SS

Sea anaTomagapi aa Toei —

Werlin elected
to presidency

of Alta. Fed

EDMONTON — Dave
Werlin, a former officer of
the Vancouver outside
workers local of the Cana-
dian Union of Public
Employees, won election to
the presidency of the
90,000-member Alberta
Federation of Labor in an
upset vote at the AFL’s
convention Friday.

The federation’s ex-
ecutive elections capped a
week-long convention
which had been distinguis-
ed by the adoptiong of a =

-resolutions, ranging from rejection of wage concessions to
opposition to cruise missile testing.

The mood of delegates figured considerably in Werlin’s
election although it was not the main factor which propell-
ed the well-known left unionist into the re s top
position.

Werlin, who has been a national reine for
CUPE working with Calgary hospital employees since
1979, replaces Harry Kostiuk, the AFL president since the
Position became full time in 1977. Kostiuk had vacated his
position to run for secretary-treasurer as part of a pre-
convention arrangement with incumbent secretary Dave
Eastmead to trade positions — an arrangement which,
although it had the apparent backing of the Alberta Union
of Provincial Government Employees with the largest bloc
at the convention, angered many delegates, who dubbed it
a Shix.” ’

Eastmead is also a CUPE representative but when the
union’s caucus at the convention came to decide which
candidate to endorse, it backed Werlin by an overwhelm-
ing vote.

When the ballots were counted following Friday’s vote

___ onthe convention floor, Werlin was again on top with 355
~ votes to Eastmead’s 255. A third candidate got 15 votes.

As AFL president, Werlin will also sit on the executive
council of the Canadian Labor Congress.

Eastmead noted following the convention, “‘I guess the
delegates saw Werlin as the better man to give this federa-
tion some action.”’

Werlin was outspoken during debate in the convention
which — at a time when the oil-rich province is facing
mounting unemployment and the Conservative govern-
ment’s own restraint program — urged the labor move-
ment into action.

In his acceptance speech to delegates, he pledged to
carry through the policies of the federation as laid down by
delegates at conventions.

In an interview. later, he noted that many unionists were
often demoralized because ‘‘of the gap between the deci-
sions of the convention and the subse actions of the
leadership.”’

He emphasized that he would be danny everything possi-
ble “‘to try and close the gap.”’

Werlin also termed the current convention “probably
the best, most militant convention in many years.”’

A policy resolution adopted Feb. 18, following an ad-
dress by United Auto Workers’ leader Bob White, rejected
wage concessions and rollbacks, arguing that they did not
oe job security and eroded workers’ purchasing

The convention also called on the Lougheed govern-
ment to make Heritage Fund money available to revenue-
pinched municipalities and to reinstitute rent controls.

Delegates also adopted resolutions aimed at organizing
and assisting the unemployed who have themselves laun-
ched an organization of jobless in Alberta.

Another resolution stated the federation’s ‘‘solid, un-
qualified demand that no testing of the cruise missile and
any other nuclear warfare weaponry be allowed on Alber-
ta or Canadian soil.’’ It pledged to ‘‘spearhead a public
awareness campaign to oppose the missile testing.’’

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PACIFIC TRIBUNE—FEBRUARY 25, 1983—Page 12

lo

Bae ee Ae eR an TS

Kinnaird known as advocate
of disarmament, labor unity

With the sudden and untimely
death Feb. 17 of B.C. Federation of
Labor president Jim Kinnaird, the
trade union movemen in this province
lost a leader whose name had become
almost synonomous with the ad-
vocacy of labor unity.

And increasingly, as the force of
public opinion created new forums,
Jim Kinnaird was labor’s well-known
spokesman for peace and nuclear
disarmament, appearing at rallies and
meetings and setting a visible example
for the trade union movement
elsewhere on the continent.

Kinnaird died in the early hours of
the morning last Thursday, felled by a
heart attack in his 50th year.

He had been elected president of the
federation in 1978 when the full-time
position was created, crowning a long
career in the labor movement which
also included the leadership of the
B.C. and Yukon Building Trades
Council. He was also an assistant
deputy minister of labor when the
NDP was in government.

Although his election at the 1978
convention came in the context of a
clash with the militant policies of
George Johnston and Len Guy leader-
ship —- whose successors Kinnaird’s
slate challenged in the election — his
leadership sought to avoid partisan-
ship and strove to bring the affiliates
together despite differences in ap-
proach.

He was often associated with a
quieter, less demonstrative style of

‘leadership but, as the historic
'Telecommunications Workers strike
in 1981 showed, he could also bean ef-
fective, even powerful, leader of
workers when they were struggling to
win better wages and conditions.

JIM KINNAIRD .. .
March, 1982.

A testament to his statureas a leader
was also his advocacy of labor unity at
a time when powerful forces, some of
them political, some economic, were
prying the labor movement apart.

In the months before the interna-
tional officers of the Building Trades
precipitated the split with the Cana-
dian Labor. Congress, he appeared
frequently at various labor forums,
calling on the Building Trades not to
split the labor movement.

Even after the split, he pressed the
CLC hard to find the means to keep
the Building Trades affiliated and, at
the time of his death, was about to
begin work on a CLC commission to
study ways of re-uniting the labor
movement.

He repeatedly advocated bringing
into the federation unions outside its
ranks — even though it was sometimes
not a popular policy with some af-

speaking to disarmament rally in Vancouve

filiates.

The labor movement must ac
unity and solidarity if it is to fight D4
the attack currently mounted
governments and corporations, Ae
told delegates to the B.C. Federatio#
of Labor convention last Novembet

In that speech, and in pio
years, he had also given priority to
-issue of nuclear disarmament. He
ried it further, speaking at disarmé
ment rallies in Vancouver and at i
international rally at the Peace Arch
last June 12. J

As with his position on labor unity,
the urgency of disarmament was oftel
as much a personal imperative as | it
was the policy of the federation. Bu!
his advocacy of peace gave it a new
strength in the trade union movemetll
prompting others, often thosé
elsewhere on the’continent, to cite i
example.

2,500 gather in final tribute

They represented every section of
the labor movement — firemen still in
uniform, trade union officers together
with workers just off the job,
members of the Labor Relations
Board. And they had come by the
hundreds to pay their last respects to
Jim Kinnaird.

The PNE Garden Auditorium was
filled and as 2,500 heads bowed and
the haunting skirl of the piper’s lament
drifted through the huge hall, the
sadness and loss over his death were
palpable.

“‘We have received hundreds and
hundreds of calls, letters, cards from
all over the world — from Asia, from
Europe, eastern Europe, all of them
expressing their shock over Jim’s
death,’’ Federation secretary-
treasurer Mike Kramer told those at
the memorial service. _

“Tt was a testament to his stature as
a leader who brought a fractious, and
yes, sometimes rambunctious labor
movement together with his unique
skills,”’ he said.

He called Kinnaird a man whom
was more than just a trade unionist.
“He was aman solidly committed toa
better society and to the trade union
movement being the vehicle for the
change we desir

Roy Gautier, who now fills Kin-
naird’s former post as president of the
B.C. and Yukon Building Trades
Council, paid tribute to Kinnaird as a
leader ‘‘who could go head to head
with the prime minister . . . but who
liked nothing better than to get
together at a friend’s home and spend
the night in a sing-song session.”

But he will be remembered most, he
said, for his work for labor unity.

“There can be no more fitting
tribute to Jim than to dedicate
ourselves to do everything in our
power to re-unite the labor movement
in this country,”’ he said.

‘‘We must pledge to carry on his
tireless efforts to re-unite the labor
movement — to build a stronger trade
union movement, better able to ad-
vance on behalf of all working
people.”

International Woodworkers presi-
dent and federation vice-president
Jack Munro also emphasized Kin-
naird’s efforts to build labor unity.

“Too many people do not know of

the fears, the solidarity, the traditions

and the martyrs that are part of labor
history, a part of this trade union
movement,” he told the memorial ser-
vice.

“But Jim understood them and
devoted himself to the unity of the
labor movement. ’

As 2,500 voices joined in singing
solidarity forever at the close of the
memorial, it was not only in tribute
but also in reaffirmation.

Both Canadian Labor Congress

president Dennis McDermott and
B.C. NDP leader Dave Barrett also
spoke at the memorial, paying tribute
to Kinnaird, as a man of courage,
compassion and justice.

Barrett emphasized that only three
weeks before Kinnaird had briefed the
NDP caucus on the ‘‘massive job of
assisting the unemployed,”’ a job to
which he had given much time and ef-
fort.

As a leader, he said, ‘Jim spoké
forcefully for organized labor and in
doing so did a service to all working
people.”’

In the days following Kinnaird’s
death of a heart attack Feb. 17,

‘tributes to him come in from aroul

the province, from unions and othet®:

In a statement Monday, provin'
Communist Party leader Mauricé
Rush joined thousands of others i?
paying tribute to him asa man ‘ ‘whose
death isa loss to the labor and people’
movement in British Columbia. _

“While we had our differences with
Kinnaird, the Communist Party com
sidered him an outstanding leader if
labor struggles and a strong champio?
of trade union rights and conditions

. he said.

“His leadership will be missed in the
fight against the growing threat from
employers and from the Socred
government, in a year in which ove
250,000 unionists will be involved if
critical contract negotiations an¢
when employers are engaged in a ma
jor drive to force concessions from
unions.

Citing Kinnaird’s efforts for unity;
and to involve labor in organizing th¢
unemployed and for disarmament,”
Rush said: ‘‘Unfortunately there ar¢
too few trade union leaders who havé
Kinnaird’s dedication to labor unity:
to unity of the jobless and to labo!
support for the movement for peace.
His death i isa loss to the whole labo!
movement.

In Kinnaird’s memory the B.C. Fec
has set up a memorial scholarshif
fund to the Labor College of Canada

phe tives ees Res hy Seg he