LESS THAN MIDDLE. EAST
Oil interests chea

Alberta of royalties

By JAMES MacPHERSON

_EDMONTON
like a colossus over
fConomy are - the
“orporations.

They have grown fat on fab-
Ulcus concessions from the
Social Credit government - of
Alberta which is driving mu-
Meipalities to financial ruin
ough special tax
Ments of the government. They
Plunder Alberta’s natural re-
‘Ources with the connivance of

€ provincial government.
They: Stand a: a threat. to
€mocracy, a ‘corrupter of
S0vernment.

Some idea of the growth of

lr economic power may be
Sleaned from the fact that one

Mperial Oil refinery just east
of Edmonton is worth more

Standing
Alberta’s

giant oil

arrange-

Bert Whyte ‘2

SPOR

FFTER WATCHING three
Straight games for Toronto,
Marterback Ronnie Knox
st into print with a “poem”
Which started Byron, Shelley
‘ha Keats whirling like tops.
bove ground things changed,
®0. On his next trip out Knox
i clobbered by the oppo-
é on, who apparently couldn’t
“Md the thought of being
sted by a poet.
eee Barr of the Canadian
. Une. figures Knox beat
M™self. He explains why:
he least you could have
She, Ron, was wait until after
Vir _Same to publish your
a opus. Maybe you still

t realize the awful im-
rt of your careless first love.
Can well imagine the. con-
oo in the huddles on that
attep day. You call the play
he t that swift appraising
““pheral glance at your op-
W@ents’ defensive patterns—

Atto ~ 32 - through the rain-
ai wind” and your team
«s at you with awe.

Mean,” you stammer, in
Lactic septameter, “Mann -
Wey wound the Truth-beauty

“dirt.”
.: this time, it’s too late
ban anything but grab the
toy Na me, the
loo elling pig - in - skin, and
anon for your receivers lost
hasten the pumpkins and

d marshmallows. A pretty

slimy >

than the total gross expendi-
Alberta govern-
And it is only
rising in the

ture of the
1937.
dozen

ment in
one ol a
province.

The time has come for a re-
vision of the present oil and
royalty concessions to the oil
corporations. The labor move-
ment is 40 behind the
spirit of the founding conven-
tion of the Oil Workers Inter-
national Union of America
which in 1918 demanded the
nationalization of the petrol-
eum industry and other major

years

industries.

Even if it is not yet timely
to raise the issue of national-
ization, the fact remains that
this country, as reflected in
the concessions and profits al-
lowed to the oil industry in

TLIGHT

tough job even fcr fast-wind,
swift-wind Knox, you'll have
to admit.

Especially with McNichol
and Shipp, not to mention the
rest of the invading infantry,
examining the curvature of
your tonsils. I wouldn’t trade
places with you for all the Tea
in Eliot.

How could you expect to
steer a “playoff - bound
schooner” (even I said _ it)

through those Alouette shoals
when you were suffering from
mud-in-your-eye and drowned-
in-in-the-sea Life - emotions?
Particularly, with Patterson
back to haunt you in the
nether-regions, sometimes call-
ed the end-zone.
xt be: xt

“Trade unions span the
whole of our political, social
and economic life in catering
for the wellbeing of their
members, but in one respect
there is a collossal gap—sport.”

So writes a London Daily
Worker reporter, lashing out
at the minor role played by
the unions in organizing sports.

“Almost every large com-
mercial enterprise has a num-
ber of sports clubs operated
with the support of manage-
ment, but how often are the
questions of sports among the
workers discussed in trade
union branches or: shop stew-
ards’ committees?”

Alberta, is far behind
nation of the world.
0 ie; $03

every

Consider these facts. In Ven-
ezuela the oil move-
ment, supported by the people,
is demanding revision of the

workers’

deal with U.S. oil corpora-
tions. It 1s demanding
that 75 percent of the huge

income derived from oil go to
the. country. It is
manding suspension of further
grants to any private oil com-

also de-

panies.

Iran has a 75-25 deal with
U.S. oil corporations and
others.

Japanese oil interests have a
56-44 deal with Saudi Arabia,
and a 57-43 deal with Kuwait.

Now Saudi Arabia is fight-
ing against the present 50-50

conception which generally
prevails in the Middle East

and is demanding in addition
to the 50-50 arrangement par-
ticipation in operations and
profits all the way to the con-
sumer>in an integrated com-
pany. This would be a virtual
75-25 deal.

The Iranian government re-
ceives 75 percent of oil in-
come. Most Middle East coun-
tries get 50 percent, some
close to 60 percent. All of
them have a 75 percent share
as an immediate objective. But
Alberta gets a miserable 13
percent.

Obviously the time has come
for a new deal in Alberta’s oil
industry. There must be an
immediate revision of the
present ratio to a minimum of
50 percent, that is a 50-50
deal.

xt xt xt

What could such a revision
mean to the people of Alberta?

Recently Premier E. C. Mann-
ing proposed a gigantic five

a

Oi

‘ 3

1 monopolies are extracting vast wealth from Alberta’s

oil fields, but only a fraction of it is returned to the people

in royalties.

year plan that will cost about
$200 million.

Actually it will not help
solve the problems of the mu-
Nnicipalities, it will not relieve
the hospital crisis — but it
will saddle the people with
more interest payments.

Yet if the Manning govern-
ment revised the present ar-
rangement with the oil com-
panies to bring it into line

India works on theory
for atomic ice dams

NEW DELHI — Indian
scientists are working out a
theory based on the possibili-
ty of using atomic energy
to build ice walls instead of
concrete dams for water con-
servancy and irrigation pur-
poses. This» is disclosed here
by Professor M. S. Thacker,
director - general of India’s
council of scientific and in-
dustrial research.

He said it would be possible
in the foreseeable future to
use the atomic energy to

build refrigerated ice walls to
hold water. The dam site could’
be shifted simply by building
a new ice wall at another site,
and the fertile bed of the
previous reservoir could be
made cultivable.

Thacker indicated that among
other major scientific research
projects being carried out suc-
cessfully: by the Indian na-
tional laboratories production
of stainless steel without using
nickel and were making top
quality optical glass.

with the 50-50 deal already
in’ effect in the most “back-
ward” of the Middle East
countries, the royalties collect-
ed would rise from $150 mil-
lion to $550 million for five
years.

If it were revised on a 75-
25 basis such as exists in Iran
and is being demanded in Ven-
ezuela, it would rise from
$150 million to $750 million for
five years.

Think what could be done in
assuming educational costs and
thus relieving municipalities!
What could be done in solvy-
ing the hospital crisis in build-
ing homes for the aged, and
increasing pensions for the old
people and widowed mothers!

That would be a more demo-
cratic and dignified way to
finance Alberta’s expenditures,
by drawing it from the peo-
ple’s natural resources (a
phrase Social Credit frequent-
ly uses but denies in practice),
by doing it from the income
from our people’s resources,‘
instead of going hat in hand
to the financiers in Wall
Street.

November 14, 1958 — PACIFIC TRIBUNE—PAGE 7

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