LABOR -

By GEORGE MCKNIGHT

For some 40 odd years the wood industry
in B.C. has been in a period of relative
Stability and more or less rapid growth.
New pulp and paper mills, plywood plants
and sawmills were established and a period
of expansion came to be seen as almost the
normal situation.

This period lasted from early in World
War Two until the begining of the 1980s.
For trade unionists in this relatively affluent
period the lessons of the early years became
blurred if not lost as thousands of young
workers entered the industry and the older
workers who endured the hard years grew
telatively prosperous, retired or otherwise
left the industry.

Half way through the eighties we were
shocked to find that the lessons of those
early years needed to be relearned. Nowis is
time for woodworkers as well as pulp and
paper workers, for all who make their living
as workers in the forest industry to assess
the situation and act to ensure the future of
the unions and the industry in B.C.

These are not ordinary times. Serious
problems are indicated by recent and cur-
rent events in the economy of the province,
the country and industry. Among them:

© Top industry spokesmen are increas-
ingly calling for wage and other concessions
from the workers. In the U.S. Pacific
Northwest, the International Woodworkers
of America ([WA) and the Lumber and
Sawmill Workers Union (LSWU), repres-
enting some 40,000 workers, have proposed
a concessions package and are voting on it.

@ Already about 20,000 woodworkers’
jobs have been lost through layoffs, both as
a result of increasing production of compu-
ter technology and speedup as well as the
market slump and mill closures. Formerly
prosperous communities which relied on
the industry now face drastic unemploy-
ment, particularly among the young wood-
workers who, a few years ago, were full time
workers.

e As the industry has faced declining
markets, it has, with the collusion of the
provincial government turned ever more to
log exports to maintain its cash flow. Ship-
ping out round logs is further undermining
the future of the industry as a source of
employment and manufacturing in the pro-
vince.

© Both government and the industry
have failed to manage the forests properly,
further undermining the future of the indus-
try.

© We are seeing the ever-increasing use
of contractors and sub-contractors, many
of them non-union. In some camps, certi-
fied by the WA and belonging to one of the
big companies, not a single employee of the
Parent company remains, the whole opera-
tion having been turned over to the contrac-
tors. :

From the above it is apparent to anyone
that a major offensive has been launched
against the labor movement in the wood-
working and pulp and paper industries.

The fight against concessions is far more
than a fight over general wage increases and
broad negotiations. There is the whole ques-
tion of working conditions and hundreds of
day-to-day issues on the job. What can the
Union do about a violation of seniority if it
can’t fight and win a concessions battle?

Ow can a union fight off the contracting-
Out drive if it has to capitulate in negotia-
tons? The mhilitancy and will to fight will be
tested first on these job-related questions
and it is here the fight will be the toughest.

In this respect probably the IWA is the
Most vulnerable, In the CPU and the

‘WC the pulp mills are large factories
With a crew all in one location. Communi-
“ation is realtively easy and meetings can be

€d on a moment's notice. In the logging
camps, scattered all over the province in
autonomous local unions and each one over
HeLY miles of forest, this is much more

Icult.
= Some examples of the problems arising
©W are the following:
that Employers telling the union committee
Contractors are going to be hired to

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Mapping
in the we

build roads or fall grade or other work
normally done by the camp crew without
any willingness to negotiate the change.
They just unilaterally decide to do it.

@ Employers deciding that contractors
will not get the benefit of wage increases and
other conditions of the union agreement,
thus setting up union-busting rates.

© Employers arbitrarily deciding to elim-
inate travel time provisions and instituting
longer hours of work at straight time.

@ Employers building new mills, as in
Chemainus and unilaterally setting working
conditions and work load without consulta-
tion with the unions as to crew complement
or other factors. The result — unheard of

“From the problems we're
experiencing, it is apparent that a .
major offensive has been launched
against the labor movement in the
wood and pulp industries.“

speedup, crew reduction and increases in
productivity.

What are not so apparent are policies and
programs in the trade unions to turn back
and defeat this offensive. There is no doubt
that the employers are big and powerful,
they have the support of the governments in
Victoria and Ottawa, they are united in their
demand for concessions and rollback of the
wages and working conditions previously
won by the struggles of the union members
in the industry.

What about the unions?

Can it reasonably be said that the wood-
workers unions are prepared to meet such
an employer offensive? What about the
childish raiding which is still going on
between the IWA and Pulp, Paper and
Woodworkers of Canada (PPWC)? What
about the dispute between the [WA and the
B.C. Federation of Labor? Where is that
unity to protect workers against conces-
sions and the employers’ attack on the very
existence of the trade union?

Let us not forget that 60 years ago the
trade union movement in the lumber indus-
try was smashed completely in circumstan-
ces somewhat similar to those existing now.

I believe that the forest industry unions
have no choice but to return to a style of
unionism which built union organization in
the industry, but which sadly has been lost
over the past decades.

In programmatic terms this style of union-
ism could be summed up in three points:
unity and autonomy; militant industrial
action; an alternative economic policy. :

For a great many years, one union in
wood has been an annual subject at TWA
conventions and union election pamphlets.

Still it can be said that we are no closer to
that goal than we were 40 years ago.

sy S
a fightbac
| defeat concessions, and the IWA
é § : can’t do it alone. Isn’t it time that the
' ok ' IWA members and leaders asked

Now we have three major unions in the
woodworking industry in the province. All
attempts to co-operate in bargaining and in
other ways have ended in failure to date,
although the two pulp unions have man-
aged to maintain a joint strategy.

How important is the principle of one
union in wood? There can hardly be any
doubt that it is of very great importance. It
would strengthen the whole trade union
struggle and lead the way to further gains
for the whole movement. But, it can only be
achieved in the proess of determined strug-
gle against the employers’ and their anti-

union campaign for concessions, rollbacks

and union busting.

One of the questions which will have to
be addressed before such organic unity can
be achieved is that of Canadian autonomy.
This issue has recently come to the fore in
the United Auto Workers around the issue
of concessions. The Canadian members
refused to go along with the US. leader-
ship’s willingness to accept these conces-
sions. They fought for — and won — a
contract with real gains.

The problem of the U.S. is accentuated in
the contract now being voted on by the
IWA and the LSWU members. Some of the
employers have campaigned against the
package because the concessions are not big
enough. Here is lesson in the logic of con-
cessions. Once the union agrees to conces-
sions, the issue then becomes, how big are
the concessions going to be? If the union is
not strong enough to resist the first round of
concessions, then how can it stop further
concessions? :

What is needed is an independent Cana-
dian policy and which will effectively com-

“The fight against concessions is
‘more than a fight for increases
— there is the question of working
conditions and hundreds of day-to-
day issues.

bat the concessions mentality which is being
pushed by the employers.

Clearly, a Canadian policy to block the
concessions that will be demanded by
Forest Industrial Relations in B.C. — which
have already begun with the demand to
forego the next increment in the present
collective agreement — can only be based
on a common bargaining front of the three
forest unions. The IWA regional leadership
must accept the responsibility for the break
down of common bargaining in the last
negotiations. They should take the lead in
healing the split which is harmful to the
members of all three unions.

Unity also requires the ending of the
IWA’s policy of confrontation with the
B.C. Federation of Labor. It will be almost

impossible to develop a common front of
\ forest unions while the [WA is attempt-
\ ing to undermine the first vice-president
. of the Federation, Art Gruntman, for
the sole reason that Gruntman now
has that job instead of Munro. It is

: painfully obvious that the whole labor
movement has to pull together to

anasvets

the question of why Jack Munro
became so unacceptable to the majority in
the B.C. Fed?

After spending a lifetime in the forest
industry and as a member of the IWA, I
hope that the union honestly takes up the
question of its current unpopularity. The
answer will not only get at the matter of
unity with the other forest unions and the
whole labor movement, but also at the
effectiveness of the IWA itself as a militant
industrial union.

The IWA has a golden opportunity to
re-establish its prestige by leading the fight
against the drive for concessions, and to go
out and win increases in line with increased
productivity. Of course the fight to turn the
union on the offensive begins with enforcing
the current collective agreement from the
wide scale violations now being imposed by
employers.

Some in the union are calling for a dele-
gated conference now to defend the con-
tract and mobilize against concessions.
Such a conference can be called by motions
in any three locals, or by the regional leader-
ship. In the old days, the [WA used to have
delegated meetings quarterly each year to
discuss problems, and work out tactics for
the union. Statements by union leaders
against concessions do not by themselves
prepare the membership to fight. Commun-
ication, education and co-ordination is
needed to establish solid organization at the
local level.

Finally, there was a time when the IWA
was a leading voice in B.C. for social
change. The leadership linked the problems
of the members with the problems of all
working people. It pointed out to MacMil-
lan Bloedel and the other U.S. companies as
the common enemy of all working people.
Today, IWA leaders disgrace that tradition
by speaking for MacMillan Bloedel over
Meares Island. In every public forum the
union appeals for great co-operation with
the industry.

The fact is that there is no basis for co-
operation with an industry which is intent
on eliminating half the work force and using
the other half to produce more product for
less wages. That is the kind of co-operation
the Socreds will be appealing for in the next
election.

The whole labor movement is searching
for an alternative economic program to the
Socred brand of co-operation. It could only
strengthen the immediate fight of wood-
workers to stop concessions if the |WA and
the other forest unions joined in the growing
demand for public ownership of MacMillan
Bloedel and the transnationals as the basis for
anew policy that would preserve our precious
but endangered forest resources and put
many thousands of workers back to work.

George McKnight is a member of IWA Local
1-85

PACIFIC TRIBUNE, MAY 1, 1985 ¢ 11