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Not many

— jobs here

Once a natural gas pipeline
is built it needs very few
workers to operate the line. A
handful of workers manning
compressor stations operate
the present Westcoast Trans-
mission line which pumps
billions of cubic feet of gas into

the U.S. every day.

Photo at right shows one
worker attending a compressor
station on a natural gas pipe-
line. The claim pipelines mean
lots of jobs is a false one aimed
at misleading people into
supporting giveaway schemes.

Parliament _must_act

STOP GAS SELLOUT

Bennett’s welfare edict
means tax hoist on homes

By NIGEL MORGAN

Premier Bennett and his

government have ordered an in-
Crease in the taxes on your home
with the new welfare ruling from
Victoria, jumping the per capita
Share borne by municipalities
from $1.06 to $1.58.
_ At a time when the number of
Jobless is rising, farmers are
being forced off the land, and
Pay cheques are buying less,
Premier Bennett has brought in
a new device to strip several
million dollars more from the
pockets of municipal ratepayers
of this province.

Formerly welfare costs were
Shared by the three levels of
government on the basis of
Federal 50%: Provincial 40%

and Municipalities 10%. Early

in 1968, the Bennett administra-
tion ordered the municipal share
Increased from 10 to 20 percent,
while it’s own share was dropped
from 40 to 30 percent. And this,
despite the fact that the Socred
government’s revenues rose by
more than 20 percent in the
fiscal year 1969-70.

_ Victoria sources estimate
Increased welfare costs for the
full year could amount to as

_ Much. as $30 million, although

€ven without changing the

formula the Provincial treasury
would have only had to cover
about $9 million of this since
Ottawa pays 50 percent and the
municipalities 20 percent.

The new cost-sharing order,
represents a 43 percent increase
in municipal welfare costs — the
second boost this year. For the
remainder of this year alone the
new formula will add another
$500,000 to Vancouver ratepayers
tax load: $192,000 in Burnaby;
$100,000 in Victoria and Saanich;
$164,000 in Richmond; North Van
city, $86,000; Delta, $80,000;
Westminster, $65,000; West Van,
$52,000 and Prince George
$33,000 amongst others.

With unemployment in B.C.
having doubled in the last four
years as a result of Trudeau’s
austerity program with its
deliberately-induced unemploy-
ment, and the growing volumes
of B.C. resources and job
opportunities shipped out to
foreign lands, welfare costs have
spiralled.

The new cost-sharing welfare
formula ordered by Premier
Bennett is as unworkable and
unacceptable as his resource and
tax policies. It faces all muni-
cipalities with the impossible

alternative of either increased

borrowing from the banks (with
repayment via a substantial tax
hoist next year), or a sharp
cutback in public works and
services, staff layoffs etc.
forcing more people onto
welfare and raising costs again.

It adds another impossible
burden to that of rising from the
Socred's totally. inadequate
school, hospital and municipal
grant system.

At a time when unemployment
has reached above the half
million mark, and we are faced
with an acute shortage of

‘housing, educational, health and

recreational facilities there can
be only one solution — JOBS.
Shifting the tax burden on those
least able to pay Premier

Bennett, can only deepen and

extend the crisis.

Jobs can be created! Mass
united, action, starting at the
municipal level, is what’s
needed. Instead of pressure on
the homeowners, pressure on
the senior governments to:

i) Build 100,000 new, low-cost
housing units, and the hospital,
educational and recreational
facilities so urgently needed;

2) Divert the wasteful so-

See WELFARE, pg. 12

Vol. 31, No. 41

Energy deal with U.S.
means export of jobs

By MAURICE RUSH

“The Trudeau government’s sellout of natural gas to
U.S. financial interests was undertaken behind the backs
of the people and without the consent of Parliament. The
deal is a serious blow at Canadian independence,
undermines the sovereignty of Parliament and seriously
weakens the development of secondary industry in

Canada.”’

This is the charge made this
week in an open letter to all
members of Parliament by the
Central Executive of the Com-
munist Party of Canada.

On September 29 — only a few
days before Parliament opened
— the federal government ap-
proved the export of 6.3 trillion
cubic feet of natural gas to the
U.S. over the next 15 to 20 years.
The deal resulted from many
months of negotiations behind
closed doors and:signalizes that a
continental energy agreement
has been arrived at despite
speeches by some government
members to the contrary.

Once the pipelines are built and
U.S. development takes place on
the basis of Canadian natural
gas, the possibility of some day
being able to stop the flow is very
remote. The present deal must
therefore be seen not as of a few
years duration, but as one of long
range, with the ever-expanding
appetite of the U.S. pressuring
Canada for more and more of this
precious resource.

The Communist Party letter to

MP’s says:

“The government has decided
to carry on its policy of sell-out
without reference to Parliament

because it fears another 1956
debate in the country that would
call into political motion that vast
majority of the people who op-
pose sell-out and austerity.

“At the present session of
Parliament every member,
regardless of party affiliation
must speak out for reversal of the
gas deal; to prevent a complete
sell-out of Canada’s energy
resources; to uphold sovereignty
of Parliament.

‘Prime Minister Trudeau’s
policy of austerity and sellout is
creating hardship and_ falling
living standards for millions of
Canadians. The economy is
stagnating. Farmers are without
markets. The municipalties face
a grim winter of rising welfare
costs. The. youth face an un-
certain future. Only the rich
corporations support unem-
ployment politices. They utilize
unemployment to drive down
wages and weaken _ the
bargaining position of the labor

-and farm movement.

“The present disastrous course
of sell-out and unemployment
with inflation must be replaced

with new policies, Canadian

See GAS SELLOUT, pg. 12

Coal pipeline next?

; I: = ¢

Pacers ARETE

Plans are already well
advanced for a pipeline from the

Kootenays to the coast to speed .

up the shipment of coal to Japan.
An application for the building of
the above pipeline has already
been made in Ottawa by the
Cascade Pipe Line Ltd. ~

It will move coal in “‘slurry”’
form, meaning watered. When it
arrives at the coast the water
will be separated and dumped in
large quantities into coastal
waters. Pollution from this will
be immense, but it will enable

See COAL, pg. 12

Sioned