You don't...........

..........become a billionaire by being nice.

In BC today, workers are peasants, there to be used by the wealthy elites at their whim.

Nice propaganda piece. Of

Nice propaganda piece.

Of course the union has absolutely nothing to do with the bad relations. It's all big bad Pattison's fault.

I'm sorry JIm - did you miss the part

Did you miss the part where Pattison had a chance to make the case for his side?

I'll post it again for you, save you the effort of going back and reading the whole thing again for content:

The Tyee contacted Pattison's Vancouver offices to ask for comment for this story. His aide Maureen Chant said Pattison was travelling and could not be reached. Even if reached, she went on to say, he would be unlikely to speak to The Tyee. "We don't comment on our investments."

I always invite respectful comments to my posts here at Tyee.

G West

comments & Jeffery J.

Firstly, I can't imagine that the workers went on strike for 16 weeks in the dead of winter, because the employer was treating them fairly. Through a mediator, they got 12% over 4 years - not a great deal, but Pattison is not known for soft bargaining. So, when will this many think he has enough? Is 6 billion enough? Who will he leave it to? From what I hear, not his children. Maybe he'll leave it to the NDP.

Jeffery J.:
You are absolutely correct about The Tyee offering the best journalism in BC. I have been reading The Tyee for about 4 years now. I have quit buying the Sun and the Province. I make donations to The Tyee instead.

What a cheap shot Jim are

[INFLAMMATORY COMMENT REM0VED. -MODERATOR.]
Tom Sandborn "The juice company still racked up a respectable $4.6 million in 2007, but significantly less than the $7.3 million earned the year before".
Greed, there is no other word for this as JP racked up more than $11.9 million in just two years and still he wants more blood by bleeding his hard working employees, can you spell d-i-c-t-a-t-o-r?
http://search.live.com/results.aspx?q=CFR+and+SPP&src=IE-SearchBox
CFR, SPP
Secrecy of Planned Montebello SPP Meeting Part of CFR Plot Foundational Council on Foreign Relations document calls for a "North American Advisory Council"
Remember the phony "protesters who turned out to be cops"?
All hushed up no public inquiry, WHY?
We are in a battle for OUR FUTURE FREEDOMS!
Dirty deeds, WE should all demand that OUR tax dollars not be used by these traitors and they are Google Treason, Canada.

SIG...

Maybe he'll leave it to the NDP.

Hmmmmmm... I would think that he would delegate that matter to his executive vice-president who is um... Glen Clark. Yep, Clark was never known for his soft bargaining positions either. :)

http://www.jimpattison.com/corporate/executive-team.htm

Luke

I doubt Glen wants to see a union busted and a place of work turned into a prison. I see nothing in his background that would suggest otherwise. On the bright side, when you work for a guy like Jimmy P its amazing how fast the media stop hanging around outside your home.

Speaking of homes, how many is it that Gordon and Nancy have now? Do they live together in any of them? Just asking.

pattison

How could anyone support Pattison.This crap
has gone on since the 50's and his car sales in Vancouver.We never use sun-rype
products and we sure as hell would never buy a toyota. We would like to know some of the other products he's involved in so we can put them on our do not need list.
Where does Glen Clark stand in all of this? Does he still work for Pattison? One would think that with his past he would have something to say about the trash they
hire for management.

"Wher does Glen Clark stand on all of this??

What difference does that make. Is anybody who works in one of Pattison's companies now guilty by employment? If the union members had dealings with Clark and if this part of the operation was under his control, which I doubt, would they not have said so? Here is another nonsense introduction of an issue by Luke that has no relevance whatsoever. Next time your right-wing employer acts like a despot to some union members, you too can be branded. So perhaps a few people need to get rid of their bobble head Clark dolls and get another obsession.

Luke

Unless Jim believes its in his interest to replace the workforce. Maybe he's quite happy people are moving on so he can replace them? Maybe the long-term goal is to get rid of the union altogether.

Well from here we don't know. It would be great if someone with actual on-the-floor knowledge was here.

Jimmy's business plan

Of course the shareholders will follow the lead of a figure like Jim Pattison, he is cast as the great businessman who shows a profit at the end; and that is all greedy shareholders are worried about!
Had Sun-Rype remained a co-operative effort there would have been an emphasis on work environment and safety, now the aim is to push the workers to squeeze out the most effort for the least expense and damn the consequences!
Why should big business worry about workers, when they have paid the price to have a government that will support them!
So why be surprised when most workers wind up being part-time?
Why wonder that more outspoken workers get the "funny shifts" and are monitored constantly?
This is big business! [EDITED FOR LIBEL CONCERNS. -MODERATOR.]One way to make the competition suffer so they can be bought up when they go broke.
There is indeed a plan behind it all, and it is helped by greedy shareholders.
And yes, I invite constructive comments to my writings too, and you do not have to be a stuffed shirt to reply!

Circumstances alter cases

Under the circumstances surrounding Mr Clark's exit from politics I think it might not be unfair to assume he 'needed' the money.

Having been targeted by Gordon Campbell, the Police and the media for a deck, he had, I'd suggest, little left in the kitty after managing to clear his name.

That being said, there is a long tradition stretching back to Hazen Argue and Ross Thatcher of CCF and NDP folks moving to the 'dark' side for a variety of reasons - Bob Rae and Ujjal Dosajh being only two of the latest examples.

I think all it tells us is that most people have a price and that principle, when power and money are concerned, often goes by the wayside.

It was ever thus. At least, in the case of all these people, one hopes they did something worthwhile for the common weal during the time before they succumbed to the siren call of cash, power and influence.

I'd suggest this is a truism which, if anyone cares for an artistic example, is well illustrated by Goethe's Faust.

I always invite respectful comments to my posts at Tyee.
G West

GWest

But you didn't address the point I was clearly making, Garth.

It was Clark and his unionist gang that got rid of Harcourt.

Was that good for the Party? Do You think they were REALLY Socialists?

What do I win?

People change? Don't judge a philosophy by an individual adherent? Money talks? Politicians of all stripes do what's utile?

I think I did

My view of the Harcourt thing is a little different and, interestingly, I see him today (Harcourt that is) as something of an Uncle Tom.

In any case, I think Harcourt (and in his time Clark too) resigned as leader and Premier for the 'good' of the party. At least they - unlike Ujjal and Bob Rae - didn't immediately hop off to join the most opportunistic party of all - the federal Liberals. (Maybe that's not true of Rae - he did let a decent period lapse before going over to the dark side.)

And Ujjal, well, I tend to make allowances for him because of his ethical and principled stand against Sikh extremism - you have to take people as the come.

I would never vote for someone like Trudeau either - but that doesn't mean I can't see greatness in him.

The whole Nanaimo gate business was as much a put up job (with a different target) as Clark's deck. Dave Stupich took the 'real' fall for that one - again, in my view, unjustly.

The Socreds/Campbell party don't like anybody but them running the province and they'll do anything, repeat anything, to stay in power. That includes misusing the instruments of the justice and legal system.

I'll look a bit askance at guys like Mike and Glen for their actions but, in the end, I think they're better men and politicians than the bunch in power today.

Seem reasonable to you?

As for union power in the NDP, I think it had it's place but I've never seen the union vote as particularly solid and firm so I'd be happy to see its influence reduced.

But anyway, I'm not a member - so it's just a few casual thoughts at best. Carole James doesn't even answer my letters! Jack Layton does.

As Stump puts it, the philosophy is more important than the views or actions of the individual adherents (strong or weak). The stupidest thing I ever heard from a politician came from the mouth of a New Democrat immediately after the Harcourt election…so it doesn’t just apply to the other parties either.

I always invite respectful comments to my posts at Tyee.
G West

64 charges

Sure, poor Dave Stupich, yet another innocent victim of an unfounded neocon right wing witch hunt abetted by a compromised RCMP and judicial system:

"But after a tip that something was amiss from the head of the Nanaimo Commonwealth Bingo Association, RCMP launched an investigation. It found Stupich ran kickback schemes in which donations to charities were refunded to NCHS. In 1999, Stupich, then 77, faced 64 charges, including theft, fraud, forgery and breach of trust. He pleaded guilty that year to fraud and running an illegal lottery, involving the misappropriation of about $1 million from the NCHS. He was sentenced to two years, serving it on electronic monitoring at his daughter's home in Nanaimo."

BTW, with all this talk about former socialist dropouts going over to the "dark side" out of financial neccessity, how was it the Old (Left) Boys Club found a comfy landing spot for Svend?

happy's back!

The NDP, our motto is we serve far less time in jail than happy's favourite party.

Speaking of financial necessity, how is Bill Bennett and Colin Thatcher doing?

Happy

Well, Happy, first of all, I would point out to you that when it comes to feeding at the public trough, NDP politicians have been pikers, and I don't know of any who have personally gained at public expense through malfeasance, or who have been given comfy "Directorships" upon retirement.

Stupich himself didn't make a nickel out of "Nanaimogate", the diverted monies went to the Nanaimo Constituency to pay off debt.

The monies donated to "Charities" was a tax-avoidance scheme, and legally wrong, but far, far larger sums were, and continue to be, illegally given to the politicians you support.

When the NDP was in power, I was told by Graham Lea, then Minister of Highways, that during his very first day of business he was offered, right out front, three different cash bribes for various administrative favours. (which he turned down)

And I personally know of a land transaction that in Socred days was the result of $300 handed in the traditional brown envelope to an Executive Assistant.

[EDITED FOR UNFAIR INFLAMMATORY RHETORIC. -MODERATOR.]

"Yup, they all do it" is commonly heard these days, and so while your propaganda has worked well, it also demonstrates your jaundiced attitudes concerning democracy.

But none of this has anything to do with the question I posed, and which still remains unanswered, which goes something like this :

"If the Union establishment has so clearly forsaken the basics of Socialist thought, should it be given a powerful management role in even a Social Democratic party?"

sauce for goose and gander

Well, corporations have clearly forsaken the free market in search of tax breaks and handouts, so I suppose one should also ask if they should be allowed a role influencing 'conservative' parties yeah?

Greetings Frank!

Actually your motto should read "We serve far less time in ELECTED GOVERNMENT than happy's favourite party"
Why is that? Never mind, I've learned the mantra. Mass media brainwashing of a general public too stupid to think for themselves. (My God, it's true! I've been brainwashed by the Tyee into believing about MSM brainwashing!)
And come on ME2, your defence of Stupich stealing a million bucks to "pay back debt" as no big deal...kind of wipes out your own arguments.

Not quite so cut and dried

The Nanaimo Commonwealth Holdings/Dave Stupich story is NOT just a question of the RCMP going after Stupich - far from it.

I don't have time to get into it here but the case against Stupich was far from unequivocal and, furthermore, it had political tracks all over it - just like the footprints on Glen Clark's deck.

That being said, unlike certain other former premiers of this province, Stupich pled out, largely for personal and health reasons, and served his time. Others, from other parties, just continued to lie.

That's the way I see it happy - no doubt you're unconvinced - even so, there is another side to the whole sordid story and the current government in power has plenty of its own skeletons in its closets - perhaps we can discuss THEM now instead of flogging the usual dead horses.

I always invite respectful comments to my posts at Tyee.
G West

You might also recall...

...that the Park's Report (I think it was) said that all political parties of the time were "deficient" in their disclosures and charitable portions when using lotteries in that time. Campbell said he would investigate his parties involvement but both he and the media forgot about the issue after they had Harcourt on the run.

It is completely irrelevant to this issue but none of the money went into Dave Stupich's bank account or to pay off his personal debt. But hey, never let the facts get in the way of a good mythical stick to beat up on your opposition.

To our dear censor

I looked at that comment very carefuly before leaving it in, and was confident enough in it being fair comment to make make the following paragraph, which was a key one, dependant upon it.

I think you've become blue-pencil happy, Mr. Beers, and as always happens with censors and censorship, you've lost touch with reality.

Pattison says

juice factory like resort

Don't you ancient NDP hacks get tired of spewing the same "the dirty capitalists are trying to keep the indentured serfs that work for them under their boots"
twaddle?

Oh Tom/ or others

Why don't mega unions use their pension money to "invest" in BC lumber or pulp mills that are going out of business, you know, buy Harmac for example and run it happily ever after with joyful singing union member/owners

Dave Stupich

was forced to tough it out in his final days at his million dollar plus mansion on the waterfront in Victoria. He musta been mighty good at savin', when he was a workin' on the chain gang with all the brothers and sisters.

That's priceless people defending him.

He musta been framed by the filthy capitalists

If you don't want to flog dead horses...

Then stop bringing them up! It wasn't me that started this, was it. If you only want to talk about the government in power thats great, no problem here. But most posters seem to have no problems bringing up past history whenever it suits their arguments to do so (Bennett, Zalm, etc.)

It seems to me that its the NDP sympathisers are the ones who constantly complain they are sick and tired of hearing about ferries, decks, budgets, bingo, power plants, casinos, (and on and on and on...) so why do you keep rehashing them?

And really Skywalker.... you think its ok that a million dollars that was meant for charities that was "redirected" to pay for bad business decisions made by Stupich is fine because the money didn't go into his own bank account. Right. The charities didn't need the money anyways, did they.

Good heavens don't you people read.

When did I say that Stupich's actions were OK? I just corrected a common myth about what happened to the monies and it was to a previous post. Don't read stuff into my comments that is not there. You might also then address why the Liberals never came clean on their own activities during that time. You know, what is good for the goose and all that. As I recall any money the NDP actually got was paid back so where is the beef Happy?

And Sparkyboy, it is the liberal forest policy that has made the forest industry so tenuous. The drop in prices is only a recent part of it.

You are the ones flogging a dead horse. This notion that you can't protest unfair treatment at the workplace because you have the option of "using your pension funds" to buy the place is silly in the extreme.

Happy Planet....

..has a new customer, me.

I can read

Sure, the money was paid back AFTER they got caught and tried and ORDERED to by the courts. Not quite your version of events.

And you know Skywalker, if there actually is unfair workplace treatment happening at Sunrype - this article is complete heresay from the union perspective - then the union can file greviances. If they lose those and still have hurt feelings then there is the Canada Labour Code. It's pretty black and white on acceptable workplace practices and what real "harrasment" actually constitutes.

Being made to do the job your paid to do, under the contract, isn't harrasment.

Mostly from China?

"Sun-Rype is based in Kelowna, BC. Our flagship product – Pure Apple
Juice Not from Concentrate is produced using apples from the Okanagan
Valley and the state of Washington. Sun-Rype Apple Juice is available
across Western Canada."

"Sun-Rype raw materials are sourced from only approved, reputable
suppliers around the world including the United States, Chili, China, New
Zealand, Poland and South Africa. All suppliers that Sun-Rype sources
from must be HACCP certified. (Hazard Analysis Critical Control Points
system"

Happy

Looks like statement #1 :

"Our flagship product – Pure Apple Juice Not from Concentrate is produced using apples from the Okanagan Valley and the state of Washington."

Is qualified by statement #2 :

"Sun-Rype raw materials are sourced from only approved, reputable suppliers around the world including the United States, Chili, China, New Zealand, Poland and South Africa."

So it looks to me like statement #1 is connected to #2.

So if you can give us #1 again with ONLY inserted between "using" and "apples", I'll take that statement at face value.

And incidentally, how much of Sun-Rype's production is outsourced to places like China?

No idea ME2

Ask B Campbell. He's the one who claims to know

Calrification ME2

Statement 1 and 2 aren't connected. Statement 1 refers to NON concentrate products, Pure Apple Juice.

Statement 2 refers to where Sunrype sources their concentrate for their other products worldwide, China and many other countries. In what quantities I have no idea.

Sorry for the confusion

Then read this happy!

Your quote: "Sure, the money was paid back AFTER they got caught and tried and ORDERED to by the courts. Not quite your version of events."

They (I guess you mean the NDP)were not ORDERED by the court to do anything. Not a damn thing! You still self righteously make statements about one party when the report said that all parties where deficient in their disclosures and charitable contributions.

I trust this is not an example of the accuracy of your research when you you post your messages.

I doubt you have ever had to file a grievance or taken a matter to a Labour Board? If you had, then you would know that even if you win your case, you lose. Often the employee must still leave the job as the relationship with the supervisor is poisoned. There are not as many "enlightened" employers around as you would have us believe.

And one last question happy.

Who was it that stopped the "Inquiry" into all the Bingo stuff so we would never really know the involvement of any others?