Toronto
conde
fascist party

TORONTO — The Metro Toronto
Labor Council voted June 1 to con-
demn the recent application of the
fascist Nationalist Party of Canada
for registration in Ontario as an
official political party, but
delegates stopped short of calling
for its outright banning.

In an emotional debate, which
saw many delegates call for the
bamning of the fascist party,
delegates finally concluded to urge
the Commission on Election Ex-
penses to carefully check the
names on the registration petitions
and to withhold registration if any
irregularities were observed.

“We must stand opposed to
giving democratic rights to the
scum of human society,” said Joe

Meslin of the Hatters Union. “If we

don’t say no now, we are opening
the door to what took place
yesterday. The working class must
face up to their responsibility
against these fascists.”

Dan Heap, Canadian Paper-
workers local 496, and a World War
II veteran, responded to the execu-
tive’s argument that laws banning
fascist parties could be used
against the left and other fighters
for democratic social change.

“It isn’t necessary to ban the
parties of the left,’’ Heap said,
“when the RCMP can forge
documents, break into the head-
quarters of. political parties,
monitor their telephone conversa-
tions and go unpunished.

“‘We don’t need laws banning the
Communist Party or the New

,. Democratic Party; we have the
War Measures Act,”’ he said. “‘By
refusing to take action now, we are
doing nothing to protect the rights
of any parties who feel the need to
be critical of our governments.”

He said the situation demanded
_taking “drastic steps’’ to ‘‘find the
ways to say that fascist parties
aren’t allowed in this country.”

Locked out brewery workers at Labatt’s plant in New Westminster
have occupied the social room at the plant to protest company tac-
tics. Spokesman Brian Frizzell (left) is shown. outlining the union's
position to Tribune reporter Fred Wilson.

Brewery workers stage

sit in at Labatts plant

Continued from page 1

ing it. Our -livelihoods are at
stake,”’ spokesman Brian Frizzell
told the Tribune at the sit-in
Monday. “‘We are here to get that
message to the _ Labatt’s
executives.”

Negotiations with the brewery
companies have stalled because
the companies have refused to
negotiate until union spokesman
John Langley returns from the
Brewery Workers’ national con-
vention in Toronto. ‘‘That is just an
excuse not to bargain,’ Frizzell
said, ‘‘we told them that we have
people capable of carrying on
fruitful negotiations and that-we’re
prepared to bargain.’

Labatt’s gave the brewery work-
ers at the sit-in a Monday morning
deadline to vacate, but the workers
continued to occupy the social
room at the brewery this week.

Contrary to the impression left

by media reports that the Brewery
Workers are responsible for the
dispute and the beer shortage, the
union has applied to the Labor
Relations Board for a ruling that
the lockout be declared illegal. The

union has made it clear that it is |

prepared to return to work and
continue negotiating for new
contracts with each of the
breweries.

A so-called ‘‘compromise’’ of-
fered by the breweries this week to
end the lockout if the Carling’s
workers would end their strike also

received wide media coverage, as

the companies knew it would, even
though the proposal had no chance
of being accepted. The companies
wanted to use the industry-wide
lockout to break the strike of the
Carling’s workers and to force the
Carling’s workers to submit to the
general bargaining system the
unions are opposed to.

OTTAWA — The threat of a
national strike between the federal
post office and the Canadian Union
of Postal Workers is a real
possibility said CUPW. president
Jean Claude Parrot here-last week
in response to the provocative
statements of the postmaster-
general in the House of Commons
May 29.

“Mr. Lamontagne is telling the
postal workers they will have to be
prepared to strike just to defend
what they achieved on paper in
1975,” Parrot stated.

“By his statements in the house
May 29 one can only conclude that
Mr. Lamontagne not only wants a
strike, but he wants to guarantee
one.”’

Parrot was responding to the
ilighly provocative statements of
yostmaster-general Lamontagne

n Parliament about the current.

negotiations with the union. La-
montagne admitted that the post
office had yet to make an offer to
upgrade the 1975 contract, won
after a 42-day postal strike. In-
stead, he presented a hard line
position, indicating the govern-
ment’s intention of violating the
1975 contract.

“There are four principles we
are not prepared to negotiate,’’ La-
montagne told the House. “We
intend to proceed
technological change. We want to
have the freedom to contract out
some of our work. We want our
casual and temporary employees
to meet peak demands and we
want to be able to measure
quantity and quality of employee
output which we don’t have at the
moment.”

Lamontagne’s statements are in
direct violation of the 1975 contract
which in Article 29 enshrined the
employer’s responsibility to
eliminate any adverse effects of
technological © change and
guaranteeing a procedure for

1975 contract.

taken an aggressive stance ip

with.

adjudicating disputes arising fro™
the introduction of technologic#!
change. Re

The post office has refused to liv®
up to the word of the collectiv’

agreement claiming that tht
special adjudication commit
established by the contract is #
violation of the Public Servit
Relations Act. The postmastel
general’s statements are seen #
confirmation of the government
decision to ignore the terms of

The post office management hé

negotiations and is also attempting
to win concessions that wo y
weaken the position of unid
stewards. The Post Office wants!
revoke the steward’s right to #
tend to grievances during wor
hours. : “4

CUPW has charged the p®
office with mass violations of
1975 contract and has placed
case before a conciliation b0a
which began hearings April 10. TH
union has also filed chars®
against Public Service Staff Rel
tions Chairman J. H, Brown f
federal court for “violating 2”)
misrepresenting the law in se
the terms of reference of
conciliation board.”

Brown refused to submit 61 of ®
disputed items between the unio?
and the post office to the co
ciliation board. His refusal ©.
submit the items, CUPW charg?
amounted to assumption of
quasi-judicial role which the J@
doesn’t confer upon him.”

Although CUPW would rathel
avoid strike action, the union h@
decided it necessary to call on loc
officers across Canada to establ
local strike committees to prep:
for the possibility of a strike.

Such a strike would likely be?
bitterly fought one, with C
forced back on the picket line
win the terms of the 1975 contrat
over again.

wm

& —

Policy

John Munro, federal minister of
labor, has many speech writers.
Almost every week there is a new
batch of his speeches _ to
management groups, government-
sponsored forums and trade union
conventions.

The message in nearly every
case is the one spelled out in the
title of a pamphlet based on his
speech in 1977 to the Vancouver
convention of the International
Boilermakers’ Union: The Trade
Union Movement — A Partner In
Canada.

The three-point program he
presented to the Boilermakers, and
which he is still trying to sell, can
be summarized as follows:

e Labor and business to become
partners in a multi-partite con-
sultative forum which would meet
four times a year along with
government and ‘possibly con-
sumer and farming represen-
tatives.

:-@ Labor and business to sit on a
national monitoring agency’ to
report on price and wage changes.

e Labor and business to commit
themselves to exercise. voluntary
restraint following the removal of
wage controls.

Although the Canadian Labor
Congress Manifesto for Canada
adopted in convention in 1976 was
quietly dropped in 1978, its basic
idea of collaborating with business
to make the capitalist system work
more efficiently is still current in
the labor movement.

debate on tripartism still raging

A different approach, however,
was explored by Sam Gindin,
research director for the United
Automobile Workers Union, when
he addressed a conference on in-

dustrial. democracy at the
University of Toronto last
November.

The speaker posed a few hard

LABOR
COMMENT

BY JACK PHILLIPS

questions for the advocates of
tripartism. For example: ‘How
can we sit-down and expect
anything from corporations that
fight us in numerous organizing
drives across the country to deny
the very existence of trade unions?
Corporations that will move plants
and equipment — our jobs — in
search of higher profits with little
or no regard for the workers, the
community, or the economy as a
whole?”’

He told the conference, ‘‘The
essence of a capitalist economy is
that the basic economic decisions
of setting prices, determining
priorities, deciding the level and
geographical allocation of in-
vestment are concentrated in
private coprorations. The state is
therefore severely restricted in its
ability to guarantee full em-

PACIFIC TRIBUNE—June 16, 1978—Page 12

ployment price stability, income
redistribution and other working
class demands.”’

The ‘‘consensus’’ that John
Munro is calling for mans that
everyone must take it for granted
that the capitalist economy will
prevail. The implication is that
labor voluntarily agrees to a
subordinate position in society.
That is precisely the concept that
Gindin rejected in his paper. He
accused Canadian capitalism of
having failed to convert our in-
credible natural wealth and highly
skilled manpower into a_ strong
manufacturing base. He defined its
industrial strategy as one of
essentially arguing for and using
the state to enforce wage restraint
and more subsidies (less taxes) to
big business.

“The point is’ he said, ‘that
tripartism will not be able to
provide the goods. Job security,

rising living standards, improved

working conditions, greater
equality all imply fundamental
challenges to corporate power, yet

- the very essence of tripartism is

labor’s acquiescence to main-
taining the essentials of the status
guo.””

All experienced trade unionsts
know that labor cannot refuse to
have consultations and
negotiations with employers and
with government agencies at
various levels. In fact, as Gindin
pointed out, labor wants more
consultation and information about

the financial status of cor- |.

porations, consultation prior to
introduction of technological
change and consultation before
plants can be shut down or major
layoffs occur.

Gindin followed that with this
significant statement: “But we do
not want to enter into such
discussions on the basis of any
presumed consensus’ about
management rights and corporate

freedom to control their capital.

The basic issue involved is power
and we do not accept the
inalienable rights of corporate
power. We consider the economic
relations of our society to be not
only unequal but. also un-
democratic.”

As an alternative to tripartism,
the paper advanced three points:

e Rejection of Labor’s in-
tegration into capitalist in-
stitutions in favor of integrating

does not in itself constitute a f

debate. ~

workers into the working ¢a®
movement, + eae
e Rather than depending %
tripartite consultation to achieY
our goals, the main focus should
to strengthen the independence di
organized labor. eS
e The trade union leaders?
must increase its links. to
membership by. speaking out 0
the issues that concern them. Th
will mean fighting for the’ shor
work week, undertaking a ful
damental challenge
management rights at the wot
place and articulating the need f0!
socialist planning at the natiot!
level.
While the paper I have reviewe!

rounded-out program {0
organized labor, it is a positiv®
contribution to the on-going policy

Back the paper that fights for labor —
PACIFIC TRIBUNE

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