UFAWU vice-president Ken Robinson confers with union's lawyer

cat

Harry Rankin outside courthouse following decision by Judge
- David Hume finding him and Dave Mcintosh guilty of impeding

Combines hearing.

—Geoff Meggs photo.

Unemployment to hit new
levels as jobs go to U.S.

Unemployment in Canada will
rise by. over 110,000 per year
simply by new additions to the
labor force, and by 1980 will exceed
1.2 million or 10.4 percent of the
labor force by official government
statistics.

The grim economic picture for
the country was forecast by the
Committee for an Independent
Canada in an economic report
released last week in its national
bulletin. The Canadian economy is
currently producing about 190,000

jobs per year, the report pointed

Bargaining rights issue pressed

Continued from pg. 1

Commission in December, 1976,
did, in fact, constitute an inquiry.
Hume noted, with respect to the
five found not guilty, that, although
they ‘may have made the
i more difficult, they
did not go so far as to impede.”
However, in pronouncing the
guilty verdict on McIntosh and
Robinson, Hume noted, ‘I am not
ing that they did not have
the moral right to demand a public
hearing. But the Act is clear.”
“The issue is not whether the
inquiry should have been held in

public or in private,” he added,
arguing that it was on the
“narrow” issue of the specific
charges laid.

Throughout the trial, the union
had declared that it had sought to
have the hearings held in public, as
the Act provided, and that all its
actions in December, 1976 had been
aimed at that objective.

This week, in a call on the
Canadian Labor Congress to led its
full “moral and financial support
and that of its affiliates” to the
union, the UFAWU outlined the
central demands for the support
campaign.

e That the Combines branch,

under consumer and corporate
affairs minister Warren Allmand,
call off its investigation;

e That Section 4 of the Act
exempting trade unions from its
provisions be amended to give
fishermen the same _ protection
afforded other workers;

e That the federal labor code be
amended to define fishermen as
workers beyond legal dispute;

e That the question of
jurisdiction over fishermen’s
bargaining rights be submitted
immediately to the Supreme Court
for a constitutional ruling.

out, but there are over 300,000 new
job seekers joining the labor force
from the education system alone
each year. :

The CIC rejected government
claims that the cause of high

unemployment in Canada is high -

labor costs or world wide
recession, pointing instead to the
loss of Canadian jobs to U.S. in-
dustry due to the dominance of
U.S. corporations in Canada.
“Clearly the immediate con-
tributing factors to Canada’s
unemployment problem are the
excessive degree of foreign
ownership of industry combined
with our unsatisfactory trade
posture,” the report declared.

Canada’s trade deficit in
manufactured goods grew by $8
billion between 1973 and 1977, said
the CIC, which translated into the
loss of about 400,000 jobs. About
three quarters of the increased
deficit is in imported goods from
the U.S., the direct result of U.S.
government policies designed to
repatriate production from foreign
subsidiaries of U.S. multinationals
to U.S. based plants. “The con-
clusion seems inescapable,” said
the CIC, “‘That the primary cause
of our trade and employment
problems arises from the massive
transfer of production activity

from Canadian to American
manufacturing plants.”

If only 25 percent of present —
imported manufactured goods —
were transferred to domestic
production, about 325,000 jobs —
would be created in the Canadian
manufacturing and service in-
dustries. ‘‘There is no fundamental —
reason why Canadian industry
could not produce most of the
products now being imported and
even improve on them to meet the
special needs of the Canadian
market,” the report stated.

Support for
bankworkers

The Vancouver and District
Labor Council Tuesday called on
the Canadian Labor Congress to
provide immediate assistance to
bankworkers at 20 bank branches ~
in B.C. who have been left without
protection by the decertification of
the Service Office and Retail Union -
of Canada (SORWUC) last month. ©
The unanimously endorsed
resolution asked the CLC to work
towards the re-establishment of —
union certification at the banks.

CUPE makes effective use of ‘The Facts’

Some unions do a good job of
public relations. Others do a poor
job. One of the better unions is
Canada’s largest, the Canadian
Union of Public Employees. CUPE
is big enough to have a large staff
of professional researchers,
publicity people and executive
assistants at the head office in
Ottawa. This staff turns out a lot of
good material for the members
and many speeches for leading
officers. When I worked for CUPE
a few years ago, some of us would
complain that the public relations
people in Ottawa turned out
printed material in support of
_strikes that was too slick and too
superficial, like ad men trying to
sell soap or headache pills.
However, while that was true, it
wasn’t the whole truth, and neither
is it the whole truth today.

A staff member I once worked
with recently sent me three copies
of the monthly factual digest now
being i by CUPE for staff
and local executive officers. Aptly
enough, the periodical is named
‘The Facts.

As are most CUPE publications,
this one is slick, professional and
expensive to produce. It is well laid
out, attractive in appearance and
easy to read.

In addition to the nuts and bolts
items for servicing representatives
and local officers, such as changes
in strike pay, CUPE contract
settlements and wage scales
across the country, there are some
very good articles dealing with
broad policy questions of concern
to CUPE and the labor movement
in general.

In the June-July issue I found an
estimation of Trudeau’s record as
prime minister: :

e The country suffers from in-
creasing intolerance, hate and

ty.

e Instead of ‘‘greater balance in
the distribution of wealth”, the
Trudeau years have led to more for
the rich and less for the poor. In
fact, according to Statistics
Canada, during the first eight

PACIFIC TRIBUNE—SEPTEMBER 8, 1978—Page 8

years of the Trudeau ad-
ministration, the gap between the
20th and 80th rungs on the income
ladder has grown from less than
$7,000 a year to $15,000.

e Canada’s ‘‘rational use of
resources” has meant that bet-
ween 1968 and 1974 there was a net
export of capital out of Canada of
$5.2 billion.

LABOR
COMMENT

BY JACK PHILLIPS

eOur ‘“‘effective national
policies’ increased regional
disparities instead of alleviating
them.

e Unemployment stood at
356,000 nationally when Trudeau
took over; today it is officially near
one million. :

e Inflation was four percent in
1968; now it is running at an annual
rate of more than nine percent.

Under ‘Notes and Quotes” in the

May, 1978 issue, I found the
following on the depreciation of the
Canadian dollar:

e Our politicians have been
telling us that the fall in the value
of the Canadian dollar will make it

possible for Canadian exports to

sell more cheaply abroad, but...

e Instead of lowering the price of
exports some companies are
maintaining their prices and
reaping huge profits when they
convert their sales to Canadian
dollars. :

e The Abitibi Paper Company is

a major exporter of paper to the
US. Its chairman, Thomas Bell,
as quoted in the April 19

Globe and Mail, told his annual
meeting: ‘“‘We had one hell of a
first quarter and we expect the
trend to continue. Profit for the
first three months ending March
31, 1978, was $14.8 million: . .
compared with year earlier profits

4

of $3.5 million. A good deal of our
improvement in the first year was
a result of the weakness of the
Canadian dollar. The exchange
gain counted for about 58 percent
of the total profit.

Under another heading, ‘“We’re
under attack’, I found an item
relating to the problems of public
employees in collective
bargaining:

e Whole government depart-
ments such as the Department of
Regional Economic Expansion
(DREE) and Industry, Trade and

Commerce are in business to give ©

handouts to big business. This now

‘amounts to billions of dollars

annually. The theory is that cor-
porations are to use this money to
provide jobs. But corporations are
not providing jobs. They are in
business to make profits. In most
cases companies use this money to
improve productivity, reduce jobs
and increase profits. :

e While countries such as
Britain reduce military ex-
penditures during periods of
economic crisis, Canada continues
to expand its military budget. The
military now takes nearly a $4
billion bite out of the federal
budget, more than twice what it
took in 1970. Much of this money is
spent on_ highly technical,
sophisticated equipment pur-
chased outside. of Canada. For
example, the military will soon be
spending to purchase the latest in
jet fighter aircraft, solely to ap-
pease our American allies in
NORAD. This military spending
represent both a continual, un-
necessary strain on government
revenue, as well as a further
example of Canadian resources
flowing to foreign concerns.

In linking expenditures for ar-
maments with the struggles of
public employees for better ‘pay
scales and working conditions the
article called for militancy:

e “The tight supply of govern-
ment money is making collective
bargaining tougher at all levels of
government. It will take more

militant unions to win gains that
are necessary to give all workers
a decent standard of living. Unions
will also have a tough fight in
ensuring that the cutbacks caused
by the fiscal squeeze are defeated
or kept to a minimum.”

There were other interesting
articles in the three issues of The
Facts which I read, on such sub-
jects as the Consumer Price Index,
the Quebec labor code, right-to-
work laws, May Day and health
and safety.

J found it refreshing to read this
publication, after reading so many
dull, and almost irrelevant trade

union papers. Some of the pale.

imitations of a red-blooded, labor
paper seem to exist only to report
what this or that top officer said
after some one else had written his
dull speech. It is particularly true

of a lot of the international journals _

from the U.S.A. They are
technically slick, but the content is
usually as flat as a stale glass of
beer, and with very little direct

connection to the Canadian.

membership. However, when it
comes to trade union newspapers
in line to win first prize for
mediocrity, we have our own,
Canadian contenders, in contrast
to some outstanding examples of
what a Canadian trade union paper
should be.

CUPE itself is not entirely free 0!
image polishing in some other —
publications, but we can at least
say that CUPE images are con-—
nected with some good trade union
and social policies. i

There are some who would shrug —
off this positive fact by pointing out —
that the top leadership of CUPE is —
closely identified with the NDP,
that some staff members arrived
in CUPE with strong NDP backing —
while others went from CUPE to —
assume responsible positions in —
the service of that party. No left- —
winger, however he may disagree i
with specific policies of right-wing —
leaders in the NDP, should fault —
CUPE, or the NDP for that matter, —
for publishing articles and making —
speeches that help the average
worker to understand how he is
being exploited and cheated under —
capitalism. That is good for the —
whole labor movement. #

Where do we go from there, how
do we unite the people in action on
the basis of program? These are —
the key questions for CUPE
members. Articles like those
referred to earlier open the door to
a wide discussion around such
questions. In that respect, we call |
be grateful to the CUPE public —

‘relations people for breaking new —

ground for that union and to the
union officers who permitted them —
to do so in official publications.

Enclosed

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