CAPE BRETON HANGS IN THE BALANCE

Sysco — from dream to disillusion

SYDNEY, N.S. — For the past 15 years this city has
been conditioned to accept the phasing out of its main
industry, the steel plant, to a bare rail mill operation.
‘ In December of 1901, when the first iron was poured,
its founders could see nothiing but success. ‘“We are on
the doorstep of the world’s markets’’ they declared
and, indeed it looked like a natural, at least on paper.

With almost all of the raw materials needed for the
Making of steel within a ninety mile radius, the plant
Was at tidewater with its own piers and an advantage of
1;400 miles over any steel plant in North America, in
relation to the European market. The plant was on the
doorstep of the world’s markets but the door was
closed. The Dominion Iron and Steel Company (Disco),
was refused admittance into the cartel which controlled
those world markets.

_ The American founders of the plant threw in the
Sponge and control passed into the hands of Montreal
and Toronto financiers.

As is customary in capitalist enterprise the mis-

fortune of not having the market they anticipated was
Passed on to the workers in the form of wage cuts
Tanging from 10% to 33%, although they were already
10% to 15% below the wage paid in the U.S.A. Natur-
ally this brought on a strike in the summer of 1904 but
this was short lived when picketting was rendered use-
less by the militia.

__ With the sale of raw billets curtailed, DISCO opened
-arod mill in 1904 and a rail mill the following year and

later on a wire and nail mill. Such diversification

broadened the market and therefore aided employment

On the plant.

_ During World War One, a plate mill was built and

€quipped with the aid of the federal government. Dur-

Ing that period the steel plant boomed.

The end of that war brought a recession and a con-
Sequent lay-off. Many trained employees left Sydney
for the steel mills of the USA.

Between the world wars the steel plant had its ups
and downs. There was little in the way of job security,
Wages were low and conditions poor but many families
depended on it for a living as well as for jobs for their
Sons and possibly an opportunity for them to learn a

Backgrounder
George MacEachem

trade or acquire industrial -skills that could be used
elsewhere.

The range of production, which is lacking now, in-
cluded billets, rails, tie plates, fish plates, rods, bars,
wire and nails. By-products of the coke ovens included
tar, sulphur, Toluol, salamoniac and benzol all of which
was sold to other first — DuPont, Imperial Oil, Domin-
ion Tar & Chemical — for further processing. Because
of the introduction of a very high percentage of im-
ported anthracite coal these by-products have been cut
to almost nothing.

There has been several changes in ownership and

management over the years, all of whom took all they

could.out of the industry putting nothing back. The last
private owner, Hawker Siddeley, announced on Fri-
day, October 13th, 1967, that the steel plant was an-
tiquated and unprofitable and must be closed down
immediately.

The population of Sydney responded with the
greatest display of unity ever witnessed here. On Sun-
day, November 19th, a massive parade and open air
public meeting was held. Twenty-five thousand people
took part.

The Tory government of Premier G.I. Smith was
impressed. The steel plant was taken under government
ownership and a board of directors set up. Pictou
County industrialist R.B. Cameron was appointed gen-
eral manager. The following year Premier Smith an-
nounced plans to spend $94,000,000 on modernization.
Inspired by this new hope for a stable industry the
steel workers broke records for production.

Before long they were disillusioned. The
‘‘modernization’’ started off in a strange direction. The
coke ovens and blast furnaces, both in a deplorable
state of repair, were overlooked and a new rail finishing
mill was imported from West Germany. :

Tens of millions of dollars were spent on a continuous

casting shop without any assurance that the existing
steel making departments that must feed the new shop
would last another year or even another week.

But Cameron and his board of directors, almost
without exception political appointees and few, if any,
with any experience in steel making, had only started
on the phase-out.

The wire and nail mill was first to go. This job was
done decisively and without delay. Some of the
machines were sent to Dartmouth where they were set
up in a smaller operation allegedly owned by R.B.
Cameron’s son. The remainder were quickly taken to
the scrap yard where they were broken up and fed to the
openhearth furnaces. This effectively stifled any at-
tempt to save that mill.

The rod mill was next to go and closed down without
protest. When it became the turn of the bar mill a new
situation had arisen. An election of officers in Local
1064, United Steelworkers of America brought in a
more progressive executive which quickly informed
management that they were prepared to fight any
further phasing out. The mill was saved from dismantl-
ing but a few years later, on the excuse that there were
no markets, was shut down “‘until things picked up”’.

Now the phase-out is almost completed. The plant is
completely shut down. The workers are aware of what
they are faced with. The idea of turning what was once
the largest steel plant in Canada into a rail mill is being
accepted by more and more people as the
‘*hopelessness’’ of diversification is promoted.

Cheap politics have played too big a part in the opera-
tion and ‘“‘modernization”’ of the plant. For years the
operation was stifled by interlocking directorates and
now we have a Liberal government in Ottawa and a
Tory government in Halifax, each trying to make poli-
tical capital of the ups and downs of the phase out.

The wide support which the people of Sydney gave
the recent strike of the steelworkers must be revived for
a fight, not for a rail mill employing a couple of hundred
workers, but for a diversified operation, employing ten
times that many.

Wars and the threat of war as a means
of settling differences between nations
are the criminal legacy of past exploiting
Societies. Reactionary philosophical
concepts try to make people believe that
the causes of war lie in the very nature of
man. Socialist philosophy rejects this
reactionary concept as a cover-up for the
sufferings and horror experienced by the
Peoples plunged into bloody wars by the
reckless policy of the ruling classes of an

Canada’s future — the socialist alternative (6)

Alfred Dewhurst

..| Marxism-Leninism Today see ce

against war. Peace and socialism are
therefore inseparable. The achievements
of socialism strengthen peace.

Peaceful co-existence means more
than the absence of war. It is based on
forsaking war as a means of settling is-
sues between nations, the settlement of
these issues by negotiations; equality
and understanding and trust between
countries with due regard for each

exploiting society.
_ Scientific socialism, Marxism-Lenin-
ism, is the only social science to reveal
the real causes and essence of wars. War
is not an eternal sin of man. It is a histori-
cal phenomenon created by social and
€conomic factors.
* * cd
The causes of war are rooted in the
nature of a society made up of antagonis-
tic classes, in the economic foundation of
Such a society based on private owner-
Ship of the means of production. Wars
are a continuation of the policy of the
Tuling classes in an exploiting society. In
capitalist society war and preparation for
War are permanent features of the policy
Of the big capitalist powers.
_Wars have their roots in social classes.
Since society consists of different, op-
_ Posing classes, wars are different as well,
as are their objectives, causes and mo-
tives. Consequently, there are two
Categories of wars; just, voluntary wars,
and unjust and predatory wars. The latter
are reactionary and are started to defend
_ the old and outworn, to preserve and
intensify social and national oppression.
Socialism is unalterably opposed to un-

just, predatory wars. Onthe other hand it
links together the struggle against exploi-

tation for the victory of national libera- .

tion, sovereignty of states, and the vic-
tory of socialism.
: x * *

During all of this century, concurrent
with the vast development of the pro-
ductive forces, armaments and
weaponry have become monstrous and
destructive. Wars have become more
and more costly in terms of human life
and material values. In the first half of
this century the ruling classes of the big
capitalist countries have plunged man-
kind into two murderous world wars. If
nuclear war is not prevented the destruc-
tion of life and property caused by the
two. world wars will pale into in-
significance in comparison with that of a
nuclear holocaust.

The emergence of socialism, first in
one country, (the Soviet Union) and fol-

wing World War Two in a community
of socialist countries, means that social-
ist and capitalist countnes are Co-
existing side by side. It also means that
the main contradiction existing today is
that between capitalism and socialism on

a world scale.. That co-existence is an

antagonistic contradiction. However,

the co-existence can be peaceful and

competitive, or it can be combative,

carrying with it the dreadful danger of

world nuclear war.
* * *

The peaceful co-existence of socialist
and capitalist countries is an objective
necessity of human development. The
policy of peaceful co-existence and
peaceful competition is based ona scien-
tific analysis of the driving forces behind
the development of contemporary socie-
ty. General world-wide economic re-
lations are stronger than the desire, will
and decisions of any bellicose govern-
ment or class. This is what compels
capitalist governments to have peaceful
relations with the socialist governments.

For the countries building socialism,
peace is a vital need. In socialist society
the economic foundation of wars — pri-
vate property — has been abolished and
none of the social forces in it are in-
terested in war or the enslavement of
other nations. Socialism means the build-
ing of the new, which is impossible to
create without struggling for peace,

others’ interests; non-interference in in-
ternal affairs; the recognition of the right
of every country to settle its own prob-
lems independently; respect for the
sovereignty and territorial integrity of all
countries; the promotion of economic
and cultural co-operation founded on
complete equality and reciprocal benefit.

Peaceful co-existence does not imply
the giving up of armed struggle in the
event the imperialists violate peace by
force of arms in an attempt to impose
their rule on one nation or another. It is
not applicable to relations between op-
pressors and oppressed, between the
colonialists and the victims of colonial
exploitation. For every nation has the
sacred right of defending its in-
dependence and freedom, of fighting ag-
gression or imperialist oppression.

Socialism established as the world so-
cial system will forever deliver mankind
from wars, from annihilation and the de-
struction of incalculable material re-
sources created by the labor and in-
telligence of man, because hostile re-
lations among nations will disappear.
N.B. more next week

PACIFIC TRIBUNE—JUNE 11, 1982—Page 5