Labour job goes to hand-up critic

WASHINGTON - Linda Chavez, George W. Bush's choice for Labour Secretary, is a critic of "affirmative action" programmes who believes minority groups can succeed without special help from the Government.

A syndicated columnist and author who was Bush's campaign adviser on immigration, Chavez, recalled her parents and the long hours they worked as a house painter and in restaurants and department stores.

"If I am confirmed as Secretary of Labour, I intend to keep faith with the men and the women who still work at jobs like those my parents held," Chavez said.

She promised to help make American workers more productive, promote safe working conditions and make sure federal contractors do not discriminate.

Chavez also vowed to "work with employers to ensure that the Department of Labour assists the private sector in expanding economic opportunity and job growth."

Known for her opposition to affirmative action policies, Chavez wrote earlier this year: "America is increasingly a multiracial, multiethnic society, one in which both women and men are found in most jobs and universities. It is foolish and dangerous for the Government to rank favourites on the basis of skin colour, ancestry and sex."

Chavez has been equally frank in assessing some Republican talk on the subject.

She agreed with the basic Republican stance that immigrants should be self-supporting, but has said "the Republican Party sometimes shoots itself in the foot as conservatives generally do, when they talk about racial or ethnic issues."

Chavez is president of the Washington-based Centre for Equal Opportunity, which has done studies supporting its position against affirmative action programmes.

She is also on the board of the American Civil Rights Union, which has been billed as a "constructive alternative" to the American Civil Liberties Union.

Born in New Mexico on June 17, 1947, Chavez traces her Latin ancestry through her father's side back to Spain in the 1600s.

Bush's cabinet, depending on Senate approval, is:

Colin Powell, Secretary of State; Paul O'Neill, Treasury Secretary; Condoleezza Rice, National Security Adviser; Don Evans, Commerce Secretary; Ann Veneman, Agriculture Secretary; Mel Martinez, Housing and Urban Affairs Secretary; Karen Hughes, President's counsellor, Al Gonzales, White House counsel; John Ashcroft, Attorney General; Christine Todd, Whitman Environmental Protection Agency; Donald Rumsfeld, Defence Secretary; Tommy Thompson, Health and Human Services Secretary; Gale Norton, Interior Secretary; Rod Paige, Education Secretary; Anthony Principi, Veterans Affairs Secretary; Spencer Abraham, Energy Secretary; Linda Chavez, Labour Secretary; Norman Mineta, Transportation Secretary.

- REUTERS

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