Canada

Minister rejects
environmental
Warnings

_ The new minister of state for Interna-

tonal Trade, John McDermid, has
tejected a report prepared by 90 Cana-
dian and U.S. environmental groups out-
lining the implications of free trade on
the Canadian environment.

Speaking in the House of Commons,

cDermid called the report, prepared
by the Environmental Law Association,

4 Campaign of total distortion.” Under
Questioning from Windsor MP Steve
angdon, McDermid refused to meet
With environmentalists to discuss their
concerns,

He also rejected suggestions that
future Canadian governments may be
charged under the agreement for such
Programs as assisting business with pol-
Ution controls or reforestation projects.

It was precisely government's role in
forestry management which led to the
a and shingles showdown. Canada

Bridge named
for Riel

One hundred and two years after he
Was hanged, the man who brought Mani-
‘ba into confederation is being honoured
In his home province. In response to a
Campaign from area residents, a bridge

_ Tossing the Red River at Ste. Agathe will

be named after Louis Riel. The bridge is

_ Ppropriately in the federal riding of
TOvéncher which ‘elected him to Parlia-
Ment three times. Despite taking the

_ Vath of Allegiance, Riel was never

~ allowed to take his seat.

‘Family’ in
Alberta shuffle

ollowing remarks from Premier Don
Getty that he intends to introduce poli-
“les to encourage mothers to stay home
with their children, a cabinet shuffle was
—4nnounced. A new “family” portfolio
aS been created, and the minister
responsible is Jim Dinning. Child care
4s been moved out of social services and
Placed under the new ministry.
€dia attention has not been unfa-
Vourable to the premier’s campaign. It
as helped created public sympathy for
Sa Since the arrest of his 31-year-old son
ale on possession of cocaine for the
Purpose of trafficking. The personal suf-
“ting the incident has caused the pre-
mulcr evidently makes Getty feel so
Te omtely about strengthening fami-

Subsidies to
Private operators

In one of the largest rallies ever held in
Tont of the Manitoba legislature, angry
Child care workers protested earlier this
Month against changes in the province’s
child care program. Under the guise of
©xpanding spaces, community services
Minister Charlotte Oleson made public
Unding available to private operators.
Child care workers, who average
15,000 annually, are worried that
Spreading limited funding into, the pri-
Yate sector will put an even greater
Squeeze on non-profit centres. Dorothy
Dudek of the Family Day Care Associa-
Hon called the minister’s policy changes
Misguided, saying the government should
90k at conditions in existing centres and
€lp improve the quality of care there.

o

baad

Mike Phillips

One of the most-repeated claims by the
federal Tories in their campaign to hood-
wink Canadians into supporting their free
trade deal with the U.S. is that, inevitable
dislocations and adjustments aside, the
deal will open up a new era of prosperity
for Canada.

In their more ardent moments they
invoke Mulroney’s 1984 election battle cry
of jobs, jobs, jobs, and point to free trade
as the golden road to this promised land.

Since the government has never been
able to give any concrete ideas of how
many of these jobs will actually material-
ize, and since labour’s analyses tend to be
reinforced by gloomy government projec-
tions both public and secret, Canadian
workers have remained skeptical.

So it is in this context that a conference
last week, billed as a forum to “discuss the
de-industrialization of Metro Toronto,”
sparked the interest of trade unionists and
others in the region.

Sponsored by the Industrial Develop-
ment Institute, it brought together labour,
academic, government and some business

- representatives to project their views on

what’s happening to the economic face of
cities like Toronto in the wake of capital-

ism’s global-shakedown and re-organiza-:

tion? ** Set ra a Ge

For example; one of the rarely discussed: »

facts to emerge from the conference is that
while the city is booming economically,
low paying, part-time jobs account for
nearly half of all the new employment

LABOURIN ACTION

created in Metro in the 1983-86 period.

And this points directly to the thesis
advanced in the conference’s opening ses-
sion by Massachusetts Institute of Tech-
nology professor Bennett Harrison. He
stands among a select group of labour-
oriented economists who challenge the
idea that capitalism, particularly its North
American variant, is entering a “post-
Industrial” stage.

While careful to note that the logic of

contemporary economic development is
blurring the distinctions between eco-
nomic sectors (citing as an example that in
the U.S. General Motors and Sears
Roebuck are the largest consumer finance
banks in the country), Harrison warns
“the urbanely revitalized service centres of
North America (like California’s Silicon
Valley) do not hold the key to the evolu-
tion of economic life in the late 20th cen-
tury.
*At least,” he emphasizes, “not if we
want to maintain — let alone expand —
our standard of living, and share it more
equitably among the members of civil
society.”

It isn’t a post-industrial society we are
entering, but “a new, more complex form
of. decidedly industrial society.” The
explosion in the services industry, particu-
Jarly in the late 1980s, is just anexpression
of how much more complicated and indi-

“rect the production process has become.

Manufacturing and distribution now

occur within companies that not only span

io manufacturing, no jobs

continents and national borders, but even
different economic sectors. “The co-
ordination of such complex activity
creates enormous new demands for every-
thing from photocopying services to man-
agement consulting and businesses special-
izing in language translation,” he told the
conference.

What countries like Canada have to
guard against is precisely the kind of eco-
nomic policy direction the Tories would
drag us into with the free trade agreement.
It is precisely this services-will-take-up-
the-slack philosophy of the neo-conserva-
tive economic clan that spells disaster for
this country and its working people.

Harrison shows us that manufacturing
in the age of high tech matters very much
indeed. He names at least four reasons
why this is the case. Manufacturing has
stronger buying and selling links to the rest
of the economy,.so that dollar for dollar
money spent by government, business or
consumers on manufacturing generates
more output and creates more jobs than
the same spent in the services sector.

Secondly and thirdly, more technologi-
cal innovation and skill development takes
place “in the process of making things, on
the shop floor.” A country that loses its
manufacturing base also loses its ability to
make technological advances, and this is a

» key danger posed by the free trade sell out.

Finally, wages and benefits on average
tend to be higher in the manufacturing
sectors than in services, and there are pro-
portionally fewer very low-paying jobs.

We don’t have to buy the de-
industrialized, low wage service strategy of
Reagan and the transnationals. Canada
can have a strategy for jobs and independ-
ence that rests On a strong; modern (pref-
erably ~ publicly-owned) manufacturing
base — a strategy more in tune with
people’s needs than the low wage, de-
industrialized future international big bus-
iness has in store for us.

Tax freeze dominates Regina vote

With only a few weeks to go, the cam-
paigns for municipal elections in Saskat-

* chewah (Oct. 26) are in full swing. Regina is
the focus of attention as right-wing forces ©

try to impose drastic tax cuts and to wina
majority of city council.

Earlier this year, the Regina Business
Alliance successfully petitioned for a plebis-
cite ona 10 per cent tax cut and three-year
freeze on the city’s business and property
taxes. The “tax revolt” has hit other com-
munities across the province, fuelled by
economic hardships faced by thousands of
small business operators. Government fig-
ures show that retailer in Saskatchewan had
an average net income of $10,792 in 1985,
below most other occupations. ~

But business and community leaders
have focussed the debate over high taxes in
Regina onto “wasteful spending,” rather
than examining serious alternatives to meet-
ing the city’s budget difficulties. A “yes”
vote in the plebiscite would benefit large
corporate interests much more than the
average homeowner or small business. —

The giant developer Cadillac Fairview
(with total profits of $140-million over
1984-87) would save $106,000 a year prop-
erty taxes. Altogether, the 50 largest prop-
erty owners in the city, and the 50 biggest
business taxpayers, would save over a $1-
million a year if the plebiscite passes. In
contrast, the average homeowner might
save $100 per year, and lose many city pro-
grams in the process.

As the Social Justice Coalition’s Regina
branch points out, “there are alternatives”
to the tax cuts and budget rollbacks. The
Devine government’s municipal grants to
Regina have dropped from $29.4-million in
1984 to $19.4-million this year, placing
extreme pressure on city council to boost
taxes.

As the staggering range of cutbacks faced
by the city if the plebiscite passes becomes
clear, opposition is mounting. An itemized

account of the impact of: the tax cut, pre-
pared by the city administration, takes up
six pages.

Of the four mayoralty candidates, only
one, New Democrat Doug Archer, has
clearly rejected the tax cut. Community
groups and progressives are beginning to
rally around Archer’s campaign as the best
alternative to the right-wing’s leading can-
didate, former Tory social services minister
Gordon Dirks.

Although Dirks is unpopular for his role
in Grant Devine’s first term (he. was badly
defeated in 1986 election), he has the Tory
machine backing him, and the advantage of
a potential split between Archer and
another candidate, councillor Mark Han-
ley, who has also been generally associated
with centre-left majority on council.

The plebiscite and election are clearly
crucial for Regina. Regina council, whatever
its weaknesses, has been a centre of opposi-
tion to Devine’s attack on working people.
Now the Tories have scrapped the ward
system against the wishes of urban resi-
dents, and they have some strong candi-
dates looking to take over city council. The
10 per cent tax cut would give them a perfect
weapon to attack the social infrastructure of
Regina, to put the city completely in the
hands of big business over the next three
years.

People’s organizations, and NDPers and
others on the left, should work for unity to
beat the tax cut and to return the anti-Tory
majority to city hall. That would strengthen
the demand for real tax reform, and for full
restoration of municipal grants slashed by
the Conservatives.

This election could be a turning point in

_ the fight against Devine. Now that it seems

there will be several weeks between Oct. 26
and the expected federal election date, it
should be possible to stop the Tories at the
local level, and then make sure they lose all
three seats in Regina federally.

Pacific Tribune, October 10, 1988 « 5