——

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SS eee eens eee Ee ee ee Ee ee SS ®

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of

fus

ig to the stink of graft and corruption arising from shady

rottin real estate sharks and high-rise developers, the “aroma”

© to : garbage pervades Metro Toronto as the “city fathers” re-

his ettle for the reasonable demands of the civic workers and
People to dump their garbage in city parks.

Stubborn Toronto ‘fathers’
Gre stinking up whole city

By RICHARD ORLANDINI

wore tke by 4,000 outside
OWed of Metro-Toronto fol-
Nepotinti cor elete breakdown in
fused tons when the city re-
The at negotiate in good faith.

" ike centres around the
ay ia by the workers for
alread ases similar to those

dy granted in ,
MUnicipalities, many Ontario

intimfast® “city fathers” have
“a Small businessmen
Broun, ore used children’s play-
ffici or garbage dumps.
Which Ss Of CUPE Local 43,
Rporteq presents the strikers,
Manage to the Tribune that
Teche goons called the
have ml Assistance Service”
Tana, pacened small restaurant
teh, with summonses’ if
to nee to haul their garbage
dumps Officially designated
Men 5 any of the business-
is no 5 ve complied, but there
the: yaw which would enable
gainst Y to issue summons
Comply anyone for failure to
Union With the demands, The
bape bs 4s asked that the gar-
“ual an left on the sidewalks as
neh hot taken to the parks.
88 parh se. ey the city of parks
to breaks dumps in an effort
Man the strike has lead to
Prima ar situations. The
age ue of the strike is
that it a the city maintains
the un asn’t the money to meet
City i, On’s demands. Yet the
Money ppending large sums of
There 38 Protect its garbage.”
being .° ad at park locations
um ; dumps, and each
hi - oe assigned to it a city-
a ra eur. One secur-
ake 2 0. was hired to
Proper’ that the garbage is
and cate § agged to stop dogs
bape aro .o™ Spreading the gar-
dali, UDd and to prevent van-
Paid $} eel the Tribune he is
Works ,.. Pet hour and that he
Shifts one of the two eight-hour
Suarg di day. This “security”
What ‘ 2 set know, however,
| Bency ae eeontract of his

PEE ]ocne:
ME Useq tion Of the parks be-
WSsy

é haunt ich will come back to

aS dumps is another

the qo “city fathers.” All of
Useq 4, /OWN parks are being
those D dumps and most of
areas, arks are in working class
leq a when the Tribune vis-
ale, whigeish Park in Rose-
Class gract is an upper middle-
ably la ie we found it notice-
the Typ i8 in garbage. When
2 Cruisin, ne asked the driver of
Craigtej 8 police car outside of
Nearest © Park, “Where is the

Park for garbage?” we

Strik their efforts to break the

were told to take our garbage
to Allen Gardens which is al-
most two miles away and in the
middle of a working-class dis-
trict. We then visited Allen Gar-
dens and found garbage in piles
eight feet high, 30 feet wide and
200 feet long.

Private garbage collectors be-
gan collecting in an effort to
take advantage of the strike but
effective picket lines at the mu-
nicipally-owned dumps prevent-
ed access.

The Tribune was also told by
a Local 43 official that things
could quickly become critical in
the sewerage plants around the
city.

Acting on a tip from the Trib-
une, Pollution Probe, a local or-
ganization which investigates
pollution spills, will be request-
ing a study of the discharged
waters around the sewage
plants. Before the workers walk-
ed off the job at the Humber
Sewage Treatment Plant, they
were asked by the engineers who
were planning on staying in the
plant, “Where are the by-pass
valves?” If the by-pass valves
were opened the sewage would
not be treated and raw sewage
would be dumped into the lake.

To date most of the public
reaction has been favorable to
the strikers. One of the picket-
ers at City Hall reported that
one irate taxpayer called a city
official to remind him that she
pays taxes to have her garbage
collected and unless the city was
willing to settle the strike and
provide the service, then she
would demand a rebate.

Officials at Local 43, in their

call for the public to put its

garbage on the sidewalks instead
of in the.parks, remind the pub-
lic that by moving the garbage
to the parks, they are in effect
strikebreaking.

logical Weapons Convention in
ceremony N. Podgorny, |
all other countries to sign a pac
fare.

¢ similar

by Bruce Magnuson

Should any worker, male or
female, single or married, be ex-
pected to work either in public
or private employment for any-
thing less than $100 per week?
When allowing for taxes and
other payroll deductions, what
is left is hardly sufficient to
keep alive, let alone to live a
life in decency and self-respect
in our day and age in the high-
cost society of Canada, one of
the 10 richest countries in the
capitalist world.

The problem is not one of
ability to pay a decent wage or
salary to those who do the work
and produce the wealth of this
country. The problem is our eco-
nomic system where private
profit rather than people and
their requirements determine
everything we do and how we
do it. It is this which accounts
for the fact that people who
work and produce goods and
services in our society are the
poorest and least secure; while
those with capital to invest for
profit, and who therefore do not
have to work for a living or pro-
duce anything, appropriate more
and more of the wealth produc-
ed.

It is this situation which is
leading us in the direction of a
sharpening class conflict in our
society at a time when new
technology threatens to deprive
millions of their right to work.
Here again, private profit rather
than people’s needs determines
that profits from this new tech-
nology shall go to the capitalists,
rather than to the workers and
to society so that all may bene-
fit from increased productivity.

k * *

Since capitalist governments
and the state constitute the in-
struments by which the ruling
capitalist class exercises its
power, it is inevitable that at a
certain point the struggle be-
tween labor and capital finds its
reflection in public services.

While masses of workers in
public services have long suffer-
ed from discrimination and sub-
standard earnings, and while in-
creasing numbers have organiz-
ed and fought for more econo-
mic and social justice in various
areas of Canada, the present
general strike of more than
200,000 public employees in
Quebec is unprecedented in its
advancement of common aims
and solidarity in a common front
of struggle.

For the working class of this
country there has never been a
more important struggle since
the Winnipeg General Strike in
1919. That battle, too, was a
battle in defense of the work-
ers’ right to. collective bargain-
ing, and the right to strike to
make such bargaining meaning-
ful. Make no mistake about it,

signing the Bio-
Moscow on April 10. At the signing

this is also the central issue in
the Quebec general strike of
1972, while on a much higher
plane and of much greater scope
than the Winnipeg strike of 53
years ago.

ak
3

Over 60% of the workers paid
directly or indirectly by the Que-
bec government are women.
Nearly one-half are single peo-
ple, male and female. A fantastic
discrimination in rate structure
and substandard pay have long
been the lot of these public em-
ployees in Quebec, when com-
pared to workers elsewhere in
this country. But considering the
sharp political impact of the
present heroic struggle of the
public service employees in Que-
bec, the capitalist mass media
prefer to ignore the real issues
in the Quebec strike, including
the demand for a $100-dollar
weekly minimum pay.

Instead, the media, which pre-
viously cared not a damn for
the old and the sick, have all
of a sudden become aware of
their presence and now seek to
pretend that all their suffering
is a consequence of the strike.
Little or nothing is said about
the despicable attitude of a Que-
bec government which refuses
to negotiate in any meaningful
way, but instead engages in
wholesale intimidation and ille-
gal practices to break the strike,
seeking by injunctions and other
manoeuvrings to divide the
workers against themselves.

In this situation, every ex-

LABOR SCENE| Rally all-Canada support
for fighting Quebeckers

pression of solidarity with the
Quebec workers from unions
and other public-spirited organi-
zations and citizens becomes
more important than ever. Cer-
tainly it behooves every local
union, every member, every
central labor body locally and
provincially from coast to coast,
including the Canadian Labor
Congress, to move to the de-
fense of the Quebec workers
battling for the common cause
of all public employees in this
country. :

On the other hand, one must
condemn those elements in the
trade union hierarchy—particu-
larly in English-speaking Can-
ada — who by their devious
manoeuverings belrind the
scenes seek to undermine the
Common Front of Quebec work-
ers, seeing it as a threat to
their privileged positions. They
prefer to sell out the workers
rather than to rally them for a
fight against the bosses and their
instruments of class oppression.
They prefer disunity and sur-
render in place of class-struggle
policies that reject compromises
made at the workers’ expense,
particularly when retreat is un-
called for.

Country-wide solidarity with
the Quebec workers today can
bring a victory for all Canadian
labor, restoring confidence and
showing the direction the strug-
gle must take if labor is to win
the battle against the aims of

‘monopoly and its governments

in this country.

Still more jobless

OTTAWA — The government

should immediately introduce a -

full emp!oyment budget and use
fiscal and other means to com-
bat high unemployment, Donald
MacDonald, president of the
Canadian Labour Congress said
in a press statement.

“The latest unemployment
figures prove that the federal
government has failed to re-
solve Canada’s’ number one
problem, serious unmeployment.
The seasonally adjusted rate,
which is the basic indicator of
the unemployment trend, in-
creased between February and
March. This is particularly sig-
nificant in light of the govern-
ment’s repeated claims going
back over many months that this
rate would go down.

“The number of unemployed
Canadians has increased to
642,000, which represents a stag-
gering 7.4% actual unemploy-
ment rate. It is perfectly ob-
vious that the government’s
much vaunted programs, includ-
ing the Local Initiatives Pro-
gram, have not succeeded in
curbing the rise of unemploy-

~ ment in Canada.

“Canada’s unemployment rate
is far higher than that which
exists in any country of the
Western world. Unemployment

in the Atlantic region, at 12.1%,
rose considerably over last
month and is much highér than
a year ago this time. Indeed,
the unemployment rate in every
Atlantic province is higher than
a year ago. This once again un-
derscores the fact that the gov-
ernment’s regional economic ex-
pansion policies have failed to
alleviate, let alone make any sig-
nificant dent, in the unemploy-
ment crisis in that part of the
country. Furthermore, unem-
ployment is higher in British
Columbia, Manitoba and Saskat-
chewan than a year earlier.

“We once again repeat, the
country needs a full employment
budget, rallying the entire re-
sources of the country through
fiscal and other means, to pro-
vide jobs.”

PERU SCHOOL REFORM

LIMA — A government decree
on educational reform was an-
nounced here last weekend by
the Ministry of Education.

Under the reform the Indians,
who make up 40% of the popu-
lation and speak only Quechua
or Avmara, will be taught in
their language first and then in
Spanish.

Equal education for women is
provided in the decree.

~. ‘PACIFIC TRIBUNE—FRIDAY, APRIL 21,'1972—PAGE 7