b

|

Special budget fightback issue

Friday, July 15, 1983

Newsstand ® LS: at 48 price os 40c Vol. 46, No. 28

RIBUNE

Mass outcry could turn gov't back

With its July 7 budget and its opening Salvo of 26 new bills, the Social Credit SOvernment, at the bidding of big business in this province, has declared = War On the public.

The onslaught was launched under the Cover of restraint, with premier Bennett demagogically insisting that ‘‘the public - . .and the taxpayers can no longer sup- Port the present level of services. . .”’ But

L the very public he purports to speak for is

BRITISH COLUMBIA FEDERATION QF LABOUR

Minne ieeeese cay EE ES the same public which will be the victim of his government’s vindictive elimina- tion of programs, its slashing of educa- tional, health care and other services, its Wholesale abolition of the rights of public employees and tenants.

It is not for any ‘‘public’’ that this S0vernment has launched its attack. It is for the corporate sector in this pro- vince, the same corporate sector that pays the salary of Michael Walker, the director Of the ultra-right Fraser Institute whose Policies are now embodied in the Socreds’ legislation.

It is that same corporate sector which Wants wages in the public sector not only

See ACTION page 8

B.C. FED PRESIDENT ART KUBE (I), SECRETARY MIKE KRAMER . campaign for broad coalition to fight Socred legislation.

.. €nnounce

Attack on human rights protested

z 3 im w 2. z < a |

The tight to dissent will become past tense in B.C., members of the soon-to-be-abolished B.C. Human Rights Commission Warned at a packed meeting Monday, called to protest and map strategy against the Socreds’ new Bill 27. Participants, in- Cluding Donna Stewart of the B.C. Human Rights Coalition and Charan Gill of the B.C. Organization to Fight Racism, agreed

“nd urged participation in coalitions established to fight the new Act, which severely limits victims’ ability to fight and achieve r

ae for discrimination in housing and employment and attacks on the street. (See story on page 8.)

The Socreds’ new budget and the machine-gun barrage of legislation that followed it sparked a swift return volley this week from the B.C. Federation of Labor which declared Monday that it was moving immediately ‘‘to mobilize against this madness.”’

Warning that the government was “deliberate in its intent to undermine human, civil, social, economic and trade union rights,’’ the federation began organiz- ing a major campaign of opposition, in-

~ cluding an unprecedented conference & scheduled for Friday which will bring & representatives of nearly half a million trade % unionists together with community and ° church leaders.

o = ‘Wewill fight this legislation,’’ B.C. Fed 2 president Art Kube told anews conference at

f :; federation headquarters Monday, ‘‘and, we

5 are sure, so will the majority of people in this © province.”’

The federation’s public sector committee was to lead off the campaign with a con- ference Wednesday of representatives of both affiliated and non-affiliated public sec- tor unions, including the B.C. Employees’ Union, Canadian Union of Public Employees, Hospital Employees Union, B.C. Nurses Union and the B.C. Teachers’ Federation. Together, they represent some 240,000 members.

The conference was to initiate a coalition of public sector unions and to advance to a “program of action in defence of its membership.’’ The committee was also ex- pected to launch legal challenges of the pro- posed legislation which, both unionists and legal experts agree, violates fundamental principles of common law as well as the Canadian constitution.

But it is the conference Friday — schedul- ed for 10 a.m. at the Operating Engineers’ hall in Burnaby — that will be the major opening thrust of the federation’s campaign.

In an unprecedented action, the federa- tion is calling representatives from all unions in the province, whether they are affiliated or not.

The B.C. and Yukon Building Trades, the Hospital Employees and the B.C. Teachers’ Federation, despite being non- affiliates, have often been part of federation mobilizations for rallies and conferences. But this time, unions affiliated to the Con- federation of Canadian Unions, including CAIMAW, the Pulp, Paper and Wood- workers and the Canadian Association of Smelter and Allied Workers in Kitimat as well as the independent Teamsters have been requested to take part.

‘‘Our indications are that everyone will at- tend,’’ Kube told the news conference Mon- day, indicating the breadth of opposition to the Socreds’ legislative assault.

Earlier on the same morning, the federa- tion’s executive council will meet to put for- ward what Kube called ‘‘a proposal for a

See FED page 8