By AL
Me AIN PATRIE

the mtn Lebrun awakes
tttneq age she is more con-
Ot pe th the weather than
Montreal ee The weather ~ in
tr jg me a direct bearing on
Dirge 2 OPerator in a plas-
hours 4 factory. For eight
tides ’y she ingeniously fits
toseea8s which are then

i} ssure Bether under enormous
| landleg The machine she
More p,ecmerates a pressure of
the hersets 7,000 pounds while
Weighs scarcely 100.

e
bs “oncern for the weather
Lory ie With fumes. The fac-
paint Powerful acrylic glues
Vhen the M its production and
Meayy and City’s atmosphere is
"OSiv Smog-ridden the cor-
er ; Poisonous fumes
the expe the plant in spite of
The Briive exhaust system.
‘curl 4re insidious and have
| ity aah effect so. that. at
2 alr ty time a test will reveal
the i tolerable; but not

e

OF)
bie in the plant have ex-
si) ths compine® symptoms. The
tls and ain about their finger
Me of fee ey dizziness.
P ace g mPlo have had
ac, yees have
tits, Ages with their ma-
ns a of them after long
a Suffered instant fin-
J tion,

ay,
Nputa
Pp
ton, Hi *tit works in construc-

@
ta ster rates a backdigger
kde Mshovel. Sometimes
vit into» as he sees the men
Bret have €xcavated ditches
ta of 4, 1°t been reinforced.
and oo digs are 12 feet
Me™ cop ow: Last year one
Wieg op .1PSed: on a laborer.
Aleida » suffocation.
tat’ myri Onde works in one
te, dot Q ad paper companies
| ay heat eee’: In the summer
Woach Ses until the mercury
*8 100°. The wood tra-

ee a ee ee

verses a Dantesque inferno of
operations as it is converted to
paper. It passes from shredding
machines to chippers to vast
vats of bubbling chemicals. The
heat in |the factory and the
fumes from the boiling cauldron
combine to create a death trap
along the cat-walk that spans
this man-created hell. Last
month Alcide watched in horror
as his friend slipped from the
wet rail and plunged into per-
dition.

Gui Mathieu used to work for
a trucking company. In the sum-

LITT oe

Anthology of
accidents at work

A DIRECT
EXTENSION OF
(LASS CONFLICT

ectly attributable tp the condi-
tions of work or the wicked
negligence of government in-
spectors.

In a capitalist society workers
have to face the blows of an
evil and indifferent system but
the grimmest reaper of all is
accidents at work, It is a deadly
gauntlet which every worker
runs, at times hidden and covert
and at other times open and bla-
tant. Every plant, every mine,
every construction site is a po-
tential hazard, aggravated and
made more acute by the inveter-
ate lust for profits which gov-
erns the installations and their
safety.

It is difficult to conceive of
the wholesale violence and

SUUvveeeauueeeeeuueuaeeeQUUeeeeeuUUUUgeeHQUUCOUUCUUSUUUUEEENUUUEUUEEAATEEEREE UATE EEE

"It is a deadly gauntlet which every worker
runs, at times hidden and covert and at other times
open and blatant. Every plant, every mine, every
construction site is a potential hazard, aggravated
and made ‘more acute by the inveterate lust for
profits which governs the installations and their

safety..."
PUAUNOUUUEDROROGUUUOUEROOUIUREUUDUG000

mer he hauled gravel from quar-
ries to roadbuilding projects and
in the winter his boss had a con-
tract for hauling snow. This
spring in a reckless gesture of
careless speed he was motioned
back onto the river ice by his
foreman, where he dumped the
snow. No one had bothered to
examine the base or calculate
the stress, so 27 tons of truck
sank into 60 feet of water. The
frogmen have not yet recovered
Gui’s body.

* * *

These stories and thousands
of others make up the anthology
of accidents at work. They are
stories of quick violence and
tragedy, for the most part dir-

slaughter, engendered by big
business due directly to reckless
production, cheap and faulty
means of production, thought-
less or immoral directives and a
total disdain for safety regula-
tions and safety education.
* * *

In the bastion of capitalism
itself, the United States, 55
workers are killed on the job,
8,000 are disabled and 27,000
are injured each day.

The impact of these figures.

becomes more vital when brok-
en down. Thus every eight
minutes of every working day
a man or a woman will be

killed on the job and 148 will t

pe disabled.

Every 12 months 14,000 work-
ers will die on the job, some
500,000 will be disabled and an
extraordinary 7,000,000 will be
hurt.

Figures which read like a
war? Indeed they are—the di-
rect extension of the class con-
flict.

* * *

It is pertinent to examine

similar statistics in Quebec.

This reporter encountered the -

full brunt of bureaucratic cold

‘shoulder when he attempted to

fathom the extent of industrial
accidents in the province. The
federal minister of labor in-
formed me that no such figures
were available since it was
strictly a provincial affair. The
provincial ministry of labor in-
dicated their files were skimpy
and failed to cover that area.
The Commission des Accidents
du Travail explained that they
were concerned only with com-

pensation and could not furnish
province-wide data. The Indus-
trial Accident Prevention Asso-
ciation finally came up with
concrete figures (it should be
mentioned that the IAPA is a
private group composed of em-
ployers and for the benefit of
employers), compiled from. all
reported accidents:

Quebec workers suffer more
than 200 fatalities a year on the
job. Every year 56,000 are
seriously disabled and more
than 100,000 are injured.

* Ao *

Part of the history of Quebec
had been the dirge of .widows.
Countless wives have had their
husbands die, become disabled
or injured at work, and as re-
compense garner nothing or lit-
tle more than nothing.

Until last month the provin-
cial department would not allow
unions any sort of direct parti-
cipation in inquests into indus-
trial deaths. Inquests on mining
or construction site deaths have
been lacking in information,
deliberately so, and unions were
not asked to testify directly. Of
the countless deaths that oc-
cured in industry throughout
the history of the Quebec labor
movement there has never been
a charge of criminal negligence
against an employer. All deaths
were attributed to “accidental”
causes.

Recently in Montreal an un-
precedented “second” inquest
was being held into the death
of Robert Chauvette who fell 50
feet to his death after a rope
and pulley snagged his feet and
hauled him up the side of a

building. One of the instigators.

PACIFIC TRIBUNE—FRIDAY, JUNE 18, 1971—PAGE 7

regulations.

Fernand Daoust,
of the Quebec Federation of

says the government
institute stricter meas-
ures, particularly when “it has
— been established the employer
is responsible, either through
neglect or other factors.

“The misery of accidental
deaths cannot be adequately
fought unless the government
intentions of
severly penalizing employers
who are responsible.

“The era of pious vows in this
domain is a thing of the past.”

wlll
for the new inquest was Michel

Chartrand, acting on behalf of
Construction

The employer claimed total

ignorance of gavernment safety
regulations. He admitted receiv-
ing “lots of junk pamphlets from
Quebec,” but» had: never read
them and was unaware of any
He admitted not
having the work site examined
by government officials, which
is mandatory in Quebec. He in-
sisted that the first inquest was
correct in labelling the death of
Chauvette an
Mr. Chartrand called the em-
“ignorant and incom-
petent.” One wonders what to
call the government — particu-
larly since the job site was,
ironically, at Quebec’s “Palais
de Justice,” where the political
prioners are kept.

The case is not unique. The
incidents are legion and one of
the most celebrated occured last
year in the mining town of Nor-
anda. Due to the confirmed neg-

_ligence of the copper company

one of the workers was sense-

into a _ rock
crusher. In spite of testimony
by fellow employees, the coro-
ner insisted the verdict be “ac-

cidental death.”

“accident.”

The venality of government
inquests have infuriated the
unions who have been pressing
for the right to testify against
employers where it is war-

secretary

*

In this period of banalities,
when the merchants and huck-
sters are busily dissecting the
causes of violence and unrest in

and__re-

examining the sordid and lurid
results of anarchism, very few
have focussed on the cruel,
pointless and mass deaths of
men on the job.
Does the media wax indig-
nant and research all the causes
leading up to an accidental
death? Does the media print in-
sights into the dragon that pro- |
fits while it kills? Does it head- - Pid
line the killer as Private Proper-
ty? Does it list the accessories
as connivers, bribers and indif-
ference? Does it chant the mo-
tive as the insane drive for pro-
fit, profit and more profit?
It is they, private capitalists, *
who are the ultimate criminals. 7.