British Columbia/Canada

Developers’ NPA
must be defeated,
Candidates declare

Continued from page 1
Contesting the school board are former
trustees Chris Allnutt, Gary Onstad, John
Church, Sadie Kuehn and Pauline Wein-
Stein, former board chairman.

Incumbent COPE trustee Phil Rankin is
Not seeking re-election.

Former commissioner Pat Wilson was
chosen along with lawyer and disabled acti-
vist Tim Louis, and electrician and trade
Unionist Mike Chrunick, to run for the
Parks board.

Sue Harris, a former parks commissioner
Who ran COPE’s voter registration cam-
Paign in the summer, was among the list of
€xecutive-recommended candidates for the
aldermanic slate. She was narrowly defeated
MM a six-way race that followed a nomina-
Hon from the floor for Walker.

In her acceptance speech Davies slammed
the NPA’s record on megastores, store clos-
Ing hours, council members’ salaries — the

PA majority is seeking a further 3.5-per
Cent hike, retroactive to January — cuts in
the city’s operating budget and city services,
Closure of low-rent secondary suites, and
Zoning for large-scale developments.

She hit council for chopping the pre-1986
fair wage policy for contracted workers and
Its failure to ensure social housing needs and
low-cost transit.

“We need a council that is independent of
the developers,” Davies asserted.

nkin, a 20-year veteran of council and
COPE’s first elected official, compared the

PA council’s decision to chop door-to-
door voter registration — a move which
left this year’s voters list short 96,000
Names — with the South African govern-
Ment’s apartheid policies which deny the
Majority black population a franchise.

School board candidates cited previous
COPE school boards’ record in establishing
4 race relations committee and fighting res-
traint in education.

Wilson said COPE’s presence on parks

Oard — it had three members prior to the
1986 election — has “made a difference”

with a parks policy on land acquisition and
reduced rates for GAIN recipients.

A COPE policy paper commits the
organization to fighting for affordable
housing, public involvement in . major
development projects, an improved transit
system with no fare hikes, “social and eco-
nomic equality” and a ward system.

COPE school policy includes community
control of schools, return of the commercial-
industrial tax base to local boards, and

increased senior government funding of i

English as a Second Language.

The parks program calls for access to
facilities regardless of personal income,
preservation and upgrading of park facili-
ties, and an end to the NPA’s privatization
program.

The meeting also endorsed the candida-
cies of council, school and parks contenders
in the Civic NDP.

New Democrats running for council are
Ian Reid, Sandra Bruneau, Linda Ervin,
Adrienne Peacock and David Levi. For
school board it’s Jean McMurdo, Les
Marlen, Gerry Brown and Anne Beer.
Parks board candidates are Daryl Nelson,
Janice Vichert, Charlotte Beresford and
Michael McEvoy.

Both slates will seek the endorsement of
the Vancouver and District Labour Coun-
cil, which has already backed Swanson’s
mayoral candidacy.

Davies told the meeting that.the key-to a
democratic council is the “unity slate.”

“We know that we’re up against a slick
money campaign that developers and the
megastores have no doubt poured hundreds
of thousands of dollars in, but you know,
friends, we’ve done it before, we’ve done it
with people, we’ve done it with our support
from the grass roots, from the community
organizations, from the trade unions, and I
know we can do it again, so let’s get going
tomorrow.”

COPE will officially open its campaign
office at 2240 Commercial Dr. on Sunday,
Sept. 18 at 2 p.m. The phone number is
251-2963.

Abortion clinic to be
the first of several

Continued from page 1

BCCAC spokesperson Bettie Schesser
Said the building — the location of which
Will not be disclosed until it goes into service
October — has more than the required
Space, is near major bus routes and is wheel-
Chair accessible.

She said the clinic will perform abortions

Y the vacuum procedure under local
" 8Naesthetic and will provide pre- and post-
ortion physical and psychological coun-
Selling.

“Tt will offer the best possible level of
Setvice to women who have made the very
difficult decision to have an abortion,”

hesser said.

Coalition leaders said the Every Wom-
an’s Health Centre Society will be the first
Of a series of clinics around the province
Providing a full range of health services for
Women.

Marcy Bloom of the Aradia Women’s

€alth Centre in Seattle said the U.S. clinic
Provides abortions for 10 to 15 Canadian
Women per week. And she noted that, after
India, Canada performs the highest number

‘second trimester” abortions.

Vancouver Sun columnist Nicole Parton
charged that the provincial government “‘is
now trying to throw up another dreadful
obstacle, and it must be fought, and the
fight must go beyond the parameters of this
small group in this small room.

“You must fight this mean, petty tactic,
because this tactic once again denies poor
women the right to an abortion, and it is
wrong,” she declared to applause.

“We must never again allow coat-
hangers, never again allow self-mutilation,
never again allow the deaths and tragedy of
women who attempt to have their own
abortions,” Parton said.

Said Schesser: “The coalition has had the
courage and the conscience to speak and
act. We have not had the whole world’s
contempt and scorn. We have many power-
ful and generous supporters.

‘‘We have weathered and will continue to
withstand the comments and actions of
those who do not understand that because
women feel and hear and desire freedom to
act about our bodies, that this choice is ours

to make.”

HARRY RANKIN ... COPE aldermanic candidate hits NPA’s undemocratic voter

registration.

Tory majority cut

By MIGUEL FIGUEROA
Atlantic correspondent

Premier John Buchanan and the
Tories in Nova Scotia are back in power
for another term, and Prime Minister
Brian Mulroney has received a big boost
for his own election plans. Or has he?

The election outcome, after all, could
hardly be interpreted as a ringing affirma-
tion of 10 years of Conservative rule.
Although a Tory government was
returned to office, its majority was
sharply reduced by 14 seats from the 1984
results, and its popular vote dropped a
full eight per cent, with most of that going
to the resurgent Liberals under Vince
MacLean. The Tories took their worst
beating in Cape Breton where they now
hold only one of the II seats on the
island.

. Asa result, the new legislature will take -

on quite a different character. After
appointing a speaker, the Buchanan
government’s slim majority will be
reduced to three, raising the possibility of
an early defeat and a new election.

The Conservative setback reflects
growing public’ dissatisfaction with the
scandal-ridden Buchanan administration.
The Liberal party was the primary bene-
ficiary of this mood for change.

In fact, had it not been for the cynical
manoeuvreing of Buchanan’s Tories, the
Liberals would likely have swept to
power. In addition to lavish pre-election
handouts including a massive highway
paving program and new capital con-
struction projects, Buchanan managed to

“create an image for himself and his party
as “champions” of the environment,
child care, and even the war on patron-
age.

Masquerading as a reformer, Bucha-
nan avoided identification with neo-
conservative policies, and presented
instead a populist program which did not
differ significantly from the policies of
either of the opposition parties.

Objective factors also played a signifi-
cant role in determining the outcome. Big
business interests in the province for the
most part have been pleased with the
performance of the Buchanan govern-
ment and united behind the Tory re-
election bid, both financially and politi-
cally. Economic recovery and reduced
unemployment, mainly within the metro
Halifax region, also helped the Tories,
who were quick to claim credit.

It was the New Democratic Party that
perhaps suffered the greatest political set-
back on Sept. 6. Despite high expecta-
tions for a breakthrough and the most
organized and ambitious campaign in its

history, the NDP failed to increase its
popular vote above the 16 per cent
achieved in 1984, and lost one of its three
seats in the legislature. The party finished
first in two ridings and second in three
others, while placing third or worse in the
other 47 provincial seats.

NDP leader Alexa McDonough, who
held her own seat by a scant 26 votes,
blamed the poor showing on the polar-
ized political situation which led many
voters to abandon the NDP in favour of
the Liberals in a bid to defeat the Tory
government.

There were several factors which con-
tributed to the failure of the New Demo-
crats to make any hoped-for gains in this
election. The polarized climate, com-
bined with the impact of “patronage
politics,” whereby electors perceive their
vital interests being best served by electing
a government member to the house,
tended to inhibit a popular shift to the
NDP. The timing of the summer election
(when most university and college stu-
dents were off campus) also had a nega-
tive impact.

These factors alone, however, do not
tell the full story.

The NDP election strategy was
seriously flawed in many respects. The
principal error was its apolitical, populist
focus on the issue of “fairness in govern-
ment” and opposition to patronage,
together with its failure to project a
cogent social and economic alternative to
Tory and Liberal policies. While many
Nova Scotians were rightly disgusted
with scandal and corruption in the Buch-
anan government, that in itself did not
provide a sufficient reason to vote NDP.

Major opportunities to attack the
vulnerable Buchanan record on such fed-
eral issues as free trade and the Meech
Lake Accord were downplayed or totally
missed by NDP strategists. Similarly, the
mistaken approach of avoiding “‘contro-
versial issues” resulted in NDP silence on
peace and militarization, Native concerns
and pervasive racism in the province.

Although the NDP put forward some
positive positions on labour issues,
including improvements to the labour
code to protect part-time workers, envir-
onmental protection and anti-scabbing
legislation, these too were largely lost in
the drive to focus public attention on the
“fairness” theme. This strategy tended to
limit the mobilization of the labour
movement in the campaign, and resulted
in the NDP finishing a distant third in
most industrial working class ridings and
fishing communities in Cape Breton,
New Glasgow and elsewhere.

Pacific Tribune, September 14, 1988 « 3