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EDITORIAL

The ruling of the court

Justice Allan McEachern’s contempt ruling against the B.C. and Yukon Building Trades Council was the final knot in the noose by which the Construction Labor Relations Association (CLRA), the right-to- work independent contractors, the Employers Council of B.C. and the Social Credit government intend to tie the hands of the trade union movement while a massive campaign is underway to displace 40,000 organized building trades workers from the B.C. economy.

Union lawyer Harry Rankin put the issue in context when he commented that the ruling focused on the narrow point of law and avoided the real issue at Pennyfarthing: a union busting campaign spurred by the provincial government and the Labor Relations Board.

But it was the narrow point of law which the court brought to bear to break the back of resistance to the flagrant union busting at False Creek.

The Pennyfarthing case was one of a major CLRA contractor, Stevenson Construction, simultaneously a developer with 40 per cent ownership of Pennyfarthing, turning over a union job to the leading anti-union, right-to-work contractor in the province, Kerkhoff and Sons Construction.

The Building Trades were offered the “choice” of losing their jobs or accepting wholesale wage cuts. It is the same choice that CLRA and the Socreds are offer- ing at every opportunity. The threat of non-union con- tracts at Expo will be the next carrot-and-stick lever to exact concessions in the currently stalled industry con- tract talks.

The workers at Pennyfarthing refused to give up their jobs or to accept concessions. They were, in effect, thrown off the job and they decided to picket. Their struggle was just, in spite of the LRB and court rulings.

In essence, the issue was no different than had Mac- Millan Bloedel fired its unionized work force and attempted to replace them with cheap, unemployed workers provided by a labor contractor.

The incredible LRB decision which refused to acknowledge the connections between Stevenson and Pennyfarthing, and the ruling of Justice McEachern which would deny the trades their right to assemble and picket in defence of their right to union organization, has shown clearly that the LRB and the courts are one with the Socreds and the CLRA in the drive to smash the Building Trades.

...and Solidarity’s response

The blunt question on the minds of many building trades workers and their supporters is how it was possi- ble for the Building Trades Council to be backed down by the courts without a broad pledge of solidarity action from Operation Solidarity.

The visible display of moral support on the picket line from teachers, longshoremen, fishermen and others was outstanding. The B.C. Federation of Labor’s pres- sure on the B.C. Central Credit Union for its part in the dispute was also useful.

But what was needed to stop Kerkhoff in the face of the court’s ruling was nothing less than the full mobili- zation of Operation Solidarity if the government or the courts moved against the unions.

The significance of Solidarity’s failure to act cannot be lost on trade unionists or the Socreds. Legislative action to break the pulp strike appears imminent. Amendments to the Labor Code will soon be intro- duced and they will likely restrict secondary picketing and strike down non-affiliation clauses, at least. The battle against union busting promises to flare again

. soon, at Expo or other construction sites, or at the new

Ridley Island coal port where a dummy company was created to circumvent the longshoremen’s union. Solidarity was able to slow the drive to the right last November by its own co-ordinated action that united all of labor with wide sections of the community in escalating action around a common set of demands. But since the brakes were applied to that movement by the most backward sections of the B.C. Federation

of Labor leadership who made it clear that they would not support continuing escalation to win the movement's political demands, Operation Solidarity has been with- out a unifying program of action.

When the second Socred budget was introduced last month, continuing the attack on social services and resulting in the direct loss of more than 8,000 jobs, there was almost no response from Operation Solidarity.

The Vancouver and District Labor Council and the Lower Mainland Solidarity Coalition did issue a call for a mobilization Mar. 31, a date chosen on the advice of Operation Solidarity. But soon after, the officers of Operation Solidarity made it clear the the success or failure of the Mar. 31 demonstration would be a loca matter.

The pickets at Pennyfarthing who were prepared to be jailed, if necessary; the teachers who reaffirmed their support for Solidarity; the pulp strikers who are display- ing a militant resolve to stand their ground; the students who are continuing to fight cuts in post secondary education. . .there is everywhere evidence of the willing- ness and desire in the people’s movements to continue the fight.

The responsibility to bring the movement together and to ensure that neither the Building Trades, nor the pulp workers or teachers will stand alone rests with the Operation Solidarity council. It is there that the critical decisions must be made to halt the drive to the right and to build Solidarity II.

“.. .well like G2 explained, we're movin’ in only to protect those advisors we sent :

y Wap . Mix asic

down here.” a

Trizec Corp. Ltd., Calgary, is in real estate, property manage

ment, mobile home communities and all that lucrative stuff t

hat

makes one love an economic “recovery”. Trizec recovered nicely with an after-tax profit of $10,515,000 for three months ended Jan.

31/84, up from $8,532,000 for the same three a year earlier.

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__JIRIBUNE

Editor — SEAN GRIFFIN Assistant Editor — DAN KEETON Business & Circulation Manager — PAT O’CONNOR Graphics — ANGELA KENYON

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People and Issues

government, it was clear that any expose of the Fraser Institute — the far-right think tank that is the real author of the Socreds’ cutback measures — would be timely and popular. But just how popular the new booklet on the Institute would turn out to be has been a pleasant surprise for everyone involved.

All 900 copies of the first printing of The Fraser Institute: A Socialist Analysis of the Corporate Drive to the Right by Ben Swankey director of the Centre for Social- ist Education which published the book, have been sold out. When one considers that it came out only three weeks ago, and enjoyed only limited distribution, the pub- lication’s relevance becomes noteworthy

_ Those who missed the first edition need not worry. A second is being rushed into print, and the new run will have some additional material, including a list of the corporate sponsors of the Institute. The new edition will be available from individ- ual distributors and the Peoples Co-op Bookstore.

*x* * *

Rc RE a RR SB EEN RR ge I Tren

nlike the Brian Mulroneys and the

would-be leaders of the Liberal Party who likely get as much air timas the Campbell’s soup commercials, leaders of the Communist Party have little access to the medium. But at least community tele- vision, low budget though it is, has done something to help change that and as a result, B.C. CP leader Maurice Rush will be appearing on community Cable 10 in Vancouver, Richmond and Burnaby in a show to be aired three times.

The show is a profile of his political activities, both past and present and is part of the continuing series Eastsider on Cable 10. The first show has already been aired as we go to press but there are two more showings for those who want to catch it: on Mar. 28 at 11 p.m. and Apr. 1 at 10:30 a.m.

* * *

Wi: had a sad message relayed to us from Toronto last week, that long- time Tribune supporter Kate Bader passed away on Mar. 19 after suffering a heart attack. She was 84.

Kate and her husband Mike, a former member of the anti-fascist resistance in Germany, had moved to Toronto from their home in White Rock last year to be with Mike’s family.

Born in England, Kate immigrated to this country in the 1920s and settled first in Montreal before moving to Toronto. Like thousands of her generation, she became active in the left-wing movement in the 1930s and assumed a particularly promi- nent role in both the Aid to Spain Com- mittee and later the Friends of the Mackenzie-Papineau Battalion.

She also joined the Communist Party and for many years was a personal secre- tary to its general secretary Tim Buck.

She came to White Rock in 1967 where she took up an earlier cause, assisting Mackenzie Papineau Battaltion veterans here in forming a senior citizens’ organiza- tion under the federal New Horizons pro- gram and helping them to raise the funds to publish an official battalion history now in preparation. ;

* * *

W: have a note — brief as it is — that a fund has been set up in the memory of martyred Grenadian trade unionist Vincent Noel.

Noel, who led Grenada’s trade union central and along with the late prime min- ister Maurice Bishop was the target of a CIA-financed assassination attempt, died with Bishop and several other supporters in the internicine violence that gave the U.S. Reagan administration its long- awaited pretext to invade the tiny Carib- bean island and topple its government last year.

Noel’s loss was particularly felt by Van- couver supporters of the Grenadian revo- lution, since the personable and witty Grenadian leader visited the city about one year before his death.

More details on the fund, set up by leading Canadian trade unionists to help

-Grenadian trade unions rebuild after the

U.S. invasion, should be forthcoming. Backed by the United Auto Workers pres- ident Bob White and the Canadian Union of Postal Workers’ president Jean-Claude Parrot, among others, it deserves the sup- port of every trade unionist who wants to see what Vincent Noel worked for all his life continued after this tragic death.

4 e PACIFIC TRIBUNE, MARCH 28, 1984