Peer

\

ANADIAN labor is being put through the wringer. That, in one brief sentence, ex-
plains the process that és methodically taking place in the country. The rollers are

being steadily tightened@*by the hands of big business on one side and by the hands |

of government on the other. Failtife on the part of labor leadership to unfold immediately
a clear-sighted, effective and coordinated campaign to arrest this dangerous process and
to quickly correct the harmful effects it has already wroug

trayal of trust or a horrible example of leadership bankrupt
use. But it would be less than forthright not to say them, F
ing standard of the majority of Canadian

the country. The strength, the future growt

ment is also at stake.

Alarming things are taking
Place. They are not isolated
events. They constitute a pat-
tern the outline of which has
deen clearly visible for months.
The full effect of these develop-
ments will be felt with increas-
ing painfulness as the weeks and
months go by. Only the ignorant
Sr*the bosses’ stooges’ fail to
recognize the direction in which
We are being driven.

Here are but a few of the in-
_ dications,

® Price controls are being
Speedily thrown overboard by
the government. There is little
left, aside from rent control,
which really matters, and that,
too, is scheduled for an early
ttimming. The purchasing value
of the dollar is on-+a_ terrific
Skid. The full effect of what
is taking place will reach un-
bearable proportions by the
Spring and early summer of
this year. All this, while pro-
fits ang dividend payments rise
to new high levels.

® Big business has renewed
its anti-union policy with a ven-
Seance, It follows in the foot-
Prints of the anti-labor crowd in
the United States. One of its
leading spokesmen, Murdoch of
the fabulously rich Noranda

Ne, flagrantly defies publio
Policy and refuses any type of
Union security. Steleo manage-
ment intensifies its efforts for
the company union, The forma-
tion of company unions is being
Stepped up and every assistance
is given them by corporation
management. There are numer-
_ SUS examples of company-direc-
fed groups boring from within
legitimate unions to destroy
them. Behind the smokescreen
of anti-ccommunism and in the
Yan of the red-baiting hysteria
'g business utilizes religious
8Nd other outside agencies as
Well as labor dupes, who are
“aught in the anti-communist
net, in an attempt to divide,
‘Weaken and destroy some of the

Most. powerful unions in the
country, -

® On the legislative front
°rganized labor is faced with
menacing developments that can-
not be over-estimated. Ottawa's
draft bin for the replacement of
1003 by an extension of the
Industriaj Disputes
STavest consequences. for the
‘rade union movement. Little
Wonder that the Financial Post
Bives its, Ottawa story a gleeful,
front page headline which reads
See Union Leaders Curbed in
New Draft Labor Code.” While
Most Canadian trade union lead-
*ts_ who have received ‘confi-
dential copies’ of that draft keep
Bentlemanly. silent, George Ad-
des, international secrtary-treas-
Urer of the United Auto Work-
ts, CIO, performed a great ser-
Vice in exposing the anti-labor
and company union chacter of
that draft when he addressed a
madian UAW conference in
Hamilton recently.

Aside’ from the Dominion

raft, which the Financial. Post
likes. so well, there are equally

"RO eR

@ Feature Section

ti Investiga-"
On Act is fraught with the:

by J. B. SALSBERG, MPP

and perhaps more dangerous
Jaws being prepared now by
Premier Maurice Duplessis for
Quebec. As if the present Que-
bec ‘labor laws’ were not good
enough for the monopolies, Du-
plessis, sq it is reliably reported,
ig planning legislation to incor-
porate the unions and to license
union organizers, F

In Ontario no collective bar-
gaining legislation exists outside
of PC 1003. And. Ontario labor
can have no illusions about the

‘kind of ‘labor laws’ Col. Drew’s

government would like to enact
—the kind that the Canadian
Manufacturers’
recommend.

e

0° course the picture is not all
black. Basically the Canadian

trade union movement is solid’

SEE S.

Letters From Finland

els [-W een en ee ss i 10
Why Plane Crashes ?
Pade cheat a

FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 14, 1947

Association will.

ht will amount to either a be-
cy. These are harsh words to

or what is involved is the liv-

families and the immediate economic future of
h and the influence of the trade union move-

and constitutes a good fighting
force. i

In Noranda, Canadian labor
shows the fighting stuff it is
made of.

The deep-sea fishermen on the
Atlantic coast reveal the deter-
mination of Canada’s working
folk to build powerful dikes
against ravaging waves of pre-
war capitalist exploitation.

The Toronto gas workers won
a splendid victory without a

\ strike only because of their firm
militancy and readiness to fight
if necessary. :

Nova Scotia coal miners are
displaying their traditional class
consciousness and glorious fight-
ing spirit. .

In the West, the loggers who
led the nation in the great wage
struggles last, year are again
facing up to the new conditions.

These and scores of similar
examples reveal the _ great
strength which exists in the
ranks—a power quite capable of
leading the majority of. Canad-
ians in a successful fight to re-
verse the present catastrophic
trend. :

e

UT the national trade union

leadership has not yet shown
that it is aware of the challenge
and of the demands made upon
it. It is true that individual

voices of protest against the at-

tacks on the workers’ living

standards are raised by a num-
ber of leaders of both AFL and
CIO unions. They issue  state-
ments to the press and other-
wise display alarm.

But the trade union leadership
as a whole and the two Con-
gresses in particular have thus
far failed to arouse labor and
the nation to the seriousness of
the developments, They have

@ Trade union leaders need to alert their members against
dangers of government-big business tactics

not yet alerted labor and the
nation for the fight that is ne-

cessary to halt the ‘disastrous
course which ‘government and
Big Business are pursuing. They
have. not made known a plan
of action. Not one Congress
leader has as yet proclaimed
the obvious necessity which
George Addes, of the UAW,
stated in Hamilton when he
said:

“There is a great need for

‘the CIO, the AFL, and the rail-
road brotherhoods

to try to
formulate some basic under-
standing in order to see that

the proposed legislation is - not.
enacted and that social legisla-’
_ tion which will benefit) all the

people of Canada is enacted as
quickly as possible.”

Yet this is so elementary and
so urgently required!

One gets the impression that
our national trade union leader-
ship has- been in the doldrums

since the annual conventions of
the two Congresses. Some so-
called ‘labor economists’ have
been feeding national trade
union leaders in Ottawa with
infantile and stupid ‘research.’

But these ‘economists’ display-
€d complete inability to under-
stand the dynamics of the pres-
ent situation, the process taking
place. And their totally incor-
rect political and economic di-
agnoses have resulted in a dis-
arming of labor’s forces, an in-
decisiveness which demobilizes
and has made it much easier for
big business and government to
accelerate their attacks.

E speech. from the Throne

at the opening of this session
of parliament shows that the
government does not even con-
sider it necessary to ‘appease’
labor. The morning after the
opening of the House the dikes
of price .control were blasted
wide open again on the essen-
tials of life.

It is obvious that the two
Congresses must step forward
and.mobilize their unions around
a constructive, long-range, fight-
ing program. They must bring
about complete coordination of
effort, They ‘must seek the
achievement of the highest form
of unity in action between then
two bodies and the Railroad
Brotherhoods around all immed-
iate, common objectives. They
must realize that this is a na-
tional, political battle that they
must lead and not merely at-
tend to a narrow economic prob-
lem. ee

There is a crisis brewing. La-
bor must emerge from top to.
bottom in all its strength and_
with all the statesmanship at.
its command to lead labor and

‘the nation in a battle to pre-

vent the' catastrophe which big
business and its governments.
are bringing on the people.