TEV ELEILLEIL soll WIM LLL RH LABOR Dandelions take root in B.C. A lot of those coming up the stairs to the meeting remember when the Ironworkers Hall was built, back in the 1960s when times were good in the construction industry. It was a time when most could count on a dispatch to a new job when the old one ended and talk at union meetings centred on making the new collective agreement better than the last. But tonight, nearly everybody coming into the hall is unemployed. Many of them have long ago exhausted their Unemploy- ment Insurance claims. The waiting lists for dispatch at union hiring halls are two years ke And tonight, they’ll be talking about how they’re going to help the Building Trades Council fight back against the contractors” demand for 55 cuts to Building Trades workers’ contracts. More than anything ced 2 ae about how they can mount a campaign to turn around the govern- ment and employer policies that have led to the unem- ployment that has put half the provin- ce’s highly-skilled construction workers on the welfare rolls. This is the first major public meet- 77 ing for the newly- formed Dandelions and if the hall isn’t packed, there’s a good crowd, drawn from across the Trades — pipefit- ters, electricians, ironworkers, carpen- eae ters, Teamsters, both JIM YOUNG women and men. From the plattorm, Jim Dougan, an unemployed pipefitter and one of the organ- izers of the Dandelions, announces plans for a demonstration at the end of the week outside the offices of Construction Labor Relations Association By the end of the meeting it will be unanimously agreed to and the wheels set in motion to turn people out. Formed about three months ago, the Dandelions have already made their pres- ence known around the Lower Mainland. In February Dandelions’ pickets briefly shut down a project being put up by a non-union contractor who was flouting a Labor Relations Board order binding him to the Carpenters collective agreement. And last month, the group demonstrated outside the regional headquarters of the Unem- ployment Insurance Commission to protest new “repeater” provisions of UI regulations which increased the qualifying period for UI benefits based on misleading labor force _ The group has taken its name from the _ Dandelions in Alberta, who appeared among the Building Trades ranks following the disastrous 1984 negotiations when Con- struction Labor Relations-Alberta imposed “a series of 24-hour lockouts and effectively threw out union agreements from the industry. Formed by unemployed Building Trades workers who were not prepared to accept the unions’ demise, Alberta Dandel- ions likened themselves to their namesake Dandelions picket the office of Construction Labor Relations in New Westminster May 9 to protest employers’ demand for contract concessions and to back stand taken by Building Trades bargaining council. and began “popping up everywhere,” with picket lines and demonstrations .They have gone on from there to organize political lobbying for job creation. In Alberta, as here, the organization was born out of four years of devastating unemployment — and the assault on trade union rights from both employers and government that has come as a result. “Ten years ago, if someone had said we would face this situation, I’d have said: ‘you’re crazy,’ ” says unemployed electri- cian Jim Young, also an organizer of the Dandelions. “But it’s happening, and we decided we had to do something construc- tive about it.” Young says that the idea to establish the Dandelions here was prompted by the fact that there was need for a forum where the specific problems of the Building Trades could be addressed. “A lot of our people are in really bad straits, there’s a lot of frustration and anger,” he says. “But I think they’re begin- ning to see that the Dandelions gives them a place to focus their frustration in a construc- tive way, in action.” Because construction activity bears a direct relation to the general functioning of the economy, unemployment in the indus- try is an echo of the economic crisis. But because it is also dependent to a great degree — on public contracts, the policies of the Social Credit government and the encroach- ment of the non-union right-to-work con- tractors has compounded the effect. “Most of us know about the anti-labor legislation, about the 50-60 per cent unem- ployment, about the growth of the non- union sector and the 55 concessions demands from CLRA,” says Dougan. “But what we need to do,” he emphas- izes, “is find the the ways to fight back and to turn these statistics around.” At the Dandelions meeting, Dougan tells unionists that they should look back to the 30s and the “bold and imaginative tactics of the unemployed. “The business-as-usual attitudes of the 1960s and 1970s have to end,” he adds, “sitting down with the employers on one side and trade unionists on the other with the Marquis of Queensbury rules, won’t get us anywhere. Cr E a ® 4 IRIBUNE Published weekly at 2681 East Hastings Street Vancouver, B.C. V5K 1Z5. Phone 251-1186 Postal Code lamenclosing 1yr.$160) 2yrs.$2800 6mo. $100 Foreign 1 yr. $25 ta Bill me later Donation$........ \ READ THE PAPER THAT FIGHTS FOR LABOR 12.¢ PACIFIC TRIBUNE, MAY 14, 1986. “Above all, it is action that’s needed. We're not going to grow by just having meetings in meeting halls,”’ he emphasizes. “We have to organize action.” Across the hall, there are nods of agreement. And outside the CLRA offices, that point is made forcefully. Big as the meeting was, the numbers at the picket are far greater. The demonstration also makes another point clear: the unemployed are completely behind the Building Trades Council’s stand against concessions. “The contractors have been trying to paint a picture that all of us are just waiting to go to work for $8 an hour non- union — butit’s not the case,” says Young. “The guys are solid behind the Building Trades Council stand. “Tt’s more than just a question of dollars and cents, too. There’s a strong history of the trade union movement in this industry _and we’ve got to defend it. So far, Young says, “there has been a good response” from the Building Trades membership and the list of people that can be mobilized has grown to some 200. But unemployment in the Trades is “going to be around a long time,” Dougan notes, and the Dandelions know that they will have to organize a lot more people and mount a much bigger campaign if they are to effect some changes. In the meantime, they'll be popping up all over the province. The seeds from Alberta have laid down solid roots. run again Art Kube, the president of the B. Federation of Labor since 1983, 2 | announced that he will not be running again for the top officer’s positiol when the federation elections are hé at the annual convention this fall.” Kube announced his decision t0 meeting of the Solidarity Coaliti steering committee last week and ¢0 firmed it Monday, citing the press of the job as the reason for his di sion. Kube was first elected to the 1983 by the federation’s exec’ council following the death of - Kinnaird. He was ‘subsequently elected in a three-way race at the 1? ‘B.C. Fed convention. . The announcement was somewh abrupt since he had declared his inte ion to run again as recently aS the Hospital Employees Union conv tion in March. But there had bee? considerable dissatisifaction among | many unions with his leadership particularly with recent comments i made to reporters.that labor was i | “conciliatory mood.” There had already been considers ble speculation about a possible ¢ lenge at the convention, even from th unions on the federation’s right wits: } Many unions have apparently touted the name of the Steelworke Local 480 president Ken Georgiett# federation vice-president, as the ne didate for president. Georgietti confirmed in an inter : view that he had been approache : run, adding that he “hadn’t said ‘n0e He said that there are enough i unions approaching him to “make my think seriously about it” but emphi ized that there were “a number things to consider”’ before he w0 make a decision. He declined to say whether he ha been approached before or after t announcement of Kube’s resignatio# Georgietti’s name reportedly the backing of several unions but 4 number of others have not yet contr mitted themselves and a second didate could emerge before © federation convention, expected t come some time in late Novembe!- Trades take Continued from page 1 they began that CLRA was making no movement. Building Trades bargaining council chairman Roy Gautier said May 7 fol- lowing the council’s issuing of 72-hour strike notice: “Yesterday we reiterated proposals for serious negotiations aimed at addressing the serious concerns of the employers and asked them to indicate their willingness to continue good faith bargaining. “Unfortunately, they hose to advise us ‘we have a game plan and intend to carry it to conclusion’ and that unless our council agreed to sweeping cutbacks, the employers would ‘have to carry on with termination and imposition of new wages and conditions’,”, Gautier said. CLRA had announced in letters to each of the 16 Building Trades unions in January that unless new contracts were signed, embodying the concessions demanded by the employers’ associa- tion, collective agreements would be terminated on their expiry date April 30 and new wages and conditions unilater- ally imposed. The threat was an echo of the strike action | “Alberta scenario” by which contract in that province imposed lockouts #, | then lifted them 24 hours later and cal workers back to work at inferior wage and conditions. Because Alberta Bull@’ ing Trades unions had not conduc™” strike votes, they were unable to picket sites once lockouts were lifted. ee: A ruling by the B.C. Labor Relatio™ Board Oct. 16, 1984, known as the Pa' if case, opened the way for employes * this province to terminate . contra’ under certain circumstances and im wages and conditions. CLRA had put off its lockout vol earlier this month following the announ@ ment of the Trades’ 95 per cent a mandate but its stand at the barga! fp table indicated that its objective has nm changed since January. {0 “In spite of our determined efor have reasonable negotiations leading fair settlement, the employers have saat it clear that they intend to carry throug? their intention to reduce wages and ¢ ditions to the levels prevailing in the oa union sector,” Gautier said. “Clearly union or group can accept demands.”