“As you were’

onday’s general election was not altogether a “need-

less” or “‘useless’’ election, as it has often been des-
cribed. True, it was unquestionably an expensive one,
costing the people of Canada well over $10-million from
the public treasury for the opportunity of decisively re-
jecting Prime Minister Pearson’s demand for a “strong
Liberal majority”? government.

That phoney pretext for calling a general election
was decisively rejected. With a few minor changes the
Pearson “minority” government remains almost exactly
as was at the time of dissolution. In essence it was a vote
of “‘non confidence” in the specious arguments put for-
ward by the Liberals for “majority” government. It gives
Prime Minister Pearson and his Liberals a ““mandate”—
to get on with the business of the country; to make the
government and five-party Parliament function in the in-
terests of Canada, nothing more.

\

It also nails the Pearson “threat” during the cam-
paign, that if he and his Liberal Party didn’t get the
“majority” they wanted and specifically called an elec-
tion to get, that “another election” would soon follow.

The electorate made clear by their vote that if Pear-
son and his Liberals cannot make a “‘minority” -govern-
ment work, other opposition parties in the House can,
without resort to another needless election.

The substantial gains made by the NDP in addition-
al seats, plus a rising popular vote, provides added assur-
ance that the urgent needs of the people, medicare, pen-

sions, development of natural resources, for and in the in- |

terests of Canada, etc., will be in the forefront. These and
other pressing issues, side-tracked and delayed by Liberal
“majority” subterfuges, will be on the agenda when the
28th Parliament of Canada meets—backed by Monday’s
popular vote — to “get on with the business of the
country.”

There is no doubt that the results of Monday’s vote,
“very disappointing” to Prime Minister Pearson, was
equally “disappointing” to Washington, the prime pro-
moter and financier of a hoped-for “Liberal majority” in
Ottawa to facilitate U.S. domination in Canadian affairs.

é

Fe
ede
Hie a eae eae

TING {London Free Fress)

“Just slip it under>the door.”

Fight or go under

n the B.C, Federation of Labor campaign to fight
ex-parte injunctions now extensively used by em-

~ national unity ‘and the widest inter-
_national understanding and apprecia-

' Be that as it may, the Canadian people delivered the
orders-of-the day for the 28th Parliament of Canada; “As
You Were—Forward, March.”

Tom

McEWEN

D uring the next couple of
weeks ormore Canadians
may expect a heavy spate of
wordage from the ‘experts’,
**analysts’’, ‘forecasters’? and
what-have-you on last Monday’s
election results,

Since we’re doing this column
a good four days ahead of the
election, we won’t climb onto
this Wisenheimer merry-go-
round just yet to advise our
fellow-citizens on what we’ve
got, how we could have got some-
thing better—or worse, Nor shall
we fall victim to the political
sour-pusses who will cynically
declare with an air of finality
that in elections ‘‘the people
always get what they deserve,”

If we accept an old Marxian
viewpoint that ‘‘parliamentary
democracy is the system that
allows the oppressed, every few
years, the opportunity of decid-
ing what particular representa-
tives of the oppressing class
should represent them in parlia-

ment,’’ then we may, without any
undue ‘‘reverence’”’ throw a mini-
mum of 90-percent of the pre-
election ‘promises’? made by
these representatives out of the
window and accept the end re-
sult of the election as merelythe
beginning of another round in
the unending struggle for peace
and progress, When the people
in their majority grasp that idea,
instead of grasping at phantom

election ‘‘promises’’, the next.

**round’’ is already won,

One thing we can therefore be
dead sure of, regardless of Mon-
day’s verdict—the fight must go
on, stronger and more united
than ever before, Monday’s ver=-
dict only underscored its urgency
and intensity.

In the aftermath of manyofour
‘democratic’ elections, which
more often than not tends to look
and feel like the‘ morning after’’,
there is always enough grim

ployers to cripple or break strikes, a fundamental issue
is at stake: the inalienable right of working men and
women through the media of their unions, to strike and
picket.

While the statutory laws of Canada recognize that
hard-won right, the Courts in ever-increasing numbers,
ignore and violate it by their wholesale granting of “re-
straining” injunctions. Automation, geared to court in-
junctions, can destroy democratic trade unionism. That’s
what makes the BCFL campaign to fight injunctions
“top priority” for every union man and woman.

need to be done to help it face
up to the pressing issues of the
moment, which strangely enough,
no small number of the elected
and non-elected shied away from
on the hustings,
* * OK

The November ‘Newsletter’?
from the ‘‘U,S, Assistant Secre-
tary of Defense’’, Washington,
D.C. informs us that the U.S,
‘¢Military Assistance Program’?
(MAP) ‘‘is supporting and en-
couraging civic action projects
in more than 25 countries
throughout the world,’’

humor left around to facilitate
a fairly speedy recovery,

For instance.the tons of print-
er’s ink and human lung power
expended to convince the people
that ‘‘Canada Needs Percy Fink’”’
is enormous, It just seemed (be-
fore the election) that unless
Canada elected ‘‘ Percy Fink’’ the
country would go straight to the
dogs.

Yet when the electors make
their periodic pilgrimage to the
voting box, it becomes readily
apparent that Canada neither
needed nor wanted ‘‘ Percy Fink”?
in any capacity whatsoever, And’
in this most recent election the
old-line partisan ‘‘Percy Finks”’
were as numerous as bedbugs in
a mission flophouse,

MAP, we are told embody
those in which the military forces
of a nation undertake activities
which contribute to the economic
and social development, and

There is also a touch of ironi-
cal comedy in the fact that when
the surplus of ‘*Percy Finks’’

Worth
Quoting

There are more than 1,000 cand
dates in this federal election. Of th
number, less than one percent ha
any real knowledge of the Indian
people, let alone any real interest in
them, other than their votes. And no!
¢ single one of them is an Indian.

No matter who forms the govern:
ment after November 8, Indians will
continue fo suffer and remain on ti
bottom of the totem pole. an

—Guy Williams, President, Native
Brotherhood of B.C., in NATIV
VOICE, Oct., 1965.

)

Sincere pacifists and honest criti
of the President's policy (in Vietnam,
would serve their cause and count
best by shunning all support of .
demonstrations, sit-ins and lie
which, in effect, aid the Commun
aggressors. It is the first responsibility
of every American... to foster our

tion of our country’s Vietnam poli

—AFL-CIO Executive Council state-
ments, AFL-CIO NEWS, Oct. 30/65.

Come to think of it, there are $0
many similarities between the commer
cials of finance companies and funeral
parlors that it just makes us wonder
the same public relations firm might
write for copy for both “enterprises » i;

—Bob Ward in UE NEWS, Oct.
11/65.

The unity of working people in the -
‘struggle for the construction of a new —
social system is more important than
the unanimity of their views concern:
ing life beyond the grave.

—“‘Catholicism in a Socialist State”

CEYLON TRIBUNE, July 31/65.

When the labor movement of the
United States makes up its mind that
the war in Vietnam, and the few jobs
and extra income it brings in has n°
future in it for the workers of
country, such a position probabl
could end the war in Vietnam.
could even end our futile role of but

ting into every country’s affairs @
tying to be the world’s cop.

~—ILGWU President Bridges in TH!
DISPATCHER, Oct. 15/65.

strengthen the ties between the
military and civilian communi
ties,’’ :

The laudable ‘objectives’
cited by ‘‘Newsletter’’ in a num
ber of Latin American countrié
and in South Korea and Thailand
don’t just square with the facts
of life, particularly when one re
members that the U.S, went into
Vietnam on its own ‘invitation
to work in the capacity of 2
‘fadvisor’’? for economic 2!
social development, and woul!
up as the killers of the Vietna”
mese people,

Like ourselves, we imagine thé
people of other countries would
prefer to have their “civic proj”
ects’’ carried on without ‘*bene”
fit’? of MAP,

if a ia qth

[et

h

have been thus ‘‘democratically’’
disposed of, the bulk of the goodies
they ‘‘promised’’ to shower upon
Canada go into limbo with them—
with no great sense of loss tothe
electors—or for that matter to
the ‘‘Percy Finks’? who made
them,

Next week we’ll probably be
able to take a closer look at

_ Editor — TOM McEWEN
Associate Editor —
Circulation Manager — JERRY SHACK
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MAURICE RUSH

Monday’s results and what will