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FRIDAY, MARCH 3, 1967

Won’t answer questions:

IN THE DOK,
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Peacelobby more urgent

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This photomontage from The Minority of One shows McNamara, Johnson and
oners dock at Nuremberg for war crimes. The international court set up by Lord
Il to try U.S. leaders for war crimes in Vietnam starts its sessions in Paris this

Gs U.S. escalates war

The giant
T Victoria
deq

Peace lobby planned
: On March 8 took on
tmMportance this week as

rr a dent Johnson ordered a
Which €scalation of the war

Serious] i
a: Y heightens
anger of world war. the

fo

In wh: i
ae at one British Labor MP

last tae behavior,” the U.S,
With heg €nd expanded the war
North Bae artillery shelling of
itarigeg na Across the demil-
shelling zone, and with heavy
North :: f coastal centres of
Ships, etnam by U.S. war-

by anit etions were followed
a Ouncement from Wash-
et the U.s. had begun
Vietnam: the Tivers of North
Plans and indicated that it
4 further intensification of

its at
ta j
spat < in order to force

agree to
on U.S, terms, peace talks

h
that sth Se Serious indications
2 step.p U.S. is now planning
Vietnam Y-step invasion of North
*Scalations These new military
» following the huge

buildup of U.S. armed forces in
Vietnam, pose a very grave dan-
ger for mankind.

Reacting quickly to last week-
end’s escalation of the war, 100
men, women and youth demon-
strated in front of the U.S. Con-
sulate on Georgia Street in Van-
couver, Called by the newly-
formed Ad Hoc Committee of
Youth for Peace in Vietnam, the
demonstrators handed out a leaf-
let demanding the U.S, stop the
escalation.

It said: “The U.S. is rejec-
ting all appeals to end the war
in Vietnam, . .Instead of putting
an end to their indiscriminate
bombing they are deliberately
escalating the war. , . Their plan
is a military victory, the result
of which would be the complete
abrogation of the rights of the
Vietnamese people and a viola-
tion of the United Nations Char-
ter,

“Canadians cannot help but feel
the greatest revulsion towards
this act of genocide, Canada
must stop the. supply of arms to
the U.S, for use in Vietnam,

Canada must demand an end to
U.S. bombing of North Vietnam
and negotiate to end the war.
Canada must condemn the U.S.
action in the most forthright

way.”

The B.C, Peace Council an-
nounced this week that the giant
lobby it is organizing to con-
verge on the Legislature next
Wednesday will ask the MLAS
to pass a resolution calling on
the Canadian government to take
these steps:

@Call on the U.S, to stop bomb-
ing North Vietnam;

@Halt the shipment of war ma-
terials to the U.S,; and

@Call upon the U.S, to make a
settlement in Vietnam based on
the Geneva Agreements of 1954,

Peace Council officials said
support for the lobby is growing,
that this is one of the most im-
portant lobbies yet, and that
public support is needed, “Take
a day off to go and see your MLA
about peace,” — that’s the appeal
of the B,C, Peace Council at this
critical time when war or peace
hangs in the balance,

VOL. 28, NO. 9

bune

10¢

WHAT IS BENNETT HIDING?

Full probe needed
of Columbia costs

By MAURICE RUSH

A Royal Commission to conduct a full, open probe into the
government's power program and the costs of the Columbia
dams — as demanded recently by the Vancouver Labor Council
—is urgently needed to get at the truth and make the facts

public.

This was the conclusion | came away with from Victoria
last week after three days in the capital listening to the debate
in the Legislature, and watching Premier W. A. C. Bennett refuse
time and again to answer questions from Opposition members

on this vital issue.

Such a probe must also dis-
close the full extent to which
public funds from various gov-
ernment and public agencies are
being emptied to pay for the costly
dams B.C. undertook to build
under the Columbia Treaty to
store water for the U.S.

Everyone I spoke to in Vic-
toria told me: *The government
is in trouble over its power policy
— particularly the Columbia.”
How much this is so was illus-
trated this week when Bennett
appealed to Ottawa for a $100
million loan for B.C, Hydro,

Here are some of the main
charges made by Opposition
Members in the House which
Bennett refused to answer:

®That the Socred government
had so mismanaged the Peace
and Columbia River projects that
it has been forced to use every
cent that it can get to extricate
itself from the fiasco, And that
in order to do this it has dug

into government superannuation
funds, sinking funds, Canada Pen-
sion Plan funds and others, Ben-
nett was asked to divulge the
figures but refused to do so,

®That the needs of the people
of B.C. for schools, hospitals,
chronic care, handicapped chil-
dren, housing, are all being sac-
rificed while the government
scrapes together ‘every cent it
can to prop up its sagging power
policy.

@That the money received from
the U.S. for downstream benefits
on the Columbia will fallfar short
of the costs to B.C, and that a
so-far undisclosed amount —
running anywhere from $164 to
$200 million — will be heaped
on the taxpayer,

@That on the basis of figures
used by B.C. Hydro which show
a net operating income for last
year of $9 million and debt charg-
es for 1967 amounting to $46 mil-
lion on moneys borrowed, Oppos-
ition members charged that a
heavy increase in power rates to
the public is being planned by
Bennett. The Premier’s reply
to this charge was: *I’ll make
no statement — not tonight and
not tomorrow either,”

®That the governmentis boost-

ing the borrowing powers of B,C, ~

Hydro. to $1,700,000,000 and
that the public debt will rise to
over $2 billion in the near future,
giving B,C, the highest per capita
debt of any in Canada,

These charges — and there
are many others made in the
debate — are causing widespread
public concern, Bennett isarro-
gantly refusing to answer them,
Only a full Royal Commission
probe into the situation can bring
out the facts and lay them before
the people,