Lil || dl [on eeeeee e 0

EDITORIAL

-Aplace of refuge

= Prime Minister Brian Mulroney has said Parliament is to be recalled in mid-

ugust.

Not to create jobs nor strengthen peace. Not to extend democratic rights, but to

limit them by railroading through a reactionary piece of legislation — Bill C-55.
Bill C-55 is the Tory plan to get out from under the United Nations Convention

on Refugees and to sidestep the government-commissioned proposals of Rabbi

Gunther Plaut for democratizing, humanizing and streamlining Canadian refugee

The Tory bill aims to harmonize procedures with United States, whose foreign
capers — economic, political and military — are so intimately connected to the
creation of refugees around the world.

The July 12 arrival of the S.S. Amalie with its cargo of 174 Asians seeking refuge
provided Immigration Minister Benoit Bouchard and the Tory government with a
heaven-sent opportunity. :

Consider for a moment a leaky old tub filled with Rhodesian or South African
middle class whites, and whether they would have been handled in the same way by
the Mulroney government, the Turners, Vander Zalms or the big media. Would
rumours of a second boat-load have brought out Canada’s navy and airforce in a
massive search of the Atlantic shipping lanes?

The Mulroney government deserves the sharpest criticism for cynically exploit-
ing the plight of 174 Sikhs, just to boost its sagging electoral fortunes. It not only
wrongfully denied the refuge seekers’ civil liberties for several days, but it fanned the
dangerous flames of racism to rally support for its much-criticized legislation.

Rather than the regressive policy expressed in C-55, Canada needs immigration
and refugee determination policies that will maintain an “open door” to refugees as
defined under the UN Convention; that will provide for speedy and fair oral
hearings with the right to appeal an adverse ruling in Canada; policies that give a
broader denfinition of family and provide faster methods of family reunification.

Cold war provision for “designated classes” which sees every citizen of a socialist
country as a potential refugee should be scrapped.

Equal opportunity of access to Canada must be accorded to all regardless of
colour, income or skill levels. This means the deployment of more immigration
officials in more third world countries and more initial assistance on arrival in
Canada. :

It also means an end to all built in bias in the present system of immigration-
selection methods. This would help overcome the problem of so-called “queue
jumping” where people grasp at the refugee option in despair of gaining permission
to immigrate to Canada.

Canada needs more immigration not less. Our population could dwindle to a
mere 11 million within fifty years if the present low birth rates and immigration
levels perist — and that would be a disaster for Canada.

Tie wad of s&s

See iT BIG
pear, |T9 AG bod THING
WE WERE HEKE
ReFoRE THE 5
EvROPEANS

GoT HERE !

FRIBUNE_

Editor — SEAN GRIFFIN |
Assistant Editor — DAN KEETON ae
Business & Circulation Manager — MIKE PRONIUK 1
Graphics — ANGELA KENYON

Published weekly at 2681 East Hastings Street
Vancouver, B.C. V5K 1Z5
Phone (604) 251-1186
ISSN 0030-896X

Subscription Rate: Canada — $16 one year; $10 six months
Foreign — $25 one year; :

Second class mail registration number 1560

———y
Sunday, Sept. 27, 2 p.m. at the Russian

FS the very beginning of the still-
simmering strike at its lead-zinc smel-
ter in Trail — prolonged by company
refusal to take concessions off the table for
office and technical workers — Cominco
Ltd. has trucked out its shopworn tale of
economic woes to justify its demands.
According to corporate communica-
tions director Richard Fish, the company
has been “battered” by low zine prices and

precarious metal markets. Those are “for

ces beyond its control,” the company says.

Well, if they were before, Cominco
— now part of the multinational mining
conglomerate, Teck Corporation — is tak-
ing steps to make sure that even the sup-
posedly all-powerful market forces are not
beyond its corporate control.

That’s not to say that Cominco didn’t
do quite well, thank you, in protecting its
shareholders from the buffeting of the
market over the past several years. In
times of low prices, the company simply
laid off workers up on the hill in the smel-
ter, forcing many to pull up stakes and
leave Trail. And even those who were able
to stay had to swallow big increases in
residential property .taxes — because
Cominco, arguing that the company’s
worth was lower because of depressed
metal prices, was able to wring tax conces-
sions out of Trail’s civic government. And
what Cominco didn’t pay, homeowners
had to bear.

Then, of course, there was the generous
financial assistance given the company by
both the federal and provincial govern-
ments to bankroll the recent moderniza-
tion program — which, when it is
completed, will increase productivity and
cut costs through a reduction in the work
force.

All in all, the Trail smelter brought the

People and Issues

ee

Cominco $7.5 million in profits for the
first quarter of 1987.

But now, according to a piece in the
Financial Post, Cominco, backed by the
clout of Teck and the Japanese and West
German partners which share ownership
of the company, is going for bigger
things — domination of the world market.
And it should tell you something about
how huge multinationals work with the
market forces that are supposedly “beyond
their control.”

“What is happening at Cominco is

more than just another cyclical turna--

round,” the Post reports, noting that the
two international partners with Teck
— M.LM. Holdings of Japan and West
Germany’s Metallgesellschaft A.G. —
have given the company a global reach.

“The partnership ties Cominco into a
strategic global linkage which sharpens
Cominco’s marketing and increases its
influence on metal markets,” the report
states. :

lan Semple, a mining analyst for Pem-
berton, Houston Willoughby Bell Gouin-
lock Inc., emphasizes that the company
“will be the major source of zinc” and thus
able to exert a significant effect on the
price of the metal over the next decade.

Robert Hallbauer, the Teck import who
took over the chief executive position at
Cominco, is also given to the same global

images of power. The corporate connec-

tions, he says, will give the company “flex-
ibility in moving things around the
world.”

Meanwhile, the pickets are still up out-
side the sun-baked main gate in Trail. And
Cominco spokesmen are still saying how
they’re battered by market forces.

* * *

Pom Tribune supporter Walter
Gawrycki told us the story the other
day of his moveable birthdate, the product
of a large family and poor or nonexistent
records. It seems that when he came to this
country from what was then Poland in the
1930s, he was certain only of the year of his
birth, since his mother could only recall
that he had been born just before a reli-
gious holiday. But when he applied for
naturalization, the official insisted on a
specific date and Walter, recalling that the
religious holiday fell some time during the
summer, suggested that since he was
becoming a Canadian, his birthdate could
be recorded as July 1, 1907.

“But I guess they weren’t going to give
some immigrant the same birthday as
Canada Day,” Walter recounts,” because
when I got my papers, my birthdate was
down as July 3.”

Only years later was he to discover that
the holiday that had been his reference
point actually fell on Aug. 21, making his
real birthdate the day previous.

But regardless of what day it really was,
dozens of friends and comrades and fellow
veterans of the Mackenzie Papineau Bat-
talion will want to celebrate with him
when the Federation of Russian Canadians
marks his 80th birthday. It’s slated for

People’s Home at 600 Campbell Ave.

ee”

|’ was only three weeks ago that we |
mailed him his certificate marking his
$500 contribution to the Tribune’s 1987
financial drive. And it was only the day
after the Tribune’s Victory Banquet that |
he marked his 92nd birthday. But the —
years caught up with the quiet, principled |
man they knew as Merv Shoebottom and
on July 16, he passed away in Sechelt.

Born in London. Ontario, in 1895, he
left the province in 1916 to volunteer for —
service overseas with the Canadian Field
Artillery. Returning home following the —
war, he joined the Socialist Party of Can-
ada, beginning a commitment to the —
labour and progressive movement that he
maintained throughout his 92 years. He ~
was a member of the Sunshine Coast Club
of the Communist Party at the time of his
death.

Working variously as a logger, farm
labourer, lineman and electrician, he fol- |
lowed the jobs across the country and into |
the U.S. as did many of his generation. In
1922, during a stint as a farm labourer, he
joined the IWW and worked briefly as a"
organizer.

During the 1930s he came to Vancouver
to work at Peterson Electric where his first
pole partner was long time Electri
Workers leader George Gee. It was the
beginning of a long standing friendship
with him that continued until George’s
death last year.

Although he had been retired for many
years, Merv continued to be a generous
contributor to the Tribune’s financt
drive as well as to Canadian Aid for Viet
nam Civilians.

4 PACIFIC TRIBUNE, AUGUST 12, 1987