LABOUR Meet set against sell-off Representatives of community organiza- tions and trade union locals are expected to hammer out a program of action against the provincial government’s privatization plans at a public meeting set for Jan. 27, 7:30 p.m. at the [WA Hall, 13th and Commercial in Vancouver. : Called by the Council for Public Services, a trade union-community group coalition established last year, the meeting comes out of a conference on privatization Dec. 12 which was initiated by the Vancouver and District Labour Council. More than 170 people from union locals, the Canadian Labour Congress, the B.C. Federation of Labour as well as a number of community groups, attended the conference which also set up the Council for Public Services as a first step against the government’s selloff Labour council secretary Frank Kennedy said the meeting Jan. 27 would be making concrete plans ‘based on the discussion at the conference and would likely establish a structure for the coalition, including joint chairs from the trade union movement and community organizations. “We're hoping to pack that hall,” Kennedy said. He added that the council had already done considerable organiza- tional work in lining groups up for the meet- ing. The council has also put out its first bro- chure on the government’s privatization plan, entitled “Privatization and You”, which is already into its second printing. Firestone — justthe beginning Firestone is skipping out. The giant international tire cartel is set to pull off a scam rivalling the Manhat- tan purchase. Not only is Firestone walk- ing away from the city of Hamilton and its 1,300 employees with nary a back- ward glance, but it is also checking out of the country with enough dough from the public treasury to fund the Winter Olympics. With its government loans and grants it has obtained over the years, its deferred taxes and workers pension money safely tucked away in U.S. bank vaults, Fire- stone risks nothing by shutting down its Canadian tire-making operations, other than some bad PR. But as the saying goes, “sticks and stones ....” Firestone is not the first corporation to snub its nose cynically at its work force or its community and it’s a safe bet that it won’t be. the last, particularly if the Reagan-Mulroney tryst signed on Jan. 2 comes into effect. Firestone will be one drop in a tidal wave of corporate ration- alization in which social responsibility will be determined only in terms of the balance sheet. The Firestone closure has some hard lessons for Canadians, particularly workers. First, the “trickle down” theory doesn’t work. This line, peddled by Mulroney, that the private sector is the engine of growth creating jobs, jobs, jobs has been used to justify the billions handed out every year to the corporate sector, while taxpayers sink ever more collectively into debt and social services are cut to ribbons. The corporate sector, especially trans- national corporations like Firestone, Labor in action cannot be counted on to develop an industrial strategy for Canada. Given the lessons of Black Monday, it is clear that they have trouble handling even their own affairs, much less those of the pub- lic. Secondly, Canadians must begin to demand stricter controls over the activi- ties of the transnationals in Canada. Labour cannot restrict its fight to better severance arrangements, important as these are. That means rejecting the “jerking around” which both the workers and the community of Hamilton have been sub- jected to in the idle speculation over this or that anonymous buyer possibly being interested in buying all or part of the Firestone operation. All of this cynical conjecture was intended to head off any meaningful campaign to keep the plant open, while softening up the Firestone workers on the need to make conces- sions. The workers have sweated enough profit and the community has given enough handouts over the years to justify nationalizing Firestone several times over. Is it too much, then, to ask the provincial government to enact plant closure legislation which would prohibit the shutdown of Firestone? Third, the lessons of Firestone for the post-free trade era are painfully obvious. Experts in Nova Scotia, which developed a unique union-proof labour bill, predict that the prize for all their effort, Michelin, will pack up its Canadian rubber and vinyl operations if a free trade agreement goes into effect. Workers from across Canada have yet to make their voices heard in sufficient numbers and volume to prevent the trea- cherous Mulroney trade deal and the repetition of the Firestone closure a hundred times over. Among the biggest obstacles to the mobilization of the labour movement, it would appear, is the understandable preoccupation of workers with everyday struggles on the job, the attack on their living standards, health and safety and union and social rights. That means those of us who play a leadership role in the trade union movement have a special _ responsibility to assist in finding the links between the free trade fight and the more immediate issues in workers’ minds — not the least of which is the loss of jobs. A policy paper currently being circu- lated by the Steelworkers is an instructive contribution is this regard which can help stimulate the fightback. The resolu- tion at the Ontario Federation of Labour which called for, among other things, action to occupy plants to block free trade closures, can also play an impor- tant role. Finally, the labour movement can get wholeheartedly behind the activities of the Pro-Canada Network and similar coalitions which are working overtime to halt the free trade deal. Labour Briefs Strike ends in paper's closing Thomson Newspapers has shut down the 108-year old Kamloops Sentinel rather than meet the union’s demand for above-pov- erty level wages. The Sentinel, published three times a week and distributed free through advertis- ing, closed last month. About 40 mailroom employees, members of Local 226 of the Communications Workers of America, had struck for a wage increase on the hourly average of $4. The company had also refused to negotiate health and welfare or pension benefits. However, elsewhere in the media, the union has finally got into the anti-labour Winnipeg Sun, owned by Quebecor Inc. of Montreal. Thirty-four editorial employees who voted to join the Media Union of Manitoba have their first contract. Attendants ready for pension fight Air Canada’s flight attendants are determined to follow in the footsteps of the company’s ground workers and win inflation protec- tion for pensioners. The airline division of the Canadian Union of Public Em- ployees is building up its war chest and has announced that strike pay will be raised from $50 to $225 a week in preparation for what is expected to be a difficult battle. The union’s 3,200 members lack the clout of the International Association of Machinists which, because it represents aircraft mechanics and other skilled trades, was able to shut the airline down when members were locked out for three weeks just before Christmas. Air Canada’s flight attendants struck for seven weeks in 1985 but the company kept planes flying by using strike- breakers. Both CUPE and the Canadian Auto Workers, which represents the airline’s ticket agents, sup- ported: IAM during its lockout, hoping the union would set a precedent with Air Canada for pension protection. The flight attendants’ contract expired in August but the union refused to negotiate until a set- tlement was reached with the ground workers. CA W says pen- sion indexing will also dominate its talks with the company, sche- duled to begin late in the spring. IAM ratified its agreement last week. The three-year pact gives partial indexing of pensions for current and future retirees and annual wage increases of four, four and 4.5 per cent. The deal, which had been tabled with no recommendation from the bar- gaining committee, was approved by 81 per cent. 65 cents an hour a free trade job While Prime Minister Brain Mulroney concedes the free trade deal with the U.S. will bring some dislocation, he promises that in the long run more Canadians will be working. - It is worth questioning the kind of jobs the PM envisions — and Washington’s other free trade partner, Mexico, provides an insight. A free trade strip has existed along the Mexican-American border since 1960 and several big U.S. corporations have estab- lished plants there: RCA, Gen- eral Motors, General Electric and others. In all, 1,000 plants are in the zone, employing 300,000 Mexican workers. Approximately 50,000 new jobs are created each year and economic forecasters see over one million Mexicans work- ing there by the turn of the cen- tury. The U.S. is also proving to bea good market for Mexican-pro- duced goods, so good that Mex- ico is quickly moving to top spot as the leading exporter of manu- factured goods to the U.S: — from less than two per cent in 1969 to over 40 per cent today. However, the blossoming of © U.S. plants south of the Rio Grande doesn’t represent an expansion in manufacturing but rather a shift in production from the U.S. to Mexico. This has caused some dislocation (read unemployment) for American workers. General Motors now has 27 plants in Mexico while in the U.S., many have ben boarded up. Some may ask why corpora- tions take the trouble of setting up in Mexico when the U.S. sun belt can provide ample unorgan- ized labour. The answer is that Mexico can even underbid Mis- sissippi’s wage levels. At 65 cents an hour, super-exploited Mexi- can labour can fulfill Reagan’s dream of a continental common market. And 65 cents an hour may be how Mulroney plans to fulfil his election promise of jobs, jobs, jobs. 12 e PACIFIC TRIBUNE, JANUARY 20, 1988 Pay ey