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WH A

NEWS ITEM: MacMillan, Bloedel and Powell River re-
leased a financial statement this week showing that
net profits had dropped from $41,440,000 last year to
$40,594,282 this year. Company chairman J. V. Clyne
said the “interim report” was being released now “for
various reasons."’ This is the third forest company to
issue an interim financial repert this month claiming a

They cried all the way to the bank

decline in net profits. These “interim reports” are being
released now to influence public opinion against the
demands of the woodworkers. Despite the juggling
around of the books by expert company bookkeepers
they can’t cover up the fantastic profits made by the
companies in this and the preceding years.

LABOR ROUNDUP:

Steel opens raiding office
as Trail wage talks open

On the eve of opening nego-
tiations for a new wage con-

tract between the Consolidated

Mining and Smelting Co, (CM&S)
at Trail and the Mine-Mill Un-
ion as the certified bargaining
Mnit for CM&S employees, the
“shock troops” of the United
Steelworkers Union raiders have
Tecently set up an office in that
interior city,

From Steelworkers Union per-
sonnel at their new headquarters,
it would appear that union-raiding
Operations will be under the di-
rection of Steel’s Don Dumphy.

Already strong | protests
against the Steelworkers Union
raiders in Trail have been voiced
by local DNP committees, Mine-
Mill locals, and other interior
unions strongly opposed to union
Splitting and raiding; and more so
at a time when the union under
attack, engaged in wage negotia-
tions witha powerful corporation,
requires a maximum of labor

unity to win improved wage and -

working conditions for its mem-
bers,

* OK

IWA wage contract negotiations
were scheduled to open Wednes-
day of this week, John M, Bill-
ings, president of Forest Indust-
rial Relations, representing
Some 120 coast lumber operators
at the bargaining table, struck

a “tough” pose early in the week, —

Billings stated he intends to
press for arbitration boards to
adjudicate any and all work “stop-
pages” which, in the opinion of
FIR, may be defined as “illegal”
or ‘‘wild cat’? stoppages.

This move on the part of FIR’s
president is designed to create
the illusion that the IWA rather
than the lumber operators must
assume full responsibility for
Such stoppages, “The unionasks
for and expects guaranteed bene-
fits® says Billings, “but gives

no guarantee of industrial peace
in return,”?

‘ing Nanaimo,

Oddly enough Billings said no-
thing about the astronomical pro-
fits garnered by the operators,
or the ruthless “speed-up” in the
industry which contribute to these

profits,
KOK OOK

Highlight of the regular session
of the Vancouver and District
Labor Council (VLC) was the
Annaics Island strike at the Sher-
win- Williams Paint Company by
the Office Employees Union, Lo-
cal 15, A group of the young
office workers fresh from their
stint on the picket line were in
the “visitors’ gallery” and got a
big hand from the VLC delegate
body.

Some 27 office workers are in-
volved in the strike to win their
first union contract, The union
is seeking a base rate of $242.00
a month, Present pay rates of
the company are as low as
$180.00, Another group of some
20 workers in the Sherwin- Wil-
liams plant, members of the
Painters Union, are refusing to
eross the office workers’ picket
line and the plant is shut down
tight.

The Painters Union have de-
clared all Sherwin-Williams pro-'
ducts in B.C, “hot® and the Team-
sters have notified the company
that “no more services’? will be
forthcoming for the duration of
the strike,

Office Employees Union dele-

gate Gibson outlined the wide
ramifications of the Sherwin-
Williams Paint Co, and its two
subsidiaries, Canada Paint and
Martin-Senor, The products of
these companies are used in a
wide range of industrial enter-
prises, Plans are being made by
the Office Employees Union to
picket a number of retail outlets
in the Greater Vancouver areas,
and at provincial points includ-
Vernon, Prince
George, etc, VLC delegates
voted unanimous support of the
office workers’ strike,

With some 600 wage contracts
involved, half of them in the
Lower Mainland, and wage nego-
tiations stalled by the big Build-
ing Contractors in their attempts
to “talk down’’ to the Brother-
hood of Carpenters and Joiners,
negotiations towards reaching
agreement were scheduled to re-
open Wednesday of this week be-
tween Building Contractors and
union representatives, with the

recent appointment of a concilia~.

tion officer.

BCJ delegate Lorne Robson
expressed the hope that the con-
tractors would “come in with
something better than no, no,
no,” and abandon some of their
previous insistence that they
alone “would always have a say
on job steward qualifications”:
and be the “sole judge of car-
penter competency.” These and
other proposals of the big build-
ing contractors mainly designed
to chop the union agreement to

pieces, intimidate the union and
a cut-back on hard-won gains,

must end,

ae

‘“*The building contractors are
badly mistaken if they think we
will give up,” stated Robson, “but
if they want to come down and
discuss a just settlement...
there will be no strike.” The
VLC voted unanimous support
of the Carpenters’ struggle for

a new contract,
* OK OK

Other motions unanimously ap-
proved by VLC delegates included
endorsation of the recently
formed Medical Aid to Vietnam
Committee and its work; a mo-
tion of criticism of the Govern-
ment and Opposition for their
laxity of attitude towards the
needs of the people inthe current
political scandal- mongering,
Steelworkers Union delegate
stated that “If we conducted the
labor movement in this fashion,
we would certainly destroy it.”

eT DTT TTL |

‘Mess in Parliament due
to cold war psychosis’

“The hullabaloo surrounding
the Gerda Munsinger case brings
to focus the extent of the politi-
cal and moral degeneration af-
flicting the old line parties, It
is these parties, not Parliament,
which have discredited them-
selves and virtually paralyzed
Parliament so that it cannot func-
tion in the interests of the Can-
adian people,® said William
Kashtan, National Leader of the
Communist Party.

‘Each of these Parties have
been accused by the other of
being lax on matters of security,
Without going into the specifics
of this or any other particular
case, we believe that the real
security of our country is deter-
mined by whether it pursues a
truly independent foreign policy,
by its independent economic de-
velopment, and by strengthening
the democratic rights of Can-
.adians not by which Cabinet Min-
ister slept with whom,

“The present mess arises from
‘a cold war. psychosis, It is this
which is at the root of ‘spyitis’
and the maintenance of RCMP
files on hundreds of thousands of
Canadians with the RCMP more
and more becoming a Govern-
ment unto itself. The sooner our
country disengages itself from
U.S. cold war policies and
presses for policies of peaceful
co-existence, the more likely is
it that Canada’s security will be
truly safeguarded,

“It has been suggested in some
quarters that what Canada needs
is another election, Thisisutter
nonsense! What Canada needs and

Anti-pollution
measures urged

A nine-member delegation
from the Alberni Valley’s Cit-
izens’ Committee on Pollu-
tion told members of the Cab-
inet Monday, they are tired of
the string of ‘‘18th century
excuses that flow from various
administrative officials and
industrial organizations”
which sidestep the problem,

Presenting a 6,841-name
petition, the delegation asked
for legislation to give muni-
cipalities power to enact and
enforce air and water pollu-
tion control measures,

the Canadian people expect, is
that Parliament begin to get down
to implementing legislation in
their interest,”

VIETNAM

Cont'd from pg. 1

ord as demanding that the Can-
adian government reverse its
position and take the stand that
the Vietnamese people should be
allowed to choose their own na-
tional, social and economic life
in the best tradition of the rights
of self-determination,”

Arrangements have been made
for a special peace train which
will take hundreds of people from
Toronto to Ottawa, Delegates and
individuals from all parts of
Canada, including B.C, are ex-
pected to take part in the Ottawa
demonstration,

Also this week the B,C. Voice
of Women published newspaper
ads calling for support for their
delegation which is going to Otta-
wa on Tuesday, March 22, to“ask
Cabinet ministers and members
of Parliament to do more to end
the war.”

The delegation will ask the
government ‘‘to seek a cease-
fire between Saigon, the Na-
tional Liberation Front, the U.S,
and Hanoi; to find means to
carry out the Geneva Agreements
for elections in Vietnam; togive
relief and aid to the people of all.
Vietnam; and to recognize China.
now as a step towards general’
disarmament,’”

On Friday of this week Yale
Professor Staughton Lynd was
scheduled to address a series of
meetings at Simon Fraser Uni-
versity, UBC, and a public meet-
ing at John Oliver High School:
auditorium at 8:30 p.m, in sup-.
port of the International Day of
Protest,

Demonstrations against the U,
S. war in Vietnam are being.
planned in most countries around
the world, These demonstrations
will express support with the’
movement in the U.S, against the
policies of the Johnson admin-
istration, and call on their re-
spective governments to condemn
U.S. aggression in Vietnam,

Huge protest parades and
meetings are planned on March 26
‘in many U,S, centres,

Join the crowd headed for the

HOOTENANNY

Saturday, March 19 — 8 p.m.

OAKRIDGE AUDITORIUM
(41st Ave. & Cambie St.)

FEATURING this star-studded cast of performers:
Tomasi Tawake, Kris Robinson, The Folkmasters, Joe
ng and Skip Fraser, The Wayside Singers and
The Milestones

A GOOD TIME GUARANTEED FOR ALL

March 18, 1966—PACIFIC TRIBUNE—Page 3