Sales tax goes on over protest

The Coalition government’s me- thoa of celebratung Canada Way was to take another wnack at liv- ing stanaards, with the provincial sales tax going into erfect July 1.

Canadian Manutacturers’ Asso- ciation delegates, heaued by T. G. Norris, KC, sought trom tne cabi-| net further exemptions from the tax. Delegation was conspicuous as being the only organization ap- pearing which has not opposed the tax as a whole.

“IT am convinced the impact on the spender will scarcely be felt,” said Tory Finance Minister Ans- comb, who, with his Logana factory in steady operation, is not faced with the problem of the low-income majority in scratching for cents let alone dollars. :

Anscomb claimed that a worker earning $175 monthly will pay $1.75 a month in sales tax. The Trade Union Research bureau has proved in the Pacific Tribune that such a worker will pay over $2.50 a month, or more than $30 a year. The gov- ernment has admitted it will snatch 48 cents every month from old age pensioners, but the same govern- ment takes only $100,000 in stump-

. age in royalties from H. R. MacMil- lan, who made over $7,000,000 last year.

Proclamation has been accom- panied by use of the taxpayers’ money for an intensive partisan

propaganda campaign that other-

ere

wise the old-line parties would have had to pay for, a campaign aimed at sugar-coating this most discrim- inatory of all forms of taxa- tion.

The government persists in call- ing it “The Social Security and Municipal Aid Tax,” although it makes no provision for extending social security measures already

in force and municipalities are

still getting the raw end of pro- vincial-municipal financial deals.

There’s no doubt the tax will. slow up business. Smal] retailers are hopping mad at the additional mass of red tape in which the sales tax involves them.

“They want to make me into a government agent, a lawyer and

.a stool-pigeon on my customers,”

one of them frothed when inter- viewed by the Pacific Tribune. “A man needs a book-keeper specially to cope with this damn thing.”

His plight became plain from study of the documents he'd receiy- ed from the sales tax commissioner.

He now becomes an agent of the crown to collect the tax from his customers, for which he

Rush shows Young, Cameron twisted poll results in Center

Claims advanced by Rod Young (CCF, Vancouver Center) in his maiden speech in the House of Commons that LPP members voted Tory in the recent byelection and that two LPP provincial committee members resigned in protest at al- leged violation of national LPP policy, were greeted with cheers by “all parties’ in the House, includ- ing Tories, Liberals and Social Crediters, but were spiked by prov- incial LPP officials as lies aimed at disrupting the labor unity on which election of a CCF govern- ment depends.

Young conspicuously failed to re- ply to the following telegram from Nigel Morgan, LPP provincial lead- er, which. was suppressed by the same daily papers that had given prominence to Young's claims:

“Press statements attributed to

you charging LPP supported Vancouver Center Tory candid- ate are viciously untruthful. No resignations were received by our provincial committee, nor do your figures of the vote correspond with the facts. We demand that you produce evidence or publicly retract.”

Maurice Rush, LPP provincial

Vanport victims storm council, blame officials for disaster

More than 1,000 Vanport flood refugegees, many of them now living on partially

inundated Swan Island, stormed the city council here to dem

PORTLAND.

and immediate requisition of

hotel rooms and auto courts to house victims of the worst flood disaster ‘in the U.S.

They were led by

tor of the ‘'elephone Workers’ Dispatcher, Victor Todd,

labor attorney Irving Goodman, as well as some 200 members of Hod Carriers Local 296, the AFL union whose membei's were most heavily affected by the flood. : :

Other demands made by the com- mittee included:

e@ Appropriation of funds for the Vanport victims. @ Prior- ity in employment to flood repair work. @ A rent freeze as of , May 30 to prevent gouging by landlords,

The flood refugees filled the council chamber and stood in traf- fic-blocking throngs on the street Outside. The council’s only answer to the request far help was to re-

fer the whole matter to the. Traf- & fic Commission for discussion at};

some indefinite future date. Republican Mayor Earl Riley threatened to drive the flood vic- tims out of the council chamber when they dared to applaud Ela Campbell, former Vanport teacher, who branded the Housing Author ity’s attempt to crowd the flood Victims and their children into “trailer ghettos” as something that “cannot be hidden from the Ame- rican public behind a Festival of Roses.” That was a reference to Portland’s annual festival which

Went on as usual this year although |"

it brought thousands of outsiders in to fill hotel rooms desperately needed by flood victims.

The Housing Authority, whose notice to Vanport residents that the dykes were safe is blamed by Many for life and property loss in the disaster, was appointed by the mayor. Riley was overwhelm- ingly defeated for re-election by labor-backed Dorothy McCullough Lee in the May primaries, but the hew mayor does not take office Until next year.

Meanwhile, persistent AFL in- Quiry into the fate of union mem- bers who lived in Vanport has forc- €d the Red Cross to admit that its list of unlocated persons is far from complete,

Names of nine AFL carpenters Were added to the list June 16. Oth- er AFL unions listing members still

Unaccounted for include the boiler- Makers with eight names and the

officers of the Citizens’ Disaster Committee including Bruce Bishop, edi- Portland longshoreman, and _ local

painters with 16 names. The AFL is setting up a master file in or- der to check and double-check on possible fatalities.

A similar check is under way by CIO unions who had over 335 mem- bers living in Vanport. The CIO regional office is acting as co-or- dinator for relief and rehabilitation workw done by the Portland In-

dustrial Council, the CIO state council and the Telephone Workers’ Organizing Committee. Contribu- tions collected by the CIO will be used among other things to make down payments on furniture.

The, Laundry Workers Union (AFL) sent a $1,000 donation to its local here, which had some 100 members in Vanport.

After the floods

River at Portland, Ore. Locai

the fight for emergency

relief in flooded areas.

ere’s what is left of homes along the rampaging Columbia AFL and CIO leaders are heading housing measures and are organizing

organizer, stated that the LPP “did nol take part” in Vancouver Center byelection “not because of any change in our policy of working for the.election of CCF govern- ments, but because the LPP could not conscientiously ask the working people in Center to back a person of Young’s disruptive record in the labor movement.” He pointed. to the “fact that Young barely held the CCF vote in a working class riding, whereas O. BE. Jones increased the vote of the CCF 59 percent in the traditionally Tory riding of Yaie,” as proving “that many thousands of working people in Center felt likewise.”

Of the two byelections the LPP decided to place its full efforts into the Yale campaign, Rush explained, contending that “results have vin- dicated our position,” and that “Young’s false statements, which seek to impugn the motives of the LPP, stand exposed by our consis- tent record of activities to unite the people to win a _ progressive government.”

When Colin Cameron, CCF past president, publicly announced that

ceives three percent commission. To do business, he has to forward a 10-point registration ferm in triplicate. He has 36 clauses of the act to master, plus 48 pages of regulations and instructions.

He must immediately place an order stating how many farmers’ and fishermen’s exemption certifi- cates he requires, how many resale exemption tickets he requires, how many tickets he requires at one cent, three cents and five cents, how many containers for tickets he wants to buy at his expense, and the number of additional copies of the act, regulations and instruc- tions, and tax table cards he wants.

Tickets have to be used where there is no other form of receipt itemizing the tax. <

Where there are exemptions the vendor must personally satisfy him- self as to their validity, or be held responsible by the government for an infraction of the act. In.. fact, he is legally responsible for appli- cation of the whole complex and cumbersome machinery, and must account to the government every month for all sales and tax collec- tions.

It’s some headache, and small wonder that almost every little Board of Trade and Retail Merch- ants’ Association in the province fought passage of the act.

It’s some headache, too, for the little guy who has to pay—but not aalf as bad as the headache ime Coalition is sure to get when elec- tion time comes round and all the little guys hit by the tax get a chance to catch up with its perpe- trators.

“No discrimination — it taxes

he found Rush’s remarks about the LPP’s unity fight “sidesplitting”, and duplicated Young’s attempts to falsify election returns, Rush re- plied with this statement:

against the LPP, both Young and Cameron have chosen to draw the amazing conclwsion from two polls in Center out of 124, that the LPP’ supported the Tories! And even the figures from these polls are twisted and dishonestly presented. Young asserts, and Cameron supports him, that poll 102A proves the LPP sup- ported the Tories. Fortunately the official figures are available for all to see,

“In 1945 poll 102 was a single poll. In 1948 the same poll was div- ided into A and B. Young has used the simple device of taking oniy part of the vote—poll 102A—to ad- vance his false statement. He con- veniently leaves out B, but even the resuits from half the poll provide no substantiation for the asser- tions. Here is the vote in poll 102 for 1945: Liberals 138, Progressive- Conservatives 18, CCF 78, LPP 47. Compare these with the recent vote in poll 102A and B: Liberals 80, Progressive-Conservatives 15, CCF 112. 1

“How is it possible on the basis of these figures to defend the com- pletely false assumption that the LPP supported the Tories in the Center byelection?

“Cameron repeats Young's false- hood that LPP members resigned because of instructions to vote Tory. No resignations took Place because no such instructions were given. I challenge Cameron to name even one member of the LPP who resigned for the reason he claims.

“Young and Cameron omit men- tion of the excellent work done by the LPP in Yale to help elect O. L. Jones — to mention this would weaken their “case” against labor and people’s unity.

“The LPP will continue to urge the people to unite at the polls for the election of CCF governments at Victoria and Ottawa because we consider it in the best interests of the nation to turn the old line par-

ties out of office.”

PACIFIC TRIBUNE—JULY 2, 1948—PAGE 7

“In their attempt to make a case!

everybody equally,” the Coalition claims. Everybody will have an equal

\chance to throw out the Coalition | too.

URGENT!

Have you a used kitchen chair, table, set of shelves, dishes, cutlery or kitchen utensils, etc.?

Such Donations Thankfully Received By ; GALIANO SUMMER

CAMP FOR LABOR

GROUPS

Recudiey ddy 10°

Phone or Write DOLCE SMITH c/o PACIFIC TRIBUNE, . 650 Howe St. MArine 5288. —

Garden Party :

in honor of

EFFIE JONES

Wed., July 7th

At the home of MRS. J. COOK _ 5907 Victoria Rd. Cor. 43rd & Victoria Attendance Prize — Musical Program —

Tea Cup Reading, Bingo, . and other attractions

ADMISSION—35c,