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FRIDAY, JANUARY 9, 1959

Continued from page J

LABOR LOBBY

not be subjected to hunger,
misery and . distress,” said
newly appointed B.C. Federa-
tion Labor secretary Pat
O’Neal.

VLC president Lloyd Whalen
recalled . Diefenbaker’s pre-

election pledge that so long

as he was prime minister “no
one will be allowed to suffer
in this nation” and said it
was time labor held him to
his word.

The door was Opened for
Whalen to run again for the
presidential post by introduc-
tion of an executive board
notice of motion to amend the
VLC constitution to provide
for a paid president.

Whalen, recently defeated
as president of Local 1-217
IWA, may not be a delegate
to council when elections are
held January 20, for his local
elects its delegates J anuary 11.
This could create a barrier to
his holding the top: VLC post,
secretary E. A. Jamiesons hav-
ing said at a previous coun-
cil meeting that all officers
must be delegates.

As nominations opened last
night the following names
were put forward:

President, Lloyd Whalen;
first vice-president, Ed Sims;
second vice-president, George
Johnston; third vice-president,
William Stewart, Mel Kemmis;
secretary - treasurer, E. A.
Jamieson.

Committee chairmen: legisla-
tive, Jack Henderson; organ-
izational, Wyman Trineer; pub-
lic relations, Allan Coleman,
Charles Stewart; grievance,
Norman Cunningham, Orville
educational, George

_ Dronick, Percy Deplissy, John

Hayward and Mike Jacobs;
credentials, John Brown.

Short reports were received
on two strikes now in pro-
gress. z

“When the IWA struck the ~
‘Big Four’ we cut of 80 per-

cent of production of lumber
in the Interior,” .said George
Mitchell. “Our picket lines are
solid and nothing is moving.
It won’t move, either, until

operators pay better than $1.53
an hour. The Interior now ac-
counts for 47 percent of all
forest products and we can’t
continue to permit a spread of
19 cents an hour in wages be-
tween the Interior and the
Coast.”

M. Bjornson (Molders, Local
281) said the molders had been
striking “for 20 weeks now”
with no end in sight.

President Whalen said the
VLC will call a meeting with-
in the next few days to dis-
cuss assistance for the strik-
ing molders.

Strike was aided
by world unions

TORONTO — Mine- Mill
strikers at Sudbury and Port
Colborne battling the world’s
biggest nickel ‘monopoly, In-
ternational Nickel, had the
support of unions around the
world in a powerful demon-

stration of international solid-

arity. ; .

The Metals Division of the
World Federation of Trade Un-
ions has sent £1,000;% the Na-
tional Union of Mine Workers
(Scottish Area) sent £500.
The Australian Miners Union
£600. From the French Min-
ers’ Union came 50,000 francs.
And from Mine-Mill in the
U.S. $100,000 was donated from
an international strike fund.
Solidarity support was prom-
ised by the Mining and Metal-
lurgical Workers’ Union of
Yugoslavia.

We're a year older

With this issue, Nos. 1 and
2 of Volume 18, the Pacific
Tribune begins its 18th year
of continuous publication. Con-
temporary librarians and fu-
ture labor historians are like-
ly to be confused however, be-
cause a printer dropped our
volume number from 17 to 16
in our February 28 issue last
year—and the error was not

caught until the volume num- -

ber was checked for this issue.

:

"RED HERRING’

Morgan nails

CCF charges

Commenting on charges that he broadcast a message on
the Sunday night prior the December 15 Rossland-Trail byelec.
tion in violation of CBC regulations, Nigel Morgan, LPP pro-
vincial leader, termed them “a downright falsehood.”

_“The fact is that the broadcast was made on Friday, more

than 11 hours before the reg-
ular 48-hour deadline pre-
scribed by the CBC,” he said.

“There was nothing irregu-

lar or mysterious about the
broadcast. It was contracted
for the previous Wednesday
for the only period the station
had available, paid for, and the
recording mailed from Van-
couver in accordance with
standard procedure. When
mail delivery of the recording

-was delayed by an unexpected

blizzard, the broadcast had to
be retaped by long distance
telephone from Vancouver.”
Morgan said he was “dis-
appointed and shocked that

certain leaders of the CCF

have lent themselves to this
obvious attempt to deny the
Labor-Progressive Party its
democratic right to. state its
position in the byelection.
“It will be recalled that a
provincial leader of that,
party moved the motion that
took away the right of the
LPP to participate in the
CBC’s free-time radio and tele-
vision series a couple of years
ago. Now apparently, an at-
tempt is being launched to

“gag the LPP ompletely by

denying us the right to even
buy radio time.”

CCF provincial leader Rob-
ert Strachan “and others who
lend their support to this posi-
tion,” said Morgan, “are trying
to use the red herring to cover
up their own delinquency and
the real reasons why the CCF
vote continued to drop in spite
of 40 percent. fall-off in the
Social Credit vote by compari-
son with the previous elec-
tion.

“How could a broadcast that
was devoted entirely to con-
demning the record of Socred,
Liberal and Tory parties pos-

sibly take votes from the CCF?

“Tf Strachan ‘had only de-
voted a little more of his en-
ergy to exposing the’ corrup-
tion, resources giveaways and
big business subservience of
the Socreds, instead of helping

build the red bogey and there- .

by foster divisions in labor’s
ranks, his party would in all
probability have won the
Rossland-Trail byelection.”
In his broadcast, Morgan was
critical of the CCF stand in a
constituency ‘where labor is
the decisive force.” Only by a
maximum of labor unity at the
polls could “the attacks on la-

bor and the political trickery
of successive Socred, Liberal
and Tory representatives be
ended.”

He said that had De -Vito,
the CCF candidate, carried
into effect the policy of all-in
unity, for which he fought be-
fore the CCF Provincial Coun-
cil and had the CCF program
injected the decisive issues
into the campaign in a more
forthright manner, De Vito’s
position would have been
stronger.

However, he continued, it
was obvious that De Vito,
“alone of the opposition can-
didates, offers any real chance
of defeating Social Credit and
registering an advance for
people’s welfare,” and he ap-
pealed “to our supporters” to
vote for him.

B.C labor pioneer, —
Hans Kroeger, dead

VICTORIA, B.C. — British
Columbia has lost one of its
best-known Labor pioneers by
the death of Hans Kroeger
here on December 17 at the
age of 76.

Born in New York in 1882,
Hans Kroeger came to Vic-
toria with his parents in 1885
and was educated at public
and high schools here. He be-
gan his long labor career as
a printer with the old Victoria
Colonist and afterwards work-
ed as a laborer,. carpenter,
motorman for the BCE in Vic-
toria, seaman on the Alaska
coast run, homesteader at Fort
Fraser, gillnetter on the Skeena,
shipyard worker in Victoria,
and in his last. years, caretaker
on Galiano Island.

Hans Kroeger, to use the
words of his ‘only surviving
brother, Harry, “all his life
was a fighter and organizer,
and always spoke up for the
working people. Indeed it was
his father, who belonged to
the Free Thinkers in the, nine_
ties, who gave Hans his first
introduction into working class
politics.”

A strong advocate of peace,
Hans Kroeger opposed the
First World War and was im-

January 9, 1959 — PACIFIC TRIBUNE—PAGE 8.

. working: people. -

_ing up on him, Hans retired —

-for peace and socialism.

Emergency,
BCL tells

government

On Monday this week t
B.C. Federation of Labor pre-
sented its annual brief to t
Bennett government, in sup=
port of proposed legislation
aimed at advancing the inter-
ests and wellbeing of the

. Three major proposals were —
put before the cabinet: =
e “. .. that this govern-
ment immediately declare that
an emergency exists in the
field of unemployment, and
they call upon the Federal
Government to join with them
in that declaration.” :

, Aas this governmenty
to declare immediately that
they will make available @ —
sum of at least $5,000,000 for —
unemployment assistance; and —
this sum, to be used under the
terms of the Unemployment
Assistance Act... .”

@ The government should
“convene immediately a prov-
ince-wide conference to plan
an all-out program, to bring
immediate relief to those suf-
fering from unemployment,
and to bring about solutions to
the present unemployment...”

prisoned for his pacifist views.
Later, in association with men
like the late Bill Moultoun,
Eric Linden and Jim, Benyon,
he played an active part in the
unemployed struggles in Vic-
toria during the Hungry Thir-
ties, when he served another
prison term for opposing the
eviction of a working class .
family from their home. |
These struggles, his lifelong
experience in the labor move-—
ment and his own extensive
reading led in the early thir-
ties to his joining the old Com-
munist party, in which he
served as an organizer, .propa-
gandist, and because of his
wide reading and. love of good
books, an ardent literature
salesman. :
In 1949, with the years creep

to Galiano Island, working-as
a caretaker until illness some _
18 months ago compelled him ~
to return to his home in —
Saanich.~ =

Hans Kroeger was a founda-
tion member of the Labor-
Progressive Party and took an
active part in all its work until —
death closed the book for a
staunch and courageous fighter —