Friday, January 14, 1983

Newsstand EH 18
price
40c Vol. 45, No. 2

|

Myths on

shortage
of food

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| convention - Saturday

|| president

‘hits arms
| buildup

William Winpisinger, an
outspoken disarmament ad-

} vocate and AFL-CIO ex-

ecutive member, blasted
Reaganomics and the arms
race at the B.C. Machinists
(see
story page 8).

Caribbean-Grenada
leading the region

in freedom of media
— page 5 —

- Liberals draw fire
over tax balloon -
floated by Erola

VRD action urged to fight

Acoastwide campaign to block
implementation of the bitterly
contentious Pearse Report on
fisheries continued to gather
momentum this week, on the eve
of possible action by fisheries
minister Pierre De Bane and the
federal government.

Opposition meetings initiated
by the United Fishermen and
Allied Workers’ Union but sup-
ported by a wide range of groups
were scheduled for Campbell
River, Port Clements and other
centres this week and a major
conference of opponents of the
report has been set for Jan. 21 at
the Pacific National Exhibition.

Recommendations in the
‘report, which was tabled last year
by commissioner Peter Pearse
would, if enacted, halve the size

of the fleet by 1992 by forcing
fishermen to bid against one
another and against corporations
for licences and would, according
to the UFAWU, “‘transform the
industry into the private preserve
of large corporations.”

The report has been opposed

by organizations as diverse in.

their outlook as the Native

That demand for a
moratorium has also been car-
ried by the UFA WU to various ci-
city ‘councils including New
Westminster which backed the
position in a motion Monday.
Surrey council earlier endorsed
the union’s call.

The demand for a moratorium
on the report was also voiced

‘Fishermen needed support,’ page 2.

Brotherhood, the Pacific Coast
Salmon Seiners Association, the
Pacific Trollers Association, the
Gulf Trollers and the UFAWU
itself. Most urge rejection of
Pearse’s recommendations and at
the very least, a one-year
moratorium on its implementa-
tion.

Monday by provincial Com-
munist Party leader Maurice
Rush who called Pearse’s recom-
mendations ‘‘a big business solu-
tion to the crisis facing the fishing
industry.”’

The report, he said, would turn
“entire coastal communities into
ghost towns”’ and would “‘lead to

the wholesale implementation of
ocean ranching and the private
management, enhancement and
harvesting of stocks for profit.’’

As an alternative, Rush
pointed to the comprehensive
program for the fishing industry,
drafted last year by Communist
Party members in the industry,
which emphasizes the need to
break the domination of the in-
dustry by multinational corpora-

tions. (The full program ran as a *

supplement to the Tribune in Ju-
ly, 1982).

The program outlines extensive
measures to assert public,
democratic control over the
fishing industry, balanced
development of the resource to
produce both jobs and food for
Canadians.

igh-handed’ transit grab

Victoria’s move to abolish the
role of regional governments in
transit planning should be met -with
a united fightback by local govern-
ments, according to Vancouver
alderman Bruce Yorke.

Yorke, who sits on the Greater
Vancouver Regional District’s
transit committee, said a letter
from Socred minister Bill Vander
Zalm informing the GVRD that it
would lose all authority over transit
by Mar. 31 was a “‘high-handed”’
action that “‘attacked and under-
mined the whole business of
regional government.”

On Yorke’s initiative, the
GVRD transit committee was to
meet Thursday to map out a
strategy to deal with the situation.

The provincial government’s
move came at a time when the
GVRD has demanded a greater
role in running public transporta-
tion. In a brief to B.C. Transit, the
crown corporation set up when
B.C. Hydro Telinquished control of
the buses, the regional government
demanded the abolition of what
has been called a “‘thydra-headed
monster,”’ consisting of a confus-
ing tangle of authority among the
regional districts, the Metro Tran-
sit Operating Company (in the
Lower Mainland) and B.C. Tran-
sit. It should be replaced by a single
committee comprising equal
numbers of regional and provincial
Officials, stated the GVRD brief.

Instead, Vander Zalm, the
former municipal affairs minister
who is still responsible for transit,
told GVRD chairman Jim Tonn in
a Dec. 29 letter that the regional
transit committees were to be strip-

ped of all power.
‘“‘For some time now, the
regional board has been requesting

a restructuring of the administra-
tion process for public transit. We
have received submissions from a
number of private sources as well
as from yourselves and the Capital
Regional District. Most recently,
the board of directors of B.C.
Transit have responded to the no-
tion of restructuring in the context
of the 1983-84 budget,’’ Vander
Zalm wrote.

“The decision is to follow the
recommendations of the B.C.
Transit Board and to appoint tran-

See GOV’T page 8

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