The Prince George
Citizen
Gone but not forgotten__________5
PSAC pokes fun at PM 8
The Pez does it again
14
Eat Smart... or else
18
TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 17,1991
51 CENTS
(PIUS GST)
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Phone:562-2441 Classified: 562-6666 Circulation: 562-3301
PUBLIC ALLIANCE CALLS FOR UNITED FRONT
Gov’t stands firm on wage freeze
by Canadian Press The leader of the striking Public Service Alliance of Canada appealed today for a united front against the federal government’s back-to-work legislation.
“The last thing we need is to be divided among ourselves,” Daryl Bean said before meeting the union’s 31-member executive to discuss the government’s bill, introduced in the Commons on Monday.
Bean said the public service walkout has exhausted the union’s S16-million strike fund, but PSAC has loans from other unions to pay picketers $25 a day.
The union, its leaders and individual picketers will face heavy fines if they continue. the strike after the back-to-work order is approved by Parliament.
Meanwhile, Treasury Board President Gilles Loiselle told the Commons today he is willing to resume negotiations, without preconditions, to end the strike. But he added immediately that the government will not budge on its wage offer of no increase this year and three per cent next year.
“With respect to the issue of a wage increase, this government remains irrevocably committed to the zero-three formula included in (back-to-work legislation),” said Loiselle, who began debate on the bill.
“Let it be clearly understood that there shall be no wage increase this year, and the wage increase next year will be three per cent.”
Liberal Leader Jean Chretien said the Tories had provoked the confrontation wilh the union.
"You are legislating zero per cent,” Chretien said in the Commons. “Offer three per cent and we will back you up.”
Both opposition parties have said they will oppose the back-to-work bill.
On Monday, the Public Service Staff Relations Board, a quasi-judicial agency which oversees labor relations in the public sector, ordered the government to resume bargaining with the union.
Its order is binding but the government can appeal to the Federal Court of Appeal.
Government officials said the
Poll of adults rejects lower age for voting
by Southam News OTTAWA — Canadians overwhelmingly reject the idea of lowering the voting age to 16, a new poll shows.
Fully 85 per cent of adult Canadians thought it would be a bad idea to allow 16- and 17-year-olds to vote in federal elections, the Angus Reid-Southam News poll found.
Only 13 per cent thought it would be a good idea. Two per cent were unsure.
The poll of 1,504 Canadians was conducted Sept. 4-11. Only adults 18 years of age (the current voting limit) or over were polled. A
sample this size is considered accurate within plus or minus 2.5 percentage points 19 times in 20.
Opposition to lowering the voting age increased with age, with 97 per cent of those aged 77 or more against the idea. But even among young people, aged 18 to 24, 75 per cent opposed the idea.
The royal commission on electoral reform is currently considering reducing the voting age limit. Sources close to the commission have said it is almost certain to recommend lowering the limit to 16 in its final report, due to be re leased in November.
Green Party eyes area
The Green Party of B.C. has a prospective candidate in the Prince George-Omineca riding, says press secretary Steve Kisby.
“We have a candidate, but we’re not sure if they’re nominated, for Prince Gcorge-Om-ineca,” he said today from Vancouver.
The party plans to field candidates in all 75 provincial ridings, says Elizabeth Smith, a Green Party executive member.
But information on candidate names will not be available until the weekend when she receives a wrapup on all the candidates running in northern ridings, she said today from Vancouver.
Neil Homer, a Green Party member in the Prince George-Omineca riding, said the party had only nine candidates in the 1986 provincial election.
Members have someone in mind for the Omineca riding, but have not received confirmation of that person’s intentions, he said.
The party is seeking an alliance with Indian groups to run native candidates in some ridings, Smith told The Province earlier this week.
“We have met with native groups, and we as a party support self-determination for first nations,” Kisby said.
“Our experience has been that having native candidates mn for political office in Canada is often held against them. But most native nations are quite happy to be part of Canada; they just want a negotiate a settlement so they can participate fully in Canada.”
HIGHLIGHTS
Highlights of Public Sector Compensation Act, back-to-work legislation introduced in the Commons on Monday •
■ Orders all federal employees back to work immediately; prevents unions and their representatives from authorizing, directing or condoning continuation of strike.
■ Extends all contracts for two years.
■ Sets wage increase of 4.2 per cent for 12 months for workers
whose contracts expired before Feb. 26, 1991; freezes wages this year and limits increases to three per cent next year.
■ Provides for fines of $100,000 for union, $50,000 for union representatives and $1,000 for workers each day they defy law.
■ Prevents anyone fined under the act from going to jail by saying a
prison term may not be imposed if fine isn’t paid.
■ Also applies to prime minister, cabinet ministers, MPs, senators, parliamentary employees and other federal employees such as Crown corporation workers.
■ Non-monetary contract issues such as dental plans and medical insurance to be dealt with by National Joint Council, a union-manage-mcnt body.
back-to-work legislation would supercede other laws respecting the public service.
Labor leaders condemned the back-to-work legislation as draconian. It would eliminate collective bargaining for public servants
for two years, impose a wage freeze this year and limit pay increases next year to three per cent.
“With this move, the government has ended collective bargaining for federal public servants,”
said University of Alberta sociologist Graham Lowe.
It carries fines of $100,000 a day for the union, $50,000 a day for union representatives, and $1,000 a day for public servants.
But no one will go to jail under the legislation since it prevents the imposition of prison terms for nonpayment of fines.
Bean implored the government to return to mediation with no preconditions.
He said if the government agreed, strikers would lift picket lines at airports and remove lines blocking grain shipments.
Wayne Easter, president of the National Farmers Union, said Ottawa should immediately appoint a mediator as the fastest and most effective method of getting grain shipments moving again.
“The ball is now in the government’s court,” Easter said in Ottawa.
Customs workers were allowing private travellers across the Canada-U.S. border without slowdowns, although commercial shipments are still only crawling.
Bean said these concessions
should remove the need for a back-to-work law.
Meanwhile, a crowd of strikers brought traffic in downtown Ottawa to a standstill Monday and chants of “Hey, hey! Ho, ho! Lyin’ Brian’s got to go!” echoed as they gathered on the lawn in front of the Peace Tower.
Parliament Hill was littered with placards after the rally. Because of the strike the mess may stay for a while before it’s cleaned up.
Strikers slowed international traffic on bridges in Niagara Falls, Ont., while the Quebec section of the Canadian Association of Electric and Electronic Equipment Manufacturers backed the government’s effort to end the strike.
It said the strike is seriously jeopardizing production and wiil soon force its 93 Quebec members to lay off employees. \
Pickets on access roads to Pearson International Airport in Toronto delayed the arrival of air traffic controllers Monday. Only about 60 flights per hour were moving, compared to the usual 75, said a spokesman.
See also page 8
End of postal monopoly pondered
OTTAWA (CP) — Canadians are disgusted by postal strikes and the government might resort to a permanent fix, government House leader Harvie Andre said Monday.
The government could terminate the post office monopoly over mail delivery during strikes or even permanently, Andre said, answering a question from Tory MP Garth Turner in the Commons.
Andre wasn’t immediately available to expand his comments. Spokeswoman Jodi Redmond said
there’s no plan to end the monopoly but it could be considered if the company and its main union can’t reach a new labor agreement during mediation.
Turner said in an interview that without the monopoly the post office would lose a lot of business to private companies.
That threat should be enough to make Canada Post improve its dismal labor relations rather than relying on Parliament to end the strikes, he said.
The Canadian Union of Postal
Workers would have to make more realistic contract demands or many of its members would loose their jobs if the post office was forced to compete with private companies, Turner said.
Andre’s comment came as the company and the union admitted slow progress in contract talks with mediator Alan Gold who has been meeting post office and union officials separately since last week.
“The progress has been slow and our negotiators are starting to wonder what’s happening,” post
office spokesman Jcan-Maurice Filion said in an interview. “There’s an air of uncertainty, but then it has only been five days.”
There has been some progress on settling greviance and arbitration disputes “but on other issues the union seems to keep bringing up old issues,” Filion said.
A union spokesman said there wasn’t much to report from the mediation. “It’s steady as she goes. . .things are progressing but it’s slow.”
"Now then, is that blue or glue?"
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Project manager Larry Webster, project supervisor Frieda Gauthier, Bill Joyes, Rob Klyne and Steve Kinney, foreground, work on
a new trail at Ferguson Lake Nature Reserve.
Nature reserve developed in city
Trail building is under way at the Ferguson Lake Nature Reserve, the city’s newest recreational area.
The new reserve crosses the northern boundary of the city, and is accessible by taking the Hart Highway to North Kelly Road, then turning left on Ferguson Lake Road for the 10-minute drive to the lake.
Already a half-kilometre of trail has been built, wilh another
kilometre of trail building under way, and parking lot construction is expected to be completed this year.
The new trail will need several bridges to avoid environmental damage to creeks and marshland areas, but by the spring of next year, visitors will be able to visit six different types of woodlands in a short stroll along the edge of the largest lake in the city.
Soon, visitors will be able to stroll through a mature forest, a
stand of cottonwood, a spruce grove, an area where selective horse logging was done in the 1920s to 1940s where the forest has regrown, a willow thicket and marshland, all within 20 minutes.
To make this possible with minimal environmental impact has required the co-operation of a lot of people. The Pnnce George Downtown Rotary Club has sponsored an Environmental Youth Corps crew which is busy trail building.
The Prince George Naturalist Club has worked with city parks planner Ren Settle and other groups in planning to minimize visitor impact on the site, while the property itself is owned by the Nature Trust of Canada who turned management to the city.
“The area which was selectively horse logged has rcgrown beautifully. It shows the resilience of the forest in our area,” said Settle, who is acting as project manager.
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