Canada

LABOUR IN
ACTION

I sit on a man’s back, choking him and
making him carry me, and yet assure myself
and others that I am very sorry for him and
wish to ease his lot by all possible means
except by getting off his back.

— Leo Tolstoy

Tolstoy wrote those words at the turn
of the century in describing the captains of
industry. It’s still applicable to Prime Min-
ister Brian Mulroney, Finance Minister
Michael Wilson and Thomas d’Aquino,
president of the Business Council on
National Issues.

I’ve dealt before with the issue of labour
leaders sitting down with their business
counterparts. Such meetings are viewed
with a great deal of skepticism at the best
of times by workers and the Left.

But when you consider that one of these
meetings took place less than a week
before the Feb. 1 Toronto meeting of
ranking officers of the Canadian Labour
Congress, there is an added reason for
concern.

The Left has been critical of the CLC
for its involvement in the Canadian
Labour Market and Productivity Centre
(CLMPC) — a body co-chaired by CLC
president Shirley Carr and d’Aquino.

On Jan. 25 and 26, the CLMPC met to
discuss adjustment issues in light of the
free trade agreement.

Who was there? For the deal were:
Stelco boss John D. Allan; Bennett, vice-
president of Manufacturers Life Insu-
rance; Robert Colosimo, vice-president of
CP Rail; A.E. Matthews, vice-president of
Ford Motor (Canada); James McCambly,
President, Canadian Federation of Labour
(the only labour leader in Canada to
openly support the deal), and others.

Against the deal were Shirley Carr;
CLC executive vice-president Nancy
Riche; Gerard Docquier of Steel; John
Fryer,president of the National Union of
Provincial Government Employees ; Cliff
Evans of the United Food and Commer-
cial Workers; Ontario Federation of
Labour president Gord Wilson; Jim Hun-
ter, Canadian Brotherhood Railway,
Transport and General Workers, and oth-
ers.

At the CLC’s February meeting, affil-
iated leaders stressed that any discussion
that labour undertakes with government-
sponsored bodies must take place around
labour’s agenda. That point was driven
home by Leo Gerard, president of District
6 of the Steelworkers.

Although not government-sponsored,
the CLMPC meeting clearly had govern-
ment support. Reports of the meeting
reveal labour’s agenda was not put for-
ward.

The press release from the two-day
event says: “Key leaders of Canada’s busi-
ness and labour communities concluded
yesterday an historic and successful two-
day Forum on Adjustment described by
participants as a breakthrough in business-
labour dialogue.”

This “historic breakthrough” was a

_ meeting of the minds around how to

“manage” change, and to find an effective
means for joint business-labour co-
operation to “facilitate” change.

Meeting sent ‘wrong signal’

We also find that six labour and busi-
ness leaders have been working on this for
the past year. Hyman Solomon of. the
Financial Post writes: “‘Six Canadian bus-
iness and labour leaders came together for
a year to assess one of the hottest political
issues of the day, produced a slew of sug-
gested improvements not likely to cost the
earth, and never once blamed free trade
for the upsetting changes now buffeting
Canadian industry and its workers.”

If you think there is a contradiction
between the January and February meet-
ing, there is. How can leaders of the trade
union movement sit down with business
and not raise the trade deal, and restruc-
turing?

At the same time, how could they fail to
advance labour’s agenda which deals with
free trade, privatization, deregulation, and
offers an alternative?

I’m not prepared to condemn out of
hand what happened at January’s CLMPC,
even though I expect nothing from right-
wing leaders like the CFL’s McCambly.

Undoubtedly most of the labour partic-
ipants had their members’ interests at
heart. But unless labour goes into these
meetings armed with its own program, its
ends up discussing what business wants.

If labour leaders sit down with big-
business or government, it must be with a
strategy that includes sharing the wealth of
this country, a fair tax system, and a
planned economy that puts people before
profits.

Business leaders are steeled in their own
class ideological and political interests. Sit-
ting on the CLMPC or co-chairing it sends
all the wrong signals to the corporations
that labour is prepared to consider their
neo-conservative agenda.

To paraphrase Tolstoy, we have to start
getting these people off workers’ backs.

A warning on regional subsidies

On Feb 24, the U.S. Commerce Depart-
ment slapped a massive countervailing duty
on steel rails bound for the U.S. market,
produced by Sysco in Sydney, N.S. The
punitive duty, which will more than double
the price of Sysco rail to U.S. customers,
comes less than two months after the ratifi-
cation of the free trade agreement (FTA).

According to industry and _ political
observers, the “retaliatory action” confirms
the argument of the Pro-Canada Network
and others that the agreement, while accel-

exported to the U.S. market and, according
to Sysco spokesperson Harvéy MacLeod,
the company had already delivered all of its
1989 U.S. orders prior to the ruling.

The decision, however, seems designed
not to make a specific impact on
Sysco — the Canadian producer meets less
than one-half of one per cent of USS. rail
requirements — but rather to send a more

-far-reaching message concerning U.S. trade
‘attitudes on “subsidies.” Under the terms of

the agreement, the definition of unfair sub-

Miguel Figueroa

FROMTHE MARITIMES

International Trade Minister John Crosbie
gave similar assurances to the Canadian
people.

Both Liberal leader Vince MacLean and
the New Democrat’s Alexa McDonough
asked last week for an emergency debate in
the Nova Scotia legislature on the issue, but
Premier Buchanan denied there was any
connection between the Sysco ruling and
the FTA, and refused the debate.

Another disturbing aspect of the U.S.
ruling is both federal and provincial grants
to the modernization program were cited as
“unfair subsidies.” In effect, the ruling is
suggesting that, as far as the U.S. Com-
merce Dept. is concerned, a grant by a pro-
vince to its own Crown corporation will
henceforth be considered “unfair’’.

Conversely, if Sysco was privately owned
by a large transnational, a capital invest-

ment grant from the parent corporation to -

its struggling subsidiary would not be con-
sidered a “subsidy.”
While this neo-conservative economic

Poverty |

groups set
to march
on Ont.

legislature 1

Special to the Tribune
Ontario’s anti-poverty movement —
expects an April 8 rally in front of —
Queen’s Park to be the most powerful —

action on the poverty the province _

will have seen for decades.

The rally will be the culmination of |
athree-pronged march leaving Wind- _

sor, Ottawa and Sudbury on March ~

24 bound for Toronto. In every —

major community along the three
routes,

reception committees are —

being pulled together to rally the ©

poor and their allies to press the pro- _

vincial government to take action —

against poverty.

The march is organized by the i

Campaign Against Poverty, a newly-

formed coalition of anti-poverty —
groups, supported by labour, church —
and community groups, with the 4

backing of the New Democratic —

Party caucus in the Ontario legisla- _ ,
ture. .

The marchers are demanding new fH

priorities for the provincial agenda, _

Number one is the stamping out of |
hunger, homelessness and poverty,
They are calling on the government _ :

of Premier David Peterson to include :

provisions of the implementation of —
stage one of the Social Assistance _
Review Committee Report (SARC) ©
in the upcoming budgets.

Two years in the making, the f
SARC report calls for ela
action to deal with some of the worst —
effects of the “welfare trap,” includ- _ :
ing an increase in social assistance —
benefits from between 10.1 and 22.5 —
per cent.

|

“If after years of telling us they :

want to ‘forge a system of social

assistance that can meet the chal- —

lenges of the 1990s and beyond,’ this
government balks at the modest stage
one recommendation of the SARC

Report, then they will stand con- ‘|
demned and half a million men, —

women and children will continue to
slide into deeper misery,”
John Clarke, who is organizing the

charged

Windsor-Toronto leg of the march,

However, as Campaign Against —
Poverty prepares for its march —
government leaders, including Treas- _

urer Robert Nixon, are sending out

signals that this may be precisely the x

course they are charting. -

“The poor of Ontario have had to #1

thinking should come as no surprise, it is
nonetheless a strong indicator that the U.S.
will press for an extremely reactionary defi-
nition of “unfair subsidy” during the FTA
negotiations, one which would not only res-

- trict regional development programs, social
services and employment benefits, but also
inherently discriminate against public sector
ownership of resources and/or manufactur-
ing in Canada.

NDP leader McDonough’ had good
advice for Buchanan when she called on
him to ask Prime Minister Brian Mulroney
to give the necessary six months notice to
cancel the trade deal before “disastrous
results ... begin to unfold for Nova Scotia”
and all of Canada.

endure sub-poverty wages and a
social assistance system rooted in the —
British Poor Laws because successive _
Tory and Liberal governments have
been able to regard them as powerless _
and friendless,” Clarke noted. :
“It is the distinct misfortune of —
David Peterson that he heads the —
government which happens to be in
power when this ceases to be the case. —
The poor and unemployed are organ- —
izing and, with their allies, challeng-
ing poverty through collective action. —
There is no doubt that the Campaign —
Against Poverty will mark a major —
development in this struggle,” Clarke _
predicted. |

sidies is still subject to negotiation over the
next five to seven years.

It is highly significant that in its prelimi-
nary ruling, the U.S. Commerce Dept.
singled out regional development programs
as a legitimate target for countervail action.

Prior to the Nov. 21 election, Nova Scotia
Tory premier John Buchanan had expressed
reservations over the FTA, with particular
reference to fears that regional programs
would be threatened under the pact. Buch-
anan later said he had received specific assu-
rances from Prime Minister Brian Mulroney
that. general regional development pro-
grams would be exempt from U.S. counter-
vail action. .

In the last week of the election campaign,

erating the sellout of Canada’s natural
resources and economic and political sover-
eignty, will not guarantee unrestricted Can-
adian access to the American market.

The interim ruling, which is subject to
final determination in June, upheld the
complaint lodged against Sysco by Bethle-
hem Steel Corp. Bethlehem had accused the
provincially-owned Sydney Steel of receiv-
ing “unfair government subsidies” during
its current modernization program.

The staggering 103.5 per cent duty is not .
actually expected to have much short-term
impact on Sysco. Sydney Steel produces rail
primarily for the domestic market and for
developing countries in Africa and Asia.
Only three per cent of Sysco’s production is

8s Pacific Tribune, March 13, 1989

i OE > ee a ay a See