’

\ Tory yesmen for. big business

‘

The great hospital swindle

EDICAL problems loom large in every

working class home. It was tardy rec- ognition of this fact that forced the provin- cial government to institute its hospital insurance scheme. Despite all its inherent de- ficiencies (none of them insurmountable), it expressed the partial realization of a long- promised. health insurance measure.

Let no one harbor, the illusion that a conglomerate. government of Liberal and “eave” the people. of this province a hospital insurance scheme out of the fullness of their hearts. BCHIS was born out of the insistent demands of the people for their right to health.

Since inauguration of BCHIS it has been evident (and would bé much more so. with the publication of. the governmént-suppres- sed Volume 11 of the Harhilton Report) that the scheme as devised by Coalition “experts” was not to insure the working class people for hospitalization if and when needed, but to assure the revenues of existing hospital administrations at premium payers’ expense.

The notorious amendments to BCHIS now being debated in tlfe legislature bear out a growing opinion, that from its ,incep- tion BCHIS has been administered by the Coalition in a manner calculated to under- mine and finally scuttle hospital insurance altogether. This is the only conclusion to

i

~ Your money -

OUSEHOLDERS. in Vancouver, New . Westminster and ‘Victoria will pay an additional 19 percent (the official figure) on their electric bills from now on. The so-cal- led Public Utilities Commission (PUC) has given the BCElectric “approval for an in-

terim increase in its electricity rates.”

With. slight variation it is the same old PUC cracked record that grates on the pub- lic ear. D. K, Penfold, pinchitting for PUC chairman Dr. A. W. Carrothers, announces the granting of the “interim” hoist; tells us that the PUC intends to “carry out an in- tensive study of BCElectric 1950 operations and audit”’then a “public hearing . . ably in the fall.”

To grant an “interim” hoist and then talk about “an intensive study” of BCElect-

ric financing is putting the cart before the horse. But this is the traditional PUC tech- | nique to soften public wrath.

With the sole exception of Ald. Atex

Fisher, Vancouver City Council passed the buck and decided “not to oppose” the BCElec- tric’s application. Ald. R. K. Gervin, who furnishes the “labor” front for the anti-labor NPA, disposed of public opposition to the gouge -— expressed in numerous leaflets,

telegrams, telephone calls, and delegations— by describing such opposition as “a low, des- picable act adopted by a group that has no Presumably in

standing in the community."

| PASSPORT FOR PEACE moa RS _ a ine eR ee (Biease fill in and mail the following credential to National ‘Assembly To Save Peace, 49 Walker Ave., Toronto, Ont., along with your remittance and whatever written comments you

care = make NAME

. prob-

be drawn from three years of maladministra- tion, bungling, “explaining” and squander- ing of hospital insurance revenues, while failing to provide “adequate hospitalization for the alleged “beneficiaries.” _

The amendments to BCHIS now pending cancel out over 80 percent of the inevitable hospital: requirements of every worker and his family. They transform a scheme provid- ine a bare minimum of protection into a caricature of insurance and bring it ‘into line with Finance Minister Anscomb’s hope of abolishing social insurance (what little the people have) completely.

Is it any wonder that BCHIS is reported $12 million “in the red”.

What BCHIS needs most of all is com-

petent business management, which will have

for its objective increased benefits and lower

premiums. In place of repeatedly dipping into the workers’ pockets without so much as a “by your leave” for additional revenues, there should be imposition of a tax levy upon cor- porate capital and the dividends of abSentee coupon-clippers, to build and equip hospitals in sufficient, volume to meet the people’s health needs. Then BCHIS could become what the people of B.C. intended and want it to be, an institution dedicated to health, rather than a partisan racket to extort taxes under false pretenses. giz

-or your light

Gervin’s NPA concept of a community ‘up the BCElectric has any standing. _ Gervin of all people at City Hall should know that every “‘interim’-cum-“permanent” fare hoist the BCElectric has grabbed off in recent ‘years, with the aid Of a pliable PUG, ‘has been 2) op eaten by two argu- ments. 4

The first is the increase of “labor costs.” Every wage increase secured by the Street Railwaymen’s Union had been accompanied by the threat of “forcing additional costs on the public,” thus seeking to place the blame “upon organized labor. ~ ;

'

The second is the contention that the

company shows a profit on its electric power’

operations, but loses on its transit opera-

tions. (This situation has been improved con- |

siderably since the last “interim” fare hoist. In the three key cities commuters now pur- chase for the BCElectric, in increased fares, an average of one new trolley or motor bus per day.)

Organized labor and the people can stop.

this PUC “hearing” from becoming a white- wash of BCElectric profiteering. They can stop that “interim” holdup from becoming

permanent by organization of public pro-

test sufficient in volume to impress upon the PUC that its function is to safeguard the public against monopoly fleecing — rather than neeine. the BCElectric to fleece the DEAS.

ADDRESS. ....:..-—.——-7.

s

I am a Delegate 1]

Corresponding Delegate [] I shall require a billet 1] Hotel accommodation oO

= s

‘Official Observer [] Observer []

‘Ishall make my own arrangements []

I represent

contribution.

(name of > Wi a cars ep aa Number of members... Secretary sign here Enclosed is cheque or money order for $...........4 representing $.

Piease send me all information on agenda and location of the Assembly as soon as possible. (Attach a sheet of paper outlining your views on how peace can be won.) ;

CA in p 2 eat x

Ee atieian es, PACIFIC TEIBUNE:

fee, $

_the question, placed ,in simple aia begins to loom - large.

TOM McEWEN

As We See lt

Ace by a ooumle of officious cops while tacking up a small poster advertising some meeting or other, a PT reader in a small Vancouver Island town wrote us inquiring, “What are a worker's rights?” y That is a very big and Saae important question. What are a worker’s rights? It needs to be emphasized at this time that, despite the oft-documented declaration on , human rights, beginning with Magna Charta back in 1215, down to the UN’s most recent pronounce- ment on the subject, such. “rights” are deplorably nebulous, vague and illusory, and readily cancelled out when their exercise threatens the vested class-rule of monopoly ®capital and its e parliamentary yesmen. In America we have watched, with too much ‘ unconcern, an UN-American Activities Committee and its numerous state offshoots, shatter every vestige of human right, liberty and conscience, implicit in the Constitution and Bill of Rights. In the wake of this extra-legal torrent of judi- cial tyranny we have seen powerful trade unions disunited and. destroyed, their’ leaders framed, hounded and jailed. We have seen some of the “most talented American writers “cited for con- tempt,” gagged and imprisoned for long terms. Negro workers framed, lynched,

propaganda machine screaming around. the clock about Puaaga ee our free democratic way of life”! .

In Canada we haven’t paid too much attention ‘to all this until now, when its evil blight begins.to strike at our own freedom. nome Wha are a worker’s rights?

As defined by proposed ‘amendments to. the Citizenship Ne and operative under an extra-legal Emergency Powers Act, elaborated by Prime Minister Louis St. Laurent, a citizen will now have the “right” not to disagree with government policy. — ernment war policies, urging that the government. legislate for peace instead of war, can now be equivalent to “renouncing allegiance.” Citizens, having “shocn by their conduct” that they believe in and work for peace, may be deemed “not loyal to Canada.”

If a citizen lands in the clink for not exercising his right” ‘to oi

shout hurrah every. time Defense Minister Claxtoh adds another billion dollars-of Canada’s wealth to Wall Street’s war preparations, he will be happy to know that his alienable right of Habeus Corpus is to be respected under the new regulations. Retention of this (‘right” enables the government to toss him into durance vile, and allows him to try to get out. Being surrounded by a government-inspired “emergency,” the exits from the clink may only be through the Star Chamber, or the wider atmosphere of a prejudiced court.

Licking its editorial chops in anticipation of an early witch-hunt against all who disagree with the atomaniacs and their yesmen in Canada, the Vancouver Daily Province of February 5, under the cap- tion “They Hiad Better Watch Their Step,” gave out with this spoon-

ful of Southam’s soothing syrup: “Nobody wants to throttle freedom’

but in these days there is very real danger that our love of freedom will be exploited by those who seek to undermine freedom. No decent, loyal ‘Canadian meed worry about anti-Canadian oe eres

If such trinquility prevails one might ask the Ofd y of Victory Square why the urgency to editorialize about it? It so happens that the threat implicit in the new Emergency Powers Act

is anti-Canadian, and does threaten the freedom of all Canadians who

do not subscribe th the highly dangerous war policies of Yanke imperialism, to which the St. Laurent Lb tas one has Neonieteion Canada, lock stock and barrel!

In spite of the Province’s assurances Ariént “anti-Canadian legis-

’ lation” it is only a few weeks ago that the Yankee’ “Un-American”

witch-hunters seized the files of the Institute of Pacific Relations, a

body with which many prominent men of Canadian letters are asso- ©

ciated. Doubtless, until now, these Canadians thought they had a perfect “right” to take part in the work of this body. Now they are not so sure. Yankee policies in Asia. Under our new Emergency Power Act, wheeled through at the behest of the U.S. State Department, the

opinions of this group could readily be construed as ee to

Canada.

All such anti-democratic legislation is directed against. the people —first and foremost the most militant and progressive sections of the people, the Communists. But all recent history shows that such legislation has no limits, that it grows like a cancer to threaten all sections of thought which do not conform with that of — war oligarchy in power.

What are a worker’s rights? Well, he has ‘the. “right” th work, or not to work, provided he conforms to the million and one provisos contingent upon the exercise of these “rights.” He also thas the right to eat, a “right” so well protected by legal ep a that he can starve in the midst of abundance!

A worker can exercise the rights of freedom of speech, eel: tion, assembly or conscience, provided that, in collective. pursuit of these freedoms, he doesn’t run foul of, or counter to the vested rights of monopoly capital,,\implicit in “our democratic free enterprise way

_ of life.” ‘Should he do 'so he will get-an object lesson on the role of

the bourgeois state not included in his schoo]-day text books.

He can even enjoy the right of freedom of the press, provided he can scrape up three or four million bucks to compete with a highly monopolized “news” fabricating industry, which specializes in pre- digested falsehoods. Obviously, the lack of these millions fens this. “right” down to microscopic proportions... .

All such “rights” are little more than Wighadundite formulae. It is the essence of these that is important, in which the right is im- plicit, and this was only won, and can only be held through organ-

ization, continuous struggle, and wed conviction in the purpose’ and :

dignity pf Man. —

“Whin th’ upper crust gives. Hinnessey to his colleague O’Toole out. »Th’ only a taaure yez'l have is pe wans yes taake by yer own mL I) a wy

ifforts. de LUD) lB

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Published Weekly at Room 6 - 426 Main. Street, Vancouver, BC. i By THE TRIBUNE PUBLISHING CVOMEANT. LTD. je Telephone MA. 5288 Tom MoOMwen Fits. ses tek et a Spins Editor — Subscription Rates: 1 Year, $2.50; 6. Months, $1.35.

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or judiciously ~ -murdered—all to ‘the noisy accompanyment of a billion-dollar war

Criticism of gov-:

At times the IPR has been* quite outspoken against |

“tis only a’ wrong turned insoid ©