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INA, RENO oa NYT ORT EE) EE LT LE OY PE ME ELSES LS RW is tim

Facing-up to an iron fist on the West

Bank

— page 5

January 13, 1988
40°

Vol. 51, No. 1

Farmers reject
_ equity financing, page 3

The Mulroney government is using
“division, deception and misinforma-
tion” to sell its free trade agreement,
particularly on agricultural issues, the
president of the National Farmers
Union charged Tuesday.

“Every time the facts are made
clear, the government says it will do
something — but what they say
they'll do won’t be allowed under the
free trade agreement they signed,”
NFU president Wayne Easter told
some 230 delegates to the NFU con-
vention, meeting in Delta Jan. 11-16..

“In fact, this isn’t a trade deal at
all,” he said. “It’s the corporate plan
for the economic re-organization of
North America.”

Easter pledged to delegates that wie
NFU would
step up its fight
“against — this
bilateral agree-

“ment. which

sells out Can-

sada”.

And in that

_ campaign, “we
“have
LS powerful — al
lies’, He em
2 phasized. "We
| are members and eeohE p cipan
in the Pro-Canada Network. We have —
_ church groups, the labour movement,
_ coalitions of different people and dif- _
ferent communities working together _
to fight against this agreement.
“And believe me,” he declared to _
applause, “on this one we're going | to

some

win.”

The free trade pact was empecis to.
be a key issue at the week-long con-
vention which is meeting under the
theme “Defending Our Farms and
Our Future.” Economic consultant
Morris Miller was also slated to dis-

cuss the agreement in an address

slated for Thursday and billed as “A
bad deal for bad times.” °

On agricultural issues, the deal is _

on worse than the government has

_ acknowledged, Easter charged in his”

c have letters ne (Agriculture -

Rallies launch phas

of free trade Campa

bps :
CONGHIONA

SEAN GRIFFIN

TRIBUNE PHOTO ~

Members of the Coalition against Free Trade march’ from International Trade Minister Pat Carney’s office through
downtown Vancouver to the CBC building Jan. 2 to protest the signing of the free trade agreement.

Demonstrations across the country
Jan. 2 — the date U.S. President Ronald
Reagan and Prime Minister Brian Mul-
roney initialled the pact — launched
phase 2 of the fight against the Canada-
US. free trade agreement as opponents
vowed to fight the deal before it comes
into effect Jan. 1, 1989.

“The struggle has just begun,” John
Trent, chairman of the Council of Cana-
dians, told demonstrators on Parliament
Hill. “Everyone in Canada has to learn
what’s in the deal and how it’s going to
destroy Canada.”

Only minutes before, Prime Minister
Mulroney put his signature on the
agreement following a brief telephone
conference with U.S. President Reagan
who had signed his copy earlier in the
day in Palm Springs.

Trent and CoC deputy chair Maude
Barlow held up a huge sign reading “For
Sale. Your Broker, Brian Mulroney
992-4211.” Barlow pledged that there
would be many Canadians “ready to
help ensure that this will not be the year

Canada signs its declaration of depend-
ence on the United States.”

The signing was also marked by pro-
tests in Vancouver, London and Toronto
as well as Fort Erie and Windsor where
hundreds of people tied up traffic mov-
ing across bridges linking Canada with
U.S. border cities.

In Fort Erie, more than 400 people,
many of them from local unions and
labour councils, converged on the Peace
Bridge linking Fort Erie with Buffalo,
N.Y. to demonstrate against the agree-
ment and to hear speakers pledge an
intensified campaign against the deal.

“Flags should be flying at half mast to
symbolize this giveaway of Canada by
this government,” Canadian Labour
Congress president Shirley Carr told the
Fort Erie rally. She called on Canadians
to become involved in the “fight of their
lives” and to echo the demand of the
CLC and other free trade opponents for
a federal election on the free trade issue.

Carr was joined on the platform by
Leo Gerard, director of the United
Steelworkers and a representative of the

Niagara grape growers who face eco-
nomic ruin if the deal goes ahead.

At Windsor’s Ambassador Bridge
linking the city with Detroit, more than
2,000 people marched slowly to the half-
way point of the span before they were
confronted by riot-equipped Detroit
police. The owner of the bridge, the Can-
adian Transport Commission, had ear-
lier obtained an injunction banning
demonstrations on its property, but no
arrests were made.

In Vancouver, the Coalition against
Free Trade drew some 200 people to a
demonstration outside International
Trade Minister. Pat Carney’s office.
From there, they marched through
downtown Vancouver streets to a rally
on the steps of the CBC building.

“The free trade agreement may have
been signed today but it doesn’t come
into effect until 1989,”’ Michele Hill from
the Vancouver Status of Women told
demonstrators.

“That gives a year to fight it — and
we will,” she said to cheers.

see PRO-CANADA page 12