Leo ween Bee OA Ba SS gee ; EWS Q a 4 oF) t Za - ‘eka faeifie Tribone .« NEXT TIME YOU SHUFFLE YOUR CABINET. COULD] HAVE ENEKGY ?. .]' En ‘ Sign 4. ~ zz ‘ £ NEVER ADWAY.. > TO BK Sos iS BEEN ri 6g / 7 33 < GP LAGE... en A ot WCE dT Fear. fens me lex ple 6 3 ——— aa : PA Vy >, About 15 municipalities in B.C. have already agreed to hold a referendum on disarmament in the November municipal elec- tions. Vancouver is one of them. But municipal affairs minister have no business holding such referendums, he says, because disarmament is a federal matter. God help us if we have to leave our nuclear fate in the hands of Ottawa, or Reagan. It’s precisely because we can’t trust these politi- cians, because they are promoting -a wasteful, inflation-generating tinguish us all that the people have to intervene. We have to putsome pressure on politicians to end this insane arms race. In a nuclear war, Vancouver would bea target. That’s for sure. One bomb set off over Vanicouver would obliterate our city, and in- that this isn’t a civic matter, that the destruction.-of Vancouver isn’t properly. the concern of the elected representatives of the ple on city council! Bill Vander Zalm objects. We. arms race that ‘threatens to ex. * cinerate us. Yet'Vander Zalm says » To havea referendum on disar- mament is a misuse of public funds, says Vander Zalm. To do something in an effort to save our city and the lives of our citizens is _ avery good use of public funds, I ~ would say. If a referendum will help to get some sanity back into Ottawa and Washington, it will be $6,000 well spent. Harry Rankin But Vander Zalm is hardly qualified to lecture us about the misuse ‘of public funds. It’s his fellow cabinet ministers that are entertaining their business friends here with dinners that include French wines. at $37.50.a bottle. It’s his cabinet ministers that have ‘been cavorting around New-York in chauffeur driven Cadillacs, taking in shows on Broadway with the tickets costing hundreds Peace is a civic issue, whatever minister says of dollars. And all this at public expense! So please don’t give us any lec- tures on morality, Mr. Vander Zalm. Clean up your own foul nest first. As for disarmament, it’s our Own survival and that of our children that’s at stake. It is not only the right but the duty of all municipal bodies to speak out for peace and for an end to the arms race. = I suspect very much that Vander Zalm’s real reason for trying to squelch these referen- dums is his own agreement with the redneck, bash-the-poor and give-it-to-the-rich Reagonistics being practiced south of the border and followed by his own government in B.C. Vancouver city council has gone on record as being opposed to the financial restraints which have chopped 359 beds from six area hospitals and caused the layoff of hundreds of hospital employees, and will demand the provincial government restore ‘‘adequate’’ funding to health care services. Council will also ask the provin- cial government to allocate more funds for the city’s home care pro- gram and other community-based health services, as a result of mo- tions passed handily at Tuesday’s meeting, during which most of the right-wing aldermen were absent. Mayor Michael Harcourt will express these concerns in a letter to be sent to health minister Jim Niel- sen in the near future. Council’s position comes as a re- sult of the initiatives of the three al- dermen of the Committee of Pro- gressive Electors, who persuaded a majority of councillors at the May 18 regular meeting to investigate Bylaws limit danger Three bylaws adopted at North Vancouver District Council Mon- day capped years of citizens’ effort to put meaningful controls on the shipment, storage and manufac- ture of dangerous substances in their municipality. The new regulations effectively put the lid on any plans for expan- sion of the North Shore’s chemical plants, many of which are located next to residential areas. Alderman Ernie Crist, who has campaigned for such regulations ever since he first contested a coun- cil seat, said the Mississauga inci- dent ‘“‘has brought home the danger of hazardous industries located close to residential areas.’’ Mayor Don Bell voted along with the majority for the by-laws, over the objections of aldermen John Lakes and Jim Ball who said _ the regulations would drive away businesses in the district and erode the municipality’s tax base. Such were the arguments of Brian Thorpe, general manager of Canadian Occidental’s chemical operations in B.C, At a May 17 Health cuts hit. - sion on ‘‘Women and Pensions” 32 the effects of the cuts on hospitals and the home care programs. Representatives of four groups — Jean Swanson of. the Hospital Employees Union, Heather Leigh - ton of the B.C. Nurses Union, Caf penters Union business agent Mal ty Smith, and a spokesman for thé Council of Senior Citizens Organ zations in B.C. — appeared before council to argue for opposition 10 the hospital cutbacks. Council subsequently voted fof Yorke’s motion to oppose the hos pital cutbacks, adding a rider that called for the provincial goveri ment to “‘start to divert’’ some funds into community-based serv ices. The amended motion incol- porated the sentiments of a motion from the Metropolitan Board of Health. : Aldermen also approved cily medical health officer David Kit cloch’s recommendation for fi long-term study of the region S” health care needs. council meeting he raised the spec tre of lost jobs and taxes if Occiden- tal’s Hooker Chemical plant was not allowed to “‘upgrade’’ its facilities. That ‘“‘upgrading”’ really meant expansion, and was contrary to i terests of a council-initiated citizens’ task force comprising businessmen, labor and other con munity representatives. CCW meet A plan of work for B.C. will be one of the features of a special meeting called by the Congress of Canadian Women at the Britannia Community Centre at 1661 Napier Street in Vancouver Sunday, June 20. Delegates to the recent national CCW convention and a special ses- Toronto will providea report of the proceedings, and a new executive will be elected. The meeting is set for 1 p.m. in Library rooms 1 and 2: —_— ‘any readers of the Saturday edition of the Giobe and ‘Mail were probably as outraged as we were to see the A Iso from Nicaragua, and of particular interest to trade unionists working in the field of occupational health full page advertisement inserted by the Canadian-Israel Comumittee justifying the invasion of Lebanon by Israel as an action “‘in accordance with international law’’ and in “self-defence against terrorism.”’ It claimed that “‘Canadian interests are served” by the invasion: and insists that by launching its assault troops against Lebanon, Israel has actually given ‘‘support for Lebanon’s terriorial integrity.”’ Most appalling, however, is that the advertisement literally eggs the Israeli government on, suggesting that the situation in Lebanon in which significant parts of the country have been seized by Israel ‘‘offers a unique oppor- tunity .. . to strengthen the forces of moderation and stability in the Middle East, thereby removing the causes of the present conflict.” How grotesquely distorted the meanings of words can become when they are put to the purpose of justifying ag- gression against another country. For the Begin govern- ment and its supporters abroad it seems, ‘‘moderation”’ and ‘‘stability”” are interchangeable with a policy of eliminating the Palestinian presence in Lebanon and im- posing on Lebanon — by force of arms — a government which will follow Israel’s dictate and deny any refuge to the Palestinian people and their internationally recognized representative, the Palestinian Liberation Organization. The issue is touched on elsewhere in this paper but some of it bears repeating. As it has done on repreated occasions in the past the Begin government has responded to in- dividual acts of terror with state terror; the latest invasion was begun to halt the terrorists who carried out the murder in Paris of an Israeli diplomat — a murder for which, in- cidentally, the PLO has disavowed any responsibility. For the life of one diplomat, the Israeli forces have ex- acted a price of thousands of lives on Lebanese civilians. SRR Se LA es SRST Lt LR a anger og mee eee In Begin’s policy, the right to security justifies aggressive acts, as it did a year ago when Israel carried out its bombing raid on the Iraqi reactor. That same security is supposed to justify the full-scale invasion of Lebanon, the destruction of towns and cities and the deaths of hundreds, even thousands of civilians. And, apparently for the Canada- Israel committee, it will even justify genocidal elimination of the Palestinian people. What is worse, we as Canadians are being asked to accept that. We cannot. For us, the only road to security, to “moderation and stability’ is through the immediate - withdrawal of Israeli troops and the beginning of genuine negotiations towards the establishment of a sovereign homeland for the Palestinians, That right is inalienable — whatever the twisted arguments of the Canada-Israel Committee. * * * Ww e missed the first part which began earlier this month but Vancouver readers at least can catch the last in a series of Nicaraguan films this Saturday and Sunday at the pacific Cinemateque Theatre at 1155 West Georgia. The film is The Uprising, made by German filmmaker Peter Lilienthal, and traces the Sandinista’s revolution against Somoza through one family in which the father is a ‘member of the FSLN and the son a deserter from Somoza’s National Guard. The film opens at 9:30 and in- cluded on the program is a short on the Nicaraguan literacy program. There is one drawback, however — you'll need to find a member of Pacific Cinemateque and go as their guest since administration is restricted. and safety, is Dr. Mario Epelman, the director of occupa- tional health and safety in the ministry of labor in Nicar- agua. He will be speaking on that subject at a public meet- ing in Vancouver’s Carnegie Centre at 7:30, June 24. With him at the meeting, which will be sponsored by the Van- couver Committee for Occupational Health and Safety, will be Dr. Jamie Sepulvada, the director of the Central American Health Sciences program in Costa Rica. * * * T hose readers who followed Jack Phillips’ Labor Com- - ment over the past few years will be particularly inter- ested in a new series of articles on Poland which are sched- uled to begin next week. Jack, currently working for the Journal World Marxist review in Europe, recently spent some time in Poland, analyzing the situation there and conducting interviews with various figures. The material will appear first in the Canadian Tribune and will be among the pages we regularly produce. * * * i f there were some people looking forward to seeing some pictures from last Saturday’s victory banquet, we must admit a terrible photographic blooper. There were supposed to be pictures — but in the final result all we got were perfectly exposed feet of everybody. . . the 500 Club members, the shield winners and the children who an- nounced the final drive figure. : In the hectic pace, the camera wasn’t set to a slow enough speed to synchronize with flash — and only part of the negative was exposed. And unlike many hobby photographers who put their mistakes in the garbage can, we have to admit them publicly. . | PACIFIC TRIBUNE—JUNE 18, 1982—Page 2