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25 years ago...

ELECTRICAL WORKERS
FIGHT WAGE FREEZE

NEW YORK — The conven-
tion of .the United Electrical
Radio and Machine Workers
opened here with unanimous
decision by its 600 delegates to
raise a million dollar fund to
fight the wage freeze and police“
state laws and for peace. The ac-
tion by the representatives of
310,000 workers came shortly
after President Albert J.
Fitzgerald opened the parley
with a call for a fight to repeal
the Taft-Harley, Smith and
McCarran Acts and the gov-
ernment dictated wage freeze
and added:

“This union, from this day on,
is on the offensive.”

Delegates of 28 Canadian loc-
als with a voting strength of 211
were denied admittance to the
U.S. the credentials committee
announced. Tribune,

October 1, 1951

50 years ago...

BYNG, MEIGHEN
LOSE ELECTION

The results of the election are .

a decisive blow at Byng, Down-
ing Street and British Im-
perialism. Downing Street
wished ' through Byng’s inter-
vention in the parliamentary
crisis to repeat its pressure of
1911 ... but the relation of
forces is different today and the
customs scandal proved com-
paratively ineffective to distract
attention from this manoeuvre.

The return of Meighen would
have meant greater domestic
reaction. He. was the most
notorious political enemy of
labor . .. He was responsible for

the anti-labor legislation of:

1919.

The three labor representa-
tives are J.S. Woodsworth and
Heap in Winnipeg and C.N. Ad-
shead in Calgary.

The Worker, |

Sept. 25, 1926

VOW AFFIRMS SUPPORT
FOR PEACE, DISARMAMENT

KING CITY, Ont. — Neces-
sity for freedom of information
legislation and governmental ac-
countability to citizens were
agreed to be crucial for Canadians
at the Voice of Women Annual
Meeting held last weekend.

Forty delegates. from eight
provinces and territories of the
sixteen-year old _ national
women’s group reaffirmed its
statement of purpose to work for
peace, disarmament and social
justice.

Policies resolutions included,
urging the Canadian government
to stop the use’ of public funds for
investment in Chile until there is
complete restoration of human,
civil and political rights. VOW
members were encouraged to
withdraw their accounts from
banks investing in Chile.

Voice of Women’s long-
standing opposition to nuclear
armaments was expressed by

support for a nuclear-free Pacific,
a United Nations Disarmament
Conference, a ban on weapons
sales and the export of uranium.

In supporting the programs for
reconstruction in Vietnam, Voice

‘of Women also sent a letter pro-

testing a recent CBC biased pro-
gram on the situation in that
country. Voice of Women en-
dorsed the Canadian Labor Con-
gress Day of Protest on October
14th.

Voice of Women’s activity con-
tinues to focus on concern for the
dangers of nuclear reactors.
VOW believes that these energy
sources are technically
hazardous, environmentally
dangerous and a potential source
of material for the manufacture of
nuclear bombs. Because of .this,:

VOW is also opposed to the sale

of CANDU reactors and uranium
to other countries.

PACIFIC TRIBUNE—OCTOBER 1, 1976—Page 4

EDITORIAL
COMIMIENT

Racism in high places

The fact that racism is deeply imbed-
ded into the fabric of Canadian official-
dom was shown again last week — this,
time in the Northwest Territories correc-

_tional system.

The so-called “training manual” used

‘for several months in 1971 in Yellow-

knife by prison: staff could only have

‘been written by a sick racist. Whoever

authorized its use must either also be a
sick racist or guilty of criminal negli-
gence. A government permitting such
acts — government departments and
heads of those departments — should be
made answerable for what was printed
and applied. !

The ugliness of what was done can be
illustrated by some “descriptions” of In-
dian and Metis people in the official
manual: “... like the Japanese, he (the
Indian) copies to perfection, but has no
creative or artistic genius ...” and “...
his intelligence is that of an adolescent,
affective rather than logical ...”

The manual describes Indian peoples
as retarded, lazy and unthrifty. A prison
run by people with such unbridled rac
ism and horrible ignorance can only be:
imagined by most Canadians. What 1s
known, not only in Yellowknife but in
many parts of Canada where most pris-
oners are Native and Metis, is that such
racist bigotry is not isolated.

Think back only a few weeks to the
closing ceremonies of the Montreal
Olympics to the plastic, hypocritical dis-
play put on by Canadian officialdom to
portray Canada’s native population as
smiling and happy and compare that to
Yellowknife pen or the James Bay rip-off
of Indian lands or the persecution of
Indian militants.

The fact that one petty official has res-
igned should not stop the investigation
which should be conducted all the way to
the top exposing the racists right in their
oak-panelled offices.

-Kissinger’s fire brigade

Henry Kissinger’s fire brigade trip to
Southern Africa has one main aim — to
keep the area safe for imperialism. Faced
with mounting internal and interna-
tional problems, the racist regimes of
Smith and Vorster, backed by the U:S.,
are desperately searching for a way out.

Kissinger’s “solutions”, made in close
collaboration with the British, are quite
revealing. Britain, it is proposed, would
convene a conference to write a constitu-
tion for Rhodesia, the USA would have a
team of experts there to help out. An
international consortium made up of the
USA, Britain, France, West Germany,
Japan, Australia and South Africa would
raise $2-billion in “aid” for Rhodesia.

A U.S.-British program would be de-
veloped to ensure - white minority
against financial loss and funnel funds to
develop Rhodesia’s industry, agriculture
and natural resources.

An acute embarrassment, South Af-
rica and Rhodesia will now have to be
made respectable in the eyes of the world
— but continue to be safe for foreign
financial plunder and stay as “bulwarks
against communism” in Africa.

-And so we have Kissinger once again
consorting with Vorster, the butcher of
Soweto, and architect of apartheid, try-
ing to haywire some sort of imperialist
bastion together that can be paraded as
“democratic” before the world.

But the liberation movements have
come to far to be fooled by these moves.
Kissinger’s record, in Latin America for
instance, where he .helped murder
democracy in Chile and make it safe once
again for foreign capital should not be

forgotten. The USA’s shameful re- .

sponse last week to Vietnam’s efforts to
join the United Nations should also be
seen as the real. State Department at-
titude toward developing nations.
Imperialism’s attempts to dress up ra-
cism, degradation, and_ super-

exploitation in some other garb to stop
the powerful drive toward liberation in
Southern Africa cannot but be opposed.
by every democratic-minded person.

-AIB monster

Trudeau’s AIB monster is nearly one
year old and getting more dangerous
and belligerent day by day. If there ever
was a time that Canadians, worred about
high inflation, had any thoughts the con-
trols program would work, that time
should be long gone. .

This government must be crazy to-
think working Canadians can miss the
point that the AIB is an anti-working
people outfit dedicated to chopping
wages, destroying collective bargaining
and guaranteeing high profits for
corporations.

Recent roll-backs are incredibly brut-
al. Ontario non-medical hospital work-
ers, among the lowest paid workers
around, have had their hard-won settle-
ment rolled back by the AIB. So have
Windsor school teachers, Yukon miners —
and others too numerous to mention. Still |
other workers are waiting for the AIB axe
to fall.

. The controls program was phoney
from the start, but the vicious way it is
being applied by a skidding Liberal gov-
ernment is a warning that Trudeau has
put his eggs in monopoly’s basket and is
out to really shaft the trade union
movement and working people all across

the board.

The importance of unity and strength

‘on October 14 is being hammered home

every day as the AIB goes about its
wrecking job. As the last shreds of cover |
are being torn away from this program it |
should convince sceptics that only a mas-
sive show of determination and power b
working people on the Day of Protest wi

penetrate the ivory, tower. -