.* omega _ effect on our cost of living,”’ and the likelihood of a LAY OFFS __- NOW AT A Sits gy” = MIGDONNELL TOP THE , LAYO ae — lav OFFS s NOT aay 7 DOUGLAS! 3 WAT fram ee INE PHOTO — JOHN MACLENNAN Part of the 200 workers laid off by McDonnell Douglas Sept. 4. This brings a total of 2,200 laid off from the Malton plant since the Canadian government awarded the company the F-18 fighter plane contract. Labor leaders hit oil deal TORONTO — Canadian labor is responding an-_—| 8rily to the sell-out to the multi-national oil com- Panies by the Trudeau and Lougheed governments. “The oil industry won its strike against Canada,”’ Said Ontario Federation of Labor president Cliff Pil- key, Sept. 4. “If trade unionists had called a strike against the entire country of the magnitude that the oil industry - unleashed, its leaders would be in jail,’ Pilkey said. Oil executives, on the other hand, are laughing all the way to the bank.” Dennis McDermott, president of the Canadian abor Congress, warned Sept. 2 of the ‘‘serious further depression of Canada’s economy and job Spportunities,’’ following the oil deal. “In turn,”’ he gave notice, it will create increased Pressures at the bargaining tables as workers will heed to protect their income from further erosion.”’ arning that ‘workers and those on fixed income face the doubling of the cost of heating a home over Next five years, the Saskatchewan Federation of bor called on Sept. 4 for ‘‘a commitment from all levels of governshent to programs which will correct Solidarity picket for 200 laid off . By JOHN MACLENNAN MALTON — So much for McDonnell Douglas’ prom- ises, another 200 workers received their pink slips Sept. 4, making a total of 2,200 workers laid off since the parent company in the U.S. Was awarded the $5.2-billion contract in 1980 to build the F-18 fighter. Although the plane is being built in the U.S., the union had been promised 2,500 new jobs at the Malton plant in return for supporting the company’s bid before Ottawa. The laid off workers had been processed in record time by the company to get them out of the plant before a press conference scheduled to show off the F-18 Hornet. How- ever when the star of the conference, was stopped at the border by the U.S. government for security reasons the press had another story to cover. During the lunch breaks members of Local 1967 of the United Auto workers poured out of the plant to march in solidarity with the 200 laid off workers. This was the first time since the firing of the union’s bargaining committee in 1973 that the workers here have taken such kind of militant action. ‘‘We should have done this ages ago’’, one worker said. Although the lunch breaks were staggered the union was able to maintain a constant picket which received consider- able support from passing motorists. Members of the office workers Local, UAW 673 also joined the picket. Joint action by the two locals has not been taken since the 1971 strike. : Local 1967 president Bill Pattrick told the workers “‘we’ve shown this bastard of a company that we are fed up with these layoffs.”’ The company had prevented the union from passing out a button to the members inside the plant which read ‘‘I was stung by the Homet’’. The button however got full display as workers wore them past the gauntlet of supervisors they had to pass when returning to work. Despite the attempts at intimidation the workers called the demonstration **smash- ing success’’. On Labor Day they took the issue into public view at the Toronto Labor Day parade. Over 400 workers, jointed by 70 members. from the office workers local carried signs demanding their share of F-18 work and protesting -the actions of the federal government and the company. This is just the beginning of a continued campaign the union is mounting to save their jobs. As one worker ex-. plained ‘*We’ve come a.long way and there’s still a ways to go, but we’ll do it.” ; John MacLennan is a former executive member of the UAW 1967. He is currently auto secretary for the Ontario office of the Communist Party of Canada. Air attendants union growing imbalance between rich and poor in this Country.”” “ “The agreement is a victory for the oil industry Which, according to the federal government’s figures, will receive $10.9-billion more than the $83.3-billion they would have received under the Liberals’ National Energy of last Octob- €r,” United Electrical Workers’ president Dick Barry _ Roted in a Sept. 3 statement. “The fate of our economy has been put further yond our own control as oil prices are now tied to the so-called ‘world price’, an arbitrary figure set by € giant multi-nationals in collaboration with the oil €xporting countries,”’ said Barry. : is If this is a ‘victory for Canada’, as Prime Minister Tudeau calls it, we would hate to see a defeat.” Who Owns Oil? ) _ The key question that should be asked at this time,” said the Metro Toronto Labor Council ina ‘X8-word executive board statement Sept. 3, ‘‘is __ Who owns and manages and, in turn, manipulates the key, critical energy resources in this country,’ nd the answer that emerges as one views the current Oil agreement is — the foreign owned multi-national Oil companies are in total control and that the other 0 levels of government only tax away what they k they can get away with without stepping on the toes of the big oil companies. —_- . But the question should be put in another fash- 'On;”’ states the Labor Council, which adopted the Statement unanimously, “‘should key energy re- Sources be owned by the private sector? ‘And the answer is an unequivocal no!’ the Labor Council goes on to declare that the Stranglehold of the large foreign-owned multi- Nationals in our petroleum industry must be bro- : McDERMOTT ... “further depression of Canada’s economy and job opportunities.” ken.’’ Since, constitutionally, ‘‘resource ownership rests with the public,”’ the statement points out, **. . . energy must be regarded as a vital public good and, like most of our public utilities, be brought under public ownership and control.” CLC president McDermott, in his statement, criticized the federal government’s abandonment of its 1980 election promise of energy price restraints, and sounded the alarm that the new agreement ‘‘will make the goal of Canadianizing the oil industry that much more expensive and difficult to achieve.’’ He accused Alberta and Ottawa of ‘‘making a sweet- heart deal on the backs of the Canadian workers and consumer. Cause of Inflation ‘‘We expect the federal government to at least use some of its additional revenues to cushion the effects of this deal on low and middle income earners through some kind of tax relief,’” McDermott said. ‘*We also expect it to keep in mind that much of the high cost of living in the next few years will be attributable to the high energy prices and not to the so-called ‘greed’ of wage and salary earners, who will have no other way of coping with inflation than by trying to increase their incomes.”’ The OFL’s Pilkey left no doubt of the planned actions of the industry leading up to the Lougheed- Trudeau deal. ‘The orchestrated withdrawal of oil rights to the United States, the media propaganda campaign for higher prices, the suspension of heavy oil and tar- sands development and an industry-inspired provin- cial cutback in production finally paid off for the large oil companies,”’ he said. offices ransacked MISSISSAUGA — As members of the Canadian Air- line Flight Attendants Association, 725 who are on strike against Wardair, marched in the Toronto Labor Day Parade their union offices were ransacked causing at gress has called on its two mil- lion members and the public at large to refrain from flying on Wardair until that charter air- line signs a fair agreement with its flight attendants and recalls the locked-out employees back to work. least $10,000 worth of dam- age. Printers ink was splashed over the walls, telephone, typewriter and office machin- ery wires were cut and other equipment damaged. The union has charged that Sec- uricor Investigation and Sec- urity Ltd., a ‘professional strikebreaking firm’’ was in- volved in the break-in. This is just part of the tactics that have been used to intimidate the strikers, said union spokesman Merl Day. Talks between the union and Wardair broke off Sept. 4 after three days with the com- pany refusing to back away from its position of cutting rest TRIBUNE PHOTO — TOM MORRIS periods and sick leave pro- visions already won by the union. The Canadian Labor Con- While at Labor Day march, Wardair strikers union offices were ransacked. PACIFIC TRIBUNE—SEPT. 18, 1981—Page 3