6 WESTERN CANADIAN LUMBER WORKER PRESIDENTS COLUMN BY JOE MORRIS A Membership Job This issue of our publication carries the facts about unemploy- ment and e ses an attempt to gloss over its implications. The reason for this is plainly to be seen. Rising unemployment is a threat to the job security of every employed worker. Our campaign to combat unemployment requires the cooperation of every person now in employment. It is also disclosed that the rate of economic growth in Canada is slowing down. Unless something - is done to correct this situation, we "| will have not less, _ but more unem- ployment. Politi- cal soothsayers conceal The situation is oats a being aggravated ORE by the rapid in- troduction of labour-saving devices. On all sides workers are being dis- placed and discarded. No effective plan exists for the re-placement of such workers. The effects are obvious. No man can be sure of steady employment. The employers have seized the op- portunity to keep wages down. Sweat Shops Exposed British Columbia has long been recognized as the most highly un- ionized province in Canada and yet in the garment industry in Van- couver, sweatshops are flourishing because the public won’t take the trouble to buy products bearing the union Iabel. John McNevin, President of the Needle Trades Council states that because the public takes this attitude, men and women are forced to work in the needle trades in unorganized plants for less money than most workers pay their baby sitters. 45¢ Per Hour In Montreal, the minimum start- ing rate for beginners in the needle trades is 83 cents per hour, in Van- couver the starting rate is 45 cents per hour. This appears bad, but look at the differential in wages for ex- perienced help. In Montreal, it is $1.04 per hour; and in Vancouver it is 60 cents per hour. Wages however, are not the only criteria when you hear about the case of the girl in a plant who at the employer’ s insistence works 52 hours in one week, and who is put on piece work rates and earns the mag- nificent sum of $27.00. Or take the case of the girl who worked four years for one company and receives the magnificent sum of 70 cents per hour and then is laid off because her job becomes automated. This girl was given no opportunity to learn a new job, was merely thrown aside because she was of no further use to the employer. Dismissal Threat These conditions exist for various reasons — unemployment, new Can- adians not familiar with the laws. Employers use the minimum wage for protection and use the threat of dismissal as a weapon to keep wages down and can in this devious way force these people to work for 60 cents per hour Council Formed The Clothing Workers Unions in Vancouver have formed a Needles Trades Council. This Council with the assistance of the C.L.C. Region- al Office, the B.C. Federation of Labour, and the Labour Councils throughout British Columbia, are commencing a “protest campaign” against the unorganized employers in an effort to abolish sweatshop condi- tions. The campaign is starting on December 4th and all Trade Union- ists and the General Public will be urged to purchase only Union Label Clothing. C. J. MURDOCH Please Contact Jackson at Suite 6 855 Thurlow St. Vancouver 5, MU 4-6045 Are Workers Indifferent? At representative meetings o trade unionists, held recently, it has been claimed that workers on the job are indifferent to the threat of mass unemployment. This is difficult to believe. When one in every twelve is out of work, almost every home is touched by the problem. If workers are indifferent, it is only because they have been Jed to believe that unemployment is something that must be endured as inevitable. It may be because they have not been sold on trade union plans to rid this country of unemployment in all forms. This is not a time to use crying towels. The trade union movement has made definite proposals for economic adjustments that will rem- edy unemployment. These proposals lack public support. The workers form the largest part of the public. The workers, through united action can wield a tremendous influence on public opinion. Governments cannot afford to ignore an aroused public opinion. Make the Facts Known Our first job is to make the facts known. We must counter the propa- “ ganda which claims that the situa- tion will soon right itself automati- cally. The public should know that the situation is rapidly growing worse. In every plant, in every com- munity, workers can tell the story of dozens of applicants for every job, and how fewer men must now produce more. The bigger the army of jobless, the greater the danger to established wages and job security. Every worker can easily convince his fellow-workers, and his neigh- bours that sensible economic plan- ning, with full employment as the aim, will vastly improve the situa- tion. The winter works program is failing miserably to meet the situa- tion. Economic plans should include all industry, and government at all levels. There is pienty of work waiting to be done. We have the materials and the men to do this work. It is folly to say that such work is financially impossible. The end result of unem- ployment is much more costly. Work To Be Done The trade union movement pro- poses that we should immediately engage in building the schools, the hospitals, the universities, the access roads, the better highways to relieve traffic congestion, the thousand and one projects that are required for decent social living. Organized labour has a long list of proposals, all of them entirely feasible. I ask only that these be ex- amined and talked about on the job and in the community. One proposal stands out promin- ently — a shorter work week with the same take-home pay. Rather than have workers thrown on the scrap- heap, we must seek to spread the available employment. It took a bitter struggle to win the nine-hour day, and then the eight-hour day. The employers fought each change as being ruin- ous. We have another struggle in the offing that will need every one of us. . ETAL WHOLESAL. , AFL-Ci9 ON TRIKE a PEARSoy HARON 2.6) t7p ‘s “2 AETAN WHOLESALE ee AFL-CIO STRIKE ee ie TAYLOR PUARSOI & CARSON Seat & ot 1yo.