Is the Cold War ending? — page 6 —

February 13, 1989

TES CINE.

Groups warn of Socred ‘threat to health care’

Ziebart outlets on B.C. Fed hot list

SERVICE Emp | nN

Auto body workers (left to right) Mark Smith, Andrew Chandra and Karl Gasston maintain picket outside the Boundary Road outlet of Ziebart. The members of the Service Employees International Union, Local 244, set up picket lines at the Burnaby store Feb. 4 after taking a non-IRC vote to strike for a first contract. The U.S.-based chain, which reaps millions of dollars for undercarriage work and specialized installations such as sun roofs, offered $8.50 per hour with no benefits in contract talks and when that was rejected, dropped the offer to $5.25 and benefits worth about 85 cents per hour. Management has closed the outlet and is re-routing customers to the Vancouver store on West 4th Avenue, and to the non-union outlet in Coquitlam. Employees are asking the public to boycott all Ziebart stores, which are now on the Bc:

Federation of Labour hot list.

Social Credit attempts to change the Canada Health Act and re-institute hospital user fees will create two-tiered health care and are the thin edge of the wedge towards privatizing medicine in the province.

Members of B.C.’s health care commun- ity and other groups sounded these warn- ings in commenting on recent statements by Socred cabinet members calling for a lobby by provincial governments to change the 1983 Act.

Finance Minister Mel Couvelier and Health Minister Peter Dueck took that proposal to a conference of provincial health ministers in Moncton, N.B., last week.

Bill Macdonald, president of the Hospi- tal Employees Union, called the proposal

“the thin edge of the wedge in the Ameri-

canization of health care in B.C.”

“If user fees are implemented, more peo- ple will get sick and more people will die,” said Jean Swanson of End Legislated Pov-

erty.

Maurice Rush, provincial leader of the Communist Party, said the free trade pact and the re-election of the federal Tories means “a greater danger now to public health care than at any time since the system was introduced.”

User fees threaten the universality of medical care which is the cornerstone of the Canada Health Act. The Act — not with- out its faults, critics say — was introduced by the former federal Liberal government in 1983, and passed by all parties in the House of Commons.

The Act penalizes provinces that charge hospital user fees, by deducting the equival- ent value in federal transfer payments to provincial health care systems.

Such was the case for British Columbia

-for the period between July, 1984, to the

spring of 1987. At that time it cost British

Columbians out-of-pocket $8 per visit to

day surgery, $10 for emergency services, see SOCREDS page 2

T in-Wis accord’ spurs environmental movement

By FRED WILSON _ TOFINO — The Tin-Wis Guest House _is a modestly furnished former Native stu- dent residence on the beach about two _ miles from Tofino that is normally obs- cured by the more upscale tourist loca- tions around Pacific Rim National Park. But this weekend Tin-Wis lent its name to a new coalition of Native, labour, environmentalist, peace and political organizations that promises to become a _ powerful movement that could shape the future of politics and resource manage- ~ ment in B.C. About 200 delegates from more than 70

organizations overwhelmed the Tin-Wis centre and after two and a half days of debate emerged with the. “Tin-Wis Accord.” The accord founds a new pro- vincial coalition dedicated to the settle- ment of Native land claims, to secure democratic control of resource manage- ment in B.C. and to “develop a people’s

_alternative to the policies of the present

government.” Chief Earl Smith of the Ehattesaht First

. Nation, David Suzuki and Tara Cullis,

Colleen McCrory of the Valhalla Wild- nerness Society, Kel Kelly of the Friends of Strathcona, and Arne Thomlinson and

Frank Cox from the United Fishermen and Allied Workers Union released the

accord at a media conference in Van- couver Monday.

Structure and leadership questions were left open at Tin-Wis, as were the imme- diate actions to follow the conference. However, there was a groundswell of pres- sure from a wide spectrum of groups to have the new coalition swing into action to oppose the Socred government’s proposal to vastly increase the scale of Tree Farm Licences in the province.

“Our common ground is broad and growing firmer,” steering committee mem-

ber Kel Kelly told the assembly as he traced the history of the fledgling move- ment from its roots in the protest move- ment to save Strathcona Park. Twenty-five organizations including six

Native organizations, several environmen- tal groups, the United Fishermen and Allied Workers Union, the NDP, Com- munist Party and Green Party launched the Tin-Wis movement at a meeting in. Strathcona Park Lodge in February 1988. The groups looked beyond the fight to save the park and adopted a resolution incorporating three points of unity:

see TIN-WIS page 3