TRIBUNE PHOTO — SEAN GRIFFIN British Columbia ~ |__| Forest minister told: freeze TFLs, set royal commission Continued from page 1 Bill 28 allows for the “rollover” of exist- ing forest licences into the Tree Farm Licence program, increasing the TFLs to 67 per cent from 29 per cent of what is called the AAC (allowable annual cut). It means a vast increase in corporate con- trol of the forests, and it points to collusion by the provincial Socred government with the corporate agenda of edging out inde- pendent logging companies, laying off workers and overcutting to feed the pulp industry and the log export business, partic- ipant after participant charged. Several interveners demanded the govern- ment repeal Bill 28, set up a royal commis- sion, freeze all licence applications and place a moratorium on old-growth cutting. Rick Jeffery of the Truck Loggers Asso- ciation pointed out that as it is now, the eight top forest firms control 81 per cent of the timber in the coastal areas where the TLA, which represents small independent companies, works. Using graphs on an overhead projector, Jeffery showed the intercorporate links between those corporations: for example, MacMillan Bloedel, Canadian Pacific Forest Products, International Forest Pro- ducts, Canadian Forest Products and Weldwood of Canada. “Through intercorporate ties, 86.5 per cent of the AAC in coastal British Colum- bia is partially owned by four major corpo- rate groups,” he said. “‘Corporate concentration in this pro- vince has cost the people of British Colum- bia. We, the public landlord, have received lower resource rents and reduced employ- ment while paying for resource manage- ment. This highlights the fact that the goals of these large corporations are not the same as the goals of the people who own the resource,” Jeffery said. He said that if all the current applications for increased tenures were granted, “R90 per cent of the coast AAC would be tied up in Tree Farm Licence) tenures.” : eeu representatives of IWA-Canada island locals also demanded a freeze on all TFL expansions, and the repeal of Bill 28. Bill Routley, president of Local 1-80 said the government should look at a new TFL system — one “which would see the com- munities themselves playing a role in guid- ing their own destinies. PARKER _ committee of the Communist “Effective regulatory supervision of the timber resource cannot be accomplished by a ministry which is understaffed and over- ruled by political whim,” said Local 1-71 representative Nick Doubinin. Sy Pederson, president of Local 1-363, Said: “We are alarmed by Mr. Parker’s comments during the legislative debate on the 1988 estimates on forestry which indi- cated a policy of moving towards private management of our forests. _“This policy would see corporations given control of administering the Small Business Program, wildlife, recreation, tour- ism, water, fisheries and anything else within the geographic region encompassed by the new Tree Farm Licence. This is not acceptable,” he said. Bill 28 has been accompanied by a steady reduction in the B.C. Forest Service — by 35 per cent, according to Routley — anda transfer of forest managing powers, includ- ing lumber grading, to the companies oper- ating on the Tree Farm Licence, a situation interveners compared to the fox guarding the henhouse. in B.C., good logging practices are the exception, not the rule,” charged tree plant- ing operator David White. White, who made headlines in 1985 by revealing that the ministry had once ordered a company he co-owned to plant one mil- lion dead Seedlings, said the ministry has refused to hand over statistics on actual harvests versus allowable yields. eat think the answer is obvious. We don’t have an inventory because without one, the ministry can allow the companies to exceed substantiable harvest amounts,” he charged. Fred Mullin of the Pulp, Paper and Woodworkers of Canada, Local 2, said the Tree Farm Licence system — which he likened to a form of privatization — has meant that 3.5 million hectares of land are not satisfactorily restocked. Environmental groups backed the call for a royal commission and for community control over the resource. Catheryn Gre- gory of Friends of Clayoquot Sound, near Tofino, complained that “community based groups . .. are patronized at best and at worst are derailed by slurs and hypoc- risy” by forest companies and the ministry. Parker had made disparaging remarks about “preservationists” during the Smith- ers hearings, dismissing the concerns expressed by participants. The forest minister, who played it straight during the Parksville sessions, was reminded of this by Judith Hutchison of the Alberni Environment Coalition: “If you scratch a preservationist you'll find a citizen of this province who the right to tell his or her government what he or she feels should be done with his or her environment. “We are the mainstream of B.C. society,” Hutchison asserted. The only supporters of Bill 28 are the forest multinationals “so if you want to represent them, you’d better resign,” she said. Ernie Knott, a former woodworker representing the Vancouver Island regional Party, slammed the TFL system for monopolizing the forest industry to detriment of small independents and for removing public lands from public control. The CP regional committee called for a phase-out of TFLs and replacement by pub- lic control, the development of secondary manufacturing, an end to further privatiza- tion and a settlement of Native land claims. TRIBUNE PHOTO — SEAN GRIFFIN Museum. Innu backed in protest against NATO flights Faced with massive protest against test flights over West German soil, NATO is “exporting” its bomber tests to Labrador — where they are destroying the lives of the Innu people, an Innu chief and a West German physician warned Tuesday. But the Innu will be continuing their civil disobedience protest at the Goose Bay base — and this year they will be backed by an international protest slated for April 6, Chief Daniel Ashini and Dr. Ernst Iskenius told reporters at the Uni- versity of B.C. March 14. Chief Ashini, an Innu band council chief from the village of Sheshatshit, near Goose Bay in Labrador, was in B.C. this week as part of a Canadian tour organ- ized by the Labrador Innu to focus national attention on their campaign against the NATO low-level bombing flights over their traditional lands. His tour was sponsored here by the 230- member organization coalition End the Arms Race. West German, Dutch, British and Canadian air forces use the Canadian Forces Base at Goose Bay as the base for low level flight training in which jet figh- ters fly at extremely low altitudes — often as low as 30 metres above the ground — to test their ability to man- oeuvre and carry out bombing runs. The low level flights are part of NATO?’s military strategy called Airland Battle and Airland Battle 200, which includes deep strikes into enemy territory and the possibility of a first strike with nuclear weapons. Flying at low altitudes is intended to evade radar detection. The number of low level flights reached 6,500 in 1987 and is expected to increase by a further 40 per cent by 1990. The West German Luftwaffe alone intends 6,000 flights in 1990. But if they tests are allowed to con- tinue, it will destroy the way of life of the Innu people, Chief Ashini warned. The tests have already resulted in mas- - sive disruption of the caribou runs on which the Innu depend for survival. They have contributed to acid rain from engine vapour and extensive water pollu- tion from various exhaust gases. As a result, when the tests resume, expected some time in mid-April, the Innu will take their protest back to the runways, he warned. “We plan to continue with our civil disobedience, our occupation of the bombing range, of the runaway and the tarmacs at CFB Goose Bay,” he told reporters. “‘It isa matter of life and death for the Innu.” = The Innu first occupied the bombing range in September, 1987 and stepped up Innu Chief Daniel Ashini (1) and Dr. Ernest Iskenius at UBC Anthropology ‘training centre at CFB Goose Bay, the protest the following year. More than 100 people were arrested during the protest, including Chief Ashini, who spent two weeks in jail for his part in the action. This year, on April 6, peace activists in four countries — Britain, West Ger- many, Belgium and the Netherlands — will be demonstrating their support for the Innu in protests outside the Cana- dian embassies in their respective coun- tries. On the same day, in Vancouver, End the Arms Race will be sponsoring a vigil outside the West German consulate at 325 Howe Street at 5 p.m.to protest the flight testing. “The success of the West German peace movement (in making the flights over West German soil unacceptable) should not be diminished by allowing the government to export this terror from the air,” Dr. Iskenius said. Iskenius, a West German physician currently working at Children’s Hospital in Vancouver, said that the International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War was planning an international tour some time in the fall to highlight the danger to the Innu posed by the NATO flights. The Innu are also slated to meet with Defence Minister William McKnight and Indian Affairs Minister Pierre Cadieux March 23 to discuss the issue. ‘We don’t see anything solid coming out of those meetings,” Chief Ashini told reporters, “but we’re going to keep up the dialogue.” The Innu had called for the meeting with the federal government during the protests last fall but it was not until last week that Ottawa agreed to meet, he said. The cabinet ministers will be flying to Sheshatshit for the discussions. Also looming as a new danger for the Innu is a Canadian proposal for a NATO tactical fighter and weapons which would vastly increase the testing area as well as the number of flights. The Canadian site is favoured by NATO command because the only other site currently under consideration, in Tur- key, is compromised by earthquake activity. But the culture of Innu “cannot live hand in hand with military activity in our area,” Chief Ashini declared to repor- ters. “We want that activity ended and the proposal for NATO tactical training cen- tre in Goose Bay abandoned,” he said. “We feel that our culture is at stake and we are prepared to give up our freedom to protect it.” Pacific Tribune, March 20, 1989 « 3