BRITISH COLUMBIA

Trekker recalls 1935
reading of Riot Act
by Mayor McGeer

aa anita

“Our sovereign Lord and King
charges and commands all persons
assembled immediately to disperse and
peaceably depart to their habitations or
to their lawful business upon pain of
being guilty of an offence on conviction of
which they may be sentenced to impri-
sonment for life,”

— from the Riot Act.

The following is an excerpt from an
interview with trekker Willis Shaparla
who was a member of Division 3 at the
time of the demonstration leading up to
the reading of the Riot Act.

Early on in the relief camp strike we
began the tactic of bringing home the
need for food by demonstrating in the
food-warehouse area which was situ-
ated on Cordova Street along the CPR
Tracks there. Later, we extended that
to the food floors of Woodwards,
Spencers (which was one of the big
three department stores at that time)
and Hudson’s Bay.

We would go down to food floors

_ which were generally in the basement

and we would demonstrate there in
order to again bring home to people
that we were hungry and here was food.
We were very well disciplined, there
was absolutely no disturbance of any
kind. If we caught anybody shoplifting
we would expel him immediately,
because we didn’t want any conduct to
be used against our cause.

When we first started it people were
a little shocked, but later on they under-
stood the message of people being
hungry and food being there. They
became vocal about that and generous
both with their finances and their opin-
ions. Many, of course, didn’t have any
more money than we did.

On the 23rd of April, 1935, we went
down to Woodwards and we found the
door secured with security guards; and
the same thing at Spencers. We
assumed it would be the same thing at
Hudson’s Bay, but we marched down

there anyway because it was on Gran-
ville Street — the main street in town.
We marched south on the east side of
Granville until we got to Hudson’s Bay
and, of course, the doors were locked
and there were security guards there, so
we kept on walking up to Seymour
Street, and then turned left. There were
three entrances there, and — lo and
behold — we got to the middle door
and it was open and there was no secur-
ity guard. So the leader just spon-
taneously walked in there and everybody
followed. It was not planned.

We just walked in there and we just
stood there. (One of the men addressed
the shoppers briefly — Ed.) About 20
minutes later the city police came in
and they stood on either side of us, with
their backs to the counters. And they
just stood there. There was no dialogue
— nothing. This went on for some
minutes, until finally some officer in
charge came in and started talking to
some of his men. He apparently gave
them orders to remove us, and they
moved in. We remained passive. And
they just handed us — one to the next
one and so on. We didn’t resist, we just
remained passive.

You see throughout our whole expe-
riences, we knew and understood that
the police and the authorities were
looking for some sort of provocation
on which to base their continuing
action of banging us over the head or
discrediting the trekkers and the strike
and the purpose of the strike. We res-
isted the provocation although we

-wouldn’t take abuse.

But some individual city policemen,
for some reason, started hitting this fel-
low and then three or four police
jumped in and banged him around a
bit. They smashed him up against one
of the big outside window panes on
Seymour Street, and he got minor cuts

_ from the shards of glass.

Once outside, we marched down to
Victory Square and there was a delega-
tion sent to see McGeer. But they were
arrested, (for
vagrancy — Ed.)
all except Matt
Shaw.

Then McGeer
came to Victory
Square. There
4 were about 5,000

people in the
} Square and there

: =! were three police
WILLIS forces there —

SHAPARLA the RCMP, the
city police and the Provincial Police.
They were all lined up in their own
ranks in separate formation, all facing
in towards the cenotaph.

McGeer stood there and read the
Riot Act — and my understanding is
when the Riot Act is read, all civil liber-
ties are suspended and the police are
free to do what they want, without
being questioned for it. Once the Riot
Act is read you are supposed to disperse
immediately, but we didn’t. We held a
meeting, which lasted 10 minutes or so,
and then we formed ranks and
marched off. And that was the end of
that. That was what the newspaper
called a “riot” —. but if it was, it was
one the police had started.

May Day Greetings

for peace,

for unity,
for jobs,

Nanaimo, Duncan & District Labor Council

CUPE Local 389

marks May Day, 1985
in celebration
of all workers,
men and women,
standing together for
economic, social and
trade union rights.

MAY DAY

- GREETINGS
for

working class solidarity and werld peace

from the
B.C. Provincial Council of Carpenters

MAY DAY
GREETINGS

to members

and supporters

of Labor :
for Peace and Jobs

Steveston Shoreworkers Local 8
United Fishermen & Allied Workers Union

‘May Day

W.G. (Bill) Clark
President

greetings’

Serving workers in the telecommunications industry since 1949.

5261 Lane Street, Burnaby, 437-8601

D.E. Bremner
Secretary-Treasurer

PACIFIC TRIBUNE, MAY 1, 1985 e 7