et DECEMBERA1974 W THE WESTERN CANADIAN LUMBER WORKER y Wa] S<= 34,000 copies printed in this issue Wor A.) thewestern canadian lumber worker Published once monthly as the official publication of the INTERNATIONAL WOODWORKERS OF AMERICA Western Canadian Regional Council No. 1 Affiliated with AFL-ClO-CLC 2859 Commercial Orive, Vancouver, B.C. Phone 874-5261 Editor —PatKerr Business Manager — Bob Schlosser Advertising Representatives — Elizabeth Spencer Associates Forwarded to every member of the 1WA in Western Canada in accordance with convention decisions. Subscription rate for non-members $2.00 per year. | T'S that time of year again. Inside the stores, which have all ad- vertised Superstar Christmas Miracle sales, hordes of people are thronging from counter to counter frantically grabbing the right size hockey socks for Cousin Bobby or a rare blend of Transylvanian pipe tobacco for Uncle Boris. _ In the past five minutes you've bumped into ten or eleven Santa Clauses of every imaginable size and shape. They’re all patting padded stomachs and ho-ho-hoing until you think your bargain basement head- ache will explode. As you begin to feel the early but excruciating symptoms of “depart- ment-store-floor-feet,”” you like to imagine the children at home are tucked snug in their beds watching sugar plums dance in their heads. But you know they re playing Christ- mas politics — a seasonal game you can win only by giving the exact right gift. From store to store you search, and in the midst of all this rush, you happen to notice a Red Cross poster. asking you to give blood during this holiday season. Or perhaps you hear an appeal for blood donors on the radio, or see a Red Cross television . commercial asking you to help. Each appeal urges you to remember the hundreds of people who will need blood during the holiday season because only people like you, who take half an hour from their busy Christmas schedules to give blood, can help. You know Christmas can mean more than crowded stores, tired feet, and finding the right size. You like to give and enjoy sharing with -friends and family. The holiday season is what you make it. So when Red Cross asks you to give blood, what will you do? During this holiday season, a time of rush and expectation, of excitement and fun, a time of life, you can give the greatest gift of all — the gift of life. It may mean the difference - between life and death for someone in need. So why not give blood? You may be giving someone a Christmas present they'll live to be thankful for! GOVERNMENT REPORTS NEW INTERIOR STUMPAGE RATES Interior forest operations will have to pay only minimum stumpage rates this winter, and independent coast opera- tors will see their stumpage rates cut in half. This announcement, made by Resources Minister Bob Williams in Kamloops, is one of a series of measures taken by the provincial government to help the sawmilling industry through its current difficulties. Interior stumpage appraised or reappraised from this date _ forward will be set at the mini- mum rate allowed by statute — $1.10 per hundred cubic feet of timber. This reduction will be backdated to November 1, 1974, and will continue until the end of March, 1975. Stumpage is the price paid _ for the raw material of the for- 2 est gugits - Bag purchase _ price of the standing _ While pulp producers in the trees. vince have enjoyed high ts recently, the non-inte- lumber producers have ffered heavily from the eontinuing decline in lumber Pins markets. This has resulted in ‘severe unemployment, parti- -eularly in the Interior. " Mr. Williams had repeatedly criticized the pulp companies for refusing to pay the saw- millers adequate prices for chips, and has promised to take action. The Forest Pro- ducts Stabilization Act, passed by the legislature earlier gives the government power to determine the price that pulp mills must pay sawmillers for pulp chips. “These temporary minimum stumpage charges will ensure that none of the gain in chip prices will be absorbed in stumpage rates,” said Mr. Williams. “The total benefit will go to the sawmills, and of course to the people they employ.” For the Coast, Mr. Williams said that stumpage rates for independent (non-integrated) firms would be reduced to 20% of log sale values in the Van- couver Forest District, and 8% of the log selling prices on the northern coast. On the average, this will be a reduction to about half the pre- sent rates. The new rates will be in effect through the November to the April adjust- ment dates. Other measures include a temporary suspension of é as penalty charges for usable wood left on the ground after logging, except in cases of fla- grant waste. However, wastes will continue to be measured to _make sure that the annual allowable cut is not exceeded in any area. In recent weeks Mr. Williams has also increased cost allowances in stumpage appraisals, and made the stumpage charges more res- ponsive to current market prices. “These measures cannot entirely compensate for the decline in lumber markets,” said Mr. Williams, ‘‘but they will help to ensure that, when the world market improves, the forest industry will be in a healthy position to take full advantage of every oppor- tunity.” Pra re a LT Ter NES OIE AR FS Ra ee LIGHTER SIDE Tom, the timber tycoon, tells us that tolerance is the ability to keep your shirt on when you’re hot under the collar. * * * A Pouce Coupe Pete opinion: He who laughs, lasts. D’ya spose them young guys spiked his snoose wit pot? BOYCOTT KODAK PRODUCTS The Canadian Labour Con- gress urged Canadians to refrain from _ purchasing Kodak products in support of the. employees of Kodak Canada Limited, on strike against the company _ since ‘November 6.005 2 2—™ i: The call for a consumer boycott was made by CLC President Joe Morris on behalf of the CLC Executive Council meeting in Ottawa. “The collective agreement covering Kodak workers is ~substandard,’’ Mr. Morris said. Facts and figures produced by Statistics Canada are true, but are they the whole truth and nothing but the truth? - The simple answer is, not always. Some of Canada’s figure finaglers have been using housing cost figures which understate the actual rise-in housing costs right across the country. The error is due-to the fact that the figures given as housing costs have been exclusive of the cost of the land. Land prices have escalated while construction and other costs have increased ‘more moderately. So the figures for housing costs which have appeared in the Con- sumer Price Index have been too low and have thus distorted the whole index. Actual housing costs in fast- growing urban areas like Metro Toronto and Vancouver, where land costs are among the highest on the continent, would be far above the national average which the CPI repre- sents. The housing component in the CPI for Toronto shows a 9% increase for the 12 months to September 1974, but the average house sold under the MLS (Multiple Listing Ser- vice) rose in price by over 26%. The Toronto housing index figure was 20% higher than two years ago, but MLS average house price was up 77.57. Averages don’t show the true picture. In September the average National Housing Act-financed home across Canada was reported to have cost just over $30,000 including just under $5,000 for land. Buta similar home in Toronto ac- tually costs an average of over $62,000, of which $20,000 or so is for land. The average MLS home across Canada cost 68% more than it did three years ago but ~ in Ontario it was up 80%. Yet the housing component of the CPI was up only 23.2% in three years since October 1971, according to Statistics Canada. Statistics Canada says that their method of reckoning pro- duces a housing cost which is comparable with ‘‘rent” costs of owned houses. It now intends to find some more accurate way of determining the housing component in the CPI. Anyone who has bought a home in the last few years knows that his costs, consider- ing mortgage and tax pay- ments, are not reflected accur- ately in the CPI housing index which was at 170.8 in October (1961 - 100). The 1961 home which sold for $20,000 to $25,000 is selling today for $75,000 and up in major urban centres, and interest rates on first and second mortgages are at record highs. ; The amazing thing is that no one caught on to Statistics Canada’s faulty figuring until recently. It was exposed on November 19th by Wayne Cheveldayoff in the Globe and Mail.