CASTLEGAR NEWS, August 28, 1983

CASTLEGAR NEWS |

7.1947

LV, CAMPBELL — PUBLISHER AUG. 7, 1947-FEB. 15, 1973

PUBLISHER — Burt Campbell pel — Ron Norman PLANT FOREMAN — Peter Hon

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112, 1978-AUO, 27, 1980

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What's excessive ?

There's a word to explain why the annual federal debt this year will soar near $27 billion—a figure so enormous it's incomprehensible to anyone but an Ottawa bureau- crat. The word is excessive.

It applies to almost everything the federal government does, from its decisions to bail out ailing cor- porations with millions of tax- payers’ dollars, to the way federal cabinet members use Air Canada as if it was their private airline.

But more than anything, the word applies to the way the gov- ernment handles its routine busi- ness. And there's no better exam- ple of that than the way the coun- try's leader handles his day-to-day business.

We've learned recently just how much it costs taxpayers to house and feed the Prime Minister and his family, but an article in the Vancouver Sun reveals in detail something that comes as even more of a surprise—how the Prime Minister deals with h as

in a word, he doesn't. Instead, he (or rather we, as taxpayers) hires 30 civil servants to handle an average of 100,000 letters a year. Thirty federal employees—just to answer the Prime Minister's mail. Is it any wonder the deficit contin- ues to climb?

These employees weigh, record in a computer and describe in

monthly reports all the letters. The .

letters are then kept in filing cabi- nets for two years before being turned over to the public archives.

Most of the letters don’t even require replies. And those that do are assigned to six staff writers— that's in addition to the 30 employ- ees working in the mail room.

Just one thing: the staff writers don't receive guidance from the Prime Minister on how to reply. They work from form letters.

In these days of six and five, and government restraint, there's a word to describe how the Prime Mini: handles his mail. Ex-

simple as his mail.

cessive.

Mackasey case a costly mistake

In this i the ch

The ruling Tt Jay by

rf h

Court Judge

against Mackasey didn’t even get

that there is not enough to send veteran MP Bryce Mackasey to trial on charges of in- fluence peddling raises a number of issues.

One arises out of the fact that the RCMP's commercial crime squad spent eight long months researching the case involving Mackasey before finally laying charges.

It seems not too much to ask that after such a lengthy in- vestigation the RCMP should be able to better determine if they had a case against Mackosey and if the case had a chance of winning in a courtroom.

past a prel: y hearing. Someone in the RCMP should be taken to task for that.

A second issue is the way media across the country treated the story. Press, TV and radio reporters, editors and commen- tators had found Mackasey ‘guilty by implication betore hei even got to court.

In these days of instant _ com- munication and media saturation simply reporting the story can sometimes make it seem that the ‘party is guilty.

in the Mackasey case, it proved to be a grave mistake. In how many other cases is the same mistake made?

FRED

MERRIMAN

Senator Ed Lawson has my respect. The Senator suggests that govern- ment, business and labor should meet. as a council to sort out the problems

and g were less less ‘noisy and much less public. We think that the election is over and the losers must be patient or at least should be

that beset, not only our great p but also most of the countries in the world.

His suggestion is far more positive than the approach that fills the newspaper these days. The approach most obvious at the moment may be best summed up by saying, “It’s either them or us. You are either for us or you are against us.”

" Wouldn't it be loverly if all the affairs of men and state were so simple. Japan does it. West Germany does it. And some reports indicate that even France does it. I am referring of course to teamwork councils which include the big three as mentioned above.

Many people in the unorganized majority would also like to have a seat at that council. We can hope that at least one or more of the afc

ing strong

alternatives — if there in fect be any.

It would be a good move in fact for the government of the day — which unabashedly has my. support — to dispatch a quiet and unpublicized invitation to the leaders of labor to attend a closed-door session to explain the meat, and rationale behind the controversial restraint and pending labor legislation. A friend made is an enemy lost. Even small children on the block here in humble Blueberry Creek know that philosophy.

Simon Fraser U

THE SOVIET WAY

Beating the bomb |

By MARK WOOD

reed shelters ofa-thick layer of snow might ‘protect citizens from nuclear fallout, and makes no mention of cata- strophe or death.

The booklet, entitled Something Everybody Should Know and Under- stand, says underground shelters might protect urban dwellers from a nuclear attack, and shows rural people how to build their own

details on ‘how far radioactive fallout would spread after an atomic explosion or how prolonged its effects would be.

Instead, it suggests that only those in close proximity to the blast would be harmed and that others would have a chance of’ survival if they

ences, have echoed western findings that radiation would render vast tracts of land uninhabitable for decades. Such information has never been published in the Soviet media and the public has generally been left ignorant

calm and followed orders.

It includes diagrams showing how to beat coats with brushes or handfuls of hay, saying that in this way radio- active dust could be removed after the bomb fell.

Westerners who have examined the

text says it reflects a return under the , Sountry’s new leadership ta.a actrine _ that the Soviet Union might be ble to

fight and survive a nuclear war.

Soviet officials abandoned that doc- trine during the latter years of Presi- dent Leonid Brezhnev, who rightly declared an atomic war unwinhable for both sides.

Soviet scientists have written in publications intended for foreign read- ers that hundreds of millions of people

would be killed outright or by the ling- ©

ering effects of radiation in the event of an atomic war.

The handbook, which recently went on sale in Moscow bookstores, gives no

Angels

By NECOLE BAER

“The diation (from a nuclear attack) can cause radiation

of how a nuclear strike oo be. : The new booklet, issued by the

Anvacaneavapconnnngnonnnocnqaonnnnncgnnuntanssscuuausnaseigessnaey

Remember ‘When?

ease: r ’ ' From’ 25,1868

The unio ee has been handing out headaches in brown window envelopes these past few days. The upper left hand corner of the envelope reads return after 10 days to

ner, Social Security and Municipal Aid Tax, Victoria, B.C., however, inside it states that you have until Sept. 20th to work it out and forward your three per cent to Vic- toria.

s s .

For sale: Six-week-old pigs and any number of turkeys, apply Mr. M. O. Hougen, Robson. _

Z o © 6

The Kinnaird Basket Picnic will be held on Sunday at Eremenko's field in Castlegar. Cars are picking up. pass- engers along the highway or at Scotts, Dumont Rd., Hardware Store, Comm- unity Hall, Kinnaird Service and Con., and railway crossing at 10) o'clock. Hibses' stat at 11 alia: Frestieb reams and coffee.

. . e

The Castlegar Clippers ball team

won the championship finals against

Castlegar News . Peter Kinakin of Castlegar can keep his cow inside village limits until spring. Mr. Kinakin wrote council request-

is kept a distance of 200 feet from the nearest residence.

Council expressed pleasure at the tone of Mr. Kinakin's letter and decided to send him a reply thanking him for. his cooperation and allowing him to keep his cow until spring.

s s s

Winner of a second prize at the Exhibition

Soviet Civil Defence presents a third world war in sketches and d strongly of

Pacific being held in Vancouver, is Mrs. Steve Harshenin of Brilliant.

the Second World War. Similar advice is found in civil de- fence diagrams and instructions Leceneh

sickness of varying degrees,” the pencdispley

booklet says. “But a shelter offers Pro- tection from this radiation.”

For those who would not have’ access to underground bunkers or have only limited time to protect them- selves, it advises that patching to- gether a shelter from reeds or bran- ches might make a sufficient fallout shield.

“In winter, it is possible to use fro- zen soil, ice and snow. For example, a layer of compacted snow 60 centi- metres thick will halve the strength of the radiation.”

Experts such as Yevgeny Chazov, a member of the Soviet Academy of Sci-

digging blocked by rubble. It gives pages of in- structions on how to fix gas masks, and on pills available in first-aid packs that would, it says, act as antidotes to radiation sickness.

Some Soviets who have seen the book say it is unlikely to change a gen- erally sceptical approach to prospects of post-nuclear war survival. S

They quoted a popular joke which says: “In the event of nuclear attack, wrap yourself in a sheet and walk qui- etly to the cemetery.” [Reuter]

just vigilantes?

subway stations in groups watching for

But while the Angels seem to be

OTTAWA — C ry over the Guardian Angels, a civilian vigilante group, may grab the headlines but some experts say the straightforward, do-it-yourself approach to crime pre- vention is the most effective.

Police have been advising citizens for five years to install security locks and burglar alarms,-engrave their val- uables for identification after a theft and set up in which neigh- bors watch each other's homes during absences.

P of such based crime-prevention measures has stemmed from a realization by police they can only react to crimes after they occur because there are not enough

or the

of a crime. ;

They then either alert police or make a citizen's arrest and offer themselves as witnesses in trials.

“In the United States, we're like radical surgery on a terminally ill patient who's already gpt one foot in the grave,” says Sliwa. “In Canada,

we're more like vitamins — we're a‘

preventative measure.”

The group has established Canadian chapters in Toronto and Windsor, on: is trainin;

by citizens, they run into opposition from police and municipal governments in every city they Plan to set up chapters, Sliwa says.

Police and

Mrs. Harshenin took a second prize with her colored crochet doily under 12

helda membership meeting fecently in the community hall.

Mrs. Joan Doran was elected to be in

of make-up and Doug Doran was selected as chairman of the Cond committee. s . os

The last meeting of the Castlegar council was over early.

The ‘meeting started at about 7:10 p.m. and was over 9:40. “Where can we get a medal stuck?” joked commi- ssioner Maddocks.

Couneil meetings for the last few months have usually lasted until 12 p.m. or later.

John Munro, former chairman of the social sciences department at Selkirk College, has been awarded a $8,000 fellowship to pursue doctoral studies at Queen's University: in Kingston.

The astiogns Kiwanis Club hosted

have chosen either to ignore the Angels or denounce them as vigilantes bent on taking the law into their own hands.

Improved research and data collec- tion on crime trends and crime-fighting methods from the last.two decades has convinced police forces and municipal

4 last week began a recruitment drive j : Vancouver.

and

‘ash.,

departing member of the local club. A presentation was made by local

-club vice-president Sam Muirhead to

Mr. and Mrs. Chuck Henry.

Mr. Henry, a trades foreman in the Celgar pulp division, leaves soon to take up a new position with Western

support crime p ties, Waller says.

LETTER

recently released the results of a study about the making of a politician. One of the key words in that report —

U ty of Ottawa

Irvin Waller says studies show that elminating a Potential criminal's opp-

it a crime can lead to

— explains how single-minded people

with a single-vested interest soon learn

to submerge their fanaticism in the mind of the

ioned musclemen would sit at that table with the concerns of those who feel or Pp sented.

May we idealistically assume that the government — our elected renre sentatives — will carry the

It may not always result in any radical change in direction but a coalition does knock the rough edges off a single-minded point of view.

Interesting how the story of the elephant eh to mind: a large

the majority, silent, d underprivileged or whatever they may be, to that all important meeting.

* If I may be forgiven once again for exercising my opinion: it does seem an utter waste of money for both the more obvious sides to spend large sums trying to convince the unwashed that each respective side is the champion of right, truth and justice.

Most of us feel that much more could be accomplished if affairs of labor

ding in a jungle clearing. The tribe formed a cirele around about the beast. The chief who stood at the front of the mammoth, called his description. He then asked each in turn to describe what they saw.

Each gave an accurate description. ‘None were the same. It is now almost time for our leaders to exercise the common sense and judgment of the primitive yet more civilized tribesmen of that legendary jungle in some foreign land.

a reduction of up to 50 per cent in such crimes as breaking and entering where more than half are attributed to trouble-seeking youths.

But Lisa Sliwa and her husband, Curtis, who founded the controversial Guardian Angels in New York four years ago, say such measures are not enough and people need the protection offered by their volunteer patrols.

Canada today is like the United States 10 to 15 years ago, when “people were reluctant to admit there even was a (crime) problem,” says Sliwa, who earned a black belt in karate to help her cope in the crime-ridden New York streets.

“The first step toward dealing with it is to admit that there is a problem. That's something that’s very, very difficult for the authorities to even

The Angels, wearing their distine- tive red berets, patrol streets and

uavannnanacnganesevvennanceseeey

We don't need CPR tracks in the city

Editor, News: About two months as0, avery hard-

The president of this railroad (the CPR): should be told to have these level

working crew project on various railroad crossings in our town. They removed the old cross- ing materials, serviced the road bed, etc., in preparation for the installation of longer rails that would greatly

was made ready for the installation of the longer sections of track. But where are the new long sections of track? Are they being sent from Tibet via Llama? Could they possibly have been mailed? Who knows why our railway crossings have been so rough, so long?

within five days, or he should move his railroad out of our city.

Of course, he would ask, “But where could it be moved?” I would suggest that a new “main line” be built on the far bank of the river.

The railroads contributed a great deal towards the of our town and country but, like the Model T, we surely don't need the railroad equip- ment and machines screeching, whist- ling and ad through our city today.

D. Bruce Lee

Bridge in s s s

Nels Allen, president of the Castle- gar and District Teachers’ Association, was one of more than 100 leaders in the teaching profession from across B.C. who attended the recent - annual summer conference of the B.C. Teach- ers’ Federation in Nelson.

5 YEARS AGO From the Aug. 31, 1978

Castlegar News

A happy even took ate in Robson during the recent long weekend when members of the Waldie family staged a reunion to honor the forthcoming golden wedding anniversary of Mr. and Mrs. W.T. Waldie and to recognize Mr. Waldie's recent 75th birthday.

s s s

The Western Canadian Bantam Girls and Boys Softball Championships held in Castlegar Aug. 5-7 saw B.C.'s

cial winners taking all honors, and the local host teams beating out three other provincial winners for third place in both divisions.

The three-day event had partici- pating teams from Northwest Terri- tories, Manitoba, Saskatchewan, Alberta and B.C., as well as the local teams.

Se TTL

This Week at . ‘

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