NEWS photo Mike Wakelieid

PREMIER RITA Johnston speaks to a breakfast meeting of North Shore business leaders Tuesday
morning in North Vancouver. Johnstor. said she has asked the board of North Vancouver-based BC
Rail to see which of its operations could be moved from North Vancouver to Prince George. She
also called on Ottawa to offer help to 8.C.'’s shipbuilding industry.

Widow awarded compensation

Council finds firm discriminated
against North Vancouver couple

THE B.C. Council of Human Rights has ordered that a
North Vancouver widow be awarded $8.650 in compensa-
tion from a West Vancouver property management com-
pany for discrimination against her and her late husband.

Hollyburn Property Manage-
ment Inc., operated by West Van-
couver resident Stephen Sander,
has been ordered to pay Kathleen
Allum $4,650 in lost wages. An
additional $2,000 was awarded to
her and to the estate of Robin
Bruce Allum, who died in March
1989,

Said Kathleen Allum, *‘I went
through a fot of hell over this
whole thing. I really just rather
would have said to heck with it,
because you go through enough
grief when somebody dies. But my
late husband said, ‘Don’t give up
onit.’”’

Hollyburn was found to have
contravened the B.C. Human
Rights Act when it refused to con-
tinue to employ Robin Allum
because of physical disability.

At a special hearing earlier this
month, the human rights council
was teld that Allum was employed
as the resident manager at Har-
bour Castle apartments in North
Vancouver in April 1987, and his
wife, 59, was employed in a simi-
lar capacity there in January 1988.

In June 1988, the couple
became resident managers at
Hendry House.

Said Allum of the working rela-
tionship with Hollyburn, ‘‘it
wasn’t all that good. Tney
wouldn’t give us any staff to help
us, and they expected me to work
for nothing when we were in
North Van. My husband had to
pay me. We needed the work. We
had just had a little restaurant and
it went down the hill with all the
rest of them during that bad
period of time. So we got back in-
to tenant management.”

Sander’s company made
headlines last year when some te-
nants were faced with rent hikes
of as much as 33%. Meanwhile
Sander had set up a charity to aid
the Third World needy.

Three months after becoming a
manager at Hendry House, Robin
Allum was hospitalized with
widespread lung disease, and two
weeks later, on Oct. 13, 1988,
Hollyburn terminated the Allums’
employment.

According to Allum, the couple
took up the issue with the human
rights council after receiving a

es

By John Pifer
and Michael! Becker

termination letter from Sander’s
wife Nancy.

‘*As soon as he became ill and
was hospitalized they came out
with a letter and laid me off along
with Aim. 1 could have managed it
with aacther staff member,’ said
Allum.

She told the hearing that she
believed Hollyburn refused to
continue to employ her because of
her marital status; and Robin
Allum said he was terminated
because of his physical disability.

But Hollyburn general manager
Jim Smith denied that the com-
pany’s action was discriminatory:
however, Smith neither supervised
nor was involved in the dismissal,
which occurred before he became
general manager.

Council hearing chairman Lor-

na Barr said that, from the evi-
dence presented, “it does not ap-
pear that (Hollyburn) ... took rea-
sonable steps (to accommodate
(Mr. Allum) short of undue hard-
ship.”’

Barr ruled the Allums’ com-
plaints were justified, and ordered
that Kathleen Allum be paid $930
per month for the five months be-
tween the dismissal and her hus-
band’s death, for a total of
$4,650.

As well, Kathleen Allum and
her husband's estate were to
receive $2,000 each ‘tas some
compensation for injury to feel-
ings of self-respect’’ caused by the
discrimination.

Allum praised support received
from her legal-aid lawyer, *‘Clark
Roberts was certainly a marvellous
young man. He really goes to bat
for people who are sort of under-
privileged. He deserves a fot of
credit."’

Meanwhile Hollyburn was also
ordered to pay moving costs fez
the Allums when they had to
vacate the premises after the
dismissal.

Council member Barr said that
she was justified in hearing the
case despite the death of Robin
Allum, because the complaint was
filed before he died, and was car-
tied on by Kathleen Alum, the
executor of the estate.

N. Van City Council
approves ship trip

NORTH VANCOUVER
City Council approved
Monday night financing a
trip to Ottawa to help
fight for the survival of
Versatile Pacific Ship-
yards Inc.

oy Famela Lang
Contributing Writer

Mayor Jack Leucks, who
may be going east in August,
said he asked for council’s ap-
proval not because he has any
definite plans, but because ‘‘I
wanted to be prepared."’

A local group may go to Ot-
tawa to lobby federal ministers
for support in helping to save
the shipyards from permanent
closure, but Loucks said there

was no point going unless the
group can speak to ministers
rather than deputy ministers.

‘“‘And we hope for support
from our local (Members of
Parliament),’’ he added.

The first trip taken to Ot-
tawa by a local shipbuilding
coalition was not worthwhile,
but the second was well orga-
nized and worth the trip,
Loucks said of two trips he
took in an effort to keep the
doomed Polar 8 shipbuilding
contract in North Vancouver.

Ald. Rod Clark, who alone
voted against the motion, call-
ed the trip ‘‘a bloody waste of
money.””

Clark has, at past meetings,
said that the local shipbuilding
industry has no future, and
that the city should purchase
the Versatile lands for future
development.

Wednesday, July 31. 1991 - North Shore News - 3

Johnston

backs

Panamax

Premier says province will fight
to keep dry dock in Vancouver

THE PROVINCIAL government will use all of its politi-

cal power to try to convince

couver-based Versatile Pacific Shipyards’

Ottawa to keep North Van-
(VPSI) $60-

million Panamax floating dry dock in the Port of Van-

couver,

Premier Rita Johnston

told North Vancouver

business leaders Tuesday morning.

On Friday, members of the
B.C. Council of Marine In-
dustries, made up of shipyard
management, union and related
marine suppliers. formed the
Floating Dry Dock Task Force to
fight to keep the dry dock in
Vancouver.

Johnston said she was glad
shipyard management and unions
have combined their forces to try
to save the floating dry dock.

VPSI has given the federal gov-
ernment an Aue. ¥ deadline to
allow Versatile to sell the dock to
an unnamed buver tor $14.8 mil-
lion or for the government to buy
the dock for $7.8 million.

“This is an excellent case study
of unions and management work-
ing together. The provincial gov-
ernmen, is prepared to lend its po-
litical sucnort to the shipbuiding
industry, said Johnston.

“The wipbuilding industry is
important '0 the local economy.”’

Arthur McLaren. president of
North Vancouver-based Allied
Shipbuildet« Lid... and chairman
of the B.C. Council of Marine
Industries, said the Floating Dry
Dock Task Force will prepare a
five-year business and marketing
plan that will include the
associated upland and infrastruc-
ture costs involved in keeping the
dry dock in Vancouver.

McLaren said that union and
management members of the
shipbuilding and repair industry
had been meeting over the last
several weeks.

He added that the task force’s
first job would be to extend the
Aug. 9 deadline for the proposed
sale of the dry dock.

“When Versatile came un with
its business plan one of the things

By Sur} Rattan
News Reporter

they wanted to do was sell the dry
dock. As a group, we don't want
them to do that,”* said McLaren.

Attorney General Russ Fraser.
who also attended the Tuesday
breakfast meeting with Johnston,
said.**The formation of the
Floating Dry Dock Task Force
reflects a cohesive approach that
includes representation from
shipowners, shipbuilders, shipyard
unions, the Port of Vancouver
and the provincial government.”*

Provincial Development, Trade
and Tourism Minister Howard
Dirks said the federal government
should stop neglecting B.C.'s
shipyard industry.

“tam disturbed by the federal
inaction on a number of issues
facing West Coast shipyards while
East Coast shipyards get prompt,
thorough attention and very
substantial assistance,’’ said
Dirks.

Earlier this month the federal
government announced that it
wou'd give $263 million to the
MIL-Davie shipyard in Quebec to
cover cost overruns on the con-
struction of 12 patrol frigates and
modernization of four Tribal-class
destroyers.

Meanwhile, the provincial gov-
ernment has postponed a decision
on ordering a second $120-million
superferry for the B.C. Ferry
Corp.

North Vancouver-based In-
tegrated Ferry Constructors Lid.
(IFC) is managing the construc-
tion of the first superferry, part of
which is being built by Allied
Shipbuilders Lid.

Baker expressed concerns
to premier in letter

From page 1

any move and { have made that
clear to the premier,’’ said Baker.

in a letter to Johnston, Baker
said she “‘has strong concerns
about the need for a very careful
evaluation of any such initiative
given the potential for disruption
and job losses in North Van-
couver,

“The recent collapse of Ver-

satile Pacific Shipyards and the
loss af jobs in the shipbuilding
industry further heightens our
concerns when talk of losing
another North Vancouver-based
industry arises,” wrote Baker.

BC Rail’s North Vancouver
head office building employs 430
people; its main North Vancouver
yard employs 358 people.

BC Rail opened its North Van-
couver head office in April 1983.

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