Friday, May 27, 1977

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20° GES Se 18 ne VOL. 39, No.

Present B.C. Hydro rates favor Ig Companies and discriminate against residential users, and that if the rate structure was changed Compel large users to pay the Price they should the average cost of power for British Columbians Could be lowered substantially, and Many of the current financial difficulties of the Crown company Could be overcome. This was the gist of a brief Prepared by three University of economists which was Presented to a special cabinet Committee hearing in Victoria last Onday. The hearings are being held to determine whether ap- Proval should be given to con-

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British Cotumbia

New Democratic Party

CONVENTION

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Urging delegates to win new members among those people dissatisfied

struction of the Revelstoke Dam.

Urging that rate structure reform should be treated as a first priority for energy planning in B.C., the brief says that if the rate reform was carried through by 1981 Hydro’s annual load growth would be reduced from 8.4 per cent to 5.9 per cent by 1990; Hydro’s outstanding debt would be cut by $3.5 billion by 1990; and the

“average cost of power to Hydro.

users would beabout6é per cent less than if the rate structure was not reformed.”

The brief said that by raising the rates to bulk users (such as pulp mills, etc.) they would be com- pelled to use energy more

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th the Social Credit government, NDP leader Dave Barrett addresses

delegates to the provincial convention held last weekend at the

niversity of B.C. (See story, pg. 12.)

economically, and that the savings made would not require approval for the Revelstoke Dam before 1982 and. Hat Creek could be deferred beyond 1984.

Tables inthe brief comparing the rates between residential and bulk users show that homeowners and small apartments which use less than 550 kwh per two month period, pay 4.6c a kwh while large in- dustrial users pay a flat rate of .4c per kwh.

Demonstrating how the present rate structure is discriminatory against residential users, the brief points to the fact that residential users consume 30.3 per cent of the total kwh but provide 41.7 per cent

RIBUNE

of Hydro’s electricity sales revenue. Bulk users, on the other hand, purchase 33.1 per cent of the total kwh, but only contribute 13.4 per cent to Hydro’s electricity sales revenue.

The conclusion drawn by the brief is that “Hydro underprices electricity to its large bulk customers”’ which encourages excessive demand for large blocs of cheap power. The bulk user consumes electricity at a cost of 13 mills, whereas the cost to the province is 23 mills, the brief pointed out.

The UBC economists put their finger on the central problem in B.C.’s growing energy crisis: the

discriminatory rate structure which caters to the needs of the large corporations, while shifting the major cost for expensive energy programs on to the public who are forced to subsidize below- cost energy to bulk users.

W. A. C. Bennett’s “‘two river’’ program and the takeover of the B.C. Electric was aimed at serving the big companies by providing large blocs of cheap power at public expense. The key device to that end was the present dis- criminatory rate structure. The public should support the proposal to revise B.C. Hydro’s rate structure as a key ingredient in a new energy policy needed in B.C.

The conviction of AIM leader Leonard Peltier by a Fargo, North Dakota court was a total travesty of justice, an eyewitness to the trial reports, carried out by the collusion of the FBI, the court and possibly Canadian authorities as well.

Coquitlam resident Liz Clarke who attended the four-week trial in the Federal Building in Fargo told the Tribune this week in an in- terview how the court refused to admit Myrtle Poor Bear’s con- fession that her affidavits against Peltier were false.

And, Clarke recounts, a miscue on the part of the prosecuting at- torney strongly suggests that the Canadian justice department co- operated with the FBI in falsifying the affidavits which were used to extradite Peltier to the U.S. and to convict him of the murder charge.

Theaffidavit in question claimed that Myrtle Poor Bear, allegedly Peltier’s ‘girlfriend’, was an eyewitness to the murder of two FBI agents on Pine Ridge reser- vation in South Dakota by Peltier. Poor Bear has since revealed that

Inquiry into post office sought

eee the B.C. Federation of

- and the Vancouver and District Labor Council last week €d Capilano Conservative hun: T puntington for his “witch Cana Se € Vancouver local of the and San Union of Postal Workers ath ee on the Conservative to denounce his remarks.

li Huntington, utilizing a radio hot- ater in Vancouver, had flushin CUPW members of toilets © mail down -post office Union 2 charged that the local “radical was dominated by that S'. Hehad also suggested Condy, Cal elections should be Meni 1&4 by the federal govern- ffieg. € employer in the post

thettington’s comments came in r ent of worsening labor by Ons in the post office, sparked

Management’s refusal to

resolve long standing grievances at issue since before the last set- tlement.

“Tt is shocking that a member of Parliament should make such irresponsible and destructive public statements,”’ Federation secretary Len Guy said in a statement following the radio show. “Industrial relations in the post office have been a disaster for years as successive postmasters general have failed to improve the poor management in the postal service. :

“At the present time, in the middle of talks between the union and management in the Vancouver post office, talks designed to try andclear up some of the problems, it is inconceivable that a member of Parliament should jeopardize the possibility of improved relations by political grand- standing,” he said.

Earlier, in Ottawa, CUPW president Joe Davidson called on the federal government to establish a royal commission of inquiry into the administration of the post office department.

At a press conference last week, Davidson pointed out that public criticism of the postal service was mounting and_ noted _ that management frustrations ‘‘are being directed at the employees and their union.

“The CUPW therefore, proposes that a royal commission of inquiry be established immediately and be given a mandate to investigate the practices of -post office management in respect to the administration of an efficient postal service and to their conduct concerning labor-management relations,’’ the union leader stated in outlining the demand.

FBI agents Wood and Price forced her to sign the affidavit, and that, in fact, she was 60 miles away from the alleged crime and that she did not know Peltier at all.

Poor Bear’s confession promp- ted the Vancouver Labor Council and the provincial convention of the NDP to demand: that federal

justice minister Ron Basford order an investigation into all evidence submitted at the extradition proceedings in Vancouver.

But as the new information suggests, the Canadian authorities — and perhaps Basford himself — are implicated with the FBI in the

See TRAVESTY, pg. 3

Student-labor campaign for jobs urged by NUS.

The National Union of Students, representing almost 200,000 students on over 37 campuses in English Canada, has decided to make unemployment its number one priority and will seek closer ties with organized labor in the fight for a massive full em- ployment program.

Meeting May 10-14 in Charlot- tetown, delegates to the NUS fifth annual general meeting agreed to single out unemployment, par- ticularly as it affects students seeking summer jobs and graduate students during the summer and fall.

The entire campaign will centre around three demands: the creation of a massive government job program, the elimination of the arbitrary _ summer _ savings

requirements under the Canada Student Loan Plan, and most

recently, that the government maintain, and in some regions reduce the requirements of eight weeks work before unemployed persons are eligible for unem- ployment insurance benefits.

The student representatives also reaffirmed a lengthy motion from the conference last fall listing a series of demands on the govern- ment in establishing a massive job creation program.

Student leaders will be seeking a meeting with prime minister Pierre Trudeau in the near future to discuss the employment issue. But one of their major efforts will be, through local student unions and a proposed conference on unemployment, to meet with union leaders in efforts to establish a national coalition to press for more jobs.

World Peace Council president Romesh Chandra presents the Fredrick Joliot-Curie Gold Medal of Peace to Luis Corvalan, general secretary of the Communist Party of Chile. For a report of the World Assembly of

Builders of Peace see page 8.