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First Union Safety and Health Conference in USSR |

Sudbury miners see safety programs.

SUDBURY — Two members
of Local 598 of the Mine, Mill
and Smelter Workers’ Union
were in Moscow recently for a
meeting of the Union Safety and
Health Conference.

Lorne Stevenson reported in
the latest issue of Mine-Mill
News that he and the other
delegate, Ed Nitchie, attended
the conference “in the Confer-
ence House of the Trade Unions;
a very nice building. Thirty-six
nations attended the conference.
I felt as if I were in the United
Nations in the. manner it was
set up and handled.

“The president of the Trade
Union addressed the 36 nations
with a welcome to the first
Werld’s Safety and Health Con-
ference. President Arkhipov
stressed in part of his address
that all the nations were there
for the conference and were not
there for any political purpose
or other reasons, and that’s how
the conference was conducted.”

There were several trips dur-
ing the conference, and delegate

Last week unemployment
among Canadian auto workers
and UAW members rose to 25%
of 106,000. This is almost as
high now as in the USA where
some 30% of the unionized work
force in the Big Three have been
laid off. These are the people on
indefinite layoffs, or to put it
another way — more or less per-
manently jobless. As for the
rest of the work force in the in-
dustry it is staggering along with
temporary layoffs of one or two,
or more, weeks duration.

At General Motors’ plant in
Oshawa — where 14,000 work-
ers returned Feb. 10, after a one-
week temporary layoff — skilled
tradesmen with as many as 20
years. seniority have been laid
off as the cars keep piling up
around the factory. This week,
Ford will close down assembly
plants in Oakville and St. Thom-
as for a week, adding some
3,500 workers to the ranks of
the unemployed.

GM in Detroit will close seven
of its U.S. assembly plants for
ene week Feb. 17-24, temporari-
ly laying off 13,405 hourly work-
ers. White Motors Corp. of
Cleveland will close a heavy
duty truck plant for two weeks
from March 3.

Chrysler (U.K.) Ltd. of Britain
will slow production from 60 to
40 cars per hour, starting March
1. Its 4,000 production workers
have been on a three-day week
since the beginning of this year.

Call for Sacrifice

In France, Peugeot will close
its Saint-Etienne plant for five
days beginning Feb. 17, involv-
ing 708 workers. Renault will
close its truck plant at Annonay
for three days beginning Feb. 19,
affecting 2,500 workers.

As can be seen, the layoff pat-
tern involves all industrially ad-
vanced capitalist countries. Nor
is it confined to the auto indus-
try but is beginning to spread to
all industries.

_ Canadian International Paper
Co. is closing its Hawkesbury
plant for a month on Feb. 17,
affecting 325 of-its 360 employ-
ees. In fact, the Toronto Globe
and Mail has carried a special
column now for some months

PACIFIC TRIBUNE—FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 21, 1975—Page 8

Stevenson noted “While visiting
Krivoi Rog, we visited an open
pit that was a beehive of activ-
ity with equipment that was
monstrous and up-to-date. We
visited an iron mine called the

Giant Mine and were taken un-

w

_ derground. Their safety program

is one worth taking a lesson
from and their air underground
is the purest air that I have ever
experienced underground, and I
have been down in the mines
many times in Canada.”

Ready for a mine tour in. the Ukraine are Canadian and Swedish. \

delegates, mine officials and interpreters.

LABOR SCENE Saeue=s ie

BY BRUCE MAGNUSON for whom? for what?

under the heading “Layoffs and
Cutbacks.” Last Friday, _ its
editor-in-chief and publisher,
Mr. R. S. Malone, published a
“Call for sacrifice to curb Can-
ada’s inflation.” The cure he ad-
vocated centred on a policy of
lower wages and lower living

standards for the working peo--

ple. He even quoted Prime Min-
ister Trudeau that “Everyone
will have to accept a slightly re-
duced salary so that more people
can be put to work.”

The facts are that while the
capitalist politicians, the bour-
geois economists and the pundits
cf the press talk and write about
the need for sacrifices, the mo-
nopolies have already embarked
upon one of the most sinister
experiments to cut the buying
power of ‘wages through infla-
tion, increase profits by keeping
prices high at workers expenses,
ruthlessly cutting costs by
means of temporary and indefi-
nite layoffs, swelling the ranks
of the unemployed industrial
reserve army of workers.

Sacrifices are already being
made by millions of ‘working
people tc guarantee the profits
of a few of the corporate elite
and their system of capitalist
exploitation. Millions of workers
are being robbed of their wages
and small savings, if any. Red
tape and bureaucracy makes for
delays, and sometimes prevents
a worker and his starving fam-
ily from collecting such social
security benefits as are coming
to him or her.

But that is not all by any
means. Making use of govern-
ments and the machinery of
state, the monopolies funnel
more and more of the gross na-
tional product into their own
greedy hands, through raids on
the. public treasury as well as
by means of exorbitant price
fixing and tax dodging. The
latest “Syncrude Steal” is an ex-
ample of this policy. ©

The crisis we are facing is no

ordinary cyclical crisis. It is also.

a general crisis of the capitalist
system, in which capitalist mo-
nopolies and their servile gov-

ernments seek to place all costs
on the backs of the workers,
while reaping all the profits for
themselves.

The only permanent alterna-
tive to the system of state mo-

-nopoly capitalism is a fundamen-
tal reorganization of our social
and political system along sci-
entific socialist lines, where pub-
lic ownership of means of wealth
production will make economic
planning possible. With our re-
scurces and developed technol-
ogy under such a system, pro-
duction cculd move full steam
ahead, guaranteeing a phenome-
nal increase in standards of liv-!
ing. :

But even now, before such eco-
nomic, social and political chan-
ges can be brought about, much
can be done to improve the con-
ditions for working people, if
united action is taken to achieve
the following minimum program:

1. Stop the layoffs.

2. Guarantee any laid - off
werkers full income for duration
of layoff.

3. Expand the domestic market
through higher wages.

4. A 30-hour workweek at 40
hours’ pay.

5. Eliminate taxes on earnings
of $10,000 or less.

6. Equal Pay for work of equal
value for men and women.

7. Funds for job-creating pro-
jects, including housing as a pub-

lic utility at prices working peo-
ple can afford.

8. Roll back prices to Jan. 1973
level on basic food, rent, hous-
ing, clothing and fuel under strict
controls.

9. Public ownership of the
food processing industry with
stable prices to farmers for their
produce. :

10. Develop energy and re-
sources under public ownership
to benefit Canadians and streng-
then Canadian independence.

_.Mass democratic action is
needed now by the labor move-
ment, the trade unions, the farm

mcvement, youth and women’s - __

movement and all democratic
forces to implement such a pro-

gram and check the drift to de-.

pression.

WILDCATS HIT
BRITISH RAILS

LONDON — A wildcat strike
by railway signalmen., forced
more than a million British com-
muters to find other ways to
work last week.

London was the worst-hit re-
gion. Roads to the capital were

snarled with extra motor traffic .

as more than 90% of trains fail-
ed to run.

MIGRANT WORKERS
WIN NEW MINIMUM
TORONTO—Migrant workers
who harvest fruit, field vege-
tables and tobacco will be guar-
anteed a minimum wage of $2.40
an hour, effective May 1, Labor

Minister John MacBeth announc- ©

ed Feb. 13.

Mr. MacBeth also told the le-
gislature that farm workers em-
ployed for more than three
months will be eligible for vaca-
tion pay:

The same workers. will be en--

titled to five paid public holidays
after three months of work, be-
ginning this year, and seven
holidays with pay beginning in
1977.

It will be the first time any
farm workers have been covered
by the province’s.minimum wage
laws.

He said the minimum wage
won’t apply to other types of
farm workers because it is in
the area of harvesting cash crops
that abuses have occurred.

CARLETON PROFS
SET UP UNION

OTTAWA — Carleton Univer-
sity professors have voted in
favor of constitutional changes
ta make the’ university’s acade-
mic stafi association bargaining
agent fo. the teachers, a univer-
sity spokesman said.

The 292-44 referendum vote
gavc Carleton faculty members
ihe two-thirds majority needed
fc. thc constitutional changes to
kecom: valid. Tha constitution
had not previously allowed the
association ta act as a union.
‘Th: next step, says associa-
tion president Jill Vickers, is to
ge stafi members to sign union
cards. “J’m confident we will
have sufficient signatures in a
week to go to the Ontario Labor
Relations Board for certifica-
tion,” she said.

PROSPECT OF
SETTLEMENT AT UNITED

MONTREAL — The prospect
of a settlement in a 14-months-
cld strike at United Aircraft of
Canada Ltd. plants appeared
brighter last week as both sides

>

ington for jobs.

HIGHER LAST QUARTER

Members of the United Autoworkers Union demonstrate in Wa

have accepted a series of com:
promises offered by Quebec La-)
bor Minister Jean Cournoyer.
Both union and company off
cials said a few points remain
be settled but the main stumbl*
ing block in negotiations—unio
demands for application of thi
Rand Formula — has been fr
solved. 3
Robert Dean, spokesman fo
the United Auto Workers
America, said the union agree@
to drop its demand for compu
sory dues check-off because Mr.
Cournoyer has promised to in
troduce legislation affecting dues)
for unions in large Quebec in
dustries. : ;
A union membership meeting)
early this week will hear Mr) —
Cournoyer’s. proposals. 4

OILFIELD WORKERS
RETURN TO JOB
—- Oilfield

servico companies in southeast
ern Saskatchewan voted last
week to end a 3!4-week with
drawal o: services which started)
Jan. .2C ta protest government;
taxation policies on resources. Al
union spokesman warned th
unless there are government!
move:i to encourage oi! co
pany activity within the nex few
months, withdrawal oi service

migh: star: again.

STRIKE GROUNDS

ANIK SATELLITE

OTTAWA — Launching of 4
third communications satellite)
has been indefinitely postponed
because of a strike at the United)
States National Aeronautics an¢)
Space Administration (NASA) —
A spokesman for Telesat, the)
consortium that built and oper) |
ates Anik I and Anik II, sai@
Anik III is grounded’ until the
end of a strike by McDonnell:
Dcuglas Corp. employees. Anikj
III is the backup for the othet)
two Canadian satellites.

OTTAWA — Major negotiatee)
‘working contracts in 1974 p
vided average annual increas
to base pay rates of 14.2%, wit!
averag« raises for the last qu
ter of the year climbing
11.414, labor department figure?)
showed. :

The negotiated increases show’
e:] a continuing upward trent
throughout the year. The 1973)
average compares with a 1973
figurc ox £.8%. i

The labo: departmen’ figure
arc based cn 2 survey of collec)
tive agreements covering, 500 :
morc workers, excluding com
struction industry settlements. —

WAGE INCREASES