Boycott

For the sake of Canadian
independence, for the
sake of peace, and for the
sake of Canada’s athletes,
the decision to boycott the
Moscow Olympics must
be rescinded. See editor-
ial, page 4.

ANN FAIR AT TENT SITE . .

- rent gouging, zero vacancy “literally driving us out into the street.”

CP meet

An estimation that the
Socred government is on
shaky ground, a new eco-
nomic strategy for B.C.,
and a policy resolution on
childcare highlighted the
Communist Party provin-
cial convention last week-
end, page 3.

TRIBUNE PHOTO— SEAN GRIFFIN

Tent housing coming closer
to reality for many renters

Tenants pitching tents in va-
cant lots? ...or living in cars? It
may not be too farfetched for
thousands of B.C. tenants like
Richmond renter and single
parent, Ann Fair.

Fair was hit with a rent increase
of $168 and told by the Ren-
talsman that there was no legal
recourse to roll it back. She and
her three-year-old daughter are
living in one of an estimated
30,000 rental units built since
1974 which are exempted from
rent controls under a section in
the Residential Tenancy Act.

With the current crisis in affor-
dable rental accommodation, the
proposed increase ‘‘will literally
drive me and others like me into
the streets, tents, cars, or
anything in the way of shelter,”’
Fair said.

Rancho Realty, the landlord of
Fair’s apartment block and two
other buildings on Bennett Road
in Richmond, is demanding rent
increases anywhere from 19.1
percent to 78.5 percent. One
2-bedroom suite will go from
$345 a month to $615, Fair noted.

“These suites are neither lux-
ury or executive suites,’ she
declared. ‘‘They are base-line, ne
amenity suites filling a eritical

need within Richmond for family
and senior accommodation.’?

Fair and fellow tenants recently
formed their own organization,
the Bennett Road Tenant
Organization — one ofa growing
number of tenant groups mobiliz-
ing at the apartment level.

Last Thursday, about 80
tenants from the Bennett Road
buildings had a meeting to plan
how they will fight their schedul-
ed rent increases, beginning with
municipal council.

They, along with other tenant
groups will be pressing Richmond
council Monday to draw other
municipal councils into the fight
against rent-gouging landlords.

The newly-formed Greater
Vancouver Renters Association,
an umbrella organization of te-
nant and community groups, has
also made the plight of tenants
living in post-1974 buildings the
focus of its first campaign.

Last Friday, GVRA president,
Tom Lalonde, and members pit-
ched a tent on a vacant lot owned
by Vancouver city on the corner
of 7th Street and Pine.

Lalonde called the tent a ‘‘sym-
bol’’ for tenants who can’t afford
the exorbitant rent increases,
and can’t find other, more affor-

dable accommodation. ‘‘There’s
simply no other place to go,”’ he
said,

‘We are calling for the provin-
cial government to enact
emergency legislation so that
tenants in post-1974 buildings are
given an avenue of appeal under
section 70 of the Residential
Tenancy Act,”’ Lalonde said.

He noted that this legislation
should be made retroactive so
that those tenants who paid ex-
orbitant increases when the hous-
ing crisis first hit, can also appeal.

The GVRA has also started a
petition campaign to build sup-
port for its ‘‘long term
objectives,”’ including seven per-
cent controls for all rental units in
B.C., inclusion of all rental ac-
commodation under the Residen-
tial Tenancy Act and provincial
funds to begin construction of af-
fordable housing.

Planned for early next week isa
lobby to Victoria, where GVRA
members will be meeting with Jim
Nielson, minister of consumer
and corporate affairs.

‘Not only will we be pressing
for appeals for post-1974 residen-
cies, but funding for tenants’
organizations,’’ Lalonde said.

oa

‘BC. Convention

Delegates ad Visitors
y unist Party

Freeze rates
say councils

Vancouver city council has join-
ed with Port Coquitlam and Maple
Ridge municipal councils in
demanding a freeze on mortgage
interest rates from the federal
government.

Vancouver council voted eight
to one Tuesday to approve a mo-
tion placed by COPE alderman
Harry Rankin calling on the federal
government to ‘“‘pass legislation
which would freeze for a cooling
off period, at their originally
negotiated individual rates, all
home mortgages up for renewal
during 1980.” om

The motion also called on the
federal government to send respon-
sible ministers to the Lower
Mainland to discuss with
homeowners and councils ‘‘the
precise details of legislation needed
to protect people’s homes and liv-
ing standards.”

Only right wing NPA alderman
George Puil opposed Rankin’s mo-
tion, arguing that a freeze was a
“simplistic”? solution with ‘‘many
ramifications.”

Rankin cited action taken by the
federal government in the depres-
sion years as proof that it can con-
trol rates if it wants to. ‘“Why

should the mortgage companies
take less than they can get?’’ he
asked, ‘‘Because of the public
good.”

The number of foreclosures is
mounting rapidly, he said, urging
aldermen to visit the courts to see
first hand the effect of the crisis in
interest rates.

Thecurrent 17% percent interest
rate is almost double the inflation
rate, he added, while most people
in Vancouver have seen their real
incomes fall in relation to inflation.

Rankin’s motion followed a
pledge he made to raise the issue to
a public rally on mortgage rates
sponsored by the Association to
Control Mortgage Rates.

Also this week, ACMR was suc-
cessful in having similar motions
passed by Port Coquitlam and
Maple Ridge council. In Maple
Ridge Monday, ACMR represen-
tative Elmer Walske’s appeal for a
freeze was met with spontaneous
applause from a packed council
chamber.

Richmond has the ACMR posi-
tion under review, and Burnaby
and New Westminster councils will
hear from the organization next
week.

China aided fascists,
secret papers reveal

Confidential Chilean documents
released Apr. 12 by a Vietnamese
newspaper have revealed that the
Chinese embassy in Chile col-
laborated with the fascist junta in
repressing the Chilean people even
to the extent of supplying ‘“‘lists of
leftist organizations and persons as
well as their activities over a
number of years.”’

The Vietnamese newspaper
Nhan Dan, printed in Hanoi,
published in full three confidential
documents from the Chilean
Presidential Palace and the Na-
tional Intelligence Agency which
reveal not only close links between
Peking and the military junta but
also show cooperation between
Chinese and Chilean intelligence,
and cooperation on nuclear
technology.

One document, dated March 2,
1978, was a letter sent from
Pinochet to Air Force General
Gustavo Leigh Guzman, in which
the Chilean dictator rejected
Leigh’s objections to Chile-China
cooperation.

“The government of People’s
China has on various occasions
publicly expressed its differences
on many points with the over-
thrown Marxist regime and missed
no opportunities to unmask the
fraud about the so-called ‘peaceful
road to socialism,’ ’’ Pinochet told
Leigh. “‘Their relations have never
been friendly. Certainly, you have
not forgotten the fact that the
Chinese ambassador in Santiago
himself has provided us with a
complete list of the leftist organiza-

See CHINA page 12