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BRITISH COLUMBIA

The Communist Party will
protest the B.C. Telephone com-
pany’s latest application for arate
hike at public hearings this spring
— ahike which, if granted, would
“take an estimated $27 million of
our the public’s pockets for
Shareholders and their parent
company in the U.S.”

Inaletter Jan. 12to the head of
the Canadian Radio-television
and Telecommunications Com-
mission, provincial leader
Maurice Rush charged the ap-
Plication for an 11.3 percent in-
crease comes at a time ‘‘when the
federal government is attempting
to impose its six-and-five formula

on working people and the
public.”

Rush also sent a letter to trade
unions and community organiza-
tions urging them to join the pro-
test at the hearings, warning that
the deadline to do so is Feb. 7.

Telephone subscribers were in-
formed of B.C. Tel’s application
through a notice included in their
phone bills over the Christmas
holidays, allowing the item to
pass largely unnoticed by the
public.

Some advance warning had
been given when the company ap-
plied last fall for an interim rate
increase of six percent for Jan. 1

as part of an undisclosed general

increase.
By asking for an undisclosed
hike in stages the company was

admitting ‘‘that it recognizes that
the total amount asked for is ex-
orbitant and believes that if it was
dished out in stages the public
would find it less onerous.”’ But
even though the interim hike was
refused by the CRTC, the total
figure ‘‘still remains 11.3 percent
. . . no matter how it is sliced,”
Rush stated.

If the federal regulatory body
grants the hike, ‘‘it would repre-
sent an increase of 31.3 percent in
telephone rates for residential
customers since the beginning of
1982,’ Rush reminded CRTC
secretary-general J. G.
Patenaude.

The commission granted the
U.S.-owned monopoly a total of

B.C. Tel rate hike ‘out of line’, says CP

18 percent in rate hikes over two
increases effective. January and
May, 1982.

“That decision gave B.C. Tela
rate of return of 16.5 percent,
which our party strongly opposed
at the time of the public hearing in
Vancouver. Economic
developments during 1982 and
going into 1983, indicate that the
CRTC was more than generous,
as it usually has been, with this
giant utility company,’’ Rush
stated.

In a letter to the Communist
Party the company acknowledg-
ed it could not defend.such a rate
of return and has asked instead
fora 14 percent return rate, which
the party considers as ‘‘also com-

pletely out of line with economic
reality,”’ said Rush.

begin around the end of March or

other organizations that “‘unless
there is strong public protest the

Noting that public hearings
early April, the party has warned

CRTC, as it has done so many
times before, will grant the in-
crease.”

Letters announcing an inten-
tion to appear at the hearings
should be addressed to J. G.
Patenaude, secretary-general,
Canadian Radio-television and
Telecommunications Commis-
sion, Ottawa, K1A ON2.

Transit takeover
is ‘dictatorial,
unfair, illegal’

Until now the two biggest
Tegional districts in the pro-
vince, the Greater Vancouver
Regional Distxict (GVRD) and
the Capital Regional District
(CRD) in Victoria, have had
some say and some responsibili-
ty for rapid transit in the Van-

’ couver and Victoria regions.

Now all that will be changed.
The provincial government has
announced that these rights and

~ Tesponsibilities will be taken

away. Big Brother in Victoria is
going to take over 100 percent.
The provincial government will
appoint advisory commissions
to take over the responsibilities
which until now have been car-

ried out by these two regional
districts.

Rankin

These so-called advisory
commissions will, of course, be
nothing more than rubber
Stamps for Bill Vander Zalm,
who, although he is no longer

‘Minister of municipal affairs, is

still in charge of public transit. It
means complete centralization
and control of all functions of

Public transit in the hands of the
_ Provincial cabinet. The people

whom public transit is supposed
to serve, and their elected
Tepresentatives, will now have
HO say whatsoever.

There is absolutely no

_ justification for this dictatorial

move by Vander Zalm. First by
using the stick and carrot
Method he ‘‘persuaded’’ the
GVRD to accept an unfair

_ finance formula to pay for

Public transit. At the same time
he “persuaded” it to agree to
leaving thereal control of transit
in Vander Zalm’s hands. Then
he “persuaded”? GVRD_ of-
ficials to accept an elevated
Tapid transit system that nobody
except the government wanted
and which is costing taxpayers
several hundreds of millions of

while leaving control in the

‘surtax on gasoline. Vander -

dollars more than a tried and
proven conventional system.
Now that Vander Zalm has ac-
complished what he wanted, he
is removing what little control
he granted the GVRD as a part
of his carrot program. With this
action the provincial govern-
ment has gone full circle.

Weneed beunder noillusions
as to the reasons for this last
move. Its clear but concealed
purpose is to force transit
system users and municipal tax-
payers to take over full financial
responsibility for public transit,

government’s hands. At present
fares have to provide 35 percent
of the cost of operating public

transit. The remaining 65 per- .
cent is covered jointly — the
provincial government pays
two-thirds andthe regional
districts one-third. The region’s
one-third share is raised by a
surcharge on hydro bills and a

Zalm will now try to change all
that by raising fares still further
and by introducing a property
tax to pay for public transit.

The action of the provincial
government in taking all transit
functions out of the hands of
regional districts isn’t only dic-
tatorial. It is illegal because the
regional governments concern-
ed have a contract with the pro-
vincial government covering the
operation of public transit. It’s
also completely unfair. It
should be the other way around.
The regional districts should
have full control of public tran-
sit in their areas.

The GVRD, municipal coun-
cils, and citizen groups should
fight this latest move by Vander
Zalm and the provincial govern-
ment with all and every means at
their disposal. : f

Indians made ‘scapegoats’

as fisheries launches raid

The commando-style raids on
Fraser River band reserves by arm-
ed fisheries officers — dubbed a
“terrorist”? act by Native leaders
— was designed to make Indians
the scapegoats in the issue of
declining salmon stocks and to ap-
pease American complaints
around the recently concluded in-
ternational fisheries agreement.

That charge was levelled by the
United Fishermen and Allied
Workers’ Union and Native
leaders in the wake of the pre-dawn
raids Jan. 12 in areas around
Lillooet, Lytton and the Lower
Mainland. About 130 people — all
but one of them Indians — were
served with summonses for 340
alleged violations of the Fisheries
Act.

UFAWU president Jack Nichol
told a press conference the day
following the raids that the depart-
ment of fisheries and oceans was
being deliberately misleading by
using the words “‘poaching”’ and
‘legal’? in a statement issued on
the day of the raids.

The basic charge stemming from
the DFO raids concerns the alleged
illegal sale of salmon caught on
reserve land for purposes of con-
sumption — the food fishery which
is part of the aboriginal right of
reserve Indians. Under the
Fisheries Acct, it is illegal to sell any
of this catch.

But in its press release issued the
day of the raids, the department

' talked of an “‘illegal’’ catch on the

Fraser watershed of approximately
500,000 salmon. Of this, two
undercover agents posing as buyers
bought some 61.5 tons (about four
percent of the catch) in a four-
month operation, said the DFO.

“They talk of an ‘illegal’ catch
when mentioning the 500,000 fish.
But that estimate includes the In-
dian fishery, which is legal . . . the
department smears Indian
fishermen,’ Nichol charged.

“The union has no patience with
poachers and we should throw the
book at them. But to publicly
equate the legal Indian fishery with
poaching is a gross disservice to In-
dians who obviously use the bulk of
their production for domestic pur-
poses,’’ he said.

The real reason for the raid, car-
ried out in a ‘‘sensational’’ manner
with the media accompanying
fisheries officers, was the govern-
ment’s campaign to sell the new
salmon treaty with the Americans

— the text of which was released
the same day as the raids, accor-
ding to the UFAWU president.
During the treaty talks by U.S.
representatives frequently com-
plained that the Native fishery was
responsible for the declining
salmon escapement on the Fraser
(under the agreement, American
commercial fishermen are allowed
to intercept some Fraser salmon, a

totally Canadian resource). i

Nichol’s words were given
weight by the disclosure that copies
of the treaty were released some
two weeks earlier in the U.S. (““We
had to get out copy air-freighted
from Alaska’’) — a definite depar-
ture from past practice according
to Nichol.

Another reason for the raid, ac-
cording to president Ed Newman
of the Native Brotherhood of B.C.,
is an ongoing ‘‘war’’ between the
fisheries department and Indian
bands over management of the
food fishery.

The seriousness of that ‘‘war’’
came to light in government
documents’ obtained by the Van-
couver Province, in which a senior
fisheries department official urged
then-fisheries minister Romeo
LeBlanc to push for the elimination
‘of powers whereby Indian bands
pass by-laws regulating their food
fishery, in conjunction with the
DFO. Making specific reference to
the international fisheries agree-
ment, the October, 1981 document
argues for complete control of the
fishery by the DFO.

The sentiment underlying that
argument is one often expressed in
some non-Indian quarters — that
the Native fishery, which is not
limited by quotas, allows for the
plunder of B.C.’s salmon resource.

The facts speak otherwise: in
September of 1982, during which
the undercover operation was
underway, several Fraser River
councils were urging closer
cooperation among commercial,
Indian and sport fishing interests to
ensure greater local control over
who obtains food fishing permits.

The band spokesmen charged
that poor fisheries management
was behind the loss of Fraser
Salmon, which had suffered
because of poaching and low
escapement. Lillooet Tribal Coun-
cil coordinator Perry Redan said
the DFO practice of granting per-
mits to individual Native
fishermen, rather than granting

i eee

JACK NICHOL ... raid ‘smears’
Native fishermen.
that control to local band councils,
was also to blame.

That issue was sparked by losses
of more than 40,000 fish in the Ear-
ly Stuart sockeye run — a decline
that officials now realize was
primarily due to corporate ir-
responsibility.

“‘The International Pacific
Salmon Fisheries Commission has
concluded that the failure of Alcan
to release enough water from its
reservoirs is the main reason for
loss of the Early Stuart escape-
ment,’’ said Nichol, ‘‘yet no dawn
raids have been carried out in this
instance.””

The Alcan dam had been cited as
the chief culprit for salmon decline
in earlier years.

Perhaps the most glaring aspect
of the department’s attention-
grabbing raids concerns those
the fisheries officers did not ap-
prehend. The DFO statement
refers to “‘private individuals’? who
-purchase the fish and resell them in
large numbers to hotels and
restaurants around B.C., on the

prairie provinces and in the United
States.
These ‘‘middlemen’’ are the

crux of the problem, Nichol charg-
ed. They operate large freezer
trucks in conducting their illegal
trade, and no such vehicle was
among the 54 impounded from
band members in the raid.

When questioned about this by
the Tribune, department informa-
tion director David Proctor said:
“To comment on that would be
very dicey — it’s all sub judice
(before the courts).””

He referred questions to Fred
Fraser, area manager for fisheries.
However, Fraser did not return
phone calls to the Tribune.

PACIFIC TRIBUNE—JANUARY 21, 1983—Page 3