffin photo Jeff Power, president of the : Shipyard General Workers’ Federation of B.C., said this week that the marine workers’ organization was going to press on with its campaign for the con- struction of a Canadian merchant marine. Power said that this has long been a policy of his federation, ‘but that it became a major issue in the last month as less than one-half of the shipbuilding workforce in the province of B.C. is now working. Power said that this ‘“‘critical’’ situation had not changed in the last month despite the fact that he had made an urgent appeal to the federal government and prime minister Trudeau that immediate steps be taken to alleviate the situation. In a letter to the prime minister, Power had requested a meeting to discuss the situation, but he said that the only response he received was a letter from Trudeau’s assistant which said, ‘‘something like ‘Hello. The weather’s fine’. Beyond that we haven't received any communication from the federal government.” The B.C. Teachers’ Federation Will appeal through the courts to test the validity of the retroactive aspects of recent decisions by the Anti-Inflation Board.’’ BCTF President Bill Broadley said this _ Week. Broadley was referring to IB ordered rollbacks in teachers _ Wages which were applied back to _ January tof this year, even though € provincial government did not _ €nter the program until nearly six Months after this date on June 23. The BCTF claims that because €y were not covered by the = Controls program until June, the AIB has no power to order their Wages rolled back to any date Previous to June 23. The AIB fuling came on Sep- tember 30, and it ordered roll cks in four of the province’s larger school districts — Van- Couver, Coquitlam, Burnaby, and Surrey — of up to five per cent. Since then a number of other Cuse to go before courts BILL BROADLEY districts have seen their wages slashed, In all cases, teachers not only had their wages cut, but were given 30 days in which to pay back an average of $500 each to local school boards, the amount of _available.”’ wages which they had received over and above the AIB figure. At the time of the AIB rollbacks, BCTF president Broadley said that the AIB had “‘totally shafted a group of employees committed to following the legal processes Broadley was referring to the fact that the set- tlements which were slashed were all arrived at by the final and binding arbitration procedures contained within the Public Schools Act. — The board’s ruling had ‘“‘kicked the feet” from under the Public Schools Act which for ‘four decades guaranteed stability in teachers’ salary bargaining,”’ Broadley charged. — In addition to launching court proceedings, the BCTF executive committee announced that it had approved a number of other ac- tions to counter the AIB rollbacks. The executive committee urged all local associations not to enter into two year agreements for the 1976 and 1977 bargaining years, and _ ‘see PAY CUT pg. 11 _ telegram Power Said that since the letter to Trudeau, both the Shipyard General Workers’ Federation and the Marineworkers and Boiler- makers Industrial Union have written to “every federal depart- ment which has anything at all to do with ship-building, just to point out how critical the employment see SHIPYARD pg. 12 CP protests ? junta murder The Communist Party of Canada last week demanded that the federal government, both in its own name and through the United Nations, protest the murder last month of Marti Uharti, slain by Chile’s fascist military. Uharti was a member of the central committee of the Com- munist Party of Chile, a teacher and had held a responsible post in the Popular Unity government of Salvador Allende. She had been arrested August 9. Her body was found September 12. “She is thus the first of hundreds of ‘missing’ victims of fascist terror in» Chile whose fate has become known,”’ the CP said in its to prime minister Trudeau. The message called on the federal government to protest the murder and to demand of the Chilean junta “‘that it disclose the state of its other victims and end its inhuman attacks on the people of Chile.”’ COPE plans noon rally fo protest fare boost The Committee of Progressive Electors has called a demonstration against proposed bus fare increases for noon, Monday, November 1 COPE iaayoralty candidate Bruce Yorke announced this week. Yorke said that the demonstration would be held in front of the B.C. Hydro Building, 970 Burrard, and that after the demonstration he, and other COPE candidates intended to meet with Hydro chairman Robert Bonner. “I don’t know if he’ll want to see us, but we’re going to try and see him, in a reasonable fashion of course. We want to tell him what our position is on his threatened bus fare increases and I think that we’ll have several thousand named on a petition urging him to hold bus fares at 25 cents,’ Yorke said, Further information is available at COPE headquarters, 251-1207.