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DECEMBER 1976 — JANUARY 1977

IWA SEMINAR

An IWA Educational Seminar will be held March 20-25, at Harrison Hot Springs in conjunction with the

regular Canadian Labour Congress School.

The Education Department will be sending out liter- ature on the Seminar at an early date to the Local

Unions.

IWA PENSIONS UP

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Due to pressure from the IWA trustees of the Coast, Southern and Northern In- terior Forest Industry Pension Plans, actuarial valuations were conducted to determine the benefit levels which could be sustained by the current contribution rate.

The results of these valua- tions enabled the trustees to extend higher benefit levels to Plan Members and retired Plan Members. These im- provements, which are retro- active to the anniversary date of the individual agreements — i.e., June 14, 1975 on the Coast, July 1, 1975 in the Southern Interior, September 1, 1975 in the Northern Interior, will not cause a further increase in contributions remitted by par- ticipating companies.

Using the Southern Interior, for example:

Effective July 1, 1975, a member who retired from the Plan will be entitled to a monthly pension of:

$9.00 for each year of Credited Future Service ac- cumulated between July 1, 1973 and June 30, 1975 (formerly $8.25)

plus

$10.00 for each year of

Credited Future Service ac- cumulated after July 1, 1975 (formerly $9.00)

plus

$9.00 for each year a Plan Member’s age was above 50 on the Effective Date of the Plan, provided such member is eligible for a Past Service Pension (formerly $4.95 for each year).

The pension presently paid to a Plan Member who retired after July 1, 1975, is being recalculated on the basis of the benefit levels described above. An adjustment retroactive to July 1, 1975 (or date of actual retirement, if later) will be included in his December 1, 1976 cheque issued by the Royal Trust Company.

A Plan Member who retired before July 1, 1975, will receive a ten per cent increase to his current pension in lieu of any change in the benefit levels. He will also receive an adjustment on December 1, retroactive to July 1, 1975.

Benefits accrued by a former Plan Member who broke his Continuous Employment before July 1, 1975, will remain at the levels in force on the date that his Continuous Em- ployment was broken.

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NOVEL SCHEME

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A pioneering pension scheme which allows employees to gradually retire from full-time work with little loss of earnings went into effect this year in Sweden.

Starting in July, Swedish workers aged 60 years and over are able to cut back their work week to as little as 17 hours while receiving an in- come amounting to between 85 and 90 per cent of their regular pay.

The income comes in the form of wages paid by em- ployers for hours worked, together with pension sup- plements funded by a tax on employers. Workers have the

option of remaining in the labour force until age 70.

According to Kenneth Brathall of the Swedish

government, the intent of the new pension scheme was

largely social: ‘Doctors os aed us that we musn’t chop

off suddenly from life, and the unions champions for

giving people a chance to

SWEDEN PAVES WAY ON RETIREMENT PLAN

But the resulting program is suited to labour force requirements as well as helping people adjust to retirement, since professionals and skilled workers in short demand are more likely to be in the labour force longer,

officials hope, if they can work less.

So far, an estimated 10,000 workers have taken ad- vantage of the plan, and it is estimated the number may triple by year end. One drawback to workers opting into the scheme is that em- ployers are obligated to slot in a “‘part-worker”’ once an older employee reduces his work week by five hours.

In large firms this has not created many problems, but in smaller firms employers are reluctant to bother themselves with the plan. It is expected, however, that this issue will be resolved when the new Swedish labour law, which expands the range of collective bargaining matters, takes effect next year.

THE WESTERN CANADIAN LUMBER WORKER

LOCAL 1-367 IWA Executive Board Members pose for their picture with IWA International Secretary-Treasurer Bob Gerwig following their installation. Group, left front, Gerwig; Hans Pietsch, Trustee; Ron Chequis, 2nd Vice-President; Gordon Claypool, 1st Vice-Presi- dent and Safety Director; Joe Fowler, President; Erik Wood, Financial Secretary. Back row, left, Dennis Huber, 3rd Vice-President; Wayne Lindman, Warden; Mike Campbell, Recording Secretary; Everett Godfrey, Conductor.

FOR LOCAL 1-367

COMPUTER

DOES THE JOB |

By ERIK WOOD Local 1-367 Fin. Sec.

In August 1976 Local 1-367 changed its internal dues pro- cessing procedures by entering into a lease to purchase agree- ment on a Burrough’s model L5000 mini-computer, com- pletely reorganizing our of- fice. The Local Union office had reached a point as a result of its many newly organized operations and _ increased members where it could no longer adequately handle the increased workload with its present office staff of two people. The Local was in a peculiar position of being a middle sized Local, too big to be small and not big enough to warrant an increase in office staff. This coupled with the seasonal shutdowns in the logging section which com- prises nearly a third of the members in the Local Union did not provide adequate dues revenue on a year round basis to allow for a staff increase.

A committee was struck from the Executive Board to investigate the situation and after a tour of the Construction Labourers’ Local which was using the Burrough 15000, made a recommendation to the Local Union to lease the machine. At a cost of $500.00 per month which included pro- gramming and servicing we are now able to post the mem- bership dues cards semi-auto- matically each month, a job formerly done by hand. The machine also breaks the dues of $14.78 per month down al- locating $2.00 to the strike fund and 15c to the Death Benefit. The totals are carried through so that at the end of the year it will automatically print out the dues receipts which are mailed to the members for income tax purposes.

In the past the preparation of dues receipts was an extreme- ly large undertaking with the office staff having to total up each card manually and type out the receipt on the type-

writer; a process no longer ne- cessary.

The Burrough’s L5000 is also equipped with an autoloader which will allow us to print out a membership list by placing the dues cards of an operation or of the whole Local in the loader which will automatical- ly print the membership list; name, address and social in- surance number. The ability to automatically print a mem- bership list which is up-to-date is a real asset for us. In the past the membership list had to be compiled manually with the girls being required to use the typewriter and type out each name individually, a job which took approximately one week and became very rapidly outdated as members changed. A total membership list of the whole Local Union would now take approximately four hours. Business Agents can also re- quest a strip list of the operations they are going into prior to service trips in order that they have a list of the

SiGhRe ity!

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members and can pass them on to the committees to deter- mine that everyone is paying dues in line with the collective agreements. This feature of the the machine can also be adapted to an address label to facilitate mailing to different committees and membership as a whole.

The Burrough’s computer can also be programmed for use in bookkeeping and will be able to handle all accounts payable with the ability to print out the cheques for each account with a record provided

In a strike situation the machine could be programmed to print out strike cheques and also record the amount; a job that is now done by hand which is labourous and extremely time consuming. All in all, the computer will be a welcome addition to the Local Office, al- lowing us to catch up on a large backlog of work and speeding

up the processing of member- ship dues.

He. OFFICE SECRETARY Alice Walsh operates the Local’s new computor.

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