Germany.

From a 1931 campaign speech of Adolf Hitler, in Hamburg;

EDITORIAL
‘Open season’ via prices

FE very housewife trying to make-ends-meet budget-wise,
may not have all the ‘‘proof”’ that she is being syste-
matically fleeced when she goes shopping for the family meat
and groceries at any or all of the big monopoly food chain
emporiums. :

Yet she does know from long experience that her own, or
hubby’s take-home-pay just cannot keep up with the almost
daily rise of meat and food prices, to say nothing of other
domestic essentials.

But she cannot “‘prove’’ it, so must just shell out the price
demanded — or go without. Often she will be seen in some big
chain, picking up a neatly-packaged item of food, looking at the
exhorbitant price stamped on the package, and gently returning
it to the pile. Yet the rising profit balance of the big (and lesser )

did buy — itself a confirmation of monopoly price-fixing to
fleece the consumer.

The current (and simultaneous) lockout of the Retail Clerks
Union employees by B.C.’s “‘Big Six’’ food distributors; their
(simultaneous) agreement, more correctly termed a published
threat of yet higher prices, should these employers have to
grant a wage increase; their arrogant attitude towards the
public generally — all constitute the crude elements of a
gigantic conspiracy against labor and the people, for the
attainment of yet higher prices and profits. But of course, ‘‘we,
the people”’ have no ‘‘proof.”’

The statutory Combines Investigation Act (CIA) was
designed just to keep tabs on such situations. The basic
principle of the CIA, (not to be confused with the U.S. witch-
hunting conspiracy) is not to demand ‘‘proof’’ before it acts, but
to take action designed to unearth proof, and deal accordingly.

To date this ‘“‘commission’’ has done nothing to tackle the
prices squeeze, other than provide alibis for the price gougers.
It has of course produced a voluminous White Paper on prices,
telling the buying public what they already know too well. This,
while the statutory machinery of the CIA rusts from sheer
disuse.

A few short years ago when some fish packer monopoly
decided, without the remotest vestige of proof that the United
Fishermen and Allied Workers Union (UFAWU), fighting for a
decent price for their fish catch, the CIA moved in on the union
like a school of hungry barracudas, in an attempt to declare the
B.C. fishermen’s wage demands as ‘“‘a conspiracy in restraint of
trade” or some such legal jargon. The CIA had no proof when it
moved against a union— and none when it concluded its ‘‘investi-
gations.”’

But today, with meat and food prices generally steadily
increasing with all the traffic will bear, with a government
commission allegedly on the job, producing meaningless white
papers and more commissions to study prices and incomes, a
Sheer waste of time and money at the taxpayers expense,
nothing is done to curb the monopoly price racket.

And it just seems that the Combines Investigation Act
cannot, or won’t act to institute a thorough investigation of the
monopoly prices racket because it ‘‘hasn’t got the proof’’ (?),
despite the fact that last week’s 79-cents per pound hamburger
is around 89-cents this week, and may reach the buck per lb.
next week — and nobody has . . . or wants any ‘“‘proof’’. Just
bigger monopoly profits for the nation’s privileged belly
robbers.

chains involved, show how very well she had paid for what she -

nadian Tribune

ST

Editor—TOM McEWEN
Published weekly at Ford Bidg., Mezzanine No. 3, 193 E. Hastings St.,
Vancouver 4, B.C. Phone 685-5288.

Associate Editor—MAURICE RUSH

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]

Need impartial probe of —
acts of police brutality —

By ALD. HARRY RANKIN

Should not the role of police in
a democratic society: be the
protection of life and property
equally for all citizens and the
fair and impartial enforcement
of the law?

This question has increasing
relevance today because
instances of police exceeding
their authority and roughing up
people appear to be on the
increase.

The Vancouver Province of
May 29 reported a statement by
Chief Justice Davey that the
force used by police in arresting
a young man in Stanley Park last
summer was ‘‘grossly excessive
and unwarranted”. The young
man charged that he was kneed
in the groin several times,
grabbed by the hair, hit in the
face, choked, and held in a full
Nelson wrestler’s grip.

The same issue of the Province

reported that in Toronto, police
chased a car in which three
young men, all brothers, were
riding. When the car stopped,
one of the brothers got out. A
detective drew his gun. His shot
killed the young man. The other
two brothers testified that the
officer deliberately pulled the
trigger. The coroner’s jury

ruled that the gun accidentally

discharged. de
Last week Mayor Tom
Campbell was asked to

investigate a charge by a young
Vancouver school teacher that
the police picked him up on the
street, beat him up in a paddy
wagon, threw him in jail for the

night and then released -him next

morning — all without

explanation.

Equally alarming was the
story (also in the Province of
May 29) of the testimony of a
Seattle police officer, an
“‘expert’’ in riot control, before
the B.C. Mediation Board investi-
gating a request by Vancouver
police for a wage increase.

What we would expect in
testimony before such a
commission would be evidence
to show the desire of police
officers to become more
efficient in enforcing the law
fairly and protecting the rights
of citizens in the process, with
the emphasis on people’s rights
wherever these conflict with
property rights.

But instead the Commission
heard this riot-happy U.S. police

officer advocate what amountet
to a police state with policem i
trained as combat soldiers
suppress the people.

n office!
to spou
merical

Why was this A nerica
brought to Vancouver
his particular brand of A
fascism? What has all th

: ic
with a wage increase. ere
Vancouver police are ©

. roup ?

the same as any other &
civic employees?

All this bears some 1ookiné
into.

The present Vancouver PF
commission is not in a posill

ice

protect the public oF Be
impartially invesiae
complaints against —P®
conduct.

What is required is a civilian
‘“‘watch-dog’’ board appointe
City Council, and including Fé
sentatives of labor and © .
liberties groups. All citizen
without exception, an
includes youth, students,
unionists and minority T°
groups have equal rights. 4
these include the right 1
considered innocent until pr ful
guilty, and the right of peac®™
protest to correct wrongs.

trade

Smoke from asphalt plant drifts across North Shore.

Public protest hits pollution

The people in many B.C. com-
munities are taking action
against widespread pollution in

their areas. Last week two such

action attracted public atten
tion.

In Port Moody about 1,000
people took part in a -protest
parade last Saturday against
pollution in the Port Moody area
of Burrard Inlet.

Organized by the Society for
Pollution and Environmental
Control, the demonstrators
carried placards with slogans
aimed at the major companies
polluting the area: Gulf Oil of
Canada, Reichold Chemicals
Ltd., Flavelle Cedar Mill,
Canadian Phoenix Steel and Pipe
Ltd.,, and Pacific Coast Bulk
Terminals.

Five floats were entered in the
parade depicting the result of
pollution on the public, on

‘vegetation, animal and bird life..

@2iGGT ToheG it
4

Coming under sharp fire from
Port Moody residents has been
the inadequate measures taken
by. the oil companies. One
participant charged that oil
leaks into the water forming a
scum which then sinks to the
bottom killing marine life.

The sawmills and _ bulk
terminal loadings are also a
target for public protest.

In North Vancouver a major
fight is shaping up between
Neptune Terminals Ltd., and
homeowners. Delegations and
petitioners have appeared before
City Council protesting the coal
dust pollution expected when
bulk loading of coal for export to
Japan gets underway.

In a submission made to City
Council by the North Vancouver
Anti-Coal Petitioners, the charge
is made that 1.700 homes lie

within the limit of coal dust

Mu

: e
pollution expected from th
harbor operation.

A report recently prepare
consulting engineers pointe
that the coal is very fine and tha
65 residential blocks, contain!”
some 1,700 homes are include@!
the pollution circle.

The protest over threatened

coal dust poliution comes on Ma
of growing protest over pollu’
from industries, a laré
distillery, and harbor activitle>
which give off putrid odors a
day long over much of Nort
Vancouver.

Potash and sulphur Joadiné
operations on the North shore
have brought forth
criticisms as well as a demal
that air pollution be halted es
stopping the loading of potas

municipalities.

Fa eo AR ee

is to do :

pre

‘oven

dby

strone

and sulphur by North Shore