Eafe Re Gi

PRINCE RUPERT — Shore-
workers, thrown out of work by
B.C. Packers’ closure of its Seal
Cove processing plant, are plan-
ning a lobby to Victoria to de-
mand that the provincial govern-
ment take action to protect the
jobs of the 300 workers affected.

Joy Thorkelson, northern or-
ganizer for the United Fishermen
and Allied Workers said Wednes-
day that the lobby would probab-
ly goto the legislature May 12 and
13.

The union is planning to set up
acitizens’ committee to campaign
against the closure and is hoping
to organize a tag day in Prince
Rupert to raise money to take a
busload of Prince Rupert resi-
dents to Victoria. City council has
already voted unanimously to
support the Seal Cove workers.

B.C. Packers’ decision to close
the groundfish processing plant
was part of a large-scale rationali-
zation program by the company,
part of the huge George Weston
multinational conglomerate.

Over the past year, the com-
pany has shut down several oper-
ations, including a Port Edward
processing plant, to maximize its
profits. For BCP, the policy re-
sulted in an increase in profits of
nearly 700 percent in 1981 —
from $146,000 in. 1980 to $1.3
million last year.

But for industry workers, the
result has been mounting unem-
ployment — with BCP chairman
indicating that more “‘painful ad-
justments’’ have yet to be made.

“BCP has told us that perhaps
half the fishermen on this coast.
may have to go before the ration-

alization is complete,’’ UFAWU
secretary-treasurer George
Hewison told the Vancouver and
District Labor Council Apr. 20.

“But we’re not going to accept
that they can shut plants down
and put fishermen out of their’
boats at will,’’ he pledged.

At the same time as BCP is
“cutting and slashing its unprof-
itable operations,’’ Hewison said,
it is getting millions from the fed-
eral government from the sale of
its rental fleet.

He told the council that the
province needs a fish policy —
one that ensures consumers can
buy fish at reasonable prices and

people in theindustry have jobs,” = a ag

Some 400 people marched Apr. 14 to the Oceanside plant, B.C.
Packers main operation in Prince Rupert, to protest the com-
pany’s action in closing the Seal Cove plant.

he emphasized.
“‘That’s the message that’s got
to go to Victoria.”’

Lobby set in campaign for Rupert jobs

FISHERMAN PHOTO—BARRY HALE eihag

Gov't anti-strike manual revealed.
as BCGEU takes bargaining stance

The B.C. Government Employ-
ees Union last week bared the ex-
istence of a secret government
“strike contingency manual’’
which details plans by the Govern-
ment Employee Relations Bureau
to maintain services in the event of
a strike this summer by 38,000
BCGEU members.

The exposure of the anti-strike
manual came only days after the in-
troduction into the legislature of
the Socreds’ Compensation Sta-
bilization Act (Bill 28) which im-
poses wage controls on some 200,-
000 public sector workers and gives
nearly dictatorial powers to Ed
Peck, commissioner of the Com-
pensation Stabilization Program
(CSP), in administering the con-
trols.

But despite the government as-
sault, the BCGEU is continuing to
insist that it intends to ‘‘approach
the bargaining table in May for an
increase which will offset the ra-
vages of three years of eight percent
annual increases accompanied by
runaway inflation.”

The BCGEU laid down its bar-
gaining demands at a special bar-
gaining convention in Victoria
Apr. 16 and 17, declaring its inten-
tion to seek increases ranging from
27 to 38 percent over one year, in-
cluding catch-up for lower paid
workers.

The demand entails a $1 across-
the-board plus a five percent in-
crease for all 38,000 members. In
addition the union is seeking a
COLA clause which would give
members a One percent increase for

every percentage point rise in the
cost of living.

With inflation estimated at 12
percent for the next year that would
peg the bargaining demand at
about 27 percent.

For lower paid categories, the
union is seeking a minimum salary
which, coupled with the other in-
creases sought, would entail a 38
percent hike.

BCGEU general-secretary John
Fryer revealed the strike contingen-
cy manual at the bargaining con-
vention, branding it as an “‘ex-
tremely provocative’? document
which is ‘‘a direct attack on the free
collective bargaining system.

“The Government Employee
Relations Bureau and its chairman,
Mike Davison, have produced a
document which seeks to place
GERB above the law of parliament
and, in addition, levels an attack at
the very heart of those freedoms in
‘an attempt to turn the industrial re-
lations clock back 50 years,’’ he
charged.

‘Davison and GERB obviously
want a return to the strikebreaking
of the dirty ’30s when they produce
a document that advises ministers
to use families of excluded employ-
ees and volunteers to scab in order
to augment the management work
force,’’ he said.

According to Fryer, the manual
instructs government ministries to
estimate the extent of assistance
that could be obtained from re-
sources outside the public service
(including volunteers and families

of employees who are excluded un-

My oe
Oma, ieee

Hear: |

MARCH: 12: 00 noon

MAY DAY ‘82.
Saturday, May 1

Jim Kinnaird, pres. B.C. Fed of Labor
Maurice Rush,
Pauline Jewett, MP, NDP

Francisco Acosta, CUS-FDR, El Salvador

CULTURAL PROGRAM

prov. leader, CPC

RALLY: 2 p.m. — Vancouver
Technical School
(Broadway & Nanaimo St.)

PACIFIC TRIBUNE—APRIL 23, 1982—Page 12

—_" eo eS Se Se aN ae ee ee

der the labor code from the bar-
gaining unit).

Other sections of the manual ad-
vise ministries that the labor code
‘does not prohibit the hiring of re-
placement employees during a
strike.’’ The result of that, Fryer
charged is ‘‘to place the govern-
ment on record as openly support-
ing the use of strikebreakers.’’

He also pointed to other sections
in the manual which outline plans
to encourage employees to cross le-
gal picket lines and to use non-
union firms to bring in supplies to
government facilities which are be-
hind a picket line.

The union condemned the man-
ual as an ‘‘underhanded and pro-
vocative attack on the rights of pro-
vincial employees’’ and called on
premier Bennett and provincial sec-
retary Evan Wolfe to dissociate
themselves from its contents.”’

Fryer also reaffirmed the
BCGEU’s ‘‘determination to pro-
tect free collective bargaining.”

However, the freedom of col-
lective bargaining, at least for the
public sector, has been effectively
abridged by the introduction of the
Compensation Stabilization Act
which would impose wage controls
on all government employees in-
cluding the 38,000 whose contract
expires July 31.

BCGEU president Norman
Richards slammed the legislation
following its introduction Apr. 13
as ‘‘an attack not only on public
sector workers but on collective
bargaining as a whole.

“Every single worker in this
province has reason to be alarmed
by this very vague piece of legisla-
tion which offers sweeping powers
to a small group of cabinet minis-
ters without recourse to the legislat-
ure,’ he said. ‘‘In addition to
scapegoating public employees,
this bill attempts a direct hit on
B.C.’s long-standing tradition of
free collective bargaining. It is an
attack which will not sit well with
any trade unionists in this
province.”’

The union has not mounted any
campaign against the legislation,
however, instead maintaining its
intention to bargain as usual.

B.C. Federation of Labor presi-

dent Jim Kinnaird indicated last

month that the BCGEU had devel-
oped a strategy which would be
aimed at testing the legislation on
the basis of the contract. If the con-
trols were not effective, he said,
then the union would conclude a
contract; if they were, then the
BCGEU would be in a strike situa-
tion.

There have been suggestions that
the union may seek to argue that its
contract should be allowed by CSP
commissioner Ed Peck even if in-
creases are beyond the top 14 per-
cent guideline figure originally spe-
cified by Bennett in his speech an-
nouncing the controls program.

Fryer gave substance to those

suggestions following the bargain-~

ing conference Apr. 17 telling re-
porters: ‘‘If the government can
find any way of making our figures
fit within the restraint program,
then there is no restraint
program,”’

The BCGEU had earlier indicat-
ed a similar position when it an-

_ nounced that several smaller con-

tracts for its members had been
signed providing for increases in
excesses Of the guideline figure. But
premier Bennett later suggested
that the contracts might be rolled
back by Peck when legislation was
in place.

The B.C. Federation of Labor
has also declined so far to mount a
campaign against the legislation.
Kinnaird had stated earlier that the
Federation would focus its opposi-
tion on the legislature at the time of
the introduction of the legislation
but there has not yet been any offi-
cial response.

‘the Vancouver and District La-

VDLC wants|
Cdn. ship

withdrawn

Whatever the outcome of the
Falkland Islands confrontation
between Britain and Argentina,

bor Council doesn’t want Can- |
ada involved in the conflict, _

The council voted Apr. 20 to |
send a wire to external affairs
minister Mark MacGuigan
voicing opposition to the use of
a Canadian Pacific-owned ship
as a water supply vessel to the
British naval fleet and calling on
him to ‘‘use his good offices to
make sure that CP Ships re
moves the vessel forthwith.’’

The motion was put forward
by Tom McGrath, delegate for
Local 400 of the Canadian
Brotherhood of Railway,
Transport and General Work-
ers, who. pointed out that the
tanker, Fort Toronto, fully
owned by CP Ships, a Canadian
company, was being leased to
the British as a water supply ves-
sel to the naval fleet now sailing
for the Falklands.

The tanker may be registered
in Bermuda or Panama ‘‘or any
other flag of convenience coun-
try,” he said, ‘‘but it is Cang- }
dian in the eyes of the world,

“If Canada is to be removed
from this conflict, then it is
hypocritical to allow a Canadi- |
an tanker to be used to service
the British fleet — and to makea |
profit out of the Falklands dis- |
pute,’’ he told the meeting.

“The federal government
should make sure that the vessel |
is withdrawn.”’

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