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By WILLIAM TURNER

FRIDAY AUGUST 21, 1970.

GOING, GOING, GONE!

~NEW SELLOUT PLANNED

What could be another Roberts Bank steal looms following
remier Bennett’s recent announcement of the provincial
S0vernments endorsement of plans for a super-port at Prince

Rupert.

_- Press reports of Bennett’s speech to a civic luncheon in the

Northern city are colored with his concern for lack of jobs and the
tax drain that hampers northern development. .

This, he opines, can be
Temedied by federal-provincial
S0vernment expenditures of
axpayers money to assist in
development of a super- port as
Part of ‘‘this great potential port
of Prince Rupert.”

Fresh in the minds of British’

Olumbians are the same false
Promises that Bennett employed
to extol the benefits that would
flow into the economy of B.C.
through the Kaiser planned

Oberts Bank super- port. The

returns to the taxpayer have
been minimal despite the
millions of dollars poured into
the project. What was hailed as
providing thousands of new
jobs in B.C. merely skimmed the

surface of the vast reservoir of _

unemployed.

The Socred government
ignored municipal pleas for finan-
cial aid towards easing the
school and hospital crisis, while

tapping needed public funds to —
-complete the development of

ite

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Hundreds of Unionists and unemployed gathered outside the M &
Building to hear their leaders outline issues.

1vwv

PPR incrcenATiONAL MOCUWORKERS "©
THE VANCOUVER LOCA.
¥

The IWA was prominently featured in the many demonstrations
Staged by Labor to protest management’s obvious objective to

__ Smash labor.

Roberts Bank. A $60 million

budget surplus was siphoned off”
- to the project in one generous

package.

Sheltered behind a facade of
phoney. rhetoric Bennett’s
Prince Rupert speech strives to
conceal another give- away of

B.C. natural resources already ,

in the making. Press reports
confirm that McIntyre Porcu-
pine Mines Ltd., now shipping
coal under a 15 year contract for
30 million tons through Van-
couver’s Neptune Terminals to
Japan, is seeking further
contracts from Japanese inter-
ests. This is obviously condi-
tional on whether the company
receives the blessing of federal-
provincial governments to con-
struct bulk loading facilities on
Ridley Island in Prince Rupert’s
harbor.

McIntyre Porcupine Mines is
one of the largest coal mining
monopolies operating in Canada
with combined capital assets of
$169 million; its net earnings
for 1969 was $10,279,000. Besides
its subsidiaries Loraine Mines,
Radar Corporation, McIntyre
Coal Mines, it has extensive
mining properties in Australia,
New Zealand, and Nevada,
U.S.A.

There can be no doubt that
Premier Bennett and his Socred
government, as the Roberts
Bank project proved, always
lends a willing ear to the
demands voiced by the mono-
polies. British Columbians must
make their voices heard by
calling upon Premier Bennett to
reverse the trend towards
complete monopoly control of
B.C.’s natural resources before
it is too late.

The people should demand
public ownership of all the
province’s natural resources as
part of an industrial program of
urgent priority to process our
raw materials and develop secon-

dary industries. With a new -

peoples’ policy such as this exer-
cising full control over our
resources, thousands of new
jobs could be possible and a
major contribution made to the
economy of British Columbia.

/¢ Iribun

SS

Vol. 31, No. 34

Labor roundup

IWA to ‘thresh out’

report before vote

Locals of the Coast IWA will
hold membership meetings to
discuss recommendations in the
Nemetz report before taking a
final vote on the offer.-The
largest local, 1-217 has scheduled
its meeting for the Queen Eliza-
beth theatre on Sunday, August
22, at 10 a.m.

Government appointed
mediator Mr. Justice Nemetz
who has been conducting the
probe into the forest-industry-
labor dispute for the past three
weeks made his report public on
Monday.

The Vancouver Sun played up
the scant 9 percent per year
increase recommended in the
report in headlines of a size
usually reserved for a second
coming. Premier Bennett and
Labor Minister Peterson were
ecstatic. The general consensus
of rank and file woodworkers
contacted by the Tribune was
that Justice Nemetz had labored
mightily to bring forth a mouse.

Reaction of the forest bosses,
as expressed by spokesman
John Billings, was one of
“extreme disappointment.’’ The
same feeling was shown by some
woodworkers who, within hours
of the release of the report, dis-
tributed leaflets to plants in New
Westminster outlining the
difference between original
union demands and the Nemetz
recommendations.

The leaflet said, ‘‘Your impor-
tant demands were completely
rejected! Considering the wage
increase to other unions, are you
willing to be second best?”’

Labor Minister Peterson and
Premier Bennett see in the sug-
gested 9 percent yearly increase
a basis for settlements at
Kitimat, where steelworkers
are on strike and for pulp
workers. That management in
those industries have been hope-
fully waiting for a ‘‘good’’ from
their point of view — settlement
from Nemetz was revealed by
remarks of Alcan officials to the
Steelworkers Union that “‘they
wanted to wait for the Nemetz
report and then might be able to
negotiate again.”’

Fred Mullen, head of the Pulp
and Paper Workers of Canada,

now on strike at several B.C.
plants, said that the lumber
industry ‘‘could not be com-
pared to the more lucrative pulp
section” and intimated that pulp
workers would not take the
Nemetz recommendations as

the basis for settlement.

***

N.S. FISHERMEN

At the regular meeting of
Vancouver and District Labor
Council on Tuesday night, dele-
gates asked that, the UFAWU
bring a representative of the
striking fishermen of Nova
Scotia to the west coast.

There has been a total
blackout in the press on the Nova
Scotia struggle, said a delegate,
and with rumors of a general
strike in that province, labor in
B.C. was vitally concerned. He
urged that all possible financial
and moral support be given.

One union local has voted to
send $1,000 to the strikers, and
the VLC voted to send another
$100.

Trudeau’s ‘“‘wild accusations”
against labor was brought up ina
letter from the CLC. Affiliates
were urged to tell their M.P.’s to
fight against the Trudeau policy
of creating unemployment in an
alleged fight against inflation.

Bill Stewart of the Marine and
Boilermakers Union said
Trudeau is performing a service
for Big Business interests now
engaged in wage negotiations
with unions such as Steel, Auto-
workers and the IWA. Stewart
noted that Trudeau makes no
mention of the 27 percent profit
increase in one year made by the
banks.

‘“‘Trudeau is engaged in
spreading the Big Lie,’’ he
charged, ‘‘and it is as dangerous
as Hitlers.”

** *

V.L.C. delegates are
protesting to the federal Justice
Department the activities of a
new police force set up by the
harbors board on the water-
front. A Longshoremen’s
delegate said the force had been
very active snapping pictures of
striking workers from Leland
Motors who were picketing the

See Labor, Pg. 8