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gust 4th, 1914; 57-years ago since the opening

A guns of World War 1. The “‘war for democracy’’; the

‘“‘war to end all wars’’; the ‘war to make the world fit for

heroes to live in,’ etc. and so forth. No end of fine slogans to
hoodwink the innocent.

Then, as befits a ‘‘Daughter in her Mother’s house,” but
never too sure of her status in her own, the Parliament of
Canada on August 4th officially ‘‘declared war’’ upon Imperial
Germany. _ ae.

‘When the Motherland is at war’’ piped Prime Minister
Robert Borden, ‘‘Canada is at war,’’ and for four fateful years
some 60,000 of Canada’s: young manhood paid. the supreme
sacrifice for those grand illusions:: The sorely wounded and
maimed have filled our military -hospitals -since, but their
generation is passing, to the bugle call of ‘‘The Last Post.’’ -

At home the labor movement, such as it was then, also
wrestled heavily on the war, ‘‘about it and about.’’ In 1913 the
leaders of International social democracy, meeting in Geneva,
had passed some heady resolutions, opposing the war, and
describing it correctly as ‘‘an imperialist war,’ determining
that they and their followers would hate no part in it. The
Johouxs of France, the Otto Bauers of Germany, the Ramsay
MacDonalds of Britain in 1913 were all against the war.

By September of 1914 they had all become veritable
recruiting sergeants for their respective ‘‘motherlands.’’ The
great betrayal had been consummated — and the flag of the
Second Socialist International hauled down for all time— by its
own most -vocal flag-wavers. But Labor was to pay a heavy
price for this betrayal, in terms of war dead, internal disunity,
disruption and wide-spread confusion.

Events at home of course, were never ‘‘dull.’’ There were
“war contracts” to be let out, and some of our most powerful
home-grown monopolists of today got their start on the road to
riches via these war contracts. It was estimated at the end of
the war in 1918, aside from 60,000 dead and twice that many
maimed for life, that Canada had produced some thirty new
millionaires more or less. And the story of the war contract
scandals of that-era make more interesting reading than
Boccaccio’s Arabian Nights.

Then we had conscription and the battle to keep young men
**needed’* at home stood in sharp contrast with ‘‘Kitchener of
Kartoum’’ pointing an accusing finger from every post and
billboard shouting ‘“‘your king and country need you.” With
“God” on our side it would only be a matter of weeks before
“Der Kaiser’ and all his ‘‘Huns’’ were disposed of. But Der
Kaiser with his own “‘Gott Mit.Uns”’ also, was ready to use up
the whole *‘Potsdam"’ family and then some. So instead of a

few weeks it took four years of carnage and destruction to

reach the ‘Treaty of Versailles’ — a man-made incubator for a
Hitler and World War II.

All across Canada there was strong resistance to
conscription, and the ‘‘Zombies”’ so recruited, never dis-
tinguished themselves as fighting men — not in that kind of
wars.

Down in la belle province, Quebec, there were big and
sharp clashes between potential conscripts and ‘‘constituted
authority,’’ in which the latter took a beating on most
occasions. At the end of the war in 1918 when the boys (or some
of them) ‘came marching home again’’ to a Canada where
jobs were as illusive as the democracy they had gone to save, it
became a standing joke in Quebec to hear Gaston pipe up,
‘Allo, allo Henri, were you come from, the war?’’ and Henri’s
reply, “non, non sacre, the bush.”

Perhaps, without being too conscious of it, Henri was even
then striking a valiant blow for an independent and sovereign
Quebec. which was to burst into full bloom over half-a-century
later.

Had the millions-strong of the Second Socialist
International shown the same fortitude, the same
determination, the same guts, as countless thousands of
American GI's, draft resisters and others are now showing
Nixon and company, perhaps World War 1.could have been
immeasurably shortened — and World War 11 need never have
happened. Since war, with its mass killing, destruction and
horrors, is capitalist politics in its highest expression, the
revolt of a youthful potential cannon-fodder against killing or
being killed, presents an insurmountable obstacle to a war-
mad ruling caste.

And oh yes, just before we forget. U.S. monopoly
profiteered on a grand scale in World War 1, selling war mater-
ials to all ““belligerants” alike, friend and foe, before it got into
the war itself, then presto, (you guessed it) the U.S. ‘‘won the
war.

Then the “‘peace,”’ the economic ruin, the jobless and the
hunger. Emerging from the great Hall of Versailles, the
“Tiger’’ of France, (Clemenceau) turns and says to his three
colleagues of the then “Big Four’’— ‘‘Methinks I hear a child
weeping.’ He did. That “‘child’’ was the imperialistic
aftermath of World War 1 and Versailles— which produced an
Adolph Hitler, sired by imperialism, and whose progeny now
rules in Bonn, London and Washington — all addicts of the
same schizophrenia which gave rise to World Wars 1 and 11.

August 4th, 1914: ‘‘It’s a long way to Tipperary,”’ but much
shorter if you take the Socialist route.

PACIFIC TRIBUNE — FRIDAY, AUGUST 13, 1971—PAGE 2

Regional governments eXxcust

adidas (Or Socred irres

By ALD. HARRY RANKIN

It’s mow six years since munici-
pal affairs minister Dan Camp-
bell came out with his concept of
regional government. Since
then, he has divided up the
province into 28 regional dis-
tricts. The Greater Vancouver
Regional District includes 12
municipalities and_ three
unorganized districts.

Are regional governments
performing any useful function?

In theory.a-good case can be
made for regional control of such
facilities as water, sewage,
pollution and transportation as a
means of providing better, more
economical and more efficient
service.

We now have several years of
experience by which to judge
whether it has been beneficial
or otherwise. In the Lower
Mainland the evidence unmis-
takably is that the provincial
government has used regional
government as a device to
escape its financial respon-_
sibilities.

Take hospitals, for instance,
which is now a regional function.

The provincial government used
its veto power to reduce the
amount the regional hospital dis-
trict planned to spend on hos-
pitals from $100 million to $51
million. Because hospital expan-
sion costs are now spread over
the whole region, it means that
taxpayers who have already paid
heavily to build up facilities in
their own municipalities must
now again pay to assist the hos-
pital-poor municipalities. The
result has been that in a few
cases hospital services may have
improved, but in others they
have failed to keep up with need
and in all cases they are woefully
inadequate. So all we are really
doing is sharing our poverty.

This is just one example of
how regional government has
worked out in the Lower
Mainland.

Municipalities have little
choice about going into regional
districts. The provincial govern-
ment has made it compulsory.

It has also maintained its veto_

power over regional govern-
ment decisions.
It isn’t surprising, therefore,

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of the press, would you?’

ponsibility

that regional government
Lower Mainland is view
great deal of suspicion. ' ‘a
palities have no desire ve
the right to run their own ale
when the obvious intent!
the provincial governmel
use regional government f
provide better service *
unload more costs on
taxpayers.

Municipalities are noble)
sending their most:capable®™
men. as representatives
regional boards. The st di
regional government- i
caught between unwilling ;
cipal officials and a poor
government with dev
designs, is experiencing 4
deal of frustration.

These unfortunate ©
iences do not prove tha
control is necessarily inl!
principle. But they cel ;
prove that little good Wi
from the way they a!
implemented now. « aa

If Regional Governmetl
operate, it must have ei
and most of these ne
from the provincial 8 i Jt
ment in much big8e
butions than at present.

Secondly, unless t®
autonomy to spend t if yi
‘as they see fit, and don't
keep looking over thelf sa
for a provincial velo
governments will be aad
more than a sorry apper rid
the department of "q
affairs. tion uf |

Until then, every 5
proposal from municip4 co
minister Dan Campbell nt 1
ing regional governm tio!
be viewed with the me ¥0
suspicion it deserves: “6
may sound fine, DU nell
result and intent are 5°
else again

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Tenants ask bargaining right

Tenants will petition city
council to enact legislation
which would authorize the
Tenants Organization to act as
bargaining agent in any building
where 50 percent plus one sign an
authorization form and pay
membership to such a tenants
group.

The petition urges that such a
regulation be added to the Van-
couver Rental Accomodation
Grievance Board by-laws.

Upon verification, the Board is
asked to certify the Tenants
Organization as the collective
bargaining agent for the tenants,
and ‘‘shall require the landlord
to negotiate all the rental
conditions in dispute.”’

In a statement prepared for
the general meeting of Wall and
Redekop tenants on Wednesday,
the executive said the recent
tenants strike of Wall and
Redekop buildings had been
marked with a high degree of
success, though not all
objectives were obtained.

A high degree of public
consciousness about the rental
problems in this city was created
as a result of the action, and the
responsible manner in which the
strike was conducted was
generally acknowledged, the
executive statement said.

The 18 tenants who stuck

through to the end were not ~

forced to pay the 10 percent rent

hike demanded by Wall and
Redekop last January 1.
“Seventy-five dollars remain in
their pockets and not swallowed
up into the corporate treasury of
Wand R..”’

In the case of 26 striking

tenants at Wedgewood P ff
owners fired W. 2. ine. J]
managers, withdré ut £0

percent increase, 4” a th
2 percent increas€. cai! J
cases the tena |
approximately $100 ea

Police violence hit |

Cont'd from pg. 1

Broome said: ‘‘Every report I
have received indicates that this
was a police riot, a totally
unprovoked attack on a peaceful
demonstration.”’

Inspired and cheered on by
Vancouver’s mayor, the police
have for weeks now been turning
to more and more violent
measures. They have used
strong-arm measures. in
smashing up premises and
roughing up suspected victims.
(See page 8). This has been going
on unchecked by the mayor and
police commission. They were
heading on a major
confrontation course for weeks.
And last Saturday night they
provoked it.

There have been far too many
instances of. police violence in
recent months in Vancouver and
across Canada. This is part of
the trend of growing attacks on
democracy in an attempt to

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Bs

0 1
instil fear of the
dissident and labor gr F

ng Wi

This trend to growine nt W
by the police and ve
political forces MUS” “nef
by an indignant public. yi
to start in Vanco" antl sg!
demand a full indeP? i) |
public inquiry 4. 7
Saturday’s bloody ev® yo,

An inquiry by the ae
General is not good tative
inquiry board represt 5 ;
democratic, labor 4" mul y

“sections of the ee to |

itute
should be constitut ings:

brought to account 2 ; jo i
from responsible P 1) an

Mayor Tom Camp 1006!

role in this whole — iq be
disgraceful affair
of the top items 0?
such a public inquiry: