2 |e oon

BRITISH COLUMBIA —

Countries with nuclear armaments
should follow the Soviet Union’s exam-
ple and declare a moratorium on
nuclear-weapons testing, delegates to a
special peace conference for youth
agreed last week. :

Gathered in the Doukhobor com-
munity of Brilliant, in Castlegar, 105
young delegates from 15 countries also
called on their governments to promote
cultural and educational exchanges
among youth, and specifically urged the
B.C. government to establish the now-
vacant David Thompson University
Centre in nearby Nelson as a “global
peace institute.”

John ‘J.J.” Verigin, one of the organ-
izers of the four-day conference, summed
up the event as “enriching” for its youth-
ful participants. ee

= We don't
expect the world
to be transformed
because of this
conference, but
we thing young
people were in-
spired by it,”
Verigin, son of

the Doukhobor ;
community John Sates
Verigin and a

direct descendent VERIGIN

of the Russian-speaking community’s
orginal founder, commented.

“There’s always been a high degree of
social consciousness in the Kootenays,”
he observed, noting the area’s strong
contributions to the Tools for Peace
campaign for Nicaragua, and the recent
famine relief drive for Ethiopia.

Because 1985 is the United Nations’
declared International Year of Youth,
Verigin’s organization — the Union of
Spiritual Communities of Christ — co-
ordinated the conference with the United
Nations Association of Canada’s B.C.
chapter, and Operation Dismantle.

Collectively the organizations raised
funds, with financial assistance from the
offices of the Secretary of State for
Youth, the Arms Control and Disar-

‘Match Soviets’ test ban,’
urges youth peace meet

mament Division of the External Affairs
Department, and the Canadian Institute
for International Peace and Security.

Verigin said the focus was on
youth —the average age of delegates was
an estimated 22 years — but the confer-
ence was also open to the general public.

Many Canadian youth are pessimistic
about their future, said Verigin, citing a
computer test at Expo 86’s information
centre which found only a 38-per cent
positive response from youth concerning
their expectations for the future.

As for the general public, “many peo-
ple are apathetic about the arms race;
and consider their first priority putting
food on the table. But information at a
conference can show the link between
that and the arms race,” he said.

Between 600 and 700 people, includ-
ing Castlegar’s mayor and some alder-
men, attended the conference, which ran
Aug. 27-31.

Of the 30 countries invited, 15 were
able to send delegates. While delegates
from the Soviet Union were unable to
attend, several Soviet resource people,
including Sergei Plekhanov, head of the
USSR’s Canada-U.S. Institute were on
hand as resource people.

Noting Soviet leader Mikhail Gorba-
chev’s announced six-month morato-
rium on nuclear testing and the offer to
extend that period indefinitely if the Uni-
ted States responded in kind, delegates
recommended “that countries with
nuclear capability follow the recent
Soviet example of a moratorium on
nuclear testing and furthermore nego-
tiate a comprehensive test ban treaty.”

Following a presentation from a Gua-
temalan delegate, the plenary declared its
“solidarity with the Guatemalan dele-
gates...and condemn(ed) the existing
state of affairs in that country.”

Other resolutions included:

@ A call to boycott transnational cor-
porations “that sustain repressive regimes
and fuel the arms race;”

@ A call on governments to support a
yearly Peace Through Communication
conference for their youth.

Schools report shows

elected boards backed

Continued from page 1

“However, without that, the fairest way"

to go is an election. It’s a sham of demo-

- cracy to continue with an appointed person

running the affairs of the Vancouver school
board,” she said.

VESTA, along with the Vancouver
Secondary School Teachers Association,
led the “reinstate the board” campaign last
spring and throughout the summer.

David Cadman, secretary-treasurer of
the Vancouver Municipal and Regional
Employees Union, said the VMREU would
“support the call for an election forthwith.

“We think it’s high time. Our chief fear
right now is the wholesale firesales of land
(appointed trustee Allan) Stables is propos-
ing. He’s making some critical long-term
decisions that will affect the region for years.
Right now the Vancouver school system is
being run from Victoria,” Cadman charged.

The sale of school board land —first
proposed by Stables shortly after his
appointment last May, as a means of cir-
cumventing provincial cutbacks — made
news Aug. 27 with the announcement that

the trustee was examining the sale of the

southwest block of Broadway and Gran-
ville, site of the board’s offices. — .

Stables is also considering closing five
schools, or school annexes, next year,
according to a report submitted to the city
planning commission.

The Socred-appointed trustee is planning
the land sales and school closures — fol-
lowing policies which go against the grain of
everything the COPE trustees stood
for — to raise: cash for an endowment
fund,

But in seeking to create his fund, Stables
has ignored the board’s practice of seeking
parent input into proposed school closures
and land sales. The reason for his haste is
apparent in that the trustee is already delib-
erating the next school budget, for the 1986-
87 academic year.

By doing so, Stables is violating the Dec.
31, 1986 cutoff for the “restraint” program,
trustees and parents charged at the press

conference called by COPE last week.

Weinstein hit the sale of school property
and the school closures, saying: “It belongs
to the people of Vancouver, they paid for i
and they should have a say in its disposi-
tion.”

The former board chairman reminded
reporters that more than 13,000 British
Columbians signed a petition calling for the

trustees’ reinstatement shortly after the —

spring firing, and that a June 18 delegation —
to Victoria consisted of people “from the

length and breadth of the province.”
Monica Simonson, chair of the VSB’s

school consultative committee, the parents’
advisory organization; and Marina Nevi 4
of the committee’s west end division echoed :

the call for a fall election.

Unclear yet is whether Heinrich plans to”
cancel school board elections in Cowichan, -
the Vancouver Island district whose nine
trustees were fired shortly after the dismissal”
of the Vancouver board, also for refusing to”

implement ministry-ordered cutbacks.
Former Cowichan board chairman Je

Joyce said it was unclear from the minister's”
remarks last week if elections for the
board — which under normal circumstan-"
ces would determine half the board’
seats —would proceed, but noted that
“parents and other groups are calling for it.”

“If you read Let’s Talk About Schools

you can see that the public wants locally”

elected boards,” he said.

Among its findings the study, which

received submissions from some 25,000 par
ticipants last spring, discovered that
majority of British Columbians feel th

quality of education has declined during the

past five years, and more than 70 per cent —
think current school financing is below ;

community expectations.

The report’s findings were a clear slap in :
the face to the Socred cutbacks, and vindi-~

cated the trustees who have spoken out ~

against increasingly declining budgets.

COPE has set a special meeting, at which —

school board candidates will be nominated,

for Sunday, Sept. 22.

The report of the director of planning,
to council’s committee on community
issues, on social changes in the economy
confirms with statistics what all of us
know from personal experience — namely

_ that the economy is still in bad shape (des-
pite the so-called recovery) and for many
people it will get a lot worse.

Real economic growth in B.C. during
1984 was nil. Capital expenditures, busi-
ness investments and housing starts were
all down while unemployment was up.
There has been a slow and slight
improvement in the Canadian economy,
especially in eastern Canada, but, the
director states, “conditions in B.C. have
remained the same as they were in the
midst of the recession, and in some instan-
ces conditions are much worse.”

During the first quarter of 1984, the

| national economy grew at the rate of 3.6

_ per cent due to increased consumer spend-
ing and a building up of business invento-
ries, but the level of business investment
(the decisive factor in any real recovery)
remained low.

In May of this year, we had 198,000
people unemployed in B.C., with 91,000 of
them in metro Vancouver.

‘Unemployment increased dramatically
for older workers, and “reports of severe
emotional problems being experienced by
oa workers who lose their jobs are

becoming common.”

- For the past six months there has been a
steady increase in the unemployment rate
for women in B.C.

The proportion of those unemployed
for longer periods has increased to an all
time high of 47 per cent. More than half of
this number have been unemployed for
more thana year, which means they are no
longer eligible for unemployment insu-
rance and must rely on welfare payments.

The number of part-time workers in
B.C. continues to increase. In March
89,000 part-time workers reported that
they needed or wanted full time work.

The average wage figure has remained
stable for the past two years, rising only
2.8 per cent in that time, while the cost of

living increased by 8.5 per cent. Thus, in.

real terms, “the value of average weekly
earnings has decreased 5.7 per cent in two
years.”

A management consultant firm reported
that as far as family incomes are con-
cerned, the top 20 per cent received 42 per
cent of all income, while the lowest 20 per
cent received only four per cent. It is not
surprising then to learn that only “the top
20 per cent are better off in 1984 compared
to 1980.”

In February there were 135,847 welfare
cases in B.C., with 26,588 in the Van-
couver area. The figures continue to climb.

City jobless stats show fallacy of ‘restraint’

At the same time the staff administering
welfare has been cut by 25 per cent.
Former provincial ombudsman Karl
Friedmann reported that complaints are
increasing about the “ever more restrictive
policies that seek to stem the tide of
demands by making it adminstratively
more difficult to become or remain eligible
for income assistance.” (For reporting
these and other facts truthfully, Fried-
mann was fired and replaced by a former

top officer of the RCMP, closely tied in
with the Social Credit bureaucracy.)

Grace McCarthy, the minister of
human resources, no longer supplies fig-
ures on the total number of recipients who
are on welfare, but previous figures indi-
cate that the number now stands at 51,200
Spica in Vancouver and 258,000 in
Be.

The total number of people receiving
either unemployment insurance or welfare
in B.C. is now approximately 501,000,

about one in five of the total population.

A few more facts from the report of the
director of planning:

© Rents have increased in all neighbor-
hoods;

@ Vancouver has only 60 daycare cen-
tre with spaces for only 1,531 children, and
over half of these are experiencing finan-
cial difficulties. The prospect is that some
will have to close down in the near future;

@ The Vancouver Food Bank is distri-
buting 3,000 bags of food a month, “but
people are still being turned away because
there isn’t enough to go around.” The
food bank has announced its intention to
close its doors to force the government to
assume its responsibilties for feeding the

I.

Well, there you have it. It’s not a very
pretty picture.

That’s the result of Social Credit poli-
cies of refusing to undertake job creation
programs and instead leaving it up to the
private sector, and using our taxes to give

I

ee

subsidies and tax concessions to the big

corporations.
B.C. has the labor power, the resources

and the money to provide full employ- |

ment. But that will only happen when we

have a government willing to implement |

the kind of economic recovery program | :
advanced by the Vancouver and District |

Labor Council.

Be Pace TReUNE. SEPTEMBER 11, 1985