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NEWS ITEM: “As long as the government keeps waving the big stick’’ there can be no hope of easing the
labor-management situation in B.C. Ray Haynes, secretary of the B.C. Federation of Labor, said last week.

U.S.-owned railway in B.C.
will be total loss to people

By MABEL RICHARDS

Railroad workers met the
Social Credit government’s
touring party at several points in
the Kootenays this past week
with hoots, jeers, and signs.
They were protesting Premier
Bennett’s approval of the
Kootenay and Elk Railway appli-
cation to build a railine into the

United States — a move they say ©

will cost hundrdds of Canadian
jobs and millions in lost dollars.
Well might they protest! The
biggest hoax of the century is the
excuse being circulated that K
and E is a necessity “‘to open
new markets for B.C. coal by
guaranteeing access to Roberts
Banks via the Burlington-
Northern Railway should

C.P.R.’s line in the Kootenay be

blocked.”’

This raison d’etre for the
railway is given in a Vancouver
Province report. But surely not
even the most gullible can
believe that Crows Nest Indus-
tries is going to build a railway
to carry coal through Montana,
Idaho, Washington and back into
Canada to Roberts Bank in case
CPR lines get blocked!

What is the real story behind
the Kootenay and Elk applica-
tion to build a line— allegedly to
link up with the Burlington and
thence to Roberts Bank?

Part of the answer lies in these
facts: K. and E. is a wholly
owned subsidiary of Crows Nest
Industries which in turn is
reported to have a large part of
its shares controlled by Kaiser
Resources.

Fact two: Crows Nest Indus-
tries (read Kaiser) in
propagandizing for the K. and
E. railway, said ‘‘ample supplies
of steam coal are available in the
Kootenays as a result of the
production of higher grade
coking coal for Japan.”’

The railway says all it needs is
permission to build a line linking

up with the U.S. and it could sell
$9 million worth of steam coal
for the next 35 years in the
Pacific Northwest.

No Roberts Bank involved in
that deal!

Besides the outpouring of
millions of tons of steam coal to
the hungry maw ok power for
U.S. industry (and how much
royalty will be paid on that?) the
K. and E. railine cannot help but
cut out Canadians jobs.

As one railway worker shouted
at Labor Minister Chabot last
Monday: ‘‘How can I work in
Billings, Montana, on an
American seniority list?’’ He
might have added ‘‘or in Idaho,
or Washington?” As the Casey
Jones song says, that’s a mighty
longhaul.. .

The sellout of B.C. coal
resources to Kaiser was
allegedly going to mean jobs,
jobs, jobs, for Canadian
workers, according to WAC
Bennett.

But Rod Sykes, Calgary’s
mayor, says the K. and E.
railway which Bennett fought for
— right up to the Supreme Court
of Canada— is going to mean the
loss of a $1.5 million a year
payroll for his city alone. The
C.P.R. operates a major repair
facility there and if C.P. was the
only carrier of coal to Roberts
Banks it would mean an addi-
tional 135 to 150 jobs. At the
present time the CP repair depot
employs 1,200 men.

The joker in the deck at the
moment is that Crows Nest
Industries which ‘‘sold out’ to
Kaiser, does not even have a
contract with Hapan to sell coal!
But Kootenay and Elk maintain
Japanese orders ‘‘will be forth-
coming once the new railway is

PACIFIC TRIBUNE—FRIDAY, JUNE 9, 1972—PAGE 12

built.’ It leaves one wondering
if the Japanese industrialists
prefer the smell of coal hauled
over U.S. soil, or what the theory
is behind that statement.

While we hold no brief for
CPR, one can only take at face
value their statement that K.
and E. would siphon off between
$437.4 million and $469.2 million
from the Canadian economy
over the next 15 years. If this is
so, why did the Supreme Court of
Canada reverse the decision of
the federal transport com-
missioners to turn down the
application to build the railway?

Could it be that K. and E.
Railway was never intended, for
hauling coal to Roberts Bank and
thence to Japan? Could it be one
more link, one more line, to
siphon off our resources to the
United States of America over
U.S.-owned railines, once more
leaving unemployment and a
shrivelled economy in its wake?

The Social Credit government
must be prepared to take the
responsibility if this latest
‘“‘gimme”’ deal on the part of
Kaiser Resources turns out to be
another big sellout all down the
line.

B.C. Angela Davis group

wires congratulations }

A wire signed by Jeff Power on behalf of the BL}
Committee for the Defence of Angela Davis sent”
following wire to Sallye Davis of the United Commill@
to Free Angela Davis in San Francisco: A §

‘On behalf of B.C. Committee for Defence of Ale)
Davis congratulations. Victory is sweet. Lookity
forward to meeting you, Angela and family if
Vancouver victory celebration as agreed. Promise My
is debt unpaid. Know you will come throuey
Incidentally Vancouver is best North American vacall 7
spot.” 7
: The B.C. Committee recently sponsored a eit
rally for Angela Davis’ mother, Sallye, which rals* |
large sum of money for Angela’s defence. =

Civic workers reject
Totten’ settlement =

Cont'd from pg. 1

Vancouver Inside Workers
voted 78 percent; CUPE New
Westminster voted 87 percent;
Delta 90 percent; Burnaby 298
to 114. :

Commenting on the trend
shown in the voting, CUPE chief
negotiator Jack Phillips says
the trend set in. the voting has
given the negotiating com-
mittee a strong mandate to get
back to direct negotiations with
the Municipal Labor Relations
Bureau. He said the MLRA deci-

CHABOT

Cont'd from pg. 1

being the IWA rejection of the
6.5 percent offer (73 cents over 3 .
years).

“B.C. labor has shown itself to
be more united and more
determined than ever before.
They are not prepared to accept
Bennett’s wage controls, and
they are not prepared to accept
‘forced labor’.

“Injunctions, thousand dollar
fines, and jail sentences won’t
build houses, cut trees or smelt
ores.”

On behalf of the-Communist
Party, Morgan called on the
government of the province to
take a good second look before it
proceeds on the provocative,
arrogant, corporate-state course
it has set for itself. Anti-labor
legislation has stoked the fires
of confrontation between
management and labor. Govern-
ment intervention will only
worsen it, he pointed out.

‘Restoration of free collec-
tive bargaining is the only way
out,’ Morgan said. ‘‘Labor and
people’s unity expressed in a
mass public political campaign
is the sure way of breaking the
present impasse.”’

sion to go to the Mediation OY
mission has only delayed aye ‘
ment. ‘The only logical ue rie
do it is through direct
tiations.”’ r) }

On Tuesday night Phil Ril 1
a TV interviewer that if ion
and compulsory arbitral it
invoked against civic oe
will become an issue #7 |
whole labor movement.

t9

Also at press time the ree
the strike vote in the fore yet
try was starting to ce |
showing overwhelming © aii)
for strike action if 4
factory agreement
reached with the ~~

companies.

WILLIAM KASHTAR

Party leader, W" of
speaker at
Banquet in t
this Saturday
also participate !
the Party’s prov! to
on Saturday, cave’
election camp?!

Bruce Yorke, chairman of the
Co-ordinating Committee for
Public Transit said following an
executive meeting this week
that the third crossing issue is
dying and it should be given an
inexpensive but speedy burial.

He was commenting on the
“trial balloon’’ from Ottawa and
and Greater Vancouver
Regional District regarding a
“Task Force’’ to study the
regional planning implications
of the proposed tnird crossing.

refused to turn oes .
Hydro transit ad righ
GVRD, especially ple Any
ways on the profita intel lt {
and Central Pat 4
lines.” A nie |
Yorke charged pe af
proposal is pee
attempt to rescur i
million dolla? qited Fe
mainly by discrs tne
cians who spaw?
the first place.

He said the overwhelming
majority of the district through
various organizations have
already spoken out strongly
against the third crossing —
freeway albatross.

‘Far better that the Secre-
tary of State for Urban Affairs
and the GVRD come up with
some action to improve the
present bus service. Specifically
they should put the heat on
Victoria who are stalling on this
bus question. So far they have