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Eee dinate inaiiitie Yadinachemanamentiadinaiaadind

by Bruce Magnuson

Canadian Transport, publica-
tion of the CBRT&GW (CLC) in
its March 1,.1972, issue, editor-
ializes on the meaning for or-
ganized labor of the Trudeau
government’s anti-inflation pro-
gram which it claims as respon-
sible for “a wage ceiling .. .
clamped on unions in federal
jurisdiction.”

“Government spokesmen, of
course deny any such wage lim-
its exists,” the editorial says.
“But the unions who have to
negotiate with the government
and
storming that ‘nonexistent’ bar-
ricade since 1968. All but a few

of them have failed to penetrate ~

it ...no matter if they submit
without a struggle or choose to
fight. In the end their protests
are overridden and they are
saddled with their 7 or 8% raise
or its equivalent.”

“Since the federal controls
have been in effect, several
unions have challenged them by
going on strike: the Machinists,
the Postal Workers, the Seaway
Workers, some CBC unions, the
air traffic controllers and the
airport technicians. The govern-
ment’s response has been to out-
last them, to let the strikes go

- on until the workers become dis-
couraged.”

“This strategy has worked in
most cases. Most strikes in the
federal sphere—even those that
paralyze postal services and air-
lines—cannot wreck the econ-
omy; and the public inconven-
ience they cause, though severe,

+ can be tolerated. Moreover, only
a few unions in the federal field
have strike funds, and they pro-
vide payments that are far below
their members’ regular wage
levels.”

“Ottawa’s success in control-
ling the pay increases of its own
employees is not surprising,”
says the editorial in Transport.
“They are splintered among a
hundred or more units, few of
which have any real bargaining
clout. As long as those few with
muscle and militancy are held in
check, the meek majority can
easily be subdued.”

«-. . Apart from the railway
groups, federal unions, divided
as they are into small, ineffective

- bargaining units, lack the re-
sources on their.own to defy the
power of the state. If they all
threw their support behind one
key union chosen as their ‘shock
troops,’ they might possibly be
able to burst through the wage
ceiling.” (My emphasis, B.M.)

This is exactly what the trade
union movement in Quebec has
decided to do in support of
210,000 public service employ-
ees. By forming a common front
they are tackling the problem in
the only way it can and must be
tackled—by unity in action.

In British Columbia too, the
unions are- meeting an all-out
assault on living standards and
democratic rights by means of
united action.

Everywhere in Canada, as
throughout the capitalist world,
working people face the same
class enemy—the private capi-
talist monopolies and their state
power. :

In Britain the coal miners re-
cently won a modest wage in-
crease after a long and bitterly
fought strike, supported without
reservations by the people of
Britain. The average wage of the
miners before the strike was a
measly $49.50 per week.

In Scotland it was the work-
ers’ refusal to give up their jobs

<©-S* PACIFIC TRIBUNE—FRIDAY, MARCH!24) 1972°_-PAGE 8

Te net, mee tt a ee

2 Serer no ~ ~—y pre aaegie

in acute class conflict

its agencies have been —

JF YOU DON'T STOP THAT AGITATING
_ YOU'LL LOSE YouR SHIRT!
ene :

we es

by conducting a seven month
work-in; supported by workers
throughout the world; who saved
what little is left of the famous
Clydeside Shipbuilding industry.

It is the working people who
are the patriots. It is the capital-
ists who seek the most profit-
able investments regardless of
consequences —as is presently
proven in the nickel industry in
Canada, with INCO laying off
thousands of workers. while
hundreds of millions of profits
made by these laid-off workers
mining Canadian nickel ore is
now being invested abroad in
other and different nickel-pro-
ducing operations.

At a time when science and
technology increase productivity
and cheapen production; and
when prices ought to decline
along with increasing abundance,
we see prices, rents, interest and
taxes continually increasing for
the working. people, while infla-
tionary pressures and ‘soaring
unemployment reduce both the
individual and the sum total of
buying power in the hands of.
wage and salary earners. The
benefit of the new and higher
productivity is swallowed up by
monopoly profits controlled by
the few, while the area and
depth of poverty is expanding.

Everywhere the monopolies
and private capitalist specula-
tors are in power and control
economic, social and _ political
affairs, it is the same dismal
situation. Factories, mines and
mills go on short time or shut
down, leaving the workers out
in the cold. Many cannot even
collect their meagre unemploy-
ment insurance because of legal,
technical and _ bureaucratic
bungling. It is the monopoly ex-
ploitation of labor and resources
for monopoly -super-profits that
produces inflationary pressures
and extreme polarization of
wealth versus poverty. It is a
lie that inflationary pressures
arise from increased wages and
salaries. It will take a sharp
rise on mass purchasing power
to produce a healthy and ex-
panding economy with full em-
ployment without inflation.

It is this division of interest
between those who work for a
living by selling their labor
power as a commodity on the
labor market; and, those who
live like parasites on the backs
of the workers by appropriating
and investing as capital the sur-
plus value taken from the sweat
and: toil..of labor; it is precisely ,

next week.—

that contradiction which pro-
duces the crisis in our society.

This class war — that is the
correct term for it even if it
offends the sensibilities of some
people for their own particular
reasons —includes the right to
strike as the only weapon of
defence in the hands of wage
and salary earners. Without the
right to strike working people
would be defenceless. Any sur-
render of this weapon means ab-
ject capitulation before the class
enemy. Any attempt to recon-
cile irreconcilable and‘ mutually
exclusive interests between a
worker and his employer can be
done only at the expense of one
or the other. A union contract is
at best a temporary lull in the
battle, or a cease-fire arrived at
by: compromise. As in any war,
it becomes necessary for a
union to see that the conditions
of the temporary truce are ob-
served to the letter. In the
‘ficantime preparations should
always be made for top-rate -bat-
tle performance in the struggle
for the next contract.

Today workers in all walks of
life are joining the battle. Those
who chose to disregard the facts
of life in contemporary labor-
industrial relations by speaking
about. some mythical “public”
as a third party in the develop-
ing conflict seem to forget that
there is no such third party, no
neutrals, in this particular con-
test. One is either with the work-
ers or against them.

The point made above by the
trade union journal I have quot-
ed concerning “shock troops”
and the need to unite the whole
labor movement. behind them, is
an excellent point that ought to
be well taken. In developing
conditions, many union leaders,
now prattling about such em-
ployers catch-phrases as “strike-
mentality” ought to think about
this. Likewise, the Canadian La-
bor Congress may stand to gain
by less abstract academic de-
bate about a non-existent “in-
dustrial democracy” and concen-
trate more attention on how to
unify and restructure the Cana-
dian trade union movement
along democratic and autono-
mous lines so as to make it
much better prepared to face the
stormy days now looming ahead
of us.

For this to be effective, we
need to establish proper na-
tional, international and class
perspectives. But more of that

ane
eats oR}

“Tories and allies seek
| to divide the peopl

Communist Party leader Wil-
liam Kashtan spoke in Hamilton
the same day that Conservative
leader Robert Stanfield was
there. The press played up the
ageing Tory chieftain’s claim

(evidently trying to copy Pierre

Elliot Trudeau’s “charisma” ploy
of 1968) that he also was able
to charm the ladies . . . But of
course that is no more the es-
sence of politics in the “elec-
tion campaign under way in the
undeclared election,’ to quote
Mr. Kashtan, than were Mr.
Trudeau’s much publicized re-
marks to a young lady in “hot
pants.”

In a speech critically exam-
ining the Liberal government’s
record and policies, the Com-
munist leader also gave due at-
tention to Mr. Stanfield and his
allies.

No set of declared policies is
presented by them, but instead
issues are advanced which are
calculated to divide the people,
such as the French language
question raised by the Tories
(though Mr. Stanfield warned
against overdoing it) and Social
Credit Premier “Wacky” Ban-
nett in British Columbia, which
constitute an attempt to blow
up an anti-French Canadian
“backlash.” The strategy seems
to be to use the Social Crediter
Caouette (the Toronto Globe
and Mail, which until now dis-
missed him as a “funny money”
crackpot, today is giving him
extensive coverage) to weaken
the Liberals in Quebec, and anti-
French propaganda to do the
same in Ontario and English-
speaking Canada generally, thus
enabling the Tories to slide in.

While an attempt is made to
suggest that unemployment is
being reduced, actually this sta-
tistical juggling and temporary
jobs measures such as LIFT can-
not conceal the fact that we

Canadian experts

tour Soviet land

OTTAWA — Two Canadian
working groups from the oi] and
gas industries have arrived in
Moscow for an extensive tour
of fuel production instalations
in the Soviet Union.

The Canadian groups will
meet their Soviet counterparts
in the Canada/USSR Mixed
Commission on Cooperation in
the Industrial Application of
Science and Technology, which
was formed in January 1971.

,At the conclusion of the tour,
the Soviet and Canadian offi-
cials will hold meetings in Mos-
cow to discuss the exchange of
information on oil and gas
technology of mutually benefii-
cial interest to both countries.

Working groups for non-fer-
rous metals industries, and the
architectural and construction
industries have already made
tours of the Soviet Union. Un-
der terms of the Agreement on
the industrial application of
Science and Technology, all
working groups have held joint
meetings in Canada or the
USSR during 1971. The next
meeting of the Canada/USSR
Mixed Commission will be held
in Canada in May this year.

The Canadian groups will re-
turn March 29)’ . SRG ORD Sickge

_democratic
~“alition.”

ag weaoat ‘
I OS ae
‘ IME, He BE ME OMT aM Mn aE a

have to do with permanett
unemployment as @ ~
feature of capitalism. ra
The fact is that the 0°)
gical revolution creates #4
ation where less and 1es8" 4
ers are required to product™
and more goods. A [are
tion of the working cla,
comes “obsolete,” and 1%
laborers but also people
a high education, PhD’
etc. ce
Ottawa has pumped ni
billion dollars “to stimula)
economy,” but this has i
curbed inflation not stopP®
employment. ‘ :
Mr. Stanfield is tryin
make hay of this situa”

Ny

berates the Liberal ad i j

tion, making a play on Ht
memories of the people 4)
gard to the Tory recol®, 4
silent on the fact thal |g
during the Conservall® ig
of R. B, Bennett in the | ¢
1930’s_that unemployme |
so disastrous, it was ve
Tory rule of John Digi r
that we had high unemP
as well. The Tory kettle
cleaner in this regard
Liberal pot. the
Mr. Kashtan told o vel
cent Conservative baa
Toronto for 2,000 pee
$100 a plate (‘there west
unemployed there”), Wa
Stanfield made tw?
ments. of
He pledged that if ine Ny
were elected they WOU aii
with unemployment 4 Fi y
ity. How? They woul
incentives to big bus”).
In other words, ye fof
for big business is g0°
Conservative Party. tte!
Secondly, he comm 4
future Tory governed
down government SP¥ si!
“frills,” to scrape ¢
government expenditul™ ne
What does that me®”
in social services. po!
Actually, Mr. Kashtam
ed out, a reduction net
ment spending woul fi
throw the country int?
class crisis. W
He dealt at some len j
the inability of the nett
system to satisfy thé 5
the people. The mus af!
“Just Society” remalr 1
just society, the prom? gi)
ticipatory democracy ih,
a hollow promise, oe if
capitalism, regional ie)
denial of their nationa™ "jolt
the French Canadial ce |
etc., remain and get tions
Hundreds of ™
dollars are given to ™ nde
take over Canadian " igf
but when it comes dy
ment in Canada’s 1 “Od
Canada’s :

future ae
have the money.” Pr
The Trudeau gover nit
retreating before the 7 pre /@
onslaught, before the sof
of big business. 4
that had some Pre ind
workers’ say in
change was i
same retreat is 5
fields as well. - 0"
Only a full-scale ge
attack of the labor, "a
and patriotic forces 9
life will turn the tide
vent a right-wing cO@ly, fy
gaining power, to Be,
strides toward the va
anti-mon

aD DERG

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