Hamilton labor will
take part in peace meet

HAMILTON — The Hamilton
and District Labor Council will
have a representative at the On-
tario provincial conference of the
Canadian Peace Congress,
scheduled to take place in To-
ronto Sept. 11.

Acting on an executive com-
mittee recommendation for coun-
cil’s participation, International
Brotherhood of Electrical Work-
ers delegate Terry Fraser
answered the executive's call for
a volunteer from the delegates,
and will attend the meeting on be-
half of the council.

Delegates also voted Aug. 18,
to send a letter congratulating the
Canadian Labor Congress for its
unequivocal decision Aug. 17, re-
jecting the federal government’s
so-called ‘“‘voluntary’’ restraint
proposal as a “‘carrot”’

early end to the wage-cutting
program.
Calling the government prop-

SCENE

By BRUCE MAGNUSON

Jean-Claude Parrot, newly
elected president of the 22,000
member Canadian Union of
Postal Workers is. committed to
struggle on behalf of his member-
ship. Mr. Parrot says neither he
nor any other officers of his union
will enter into any sweetheart
deals with their employers in any
manner whatever. In this way the
new president seems to take up
the struggle on the same level as
his predecessor, Mr. Joseph
Davidson.

For the postal workers with no
contract since June, over 12,000
grievances yet to be dealt with,
facing a government that seems
determined to undermine and
break the union and constantly
provoking new excuses for
head-on confrontation, it seems
that a strong and determined
leadership and militancy to
mobilize and lead them in struggle
is very much needed.

The vicious provocations and
attacks against the Canadian
Union of Postal Workers have a
long history. It ,dates back to
sometime before the introduction
of costly technological changes
and efforts to place the cost for
this multi-billion dollar renova-
tion on the backs of the postal
workers. The split between the
Letter Carriers and the Inside
workers in the Post Office had its
roots in this anti-union policy of
the Federal Treasury Board.

Sinister Purpose

In 1967, when public service
and government employees were
given the options of either collec-
tive bargaining with the night to
strike or arbitration, this apparent
zenerosity had a sinister purpose.
On the part of the government and
its monopoly patrons this was a
velvet-glove approach to labor re-
lations in full anticipation of fu-
ture problems growing out of gre-
ater state involvement in
economic affairs as a result of
inflation and developing
economic crisis. At the same time
the mailed fist was hidden in the
Public Service Staff Relations Act

PACIFIC TRIBUNE=SEPTEMBER 2, 1977—Page 4 °

<for.an-

osal blackmail, United Electrical
workers Local 504 president John
Ball told the delegates, “‘if Joe’s
(Morris) prepared to get more
militant, we should be prepared to
get more militant too and get into
the fight.

“It was blackmail. The gov-
ernment was saying we’ ll do away
with controls if you accept con-
trols’’, Ball said. Z

In other business the council
reaffirmed its opposition to Bill
22, the Ontario government’s
proposed legislation to force
province-wide bargaining in the
construction industry.

IBEW delegate, and spokes-
man for the Ad Hoc Committee to
Defeat Bill 22, Terry Fraser told
the council, the province’s suc-
cess in shoving forced province-
wide bargaining through in the
construction industry, would only
be a prefude to the same arbitrary
action in industry in general.

restrictions on collective ENS
ing in the public service and split
these workers from the bulk of the
working class already governed
by the Canada Labor Relations
Act. E

As the great majority of work-
ing people became the victims of
inflation and unemployment the
public service unions started to
grow. New forms of struggle de-
veloped, ranging from withdrawal
of voluntary services and work-
to-rule, to resignations, to unoffi-
cial and selective strikes. More
and more government workers
chose collective bargaining with
the right to strike, rather than the

option of arbitration. Many pro-

fessional workers began taking
the leap from association status to
that of trade_union status.
CLC Position

It was at this‘time, in the early
seventies, that the government
undertook a further review of the
already restrictive Public Service
Staff Relations Act with the view
of making it even more restric-
tive. To an already complicated
piece of labor relations legislation
with 115 complex clauses, it was
proposed to add 60 more. The
Canadian Labor Congress con-
demned this legalistic approach as
strangling the process of collec-
tive bargaining in the public ser-
vice. The CLC specifically disag-
reed with recommendations that
all matters concerning layoff and
re-call, promotions and selection
standards, probation, the content
of training programs, superannua-
tion, organization and classifica-
tions, should not be negotiable.

The recommended procedure
for consultation rather than
negotiation could only lead to un-
ilateral action by the employer,
which in this case was the gov-
ernment. In March 1975 the CLC
told the government that this pro-
cedure ‘‘had all the ingredients of
a disaster.”’

The responsibility for the sick
state of affairs in the Post Office
rests squarely upon the govern-
ment. A government policy which

oat
postal workers

“Continuation of Oct. 14”: Fox

TORONTO — The labor
council .of Metro Toronto, in
cooperation with the Ontario
Federation of Labor, and the
labor councils in Oshawa, Oakvil-
le, Barrie, Brampton, and Coburg
voted Aug. 18 to sponsor a
‘“‘major conference on un-
employment” Oct. 21.

The decision was taken while
the leaders of the ten provincial
labor federations met in Ottawa
with the Canadian Labor Con-
gress leadership to discuss
follow-up action to the CLC’s
unanimous rejection earlier that
week of the federal government's
proposal for labor to accept so-
called ‘‘voluntary’’ wage re-
straints.

The format of the conference
will involve ‘‘a complete cross-
section of the community being
invited to ee,

allows private companies to take
over the most profitable parts of
the parcel post and delivery ser-
vice is bound to undermine the
institution.

An Inquiry Commission to
examine labor relations in the
Post Office is not.enough. What
the CUPW demands is a thorough
inquiry into government policy,
as well as management’s prac-
tices.

. The CUPW wants the Post
Office to become a Crown corpo-
ration. But the corruption and
unsavory practices of the private
monopoly sector has now
thoroughly penetrated the man-
agement of publicly owned
Crown corporations. The gov-
ernment itself admits failure to
control, direct and make the man-
agements of these Crown corpo-
rations accountable to itself and
to Parliament.

All Out Support Needed

The reason is private monopoly
power which exerts its domina-
tion over government policy. It is
this which leads to privatization
of the Post Office and the aliena-
tion of Crown corporations from
democratic public management.
It is this which prevents post
office workers from coming under
the same jurisdiction as other
workers who are governed by the
Canada Labor Relations Act.

The Public Service Staff Rela-
tions Act ought to be scrapped.
All workers, including Post Office
workers, should come under one
Act, — the Canada Labor Rela-

‘tions Act — which should make

all matters of concern to working

. people subject to negotiation.

To affect such a change calls
for a two-fold struggle: all-
inclusive mass actions by labor,
including strike action, while at
the same time working for united
labor political action to elect
anti-monopoly governments,
whenever opportunities for so
doing arise.

The immediate need is all-
inclusive solidarity in action with
the just struggle of the Canadian
Union of Postal Workers.

Ct

MTLC president Sam Fox (left) with CLC president Joe Morris at the
Toronto protest against wage control Oct. 14, gq 78:

Among those to be invited; the
unemployed, affiliated unions,
the building trades council, On-
tario Anti-Poverty Organization,
churches and church groups,
Teachers organizations, Ontario
Federation of Students, Ontario
Nurses Association, Ontario Pub-
lic Service Employees Union,
community service agencies such

’ as tenants rights groups, legal aid

services, ethnic organizations and
others.

The final statements and
policies emerging from the con-
ference will be forwarded to the
OFL for use as the basis for the
formulation of the major policy
statement on unemployment to be
presented to the November OFL
convention.

Action Needed

Support for the proposal was
unanimous, with debate centering
on the need for action to emerge
from the meeting, and care exer-
cised that the conference doesn’t
dissolve into what one delegate
called ‘‘a gabfest.”’

United Electrical workers de-
legate Art Jenkyn welcomed the
executive board statement, say-
ing “‘it recognizes that the CLC
and OFL need to grasp the seni-
ousness of the problem and call a
special conference on the un-
employment crisis.”

He warned about the dangers of
the format, saying that most labor
organizations have reams of
documentation concerning what
the problem is. ‘‘What is needed
is united action by labor, the un-
employed and all those affected to
do something about it,’’ and force

_the governments to adopt out

program’’, he said.
Council president Sam Fox, ag

reed that if the conference be-

came a ‘‘gabfest’’, it would defeat
Be purpose for which it was cal-
ed.

“Since Toronto is the largest
council in Canada’’, Fox said,
‘twhat we do will be important in
setting the tone, and magnitude of

the labor movement’s fight on the

question.”’
Continuation of Oct. 14
Calling on the delegates to put
the same energy in the conference
as was displayed in planning and

carrying out the Oct. 14 protest,

Fox told the delegates the confer-
ence “‘should be seen as a con-
tinuation of that magnificient day
itself’, and that the executive
board regarded it with equal im-
portance to the day of protest.

In other business, the council

protested the recent disclosures
of secret files being kept by the
RCMP on private citizens in-
volved in trade union, or political
activity.

A resolution expressing sup-
port for the Robin Hood workers

in Montreal who were shot at by
company-hired goons, was passed
but was criticized by delegates for
not being strongly enough
worded, offering no financial as-

sistance to the local, or joining in
the demand for a boycott of Robin

Hood products.

President Fox agreed with
suggestions from the floor to send
a personal letter of support to the
strikers on behalf of the council,
and to enquire from the OFL as to
what can be done regarding the
boycott.

CPC urges Northern
jobs creation scheme

SUDBURY The Com-
munist Party in Sudbury
answered the recent announce-
ment by Falconbridge Nickel
Mines Ltd., that it was laying
4,000 workers off for a month
Sept. 11 to Oct. 9., with the de-
mand Aug. 22, for the reclaiming
‘from big U.S. and Canadian
corporations of the mineral
wealth of Northern Ontario’, by
senior government.

The Sudbury Committee also
called for a “‘five billion dollar,
ten-year development program
for Northern Ontario”’ to be con-
ducted by the provincial govern-
ment ‘‘designed to fully open up
our Northwest, end the disparity
in wages and living standards of
our key resource areas, on raise

the living standards of the Native

People to that of the province as 4
whole.”’

In conjunction with placing the
mining industry under public

ownership and democratic con- |

trol, the committee called for the
setting up of ‘‘public and crown
corporations which will engage if
secondary manufacturing and
marketing .
established close to the area 0)
resource extraction.

“If these steps were taken’’;
the statement concluded, ‘four
thousand workers would not be
out of work for a month, but
thousands more would be guaran-
teed jobs and ay for a og
time to come’”’

. wherever possible