EDITORIAL-

Exorbitant gasoline prices, and the spin-off
effects throughout the economy add up to yet
another Mulroney, neo-conservative disservice
to the Canadian public, in the interests of cor-

. _ porate monopoly.

The spin offs can be easily seen when you
consider that the falsely high oil gasoline prices
apply to virtually everything that has to be
moved by truck, car, bus, aircraft, boat or farm
equipment.

There is no question that Canadians are pay-
ing the outlandish prices per litre for gasoline
that they are paying because of the continued
collusion between the Mulroney Tories and the
oil monopolies, and because of the govern-
ment’s indecent desire to make Canada’s
publicly-owned oil and gasoline company into
a gasping privateer bolstering state-monopoly
capitalism.

The Canadian Automobile Association is
right on target when it urges its 2.5 million
members to fight back against the government
and the big oil companies. While Energy Minis-
ter Pat Carney repeats the same evasions again
and again in Parliament, the CAA members are
called upon to demand of her: “I want to know
what you plan-to do to relieve motorists of this
inequitable tax burden.”

It was her government, after all, which
scrapped the National Energy Progam, handed

enormous tax and royalty breaks to the oil
multinationals, and which led to the efforts to
force Canadians to pay world prices for their
own oil. Now, apart from imitating her leader’s
witty repartee in the House, she can only make
the hollow claim that jobs hav been created in
_ the oil industry. Well, the world price has now
falien from $28 a barrel (U.S.) last March, to
$20.50 a barrel today — and the prices of oil
and gasoline to Canadians — their own oil and
_ gasoline — have never stopped rising.

_ Stop the gasoline rip-off

How can Tory policies on oil and gasoline
create jobs when purchasing power is cut by
high prices and the slashing of social programs?

How can they when Tory policies have aggra- *

vated the drastic fall of 24 per cent in oil con-
sumption across the country since 1979?

Petro-Canada was to give our elected
representatives — and presumably, through
them, the Canadian public — not only a finan-
cial share of the oil production, but a window
into the industry, to end the easy victimization
of the public and the government by the oil
multinationals. The Mulroney government can
hardly wait to get back to the old days when
this vast sector of energy policy was entirely
dictated by U.S. and other multinationals.

What the Tory government will achieve by
way of destruction of the Canadian economy,
and the tenuous rein parliament has on a part
of the oil industry, may take a decade or two to
rebuild.

After a week or so of being battered in Parli-
ament, Energy Minister Carney said Jan. 29
that she had “communicated with industry
executives to ensure that consumers get the full
and fair benefit of the price declines which are
in the system now.”

What the public should tell Carney is that
waiting for the kindly public spirit of oil indus-
try executives could well be futile. The only
exception might be those who want to glean
something more later from the Tory pork barrel.

The minister, and the Mulroney government
as a whole, should begin to take back some of
the millions they gave away to the oil multina-
tionals (which are bursting with profits) and
return it to the public. At the same time they
should utilize the fact that PetroCan is a Crown
company and direct it to lead in the lowering of
prices.

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Foreign

Second class Mail registranon Dumber 156

t might seem a tad paradoxical at first

that the Financial Post, which regularly
publishes substantial supplements on mil-
itary contracting, should publish a fairly
lengthy speech by Douglas Roche, Cana-
da’s ambassador for disarmament. That’s _
particularly so when the speech deplores

People and Issues

O ne of the links with the early beg
nings of the progressive Yugoslay,
movement was broken last week with th
passing of John Pribanich who died Jan. 2s
in St. Paul’s Hospital after failing to ree
over from surgery. 8

Born in Croatia in 1906, he immigrated

the enormous level of military spending and
calls for ideas to reduce spending and pro-
vide funding for economic development.

But then again, the Post is really only
reflecting the policy of the Conservative
party and the Mulroney government in
appointing Roche as disarmament ambas-
sador while continuing to support the U.S.
arms build-up. Even in polite circles, they
| call that two-faced.

And it is. While Roche is deploring the
levels of military spending, for example,
the leaked draft report of the Tory-
dominated standing committee on exter-
nal affairs and defence has apparently

-recommended an increase in Canadian

- military spending from $9.4 billion in 1985
to $9.7 billion in 1986 — and that’s in
addition to the recommendation for re-
newal of the NORAD agreement without
the excluding ABM clause.

But there’s more to it than just a ques-
tion of Canada’s defence budget. Pumping
up industry throughout military contract-
ing — as the Reagan administration has
done — seems to be a key element in the
Tories’ strategy, a strategy which also
includes privatization of many of this
country’s major Crown corporations.

It was just a year ago, of course, that the
Tories’ defence department held seminars
across the country in conjunction with the
U.S. department of defence to explain to

businesses. how they could cash in on the

billions expected to be spent in military
contracting. Now, it appears, the govern-
ment has been putting that expertise to
work. :

According, once again, to the Financial
Post, Crown-owned Canadair Ltd. is
planning on getting involved with a West
German and a French company to pro-
duce a system called the CL-289 surveil-
lance drone, a pilotless vehicle which is
used by armies on scouting missions. The
system is expected to generate sales in the
$2 billion range, of which Canadair’s share
would be about 40 per cent. The company
already generates about $600 million in
sales from an earlier version of the drone
and the new military project is expected to
“consolidate the company’s return to slim
profitability.” :

What’s interesting about the whole
thing is that Canadair Ltd., like several
other Crown companies, is up on the
Tories’ privatization auction block. The
military contracts are apparently intended
to make the company’s balance sheet seem
more attractive for what will almost cer-
tainly be a U.S. buyer.

In the case of another Crown-owned
aviation company — deHavilland — it’s
a slightly different route that the Tories

. have taken but the net result will probably

be the same. U.S.-owned Boeing Ltd. was
welcomed in through the front door as a

priority buyer for the compay with the

federal government offering a financial
deal that Boeing officials just couldn’t
refuse.

The outrage over the sale and the terms
forced Ottawa to put the deal to a Com-

_ mons committee which just wound up its

hearings last week with a go-ahead for
Boeing. But one of the revelations made
by Boeing Canadian chairman Richard
Albrecht when he testified before the
committee was that the successful civilian
aircraft Dash-8 would be converted to a
military plane intended for anti-submarine
surveillance work. He told the committee
that several countries had expressed inter-
est in the radar and sonar-equipped mil-
itary craft, indicating once again that
Canadian innovation would be twisted
into military purpose by a U.S, owner.

As with the changes in the Foreign
Investment Review Agency, the result of
the Tory policy will be increased foreign
ownership of the economy. But in the con-
text of a U.S. military build-up, it will
inevitably bring increased military domi-
nation of the economy — ata time when
family allowances are being cut, income
taxes hiked and unemployment insurance
curtailed. :

Now if Roche were to talk about those
specific problems and the need for changes
in government policy, it might make his
speeches a little more meaningful. But the

Post probably wouldn’t print them, either,

to this country in 1928 where he took up
various jobs on the railroad, in the loggin,
industry and in the early construction 6
the Welland Canal. In the middle of th
Depression, he moved to Toronto wher
he learned his trade as a printer and wen;
to work on the Yugoslav paper Borbe
(Struggle), beginning a lifelong commit
ment to the progressive Yugoslav move
ment and its press. 3
It was also in the early Thirties that he
joined the Communist Party, in whose
ranks he remained throughout his life. Ay
was a member of the Vancouver East clut
at the time of his death. 4
A member of the national executiy,
committee of the Federation of Yugoslay
Canadians for many years, he come to this
province in 1951 at the executive’s reques'
to assist in the work of the progressive
Yugoslav community and the various
organizations it established. Even in later 7
years, he continued to be one of the mos'
active organizers for the Canadian Yugos
lav Community Association.
Memorial services were held Jan. 29
the Bell Funeral Home. Canadian Yugos-
lav Community Association representa-
tive John Starcevic, Nadia Niechoda
representing the Federation of Russian
Canadians, Martin Oreskovic, represent
ing the Croation Fraternal Organizatior
and Communist Party leader Mauri
Rush joined in paying tribute.

_ &e PACIFIC TRIBUNE, FEBRUARY 5, 1986