Chapter VII: Buchans: Company Town in Transition  (continued)

The Buchans of 1971 differed vastly from the Buchans of 1941 when the miners staged their first strike or from the Buchans of 1955 when they instigated a second, and ineffectual, strike. The population had risen to 2400 people. The unstable Buchans Workers Protective Union had given way in 1956 to local 5457 of the United Steelworkers of America, a powerful and far-reaching union. The two companies controlling the Buchans mines had also changed their face: on 23 December 1958, ASARCO had replaced the Buchans Mining Company Limited with the American Smelting and Refining Company, Buchans Unit; and on 30 April 1962, the A.N.D. Co. had come under the control of Price Company Limited.⁽²⁵⁾

Most significant for the townspeople were the changes surrounding the Buchans mine site. The Lucky Strike and Oriental mines inoperative and the remaining Rothermere and MaClean mines contained only eight more years worth of ore. Mining and concentrating costs had risen; metal prices on the other hand had dropped. ASARCO was therefore less amendable to compromise that it had been 30 years earlier.

The expiration of the union's working contract on 28 February 1971 gave ASARCO a chance to exercise its new philosophy. When the union asked for a 88-cent-per-hour wage increase over two years the company offered 30 cents. When the union went on strike on June 18, the company, instead of moving to negotiate, adopted a 'wait and see' attitude that infuriated the miners who, after 16 strikeless years, expected better treatment. Their fury intensified upon learning that ASARCO had just granted a 92-cent-per-hour wage increase to their American counterparts, who already were receiving $1 more per hour than themselves.

It took the miners nearly three months of being ignored by ASARCO to realize that unless they took the initiative the strike might go on indefinitely. On September 4, the union asked the Newfoundland government to call a meeting and request the company to attend the bargaining table. The meeting took place in Grand Falls. Halfway through the proceedings company representatives inexplicably walked out, returned to their hotel and refused further discussions. At this, the union unleashed its full power. Local 5457 included workers who maintained essential services to Buchans: Local 5457 therefore cut off those services and sat back to await the company's reaction.

Two months more passed by. The hospital supplied only minimal treatment; the schools operated sporadically. Still ASARCO made no move. Fifty of the younger miners left Buchans to work in the Labrador iron mines; the older men reluctantly dug into their retirement savings to supplement the strike pay:

"Some men have left their families
To find a job elsewhere
Some have gone to the mainland
And more to Stephenville
And some have left to settle down
But quite against their will
Meanwhile up in Buchans
The strike continues still."⁽²⁶⁾

At last the break came. On November 1, the company approached the union with a 55-cent-per-hour increase over two years plus a generous collective agreement that included free health care, accident and life insurance. Bill Parsons, the United Steelworkers of America international representative, advised the union to accept the offer. The workers cast their ballots: 52.4 per cent opposed! Although most older men had voted for the contract, the younger, more militant, ones had balked at receiving a 55-cent raise for an 18-week strike.