Labour

Continued from page 1

The BCNU also sought a meeting with
Premier Bill Vander Zalm to put the fund-
ing issue on the government’s doorstep but
the premier passed a message through his
principal secretary declining any involve-
ment — yet — in the dispute.

Currently, according to Statistics Canada
figures for 1988-89, British Columbia’s per
patient-day funding for hospitals ranks only
ninth among the 10 provinces, the result of
years of cutbacks and chronic underfunding
of health care. Only Quebec puts less money
per patient day into its hospitals and B.C.’s
contributions are 20 per cent below the
national average.

Predictably, HLRA was quick to claim
that the nurses were “riding roughshod
over the province,” citing the impact of a
hospital strike on elective surgery and var-
ious diagnostic and therapeutic services.

But the strike “didn’t have to happen,”
O'Flynn charged, putting the blame on the
employers and the government.

“HLRA and the government have cal-
lously decided that saving dollars is more
important than saving lives,” he said in a
statement June 14. “In their minds it is
simply cheaper to cause a strike than to
resolve B.C.’s critical health care problems
of staff shortages, work overloads and
chronic underfunding.”

O’Flynn said that health care unions had
come to the negotiations “with an agenda
that would rescue an ailing health care sys-
tem.”

He also noted that HLRA’s bargaining

Saturday, June 24, 1989

Maritime Labour Centre
1880 Triumph Street

Speaker: Ald. Libby Davies
Entertainment:

Refreshments:
Dinner: 7 p.m.

Admission: $12
$10/seniors, unemployed
Under 12 free

Door prizes

Phone 251-1186
for reservations

Strike stepped up

tactics had been similar in both the BCNU
and HEU negotiations. “After months of
bargaining, HLRA made one offer they
knew would be unacceptable and then they
refused to continue the bargaining process
even during attempts at mediation.

“This is a planned ambush by the
government and HLRA. They think that a
health care strike will turn the public against
the unions — but we don’t believe the pub-
lic will be that easily fooled,” he said.

Meanwhile, as of June 12, the HEU will
conduct its strike votes under the supervi-
sion of the Industrial Relations Council,
following the action of the employers in
applying to the IRC to have the union’s first
11 strike votes — conducted outside the
IRC in line with the B.C. Federation of
Labour boycott — declared illegal.

O’Flynn said the union was told by the
B.C. Fed that it had met the federation’s
requirements for an IRC-supervised vote
because it had conducted non-IRC votes
but had been challenged by the employers.

HEU members voted 88.5 per cent to

strike at seven hospitals — representing
some 25 per cent of the union’s B.C.
membership — although those votes, as

well as others conducted before June 12,
will be re-scheduled under IRC supervision.
The vote around the province is expected to
be complete by July.

Private mediator Vince Ready, who had
been conducting mediation talks between
HEU and HLRA, adjourned talks last
week, citing the significant differences
between the two sides.

Reunion

6 p.m.

Labour, small firms
face loss under FTA,
task force warned

Small business and labour should get

together to fight the Canada-U.S. Free ~

Trade Agreement and other policies of
big business, a hearing into economic
alternatives sponsored by the B.C. Fed-
eration of Labour was told.

Barry Morley, president of the Com-
munity Business and Professionals Assoc-
iation, said high unemployment is being
institutionalized by governments and
warned that jobs created in the wake of
the free trade pact will pay wages well
below the poverty line.

Morley was
one of some 28
representatives of
business, commu-
nity and labour
groups who, along
with an MP and
MLA, addressed
the federation’s
provincial hear-
ings into the
economy in New
Westminster on :
June 12. GEORGETTI

(From there, the hearings were sche-
duled for Cranbrook, Nelson, Prince
Rupert on June 22 and Prince George,
June 28.)

Collectively, they had the makings of a
broad-based coalition as they cited
examples from their respective fields of
interest to call for greater, not decreased,
social spending, improved wages and full
employment, and the scrapping of pro-
grams designed to harmonize Canadian
institutions with those of the~ United
States.

When the hearings are completed and
all submissions culled over, the B.C. Fed
will wrap the suggestions into a program
for an alternative economic agenda for
Canada and the province, federation
president Ken Georgetti told the session.

Most likely it will mirror in part the
Fed’s current discussion paper on eco-
nomic alternatives, entitled “Full Employ-
ment and Fairness for British Columbia.”
While concentrating on the policies of
the Social Credit government, it also lev-
els fire on the Conservatives in Ottawa.

It observes: ‘““A fundamental (Socred
and Tory) government policy has been to
encourage high unemployment,” and
depress wages and lower working condi-
tions to compete with Third World
countries and entice investment capital.

“Governments have relied on ‘market
forces’ to set economic priorities, leading
to deregulation, privatization, contract-
ing out of public services, cutbacks in
government programs and _ services,
greater use of user fees, and free trade
with the United States,” the document
observes.

The paper includes an “economic stra-
tegy” which stresses full employment as

x

the key priority and calls for changes

“such as tax reform, increased manufac-

turing, public ownership and investment
control, and lowering interest rates.

It also presents contentious proposals
such as community economic develop-
ment and worker-controlled enterprises,
noting the pros and cons from a trade
union point of view.

The federation also distributed several
position papers at the meeting on topics
such as childcare, youth unemployment,
women and poverty, the regressive
changes to Unemployment Insurance,
the federal deficit — which it called a
“deficit scare” — and the recent federal
budget.

Most of those submitting briefs
appeared to agree in essence with the
B.C. Fed’s position, citing from their
own experiences what continued govern-
ment austerity has meant to women, the
unemployed, seniors, labour and other
Canadians.

Eunice Brooks of the Disabled
Women’s Network told of the “syste-
matic legislation of poverty on disabled
people.” She cited the example of
“Tina,” a single parent with multiple
sclerosis who is forced to pay half her
income for decent food.

Burnaby school trustee Carol Jones
noted the steadily increasing government
financial support for independent schools,
charging that the privatization of educa-
tion “‘is the ultimate plan of our provin-
cial government.”

New UI regulations introduced by
Employment Minister Barbara McDou-
gall will increase the eligibility for benef-
its to 15 work weeks for many recipients.
But many construction tradespeople
can’t qualify under the current 10-week
rule, said Gerry Miner of the Building
Trades Unemployment Action Centre.

“We are facing a strong Conservative
agenda, and we haven’t come up an

agenda to replace it,” said Port Moody -
. New Democratic MP Ian Waddell.

Waddell called the Free Trade
Agreement and the Meech Lake Accord
a “double whammy.” The accord will
weaken the central powers of the federal
government to such an extent that,
should any future government want to
reverse the changes brought about by
free trade, “it'll be impossible to change
the Americanization of Canada,” he
said.

Morley of the business group hit Bank
of Canada policies that produce unem-
ployment through high interest rates. “I
employ 70 people, and I’ve just had to lay
off five,” he related.

The president of the 10-year old busi-
ness organization said Canadians “‘must
reach out globally for new trading
partners, but not (as members of) trading
blocks.”

,

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