Power boilers like the one above could convert forestry waste into
steam to provide 84 percent of the industry’s energy needs. But the
forest companies will not convert as long as they get hydro and gas at

below-cost rates from B.C. Hydro.

Shoplifting plan
strongly opposed

By ALD. HARRY RANKIN
Vancouver has an_anti-
shoplifting group called SAVE. It
was initiated and sponsored in 1974
by the Vancouver Board of Trade,
Vancouver police and Vancouver
merchants. At present it’s con-
ducting a drive to raise $200,000
from public (provincial govern-
ment and municipal councils) and
private (merchants) sources for
what it calls an ‘‘educational

campaign” against shoplifting.
Roland Odell, the president says
that his group is “seriously con-
sidering placing newspaper ads
listing the names of shoplifters,”’
while Gordon Stahl, the group’s
liason officer claims that it would

be an “‘effective deterrent to others:

if the names of those convicted of
theft by shoplifting were printed.”

If the merchants are so con-
cerned, shoplifting must be a
growing problem. And it is not an
offence to be condoned, but we also
have to recognize that most of the
shoplifting is done by poor people,
driven to it by high prices,
unemployment, low income or no
income at all. The merchants are
concerned, of course, not over the
moral aspects of the problem but
because shoplifting cuts into their
profits.

I don’t subscribe to the idea that
we should give them public funds
to protect their private interests.
If, in the interests of society, an
educational program needs to be
carried on, it should be by public
authorities, provincial or
municipal.

Secondly, I am strongly opposed
to the plan to publish the names of
shoplifters in ads sponsored by the

Take

| time
to get
a sub

merchants and paid for by their
own or public funds. There is no
reason why shoplifters should be

singled out any more than drug —

pushers, drunks, or those guilty of
theft, fraud, swindlers or num-
berless other crimes. In fact most
of those crimes are much more
serious than shoplifting.

If we are going to start
publishing the names of people who
break the-law, I know a better
place to start, and this involves
some merchants too. Every year
there are any number of cases of
corporations or business people
who try to defraud the law on in-
come taxes. In most cases, they
are called at 1110 West Georgia and
if guilty are quietly reprimanded,
forced to make restitution or fined
or assessed. No publicity is given
to these cases.

Never, or almost never, are they
sent to prison for this offence: The
reason, of course, is that these are
respectable business men and
corporations, pillars of society and
the church, and their public image
or their private lives mustn’t be
hurt. Their cases are successfully
diverted from the courts.

How would the merchants like it
if a group were organized to take
out newspaper ads to list the
names of all corporations and
business people guilty of income
tax evasion?

Iam not advocating that this be
done. And I’m damn sure the
merchants wouldn’t advocate «it
either. What I am saying is that the
merchants have no right to single
out one group of offenders, just
because it suits their private
financial interests.

When shoplifters come before
the courts their cases are dealt
with in public. Thepress is there as
it is at any other trials. The press is
at liberty to report the cases if it
deems them of interest or concern
to the community. That is the way
it should rest.

The merchants will have to find
other ways of dealing with their
problems.

PACIFIC TRIBUNE—SEPTEMBER 9, 1977—Page 2

Forest firms waste
B.C. energy resource

By MAURICE RUSH

The Socred government is
pursuing policies in B.C.’s forest
industry which aims to increase
the export of raw materials. At the
same time it is failing to pressure
the big companies to halt the waste
of valuable by-products from the:
forest industry.

Two examples in recent weeks
are the announcement of the B.C.
government’s new export policy on
wood chips, and the failure of the
government to press the forest
monopolies to use the vast quan-
tities of sawdust and bark rejects,
now totally wasted, to provide fuel
to make the forest industry more.
energy self-sufficient.

In July forest minister Tom
Waterland unveiled a new policy
towards the export of wood chips
from B.C., which went largely
unnoticed by the public, but which
represents another long step
towards encouraging the export of
an important product from B.C.’s
forest industry in unprocessed
form. The large scale export of
wood chips to foreign markets,
instead of processing them in B.C.,
means the export of many new jobs
to other countries where the wood
chips would be used to manufac-
ture pulp and other wood products
in competition with B.C. products.

Recently a chip exporting

company was established called .

Fibreco Export Inc. This company
was formed by the major Interior
chip producers.

a

The chairman of Fobreco, Hugh
Cooper, welcomed the policy an-
nounced in July by Waterland and
said: ‘We can now really get on
with the business of ‘ exporting
chips.”’ ~

Last weekend a TV program
reported that large scale exports of
wood chips are planned, that there
is a huge surplus in some areas,
and that some sawmills are bur-
ning chips in large quantities. B.C.
pulp mills use about 12 million
units annually in their manufac-
turing process. Currently there is a
surplus of 700,000 units which the
large sawmill companies want to
export. ;

For many years B.C. followed a
policy of rigid control and
limitations on the export of wood
chips from B.C. The demand for
wood chips on the world market
has grown by leaps and bounds.
Used in the manufacture of pulp
and paper products, most coun-
tries are running short of wood
resources. But the export of wood
chips in large quantities means the
export of B.C. jobs. Instead of
developing manufacuring in-
dustries in B.C. to use up the
surplus wood chips, the big com-
panies are looking to quick profits
through the export of this resource.
Now the Socred government is
giving them the green light.

One of the major areas of waste
in the forest industry is in the
failure to use hog fuel — sawdust
and bark rejects which the in-

national

The Communist Party has come
to the defence of the North West
‘Territories Indian Brotherhood
and has condemned the federal
government for characterizing the
Brotherhood’s demand for division
of the NWT into three political
territories as “racism.

“Such slander is obscene coming

as it does from official bodies of’

authority that have practiced and
condoned the worst forms of
racism against the Native peoples
since the earliest days of
colonialization,’’ the CP’s central
executive responded in a
statement released August 24.

The Brotherhood represents the
Dene, the Indian population of the
North West Territories, and are
presently negotiating with the
federal government over their land
claim to almost the entire of the
NWT. The Dene have rejected
“James Bay” style cash set-
tlements of land claims and are
asking for regional _ self-
government in a section of the
NWT as the principle demand in
the land claim.

In August, the Brotherhood
proposed to the federal govern-
ment a redivision of the NWT into
three distinct territories based on
the Dene, the Inuit or Eskimo
population, and the white
population.

The federal government rejected
the Dene demand in a white paper
that asserted the proposal was
“racist,’’ as it would establish self-
government on the basis of race.

“The demands’ of- the
Brotherhood must be recognized
for what they are — the expression
of a distinct people,’ the CP
declared in its statement. ‘The
federal and provincial govern-
ments must recognize the national

‘Recognize native

identity’

identity of the Native peoples as
distinct peoples and withdraw their
slander of racism.”

The CP calledon the government
to resolve the Brotherhood’s land

claim to the satisfaction of the _

Native peoples and to incorporate
the claim in a treaty between
Ottawa and the Native peoples of
the NWT.

As distinct peoples the Dene and
Inuit have a right to national
identity with full respect for their
autonomy with regard to regional
self government, culture, language
and education, the CP said.

dustry produces in vast quanities
in the logging and sawmilling
process — as a realistic and cheaP
alternative to the industry's
energy needs.

According to recent studies, the
forest industry in B.C. could
provide 84 percent of its energy
needs by installing equipment to
burn hog fuel and convert it into
energy: This figure is highly
significant for B.C., since the
forest industry is now one of the —
largest single user of energy of all
sorts, natural gas, hydro and oil.

At this time of growing energy
needs, when the B.C. government
is considering the building of new
dams (such as Revelstoke) and the
Hat Creek Project, and when there
is mounting pressure for oil and
gas pipelines across the province, ©
the prodigious waste of energy
resources by the forest industry
becomes a matter of serious

concern.
e

-A recent report on the use of
energy by B.C.’s number one in-
dustry shows that the forestry
plants gobbled up nearly six
million barrels of oil last year, and
used about 27 billion cubic feet of
natural gas. This is enough gas to
heat 250,000 Canadian homes 4.
year. In addition, the pulp mills
and forest companies are among
the biggest bulk users of energy —
who receive hydro power at a
fraction of the cost of production
under present B.C. Hydro rates.

The cheap rates for natural gas
andhydro, which are subsidized by
higher rates charged the public,
have encouraged the forest in-
dustry not to use the vast potential —
energy of its waste products.
Rather than spend capital in-
stalling equipment to burn the hog
fuel, the giant forest companies
have found it cheaper to use up
vast quantities of badly needed —
gas, oil and hydro to power their
large enterprises.

Rather than pouring new hun-
dreds of millions of dollars into

hydro projects and new pipelines,

the provincial government could —
bring about vast savings in energy
if it compelled the forest com-
panies to switch over-to using its
waste products to generate power.
The most effective way it can do
that isrevise the present hydro and
gas rates and make the forest
companies pay at least the cost of
production, and more if necessary-

The. Vancouver Tenants’
Council will explain what the
new Residential Tenancy Act
means to tenants at a public
meeting on September 18 at 2
p.m., at the King George
Secondary School auditorium,
1755 Barclay at Denman St.,
Vancouver. An advertisement
in last week’s Tribune erred in
reporting that the meeting
would be held on September 11.

Tenants meet Sept. 18

The Residential Tenancy Act
was proclaimed into law less
than two weeks after being
introduced into the legislature.
The new law provides. the
mechanism to dismantle rent
controls and grants government
bureaucrats . unprecidented
powers over tenants.

For further information
phone 872-2244 or 253-3575.

RIBUNE

Editor - MAURICE RUSH
Assistant Editor SEAN GRIFFIN
Business and Circulation Manager — FRED WILSON
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