By RICHARD LANE

“(Hazardous waste disposal)... is
probably the first or second most serious
environmental problem in the country.
One of the difficulties is that we realiy do
not know what the dimensions of the
problem are ... We do. not even know
where the millions of tons of stuff is go-
ing. We feel that the things that have
turned up like the Love Canal ... situa-
tion are simply the tip of the iceberg. We
do not have the capacity at this time re-
ally to find out what is actually happen-
ing. In my view, it is simply a wide open
situation ...

“The public is basically unprotected.
There just are not any lawmen out there,
state or federal, policing this subject.”’

James Moorman,

assistant attorney general,
Land and Natural Resources;
U.S. Dept of Justice,

May 16, 1979

Tip of the Iceberg

Believe it or not, the Love Canal area
“‘is as habitable as the control areas with
which it was compared.” This state-
ment, after the clean-up was finished, in
an Environmental Protection Agency
(EPA) report in July 1982, supposedly
ended the tragic story of a chemical
waste dump gone wild. It is considered
the ‘*... largest and most notorious of
America’s hazardous waste tragedies.”’
(New Scientist, Dec. 1980)

deeper by the recent glaciation. The
water run-off from the glacier, as_ it
melted, filled the basins, and the Great
Lakes were born.

Ice still blocked the St. Lawrence .

River so most of the glacial waters

_flowed south down the Mississippi. La-
_ter, about 10,000 years ago, the St.

Lawrence was unblocked and the mod-
em direction of flow through the St.
Lawrence to the Atlantic was initiated.
Water thus began to flow north from
Lake Erie over the hard Lockport dolo-
mite to form one of nature’s most magni-
ficent spectacles, Niagara Falls.

Over the next 10,000 years the water of
the river eroded the rocks until the falls,
which started at Lake Ontario, had
reached its present location at Niagara
Falls, some 19 km (12 miles) south from
Lake Ontario.

Economic Development

*‘Between lakes Ontario and Erie lie
the Niagara River and its by-pass, the
Welland Canal. The isthmus which they
cross is one of North America’s most
favored locations for industrial
development, for here is to be found ...
power, fuel, and raw materials, one of the
great cross roads of the continent.’? —
North America, J.H. Patterson (1969).

From approximately 1890 on, the
Niagara area was besieged by industrial
companies trying to take advantage of
the river’s electric power and strategic
location. Steel manufacturing and chem-

‘Pollution is paid for by the
working class’

For the people who moved away, with
their damaged lives and bodies, for the
people who still live near the dump and
for Americans and Canadians who live
near the Niagara or on Lake Ontario, the
story is far from over.

There are many other toxic waste
dumps, waste disposal companies,
industrial polluters that are augmenting
the health and life dangers of the river
that has been called ‘‘the most polluted
waterway in North America’’.

The Niagara story starts some 25,000
years ago when the Laurentian ice cap,
which covered most of Canada and south
of the Great Lakes, began to retreat to
the north. In front of the glacier were left
immense basins which paralleled ancient
_ Tiver valleys, and which had been gouged

ical plants (the area has been called a
‘‘chemical valley’’) have been erected.
Over 1,100 U.S. and a few dozen Cana-
dian industries (mostly U.S.-owned) dis-

- pose of waste into the Niagara River and

into dumps in the surrounding area.

International Joint Commission

The contamination of this boundary
water is subject to the jurisdiction of the
International Joint Commission (IJC).
The commission is composed of three
U.S. and three Canadian commission-
ers, with the duty ‘‘to prevent disputes

- regarding use of boundary waters and to

settle all questions arising ...’’ In 1972
the first Great Lakes Water Quality
Agreement (GLWQA) was signed in

which the USA and Canada were to.

woth LLL AE UIE GUAM

Niagara most polluted waterway in North Americi

*‘prevent further pollution of the Great
Lakes basin ecosystem’. The agreement
was renewed in 1978 but the impressive
proposals and regulations put forward in
the renewed GLWQA have never been
implemented by either government or
adhered to by any industry. ss

“The IJC ... has been unable to play
an effective role of ‘watchdog’ ... (and)
the dismissal of all U.S. members . . . by
Reagan ... (left)... in March of 1981,
Jean Robert Roy, a Canadian, (as) the
lone member of the IJC.’’ One Cana-
dian’s term has expired and another
member had been transferred to another
job. (Paehlke and Cameron Wright,
Alternatives, Fall-Winter, 1982.)

On March 30, 1981 the Toronto Star
commented: “‘This ridiculous situation
underlines a certain negligence and lack
of foresight on the part of both govern-

. ments involved ... neither... attach a

high enough priority to the vital task of
solving shared-boundary environmental
problems.”’

These representatives of the people
are playing a very dangerous game with
the lives and health of millions of people;
four million Canadians and one million
Americans take their drinking water

from the Niagara River ‘and Lake On-

tario; millions of Americans and Cana-
dians live near the 300 abandoned and
active waste disposal dumps ‘on both
sides of the river.

Success Story Gone Wrong

Niagara had turned out to be the ideal
spot for the typical capitalist success
story (success means lots of profits). It’s
a perfect location for cross country tran-
sport (boat, rail, barge), raw materials
are close at hand (coal, iron ore), a large
supply of renewable, relatively cheap
electric power is found on the spot, and
the river and surrounding lands can pro-
vide handy, cheap, waste disposal. All
this and total, if conniving, support from
all levels of government for industry.

These big-business governments have |

allowed the incorrect and illegal dumping
(only 10% oftheir hazardous waste dump-
ing is ecologically sound) of hazardous
wastes, untreated, into the river or into

-unsafe, leaking underground dumps near

working-class neighborhoods. Records
of what and how much has been dumped
have not been kept! When disasters oc-
cur, the ‘“‘blame game”’ starts, with in-
dustry and each government level in turn

- their families put their healt

suing and counter-suing each i
Eventually the polluter gets away"
Then who pays? sae
The industrial worker who We
the plants mines and mills pays #
est price for pollution. He puts
and safety on the line every time
to work in-industry. The wor
hand
on the line in their housing.
neighborhoods near the polluting
tries and waste dumps. After @
the clean-up is paid for out of thé
the workers have paid. Pol
class problem. Pollution is paid fo!
working class.
* * *

The following topics will be di
in later issues:

Love Canal — the story of “the
most notorious of America’s hi
waste tragedies’; Buffalo and N
Falls Sewage Plants — the sto!
rape of two cities, the ransom
river, a state and a province;
dian Contribution — Pollution — §
Niagara by U.S. companies from
Canadian side; The story of thé ¢
large dumps. Three Hookels;
Chemical Waste Co., and Lake
Ordinance, Canada; Citizens’ gro"
pressure groups. Can they make@
ence?; War Politics and Poll
Reagan and the EPA. :

Richard Lane is the pseudony!
working scientist.

i]

~~, - ‘ : F +f i)
ee H

Hed OS J

Illustration by Gustave Dore for the 1”
Chateaubriand novel, Atala. “..- 19
by the river Niagara... a thousand if
bows bend and cross each othe! ®
the abyss.” 4

n-to-Ottawa Trek attacked in Regina

2:

Through 1933 and 1934 British Columbia’s Relief
Camp Workers had conducted strikes and campaigns to
win livable conditions from the B.C. and federal govern-
ments. By May 1935 they had decided on an On-to-Ottawa
Trek to put their demands directly to the R.B. Bennett
Tory government. This is the fourth of a series.

By ALEX McLENNAN
The proposal to go to Ottawa to force the Bennett
government to negotiate was adopted, and on Monday,
June 3, 1,000 strikers departed via CN and CP freight
trains, bound for Ottawa. The Strike Committee became
the On-to-Ottawa Committee; the strike became the
On-to-Ottawa Trek.

THE ON-TO-OTTAWA TREK

By June 14, the trekkers had reached Regina and
found quarters in the exhibition grounds. That night they
were welcomed at a meeting of 6,000 Regina citizens.
The meeting was addressed by M.J. Coldwell, national
secretary of the Co-operative Commonwealth Federa-
tion (CCF); T.G. McManus, of the Communist Party;
Arthur Evans, of the Workers’ Unity League; D. Fisher,

president of the Trades and Labor Council of Regina (AF

of L); as well as representatives of the Ministerial As-
sociation and the Roman Catholic Church.

It soon became evident that Ottawa had engineered ©

plans to smash the trek in Regina and prevent any further
eastward movement of the men. The first indication of
this plan was not long in coming. On June 14, a notice

PACIFIC TRIBUNE—APRIL 1, 1983—Page 10

was delivered to the Strike Committee, signed by both
the Canadian National and the Canadian Pacific Rail-
ways (CPR). The notice prohibited any further use of the
railways by the trekkers, and stated that the ‘‘proper
authorities will give every assistance and use every
means available to ensure that the law in this respect is
observed.’’*

_On June 16, Commissioner Wood, of the RCMP, sent
a confidential letter to Inspector Chesser, CPR police,
Regina, in which he stated: ‘‘Under my instructions it is
essential that the railway police take initial action in any
matter dealing with these relief camp strikers, when, if
trouble results, I am prepared to come at once to their
assistance with all the force at my disposal.’’*

The government was not only concerned with pre-
venting the eastward movement of the trek; they wanted

to force the men into a concentration camp which had-

been hastily built at Dundurn, Saskatchewan. When the
trekkers understood they would not be allowed to pro-
ceed beyond Regina, they would have returned west-
ward to their original locations, but were not permitted
to do so.

The Bennett government was intent on the physical
destruction of the trek and the arrest and imprisonment
of the leaders. It was necessary to smash the Relief
Camp Workers’ Union and have their Union declared an
illegal organization. The trekkers and all those who sup-
ported them had to be taught a lesson. Nothing short of
that would satisfy the Tory government’s thirst for
blood. This was realized on July 1, 1935, a day that will
live in infamy in the history of toryism. -

‘as its Tory predecessors, nonetheless abolishe©

~ ready marching, 450 strong, on the road to O

aan

The violence of the police attack on Dominio?)
resulted in one of the fiercest class battles ever foul,
Canadian labor. The battle raged for more tha! |,
hours. Hundreds of Regina citizens and trekke!S
clubbed, shot and hospitalized, and 120 were arre®,
This was not only one of the most difficult batt
the Canadian working class, it was also one %
greatest political importance. Four months after the (
gina events, the Tory government of R.B. Bennett r
defeated. It was replaced by the Liberal governm® f

MacKenzie King, which, having the same class M@™

slave camps; repealed section 98 of the Criminal C
introduced unemployment insurance.

That form of insurance was not non-contributory
it was quite a concession, coming from Mac
King, the man who had previously stated that he w
not give a five-cent piece for the unemployed. 4

Ten days after the march of the trekkers was halté’
Regina, the unemployed in southern Ontario va ‘a
continue the struggle started in the relief camps of @
ern Canada. j

i!
The trek of the western Relief Camp Workers, and
march of the unemployed of southern Ontario to ott

‘together combine as the most important factor ee

defeat of the Bennett government and in the ach
ment of the principal demands of the trekkers aM

unemployed generally.
*Swankey and Sheils, Work and Wages, p. 135.

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