AAA The PEOPLE Phone MA 6929 Published every Saturday by the People Publishing Gom- pany, Room 104, Shelly Building, 119 West Pender Street, Vancouver, British Columbia, and printed at Broadway e Printers Ltd., 151 East 8th Ave., Vancouver British Colum- bia. Subscription Rates: One year $2.00, six months $1.00. Editor HAL GRIFFIN Associate Editor A. C. CAMPBELL eo eee eee MOM MMMM MMMM MMMM MMM MMMM Steel Industry Te statement made by Hon. HE. C. Carson, minister of mines, in the legislature this week that private interests are prepared to Start a steel industry “in a small way” in Brit- ish Columbia will satisfy very few of the people who properly regard this as one of the determ- ining question for the future of this province. It appears as though the government, finding itself unable to resist the popular demand for action on the question, is now seeking to evade its responsibility by holding out a promise which falls far short of the need. Even the premise upon which Carson bases his assertion that the small venture contem- plated by prviate interests will satisfy the local demand is untenable. He states that the normal demand is insufficient to justify establishment of a large scale steel industry in this province and that present facilities for the production of steel in Canada as a whole are more than suf- ficient to meet the country’s anticipated needs in the postwar period. But Carson ignores the central fact that unless a large scale steel in- dustry is established in this province, our new shipbuilding industry upon which thousands *,depend for employment has little hope of being able to survive on a competitive basis after the war. : The development of heavy industry on the Coast and creation for the demand for steel will come when the steel industry is established here. The “normal” prewar demand upon which Carson is basing his arguments was small be- cause it was throttled by the excessive cost of hauling steel from eastern Canada. Tied up with the whole question is the problem of developing our rich iron and coal resources and creating thousands of new jobs. Every worker, every farmer and every busi- nessman in this province is affected, a fact reflected in the campaign now being conduct- ed by trade unions and chambers of commerce alike. _ Carson should be told that the public is not Satisfied with his explanation. He admits that “had an iron and steel industry been brought into operation near the beginning of the war, it would have been very satisfactary.”’ And he should also know that the reason British Co- lumbia had no iron and steel industry when this war broke out was because after the last war the provincial government of the day failed to implement its- promise. British Columbia needs a steel industry for peacetime reconstruction and the people have ho intention of allowing the government to perpetuate the mistakes of the last postwar period. ‘Por Little Finland’ pe the fact that Finland is allied with Nazi Germany against the United Nations, some Canadian newspapers, among them the Vancouver Sun, persist in their dangerous ef- forts to stir sympathy for “this tragic little country.” ~ “At the same time, we cannot but feel sympathy for Finland in her present dilem- ma... This war-weary nation of less than 4,000,000 people, their manpower and material resources depleted, the Finns are subjects for pity in their present position,” the Vancouver Sun states. If the editorial writers of the Vancouver Sun are capable of any deep or sincere feelings, they should direct them towards the heroic peo- ple of Leningrad who for fifteen months starved and fought in their battered city because the Finnish Army maintained its stranglehold to the north. This “war-weary nation of less than 4,000,000 people” which to the Vancouver Sun is such an object of pity, was nevertheless an instrument used by the rulers of Finland in attempting to realize their dream of a “Greater Finland” carved out of the Soviet Union. Hap- pily for the United Nations, the people of Len- ingrad and the Red Army shattered that dream, but not before one million Leningrad citizens had given their lives, and now the war has come home to the citizens of Helsinki, The effect of its editorial misrepresentation of the facts, its ill-conceived “sympathy” for Finland, is to place the Vancouver Sun in the same category as such Papers as the Tor- onto Telegram, which are striving to utilize the Finnish question, as they have used the Polish question, to create ill will and distrust within the United Nations. ; Unless it wishes to be placed in this cate- gory and to be judged accordingly, the Van- couver Sun should make prompt apology to its readers, UNITED STATES Labor-Management . HERE are now more than 4,000 jabor-management committees in the United States, covering over 7,000,000 workers, the War Pro- duction Board announced this ee records confain thousands of examples of how these joint committee have speeded the out- put of vital weapons, improved the utilization of manpower, re- duced absenteeism and accidents, and conserved essential materials, the WPB stated. “Tn one automobile plant alone, a single idea among the 3,452 sug- gestions put into effect through the joint committee freed _ Six workers for other jobs. This idea, like millions of others, was given to the committee by a worker on the bench.” Political Action RESIDENT William Green of the American Federation of Labor has directed ali AFL affili- ates—national unions, state feder- ations and central city bodies— not to aid or cooperate with the GIO’s Political Action Committtee headed by Sidney Hillman. He demanded that all those affiliates which haye been or are collabor- ating with Hillman’s committee “cease ana desist immediately.” Attacking the CIO as a “dual rival, rebel movement,” Green said that only if the CIO returned to the AFL can they “participate in the formulation of AFL policies.” Green’s statement, which in ef- fect means that the AFL will not unite with other labor organiza- tions te insure the re-election of President Roosevelt for a fourth term and the election of progres- Sive congressmen in the Novem- ber elections, is regarded here as a victory for the Republican, anti- Roosevelt faction in the AFL, headed by Carpenters’ Union President William Hutcheson. It is expected, however, that the joint political action committees set up by AFL, CIO and Railroad Brotherhood unions in many parts of the country will continue to function. : Production EADERS of CIO metal trades unions, with a total of more than 3,000,000 members in U.S. War industries, last week sent mes- Sages of greeting to the nationwide production conference of the Brit- ish Engineering and Allied Trades Shop Stewards’ National Council, to be held in London on March 12. Purpose of the conference, ac- cording to the national council, is “to prepare for the coming second front, which will demand a su- preme effort by workers in our key industries—steel, shipbuilding, air- craft and munitions.” Over 2,000 delegates are expected to attend. Those who sent greetings were CIO President Philip Murray; R. J. Thomas, president of United Automobile Workers: John Green, president of Industrial Union of Marine and Shipbuilding Workers; Julius Empspak, secretary of Uni- ted Electrical, Radio and Machine Workers; C. S. Jackson, UERMWA vice-president in Canada: Reid Robinson, president of Interna- tional Union of Mine, Mill and Smelter Workers: and Grant Oakes, president of United Farm Equipment Workers. CIO President Philip Murray, in his capacity as president of United Steelworkers of America, declared in a letter to Ken White, shop stewards’ secretary: “On the occa- sion of your production conference I am extremely happy to send greetings from the steel workers of America. This union, like all unions affiliated with the Congress of Industrial Organizations, has gone “all out’ in- our determina- tion to help supply not only our own troops, but those of | ted Nations, in winning © “It might be interesting conference to know that 1943 the USA-GIO helped more steel than could be” our armed forces. This h Officially. attested by U.S. ment officials. Currently, ticular need is for steel pl; new production records hz -set in December and Jant are now striving to beat o record.._ We are proud of duction record of labor j ica. We extend to your co our best wishes.” : Reid Robinson, presidey ternational Union of Mi and Smelter Workers, “Greetings from the meta and smeltermen of the { Canada. ~We concur whole ly in the objeetives of you ence. Workers in the mets industry are exerting eve; to facilitate decisive vir 1944, envisioned by our lé Teheran. The workers in dustry, realizing their 3; sponsibility, are daily est: production records that | ready resulted in une output of nonferrous meta conference is an import: toward realization of | We look forward to the fi ing world labor conferenc idify international unity 5 sary for victory.” ~ : John Green, president ¢ dustrial Union of Marine q building Workers, said: “7 yard workers of Americ your national production ence and express our s with your program and obi GERMANY Hitler’s Hideout : Worse. mysteriousls - ated; galleries filled — stolen treasures of Europe ate observatory where h the stars and prepares ho —these are some of the si Hitler’s Berchtesgaden hic The astonishing reyelatic made by Lieut. Count Her} lef von Eimsiedel, who, 1 winter of 1942, had a f° a stone’s throw away from mansion, in a Free Germz east from Moscow. : When the Nazis came t' the modest villa on the ie ber, near Berchtesgaden, — too small, he said. “First | ing property was forcibly and, in 1937, peasants and : who had been living td . centuries were ejected. - | “A wall, 24 feet high az | ten miles long was built ri - land. During the con | many workers met with f dents. Several fortification took part in the architec! Signs. is “With the outbreak of number of mysterious | ments were added. Old ini = told me in great sea’ Strange things had happe | A group of workers were | from somewhere under tf of SS men, and began deep tunnels into the mi neath the main mansion. feld.” These men, all s worked under the dire: mine engineers sent by —~ of mining contractors, Po company. : “The puzzling thing ¥ these workers were nev. to leave. As it is quite in that they should have r the only conclusion is ¢ | Were ‘liquidated’ to keep t of the tunnels. “Favored guests are tal lift to a mountain peal there is a modern obs Hitler often gazes at t. alone, being a great stude trology. He has horosco pared by his personal a: Brueckner, who is an { Group Leader.”