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1973, The Regist
and Tribune. Sendicate

FRIDAY, AUGUST 3, 1973
Second class mail registration number 1560.

Layoffs agg

Vol. 34, No. 3t

ravate

railway dispute

The third in a series of rota-
ting rail strikes by the Associa-
ted Non-Operating Railway
Unions began in Quebec early
Tuesday morning but picket
lines on the CNR in British
Columbia remained up after the
Monday midnight deadline as
the rail company continued its
provocative program of
massive layoffs.

. Thousands of layoffs have
come all across the country as
CN seems bent on sparking a
general strike of railway
workers in order to create a
situation favorable to gov-
ernment intervention and strike-
breaking legislation. Workers
were told by their unions to
return to their jobsinB.C. at the
established time regardless of
what the companies told them
but later union spokesmen
stated that they had decided to

Beef price soon out of sight
Prices Review Board silent

Char Prices approaching those
have tot In Europe may soon
Canada €faced by consumersin
Of Nixo as the disastrous effects
felt onemies make themselves
As 4 © strongly than ever.
Weren’t € present prices
iNere,. *Stronomical enough,

a .
Se after increase— many

have already predicted that 50
cents or more a pound will be
added to the price — may push
beef irrevocably off the working
family’s menu— unless some-
thing is done, and quickly.

And the only ones to gain will
be the corporate friends of
Richard Nixon, bothinCanada

Grape boycott growing

the -Y FRED WILSON
Worke : L-CIO United Farm-
ey ; Non has sent an organ-
the grow; mcouver to head up
Paign 45.8 8Tape boycott cam-
lornia eainst the sale of Cali-
Workere “> 8tapes. The farm-
Strike for v8 have been on
Vicious three months against a
Ditacy STower-teamster con-
‘Mion. a.med at smashing the
“Nportan Placing a special
Whi ace Vancouver,
€Calito..s 2th in consumption
This jo (2 Btapes.
Borst 9) 'He reason why Gail
Sthize, YT old UFWU or-
: r. plas come to Van-
o¥eott <5 here to organize

Ut 9 at will effectively
Ctfor ys City as a major

The}, 2F the s
Tost. boycott camenees:

fap Powerf
str pW orke

great majority of grape workers
have responded to the union’s
strike call, loose immigration
controls have allowed the
growers to bring strikebreakers
across the Mexican border.
Skeleton crews are being filled in
with child labor teams, re-
cruited by the Teamsters.
UFWU pickets, forced by injunc-
tion to be spread more than 100
feet apart are unable to prevent
scabs from entering the fields,

see GRAPE BOYCOTT pg. 8
20 years :
after —

Moncada

and the United States who are
gleefully exploiting shortages to
charge everything that the
market will bear — and then
some. :
With the introduction of Phase
Four of Nixon’s controls, beef
has become like capital, moving
swiftly back andforthacross the
49th Parallel, wherever profit
can be maximized. Phase Three
created shortages by making
feed prices prohibitive and now,
with domestic beef prices in the
U.S. frozen, American packers
are moving their own beef into
Canada to sell at inflated price
levels and are importing
Canadian beef to sell in the U.S.
at a price substantially higher
than the frozen price on
domestic beef.
Supermarket chains are taking
advantage of the economic
disruption to jack up prices
almost daily, always with the
convenient excuse of increased
cost of supply. As wholesale
prices jump, So do the retail and
the price spread between the
supplier and the retail outletis
widening all the time.
And the Prices Review Board
is silent and immobile. ae
Nixon’s ultimate objective 1s
to end controls as he indicated in
his Phase Four statement and to
return to a ‘‘free economy’’ —
having squeezed out many indep-
endent producers, concentrated
the wealth in even fewer hands

see REVIEW BOARD pg. 7

continue the strike because of
the number of layoffs and said
picket lines would remain until
all those laid off were allowed to
return to work.

The continuation of picket
lines did affect CP rail opera-
tions and the fact that by
Tuesday, CP operations were
back to normal with all men
working put thelietoCN Rail’s
arguments that the layoffs were
made necessary because of
“Jack of work.’’

There seemed to be little hope
of a quick settlement of the
dispute as the Liberal govern-
ment continued to use the
negotiations as a political ploy
aimed at holding the line and
keeping any wage increase
within the 7% guideline.

Workers in the non-operating

trades have long been saddled
with low wages and long hours of

work and one worker on the.

picket line at Mainand Terminal
in Vancouver complained that,
“T don’t know how many or-
ganized workers earnas little as
$3.11 an hour — the wage for
waiters after six years with the
railway — and have to work 10
hours a day, and yet the govern-
ment and the rail companies
accuse us of inflationary

pressures and want us to hold to.

a seven percent increase. They
want us to save ‘the Liberal
Party at our own expense.”’

The unions are seeking a 53
cent increase in the first year of

a two year agreement and 13
cents in the second year while
see RAILWAY pg. 8

Provocation
at Seagram's

A trailer truck, owned by
Charter Truck and Trailer
Rentals attempted to break
through picket lines Monday
afternoon at the Seagram’s plant
in New Westminster where
members of Local 69 of the Dis-
tillery Workers have entered
their sixth ‘month of strike.
Pickets at the plant identified
one of the men in the truck as
plant production manager Art
Hock. One union member was
reported slightly injuredinthe
unsuccessful attempt to break
the line.

Union spokesmen pointed out
that the incident was manuf-
actured by the company to
procure evidence for an
injunction application, indicated
by the presence of several
management personnel, all
taking pictures of the scene.

The following day two
employees of a local firm
appeared at the plant with
instructions to install a camera
monitoring system on the
premises, indicating that other
provocations were planned. But
they left after a discussion with
the strikers without installing
the system.

Picket lines remained up on various CN Rail points after the Monday
midnight deadline in protest over thousands of layoffs by the rail

company.

— Sean Griffin photo

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