a THE WESTERN CANADIAN LUMBER WORKER

AUGUST, 1971-

SUMMARY OF

WILKINSON'S PLYWOOD REPORT

As a result of the 1970 Coast contract negotiations, section 4 of Article VII was written into the current Coast Master Agreement. This section deals with the Plywood Job Evaluation program and reads as follows:

“The Parties agree to obtain outside assistance from an impartial specialist on job evaluation to study the plywood job evaluation program.

“If the Parties are unable to agree on a specialist by November 1, 1970 the Honourable Mr. Justice Nathan Nemetz of the British Columbia Court of Appeal will be requested to appoint the specialist.

“The study provided for herein shall be completed and implemented by April

, 1971.”

Subsequently Professor H. C. Wilkinson, Faculty of Commerce and Business Administration, University of British Columbia was appointed on November 30, 1970 by Justice Nemetz to assist the Parties in a study of the plywood job evaluation program.

On August 4, 1971 Professor Wilkinson submitted his report to the Parties and before dealing with recommendations, outlined his procedure as follows:

PROFESSOR WILKINSON’S PROCEDURE.

“Information about the plan was collected in a variety of ways. My principal sources were the two technical representatives of the parties, Mr. Lorne Fingarson for the Union and Mr. Keith Bennett for the Employers. It is due to their experience, understanding and co-operation, and that of a number of their associates, that | was able to come to understand a quite complex situation in a relatively short time.

“Visits to seven plywood mills provided me with some important information about job content, working conditions and processes as well as an opportunity to discuss the job evaluation plan with individual employees, managers and officials of the Union.

“| met once with the Negotiating Committee of Regional Council No. 1 of the |.W.A. and once with the Steering Committee of Forest Industrial Relations Ltd. One consequence of the meeting with the Union’s negotiating committee was an invitation to appear before membership meetings of the Union’s Locals. Three such meetings were arranged — at Victoria, Port Alberni and New Westminster — and all afforded an exceptional opportunity to hear from employees what concerns them about the plan and what changes they would welcome.

“In the course of these contacts a number of written submissions were received and | have, in turn, invited reaction by making tentative proposals, but the majority of my work has involved informal meetings with individuals or very small groups. Although it has not been possible to get the parties to come to agreement, these procedures have, | think, allowed me to construct recom- mendations which are more likely to be workable and, eventually, to be ac- ceptable to the parties.

“| have been helped by many people: managers of plants and of plant departments; officers and members of the Union Locals; representatives of Forest Industrial Relations Ltd., and of Regional Council Number One of the |.W.A. | have been impressed by the essentially reasonable and responsible views put forward by both parties and by their willingness to listen to opposing opinions. In expressing my gratitude to all those who took the opportunity to assist me may | also hope that the recommendations which follow will serve to increase the value of job evaluation in maintaining good industrial relations.”

REPORT RECEIVED

Upon receipt of Professor Wilkinson's report, the Regional Officers in- structed the Regional Evaluators Tony Vanderheide and Al Busch to analyse it and to write a summary report for examination by the Regional Officers and the Regional Executive Board.

The Regional Executive Board in session on Wednesday, August 11, 1971 received the summary report — together with Professor Wilkinson's report — and referred it back to the Regional Officers for further study and required ac- tion.

RECOMMENDATIONS In his report Professor Wilkinson submitted fourteen recommendations,

eight of them dealing with administrative changes and the remaining six dealing

with thetechnical structure of the plywood job evaluation plan.

Following are some of his recommendations:

That the STRUCTURE of the Plant Review Committee be changed.

That the FUNCTION of the Plant Review Committee be changed.

That the present ‘Job Description” form be changed.

That the present ‘‘Request for Job Evaluation” form be changed.

That the Parties should undertake serious discussions with a view to making

changes in the administrative organization of the Plan so that there may be “a

continual and competent direction and control of this increasingly important

activity.”

® That Eactor 1 — Education be reduced from 6 to 4 degrees with the maximum number of points reduced from 50 to 25 and the definition for degree 4 amended. The new point values assigned to the levels respectively would be 0, 8, 16 and 25.

© That Factor 2— Experience be reduced from 9 to 6 degrees and the maximum points reduced from 90 to 50.

© That Factor 3— Complexity of Duties be re-titled “Judgement and Initiative.”

@ That Factor 6 — Mental and Visual Demand be increased from 5 to 6 degrees and the maximum value from 37 to 70 points. The Manual to be amended to replace the present definitions of degrees 4 and 5 with new definitions of degrees 4, 5 and 6. The impact will affect all of those jobs which have high levels of mental and visual demands and particularly will provide an ex- panded framework for future evaluations.

© That Factor 9 — Responsibility for Material, Equipment and Products be replaced by a new factor 9 “Process Responsibility,” and the number of points assigned to factor number 9 be increased from 80 to 100 points. This factor to be reweighted all the way through all factor levels and to be bench-marked in accordance with the new definition for Process Responsibility.

@ That the rating for Raimann Operators should be standardized at 102 points under the existing gradings (108 points under the new gradings).

PLYWOOD CONFERENCE

As can be detected from the above recommendations, their implementation will have an effect on the administration of the plywood job evaluation plan and category rates resulting from the changed technical structure of the related “Plywood Job Evaluation Manual.”

Acting on a request from the Port Alberni Local, the Regional Executive Board in session on August 11, 1971 concurred with a recommendation by the regional officers for calling a Region-wide Plywood Conference as soon as the Wilkinson report is completely clarified.

INTERIOR LOCALS

Present Southern and Northern B.C. Master Agreements are also subject to the recommendations in Professor Wilkinson's report. WAGE CURVE

No specific recommendation was made by Professor Wilkinson in respect to the present system of grade increments.

"A CITY IS FOR PEOPLE”

STEPHEN LEWIS SCORES STRIKE-BREAKING RACKET

by Alderman Harry Rankin

It wasn’t so long ago that East End residents had a nice park and salt water swimming pool—Brighton Park. That’s just west of the grain elevators near Second Narrows, north of the PNE. Due to pollution from the water the pool was closed.

Finally, the Parks Board agreed to install a filter system and re-open the pool. The work was all set to go ahead but now the Parks Board is trying to throw a monkey wrench into the project. It has notified City Council that it wants to cut the size of the pool in half. To add insult to injury, it has come up with the phoney argument that keeping a half sized pool open seven days a week, is just as good as having a full sized pool open five days a week. This “reasoning”, if you can call it such, is on a par with its effort to deprive East End kids of a

decent sized swimming pool. It’s disgraceful, and on par with a good deal of their reasoning.

Yet, this same Parks Board which is too stingy to restore a full sized pool to East End kids isn’t always so lacking in generosity. Not long ago it came to Council for a $300,000 grant to build a restaurant on the top of Little Mountain. Such a restaurant would be used mainly for tourists, that is, for those tourists and visitors to the arboretum and con- servatory who could afford it. We need it like a hole in the head: There are plenty of eating spots within ten blocks of Little Mountain, adequate to take care of all needs.

This is unfortunately typical of Parks Board mentality—it promotes expensive restaurants for tourists while cutting down on swimming

facilities in the working class section of the city. It was the same kind of mentality that prompted the Parks Board to boost admission fees to the acquarium to $2.00 for adults, an exhorbitant price for city residents who should have first use of this publicly owned facility.

I moved a motion, rather reluctantly agreed to by city Council, that the Parks Board appear in person before Council to explain its action with regard to the Brighton Park pool. I hope that East End community groups will turn out in full force to let Council and the Parks Board know that they won’t accept this kind of chiselling. The position of all thinking citizens in this city is to enhance not cut down facilities for its citizens. A city is for people.

Ontario New Democratic Party leader Stephen Lewis exposed another strike- breaking racket at the Legislature but couldn’t get the government to agree to investigate it.

At the Legislature com- mittee hearing, the provincial NDP leader read a letter from the president of Canadian Driver Pool Ltd. to an official of a struck plant.

The letter offered “an ex- perienced strike security force” that includes electronic equipment and Doberman pinschers.

The president, R.A. Grange, said in the letter, ‘“‘. . . Unions have served a useful purpose in protecting the employee from unjust treatment and have helped improve working conditions. In most cases, | believe their usefulness has

been outlived, and they now have become a detriment both to employees and employers.”

Mr. Lewis demanded to know how many strikes in Ontario the company has been involved in and whether the labor department would in- vestigate.

Labor minister Gordon Carton, although he conceded “the letter reviles me per- Sonally,” refused to commit his department to an in- vestigation.

Grange boasted in his lette that 43 companies used his company’s services in the past two years.

Mr. Lewis told the minister, “I think you are simply ab- dicating your responsibility.” He said strike-breaking should be made illegal and cited four prominent examples of strikes broken in recent years by strike-breakers.