Continued from page 1

COLUMBIA

provincial government policy,
and came out strongly for pub-
lic waterpower development
on the Columbia.

(To date Premier W. A. C.
Bennett has remained silent
on a federal offer to help fi-
nance the Mica Creek dam as
a public power project, des-
pite Prime Minister St. Lau-
rent’s request for an answer
from Victoria. See uss Page
5.)

“The ultimate cost of power
of a publicly-financed project
would be considerably lower
than a privately-financed pro-
ject,’ Nash told the Comox
district Canadian Club.

“One advantage of a public
agency in producing low cost
power is that it does not pay
corporation income tax,” he
continued. “Surely the federal
government in making the
stipulation that its financing
offer was contingent upon
public development, must have
considered this...

‘If B.C. is to offer the best
inducements to competitive en-
terprise, free to establish in
whatever part of the province
best suited to its process and
markets, ,it must cease to be
divided into separate areas of
power supply and price.”

In- making this clear call
for development of public
power through the B.C. Power
Commission as against private
development by the B.C. Elec-
tric, Nash was aware that he
was probably putting his head
on the chopping block, for
Premier Bennett is known to
favor privately-financed power
development. Before making
his speech Nash told friends
in Victoria he ‘fully expected”
to lose his job for his state-
ments.

In Vancouver the NPA city
council, ‘great and good friend”
of the B.C. Electric, decided
Tuesday this week not to take
a stand on the public vs. priv-
ate power issue.

Recently the Labor-Progres-
sive party in Vancouver wrote
city council urging it to press
Victoria to enter into early
agreement with Ottawa for de-
velopment of the Columbia

Vancouver teachers
Voting on affiliation

Vancouver Elementary
School Teachers’ Association
is taking a secret ballot among
its 1,200 members to determine
whether its delegates to the
B.C. Teachers’ Federation con-
vention over the Easter week-
end will go instructed to sup-
port re-affiliation to the Can-
adian Labor Congress. A two-
thirds majority for or against
re-affiliation is required.

under public control, Council’s
decision to stand on the side-
lines drew a blast from LPP
city secretary Maurice Rush.

‘Tt is quite clear now that
city council aims to leave the
door open for the B.C. Electric

to gain control of transmission »

and distribution of Columbia
power in the Lower Mainland
when the Columbia is develop-
ed,” charged Rush. :

“This would retain the B.C.
Electric monopoly and ensure
the company’s profits while
keeping. electric rates among
the highest in Canada. If this
is allowed to happen most of
the benefit of public develop-
ment of the Columbia would
be lost to the consumers just
as it was when the BCE gained
control of natural gas trans-
mission and distribution. ~

“City council must not be
allowed to get away with its
policy of putting the B.C. Elec-
tric’s interests before those of
the public.”

A statement at this time from
Premier Bennett accepting Ot-
tawa’s offer to harness the
Columbia as a public power
project would be welcomed by
the people of B.C. and would
clarify the issues involved in
the current Canadian - U.S.
talks relating to joint use of
the river.

McPHEE ENQUIRY

Fruit growers want
end toU.S. dumping

By NIGEL MORGAN

The McPhee Royal Commission in vestigating the Interior tree fruit industry

is nearing the end of the first stage. And,

the thing that stands out most to date is

that while growers are sharply critical of the present marketing results and have many

suggestions for improving them, support is

maintaining centralized selling and orderly marketing.

There are few growers who
want to “go it alone,” men like
A. L. Cunningham of Okana-
gan Falls, who attack the cen-
tral sales agency principle as
being “socialistic.”

Even the most outspoken
critics of B.C. Tree Fruits,
growers like Herbert Corbish-
ley and John Glass of Pentic-
ton, and Max de Pfyffer of the
Kelowna district who were
largely responsible’ for the
present enquiry, have made it
clear to Commissioner McPhee
that they were not attacking
central marketing.

Of 122 individual growers
appearing before the first nine
McPhee hearings, only four
said they favored individual
selling. Others stated emphati-
cally that they wanted to main-
tain central marketing with
fairer and more effective sell-
ing policies.

Similar unanimity has been

LABOR AROUND THE PROVINCE

evident among witnesses heard
thus far who have demanded:

@ Protective tariffs for B.C.
fruit and fruit products.

@ Long-term, low interest
loans to aid replanting of frost-
killed: trees, over-age and un-
popular varieties.

e Reduction of packing
house charges.

@ More aggressive market-
ing with better merchandizing

so that the primary producer
will receive a larger share of
the consumer’s dollar.

The demand for tariff pro-
tection came mainly from the
soft fruit section in the South
Okanagan, but they had sup-
porters throughout the valley.

Growers explained that B.C.
soft fruits — apricots, peaches,
cherries and prunes — come on
the market two weeks later
than U.S. fruits grown further
south, just at the time when

Employees hurl strikebreaking
charge at self-service clubs

Striking city club and cab-
aret workers this week asked
the provincial government to
probe “strike-busting” tactics
employed by some Vancouver
club managers” and expressed
“satisfaction” with the results
of a talk Monday between a
three-man union delegation
and officials of the attorney-
general’s department and Col.
Donald McGugan, Liquor
Commissioner.

Club and cabaret workers:
struck the Gulf and Railway-
men’s clubs March 28 and op-
erators immediately. locked
out workers at five other clubs.
Three of the clubs have made
no effort to operate but four
have been functioning on a
‘limited servicing” basis, with
management behind the bar
and customers carrying their
own drinks to tables.

Union officials denounced

' the operators’ tactics as “strike

busting” and called on the
government to take action. The
union also asked for a check

on membership cards of pat-
rons, claiming there has been
a great deal of laxity in this
respect.

os x 503

Salary dispute between West
Vancouver school board and
70 secondary teachers has
reached a deadlock and: B.C.
Teachers Federation has hint-
ed that if no agreement is
reached soon it will enter ne-
gotiations.

Teachers want parity with
Vancouver salaries. Last year
they went to arbitration over
the issue and won.

Shi RES ap. al
Federation of Fruit and Veg-
etable Workers Unions is su-

ing Local 48 of the Teamsters
for return of its assets.

Members of Local 8 of the
Federation voted 23 to 12 on
November 16, 1955 to join the
Teamsters. A packer at Ver-
non Fruit Union, Oyama, tes-
tified in Supreme Court last
week that “we were afraid we
would lose our seniority” and

consequently signed Teamster
cards.

x 50 503

Deadlocked for more than a
week, wage talks between IWA
and Forest Industrial Rela-
tions re-opened Thursday be-
fore conciliation officer Reg
Clements.

The 30,000 Coast woodwork-
ers are demanding a 20 percent
wage boost.

53 % og

All five officers of United
Fishermen and Allied Work-
ers Union were re-elected by
acclamation at the union’s re-
cent convention here.

Steve Stavenes was return-
ed as president for his fourth
consecutive term; T. Buck Su-
zuki as first vice-president for
a second term; Mrs. Mickey
Beagle as second vice-presi-
dent for a third term; Homer
Stevens as secretary-treasurer
(he has held the post since
1947) and Alex Gordon as
business agent (a position he
has filled since 1945).)

overwhelming and strongly in favor of

the U.S. crops are being clean-
ed _up.

The Americans not only get
top early-season prices, but
they are at the cleanup stage
just as the B.C. fruit is ready,
with the result that they dump
their surplus on the Canadian
market for whatever it will
bring.

This condition in normal
years is further aggravated by
“distress selling” in years of
heavy production.

The answer for the growers
is equally simple — protective
tariffs to stop U.S. dumping
and preserve the Canadian
market for Canadian farmers.

Long - term, low - interest
loans were widely requested
because practically everyone in
the Okanagan was hit by the
1949 and 1955 winter frosts.

Okanagan orchardists not
only face the immediate prob-
lem of replacement, they told
Commissioner McPhee, but the
long wait of five to seven or
eight years between planting
and production. And today
they simply can’t afford this.
They have lost both produc-
ing trees and the revenue that
would enable them to buy and
plant new stock.

Much has been said about
the waste unnecessary dupli-
cation in packing houses; and
of how the industry as a whole
would benefit from amalgama-
tion of many of them.

Growers have complained
that they haven’t received

‘enough information about their

marketing agency, and “gen-
eral pooling” has been widely
criticised, particularly by those
who grow “premium” varieties
and ciaim to lose their advan-
tage in the pool.

Complaints have been heard
about misrepresentation of
nursery stock being supplied
to growers, of an “international

cartel” controlling prices of
spray materials, and of the
rising cost ‘of machinery,

equipment, fertilizer, boxes and
labor.

Concrete proposals have
been brought forward for the
“pooling of machinery on small
acreages, and for bulk pur-
Chases of spray. materials and
fertilizers.”

In the next stage of the en-
quiry, when packing house
witnesses take the stand, a
great deal more is likely to be
heard of these complaints.

APRIL 12, 1957 — PACIFIC TRIBUNE—PAGE 8

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