British Columbia What’s behind Premier Bill Vander Zalm’s threat to cut 49,000 people off welfare? On Aug. 4, Social Services Minister Claude Richmond sent a letter to 49,000 so-called “employables” informing them that they must personally call at welfare offices on the dates their cheques are due and present proof that they have been actively looking for work. Failing this, they would be cut off welfare. His excuse for this sudden and unex- pected ultimatum was an unsubstan- tiated statement that employers had asked the government to help them find employees. How many employers asked the government to find employees for them? Were there two, or 20? Where are they? What type of work and what wages are they offering? Claude Richmond failed to back up his claim with any facts. The truth is there aren’t 49,000 jobs available in B.C. today, not even 4,900 and perhaps not even 490. We have 130,000 workers unemployed in B.C. today. Forcing welfare recipients to look for jobs that don’t exist doesn’t change the picture. Our economy is obviously buoyant for some — the-banks and the develop- ers just to name a couple. But it certainly isn’t for the tens of thousands who have been laid off and remain unemployed. What is equally disturbing are the new definitions of full employment emanat- ing from Ottawa and business circles. Government economists now claim that near full employment exists when we have an unemployment rate of seven per cent and that an unemployment rate of six per cent is the “natural rate” for our society. The Economie Council of Can- ada says 7.3 per cent is natural rate. The Bank of Canada puts it at eight per cent. As for B.C., the Economic Council says our natural rate is 10 per cent. Is this what our provincial govern- ment calls a buoyant economy and full employment? How can people presently on welfare get jobs when our economy is in this state? Just consider some of the prob- lems they face. People on welfare just can’t afford to spend $5 or more a day on bus fares looking for jobs. If they do it means they don’t eat that day. If they should be lucky and land a job, and this will happen to very few, they haven’t the money to buy the clothes they need, whether these are outdoor work clothes or clothes for a job in the service industry. Many of the people on welfare just aren’t employable. What kind of jobs are there for middle-aged construction work- ers, loggers, or miners. These people can’t work in a store or office or a fast food joint. Even those who are employable need some training. GAIN attack designed to bolster notion of Natural’ jobless rate Most of the jobs available are in the minimum wage ($4.50 an hour) category or less. That’s only $180 a week and $720 a month. No one can live on that. It wouldn’t cover much more than rent in the Great Vancouver area. The remainder would be used up for work clothes and transportation. (In some jobs a car is essential to get to and from work on time.) What’s left for food after all these bills are paid? People on welfare would be worse off if they took this kind of job. With our low welfare rates they are living at below the poverty level already. It should be a source of shame to our government that B.C. has the highest poverty rate in Can- ada and that the poverty level today is worse than in 1973. The unfortunate fact is that the government is not doing anything about these very real problems. It is not helping people find the jobs it claims are available. : It is not supplying free bus passes to people looking for work. It is not offering to supply them with work clothes to at least help them get started if they do find a job. It should raise the minimum wage to $7.50 an hour. There wouldn’t be many “help wanted” signs up then. That wage is low, but it would be better than what they’re getting now. There may be a few of what the red- necks in the government like to call “wel- fare bums.” They are a small minority. But what about the corporate welfare bums? What about the hundreds of mil- lions of dollars being paid out to them annually? Here are a tew examples: The provincial government gave our Expo 86 lands, worth a billion dollars, to a Hong Kong billionaire for $145 mil- lion. The provincial government is putting up $150 million to help a private com- pany build a natural gas line from Van- couver to Vancouver Island. It is putting up $25 million to help the Louisiana-Pacific corporation (whose net sales in 1977 were $1.9 billion) build a wafer board plant in Dawson Creek. Last January the Vander Zalm govern- ment sold land in New Westminster to an unidentified company for $2.2 mil- lion. The company resold it the same day for $10.5 million. Today the land is worth over $20 million. What about the $2 million plus the provincial government is spending to build a paved road for a private ski resort operator? How about forcing these corporate welfare bums to line up in front of a government office and provide proof that they are destitute and deserve fund- ing by taxpayers? It seems to me that Vander Zalm’s threat to cut 49,000 people off welfare is caused by: @ His‘ own antipathy towards the unemployed and people on welfare, which he has demonstrated more than once. e A desire to appease like-minded rednecks in his own party. @ Most important of all, to keep down wages by forcing people to accept the miserably low wages offered by many employers today. ; This unconscionable act by the pre- mier and his cabinet deserves only con- demnation. 2 e Pacific Tribune, September 18, 1989 N. Van group rallies to save Lynn Canyon 7% be heard. North Vancouver district residents concerned about municipal plans to replace much of the forest around the famous Lynn Canyon park with 1,900 condominiums demonstrate outside council chambers Sept. 11. Bruce Edwards (inset), chair of the Save Lynn Canyon Park Committee, charged Mayor Marilyn Baker with being undemocratic for refusing to allow the citi- zens group to appear before council to address concerns about the project, contained in an offi- cial community development plan. The group is also angry that they have no representation on a 35-member committee studying the proposal. More than 14,000 names had been gathered on a petition by early summer to save the area, of which only 25 per cent is designated parkland. Council recently defeated a motion by Ald. Ernie Crist that would have increased parkland around Lynn Canyon, in a 4-3 vote. Crist told the dem- onstrators that council has denied their right to U.S. bomber flight tests TRIBUNE PHOTO — BETTY GRIFFIN spark call for coalition Greenpeace in Vancouver has called upon British Columbia peace organizations and other groups to join in a coalition to fight low-level flight testing of U.S. bombers over the province, slated to begin this month. The environmental organization pro- poses, in a letter signed by Greenpeace representative John Mate, the formation of the B.C. Defence Coalition to “co-ordinate our legal and political efforts.” In turn, the coalition would establish a British Columbia Defence Fund to cover the expenses of legal and political battles, the Greenpeace letter proposes. An agreement between the Department of National Defence and the U.S. military will see the first of several test flights by U.S. B52 and Bl bombers soaring over the ground at heights as low as 250 feet, begin- ning in September. “The government says that initially there will be only four flights a year. In reality this means four days of up to 25 flights daily,” the letter states. “There are no. guarantees that in the future the number of flights will not be increased,” Greenpeace notes. The organization cites government plans to increase low-level flights in Labrador, hotly contested by the Innu residents, to 40,000 per year. In West Germany, there are 110,000 flights annually and 181 air crashes since 1981 have claimed more than 250 lives, the letter reports. Greenpeace said it opposes the use of B.C. and Canada as a testing ground for U.S. weapons systems and military person- nel. “The purpose of these flights is either to train American pilots to deliver tactical nuclear weapons to the Soviet Union as part of an offensive first strike strategy, or to train them to fight a nuclear war over Can- ada... . Both of these purposes are unaccep- table.” The letter also charges that Defence Min- ister Bill McKnight has violated the federal government’s Environmental Assessment Review Process by failing to consult with British Columbians or to notify the local communities in the flight corridors. “He has also neglected to take into con- sideration relevant and available evidence regarding their very negative impact on people, the environment and_ wildlife,” Greenpeace charges. The organization plans a meeting of interested groups on Sept. 30. Frank Kennedy, president of the multi- organization coalition End the Arms Race, said EAR has received the letter and will make a decision at its executive meeting Sept. 25. : “We're receptive (to the coalition prop- osal) if the number one issue is militariza- tion. It is a military question, not an environmental one,” Kennedy said. Bruce Yorke of the B.C. Peace Council also said the key issue should be militariza- tion. He said his organization will send representatives to the Sept. 30 meeting. Greenpeace says it has already taken legal initiatives by asking the courts to post- pone the test flights pending an investiga- tion by an environmental review panel. The group says many tribal organizations, and peace, environmental and church groups have already written McKnight expressing their concerns. A one-hour video on low-level flights will be shown on community cable stations throughout the province soon, Greenpeace says.