138 East Cordova Street, Vancouver 4, B.C. Phone 683-9655
25 CENTS A COPY $7 A YEAR $8 FOREIGN
HAL GRIFFIN, Editor MIKE JAMES, Assistant Editor
Second class mail registration number 1576. Published by the Fisherman Publishing Society every second Friday Deadline: Wednesday prior to publication.
Amend the Act
Every year accidents at sea provide additional confirmation of the fact that fishing continues to be a hazardous occupation in which the price of production, all too often, is death and injury.
When death at sea strikes in a fishing family there can be, of course, no adequate compensation. But the tragic loss of a husband, father or son in the industry also frequently brings unnecessarily severe economic hardship in its wake to those who survive.
This point is driven home on each occasion when men are lost and their dependents fall victim to the unconscionable provisions of the Workmen's Compensation Act which exclude many fishermen and their families from the protection afforded to other workers.
In the case of the B.C. Clipper, lost in the Gulf of Alaska earlier this month, it appears that the men who died were without compensation coverage.
Under the existing system, halibut fishermen must take out their own coverage through the voluntary "independent operators" plan and, unlike other workers, they are obliged also to pay the full cost of that coverage.
As the UFAWU has pointed out many times over the years in submissions to the legislature and numerous commissions, such provisions make scapegoats of a victim's family.
The very nature of the fishing industry, and the halibut section in particular, makes it virtually impossible for every man in the fleet to have the necessary coverage, at all times and under all circumstances. That can be accomplished only by making appropriate amendments to the Act, as demanded by the UFAWU and supported by other fishermen's organizations.
The cruel anomolies of the present set-up are apparent to everyone who works in the industry and need no emphasizing here. But the fishing companies, it should be noted, have always opposed adamantly the extension of compensation coverage to all fishermen. And they have found ready allies in the Social Credit government at Victoria, which has refused to take the necessary legislative steps to correct the situation.
Women and children in most cases are the chief victims of this callous and indefensible attitude, not the breadwinner who forgot or was unable to take out adequate coverage before sailing for the fishing grounds.
For many British Columbians, Premier W. A. C. Bennett's much publicized "good life" is a sick, shoddy joke, and never more so than when that empty slogan is viewed in the context of the Social Credit government's refusal to extend full workmen's compensation coverage to all fishermen.
This is worth bearing in mind at the polls on August 27. So is the assurance given by New Democratic Party candidates that they support all-inclusive compensation coverage for every worker in the industry.
• Nanaimo Biological Station researchers have released several hundred legal size male crabs in the Roberts Bank area as part of a study of crab movements and migration patterns. Picture shows one of the crabs marked with celluloid discs used as tags in the study. Fishermen fiinding a tagged crab are asked to remove the tag and mail it to the biological station, along with the date and place of capture.
FISH and SHIPS
Now, from the people who brought you Vietnam: the ABM system.
THE FISHERMAN — AUGUST 22, 1969
In our June 13 issue we mentioned having seen the old sealing schooner Thomas F. Bayard, beter known in more recent years in her role as the Sand-heads lightship, moored at North Vancouver. This week, as an interesting sidelight to Homer Stevens' account (see page 11) of the Fraser River trip taken by a group of Ontario high school students, we learned of another former member of the sealing fleet which, as some of our reader probably know, is still at work 78 years after her launching.
She is the Arrawac Freighter,
now operated as a charter vessel by Harold Clay of Vancouver and aboard which the Toronto area teenagers sailed for a first hand glimpse of the local salmon fishery.
From her owner, Stevens learned she was formerly the Beatrice, built in Vancouver in 1891 and well known for several years as a sealer.
Laid up at Victoria in 1899 with the decline of the sealing industry she was later converted into a steam tug and worked the B.C. coast for many years under the ownership of Coastal Towing before being bought by Clay who repowered her with a Gardner diesel in 1962.
The old schooner has seen many distant shores in her day. In July of 1893, for example, the Vancouver News Advertiser reported a letter, written from a Japanese port, had been received from her skipper which said the ship had taken 1,204 sealskins and "expected to get 500 more" before returning home.
She sailed the costs of Japan, the Kuril Islands and Siberia in pursuit of the seal herds and was one of several schooners arrested by a joint U.S.-British naval patrol in 1896 for operating within a closed area extending 60 miles from the Pri-bilof Islands in Bering Sea.
Almost eight decades as a sailing schooner, steam tug, freighter and pleasure craft, that's quite a career for a 70 foot wooden hulled boat — and a credit to the skilled hands which put her together on the shores of Burrard Inlet back in 1891.
If any of our readers, particularly those who may have sailed aboard the Beatrice at one time or another, can add anything to our scanty knowledge of her history, we'd be pleased to hear from them.
* + +
We received a phone call recently from Vancouver Women's Auxiliary stalwart Carrie Ironside telling us that longtime UFAWU member Chester Sol-
berg suffered broken heels and other injuries in a fall while tying up the seiner Maple Ridge at Steveston, August 9.
This week we learned that Chester has been transferred to Southpines Hospital, 325 West 59th Avenue in Vancouver. He is reported to be progressing well but in all probability will be laid up for another two or three weeks. In the meantime, he'd be happy to see visitors.
The most startling aspect of Chester's accident was the treatment he received after being rushed to Richmond General Hospital.
That was on a Saturday. After plaster casts were applied to both legs, he was given a pair of crutches and released — barely able to move, in great pain and without even a prescription for a pain killer.
Chester's condition at this stage was such that he was unable to move to get out of the car in which a friend had picked him up at the hospital. And that's where he had to spend the night, in the car, cramped and in considerable pain.
Carrie spoke to him the next day and was appalled at what had happened. Later she spoke to the doctor at Richmond General Hospital who had treated Chester, and was even more appalled at his attitude. The doctor's reaction when told of Chester's condition was "Well, he's got crutches."
True enough, Mrs. Ironside said, but he's not able to move and is in great pain. She added she thought it disgraceful that anyone should be released from hospital in that condition. The doctor's response: "This isn't a socialist state yet, you know."
One could put almost any interpretation on that remark. It certainly suggests that doctors would be of a higher calibre under socialism, for one thing.
Anyway, thanks to the efforts of Mrs. Ironside and Vancouver Fishermen's Settlement Service manager Aag Kopperud, Chester was readmitted to hospital on the following Monday night. He'll still be occupying a hospital bed two or three weeks from now. And that will be well over a month since being shown the door at Richmond General Hospital to fend for himself with a pair of crutches, Carrie pointed out.
John Wolff, who has had many years of experience in the business of supplying the fishing fleet has gone into business for himself under the name of Wolff Marine Supply, we've been informed. He's located at 831 Powell Street and specializes in halibut and trolling gear. We
wish him every success in his new venture.
A rash of accidents has taken a tragic toll of life in the industry of late. In addition to the fatalities aboard the B.C. Clipper, reported in this issue, we have learned of two other deaths involving UFAWU members.
Campbell River and District Local member Lome Martin, crewman on the salmon seiner Gail Bern ice, drowned on the night of August 9 after apparently falling from the vessel and striking his head on a fender log or piling. His body was recovered from the Fraser River near the foot of Blenheim Street in Vancouver the following day.
And on August 11, the body of Albert Ward McKay was recovered from Nelson Bros' boat basin at Steveston after being in the water for about three days. RCMP at Steveston told us McKay, a non swimmer, was found near his boat Glo Mac which was tied up in the basin. McKay was a member of Prince Rupert Fishermen's Local.
What are the odds on being dealt a perfect 29 hand in crib? Bill Mitchell reckons it's a million to one chance but tells us he saw one last week in a game aboard the longliner Moresby 3 while she was anchored one night off Scott Islands. Albert Rohnke was dealt three fives and a jack of hearts by Melville Johnson and the five of hearts came up in the cut. Halibut men should all be so lucky in their fishing!
"7 don't see the need of you Union shop stewards! ... X can deal fairly with each employee's silly grievances without you!"