Alberta Solidarity seen

Addressing delegates to the B.C. Fed Convention Dec. 1, Alberta Federation of
Labor president Dave Werlin said that Alberta unionists would be meeting later
this month to mount a major campaign against the infamous Bill 44 and other
anti-labor legislation of the Lougheed government. “I can’t be definitive yet,”
he said, “but | think we're going to be coming out of a meeting Dec. 20 with our
own version of Operation Solidarity.” Werlin, who was given a standing ova-
tion by the convention, also pledged that Alberta labor would continue to fight
the cruise missile tests slated for Cold Lake.

Campaign for labor
economic plan urged

Delegates to the B.C. Federation of Labor

convention last week called on the federation

- to challenge the restraint program of the
Bennett government and to launch ‘“‘a
massive campaign’’ to win support for an
alternative economic program.
~ Delegates endorsed a resolution submit-
ted by the Campbell River, Courtenay and
District Labor Council, which termed the
Socred budget and legislative program ‘“‘the
program of the Employers’ Council and the
transnational corporations’’ and urged the
labor movement to advance its own pro-
gram based on control of resources and
stimulation of the economy and to mount a
campaign to win popular support for it.

_ Included in the motion was another
resolution, submitted by the North Van-
couver local of the Canadian Union of

~~ PublicEmployees, which spelled out a labor

alternative program in more detail.
It called for:

 @ Stimulation of the economy through

increased purchasing power and stimulation

of the economy;

_ @ Nationalization of the transnational
corporations in the resource industries and

the development of processing and

manufacturing industries;
_ @ Nationalization of the banks and the

credit system;

@ Expansion and diversification of ex-
port markets;

@ Reduced hours of work without
reduction in pay;

@ Restoration and expansion of social
‘services;

e@ Exchange controls, price and rent
controls to control inflation.

The importance of the resolution was em-
phasized by several delegates who noted that
the labor movement has been weakened in
its battle with the government because of its
reluctance to challenge the phony Socred no-
tion of restraint and because of the absence
of any campaign for an alternative program.

“If the labor movement doesn’t develop
its own economic program and sell it to the
people, then we come up short in everything
we do,”” UFAWU delegate Joy Thorkelson
told the convention.

“We can’t leave the economic programs
to the corporations and the government —
we’ve got to develop our own,” she said.

PACIFIC TRIBUNE—DECEMBER 7, 1983—Page 12

Delegates also endorsed several resolu-
tions as part of a major convention report on
unemployment calling on the federation to:

@ Make the demand for a shorter work
week with no loss in pay a key demand in the
fight against unemployment and to report
on the progress of that campaign at the 1984
convention;

@ Take steps towards the formation of
regional unemployed organizations
associated with the trade union movement;

@ Develop a fightback program “‘to
meet the government and corporate attack
on people and to fight for a full employment

program.”

The last resolution, a composite submit-
ted by the resolutions committee, came
under some criticism because it dropped the
phrase ‘‘assist and support the Unemployed
Action Centres in developing... a
fightback program’’ from the original
resolution. The change was apparently made
in line with a federation policy of asking ac-
tion centre coordinators not to participate
directly in campaigns.

Nanaimo Action Centre coordinator
Dyved Freethy told delegates that the par-
ticipation of the action centres was crucial

“because they are going to do the organiz-

>

ing.
Elsewhere in the convention, delegates
voted to set up a committee of federation of-
ficers to encourage non-affiliated unions to
join the B.C. Fed and to seek ways of resolv-
ing quickly any roadblocks in the way of that
affiliation.

A number of resolutions were endorsed
demanding that the federal government
reverse its position on the cruise missile test
and pressing the federation to give full sup-
port to End the Arms Race in its refuse the
cruise campaign.

A resolution adopted on the final day
clarified the federation’s stand on Grenada,
a point of some confusion since the executive
council report had reserved judgment pen-
ding the receipt of further information.

But the resolution was forthright, calling

for condemnation of the U.S. invasion and.

demanding that troops be withdrawn and
that the Grenadian people be allowed to
decide their own future free from outside in-
terference.

Ry)
4

4

itm LABOR NOTES

~ 10-cent mail protests

handouts to business

The Canadian public paid $1 billion
for the post office’s new automated mail
sorting system — a system bypassed by
Canada Post’s reduced rates to big cor-
porations, which Canada’s taxpayers are
also subsidizing,the Canadian Union of
Postal Workers has charged.

The union is pointing this out through
CUPW Incentive Rates Week, Dec.
11-17, during which Canadians can mail
cards and letters for only 10 cents apiece,
which will be processed by inside postal
workers.

“J think it is totally unfair that the
public pay top rate for their mail while
corporations get big discounts,’” CUPW
president Jean Claude Parrot stated in
announcing the campaign.

Parrot said corporations which pre-
sort their bulk mail get discounts ranging
from 13% cents to 24 cents per item,
while services to the central public are
deteriorating, with more cutbacks on the
way.

Among future cuts the crown corpora-
tion is considering are group mail boxes
replacing home delivery, alternate day

The Retail Wholesale Union of British
Columbia will become an affiliate of the
International Longshoremen’s and
Warehousemen’s Union, paving the way
for the retail union to rejoin the B.C.
Federation of Labor and the Canadian
Labor Congress.

ILWU Canadian Area president Don
Garcia announced Nov. 25 the establish-
ment of the union’s Retail, Wholesale
and General Division, which will include
the B.C. retail union and the Saskat-
chewan Joint Board of the Retail,

as autonomous affiliates.

November per capita dues for the
8,000 workers involved have been
forwarded to the CLC, and ar-
rangements for affiliation to the two pro-
vincial labor federations are underway,

Leaders of the province’s three major
wood unions have dismissed a so-called
“final offer’ from the forest companies
that include a zero wage hike in the first
year of a three-year settlement.

The Canadian Paperworkers Union
and Pulp, Paper and Woodworkers of
Canada have submitted the offer, which
includes several concessions demands, to
their collective membership for a vote,
with a recommendation it be rejected.

At press time negotiators for the Inter-
national Woodworkers were considering
their next move.

The companies, grouped together into
Forest Industrial Relations and the Pulp
and Paper Industrial Relations Bureau,

before any vote is concluded.
Voting for the two pulp unions will be

Wholesale and Department Store Union -

may impose a lockout, possibly even”

delivery and reduction in the range of ser-
vices at the wicket, said CUPW vice- -
president Bill Chedore.

Parrot said the cutbacks run against
Bill C-42, the legislation which created
Canada Post. The bill gave top priority to
improved service to the public, ‘“but since
becoming a crown corporation, any ef-
forts for improvement have been aimed
at the corporate mailers while the public’s
needs are set aside.

“‘New and better mail services to the
public are a higher priority. in our minds
than financial self-sufficiency for Canada
Post Corporation,” said Parrot.

At press time, the 10-cent mail issue
was before the Canada Labor Relations
Board, with corporation officials charg-
ing CUPW’s campaign was illegal.

But, Chedore countered, the corpora-
tion’s own bulk rate for businesses is an
exception to the federal cabinet-set first-
class rate. The union is doing nothing il-
legal, he argued, but is protesting the
reduced bulk rate for business while the
public must pay 32 cents an item.

Retail union joins ILWU

. said Garcia.

‘““We are of the opinion that the affilia-
tion will be welcomed by the labor move-
ment across the country, and may well
serve as a blueprint for other organiza-
tions to come together at this time in
history, when solidarity is of prime im-
portance to all working men and
women,”’ said Garcia, calling the affilia-
tion agreement a ‘unique arrangement.”

Although formally part of the
Longshoremen, the affiliates will have
‘‘maximum autonomy”’ including con-
trol and development of their internal af-
fairs, he announced.

The new division’s officers are: John
Squire (B.C.), president; Brian Haughey
(Sask.), vice-president; Chesley
Langham (B.C.), financial secretary; Len
Wallace (Sask.), recording secretary.

Forest unions say ‘No’

completed Dec. 21.

The companies’ demands failed to
match even the settlement earlier this year
between the IWA and forest companies
in Washington and Oregon. That con- —
tract was laden with concessions and
rollbacks.

B.C.’s forest giants want, in addition
to no wage increase for the first year, a
settlement involving four per cent hikes
eah in the second and third years, the
elimination of a statutory holiday, and
what union leaders term ‘‘inadequate’’
pension proposals.

The pulp unions’ vote followed a
meeting between the CPU and PPWC
bargaining committees, in which the two
agreed to co-ordinate future strategies in
fight*ig the companies’ concessions de-
mand.

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