Friday, July 1, 1977

> 45

VOL. 39, No. 26

PACIFIC

BUNE

Bri Arlt.

have you
| po Shame.
' Low are sfi

Poilf

Their numbers indicating the swift — and unanimous — response to
Bill Vander Zalm’s proposed bill abolishing the Vancouver Resources

\0S7eS 73
Biz

6c iE

Board, more than 400 people gathered outside the Legislature

BOuTH =
Van COVVER m C

Tuesday to demand that the government “’kill the bill.”

—Sean Griffin photo

Public rip-off charged

The announcement last Thur-
Sday by federal energy minister
Alastair Gillespie that the price of
oil and natural gas will go up 41
Percent over the next 18 months
has been described as ‘‘the biggest
"ip-off of the public since the days
of the transcontinental railway
Scandals,”’

Ina sharply-worded telegram to
ape minister Pierre Trudeau, C.

- Jackson, president of the United
Electrical, Radio and Machine

orkers Union (UE), charged that

€ federal government was

“bowing and scraping to the
demands of the petroleum
monopolies”’ by granting them the
41 percent price hike.

In his announcement Gillespie
blamed higher crude oil prices,
and said that in the next two years
the price of a gallon of gasoline will
rise by 14 cents and heating oil will
go up by 12.4 cents a gallon in the
same period.

The federal energy minister said
that the increases will come in four
stages, $1 a barrel every six
months starting this July 1,

NEB pipeline decision

; A decision of major importance
or all Canadians is expected
Onday when the National Energy
z ard hands down its report and
of ommendations on construction
4 northern pipeline.
board announced Tuesday
that it will be ready with its report
fo € hearings into applications
; T the northern pipelines which
larted in October, 1975. The two
Major applications before the
ard are the MacKenzie Valley
peline project and the Alaska
Shway (Alcan) project. the
fe as will recommend to the
le cabinet whether a pipeline
uld be built and which of the two
Proposals should be approved.
to © federal cabinet is expected
Make its decision on the pipeline
4S Summer, and prime minister
€rre Trudeau has indicated that

‘expected next Monday

his government intends to meet the
deadline set down by U.S.
president Jimmy Carter for a
decision by Canada by September

; Plans for the MacKenzie Valley
Pipeline received a severe setback
in the report of Justice Thomas
Berger who recommended that a
decision on the pipeline be delayed
for 10 years and that in the
meantime steps be taken to solve
the problems of native rights and
claims. Although there was wide
public support for _the Berger
Report recommendations, there is
no indication that Ottawa will take
them seriously. In recent weeks
there has been a media campaign
aimed at discrediting the Berger
Commission on the grounds that
See PIPELINE, pg. 12

bringing the price to $13.75 a barrel
in 1979. Natural gas will also rise
by 17.5 cents a thousand cubic feet
on August 1 and a further 17 cents
next February 1. Further in-
creases for 1978 are still to be set in

discussions with the major
producing province, Alberta, next
spring.

Gillespie’s announcement in-
dicated that after two years the
new price hikes will have added an
average $88 to the yearly cost of
driving an automobile, $80 to $124
to the cost of heating a home with
oil and $84 to $112 to the cost of
heating with natural gas.

‘Pretty dismal news for the
Canadian public,” was the way
T.C. Douglas, NDP energy critic in
Parliament, described the
government’s announcement.

In his telegram to the prime
minister, UE president C. S.
Jackson said that ‘‘the duplicity of
your government and the oil
companies in creating a city fear,
and. the blatant placing of
profiteering ahead of people’s
needs, is the antithesis of the
fulminations on democracy so
glibly prated about by your
government.”’

The UE leader said the
argument that higher profits would
stimulate greater exploration of
new energy sources was a specious
one. “This phony argument,” he
said, ‘tis ably given the lie by a
Globe and Mail editorial which
rightly states that no guarantees
are required from the corporations
to ensure that they will invest
increased returns in exploration
and development of new sources of
energy.”

Jackson said the failure of the
Trudeau government to make its
own independent survey of existing
petroleum supplies and future
Canadian needs, while allowing the
oil companies to produce. figures
solely to enhance their continued
high profits, was an act bordering
on the criminal.

“This,” he said, “‘coupled with
their recent strike threats, and
other actions designed to hold the

public at ransom, constitutes the —

biggest rip-off of the public since
See OIL, pg. 3

Four hundred demonstrators
marched on the Legislature
Tuesday, highlighting a week of
protest against the Social Credit
government’s arbitrary decision to
scrap the Vancouver Resources
Board.

But although the protest won a
delay in the passage of Bill 65 — at
least until this Wédnesday when
the cabinet has pledged to meet
with the VRB — the arguments of
the Resources Board supporters
fell on deaf ears in Victoria as
premier Bill Bennett arrogantly
maintained that the bill will go
ahead, in spite of overwhelming
opposition to it.

Vancouver city council added its
voice to the opposition when it
voted nine to two on Tuesday af-
ternoon to demand the provincial
government withdraw the bill that
would centralize all social services
into Vander Zalm’s direct control.

Vancouver alderman Harry
Rankin, founding chairman of the

See WITHDRAW, pg. 3

Press gov't
over Bill 33

Representatives of the Ad Hoc
Committee to Oppose Bill 33 met
with several members of the Social
Credit caucus Wednesday to press
their opposition to the contentious
legislation and although they won
no definite commitment,
spokesmen for the committee
noted that the government is
moving more slowly on the bill and
has been compelled by the protest
to give it closer consideration.

The committee had scheduled
the meeting following the
representative delegation to
Victoria last week. It submitted a
comprehensive brief reiterating
opposition to the principle of
financing private schools with
public funds and called for with-
drawal of Bill 33.

The delegation was made up of
representatives from teachers,
trustees, the labor council as well
as the Home and _ School
Federation.

Employer provocations
charged as hotel closes

Massive labor support for the
striking members of the Canadian
Brotherhood of Railway and
Transport Workers forced the
closure last week of Hotel Van-
couver as the bitter dispute en-
tered its third week amidst em-
ployer thhreats of a permanent
closure and hints of punitive action
by the provincial attorney-
general’s department.

Several hundred unionists from a
number-of Lower Mainland union
locals turned out again iast
Thursday ina mass picket, forcing
Hilton, which manages the CN-
owned hotel to close its doors.
Hilton had sought to keep the
operation going with
strikebreakers some of whom had
been referred by Canada Man-
power.

Unionists also demonstrated

their opposition to the federal
agency’s action last Friday as
some 100 people, led by B.C.
Federation of Labor president
George Johnston,: picketed the
Manpower offices on East Tenth
Avenue in Vancouver.

Johnston called the picket, which
closed the offices, a ‘tangible
reply” to the stand taken by
Manpower and immigration
minister Bud Cullen who had said
in a letter earlier that Manpower’s
referral of unemployed workers to
the Hotel Vancouver constituted
taking a “neutral” position in a
labor dispute.

The decisive support given the
CBRT local by the trade union
movement manifested by the mass
pickets has been successful in
compelling Hilton to back down

See HILTON, pg. 12