ELSON CLARKE

testing time is com-
Canadian confeder-

year, another federal-
conference on the
will be held in Ot-
time it will take
nst the background
d deal of studying and
ng which has been
not only in the federal
in the provinces.
have of course been
d in the case of B.C.’s
nett, a whole flood.
tended to be angry
postponement of the
ce from last December
the illness of Quebec
inister Jean Jacques
and dumped his whole
Victoria press confer-
we know what he
it is not re-assuring.

tuck most in the pub-
after Bennett sounded
idea that the Atlan-
ces and the prairie
might be combined
big provinces, leaving
of course bother to
people in the areas con-
m any case, the idea is
to any of the really
problems facing Can-
y. His proposition
solve the national

cial relations today.

at is more relevant in a
ve way is Bennett's ob-
of amendments of the
on to guarantee the
the French minority in
Canada. Bennett’s views
cs are so simple. He
there are more Anglo-
uvinists than there
Canadians who vote
dit in B.C. —and-in
y well be right. If as
t of taking a stand against
nent of the constitution,
gather up votes for Ben-
m what else matters?
l, if his stand should
Canada, Bennett is

. The British North
Act of 1867 is as out-
‘the one horse shay and
) skirt.

that constitution is
‘to have to recognize once

all that Canada is made
0 nations, not one. That
hat the new constitution
to be negotiated be-
he two nations. It will
represent a new part-
that is entirely equal
firely voluntary. If it
one of the partners is
pull out, as he will have
ight to do. A federal-
conference that puts
the homeland of a na-
the same footing as
ces which are all
another nation will never
f produce a satisfactory
tution. The best thing
al-provincial confer-
d do would be to de-
it it will call for the
of a Constitutional
democratically elect-
composed of equal
on from the two

the negotiation of a

tution will have to

its starting point that
é 4

Politician’s
playground

quite ready to move down Puget
Sound to Olympia as the first
Social Credit governor of the
new American state of British
Washington Columbia.

Meanwhile at the other end
of the country, the Union Na-
tionale government of Quebec
is readying a few more shocks
for “les anglais.” They have al-
ready changed the name of the
Legislative Assembly of Quebec
to “National Assembly,” thus
quite properly making it clear
that this is the parliament of the
nation, not the legislature of a
province. One could make the
comment that changing the
name costs no money, and that
the sales tax is just as high, the
teachers just as poorly paid, and
the social services just as inade-
quate as ever in Quebec. But for
French Canadians in Quebec the
struggle is for both their nation-
al rights and their social rights,
and more and more are seeing
that fundamentally, the enemy
which denies them both is the
same—the Anglo-Canadian and
American monopoly establish-
ment. When that understanding
is fully grasped by the working
class, there will be a govern-
ment in Quebec which genuinely
fights for the true interests of
the people of the nation, not
one that says some of the right
things about the national ques-
tion, to conceal the bankruptcy
of its social policies.

Fundamentally, today, the
trouble is that federal-provincial
conferences are the playground
of capitalist politicians who
either know no answers, or don’t
want to produce any because
there is nothing in it for them
and their bosses. That is why
Canada is in danger, and that is
why the working people of this
country will have to take a hand
in the great constitutional de-
bate, complex and difficult as it
sometimes is to follow.

Let’s put down again what
really needs to be done about
the Canadian constitution.

First of all, we need a new
both nations possess full sover-
eign powers, and that it will be
for them to voluntarily decide,
on the basis of their mutual in-
terest, what powers and how
much powers they want the cen-
tral Canadian government to
have.

They will have to decide what
form the central Canadian gov-
ernment will take in order to
make sure that one nation will
no longer be in a position to
outvote or otherwise dominate
the other. One suggestion that
has been made is that there
should be two houses in the
new federal parliament, one
elected like the House of Com-
mons now on the basis of popu-
lation, the other elected by the
people of the two nations and
made up of equal representation
from each.

Fourth, the new constitution
will have to guarantee to French
Canadian minorities in English
Canada, the same rights to the
use of their language and edu-
cation in it as are enjoyed by
the English speaking minority
in Quebec. That this is still a
big problem can be readily seen
in the resistance being put up
by the Metropolitan School
Board in Toronto to a French
language high school.

By BRUCE MAGNUSON

“An aroused public in both
countries now insist upon a halt
to the continued degradation of
water quality on these great
international waterways. We on
the commission share this con-
cern and are determined to do
everything within our power to
correct the situation.” These
words were spoken by A. D. P.
Heeney, chairman and chief of
the Canadian section of the U.S.-
Canadian International Joint
Commission, as the commission
opened hearings on January
22nd at Windsor into the rea-
sons why water pollution stan-
dards and goals set by the U.S.
and Canadian governments for
the Detroit and St. Clair Rivers
are not being met.

Heeney told 240 persons pres-
ent at the opening of the investi-
gation that the IJC will identify
“those responsible for such deg-
radation and describe the status
of such corrective measures as
have been and are being taken.”

Nutrients released into Detroit
River are blamed for turning
Lake Erie and Lake Ontario into
near-swamps. This food matter
is speeding up life in the lakes,
causing them to “live themselves
to death.” H. W. Poston, chair-
man of the U.S. section of the
Lakes Superior-Huron-Erie ad-
visory board stated that down-
stream in the Detroit River the
levels of pollution climb to as
high as 10 times the IJC objec-
tive for safety. Speaking of
phenol concentrations, Mr. Pos-
ton named the principal sources
as the Ford Motor Company,
Great Lakes Steel on the Rouge
River, the Detroit Sewage treat-
ment plant and the Mobil Oil
Corporation at Trenton, Michi-
gan. Iron concentrations in the
upper ten miles of the river ex-

4

ceed the IJC objectives, but
sources have not been identified.
Downstream, Firestone Steel
Products Company on the De-
troit River was identified as one
source. Large Chloride concen-
trations were traced to Allied
Chemical Co. and the Wyandotte
Chemical Corporation. Sources
of oil pollution have been traced
to industrial wastes, municipal
sewage treatment plants, lake
vessels and the U.S. Naval Air
Station at Grosse Ile, Michigan,
Mr. Poston stated.

Dr. E. A. Watkinson, Cana-
dian chairman of the Lake
Superior-Huron and Erie advis-
ory board stated his concur-
rence with the findings of his
U.S. counterpart. The firms fall-
ing short on Ontario Water Re-
sources Commission’s expecta-
tions for pollution control were
identified as the Ford Motor
Company of Canada and the
Allied Chemical Co. of Canada
Ltd., Amherstburg.

Dennis Caplice, director of
the OWRC division for indus-
trial wastes, described Allied
Chemical as “a smaller scale
Wyandotte Chemicals,” dis-
charging 100 tons of suspended
solids a day into the Detroit
River along with 400 tons of
chlorides. Since the removal of
chlorides from industrial waste
is an extremely expensive under-
taking, Mr. Caplice said the
OWRC will explore with the
company the possibility of
dumping the wastes in a deep
well.

Ford Motor Company was
criticized because it has an-
nounced its conversion of the
plant to engine production but
“to date the company has not
indicated whether or not this
changeover will include facilities
for the treatment and disposal
of process wastes from this ex-
panded operation.” Because Ford
is a U.S.-owned subsidiary “we
must deal with the people in
Detroit,” said Mr. Caplice.
“Quite frankly we are not happy
with the cooperation.” Mayor
John Wheelton of Windsor said
his city has a new bylaw on
pollution control, with “a dead-
line that will apply to the Ford
Motor Co.”

David S. Caverly, general
manager of the OWRC, told the
commission, “We have had our

ct on water pollution

difficulties with Ford and Ford
has had its difficulties with us,
but we will have to work these
out.” Caverly also that
McKinnon Industries has a treat-
ment plant in operation, and
Chrysler Canada Ltd., treatment
facilities are to go into opera-
tion in March of this year, The
City of Windsor has a program
to be completed in 1972.

It was revealed that Windsor
taxpayers end up paying 84 per-
cent of the cost of pollution
control despite grants by the
Ontario government and the for-
giveness of part of the loans
made by the Central Mortgage
and Housing Corporation. Robert
T. Bailey, city commissioner of
works, said the city of Windsor
had spent more than $6 million
on pollution abatement during
the past six years. He stated that
the city now has for considera-
tion a capital works program
which includes $15 million ex-
penditures by 1973.

The Windsor Star, in an edi-
torial on January 24th, last,
stated that the time had come
to be tough on water pollution.
It chastised David S. Caverly,
general manager of the Ontario
Water Resources Commission
for taking too complacent an
attitude to the problem. Donald
W. Marshall, engineer of the
U.S. health department told the
Commission that discharge of
industrial and other wastes in
Detroit, St. Mary’s and St. Clair
rivers and their tributaries “con-
stitutes a threat to the health
of people living in these water-
sheds and utilizing these waters
for domestic supply, commer-
cial and sports fishing and
other purposes.”

As the Windsor Star emphas-
ized editorially, “the time for
words is past. The time for ac-
tion is now.”

We wholeheartedly agree. But
the biggest obstacle is the priv-
ately owned and controlled in-
ternational. corporations who
refuse to pay their just share by
controlling their waste disposal.
These gentlement must change
their mind or face expropriation
and nationalization so that pro-
per community planning can be
undertaken to deal with the
problem on the basis of modern
science and technology.

"PACIFIC TRIBUNE—FEBRUARY 7, 1969—Page 5

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