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Dave McCullough

OurWiEWS

AdrianRAESIDE

Malls, malls,
everywhere

pring has arrived early for

Castlegar — the sun is out,

the snow is gone and there’s
talk of another shopping mall.

Ah, Castlegar... the only city in the
civilized world that has more mall
proposals than people. In fact, if
Castlegar could string together all
the shopping malls ever discussed,
planned or pondered, our mall-
deprived city would give the folks in
Edmonton a run for the consumer-
mad dollar.

The city’s latest tall mall tale has
two developers ready to break ground
on the shopping centre of shopping
centres. The Reid Group and First
Allied Development Corp. could be
going shovel-to-shovel in a bid to
build the city’s first mall. The only
thing standing in each group’s way
are development permits and some
wise words from Ald. Kirk Duff.

Like most residents, Duff wants a
mall. After all, it would generate
local employment and boost our
sagging economy. But Duff isn’t as
anxious as most of us.

Instead, he wants the city to-resist
the almighty dollar until the Official
Community Plan Update has been
completed.

A trouble maker? Hardly. Duff’s
word’s hold merit. After all, what’s
the use of setting up an OCP
committee if its hands are tied by
permits it had no control over.

Castlegar has waited an eternity
for its shopping mall. It can afford to
wait six more months until the OCP
update runs its course.

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Robson ferry lands in'Victoria

Okay, it’s a longshot —
kind of like betting on the
Vancouver Canucks to take
home Lord Stanley’s mug —
but it sure was nice-to see
the B.C. Liberal Party
scoring points on our behalf.

In case you missed it,
leader Gordon Wilson
decided he’d take his first
true roll in the political hay.
The fresh-faced Wilson
decided he’d defend our
long-lost little treasure, the
Robson ferry.

s.D. HARRISON

Harrison
Comparison

though... “Because, blah,
blah, blah.”

Not good enough, Mike,
and it never will be.

The Robson ferry may
mean diddly-squat to the
pin-striped folks’ in
appreciated British
Columbia, but it means a
heck of a lot to us in “the
hinterland.”

(It would have been
interesting to see Ed
Conroy when that

In his polite-yet-pompous
manner, Wilson somewhat
demanded to know why the ferry promise
— along with two other promises — was
nixed faster than a Grade 4 love interest.

newscast I was watching — that’s
Vancouver-based television for yah — so
I’ve been scratching my head all morning
trying to come up with one for our beloved
premier.

No doubt it went something like this,

question was asked, just to
see if he was giving ’Ole
Gordie the thumbs up
under his desk.)

So what do we have to gain by the

> _ Liberals sudden affection? Sadly, I think
Mike Harcourt’s reply was edited out of the ©

Christmas cards are out of the question.

So why bring the issue up, you say?

Well, the short answer is that the Robson
ferry was there. Wilson needed a few sparks
while making his debut and our ferry
happened to be one of them.

please see HARRISON page 7

Street WALK

Nicole Fullerton
Castlegar

“Housework.”

Vien Seneyavong
Castlegar

“Staying home.”

Question: What have you been doing for spring break?

Lindsay Voykin
Castlegar

“Playing with my
best friend Natalie.”

Kara Messer

“Relaxing.”

Mark Kinakin

Nelson Castlegar

“Nothing.”

@ Saturday, March 21 1992

'  #TheNews

OtherVIEWS

Please address
all letters to:

Letters to the

ditor
Castlegar News
P.O. Box 3007
Castlegar, B.C.
V1N 3H4

or deliver them to
197 Columbia
Ave.

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include the
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will be published.
Only in
exceptional
cases will letters
be published
anonymously.
Even in those
cases, the name,
address and
phone number of
the writer MUST
be disclosed to
the editor.

The News
reserves the right
to edit letters for
brevity, clarity,
legality, grammar
and taste.

Letters tohHE

EDITOR

Child care neglected

The recent budget speech by the Minister
of Finance made it clear that the present
federal government has no intention of
addressing child care issues and needs in
this country.

The Minister of Health and Welfare
made the following statement:

“Since 1984, the reality of children in
Canada has changed dramatically. I’m not
saying child care isn’t a priority. It is for
working women earning $30,000. or
$40,000, but it is no longer seen by

‘Canadians as the first. priority. I had a

choice to go to child care. I had a choice to

go on this side (directing federal assistance

toward children from low and middle-

income families, replacing the day care

initiative on the government agenda). The

fact of the matter is I don’t have the

resources to do both.”

5 Benoit Bouchard

Minister, Health and Welfare Canada

Feb. 25, 1992

Sandra Griffin, President of the Early

Childhood Educators of B.C. wrote the

following editorial in the March 1992 issue
of The Early Childhood Educator:

“These quotes speak for themselves. This

is one of the most misguided, misinformed

policy decisions the federal government
could have made with respect to child care.

“As if there is a choice to be made. As if
the struggles undertaken by thousands upon
thousands of Canadian families on a daily
basis to both earn a living and ensure a safe
and nurturing care environment for their
children are somehow unrelated to children
living in poverty, or to children whose mental
and physical health is threatened by family
violence. .

“Deputy Liberal leader Sheila Copps noted
outside the Commons that, those questions
are inextricably linked and you cannot
simply pit one against the other, dismiss one
out of hand in favor of another because you
ran a poll.”

The poll she referred to listed six issues
related to child welfare, including child
poverty, family violence, child sexual abuse,
and setting up a national child care program.

Based on the fact that child care came out
at the bottom of the list, the federal
government chose to interpret that as
meaning that child care “no longer being
seen as a first priority”.

The federal government obviously believes
the Canadian public will not see through this
ruse. It is up to concerned individuals to take
action and let their MP know that the

interpretation made is inaccurate.
Community action is important.

Act now!

These families are depending on it:
CHILDREN BY AGE GROUP WITH MOTHER IN THE
LABOR FORCE, CANADA 1988
CANADIAN NATIONAL CHILD CARE STUDY
Age Total No. of % with Mothers
Children in Labor Force

559,000
531,000
1,073,900
6-9 yrs. 1,436,800
10-12 yrs. 1,056,900 68.3

There are a lot of children at risk.

As Judge Abella stated at the national
conference on Canada’s children in October
1991: “We cannot afford it” is only one side of
the ledger, and it melts before the
undisputable morality on the other side of
the edger that says “We cannot afford not to.”

Canadian children deserve the best that
we as a progressive and prosperous society
have to offer. -

They rely on concerned adults to advocate
in their best interest.

They need our help.

Judy Pollard,

Nelson i

B.C. Director to the Board.

Canadian Child Day Care Federation

0-17 mos.
18-35 mos.
3-5 yrs.

Hold on to your wallets, British Columbia

There was.a lot in the Speech
from the Throne about giving
women more say in the affairs of
British Columbia, a praiseworthy
effort, indeed.

There will be legislation to
bring pay equity to public sector
workers. The bill is to end the dis-
criminatory pay gap between men
and women.

The throne speech also
promised to give women better
representation on the boards of
Crown corporations.

Not a bad idea either.

Most of those boards are now
run by the old boys’ club.

But there is one woman who
could argue with the Harcourt
government's professed commit-
ment to deal women in — Her
Majesty, Queen Elizabeth the Sec-
ond.

In the past, throne speeches re-
ferred to “my government,” which
is perfectly correct since the queen
is the titular head of our govern-
ment. That tradition was
scrapped by the NDP.

The latest throne speech read
by lieutenant-Governor David

Report
from

Victoria

Hubert BEYER

Lam had numerous references to
“this government,” but none to
“my government.”

Now to the throne speech itself.
Hold on to your wallets.

Premier Harcourt and his crew
will be on the prowl for more tax-
es. And as for election promises, if
they cost money, you might as well
forget it.

Most of the measures alluded to
in the throne speech will either
cost no money or their cost can be
deferred for a vear or two.

‘Take the freedom of informa-
tion legislation, which will proba-

bly be introduced in this session
by way of a social exposure bill,
which means the government wi
invite response to its proposals be-
fore actually implementing the fi-
nal draft of the bill.

The government will bring in
fair-wage policies for all publicly-
financed construction projects.
This means that on public pro-
jects, non-union companies would
have to pay their workers union-
scale wages.

The ombudsman’s jurisdiction
will be expanded to include mu-
nicipalities, regional districts,
school boards, universities and
hospitals.

The government will also put
an end to politicians voting for
their own pay increases. And, as
promised, the government will
bring in tougher conflict-of-inter-
est legislation.

Women are to be the beneficia-
ries of a number of government
initiatives. One is to make sure
that pay equity exists in the pub-
lic services which will guarantee
that women get the same pay as
men if they have the same respon-

sibilities. The other measure is to
bring more women onto the
boards of Crown corporations.

Predictably, the Liberal opposi-
tion didn’t have a lot of praise for
the throne speech. They criticized
the speech for not dealing with
economic measures.

But then, you don’t have to go
to Her Majesty’s Loyal Opposition
to get an earful of criticism about
the government. About a hundred
protesters, many of them dressed
in rather weird fashion, showed
up outside the Parliament Build-
ings on opening day to lambaste
the Harcourt government for not
having done anything yet to save
a number of valleys and water-
sheds from logging.

It’s safe to say that every one of
those self-proclaimed environ-
mental watchdogs voted for the
NDP in the last election, and now
they want to callect their reward.

Not having performed the ex-
pected miracles earned Premier
Harcourt the particular wrath of
one of the protesters who show-
ered him with pine needles.

Great symbolism, I suppose.

continued from page 6

It’s politics, after all. The same
game, just different players.

The real loser in all this will
likely be the Robson-Raspberry
Ferry Users Ad Hoc Committee.
Despite working countless hours
on countless approaches, count-
less times before supplying the
Liberals with an arm-load of doc-

uments, Wi ’s one question will
likely be ‘ie Tat terse the Robson

ferry is mentioned in the legisla-
ture.

Call me a pessimist, or just a
pest, but a party that didn’t even
bother to run a candidate in Ross-
land-Trail can’t have the Robson
ferry high on its agenda.

Sorry ferry users, I think you'll
have to fight this one out in the
B.C. Supreme Court.

The way I see it, the Liberals

were merely putting on their best
faces before the camera.
If was their coming out party,
after all. :
eee
Ron Norman fans, fear not.
The News’ rosy-cheeked colum-

‘nist hasn’t moved to a new coun-

try to assume a new identity be-
cause his Cowan Office Supplies
Kootenay West basketball crew

was unceremoniously dumped
from the post-season party.
Instead, still stinging from the
humbling defeat, Norman needed
time to re-evaluate his playing ca-
reer.
But we’re in for double-trouble
grabs