[The following is the text of a leaflet distributed to thousands of demonstrators at the March 22 labor demonstration in Ottawa. It was issued jointly by the League for Socialist Action/Ligue Socialiste Ouvrière, Canadian section of the Fourth International; and Groupe Socialiste des Travailleurs du Québec (Québec Socialist Workers Group), affiliated to the Organizing Committee for the Reconstruction of the Fourth International.
[The leaflet also announced two rallies against the wage controls to be held jointly by the GSTQ and the LSA/LSO in Montréal (March 26) and Toronto (April 9).]
NO TO WAGE CONTROLS
Stop the cutbacks in social services!
For cost of living escalator clauses!
For the unity of Québec and English Canadian workers to defeat Trudeau's measures!
Governments at all levels claim that workers demands are excessive, that public funds are limited, that we all have to tighten our belts.
These same governments are further lowering our standard of living through cutbacks in health, education, social security, and other social services, while they hand out billions for their profit-making projects. (Olympics, Syncrude, etc.)
Prices and profits of the large corporations continue to climb. The bosses and their governments are trying to make workers and the most oppressed layers of the population pay for the crisis of the capitalist system.
March 22 is the beginning of the response that is needed. We need more united mass actions of all organizations of the working class and others (unemployed, students, women, etc.) who are hit by these antisocial measures.
Such mass mobilizations are needed to support the struggles and strikes against the Trudeau measures, such as the present struggle of the Common Front of 185,000 hospital workers, teachers, and other Québec employees against the Bourassa government.
It is not possible to win by means of parliamentary commissions, mediators, conciliators, etc. Workers must rely on their own strength.
It's on the level of government that the problem is posed today. To win, workers must kick out big business governments and replace them with their own governments committed to satisfying all their demands.
For an NDP [New Democratic party, Canada's labor party] government in Ottawa!
For a labor party in Québec based on the unions!
Fried Eggs, Over Easy
The Paris newspaper Le Figaro recently assigned two reporters to eat at five of the world's most famous restaurants. The two staffers, in what Le Figaro called "an act of heroism," ordered fried eggs, lettuce salad, plain yogurt, and water at each restaurant.
The maitre d'hotel at Maxim's was not amused. "A provocation; a provocation. A total lack of respect for Maxim's!" he sputtered. What was worse, it was done by a Parisian. "Not a foreigner, but a Frenchman! A Parisian!"
Prices ranged from $34 at the Tour d'Argent and at Lasserre, to $21 at the Grand Vefour, where the couple skipped dessert. At Maxim's, the eggs were burned.