2 t } ie FE ‘ | i a LABOR Vancouver bus driver Tom Hawken joins other drivers in showing up for his shift in street clothes Feb. 28 as members of the Independent Canadian Transit Union launched the first phase of their “’unstrike’”’ aimed at escalating their contract dispute without inconveniencing transit riders. They have been driving without uniforms and have refused to sign scheduling sheets which include service cuts. The union, which has been without a contract since Mar. 31, 1983 began the second phase this week as union mechanics declared they would limit their overtime to 20 hours per week and would refuse to undertake management duties. Pulp lockout at critical stage The pulp companies pushed their lock- out into a critical phase last week as negotia- tions, already stalled by the employers’ demand for concessions, broke off once again. The Pulp and Paper Industrial Relations Bureau, representing the major pulp com- panies, refused to move from its demand for a three-year agreement modelled after the forest industry and still insisted on removal of one statutory holiday. Pension improve- ments were also refused. “The employers have adamantly refused to consider any kind of reasonable com- promise and we have no alternative but for the delegates to return home and consult with their local unions,” Canadian Paper- workers vice-president Art Gruntman told- reporters after talks were broken off. “They have refused to consider pension improvements and continue to pursue elim- ination of a statutory holiday,” he said. The CPU and the Pulp, Paper and Woodworkers of Canada had offered com- promise on the three-year agreement, indi- cating their willingness to accept the extra year if it included cost-of-living protection. But the bureau rejected the proposal, insisting that it would be “‘leapfrogging the TWA” to accept it. With the breakdown in talks, the focus has again shifted sharply to the picket lines, particularly the secondary pickets on mills where the IWA is represented. One recent decision by the Labor Rela- tions Board — ordering pickets removed from Crestbrook Forest Products sawmills at Cranbrook, Canal Flats and Elko — was beginning to show the results of the pressure being mounted by employers for restric- tions on secondary picketing, In a ruling Mar. 1, LRB vice-chairman Dale Michaels indicated that the pickets on the three plants might be aimed at holding IWA members “to ransom” in a demand for a better contract. That position was completely at variance with the position advanced by LRB chair- man Stephen Kelleher only a few days earlier. Kelleher stated Feb. 27, referring to pick- 12 e PACIFIG TRIBUNE, MARCH 7, 1984 eting by the CPU at Crown Forest Indus- tries, that the CPU was not trying to leapfrog the IWA but rather was seeking “the type of success achieved by the IWA” in resisting employer concessions. “This is not a case. ..where one union is simply seeking to improve on the collective agreement reached by another union and using that union’s members as ‘cannon fodder’,” he said. “I am persuaded that this is not an attempt to ‘leapfrog’ on another agreement. Rather, it is legitimate exertion of pressure in an attempt to continue collective bargain- in (deg The ruling gave substantial weight to the pulp unions’ secondary picketing which has been under attack from independent truck loggers and some IWA members who have interpreted IWA regional president Jack Munro’s various statements as encourage- ment to cross picket lines. The pulp unions were also bolstered by the B.C. Federation of Labor which slapped a “hot” edict on all logs which have been hauled across picket lines. The independent joggers had been responsible for numerous incidents on northern picket lines as they took their rigs across the lines. The same meeting which issued the hot edict also discussed the demand from sev- eral CPU locals for the resignation of Munro from the federation. Munro has been criticized throughout the labor move- ment for his statements attacking the pulp unions pickets. Although as had been expected, the fed- eration did not ask for Munro’s resignation, B.C. Fed president Art Kube called on both IWA and pulp union leaders to cool their dispute and indicated that further state- ments should come only from him. But Munro broke that only days later on BCTV claiming that the pulp unions’ pick- eting could jeopardize unionists’ right to secondary picketing in the Labor Code. However,. the vast majority of IWA members have respected pulp picket lines and the union is now beginning to organize weekly relief payments for some 15,000 members who have been idled. In Terrace, the local Operation Solidarity organization threw its support behind the pulp workers, as representatives of several unions, including the B.C. Government Employees, Carpenters, Telecommunica- tions Workers and others, joined the PPWC on the line to stop truckers’ log deliveries and to close two local area mills. The action followed a meeting of Operation Solidarity which voted unanimously to back the pulp pickets. The two pulp unions were compelled to adopt the secondary picketing when it became apparent that the companies were not suffering any economic pressure from the shutdown of the pulp mills alone. The lockout was imposed in an effort to force the contract issue before pulp contracts in the east expired on Apr. 30 and the compan- ies have managed to boost prices as a result of the decreased production. to hold line at Kerkhoff Several hundred Building Trades workers massed outside a luxury condominium con- struction project Monday and vowed t0 continue their picket line in a fight to stop the notoriously anti-union J.C. Kerkhoff and Sons Contracting from continuing work on the project handed to it by a union firm. : The unionists took up their vigil outside the four gates to the project before 7 a.m. and barred the way as a Kerkhoff manager attempted to drive his truck through. Members of the Kerkhoff family and police watched from across the street. The Building Trades action was the latest in an intensive campaign to prevent the pro- ject developer, Pennyfarthing Develop ments, from turning the $20 milliom contract over to Kerkhoff, a leading member of the right-to-work movement in this province. a Pennyfarthing originally contracted with” a union firm, Stevenson Construction, to” put up the project but.after the foundation — was laid, Stevenson moved abruptly to turn the contract over to Kerkhoff. 3 Before doing so, however, the construc tion firm told the trsdes that they would have to accept a 30 per cent reduction 11 wages if they wanted the contract to stay” with a union firm. Signficiantly, the key figure in the com-_ pany Ken Stevenson, holds 40 per cent of Pennyfrathing and “as we understand it, that’s a controlling interest,” said Building — Trades Council president Roy Gautier. Accordingly, the trades have argued that — their members have been “locked out” by — Stevenson and are treating the dispute 45 such. i Gordon Heard, secretary of the Van- couver New Westminster and District © Building Trades council told unionists at the site that the trades would be sustaining the picket line on the project.Kerkhoff was expected to seek a court or Labor Relations board order to ban picketing. For the trades, taking a stand on the | project is of crucial importance since it — would set a dangerous precedent if Steven son were successful in using the ploy ice circumvent a union agreement. Also this week, the Carpenters Union was to begin sending letters out to credit — unions throughout the province urging — them to withdraw all but the necessary reserve funds from B.C. Central Credit — Union because of B.C. Central’s financing _ of the Pennyfarthing project. If they do not, the union has warned, | many unions will withdraw their funds from credit unions. : Continued from page 1 Simultaneously, the University of B.C.’s Students for Peace and Mutual Disarmament planned a rally, with street theatre, on the steps of the Robson Square courthouse. Today, Mar. 7, a demonstration is planned outside the Liberal Party head- quarters at the corner of West Broadway . and Cypress streets in Vancouver, beginning at 3:30 p.m. The action, organ- ized by member’s of Co-op Radio’s Radio Peace show, involves a mock fun- eral at which the “death” of peace initia- tives will be mourned. Demonstrators from the western pro- vinces, including some from B.C., also planned to rally outside the Canadian Forces base near Cold Lake on Tuesday. The protest, to involve mainly those within driving distance of the base, was Rallies protest cruise to take the form of a human chain stretching from the base to the town. Large demonstrations in several cen- tres across Canada are also planned for this Saturday, co-ordinated by Toronto’s Against Cruise Testing Coalition. While Tuesday’s test was to be the only one slated for 1984, future tests — in which the missile will be flying under its own power — are slated for 1985 and 1986. Operation Dismantle, a peace coali- tion based in Ottawa, has been challeng- ing the cruise tests in Supreme Court for the past year. At press time Monday, the group was seeking an injunction halting Tuesday’s test and all other tests until the issues of legality surrounding the cruise agree- ment, which has drawn scores of protests since it first came to light in spring, 1982, are settled.