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By MAURICE RUSH

The Employers’ Council
of B.C. recently marked its
fifth anniversary amid
self-congratulatory re-
ports by its officers about
what it was able to achieve
in 1970 in forging a united
front of big employers to
defeat labor’s attempts to
win a decent life in last,
year’s big struggles.

“The Employers’ Council of
B.C. came of age and withstood
the tests of total involvement in
the B.C. labor scene,’’ boasted
its chairman J.V. Christensen
(of Tahsis Company Ltd.) in the
annual report, recently made
public.

Although the annual report, in
printed brochure form, carries
carefully written' reports by its
top officers, it appears quite
clear that the Employers’
Council played a major role in
provoking last years sharp
confrontations, and that it is
planning to continue to play that
role again in 1971 labor-manage-
ment relations.

The Employers’ Council has
obviously become what the PT
warned it would when it was first
founded under the disguise of a
research foundation, (CIRF:
Commercial and Industrial
Research Foundation) some
five years ago.

It is now a united front of the
“big lions’’ of the corporate
wealthy in B.C. It is a sinister
and extremely powerful finan-

‘Recognize GDR’

On behalf of a number of
people in White Rock, Mrs. Kate
Bader has released text of a
letter written to Rt. Hon.
Mitchell Sharpe, Minister of
External Affairs. :

The letter stated that Canada’s
recognition of the People’s
Republic of China will be of
tremendous mutual benefit, and
urged the federal government to
take the same action in regard to
the German Democratic Repub-
lic.

The group feel that great
advantage to both countries
would result, particularly in the
field of two-way trade.

cial combination which aims to
dominate B.C. economic and
political life. B.C. has never in
its history been faced by such a
combination of industrial, bank-
ing and commercial power
ranging over every field of
activity which touches people’s
lives.

The Council’s printed report
says that by the end of 1970 there
was a total of 73 members— 59 of
them ‘‘corporate members” —
that is representatives-of giant
corporations. The latest new
members are CP Rail and the
Construction Labor Relations
Association.

The list of ‘‘corporate
members”’ reads like the ‘‘whose
who”’ of big business in B.C.
They are all there from
MacMillan Bloedel to Con-
solidated Mining and Smelting,
and even the liquor interests. It
is dominated by the bloc of U.S.
corporations which the Socred
government serves so well.

F.G. Peskett the chief of the
Employers’ Council, summed it
up in his report: ‘“‘A myriad of
problems rushed upon us in 1970
— a major year of collective
bargaining activity. Predictably
it became ae year. of
confrontation during which
employers in B.C. worked
together better than ever before
to co-ordinate activity and effort
on a wide variety of fronts. . . I
believe we achieved substantial
success.

“The Council really matured
in 1970. If one were searching
for the moment of actual
maturity perhaps it would be the
juncture at which the forest, con-

struction, concrete and towboat .

industries all seemed poised to
explode in one great collective
blast. I feel it safe to say that the
outcome would have been a
great deal worse (for big
business, Ed.) without the
presence and performance of
the business community
through the Employers’ Coun
cet hae

LAUD MEDIA

Peskett said he ‘“‘ranks among
our most valuable assets the
rapport the Council now enjoys
with leading communications
media.’’ And no wonder. E.
Benson, head of Pacific Press
which prints both the Sun and
Province is a top member of the
Board of Governors of the

Council. The brochure prints a
whole page of clippings from the
capitalist press to show how
effective its impact has been
through the media.

Peskett also reports that one
of their major efforts has been
“to establish new lines of com-
munication with governments
and strengthening existing
ones.’’ In a report by E.G.
Shorter, chairman of the indus-
trial relations committee of the
Council, success is reported in
getting the provincial govern-
ment to react positively to
their request for the enactment
of accreditation legislation.
(Legislation to force smaller
operations to become certified
under an employers group and be
compelled to form a_ united
front).

Shorter, reporting for the key
committee handling labor nego-
tiations said: “‘Throughout the
year, the Employers’ Council
acted in a catalytic and solidi-
fying manner — a function it is
ideally suited to perform. Com-
mittee members focussed on
negotiation issues and combined
their expertise to resolve many a
thorny problem.”

ATTACK LABOR

Among the projects organized
by the Employers’ Council to
establish an overall policy to
beat back labor was a special
meeting held May 21 which was
attended by some 100 senior
executives of B.C. .corpora-
tions.

Another is the admission in
Shorter’s report that the Council
was able to pressure purchasers
of construction materials not to
harass contractors during their
dispute with the construction
unions. This last is a revealing
insight into how the Council is
able to use economic pressure to
force sections of the business
community into following their
dictates.

The report also reveals that
several meetings were held with
companies involved in nego-
tiations and how the Employers’
Council helped provide some of
the tactics and arguments used
by employers in Conciliation
Boards.

The report of the Employers’
Council shows that it now
occupies a dominant position in
B.C.’s economy and is able to

the young.

education in the province. It blatantly denies
free collective bargaining to government
employees. It rejects demands for action to
curb the corporate polluters who are given a
free hand to destroy our environment for
the sake of bigger profits. It rejects demands
from pensioners for decent pensions. It
wages war on the poor who have to depend
on social welfare, and ignores the needs of

The major need in B.C. today is for a
united labor movement acting together
with all other forces in the province who
want progressive change — and who Day.

UNITED — LABOR CAN WIN!

Cont'd from pg. 1

our history.

are being blocked by the most
reactionary provincial government in

If labor is to play the unifying role it can,
labor must overcome the divisions in its own
ranks. To fight among themselves while big

business is uniting against labor, is to court
disaster in 1971.

_ The only answer to big business
power is the united power of labor and
its allies: that ought to be the message
that rings from every platform this May

“Vancouver’s candlelight march last Friday night to P!

Indochina war. (See story pg. 1)

res!
beh
fae

exercise awesome economic and
political power to force its will
on the province. It has set up an
Industrial Relations Com-
mittee to direct its affairs on the
labor relations front in 1971
which is made up of 22 of the
most anti-union big business
spokesmen in the province.

The report of F.G. Peskett
indicates that the Employers’
Council is already making

preparations to deal “a
in 1971 with more of ©
they handed out in 1970.

He points to upcom
tiations in trucking,
markets, and indicat
employers will continu
tough stance.

Labor will be able t@ ye: t

: l array i
this powerfu iy bY wail?

business power 02
its ranks. —

PACIFIC TRIBUNE—FRIDAY, APRIL 30, 1971—PAGE 16

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WELL, DICK,

THERE'S THE MATORITY! MOH! HOW 00 WE MAKE THEM

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