a } he said. ‘‘It never was a defense ‘Arms race kills now’ Continued from page 1 men perched on a nearby roof filmed the afternoon’s events with a movie camera on a tri- pond. . Rally organizer Wayne Bradley and member of the Comox Valley Nuclear Respon- sibility group also tipped the ral- ly that a SWAT team equipped with sticks and helmets, as well as a fire truck readied with a fire hose, were stationed behind barracks in the compound. The security plans appeared ludicrous to the demonstrators, and Bradley’s announcement of a “‘peace offering”’ of flowers to the base’s commanding officer eS ite with applause and Vancouver alderman Harry Rankin said that the winning of peace in the world was ‘‘our number one task.” He slammed in particular the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO). “NATO was a product of the cold war and McCarthyism,” alliance, it was always an offen- sive alliance. It was always stridently hostile to detente and always the leaders have asked for bigger, deadlier weapons.” He also rapped Norad, ““NATO’s little brother,’’ ad- ding that it’s original reason, to intercept Soviet manned bombers over Canada, was “‘totally obsolete’ with the ad- vent of ICBM missiles. “We need an independent foreign policy for Canada,”’ Rankin said. ‘‘And we have to get out of NATO and Norad.”’ Hospital Employees’ Union researcher Jean Swanson, a hopeful NDP candidate in Van- couver’s Little Mountain con- stituency, called nuclear disarm- ament ‘‘the most important issue in the world.”’ “The arms race is not just a potential problem, it is killing oer today, August 8,’’ she _¢ SR for not developing socially- necessary programs because there ‘isn’t enough money,’ belies the fact that ‘“‘there is money and it is being spent on arms. “People are dying today, not from heat, walls of fire or radia- tion, but from malnutrition, nuclear leaks, crowded housing and the lack of medicine,” she noted. : After marching back into Courtenay, the demonstrators were rewarded with a mini-folk festival. There, under the trees, they heard well-known folk per- formers David Sereda, Holly Arnzen and Tommy Hawken ° LABOR Members of the Canadian Union of Postal Workers return- ed to work this week following an 83 percent acceptance vote of a new collective agreement ham- mered out last week in Ottawa. However the Vancouver local of CUPW only narrowly ac- cepted the pact by a sheer 52 pe- cent margin, after. the local ex- ecutive unanimously recom- mended rejection. Vancouver Local president Evert Hoogers told the Tribune Monday after the vote was counted that the contract is a ma- jor victory for the union, in spite of the Vancouver executive’s decision to recommend rejection. The fact that the union was able to win a collective agreement acceptable to the majority of members and prevent the federal government from using legisla- tion to strikebreak as in previous years is ‘‘the primary point’’, said Hoogers. “We have won back our right to strike, and we intend to keep it.” The massive organizational campaign conducted by CUPW throughout the labor movement following federal strikebreaking legislation in the last strike ‘‘saw its results this year’’ in staying the Major gains won in CUPW contract hand of the government and forc- ing it to negotiate, Hoogers add- ed The contract included major gains for the union including its chief demand of improved mater- nity leave with 17 weeks paid maternity leave at 93 percent of wages. The provision is ‘‘a beacon for the labor movement’’ said Hoogers. Other gains included new health and safety language which guarantees the right to refuse to work in dangerous conditions, and the right to require monitor- * ing and inspections of the work © environment, including the right the right to grieve and have ad- to demand the necessary in-. | struments to measure the quality | of the environment. Other provisions give the union judicated all types of termination of employment, and restrict the use of closed circuit television systems in the post office. No existing benefits or condi- tions were lost inthenegotiations. | | The money package was the | reason for the low vote in Van- couver, with union members get- ting a 70 cent or 13 percent in- crease in each of two years, retroactive to Jan. 1, 1981, plus the existing COLA clause. Some 2,300 Lower Mainland bus drivers and support staff could be-on strike or locked out in the next few days. They are members of the Amalgamated Transit Union employed by the Metropolitan Transit Operating Company. Members attended union meetings on Tuesday to hear a report, from their advisory board (negotiating committee) and will vote on a company offer by secret ballot at designated voting places on Friday. The advisory board is - recommending rejection. The offer would give bus drivers and increase of $2.90 an hour over two years on a rate of $11.37. Percentage wise, this breaks down _ to approximately 25.5 percent. The original union demand was for 18 percent increase in one year, plus a COLA clause. Partsmen and tradesmen would also receive $2.90 over two years. Servicemen and helpers would’ receive $2.60 over two years and janitors and cleaners would receive $2.50 over the same period. Last June, a circular bearing the name “Notice of Motion’? was widely distributed to bus drivers. Its masthead called for grass roots unionism, democracy, militancy and solidarity. It was published by a group calling itself the Angus MacInnis caucus, ATU-101-134 (the Lower Mainland local). MacInnis, now deceased, worked on street cars, became a paid of-: ficial of the union and went on to become a member of parliament for the CCF (predecessor of the NDP). A quotation from that Notice of Motion should be informative: “Reform by-laws have been won at. union meetings over the last year. They put you, the rank-and-file, firmly in control of these negotia- tions. We can now elect the members we have the most con- ATU caucus wants fidence in to the strike committee. In the event of a strike or job ac- tion, we will now be kept informed through mass meetings and bulletins. And, when company and union negotiators reach a proposed settlement we now have at least 24 hours to examine it — rather than having it sprung on us at the same meeting called to vote on it. ‘Members of all the factions in our union have agreed to work together in unity.” ‘The reference to other factions, I learned, meant that the Notice of Motion group was co-operating with the group who had been pro- moting the Independent Canadian Transit Union. Last November, ICTU made a bid to take over the certification from ATU. It fell short of the necessary total by 29 cards in its campaign to sign up a majority of the members. Accor- ding to what I have been told, the Notice of Motion group did not / support ICTU in its 1980 bid for certification. I am also informed that ICTU people hope to make another attempt at gaining cer- tification in the fall of this year. This means that the final outcome of these negotiations could be the determining factor in whether another raid will be launched. I am reminded of the Trail-Kimberley situation where there was wide dissatisfaction over a recommend- ed settlement, resulting in 48 per- cent of. the production workers voting against it. This prompted the Canadian Association of In- dustrial Mechanical and- Allied. Workers (CAIMAW) to mount CAIMAW raids Steel at Trail The Canadian Association of Industrial, Mechanical and Allied Workers (CAIMAW) this week began a raid against Local 480 of the United Steelworkers of America, representing produc- tion workers at the Trail and Kimberley operations of Comin- co Ltd. CAIMAW organizers have been active in Trail for at least two months, but the provincial labor code limits signing cards in.a raid to the seventh and eighth months of the contract year. - CAIMAW unsuccessfully raided Local 480 in 1973. Newly elected Local 480 presi- dent Ken Georgetti is receiving - assistance from the B.C. Federa- tion of Labor to fend off the raid. Raid analyzed next week in Jack Phillip’s Labor Com- ment. : CAIMAW is making effective use of dissatisfaction among Local 480 members with the re- cent contract which provided Cominco workers with a 32 per- cent increase in wages and ‘that the contract was worth 43.7 ‘membership. .benefits over two years. The con- tract was only narrowly ratified, in spite of claims by Steel’s | regional director Monty Alton percent, a claim since refuted. _ Georgetti has dissassociated the local leadership from Alton and has argued that the local is responsive to the needs of the A USWA advertisement this week attacked raiding as ‘‘un- principled”, and suggested that CAIMAW should spend its time aE A CAREER am 9 3 © organizing the unorganized. PACIFIC TRIBUNE—AUG. 14, 1981 —Page 8 unity, militancy _ with better compensation for those another raid against the certified union, the United Steel Workers of America, In the ATU situation, the of- ficers of the union and the advisory board are moving carefully, as if they were walking on egg shells. While the ICTU and Notice of Mo- tion groups are supporting the recommendation of rejection, there is a strong feeling among Labor Comment Jack Phillips them that the advisory board has set its sights too low-in terms of what it will eventually be prepared to recommend. At least, that’s how I read the situation. When I went over the MTOC of- fer with some bus drivers, they ad- vanced the following reasons to ex- plain their personal decision to vote no: crease is not big enough. 2. The company proposals on the Sickness Protection Plan would, if accepted, be a rollback in established conditions. 3. There would be no reduction with pay in hours worked over the year. (I was told that traffic super- ‘visors, members of the Interna- tional Brotherhood of Electrical Workers and clerical workers employed by the company enjoy 17 days off per year with pay, over and above vacation periods and statutory holidays.) 4. Thereisno provision. for paid coffee breaks. 5. While there is a seven-and- one half hour work day, some 47 percent of the drivers work split shifts spread over a period of up to 12 hours. The indications are that the company intends to have 55 percent of the drivers working on split shifts. The union would like to have at least 65 percent of its members on straight shifts, along Gity OGtOWN siece Se is. Postal Gode err ee es ™TRisUuNE Published weekly at Suite "Published weakly at Suite 101 — 1416 Commercial — 1416 Commercial ‘Drive, , Vancouver, B.C. V5L 3X9. Phone 251-1186 Read the paper that fights for labor aa ee a et ee Se rae eh ea re ae Tee ary ! am enclosing: 1 year $12 (0 2 years $22 0 6 months $7 () Old O. New Foreign 1 year $15 (1) Bill me later C) Donation$.......... who must work split shifts. | The. drivers also informed me that there is a growing resentment against the increasing pressure on bus drivers by way of new rules and a heavier hand in imposing disciplinary measures for relatively — minor offences. This is particularly | irksome to the younger members, | q the same members who in most ~ cases work split shifts because of | their low seniority. a Some 200 bus drivers have quit ‘ since last January, because of dis- | satisfaction over split shifts, work- — ing conditions.and cutbacks in run- | ning time (time allowed tomovethe — bus from one end of the run to the | other). 1 If the offer is rejected on Friday, — it is likely that the union will ask — provincial mediator R.J. Phillips to | make his report to the minister of | labor. That would mean the union ~ would legally be entitled to strike — and the company would legally be entitled to lock out the workers. With the annual fair at Pacific — National Exhibition opening on | Saturday, August 22, my guess is it 7 is unlikely that the company will ‘lock out the workers. Also it is my opinion that if the workers go on — strike, the provincial government, — directly or through the ministry of labor and/or the Labor Relations Board, will scramble to get a settle- ment. Whatever happens, the ATU, will need unity in its own ranks and the support of the trade union movement. Particularly im- portant will be the support of thi British Columbia Federation Q: Don't miss: an issue | Ae er a es De ee ee i wee he ee Re eo Pe et Ce om Ma