Labour Unions map plans Unionists from across the country met with Canadian Labour Congress officers Wednesday to frame labour’s response to the free trade agreement and wound up the half-day conference with a call to CLC leaders to beef up the six-point plan pro- posed by congress staff and to begin to put forward labour’s own economic program. Affiliates are “very angry” and want action to prevent workers from becoming the victims of the Canada-U:S. trade deal, CLC president Shirley Carr said following the meeting, held in Toronto’s Skyline Hotel. With. more than 150 ranking officers from affiliated and directly chartered unions in attendance, it was one of the larg- est ever held by the congress, an indication of the deep concern among unionists about the impact the trade deal will have on Can- adian workers. The conference itself was prompted by the unionists’ demand for a meeting to assess the fight against the trade deal in the wake of the Nov. 21 federal election. Both the Ontario and B.C. federations of labour which met the week after the election adopted resolutions calling for action to protect jobs and services and called on the CLC to co-ordinate a national campaign. At Wednesday’s meeting, union leaders debated a CLC paper entitled A Working Future — Canada’s Challenge. It outlined a six-point action program, calling for: ®@ Demands on governments to mitigate the losses to workers under the trade agreement; ® Monitoring for the purpose of gather- ing and distributing accurate information on the effects of the FTA; ® Inter-union solidarity to stem the cor- porate attacks due tothe FTA; ® International solidarity to develop fair trade; ® Community solidarity for effective coalition-building; ®@ Education and awareness as instru- ments of policy implementation. On union solidarity, the program noted that the effect of the trade agreement and the “conservative agenda is showing its menacing head at the bargaining table and : + The Canadian Association of Indus- trial, Mechanical and Allied Workers last week won a hearing from the Indus- trial Relations Council to discuss halting dismantling of the Western Canada Steel plant afcer a startling revelation from its former manager that he was asked by top management to incite a confronta- tion with locked-out workers. CAIMAW representative Borys Lessy said Wednesday that the union was cur- rently appearing before the IRC on its application for an unfair labour practice ruling and a cease and desist order against IPSCO Ltd., the new owners of the Western Canada plant, to prevent them frem closing the mill and tearing it down. IPSCO took over Western Canada Steel from its former owner, Cominco Ltd. in November, 1988, claiming that it never intended to re-open the mill. The 350 members of CAIMAW were locked out by Cominco July 6 and have been on the picket line ever since. The IRC acceded to CAIMAW’s application for a hearing after Stuart Gilbertson, the former divisional man- ager for Western Canada Steel’s Van- couver operation, told Richmond city council that he had been instructed by Cominco senior managers to stall and obstruct during negotiations and to pro- voke a picket line confrontation with locked-out workers so that the company could get an injunction and proceed with dismantling of the plant. Gilbertson said that he did stall during bargaining but refused to incite the inci- dent and was subsequently fired. In a brief to Richmond council, he stated: “I was instructed to provoke picket line violence during the week of July 18 to enable the company to secure an injunction that would remove pickets and allow free movement for liquidation of inventories and other assets. I was terminated July 21 due to my continued disagreement with the unnecessary clo- sure.” Cominco senior vice-president Ted Fletcher later issued a prepared state- ment denying that any such instructions were given. Gilbertson asked council that it press for a judicial inquiry and a court order Manager’s revelation prompts IRC hearing uo i STUART GILBERTSON...told to pro- voke picket line incident. preventing the planned closure of the plant and directing the new owners to re-open the plant. Western Canada Steel operations consist of the province’s only steel mill in Richmond, together with a fastener division in Vancouver. “If IPSCO (is) not prepared to allow the work force to return to work under a standard industry labour contract. and restart the plant, we request judicial assistance in recovering the entire opera- tion from IPSCO,” he stated in his sub- mission to council. “The company would be sold to the employees and to other qualified steelmaking interests.” Earlier this month, the former plant manager told a union rally that Western Canada Steel could be a thriving opera- tion given proper management and an owner prepared to operate it. Representatives of CAIMAW, together with Richmond Social Credit MLA Nick Loene, who has also opposed closure of the plant, are slated to meet Feb. 6 with Elwood Veitch, minister of regional and economic development and ministry officials to discuss the plant closure. 12 e Pacific Tribune, February 6, 1989 SHIRLEY CARR...labour has to set terms for committee participation. other industrial relations situations.” It urged: “‘Every resource of the labour movement must be mobilized against employers engaged in these kinds of anti- worker activities.” It outlined several co-ordinating actions that the congress might undertake to defend workers, including the use of hot cargo provisions and national strike com- mittees in major disputes; CLC support for unions involved in contracting-out as well as co-ordinated bargaining on request; and stepped-up efforts for the enactment of anti- scab legislation. The program also stated the congress intention to ‘“‘use the boycott weapon against companies engaged in union- busting or unnecessary plant closure.” Citing the need to “strengthen and expand the coalition of progressive forces locally,” the program pledged the CLC to step up its commitment to coalition build- ing and, specifically, to continue participa- tion in the Pro-Canada Network. With that will go an increased public profile for var- ious CLC-NDP policies on social, eco- nomic and environmental issues. The program also calls for international meetings with the AFL-CIO, the Interna- tional Confederation of Free Trade Unions and others to discuss the impact of the trade deal, particularly on social programs. On the floor, union leaders clearly wanted to see a stronger program, accord- ing to participants in the meeting. “That was pretty well the consensus — continue the fight against free trade and beef up the program to do it,” Carpenters Provincial Council president Bill Zander said in an interview following the meeting. Vancouver and District Labour Council secretary Frank Kennedy said the docu- ment “wasn’t what I would have liked it to be” but added that there were a lot of good proposals made by unionists on the floor. “I think most people wanted a stronger document — they wanted to make-it clear ight free trade that the labour movement wasn’t just going to roll over and play dead now that the trade deal’s passed,” he said. Both Zander and Kennedy noted that many unionists had put particular emphasis on the need for labour to work with com- munity groups in building coalitions and to continue the campaign against free trade carried on by the Pro-Canada Network. Zander also noted that many union lead- ers expressed misgivings about the CLC working with the federal government on various trade adjustment committees which might co-opt unionists into managing the re-structuring being carried out by govern- ment and industry. Carr acknowledged some of that in her comments to reporters following the meet- ing. “If we do participate,” she said, “it will be on our own terms.” The program was not voted on at Wed- nesday’s meeting but will go to the officers for changes before being adopted by the CLC executive council in early March. Later this month, CLC executive vice- president Nancy Riche will be the feature __ speaker for a one-day conference called by the Coalition Against “Free” Trade to con- tinue the campaign against the trade deal. The conference is slated for Feb. 25 at the King Edward Campus of Vancouver Community College. New Titles THE POWER IN OUR HANDS. 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