a a

tee

25 years ago...

OPPOSE W. GERMAN
_ REARMAMENT PLAN

_ Across Canada last week pub-
lic opinion against the rearming
of Western Germany was being
taken directly to MPs by delega-
tions, by telephone and by let-
ter. In most cases MPs have
acknowledged their fear of giv-
Ing arms to a regime that has

_ twice broken its promises and

drawn.Canada into war.

_ ACCF member of parliament
in Saskatchewan announced last
week that he will speak and vote
against any plan to rearm Ger-
Many; A.M. Nicholson (Man-
kenzie) is reported to have told
a delegation visiting him in

Sturgis and seeking to enlist his .

support against the ratification
of the London-Paris agree-
ments that he will speak against
it in the House.

The Tribune,
January 3, 1955

To Peace and People’s Unity

50 years ago...

DEPORTATION
USED AGAINST JOBLESS
VANCOUVER — Comrade

McEwan, secretary of the Un-
employed Workers Organiza-

‘tion of this city, has been ar-

rested and is being held by the
immigration authorities for de-
portation. This coup was not
unexpected by the workers here
after thearing the threats of
Supt. Tracey of the city police
This fascist tried to browbeat
and intimidate the leaders of
the unemployed and declared
that the elimination of militant
leaders would solve the un-
employment problem in Van-

-couver. This organization is too

militantly and honestly led to
suit the rulers of Vancouver
and they have started the ar-
rests and frame-ups which they
think will smash the organiza-
tion. Other arrests are ex-
pected. :
The Worker,

January 4, 1930

Profiteer of the week:

Let them drink beer, you say? John Labatt
Ltd., had a tax-free profit for six months ended

’ Oct. 31/79 of $23,603,000, up $9-million from a
year earlier. Serves the beer drinkers right,
you say? But Labatts filched some of that from
users of products from flour mills, egg farms,
food processors,

etc. Let them be

nationalized, you say?

Figures used are from the company's financial statements.

Editor — SEAN GRIFFIN
Associate Editor — FRED WILSON
Business and Circulation Manager — PAT O’CONNOR

Published weekly at Suite 101 — 1416 Commercial Drive,
Vancouver, B.C. V5L 3X9. Phone 251-1186

Subscription Rate: Canada $10 one yr.; $6.00 for six months;
: All other countries, $12 one year.

Second class mail registration number 1560

EIDIOUMUATL
COMIMIENT

Make the 80s a decade of )
consolidation of detente

The new decade, of which we are now
a part, holds out the potential of lifting
great burdens from a multitude of the
earth’s people. (That is, if one looks at
the positive influences; on the other
hand it promises to be a decade of
monumental struggles.)

The positive side exists precisely be-
cause the 1980s can, within the most
realistic bounds, become the decade of
the consolidation of detente in the
world, the decade when political detente
spreads to the military sphere. This is
both the centre of the most serious
struggle, and the most obvious fact of
the 80s, and should win all of us to the
struggle.

The 70s have shown what a crushing
burden arms escalation can become
while at the same time recording some
poive steps, such as SALT II, the

SSR’s withdrawal of troops from cent-
ral Europe, growing resistance to the
introduction of new generations of U.S.
nuclear missiles in Europe, and so on.

Disarmament in our age is the alter-
native to thermonuclear war.

Massive arms production means a
dead end — either thermonuclear in-
cineration or thé deadening arms bur-
den which nullifies wage increases, rules
out a rising standard of living, and
cripples worthwhile human develop-
ment.

The key and crucial issues of the
1980s are the upbuilding of detente,

and a relentless struggle against those —

forces who would wreck detente for the
sake of super-profits.

Canada’s arms budget, not counting
extras like $5-billion worth of fighter
planes, is now well over $4-billion a
year. Our commitment to the aggressive
North Atlantic Treaty Organization
(NATO) goes up by 3% a year. Our
expenditure on the North American Air
Defence scheme (NORAD) is worthless
both for security and as a good tax-
dollar investment. Canada squanders
money; U.S. generals order us on to
suicide missions.

Canada’s Defence Department admits
that “only eastern Canadian airspace
(with the exception of south-western
Ontario and southern Nova Scotia) is
controlled in Canada while the remain-
ing Canadian airspace is controlled
from centres in. the United States.”
(News release, Dec. 20/79).

Such expenditures neither meet con-
sumer needs nor result in production of
other products — they are dead ends.
Also, it has been asserted that arms

industries make 70% more profit than

consumer-use, or supply to production
industries, while providing a withered
proportion of jobs. No wonder “conver-

sion”. to peace industries is the call of —

trade unionists in’ Britain and else-
where. ba

The arms industry hits us three ways:
through merciless tax gouging, dwindl-
ing jobs, and the very real threat of
being turned to cinders if just one
redneck U.S. general gets his shaky
fingers on the panic button.

The new decade of the 80s deserves
better, but it will only get it if we fight
for peace as we'd fight for our own lives.

Keep the old parties out

Tory promises, new and re-cycled, are
never in short supply. There are the
Petrocan shares for the “little guy”, and
maybe we'll hear again of a $2-billion tax
cut. But we know now that Tory tax cuts
are for corporations, and Flip Flop Joe
will say anything for votes.

With that said, a warning must be voi-
ced against being stampeded back to the
other big business party, the Liberals.
Remember the Anti-Inflation Board and
the back-to-work legislation?

The point is on Feb. 18 to break the old
parties’ power by preventing their re-
election. Canada needs policies such as
the working class, farmers and the
democratic forces in their unity could
develop. Unity is the crucial ingredient
in the fightback against belt-tightening
dictated by monopoly profits, against the
downhill slide of real wages, against cut-
backs in social services.

It is such unity that is proposed by the
Communist Party — whose own election
platform offers sound, workable solu-
tions on workers’ terms, to throw off the
burden of the crisis inflicted by the
capitalist system. (See platform else-
where in paper.) Unity in the fight for
jobs, against inflation, for Canadian in-
dependent development, and for a

democratic solution to the national ques-

tion in our two-nation state, is unity

against the.monopoly bosses and their
controlled government. _

The Communist Party see united ac-
tion with New Democrats, trade union-
ists, ‘farmers and other groups, as
strengthening the battle of working class
and democratic people. The struggle ex-
tends from the picket line to the election
campaign and into many facets of life.
To extend it as well into parliament
Communists propose: For real change,
elect a progressive majority, including
Communists. That is the best answer to

- Tory-Liberal attempts to trick voters into

giving their votes to big business. —

Saving on fuel

With the price of gasoline and refined
oil soaring, taxpayers might ask Cana-
da’s defence department how much it
burns up each year — for aircraft, ships,
and land vehicles. Money could be saved

and also fuel, particularly from the .

unnecessary performance of North
American Air Defence (NORAD) and

NATO duties.
PACIFIC TRIBUNE—JANUARY 11, 1980—Page 3