Former Navy leader hits sub purchase

By BETTY GRIFFIN

The federal government’s White Paper
on defence is “a lapse into alarmist, anti-
Soviet Cold War rhetoric and is counter-
productive to the pursuit of international
reconciliation,” a leading peace activist and
physician told a North Vancouver audience
Mar. 1.

Dr. Tom Perry, addressing a talk spon-
sored by the North Vancouver Citizens for
Peace, said the consequences of a nuclear
build-up as advocated by Defence Minister
Perrin Beatty would be disastrous.

*‘What would happen in a nuclear war?
Most of us would die — 40 to 70 per cent
by the end of the first month and the rest of
us by the end of the following year,” Perry,
professor of pharmacology at the Univer-
sity of B.C., warned.

Perry, a member of the Canadian Physi-
cians for the Prevention of Nuclear War,
Veterans Against Nuclear Arms, and Van-
couver city council’s Special Committee on
Peace, said: “Nuclear disarmament and
arms control should be the focus of defence
policy — not increased military spending.”

Perry said Canada will have to add $10-
$12 billion to its $10-billion defence budget

to purchase the nuclear submarines the
defence department is calling for in its white
paper.

“But 50,000 people each day die of star-
vation, four million children die yearly
because they have no immunization, and 80
per cent of all diseases are caused by con-
taminated water.

“Yet Canada spends little more than half
of what the United Nations considers min-
imal for countries to contribute to humanit-
arian aid,” Perry said.

Former Navy commander Roger Sweeny
said he had been in charge of a NATO plan
to detonate a nuclear device in mid-air off
the coast of Denmark to see if the blast
could deter Soviet planes.

* After I left the service, I was not allowed
to say anything for five years, but for the
first time in my life I started to think and
finally joined Veterans Against Nuclear
Arms,” he said.

“On the plan to buy nuclear subs, I
would say: Why in the world would we
want to do that?

“The first thing that is needed is a risk
assessment — what is the actual threat
from anywhere in the world, and what

could nuclear subs really do about it?” Swe-
eny argued.

“The White Paper says they will patrol
the Canadian Arctic, but as anyone knows,
including the United States Navy, the Can-
adian archipelago is too shallow for the

passage of submarines, and it is only in the’

polar regions where the seas are ice-covered
that subs can navigate.

“By going nuclear, Canada would abro-
gate the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty,
raise the spectre of nuclear accidents in
Canadian waters, and create a massive fed-
eral debt that could threaten social pro-
grams for years,” Sweeny said.

He said that despite assurances that such
weapons are safe, records show that in U.S.
harbours there were 354 fire alarms.

“A near disaster which was barely
reported on occurred Feb. 2 involving a
Polaris sub, The Resolution, in northern
Scotland. Two fail-safe devices failed, a
meltdown was imminent, and two seamen
rushed to start a diesel engine as the final
way to avert tragedy.

“The engine started just in time, with
only a minute or two to spare. If that hap-
pened in Vancouver harbour, and there was
a meltdown, downtown Vancouver to

Sechelt would uninhabitable for 24,000
years at least,” Sweeny warned.

“T have seen more than one ship fire, and
it usually happens while the men are on
shore leave. If anyone asks, the word is to
deny it happened — and this I have had
corroborated by a petty officer in the U.S.
Navy,” he revealed.

Both Perry and Sweeny urged the public
to write Ottawa to stop the purchase of
submarines and instead spend taxpayers’
money on peace-keeping, and safety and
rescue measures, as the External Affairs
Department has advocated.

The meeting unanimously resolved to
“urge the government to reverse its warlike
policy and adopt a policy reflecting the
wishes of Canadians, a policy for positive
defence measures such as continuing its
peace-keeping role within the United
Nations, guarding our fishing rights, work-
ing toward nuclear disarmament and reject-
ing any nuclear escalation such as the
purchase of nuclear submarines.

The resolution called on Ottawa to scrap
plans to buy 10-12 submarines, and instead,
“spend the billions for hospitals, daycare
centres and other socially useful purposes.”

REISMAN,
You TRAITOR.

Bou GAVE CANADA:
Te the USA! =

: crouge Et cdots cutie fe Hewt Vaan Me A ee ree”

_ trade pact negotiator Simon Resiman was addressing a $50-dollar-a-_
plate luncheon for business executives. Not surprisingly, Resiman was
Svante at ie reer ane momen se et OE :
Boerne St ate ete He, Free ann debate fe RFORROC ER

6 « Pacific Tribune, March 9, 1988

Sysco strike is solid
as pact turned down

By MIGUEL FIGUEROA

SYDNEY — After the collapse of the
latest round of talks between Sysco and
United Steelworkers Local 1064, the strik-
ers stand more united than ever and are
digging in for a long, hard battle to defend
their jobs and their industry. At stake is not
only the achievement of a new collective
agreement, but the very future of Sydney
Steel, the jobs of its 1,200 employees, and
the fate of this community and that of
industrial Cape Breton.

Hundreds of workers jammed the Steel-
workers Hall March | to hear the com-
pany’s latest contract offer, brought
forward after four days of intense mediation
efforts. Local president John Callaghan
dismissed the offer, which had not changed
substantially from earlier ones, as a delaying

From the
Maritimes

Miguel
Figueroa

tactic by management. He said it fell tar
short of union demands on such key issues
as wages, pensions, job security, severance
and duration of contract.

In a standing vote, the membership
unanimously supported the local execu-
tive’s recommendation to reject the offer,
and vowed to step up militancy on the
picket line and political pressure on the pro-
vincial government.

Sysco workers have good reason to stand
firm on their contract demands. For years
the management of the provincially-owned
steel plant has sweated wage concessions
out of their workers, holding the threat of
closure over their heads. Asa result, Sydney
steelworkers are today the lowest paid any-
where in Canada.

The monetary value of their average
wage and benefit package, for instance, is
approximately $6 an hour below similar

packages at Stelco or Algoma. In this light,

the union’s demand for a $1.30 per hour,

increase, pension improvements, job secur-
ity and a severance package in a two year
agreement, is fully justified.

But the dispute goes well beyond wages
to the future of Sydney Steel itself. It has
become clear to a growing number of steel-
workers that the company’s negotiating
strategy, the planned $260-million moder-
nization of the plant and the closure of the

coke ovens, is all part of the master plan ©

concocted by the federal and provincial
Tory governments. The plan calls for mea-
sured steps to curtail production, lay off
most (if not all) of the current work force,
upgrade technology and hand over a refur-
bished, profitable, non-unionized mini-mill
to their friends in the private sector.

There is a clear recognition among union
members and throughout the community
that the strike is essentially political in char-
acter, directed against the Buchanan
government’s neo-conservative agenda with
regard to the public sector and the provin-
ce’s steel industry in particular. The union
has called for a full public inquiry into the
mismanagement at Sysco and the future of
the industry in Cape Breton, and is increas-
ingly focussing on such issues as early
retirement, pension improvements and sev-
erance,

Community support continues to build
for the striking members of Local 1064. The
local labour council, the teacher’s union,
pensioners and numerous other community
groups have joined Sydney City Council in
voicing support for the strikers. The Cape
Breton Nuclear Disarmament Committee
has also added its support, expressing con-
cern that the closure of Sydney Steel may
result in the location of a military-related
plant on the site.

United in its ranks, and with strong
community support, the strikers are in a
good position to win a just settlement on the
outstanding issues. The next step will no
doubt include plans to mobilize the rest of
Nova Scotia’s labour movement in support
and to carry the fight to Buchanan and his
Tories in Halifax.

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