A PT SPECIAL The youth of British Columbia, together with a good many of their elders, are acutely aware of the fact that this province is experiencing a severe unemployment crisis. In the simple arithmetical language of the Dominion Bureau of Statistics, this is the picture: unemployment appear in British Columbia in exaggerated form, and the resulting unemployment problem is accordingly especially severe in this province. _As the consequence of long- standing government policy, we are primarily a raw material producing Labor Force December 11, 1965 669,000 December 10, 1966 717,000 December 9, 1967 778,000 Percent Unemployment Unemployment 22,000 3.3 40,000 5.6 49,000 6.3 According to these figures, the number of unemployed has more than doubled, and the percentage of people out -of work has almost doubled. The figures, of course, are minimized. For certain classes of persons, such as married women and elderly persons, are considered, when out of work, to be ‘‘not in the labor force’’, rather than ‘‘unemployed’’. Thus, from, November 11 to December 9, 2,000 people unaccountably disappeared from the labor force. A closer approximation of the unemployment rate is obtained by looking at males only. This gives us 41,000 unemployed out of a male labor force of 481,000 or 82 percent, one in 12 out of work. Except for the perennially underemployed Maritimes, British Columbia has the highest unemployment rate in Canada — a rather sad commentary on Bennett's Dynamic Society. Why is British Columbia repeatedly plagued by unemployment? The pattern of recurring, excessive unemployment is not peculiar to British Columbia. It is characteristic of the Canadian economy as a whole. But the distinctive features that make Canada especially susceptible to economy. This means that we are dependent for jobs on the export of raw materials to the manufacturing industries of other countries, and hence at their mercy. Obviously, when the raw material requirements of American or Japanese industries decline, imported supplies will first be reduced, and hence any slump in their economic activity is not only reflected here, but is reflected in exaggerated form. For example, the United States obtains 10 percent of its wood products requirements in B.C., and this accounts for 55\percent of the net value of our forest products. This means that in the event of a ten percent slump in wood products use in the United States, it would be theoretically possible for the United States to wipe out more than half of our forest industry by meeting its raw material needs from its own sources. Similarly, our mineral output is almost wholly exported raw and is therefore completely at the mercy of fluctutations in U.S., Japanese and British manufacturing. As presently organized we have little control over our own economy. Despite all of W.A.C. Bennett’s boasting, the extent of B.C.’s dependence on raw material exports has increased during the Social Credit years, and our economic position has therefore become more precarious. Thus, if we examine Bennett’s green book, the ‘‘Financial and Economic Review’, we find that between 1952 and 1966, the proportion of the Provincial Product due to ‘manufacturing’ dropped from 57 percent to 49 percent! Moreover, closer examination shows that in the statistics “‘manufacturing’’ means, in the main, conversion of logs into lumber or pulp, conversion of ore into concentrates or raw metal, etc. in short, manufacture of raw or semi- raw materials. In both 1952 and 1966, output of finished, or mainly finished goods, accounted for only 20 percent of “manufacturing” or ten percent of the Provincial Product. Further, if we analyse our export picture, we find that less than ten percent of our exports consist of finished goods, and over 90 percent of our imports. While many apologists will justify this situation on the grounds of the nature of our resources, or Raw material economy cause of high unemployment alternatively the sparsity of our population, in reality it is the consequence of deliberate government policy. Actually, B.C. has all of the resources necessary for the development of secondary industry, wood, metal, oil, gas, abundant cheap power and the potentially unlimited Pacific market. What is required is government policy designed to foster secondary. industey. THIS MEANS that licenses and permits for mining our ores or logging our forests will be conditional on their use, to the extent that is practical, in secondary processing here. IT MEANS that instead of building storage dams for American power we should be producing the maximum of power in Canada for Canadian use. IT MEANS that instead of building pipelines to carry raw oil and gas to U.S. markets, these should become the basis for refining and chemical industries in our own province. IT MEANS instead of exporting iron ore and coal to Japan and the U.S. we BELLA York, was a sensation... Lily Pons’ — N.Y. TIMES. of the Bol $4.00, $3.50, $2.50 “Her American debut Sunday, Jan. 21 at the Philharmonic Hall, New She is one of the rare ones, greater than QUEEN ELIZABETH THEATRE — FEBRUARY 20th at 8:30 p.m. By special prengea(y with S. Hurok and the Soviet Embassy — the only Canadian appearance of the great RUDENKO : lyric ‘coloratura: SOprano shoi Opera | TICKETS ON SALE AT FAMOUS ARTISTS BOX OFFICE, "Main Floor, The Bay / Daily 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. / 681-3351 ae 7" “FEBRUARY mee 9, 1968-—PACIFIC, TRIBUNE — Pose ea should be building our own steel industry on the Pacific Coast. This could provide a basis for the modern industrialization of our province, a large steel fabricating industry, and steel for our shipyards which need to be revitalized by the building of a Canadian merchant marine. We will find, of course, that the international monopolies, mostly U.S. and Japanese who now exploit our resources will resist such a course. Very well! Then they can be replaced with Crown corporations that will do so. Thus, and only thus, will our resources be used for the benefit of the people of our province. . ‘Use Crow's Nest coal for new B.C. industries’ Reacting to the announcement last week that the U.S. Kaiser interests and Japanese monopolies had signed an agreement in Tokyo involving a $650 million deal for Crows Nest coal, and the fact that unemployment in B.C. had passed the fifty thousand mark, the B.C. Provincial Committee of the Communist Party, meeting last weekend, called for immediate action to develop processing and manufacturing industries in the province. The Communist Party’s statement said that Japan’s steel industry, fed on B.C. iron ore and coal, is booming while many hundreds of steel fabricating workers in Vancouver are without work because U.S.-Japanese consortiums have been given privileges and engineering rights to build plants and equipment in Japan to exploit B.C. resources. Hundreds of thousands of tons of concentrates and ores for smelting and processing are being shipped each year from mines such as Texada, Jedway, Granby, Phoenix, Pine Point, Wedge Mines, Coast Copper, Granisle, Giant Mascot, Brenda Mines, Bethlehem Copper and Craigmont. Iron ore concentrates valued at $9.50 per ton are being sold back to B.C. at $90 a ton in structural shapes; $200 a ton in tubes, gas oil pipes and many times that figure in machinery. The Communist Party statement said that by surrendering massive coal and ore deposits to foreign strippers, the B.C. government is exporting many thousands of new job opportunities and resources on which a large steel industry and modern industrial complex could be built on the Pacific Coast. It says that Western Canada needs a steel industry and has all the prerequisites, yet local steel fabricators are forced to cut back production by over 50 percent. While welcoming the expansion of coal production, the Communist Party in B.C. demands government action to develop the economy to provide jobs through processing and manufacturing of Canadian resources in Canada by Canadians, with nationalization under democratic control, and export taxes to Stimulate industrial ‘expansion. Vos? ti ‘7 ti a)