hears world response

Demands for the release of
imprisoned Chilean Communist
- Party leader Luis Corvalan have
reechoed throughout the world
following reports last month that
his life was in grave danger as a
result of medical negligence at the
hands of the fascist authorities.

Initial protests voiced by various
political parties, trade union
bodies and the Red Cross prompted
the junta to move Corvalan from
prison to Valparaiso Naval
Hospital where the latest reports
indicate he has been sent.

Transferred to the notorious
Tres Alamos concentration camp
in July, Corvalan had contracted
asthma and ulcers and was
.reported to be hemorrhaging.

Last week, leaders of virtually
all Italian political parties, the neo-
fascist party being the only ex-
ception, affixed their names to a
telegram to United Nations
general secretary Kurt Waldheim,
expressing their “deep alarm”’ at
the news of Luis Corvalan’s state of
health and asking him to exert his
influence on the Chilean
authorities to save his life and that
of all political prisoners in Chile.

The telegram was signed by
Benigno Zaccagnini, newly-elected
general secretary of the Christian
Democrats; Enrico Berlinguer,

general secretary of the Com
munist Party; and Francesco de
Martino, general secretary of the

Socialist Party as well as other
leaders.

Only the day before, the six
component parties of Chile’s
Popular Unity government, con-
cluding a four-day conference in
the German Democratic Republic,
issued a call for world action to
save the life of Corvalan.

They sent a cable to Corvalan
praising him for his staunchness,
courage and political stand and
urged both the general secretary
and president of the UN to in-
tervene with the Chilean
authorities on his behalf.

The appeal was followed by a
similar appeal from Harilaos
Florakis, first secretary of the
Greek Communist Party, who
noted that the Greek Communists
suspect the Chilean junta of trying
to “finish off” Corvalan.

Dr. Werner Ludwig, president of
the Red Cross Society of the
German Democratic Republic, has
also added his voice to the appeal
and last week sent a wire to Prof.
Eric Martin, head of the In-
ternational Red Cross in Geneva,
asking that he assist in getting the
Chilean authorities to grant entry
to ateam of leading Soviet medical
specialists who have volunteered
to give aid to Corvalan.

“Thorough medical treatment
by reliable physicians is absolutely
necessary,’’ Ludwig stated.
“There must be no delay if the
Chilean patriot is to be kept alive.”

Reform of ‘unworkable’
prison system advocated

By ALD. HARRY RANKIN

Twenty-five years ago last week
I was admitted to the bar. Perhaps
it would not be out of order for me
at this time to make some com-
ments on prison reform, a subject

that is very much in the news these

days.

Long ago I came to the con-
clusion that our whole prison
system is inhuman, barbaric and
self-defeating. Its whole purpose is
to punish, not to rehabilitate. The
methods of punishment are nothing
less than brutal.

Take the ‘“‘hole’”’ for example,
this prison within a prison. This is a
continuation of the dungeons of the
Middle Ages. Its purpose is to
break men mentally’ and
physically by starvation, utter
isolation and confinement in a tiny,
dark cell where all too often ver-
min are the only company. Little
wonder that some men are driven
insane by this torture. Only the
strongest survive and they become
embittered and desperate men who
hate the society that does this to
them.

There is no doubt in my mind
that the majority of people in our
prisons are the victims. of our

economic and political system. .

Class divisions in our society with
poverty for many and great riches
for a few have inevitably resulted
in one law for the rich and another
for the poor. Those at the bottom of.
the economic ladder who break the
law are imprisoned. The wealthy,
on the other hand, carrying on
their own type of law-breaking
with impunity — price fixing,
profiteering, .compelling em-
ployees to work under unsafe
conditions to mention but a few.
You see very few rich men in jail.
When the odd one does land there
he usually gets preferential
treatment and is out in no time.
The Indian people, the poorest
section of the population, are the
ones who suffer the most.

Our whole system of fines is
discriminatory. A poor person who
can’t pay a fine, goes to jail, or if he
manages to raise the money, it is
with great difficulty and sacrifice.
A rich person pays a fine and
doesn’t have ‘to think twice about
the amount. As for corporations
fined for price-fixing, their fines
are usually such a small per-
centage of the profits they make
from price fixing that it’s good

business to pay the fine and keep
on price-fixing. Paying a $10,000
fine to make a million makes good
business sense.

Short of a change in our social
system some of the reforms I
would advocate include: ~

e Base fines on ability to pay.

e Abolish prisons like the New
Westminster Penitentiary and
Oakalla and replace them with
smaller work- camps_ where
physically fit prisoners can do
useful work.

e Pay the going rate of wages for

‘ all work done by prisoners. The

money earned can be spent on
room and board, to support their
families, building up a
rehabilitation fund- for their
release or in some cases paying the
victims of their criminal acts.

e Give prisoners the right to
elect their own Prisoner Grievance
Committees to take up their
problems with prison authorities.

e Abolish the unjust practice of |

arbitrary and harsh punishment of
prisoners for breaches of discipline
by wardens and other prison
authorities. Prisoners charged
with such breaches should have the
right to defend themselves with the

aid of their Prisoner Grievance :
Committees ‘or if need be with ©

outside legal aid.

e Prisoners should be segreated

according to the seriousness of the
crimes committed. In trying to
humanize our prisons we have to
recognize that prisons

pretty inhuman characters who
are amenace to any society as well
as to their fellow prisoners.

The parole systern should also be
revamped and expanded.

It’s about time we recognized |

that our present prison system just

isn’t working. Tightening the |

screws, as some advocate, will just
make matters worse. Outbreaks
and disturbances will grow and
become more violent.

Our present prison system 1s
costing us a fortune. To institute

some of the reforms I have men- ;

tioned — work with wages;
recognition of Prisoners,
Grievance Committees, emphasis

on rehabilitation — would in the |

long run cost us a lot less, and

would make the prison system |
“more humane, ‘frkeeping with the |

civilized principles we profess.

Cont'd from pg. 1
rental housing field.’”’ By ‘“‘safer
areas’”’ one may~- assume that

Simonite referred to those sectors .-

of the economy in which there are
no restrictions placed ‘on
profiteering.

Even attorney-general Alex
MacDonald seems to have given in
to Clarke’s sentiments saying that
rent controls were meant to be a
temporary measure only.

Yorke countered MacDonald’s
statement with a demand that the
government not retreat from its
present policy of rent controls. ‘In
fact,” he said, “the present policy
needs to be greatly strengthened in
terms of meeting the needs of the
tenants of this province.

He said that the strengthening of
the policy would not come about by
following the ideas put forward by
Clarke and private industry
spokesmen. ‘‘Increased private

‘Rentalsman lobbying
for landlords’—BCTO-

rental accommodation will not be —

the solution to the present rental
housing crisis. In fact, private
rental accommodation is the
problem here. What is needed 0
solve this crisis is for the govern-
ment to get into the rental field in 4
massive way.”

He noted that Clarke’s latest
public statements have confirm
his opinion that the entire concept
of the Rentalsman is incorrect.

“We were opposed to the establish- —

ment of this office, and par

ticularly opposed to the ap —

pointment of Barrie Clarke in the
position. Ba

“Our position is unchanged: AS
far as we are concerned, the office
of the Rentalsman should bé
scrapped. We maintain that the
NDP provincial government
should live up to its election
pledges and set up municipal Rent
Review Boards,’

include |
psychotics as well as some other |

TOM
McEWEN

t was just like any other day in a workingman’s life, a

steady increase in official buckpassing at all govern-
ment levels, and a growing increase of little notices on
factory gates saying ‘“‘no men wanted.”’

Yet it was different on that August morning vf the year
1914 — 61 years ago. The wires were hot with the
proclamations of Tory prime minister Robert Borden
booming out, ‘‘When Britain is at war, Canada is at war.”
Dutifully, with scarcely a murmur of dissent, the
parliament of Canada so decreed.

August 4, 1914. War was declared against Imperial
Germany. The “Hun” and the entire Hohenzollern Pot-
sdam family and his ambition of a Berlin-to-Baghdad
railway was to be cleaned up in no time. It was to be a
short war, a war to make the world “‘a fit place for heroes
to live in,”’ to ‘‘save the world for democracy” and similar
lofty ambitions.

Almost over night, in place of notices announcing “no
men wanted,” on almost every post and billboard large
posters of Lord Kitchener, with an accusing finger pointed
at all and sundry, was reminding us that ‘‘your king and
country needs you!” :

Up until then with well over three-quarters of a million
jobless and destitute workers as the first evidence of a
PACIFIC TRIBUNE—AUGUST 8, 1975—Page 2

1913-14 economic crisis, there had been no tangible
evidence that neither their ‘king or country’’ gave one
small tinker’s damn for their plight.

Now that was all to be changed. A cheap and tawdry
jingoism became the hallmark of the super patriot, and in
the process of making the world safe for democracy,
80,000 of Canada’s young manhood were to rot and die in
the trenches of France and Flanders during the next four
years of this ‘“‘short’’ war. Countless thousands more
broken and wounded men were destined to live out the rest
of their lives in military hospitals and mental institutions

. with a new crop of broken men to augment their
numbers — 25 years later.
While men died in the rat-infested trenches to make the

world safe for democracy, the political pundits at homee ~
were doing their damndest to make it still more safe for .

themselves.

All workers’ organizations, trade unions, political
parties, organizations, which harbored any notions of
progress, peace or socialism were put under a tight ban, a
sort of legislative hybrid between an old Section 98 of the
Criminal Code and a War Measures Act. With the
Establishment of the day, Order-in-Council became the
order of the day, applying to all except the big and
powerful monopoly moguls who specialized in supplying
war materials, food, etc. and etc. They played it at both
ends and made money on both. Their racketeering rose in
almost direct ratio to the death rate of the men in the
trenches. They became millionaires over night, and in-
stead of being shot for high treason, were rewarded by
king’s honors, appointments to the senate, and what not.
Patriots only to the almighty dollar. ;

of the day shows that they too did their bit — indeed on the
day before Canada declared war. They withdrew all gold
in circulation so that they might have the swag ready 4
hand if the worst came to the worst. The prime ministet
acted in conert by having his Order-in-Council meeting @
arranged before hand to give legal authority to this
patriotic robbery. Later of course the same CBA J ournal
described the whole action as “‘totally illegal,’’ and, ha

anyone questioned it, the CBA “‘wouldn’t have had a leg! _

stand on.”

Neither of course would the established warmonge!> .
and merchants of profits and death — were the comm0? —

people to question it with the mass action such a crime
merits. . :
Another 60,000 Canadians perished in World War II just
25 years later, and still the ripoff criminals rule the roost.
As the Irish poet Yeats wrote in his poem to the dead of thé

. Easter 1916 uprising, ‘Too long a sacrifice makes a ston

AIBUNE |

of the heart.”

Editor — MAURICE RUSH
Published weekly at Ford Bldg., Mezzanine No. 3,
193 E. Hastings St., Vancouver 4, B.C. Phone 685-8108
Business and Circulation Manager, FRED WILSON

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A reading of the Canadian Bankers Association Journal