Ontario budget — political football

By BRUCE MAGNUSON

The new Ontario budget ex-
amplifies all the gimmickry and
cheap politicking of which the
Tories have proved to be the
masters over the past 28 years
in office.

After giving voice to the same
policies to fight inflation as the
Trudeau government put into
effect in 1969, including 5%
freeze on salary increases for
civil servants in Ontario, the
Davis government declares poli-
tical war on Ottawa and threat-
ens to opt out of federal shared-
cost programs.

The trouble with this gimmick
is that it is old enough to pre-
date the Tory government itself.
This particular political buck-
passing goes back to the Hep-
burn-Duplessis Axis of pre-
World: War II days. It has been
used to fight every piece of
social legislation wrung by po-
pular demand, from reluctant
federal and provincial govern-
ments.

Whenever capitalist mono-
polies feared that they might be
taxed to meet some popular
need, such as pensions, social
and unemployment insurance,

family allowances, medicare and

similar programs, they have done
everything to emasculate and
to kill such programs and pre-
vent them from coming into
effect.

The Basic Fact

The method used has been the
political-football technique of
passing the buck between Ot-
tawa and the provinces. At the
root of the crisis in “federal-
provincial relations’, so-called
because of the effort to cover up
and dismiss the real problem, is
the fact that the Canadian state
is made up of two nations,
French and_ English-speaking.
Because of the attempt to bury
the French fact in Canada, to
discriminate against and forci-
bly destroy the French Canadian

nation within an unequal Cana- |

dian Confederation, a crisis of
constitutional relationships has
developed that threatens to
break up Confederation.

Today, as always when Cana-
dians stand face to face with
some crisis of one kind or an-
other. the provinces’ relashinship
to federalism always comes up.
By treating all provinces alike,
including Quebec, the essence of
the constitutional crisis—which
is failure to recognize equality
of rights between the French
and English-speaking nations in
Canadian Confederation — is
ignored or swept under the rug.
Instead, the issue is falsely pre-
sented as a matter of “Federal-
ism versus provincial rights.”

As one of the Toronto dailies
has editorialized: “How can
Trudeau who insists that Quebec
is no different from any other
province, deny Ontario what has
been granted to Quebec?”

Then it continues: “But if On-
tario joins Quebec in opting out,
much more than half of the
population of Canada will have
plumped for a looser federation
than now exists.”

Not Equal
In 1968, Pierre Elliot Trudeau
became the political champion
of monopoly capitalism in Ca-
nada with the slogan “One

Canada-One Nation.”
Now, in 1971, Wm. Davis’ On-
tario government comes forward

to “reconsider in a fundamental
way Ontario’s basic role in
Canadian federalism,” which in
essence means a Canadian fe-
deration of no less than ten
“equal” provinces,

At the same time everyone
knows that the provinces are far
from equal — just as regional
disparity, unemployment, pov-
erty, low wage-areas, economic
discrimination, social discrimin-
ation and so on ad infinitum
exist in a society based upon a
system of exploitation of man by
man.

It is clearly, therefore, not a
matter of equity, or of dealings
between equals, but rather a
matter of economic, social, na-
tional and class discrimination,
with monopoly capital seeking
to perpetuate inequality and
gain maximum profit at the ex-
pense of working people, who
are the producers of all wealth,
including accumulation of capi-
tal an profits.

This brings us to the other,
rather substantial question flow-
ing from the Ontario budget.
Does a $415 million deficit
budget and no new taxes mean
more jobs and less unemploy-
ment? Does it mean lower prices
and less inflation?

According to classical capital-
ist economics, the way to stop
rising prices and inflation is to
restrict money and credit. The
accepted policy to create more
jobs and reduce unemployment
is to make money and credit
easier to get. But as British eco-
nomist Sir Roy Harrod asked the
other day in Ottawa, “what does
one do when one has both rising
prices and rising unemploy-
ment?” That is the seemingly
unanswerable question that

By JACQUES SAVARIA

MONTREAL — The rail ma-
chinists’ lone fight to have the
sweetheart agreement of last
December rejected by the mem-
bership in order to obtain addi-
tional benefits came to a suc-

- cessful conclusion on April 8,

1971 when the railways and the
Shop Crafts signed a new tenta-
tive agreement giving the Shop
Crafts the additional benefits ac-
corded to the 60,000 associated
non-operating workers.

-The Machinists led by Cana-

dian vice-president Mike Rygus,
who had tersely termed the
December settlement ‘“inade-
quate” made a shambles of the
boss-loving class collaborators
among the Shop Craft leader-
ship.

The Machinists alone gave the
required leadership and struck
gold when they advised the
membership of the other crafts
to vote against the recommenda-
tions of their leaders, and to
support the Machinist proposal
to reject the contract.

The contents of a circular let-
ter dated April 15, 1971 issued
by the Machinist  secretary-
treasurer makes it plain that
only the Machinist organization
was aware that the railways
were aiming at a cheap Shop
Craft settlement in order to set
the pattern for the whole indus-
try.
That the railways were not
able to do this, attests to the
splendid unity which existed

PACIFIC TRIBUNE—FRIDAY, MAY 7; 1971—PAGE 6

haunts all capitalist economic
policy makers and governments
these days.

One rather obvious problem,
which all too few seem prepared
to tackle, is the almost total
substitution of state and mono-
poly control in place of the clas-
sical capitalist self-adjusting law
of “supply and demand”.

Mr. Darcy McKeough’s budget
aims to cut unemployment in
Ontario to 3% of the labor
force, which is to be considered
as full employment. To do this,
Ontario needs 150,000 new jobs
this year.

. The way proposed to achieve
this is by giving tax incentives
to private industry. A 5% tax
credit for machinery and equip-
ment at a revenue loss of $125
million dollars means an anticip-
ated 2.5 billion dollars in capital
expenditures for such machinery
and equipment. Put another
way, it means a tax credit of
$50,000 for every million of ca-
pital so invested. A good in-
centive to rationalization and
profits, not new jobs.

Don’t Hire More

What seems to be overlooked
is, what Arthur Smith, Chair-
man of the Economic Coun-
cil of Canada has stated, that as
business improves, companies
do not immediately hire ~more
workers; they extend hours of
work. Part-time workers are
shifted to full-time status and
full-time workers work over-
time before new employees are
hired. Plant capacity is used at
closer to its full potential, thus
productivity improves rapidly,
mitigating against additional im-
mediate employment.

It is clear that the Ontario
budget is not a full employment

among the Shop Craft workers
in rejecting the original settle-
ment.

The new settlement also
serves as a slap in the face to
some of the carmen leaders who
spent a sizable chunk of the
membership’s funds touring the
country advising the members
that “the Machinists were crazy,

that the December contract was .

legal and binding and that there
was nothing more to be gained.”

The results prove once again
that “the fools were right.” The
April settlement was substan-

‘tially improved in every single

item in which fringe benefits
were concerned.

In some trade union circles,
the Machinists’ fight and the re-
sults. achieved will make about
as much noise as a “butterfly’s
cough.”

Nevertheless, things and

*

Marches in Toronto (left),
sive against the war,

budget, but another bonanza of
government handout of taxpay-
ers’ money to swell monopoly
profits. :

The budget*strikes a blow for
regional equality and against
regional disparity when it equal-
izes the price of beer in all areas
of the province. Here again, the
15¢ per case increase in South-
ern Ontario covers an 11-cent
reduction in Northern Ontario,
produces $1 million dollar each
in added revenue for both On-
tario and federal governments,
while giving the breweries an-

other $3 million to add to their ~

profits for the coming fiscal year.

Gifts to Rich

It should also be noted that
the above gifts to business go
into effect immediately, while
other concessions to popular
needs do not became imple-
mented until a year from now.

For instance, a $50 million
plan to bring nursing homes and
nursing services in patients’
homes under the _provinciaal
health insurance program (OH-
SIP), and a 20 million dollar in-
crease to provide more staff in
hospitals for mentally retarded,
begin next April, 1972,

An increase of provincial
grants for local school costs,
from 51 to 55%, falls short of
the 100% required, and barely
goes beyond meeting a promise
made by ex-Premier Geo, A.
Drew 26 years ago in 1945.

Changes in the tax structure
will allow Ontario companies to
deduct the interest on money
they borrow ‘to buy shares of

- other companies. This is design-

ed to put Canadian companies in
the same position as U.S. com-
panies, in itself. a reasonable
enough proposition. To make

events must be seen in their
true perspective.

This is the first time in the
history of rail negotiations that
a large segment of workers have
rejected the recommendations of
their leaders.

This is heartening, for rail
workers have a long history of
being plagued by poor leader-
ship which has contributed both
to eroding militancy and class
understanding.

The Machinists by achieving
the results they did under the
most dismal conditions lead one
to believe that the moment has
arrived when rail workers in
general are ready for bigger and
better fights.

Here are the details of the
April agreement:

Over and above the wage in-
creases of the Dec. 18, 1970 set-
tlement, the railways have

Winnipeg (right) and other Canadian cities were part of the

will!

ix awa :
this complete, Otta regs

to join in with similat Ker y
in the federal area. (Oe
McKeough’s Ontario bude i)
Consumers’ Gas will sania
on every $100 of interest ;
on any borrowings ' "7g
Home Oil Company. ny oa
ing large sums this call ae
much as $80,000 interest?
$1 million borrowed.)
But Ontario universit |
have increases rea a
operating grants slice ne!
next year, a cut of 5°
million. a
Basic per-student a4) y
increase by $80 to Sh
year, but will be slicé ott
per-student next fiscal ¥

Edge Against Poot y

While nursing hom ot
home care services arg?
under OHSIP and broug jf
to a patient’s fee ° t
day, or $105 per mon ag
mum, the homes for the 8
main outside the plam per”
of from $4.70 to $12.00 —

er patient. — i
Prindeed a budget % 4
sharp edge against he put
people and the P00! fri
bonanza in every W4 a
rich. + tolm
At the same time i iit
on federal-provincl®® — ¢
shared-cost programs: cost
ignty, unemploymen : oN
education, health cal. 1
pollution, municip4 entio®
such as it is, not to F
and beer.

Depending upon wed
emphasis is put, peers publ
be a set-up for a slick Pi
lations snow job OP 4 fly
voters, and cannot ly. ele
dismissed as an ef
budget.

nv

he al
agreed to give U/l”,
employees the add he i
fits they. accorde are
iated Non-ops whit af
lows: it
e 5 weeks vacation | ips!
after 30 years servi
of 35. c):
e Medicare (0 $6 J
per month—inste RO)
@ Medicare (other f ff
married: $11.50 inst ante a
e Paid up Life Ins" Holy
retirement: _$5,00 eeme”
the Shop Crafts aay {0
Dec. 18, 1970 was | in s@
on employee's deat ity: Sy
® Weekly Indemn inst
week for 26 weeks am 4
$65 per week—!0. i ynctiO® ;
indemnity in CO ify
Federal legislation” 4 cor
e A letter covet 9h

ing out of work.

‘ (OV
spring