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Article
Titles…
Redressing B.C.'s democratic
deficit | Anderson takes on Victoria on
election eve | Students give top marks to
four-day school week | Island should focus its energy on
energy | Anderson stands
firm on offshore | Air
Canada seeks last-gasp deal | Air Canada inching toward deal
| Lake Ontario water used
to cool buildings | Port an important local,
provincial and national asset | Outlook for week keys on oil costs,
consumer price index | BC Film makes it work as
government funding dwindles | Falcon to speak at chamber lunch
| Council will have plan in
place when mayor begins campaign to win federal seat | GVRD asked to produce report card on
city's balance of growth, livability | Martin wants MPs to have say in
Supreme Court nominees | Liberal points finger at Chrétien’s
office | Think price of gas
is high now? Learn to live with it, say analysts | Healthiest jobs tend to be those
that pay the most | Appointing candidates can cut both
ways | Martin has
given B.C. a team that can deliver | Democracy in Canada is but a sad
memory | B.C.'s aging
population | The high
cost of raising a family | Air Canada agrees with six unions in
bid to save carrier | No election called yet, but
candidates off and running | Designer calling on
professional artists to boycott Olympic contest | In other words: Nine steps to top
health care | It's time to give voters fixed
federal election dates | United, municipalities will
prosper; divided, they cannot survive | Charting a course over urban
scrawl | Environmentalism key issue for new
lobby group | Contempt, stupidity, or good old
patronage? | Forget crocodile tears - the
West has reason to weep | Whistleblowers: why they do it
| Alberta doubles
spending on government advertising | Key aide gave direction in scandal,
MP says | New
national regulator topic of meeting | No merger guidelines for banks
until fall: Goodale | Mining sector powers jump in
profits | Water
tension rising between Canada and U.S. | New federal health agency to be
located in Winnipeg | Liberals slam Tories over proposed
tax cuts | America's new war on drugs
targets Canadian pharmacists | Moscow expected to ratify Kyoto pact:
EU ministers | Telus gives RBC a
turn | In search
of an oilpatch Liberal for Ottawa | OPEC under pressure on oil prices
| PMO involved in sponsorship
program, Liberal MP says | Foreign journalists' tests of
Athens security not welcomed by Olympic organizers | The saga of an agrarian
plagiarist | Shrinking
Ottawa | Ottawa errs in war
crime study | Air Canada deal hinges on two
holdout unions | Martin determined to let MPs screen
judges | Ontario Grits want health
pledges from federal parties | Canada's business schools get good
grades | If
Wal-Mart is worried, maybe we should be, too | B.C. Liberals face horse race
with NDP next May | PM no closer to
the truth
Globe and Mail, Page
A04, 17-May-2004
Redressing B.C.'s democratic
deficit
By Hugh Winsor
The people
who have been using strong-arm tactics to create Prime Minister Paul Martin's
"dream team" of Liberal candidates in
Their
concept of the democratic deficit is that
So the
Liberals' B.C. election organization, led by Vancouver public-relations
consultant Mark Marrissen and Bill Cunningham, president of the B.C. wing of the
Liberal Party of Canada, set about to fix it. Their approach has the full
support of Mr. Martin, even if other notions of the democratic deficit involving
autonomy at the constituency level or the sensibilities of existing Liberal MPs
get in the way.
Mr.
Marrissen is under particular pressure because he and Mr. Martin used the
leader's prerogative of appointing a candidate directly to parachute Mr.
Cunningham into the Burnaby-Douglas riding that is now deemed winnable for the
Liberals because Svend Robinson has stepped out. The riding has a large Chinese
population and two Chinese-Canadians have been campaigning for the Liberal
nomination, selling several thousand memberships.
Mr.
Cunningham also lives in the riding, however, and the Martin organization
believes that as a long-time activist and party executive, he deserves an
opportunity to run for Parliament. So, why didn't he get out and sell
memberships like the other candidates? The realpolitik answer is the campaign
organization believed no Caucasian would stand a chance against a Chinese
candidate.
In many
other B.C. ridings, the Liberal Party apparatus is effectively controlled by
Indo-Canadians with close ties to Sikh temples. These linkages flourish because
of group-voting practices often demonstrated by ethnic groups, and they create
another form of democratic deficit, according to worried party officials.
Indeed, these officials are proactively encouraging secular candidates from the
Sikh community as differentiated from temple-sponsored candidates.
This in
part explains Mr. Martin's direct nomination of former New Democrat B.C. premier
Ujjal Dosanjh in former Chretien minister Herb Dhaliwal's riding, even though
there were two other Sikh aspirants campaigning for the nomination. Another
major factor in the Dosanjh candidacy has to do with the NDP, and more on that
later.
Mr.
Marrissen, B.C. campaign chair, argues democracy is served "if the candidate
nominated [either by the leader or otherwise] is what the community wants on
election day." Setting aside the "we know what is best for you" element in all
of this, Mr. Martin and his B.C. advisers have assembled a powerhouse and widely
representative team.
Low-key,
two-term MP Sophia Leung, for instance, was "persuaded" to step aside in
Vancouver-Kingsway for David Emerson, a shoo-in for a very senior cabinet
position if he (and Mr. Martin) are elected. (Her reward will come after the
election.) Mr. Emerson obtained his PhD in economics under the direction of Bank
of Canada Governor David Dodge (when he was a professor at Queen's University in
Kingston), has been a deputy minister in Victoria, a bank president in Alberta,
built a $500-million addition as president of the Vancouver International
Airport Authority, and has spent the past six years turning around forestry
giant Canfor in the midst of the softwood-lumber dispute with the United States.
As he puts
it, he was persuaded by Mr. Martin to be a Liberal candidate because he seeks
out challenges. "I want a problem that is substantive, complex or intractable
and some authority to run with it."
He could
well be sitting in the next Liberal caucus beside Dave Haggard, the no-nonsense
president of the Industrial, Wood and Allied Workers of
Another
former NDPer, Shirley Chan, will represent the Liberals against New Democrat MP
Libby Davies in Vancouver East. She has been a prominent activist in the Chinese
community, chief of staff to Mike Harcourt when he was mayor of Vancouver, and
recently Health
She has
also chaired the board of governors of the
Rounding
out the "dream team" is Miles Richardson, the charismatic leader of the Haida
Gwaii, and a powerful advocate for first nations. Impressive as all the
individuals are, the question is whether the tactics used to create this team
diminished the democratic deficit or added to it. The broader B.C. "community"
will give its answer on election day.
HYPERLINK "mailto:hwinsor@globeandmail.ca"
hwinsor@globeandmail.ca
By
Federal
Environment Minister David Anderson appears to be digging in his heels over
potential oil and gas development off the B.C. coast.
In a memo
written for the information of all Liberal candidates in the coming federal
election, the environment minister restates the federal government's position on
the 33-year-old moratorium on offshore oil and gas activity on the West Coast.
"In a
nutshell it is that the moratorium stays in place until the knowledge gaps on
the risks involved, the resources at stake, and the economic and social factors
that might have a bearing on the decision are filled," it says. "Only then will
the federal government have the information necessary to make an informed
decision."
In
mid-April, the provincial government released its own position paper on offshore
oil and gas exploration, which specifically stated "there are no science gaps
that need to be filled before lifting the moratoria on oil and gas development."
"Over the
past 20 years, a number of scientific studies sponsored by the governments of
"The most
recent of these by the Royal Society of Canada found that provided an adequate
regulatory regime is put in place, there are no science gaps that need to be
filled before lifting the moratoria on oil and gas development.
"Based on
these reviews and an internal assessment of the potential risks and benefits,
the province recommends removal of the moratorium to enable the gathering of
information to better define offshore resources, assess the resource potential,
evaluate environmental risks, and develop appropriate measures for managing
these risks."
The focus
of the provincial government's interest is the
The
province's stated position is unequivocal: "It is the province's view that the
decision on whether to lift the moratorium is a matter of policy rather than of
science. As such, the decision requires weighing the public risks and benefits
of lifting the moratorium. The province considers that the potential public
benefits from an offshore oil and gas industry are too great to ignore."
But
Anderson
says there has been "some confusion" about the panel, and says its purpose is
not to determine whether or not exploration and drilling should take place, but
to determine public opinion on offshore drilling, to indicate where the
scientific and resource knowledge gaps are, and to determine the views and
concerns of First Nations, including the impact of offshore exploration on
resource, land or sea claims.
The
environment minister points out that "there also has been confusion as to the
report of the [Natural Resources Canada] scientific sub-panel, and the comment
in its report that if an adequate regulatory regime were in place the moratorium
could be lifted.
"Note that
those quoting this sentence generally fail to quote the rest of the paragraph,
or the assumptions or recommendations that precede it. An adequate regulatory
regime can only be established if the current deficiencies in data, the
knowledge gaps, are filled. Put simply, you cannot have a satisfactory
regulatory regime based on our current data deficiencies."
In a
telephone interview Sunday evening,
"This is
the position that we have had all along and there's no reason for them to take
any exception to this," he said. "I can't see how a responsible government would
recommend that there be a lifting of the moratorium if we don't know what we're
lifting and don't know what the risks are that we're running."
Students give top marks to four-day
school week
By Janet
Steffenhagen
Most
parents don't like it, but students on a four-day school week in western B.C.
say it's great because it gives them more time to watch TV, play video games and
hang with friends.
A survey
has found that younger students in
But 73 per
cent of parents who responded to the survey -- one of the most extensive
examinations of a concept that has attracted wide interest in B.C. as school
boards struggle to balance their budgets -- said they want a return to the
five-day week.
Teachers
were almost equally divided between those who like the change and those who
don't, according to survey results compiled by Malatest & Associates Ltd.
The survey
was done in March 2004, with more than 3,000 students at the Grade 5 level and
above, and 283 teachers completing a questionnaire during school hours. As well,
541 parents selected at random responded to a mailed questionnaire. (Total
student enrolment in the district is 6,020.)
In a
four-day system, students receive the same amount of instruction as in a
five-day week because the school days are lengthened slightly.
School
board chair Lorrie Gowen admitted the survey raised concerns, but suggested
reinstatement of the five-day week might create even more since the
cash-strapped board would be forced to close schools, increase class size and
reduce transportation.
She also
said she's not sure the survey is the definitive word on parental views since
only 39 per cent of parents were polled.
"I'm
wondering what the other 60 per cent thought," she added.
The board,
recently rebuked by the courts for not consulting parents adequately before
introducing the four-day week last September, will continue community meetings
before making a decision May 26 on the future of the experiment.
Nisga'a
district has also introduced a four-day week, while Quesnel allowed one small
school to reduce its week.
The court
agreed but did not force changes during this school year. As a result of that
ruling, the board asked Malatest & Associates to conduct the survey.
The key
findings included:
- A
majority of teachers said their energy levels had decreased and nearly half said
their stress level had increased.
- Almost
half of teachers reported having less time to sponsor or coach extra-curricular
activities.
- A
majority of parents said the time taken by students to complete homework had
decreased or stayed the same and 61 per cent of parents said children were less
able to get extra help from teachers outside class time.
- Students
said they had less free time during the school week but three-quarters said they
had more free time on the weekend.
- Half of
high school students and 85 per cent of elementary students said their main
activities on Fridays included watching TV, playing video games or spending time
with friends.
- A quarter
of parents said their child-care costs had increased but more than half noticed
no change.
The
sampling error ranged from two per cent to 4.9 per cent depending on the
category of participants.
Gowen said
she wasn't surprised that students were more enthusiastic than parents because
kids adapt easier.
A return to
a five-day week would cost the school district an extra $1.8 million next year
on a budget of $47.2 million and would require six school closures, she said.
Much of the saving from a four-day week is a result of support workers not being
paid. Teachers continue to receive full salary.
The Daily News (
Island should focus its energy on
energy
By Mike Hunter
Every
generation gets to make choices that affect their own lives and the lives of
those that follow.The decision to develop a public medicare system in
The recent
decision of the Lower Mainland's TransLink Board to reject a rapid transit line
in one of the region's most densely populated areas may turn out to be another.
British
Columbians are facing important choices in the field of energy development,
choices that will impact the province's economic and environmental performance
for a long time. The Energy Policy that was announced in November 2002 by the
Minister of Energy and Mines, the Honourable Richard Neufeld, already sets out
some of the parameters for the future.
The Energy
Policy says that one half of new electrical energy production must come from
"clean" sources. Vancouver Island has the potential to become the
I think we
should be looking at the potential of this
But, energy
opportunity is more than electricity. Experts believe that there are significant
reserves of hydrocarbons, oil and gas, off the coast of
The fact is
that oil and gas are going to fuel human activity for a long time to come - even
hydrogen production to fuel cars on the proposed "hydrogen highway" will require
fossil fuels for production. And, as long as wheels turn, oil will be needed to
lubricate them.
The
potential of the offshore area for oil and gas is constrained by a moratorium on
development that was imposed in the 1970's by both
It is
informative to look at experience elsewhere.
There is no
reason why B.C. cannot emulate
You have
the chance to express your opinions to the federal panel which is reviewing the
moratorium.
Just email
sgedak@nrcan.gc.caYour voice can help us make one of those generational choices.
By
Federal
Environment Minister David Anderson appears to be digging in his heels over
potential oil and gas development off the B.C. coast.
In a memo
written for the information of all Liberal candidates in the coming federal
election, the environment minister restates the federal government's position on
the 33-year-old moratorium on offshore oil and gas activity on the West Coast.
"In a
nutshell it is that the moratorium stays in place until the knowledge gaps on
the risks involved, the resources at stake, and the economic and social factors
that might have a bearing on the decision are filled," it says.
"Only then
will the federal government have the information necessary to make an informed
decision."
In
mid-April, the provincial government released its own position paper on offshore
oil and gas exploration, which specifically stated "there are no science gaps
that need to be filled before lifting the moratoria on oil and gas development."
"Over the
past 20 years, a number of scientific studies sponsored by the governments of
"The most
recent of these by the Royal Society of Canada found that provided an adequate
regulatory regime is put in place, there are no science gaps that need to be
filled before lifting the moratoria on oil and gas development.
"Based on
these reviews and an internal assessment of the potential risks and benefits,
the province recommends removal of the moratorium to enable the gathering of
information to better define offshore resources, assess the resource potential,
evaluate environmental risks, and develop appropriate measures for managing
these risks."
The focus
of the provincial government's interest is the
A
three-member federal public review panel is currently hearing submissions
throughout the province on whether the federal moratorium should be lifted.
The
province's stated position is unequivocal: "It is the province's view that the
decision on whether to lift the moratorium is a matter of policy rather than of
science. As such, the decision requires weighing the public risks and benefits
of lifting the moratorium. The province considers that the potential public
benefits from an offshore oil and gas industry are too great to ignore."
But
Anderson
says there has been "some confusion" about the panel, and says its purpose is
not to determine whether or not exploration and drilling should take place, but
to determine public opinion on offshore drilling, to indicate where the
scientific and resource knowledge gaps are, and to determine the views and
concerns of First Nations, including the impact of offshore exploration on
resource, land or sea claims.
The
environment minister points out that "there also has been confusion as to the
report of the [Natural Resources Canada] scientific sub-panel, and the comment
in its report that if an adequate regulatory regime were in place the moratorium
could be lifted.
"Note that
those quoting this sentence generally fail to quote the rest of the paragraph,
or the assumptions or recommendations that precede it. An adequate regulatory
regime can only be established if the current deficiencies in data, the
knowledge gaps, are filled. Put simply, you cannot have a satisfactory
regulatory regime based on our current data deficiencies."
He says a
decision by U.S. President George Bush to buy up offshore drilling leases so
there would be no drilling within 160 kilometres of the
In a
telephone interview Sunday evening,
He said his
memo is not intended to send any kind of message to
"We're not
saying anything to the province. They have their views. We're happy to discuss
this issue with them, and will, but we have no authority to vary the normal
process, as I mention in that memo, about environmental assessment or anything
else."
Globe and Mail, Page
A01, 17-May-2004
Air
By John Partridge
Air
Despite
inking agreements with five of its seven unions between Friday and the early
hours of Sunday morning after marathon negotiations at several downtown Toronto
hotels, Air Canada was still about $115-million shy of the $200-million in
annual labour cost reductions it has been told it must secure by financiers
Deutsche Bank and GE Capital Aviation Services.
Saturday's
midnight deadline was imposed by the two financial companies, which have pledged
to provide the insolvent airline with a $2.65-billion lifeline. Without it, Air
Last night,
there were apparent stalemates in the airline's negotiations with the Canadian
Union of Public Employees, which represents about 6,500 flight attendants at Air
Air
Although
Air
Gary Fane,
the CAW's national director for the transportation sector, said the impasse with
the company was as much to do with "how they treat employees and customers" as
it does with money and he would not predict a speedy resolution. "I think we'll
be here all night."
CUPE
officials, too, appeared to be digging in for another all-night session.
However, spokeswoman Alejandra Bravo would say only that "the discussions are
still continuing and we're still hopeful."
Air
Deutsche
Bank, Germany's largest bank, has agreed to backstop an $850-million equity
offering for Air Canada, which has been under court protection from its
creditors since April last year, while GECAS, of Stamford, Conn., has agreed to
lend it $1.8-billion.
The two
companies had threatened to cancel these vital infusions of money if the airline
did not secure pacts with all its unions by midnight Saturday on both the
cost-cutting and the waiving of most labour grievances currently lodged against
the company.
However,
GECAS appeared in no immediate rush to pull the plug yesterday, even though
deals had not yet been reached with CUPE and the CAW. "Given that the deadline
was on a Saturday, I think its effective date is really on Monday," spokesman
Eric Jones said. "So we're waiting to hear from the airline and we'll probably
have [a statement today]."
A spokesman
for Deutsche Bank in
Among the
key labour deals Air
However,
while ACPA has agreed to about $40-million in concessions, its president Don
Johnson said yesterday that it still had not reached a deal on grievances.
The IAM
also agreed to cut $40-million in costs, but Ron Fontaine, one of its
negotiators, said this took a late-night intervention Saturday by Mr. Justice
Warren Winkler of Ontario Superior Court, who is currently overseeing the
restructuring.
Highlighting the distrust that appears to permeate Air
The airline
and its unions have already met the other key condition set by the two
financiers and pegged to the Saturday deadline.
Air Canada
announced Friday that it had reached an agreement with the federal Office of the
Superintendent of Financial Institutions under which it will be allowed to pay
off a $1.2-billion deficiency in its employee pension fund over 10 years rather
than five, the current legal maximum. This pact still requires approval by
Finance Minister Ralph Goodale.
Globe and Mail, Page
A01, 17-May-2004
Air
By John Partridge
Air
Having
inked agreements with five of its seven unions between Friday and the early
hours of Sunday morning after marathon negotiations at several downtown Toronto
hotels, Air Canada was still about $115-million shy of the $200-million in
annual labour cost reductions it has been told it must secure by financiers
Deutsche Bank and GE Capital Aviation Services. The shortfall occurred because
it had not been able to reach deals with the Canadian Union of Public Employees
and the Canadian Auto Workers union.Saturday's midnight deadline was imposed by
the two financial companies, which have pledged to provide the insolvent airline
with a $2.65-billion lifeline. Without it, Air
However,
there were signals as last night wore on that the stalemates might be easing in
the airline's talks with CUPE, which represents about 6,500 flight attendants at
Air Canada's mainline service, and the CAW, which represents about 6,000
mainline customer-service workers and another 1,400 maintenance workers and crew
schedulers at Air Canada Jazz, its regional airline.
A source
close to the CAW, for example, predicted another tough day of negotiations
today, but hinted a deal would indeed be reached. "I think the sun will come up
on Tuesday," the source said.
Air
The cost
concessions are wanted in the form of wage cuts, layoffs and changes in work
rules. That works out to about $8,000 to $10,000 a person.
Although
Air
Gary Fane,
the CAW's national director for the transportation sector, said earlier in the
evening the impasse with the company was as much to do with "how they treat
employees and customers" as it does with money and he would not predict a speedy
resolution. "I think we'll be here all night."
CUPE
officials, too, appeared to be digging in for another all-night session.
However, spokeswoman Alejandra Bravo would say only that "the discussions are
still continuing and we're still hopeful."
Air
Deutsche
Bank, Germany's largest bank, has agreed to backstop an $850-million equity
offering for Air Canada, which has been under court protection from its
creditors since April last year, while GECAS, of Stamford, Conn., has agreed to
lend it $1.8-billion.
The two
companies had threatened to cancel these vital infusions of money if the airline
did not secure pacts with all its unions by midnight Saturday on both the
cost-cutting and the waiving of most labour grievances currently lodged against
the company.
However,
GECAS appeared in no immediate rush to pull the plug yesterday, even though
deals had not yet been reached with CUPE and the CAW. "Given that the deadline
was on a Saturday, I think its effective date is really on Monday," spokesman
Eric Jones said. "So we're waiting to hear from the airline and we'll probably
have [a statement today]."
A spokesman
for Deutsche Bank in
Among the
key labour deals Air
However,
while ACPA has agreed to about $40-million in concessions, its president Don
Johnson said yesterday that it still had not reached a deal on grievances.
The IAM
also agreed to cut $40-million in costs, but Ron Fontaine, one of its
negotiators, said this took a late-night intervention Saturday by Mr. Justice
Warren Winkler of Ontario Superior Court, who is currently overseeing the
restructuring.
Highlighting the distrust that appears to permeate Air
The airline
and its unions have already met the other key condition set by the two
financiers and pegged to the Saturday deadline.
Air Canada
announced Friday that it had reached an agreement with the federal Office of the
Superintendent of Financial Institutions under which it will be allowed to pay
off a $1.2-billion deficiency in its employee pension fund over 10 years rather
than five, the current legal maximum.
By Tony Wong and John
Spears
Dennis
Fotinos is the first to admit the project in which his company has invested $169
million sounds like the stuff of science fiction.
His story
goes like this: First, build a monster pipe more than five kilometres long and a
yawning 1.6 metres in diameter.
Stretch
that pipe from the foot of
The
four-degree-Celsius water will be piped back to the city, providing cooling and
air conditioning for 100 office buildings, while at the same time providing
clean drinking water.
"You're
getting cleaner drinking water than you would have, pure, non-contaminated
water, and at the same time cooling buildings," says Fotinos, CEO of Enwave
District Energy Ltd.
Sound
futuristic?
Well, it's
already happened.
On July 15,
Fotinos will flip a switch at the company's plant near the foot of the CN Tower
and create enough capacity to cool the Air Canada Centre, the Steam Whistle
Brewing Co., the Royal Bank Tower and dozens of other client buildings in the
downtown core that have signed on to the new venture.
On
Thursday, Enwave and Cadillac Fairview Corp. unveiled a 25-year deal that will
add three of the Toronto-Dominion Centre's five towers to the cooling grid. The
TD, Royal Trust and Canadian Pacific towers, totalling nearly three million
square feet of floor space, bring Enwave's customer base to nearly 10 million
square feet.
Electricity
will still be needed to circulate cool air through the buildings and to pump
cold water up to the mechanical rooms, but the main cost of operating chillers
is eliminated.
But
So a lot is
riding on the shoulders of Fotinos, a former
"People
have called this the white elephant or the big black hole, so we're very
conscious of that, especially with the kind of scandals that the city now
faces," he says.
Costs have
leaped from an estimated $125 million to as much as $195 million. Fotinos now
says the final bill should be $169 million.
"The
environmentalist in me would like to see this work, while the economist in me is
hoping that they have got a good handle on all the figures and there are no
surprises for the taxpayer," said Donald Dewees, acting chair of the University
of Toronto economics department and an expert in the energy industry.
"In
projects of this magnitude you're always concerned about whether the accounting
has been done exactly right."
Fotinos is
adamant that there will be no surprises such as the city's $43-million computer
leasing deal with MFP Financial Services Ltd. which almost doubled in cost.
He points
out that his bosses at the pension fund expect a nine to 10 per cent rate of
return over a 20-year amortization period.
Enwave is
expected to break even by 2008, by which time construction on pipelines is
expected to be completed and lines will be at capacity.
When the
official launch occurs in July, Enwave will be operating at 40 per cent of its
eventual capacity. More pipes will be added as customers come on board.
Enwave got
a publicity boost in 2002 from environmental activist Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who
helped unveil the cooling plant, but the company has been largely invisible
since then. "I think we suffer from typical Canadian syndrome, where you have to
be recognized internationally first," said Fotinos.
At current
electricity prices, Andrew McAllan, a vice-president at OMERS-owned Oxford
Properties Group, says he's not actually saving anything on his energy bill by
going the Enwave route. So why bother?
McAllan
says the energy cost may be similar but not the capital cost of replacing air
conditioning equipment. McAllan's One University Avenue building, built in 1986,
was the first office tower to sign on to the deep-water cooling program, and has
already saved $580,000 by not replacing chillers on the roof, which typically
have a lifespan of 25 years.
"That's a
pretty compelling reason right there," said McAllan. The
Port an important local, provincial
and national asset
By Don Cayo
Most
industries pack up and move to the 'burbs or beyond when congestion and land
prices in the centre of the city become too much to bear.
Ports and
their myriad spin-off businesses do not. Most of their activity must, almost by
definition, take place within the confines of the natural protections that led
to their establishment -- indeed, to the very founding of their cities.
So our port
-- a national asset that moves $30-billion worth of goods a year -- is here to
stay. And that, despite some two-way tensions, is a very good thing.
A new study
underlines the value of the
And that
doesn't include the two smaller ports, run by separate authorities, on the north
and south arms of the
The
largesse trickles, at least a little bit, into every municipal office in the
Greater Vancouver area except for
The study,
prepared by InterVistas Consulting for the Vancouver Port Authority, doesn't
carp about the ever-rising cost of doing business in this ever-more-expensive
town. Indeed, it doesn't advance any argument at all -- it merely measures and
records port-related contributions to government coffers.
But I
suspect the fact that it was commissioned at all reflects the tension between a
blue-collar hold-out that finds itself awash in a wave of gentrification.
On one
hand, a working port no longer fits very well into Vancouverites' evolving image
of their town. Warehouses and working wharves interrupt our pleasant walkways
and bicycle paths. The ungainly silhouette of container cranes or storage
structures is jarring in a skyline of sleek glass towers and misty mountains.
And the land they sit on would be soooo nice for a few more million-dollar
condos.
On the
other hand, if your view is from an office window in one of the utilitarian
buildings that lurk behind chain-link fence, the cost of doing business here is
getting out of hand.
The Wharf
Operators Association convinced the provincial government to cap tax rates for
port businesses -- but not the many spin-offs -- last fall at $27.50 per $1,000
of assessment. That's still high. It's about seven times more than the
residential tax rate in
And the
assessment base to which the rate applies is spiralling in the midst of the
current real-estate boom.
Captain
Gordon Houston, CEO of the
The study
totes up the port authority's grants in lieu of taxes ($3.4 million a year),
plus property tax paid by port tenants ($16.3 million), plus the amounts paid by
associated off-site businesses and the people who work at port-related jobs.
The
jurisdictions with big facilities get the big bucks --
But even
little Anmore and Bellacara get, respectively $32,000 and $13,000, or 2.4 and
1.1 per cent of their total budgets.
This study
may not cut much ice with those local politicians -- all of them on the councils
that are big winners in the port-tax sweepstakes -- who've been griping about
the provincial cap. But it should. The study notes that our port generates
62,000 jobs across
Besides, I
like the view from my office window. It looks east from the foot of
This image
offends my urban sensibilities not at all. And it reminds my every day of my
city's past, present and future.
dcayo@png.canwest.com
ON THE
WATERFRONT:
Anmore 2.4
Belcarra
1.1
Coquitlam
2.1
Delta 7.8
North Van
(city) 23.4
North Van
(district) 20.4
Source:
Outlook for week keys on oil costs,
consumer price index
By Lynn Moore
Canadian
analysts will be diverted by the
At the end
of the week, interest may drift to the anticipated election call by Prime
Minister Paul Martin, a call expected to land on Sunday for a June 28 vote.
The
supercharged crude oil price -- which topped $41 US in
Avery
Shenfeld, senior economist for CIBC World Markets, agreed. "Crude oil is now
becoming a scare story for financial markets in general. We are reaching levels
that are going to have a material impact on economic growth if sustained, as
does seem likely," Shenfeld said.
The
underlying world demand for energy is not likely to change soon. The futures
market shows that "companies are willing to buy oil -- a year out -- at prices
in the high $30s [
Thursday's
release by Statistics Canada of the prices for the goods and services included
in the CPI basket may rattle some investors, Porter said.
"Everyone
has been operating under the assumption that
"But I
think April's and May's results -- when released next month -- could test that
assumption, because we are going to see a real bounce in both headline and core
inflation," Porter said.
"Both are
going to move up to over l.5 per cent, probably both still below two per cent
[the Bank of Canada inflation target], but that's miles away from where they
were a couple of months ago," he said.
In March,
the prices were 0.7-per- cent higher than in March 2003 and the March increase
was identical to the increase in February, which was the smallest since Dec.
2001.
Core
inflation excludes the eight most volatile components, as defined by the Bank of
Montreal. Excluded items include fruits and vegetables, and fuel and tobacco
products.
While the
consensus is that the CPI will jump l.8 per cent year-over-year, Porter puts
that figure at l.9 per cent.
Analysts
will be watching to see how the relatively new Liberal government in
If they
rely "on tax hikes or revenue measures more than expenditure restraint, then I
think, ultimately, that could be negative for
Neither
economist expects the markets to move upon the budget's release.
"At least
in the provincial bond market,
As far as
the federal election is concerned, the market figures the "Liberals are likely
to win a majority government but the polls are close enough to keep it an open
issue" through the campaign, Porter said.
If polls
should veer toward a minority government during the campaign, the Canadian
dollar could start to roll, he said.
BC Film makes it work as government
funding dwindles
By Lynne McNamara
Rob Egan is
a patient man. Though core funding for his private, non-profit society, BC Film,
of which he's president and CEO, has dwindled since 1995/96 from about $4.5
million to its current level of $2.28 million, he understands.
"Having
worked in government, and knowing what the fiscal circumstances are of the
current government," he says, "I was not surprised. I was disappointed, and then
the optimist in me took over. I take to heart the comments that folks speaking
on behalf of the ministry have made that as the fiscal climate improves that
restoration of funding will be considered."
BC Film,
established in 1987 with a mandate "to expand and diversify the cultural
industries of film and video in British Columbia," offers development and
production financing to B.C. producers, writers and directors of film through a
variety of funding, professional development, marketing and skills assistance
programs. It also administers programs such as Film Incentive BC (economic
incentives to encourage production in the province), the Production Services Tax
Credit (a corporate tax incentive available to both Canadian and foreign
production companies who shoot here), and the BC Feature Film Fund ($4 million
contributed by the province, which has contributed to more than 23 feature films
over the past three years) as well as help with marketing, an internship
program, training initiatives and a bursary fund.
The society
operates at arm's length from government, reports to a board of directors, and
receives a majority of its operating funding from the provincial government
through the Ministry of Competition, Science and
The biggest
blow for BC Film came at the end of the 2003 fiscal year, on March 31, when the
Feature Film Fund was not extended by the provincial government. And though
direct funding to BC Film has declined in recent years, its tax credit program
has been unaffected; in fact, it has been augmented by changes that the
provincial government made last year to introduce a digital animation or visual
effects credit, a new credit now available as an add-on to the film incentive or
services credit.
"There are
a variety of policy instruments that are available to governments -- tax
credits, equity investment, corporate tax structure, provincial sales tax -- and
so I think that governments look at all these instruments and within their
ability to find the money for those things and within the range of other
pressures that you inevitably face when you're governing, you have to make some
choices," says Egan, who grew up in Haney and graduated from Garibaldi senior
secondary where a teacher, Austrian immigrant Julius Borsos, was a huge
influence.
Borsos'
son, the late Phil Borsos, who became a well-known filmmaker (The Grey Fox, Far
From Home: The Adventures of Yellow Dog) was a year behind Egan at school.
"Philip is
always someone that I think about in terms of Canadian filmmakers, because I'm
always thinking that somewhere out there there's the next kid who's making films
in high school and has the talent and the passion and the vision to actually
pursue it."
Egan
recalls an early film experience. His older sister took him to see the classic
Alfred Hitchcock film, The Birds, at the Haney theatre. "That's one of my early
memories of being affected by a movie. I always loved going to the movies, and
I've always continued to be an admirer and consumer of the big screen."
After
graduating in history and political science from the
He later
taught at junior college in
"Those
He first
worked as a partner in a research consulting firm, and for a campus radio
station at U Vic.
Next, as
assistant deputy minister of culture for the provincial government, he found
himself winding his way back toward film when in 1996-97 the government was
looking to implement a tax credit program.
"That
landed on my desk and I started working closely with the film industry around
the consultation and policy and legislative design of the program."
One thing
led to another and he landed at BC Film in 1998, just as the program was being
implemented.
"So looking
back on it, it was actually a very unique opportunity to be involved in a
film-related program from the time it was a gleam in someone's eye to the
implementation and delivery, then seeing the benefits of it over a number of
years."
Egan and
his staff have been involved in recent weeks in a program review, meeting with
many of the stakeholders they serve in the BC industry -- producers,
distributors, new media and broadcasters -- seeking advice on what they see as
being the key strategic needs to support continued growth in the domestic sector
in particular.
"We're
hoping in the next few weeks that we're going to sort our way through that
consultation and the research that we've been doing and create an innovative
program menu that within budget constraints will help support continued
production and development of projects and marketing of projects over the course
of the next year.
"We are
ever hopeful that funding will be increased at some future point, but that's out
of our hands, that's a decision that government will make. We are appreciative
of the support that the provincial government provides to the industry.
"Would BC
Film like more money? Absolutely. But at the end of the day, I'm very much one
of those people -- you play with the hand you're dealt -- and that's what we're
doing right now. We know what our fiscal constraints are and the challenge for
us is to try to come up with an innovative program that will support domestic
activity."
And it's
the passion of local filmmakers that inspires Egan.
"I marvel
at it. I'm always amazed at the resourcefulness. I see some of the young
emerging filmmakers, who are able to work wonders with $100,000 or less. It is
remarkable. I wish we could find a way of bottling it," he jokes. "There's never
a day that you get up in the morning and don't want to go to work, because it's
inspiring."
HYPERLINK "mailto:thebacklot@shaw.ca" thebacklot@shaw.ca
Lynne
McNamara's Backlot appears Monday, Wednesday and Saturday.
Falcon to speak at chamber
lunch
MAPLE RIDGE
- Transportation Minister Kevin Falcon will be the featured speaker at the next
local chamber of commerce lunch.
Tickets are
still available for the May 20 event at the Pitt Meadows Golf Club at 11:30 a.m.
The cost is $30 for chamber members and $45 for non-members. To register or for
more information call 604-463-3366.
Council will have plan in place when
mayor begins campaign to win federal seat
During his
absence, councillors filling in as acting mayor will pick up his duties.
Coun. Alan
Nixon said it would be a good idea to prepare for potential conflicts of
interest and talk about whether acting mayors would need to work full-time hours
and whether they should be paid accordingly.
GVRD asked to produce report card on
city's balance of growth, livability
Councillors
decided to ask GVRD representatives to attend the June 21 council meeting to
comment on how the city has done so far in meeting the objectives of the Livable
Region Strategic Plan.
Councillor
Darrell Mussatto, who came up with the idea, said he would also like to know if
the city should be doing more.
The plan is
the blueprint for managing growth in the Lower Mainland while maintaining the
region's attractiveness. Mussatto said he would like to hear about acceptable
housing types, transportation alternatives and the importance of creating a town
centre.
Martin wants MPs to have say in
Supreme Court nominees
By Janice Tibbetts
"The prime
minister has said there must be Parliamentary review and input of nominees and
he's committed to seeing that happen," said his spokesman, Scott Reid.
Reid said
the new system will be in place to fill two seats on the Supreme Court that open
in June with the departures of justices Frank Iacobucci and Louise Arbour. In a
report last week, the all-party justice committee steered clear of the
controversial prospect of allowing politicians to scrutinize nominees.
Instead,
the majority recommended changing the 129-year-old Supreme Court appointments
system by establishing an advisory committee that would privately prepare a
short list of candidates for the justice minister, who would make one or more
recommendations to the prime minister.
The panel
would be composed of members of the public, MPs from all parties, judges,
lawyers, and provincial representatives.
Under the
current system, the justice minister privately and informally consults with the
legal community before making one or more recommendations to the prime minister.
Reid said
Martin is "positively inclined" toward the report's proposal, but that he plans
to take the committee's advice a step further to fulfill a promise to give MPs a
role in scrutinizing the prime minister's chosen candidate.
Liberal MP
Derek Lee, chairman of the justice committee, said he thinks his Liberal
colleagues, who signed the majority report, were overly cautious in their
recommendations after experts advised against political vetting of nominees for
fear it would taint the respected Supreme Court and discourage the best
candidates from coming forward.
"They may
have been so cautious that they low-balled a potential role for Parliament,"
said Lee.
But he said
he believes MPs can avoid a "public circus" by scrutinizing a nominee behind
closed doors and having a formal protocol that includes "no-go areas" so that
questioning does not become too personal.
"Transparency doesn't mean you do everything in public,
it means Parliamentarians acting on behalf of their electors get to see what's
going on," said Lee. "There's nothing wrong with the prime minister asking
Parliamentarians to scrutinize his work."
The
majority report from the committee made a more watered-down recommendation that
the justice minister should appear before the committee to explain an
appointment rather than subjecting a judge to questioning.
Martin has
promised to give committees more power as part of his campaign to address the
country's "democratic deficit." He asked the justice committee earlier this year
to study the issue of Supreme Court appointments.
Lee
defended the prime minister's plans to override the report, saying it was only
"advice" and it was not unanimous.
Liberal points finger at Chretien's
office
By Kate Jaimet
Speaking on
CTV's political program Question Period, Lastewka said statements by Chretien's
former chief of staff, Jean Pelletier, made it clear the Prime Minister's Office
and former public works minister Alfonso Gagliano gave political direction to
the program.
"I think it
was very clear," Lastewka said in response to a question. "Mr. Pelletier ...
said: 'My office was involved.' He said the minister's office was involved. We
know that there was over-involvement by the minister and the Prime Minister's
Office."
Lastewka
stopped short of saying that Chretien himself was involved in the awarding of
sponsorship contracts to events and to advertising agencies.
"The other
unanswered question is: to what extent did [Pelletier] get directions from his
boss, the prime minister himself?" asked Conservative MP Jason Kenney. "We also
don't know exactly what the current prime minister, Mr. Martin knew, and when he
knew it, why he authorized hundreds of millions of dollars to flow into this
secret unity slush fund."
The
sponsorship program channelled $250 million of public funds into events, mainly
in
An
incomplete probe into the matter by the House of Commons Public Affairs
Committee was shut down last week in the runup to an expected election call next
weekend. The probe still has not answered the question of why the rules were
broken and who benefitted from breaking them. Nor has it managed to account for
all of the missing money.
Pelletier,
who appeared before the committee in early April, did testify that he met
frequently with the bureaucrat who ran the program, Chuck Guite. Guite now faces
charges of fraud in connection with the program.
But in his
testimony, Pelletier said that the Prime Minister's Office did not tell Guite
which events to sponsor or which advertising firms to use. He also said the PMO
did not authorize Guite to break the rules.
Think price of gas is high now? Learn
to live with it, say analysts
By Tarina White
Increased
demand for crude oil worldwide -- particularly in
And this is
merely the floor of the price of oil, which could reach $50 a barrel this
summer, added Rubin.
"There is
no supply capacity to meet this acceleration in demand and ultimately that's why
prices are rising -- and likely to rise even further," Rubin said during a panel
discussion on current affairs television program Global Sunday.
The average
price for a litre of regular gasoline is now hovering around 90 cents in most
provinces.
In the last
12 months, the average cost of a litre of gasoline paid by Canadian motorists
was 73.3 cents, according to the Canadian Taxpayers Federation.
And
although prices at the pump are expected to drop by the end of summer, the
long-term outlook appears bleak, said Michael Ervin, president of Calgary-based
MJ Ervin and Associates, which specializes in petroleum marketing.
That's
because global demand for crude oil is not expected to wane. "Long term, we've
got to live with higher gasoline prices," said Ervin.
Peggy
Kirkeby, vice-president of the Consumers Association of Canada, agreed.
"I think
people should be prepared that this is the way of the future," said Kirkeby.
She expects
this message will further infuriate Canadian drivers, many of whom have called
and e-mailed the association with angry comments about the hike in gas prices.
"Consumers
are really frustrated," said Kirkeby. "We're very happy with our cars and we
like to drive."
In the
past, higher fuel costs have resulted in surcharges being applied to deliveries,
said Kirkeby.
The latest
gas hike could end up hitting consumers in the pocket with increased surcharges
on airline tickets, she added.
Trucking
companies could also up costs, which would have a "trickle down" effect on the
price of merchandise.
"If this is
a long-term thing ... I can see people second-guessing their decision to buy big
SUVs," said Kirkeby.
Appealing
to the Canadian government for fuel tax relief -- on average, 42 per cent of the
price of a litre of fuel is taxes -- isn't a viable solution, said Rubin.
"I think
down the road what you're doing [if you cut fuel taxes] is actually accelerating
even more rapid increases in oil prices," said Rubin.
Instead, he
said consumers need to face the reality that "the usage of oil is going to have
to change."
As yet,
Canadians have not become more reserved about their driving habits and are
filling up with the same level of frequency, said Ervin.
"We haven't
even seen a dent in consumption," said Ervin.
"I really
wonder if we're at that psychological point yet where people are really going to
change their behaviour patterns."
Healthiest jobs tend to be those that
pay the most
By Chris Zdeb
If you're
in a job where you have to remind people of the difference, your job is
definitely not good. And if it's not good, it's not healthy.
What
constitutes a healthy job is a complex issue, says Jeremy Beach, an associate
professor in the department of public health sciences at the
By the
numbers, occupations with lower accident and fatality rates are considered
healthier than the alternative. These tend to be desk jockey type jobs in an
office setting. Unhealthy occupations are usually manual labour and involve
working with dangerous machinery or around carcinogenic materials.
"Generally
speaking, the healthiest jobs tend to be those that pay the most money because
there's definitely a relationship between income and health," Beach says.
Judges, lawyers and doctors fall into this category, as do tenured professors.
After
income, the criteria of a healthy job tend to become more subjective. The
healthiest jobs -- the kind you look forward to going to -- tend to share the
following characteristics: manageable stress, relative security, flexibility, a
boss who supports you and values what you do, and some control over the work.
But if you like taking direction, a job that has very little will cause you
stress, Beach says.
Monster.com, a career website, in consultation with Jobs
Rated Almanac, 2001 and Best Jobs for the 21st Century, compiled a list of the
top 10 healthiest jobs. Florist is high on the list.
Kelsey
McKinney is a florist and she says she loves her job. She loves flowers and most
of the people who come into the shop, where she works, are in an upbeat mood,
picking up blooms for such happy occasions as Mother's Day, weddings and
birthdays.
The
monster.com list also includes such literally healthy occupations as massage
therapist and yoga instructor. It doesn't surprise
"A big part
of your job is being relaxed and guiding other people through relaxation and
poses," the yoga instructor says.
When she
works, Irwin is well paid, but overall hers is not a high-paying job. However
it's a lot less stressful than her old job -- teaching junior high.
It stands
to reason that working in a job involving health should be healthy because you
have a good understanding of how to take good care of yourself. But knowing what
to do and doing it are two different things, says Beach. Nurses, for example,
have a high prevalence of smoking.
Finally
there is the individual component to what constitutes a healthy job. We're all
different, so one person's idea of a healthy job could be considered unhealthy
by another.
A flatus
odour judge, for example, is listed as one of the worst jobs in science, but
Michael Levitt, the world's leading and sole researcher of flatulence, calls it
a wonderful job. Okay, he's likely alone in thinking that, but he proves a
point.
TOP 10
HEALTHIEST JOBS:
- Yoga
Instructor
- Personal
Trainer. Works with individuals to help them lose weight and get in shape. The
work requires them to work out with clients, thereby benefitting from the extra
exercise.
-
Professor. They have a relatively high income, reasonable job security,
relatively high educational level and they largely control their job.
- Florist
- Activity
Specialist. Coordinates recreational pursuits at hotels, nursing homes and other
facilities. Focuses on staying fit and helping others to maintain an active and
positive attitude toward life.
-
Chiropractor. Treats patients with back problems and other spine-related
ailments. Focuses on a holistic attitude towards health.
-
Choreographer. Arranges dances and dance themselves.
- Massage
Therapist. Performs massages at health clubs, spas or private sessions. Focuses
on relaxation. A hands-on job requiring therapist to be fit. Benefit of working
in a peaceful setting.
-
Nutritionist. Works with patients and other clients to craft proper diets. They
think about what they eat all the time.
- Running
Coach. Mentors and motivates athletes. Often runners themselves.
STRESSFUL
AND DANGEROUS:
Seven
super-stressful jobs
- Air
traffic controller
- CEO
-
Firefighter
- Police
officer
- Taxi
driver
- Farmer
- Junior
high school teacher
Ten
dangerous jobs
Top 10 most
dangerous jobs in
- Mining
and quarrying: cutting, handling, loading
-
Construction: insulating
- Mining
and quarrying: labouring
- Air
pilots, navigators and flight engineers
-
- Log
hoisting, sorting and moving
- Net, trap
and line fishing
- Truck
driving
-
Construction: labouring
-
Construction: pipefitting and plumbing
Source:
Statistics
Appointing candidates can cut both
ways
Prime
Minister Paul Martin's appointment of candidates in
The most
recent brouhaha came last week when the entire Liberal executive in the riding
of Burnaby-Douglas resigned to protest the appointment of B.C. Liberal party
president Bill Cunningham as the candidate.
Two other
Liberals in the riding, Tony Kuo and Tony Lee, had been hoping to vie for the
same nomination.
One of the
disgruntled executive members had this to say: "No democracy. No respect. So we
all quit.
"Mr. Martin
is nice to listen to when he talks about democracy, but to practice what he
preaches would be better."
To some
degree, Mr. Martin created this political problem.
When former
deputy prime minister Sheila Copps and Transport Minister Tony Valeri were
fighting for the Liberal nomination in a riding in Ontario, the PM said, "This
is a battle taking place locally ... I wish it wasn't happening, but I am not
interfering in any of these battles between incumbents."
At the same
time, Liberal party brass have also said in the past that Mr. Martin would
hand-pick ethnic candidates and women to better reflect the Canadian mosaic in
Parliament.
But since
he is the one who pledged to do politics differently and to address the
democratic deficit, the PM is facing an angry backlash from within the Liberal
party.
Mr. Martin
has appointed 14 candidates across the country. Appointing candidates has become
a tradition in the Liberal party. Before the 1993 election, prime minister Jean
Chretien appointed three candidates; in 1997, he appointed 14; in 2000, he
appointed three.
There is
some justification to appointing candidates. Strictly speaking, it is not
anti-democratic because political parties are institutions unto themselves and
are free to set their own ground rules.
The
appointments enable parties to give female candidates, always in short supply, a
boost in securing nominations. They also enable a party leader to put in place
candidates who would be the leader's personal choices to serve in cabinet if
they win their ridings in a general election.
In B.C., a
longstanding problem for the federal Liberals has been an inability to recruit
top-notch candidates who could give the province greater clout in
Mr. Martin
clearly is making an effort to address that challenge in making sure skilled and
experienced people like Dave Haggart, David Emerson, Ujjal Dosanjh and now Bill
Cunningham, get the chance to run.
The
practice is risky, however, because people take offence, as we've seen in
Burnaby-Douglas. Many party members naturally feel they are equipped to make
their own choices regarding whom they'd like to represent them. They resent
interference from on high.
They also
argue, reasonably, that it's fairer to have a level playing field for all
nominees.
If Mr.
Cunningham is such a good pick, why wouldn't he be able to win the nomination on
his own steam? This is an especially good question in Mr. Cunningham's case
because, as party president, he is far from a novice at the game of
electioneering.
In the end,
it is the voters in the riding who get to choose their member of Parliament and
democracy does prevail.
If British
Columbians in those six ridings where appointed Liberal candidates are running
decide they don't like Mr. Martin's action, the preferential treatment these
individuals received could wind up hurting them in the election.
Voters thus
will not only be passing judgment on the merits of the hand-picked candidates,
they will also be passing judgment on the Liberal leader's behaviour. Which is
exactly as it should be.
Martin has given B.C. a team that can
deliver
By Iain Nicol
For a long
time, British Columbians have complained about their lack of clout in
Some have
said that appointing candidates is not "democratic." Is it democratic to elect a
candidate whose primary credential is to sign up busloads of new members? No.
Prime Minister Paul Martin has acted in the public interest, by ensuring he has
the team that he thinks can deliver for B.C.
The
alternative is to let nature run its course, as with the Conservatives. Whereas
the Liberals offer a broad spectrum of candidates ranging from a union leader, a
First Nations leader, a former premier, a former Reform MP and a corporate CEO,
the Conservatives have put forward a middling team of political careerists.
The next
time you hear complaints about the "democratic deficit" from Conservatives, ask
them about their talent deficit and gender deficit, because those deficits will
be staring at us at the ballot box.
Iain Nicol
Maple
Ridge
Democracy in
By Gray Hawksbee
How on
earth can Paul Martin mouth the word "democracy" with a straight face when he
and his party continually thumb their noses at the very concept? By appointing
(dictating?) Liberal candidates in key ridings, he and his party are hijacking
the electoral process at the grassroots level.
Democracy
is becoming a sad memory in this country, having being replaced with the
socialist ideal of "government by people who know better than us." One can only
hope that an intelligent electorate will recognize these "parachute politicians"
for exactly what they are, and hand them all humiliating defeats in the upcoming
election.
Gray
Hawksbee
Delta
B.C.'s aging
population
B.C.'s
total labour force is over two million workers and leading the way are clerical
workers with nine per cent of the workforce. Sales and service workers are next
at eight per cent and retail sales place third in the province with four per
cent of the workforce.
The median
age (half the population older and half younger) in
The high cost of raising a
family
By Michael Kane
What price
a home filled with music, laughter and happy, well-rounded children on track to
becoming confident, comfortable adults?
Most
parents will tell you that's worth any price and
"There is
always something to pay for but they are really fun and they are very good,"
Patti Smyth says of her brood:
Smyth, 37,
is an investment specialist with VanCity Credit Union, but confesses that she
hasn't tallied up the family expenses in detail. She laughs: "Once in a while we
go through it at the kitchen table when we are wondering why we are so broke."
Both
parents work full time. Alan, 43, works with AMS Industries, his family's
metal-spinning business.
Ask any
family about budgeting and they will tell you the biggest variable is the cost
of raising children because so much depends on their ages, interests and
activities.
"Food is
probably our biggest monthly expense, other than the mortgage, especially with
the children getting older," Patti Smyth says. "The grocery bill is massive,
between $1,200 and $1,500 a month."
While the
latest survey shows the cost of raising a boy through age 18 is up $4,000 to
$164,483, that's only the start of the story.
Girls, who
cost less to feed but more to clothe, come in a little lower at $163,464, but
that's still up more than $3,000 in one year, according to the home-economics
department of Manitoba Agriculture, the only province to publish an annual study
of child-care costs.
The study
has relevance across the country.
The
For
example, they calculate the cost of recreation, reading, gifts to others and
school needs on only the basic needs for the well-being of a child. The Smyth
family demonstrates how costs can easily double or triple depending on age and
involvement in recreational activities.
The home
economists include reading materials, toys and games, a bicycle, some sports
equipment, and membership or lessons in one activity. They exclude more
expensive interests such as private music lessons, dancing or gymnastics,
competitive hockey or soccer.
School
needs cover school supplies, clothing for physical education and some
incidentals. They do not include "optional" expenses related to graduation,
seemingly endless school fundraisers to which parents are expected to
contribute, or savings for post-secondary education.
Like many
middle-class families, the Smyths also pay for private lessons and tutoring,
musical instruments, dance costumes, band trips, summer camps, sports fees and
equipment, and education savings plans.
For
security, and to manage the logistics of a large and active family, everyone has
their own cellphone. It's also a safety feature after an attempted abduction in
their
The
children all have bank accounts -- the older two also have debit cards -- and
each receives an allowance of $40 a month. They have persuaded their many
relatives to give them cash or gift cards, rather than gifts, on birthdays and
holidays.
"We buy
them the equipment they need to do what they want to do, but if they want an
extra or a more luxurious version, they can get it themselves," Patti Smyth
says.
"They have
learned to save for what they want and they are actually very good about sharing
clothes. The older girls shop the sales and they have picked up frugality,
somewhat, but of course it is only particular stores that they will go into."
Everybody
skis or snowboards in the winter but they share or pass on clothing and
equipment, rather than being slaves to fashion.
The
children are expected to do chores around the house, including cleaning their
own bedrooms, but they can make a little more money by doing extras like washing
a car.
None of
them works outside the home, although Marina, who is now learning to drive, is
talking about getting a part-time job to pay for gas. She is also taking about
volunteering at summer camp this year which could grow into a camp counsellor's
job next year.
According
to the home economists, it costs $1,175 to pay for a basic year of recreation,
reading, gifts and school needs for a girl of 16. On top of that,
For a
14-year-old girl, recreation and school needs are pegged at $1,021. On top of
that,
The same
$1,021 is allocated for a 12-year-old but Julia also has dance, piano and voice
lessons, and math tutoring three times a week.
A
10-year-old boy's recreation and school needs are pegged at $1,065 but Thomas
has three sports -- soccer, lacrosse and in-line hockey -- and until recently
was receiving private oboe lessons.
"A lot of
people might say their lives are too busy but they have all made their own
choices, and if they want to be in music and dance, as opposed to doing nothing
after school, I'd rather have that," Patti Smyth says.
"The house
has always got some positive noise to it and some enjoyment, as opposed to the
constant sound of a TV. The benefit is that they are well-rounded, they are
happy, they are doing what they like and they have made lots of friends.
"The
benefits definitely outweigh the expense, although I keep telling them to hit
the road with their music and then I can retire."
HYPERLINK "mailto:mkane@png.canwest.com" mkane@png.canwest.com
Air
By Paul Cross
Despite
negotiating beyond Deutsche Bank's critical financing deadline, set for Saturday
at midnight, Air
"It's true
that it's past the deadline originally set, but we remain confident that we'll
meet the conditions of the Deutsche Bank agreement and that's why the talks are
continuing," Reber said.
Reber
confirmed that negotiations continued Sunday with CUPE at Air Canada and two
units of the Canadian Auto Workers -- one representing 6,900 Air Canada's
customer service employees, and the other representing 1,400 customer and ground
service workers at the subsidiary airline, Jazz.
"Progress
is being made" Reber said.
By Sunday,
agreements had already been reached with six of the nine bargaining units at Air
But Gary
Fane, CAW spokesman, said the union was far from making a deal that would
satisfy Air
"We're
happy to talk to them, but we're not close today. At this time we're off on a
number of issues," he said.
"We're
planning to stay today and tomorrow and ... as long as it takes to get the
company to be logical and reasonable."
Fane
declined to comment on the issues, but had been warning since Friday that his
members would not agree to wage cuts.
Meanwhile,
CUPE spokesman Alejandro Bravo said his union, representing 6,500 workers, was
"feeling hopeful" and "working very hard" Sunday afternoon.
Reber would
not elaborate on any of the discussions and was declining interviews, but said
Air
Intense
bargaining all through Saturday had produced no word of new agreements, but very
early Sunday morning, the announcements started coming.
The Air
Canada Pilots Association, representing 3,300 pilots, announced it had reached
an agreement "after two weeks of intense negotiations."
Minutes
later, Air
Also early
Sunday, Air
By
mid-morning on Sunday, Air Canada Jazz was announcing agreements with its own 50
members of CALDA, and with Teamsters Canada representing 600 flight attendants.
On Friday,
the unit representing 1,000 pilots at Jazz reached a tentative agreement.
Ron
Fontaine, a spokesman for the IAMAW, said Sunday workers have done their share
for the airline, and called on the federal government to come to the table.
Fontaine
said the federal tax on jet fuel should be reduced.
"In
Fontaine
said the fuel tax is a serious issue for any Canadian-based air carrier trying
to compete with carriers from the
"If the
government wants to have a positive impact on the industry, that's where they
could do it."
He also
called for rollbacks in "double-digit" increases in airport rents and navigation
service fees faced by airlines.
In addition
to cost-cutting agreements with the bargaining units, the conditions under which
Deutsche Bank had agreed to underwrite an $850-million share offering for the
airline included an agreement on paying down the airline's $1.2-billion pension
shortfall. The pension issue was resolved Friday, with the Office of the
Superintendent of Financial Institutions asking Finance Minister Ralph Goodale
to approve a 10-year repayment.
The Province, Page A15,
17-May-2004
No election called yet, but
candidates off and running
By Rob Shaw
Achilla
Isaiah answered his doorbell on East 26th Avenue yesterday with the wary
expression of a man wondering if he's about to be sold a vacuum cleaner or a
Bible.
Instead,
the 34-year-old from
"I don't
know if you know me, but I've represented this area before . . . I'm hoping to
represent it again," said Waddell, 61, a former provincial cabinet minister and
three-time Vancouver-Kingsway MP.
Prime
Minister Paul Martin is expected to call a federal election for June 28 and
across B.C. yesterday, federal candidates were hitting the streets.
"It's a
Canadian trait, people are usually pretty polite," said Mary Pynenburg, 47, the
Liberal candidate for Burnaby-New Westminster, who spent yesterday ringing
doorbells.
"We've had
a few close encounters with dogs, but other than that I've only ever had a few
people who are visibly angry."
Don Bell,
62, the Liberal in
"This looks
to be as though the call will be next week," said
Former B.C.
premier Ujjal Dosanjh, Liberal candidate in Vancouver South, took the day off to
recover from a fundraising party that went until 1:30 a.m. The $100-a-plate
fund-raiser brought in $120,000.
He said
he's been doing some old-fashioned knocking.
"Most
people, at first, they don't recognize me," said Dosanjh. "It takes them a split
second to recognize me and then I get a big smile."
In
"I think
people have been hearing about the election for a while now," said Hiebert, 35.
"They know its on the horizon, they're not so surprised when a candidate comes
calling."
Back on
East 26th, a cheery Waddell had dissolved any apprehension Achilla Isaiah might
have had when he opened his door.
"I've read
about you in the papers," said Isaiah. "This is an NDP household."
There were
handshakes and a voting promise exchanged. Then Waddell went to the next house.
"It shows
how mature the political process here is," said Isaiah. "I don't mind being
bothered."
HYPERLINK "mailto:rshaw@png.canwest.com" rshaw@png.canwest.com
The Province, Page A19,
17-May-2004
Designer calling on professional
artists to boycott Olympic contest
By Pia Guerra
Matthew
Warburton, former president of the Society of Graphic Designers of Canada, has
called for a boycott of the Olympic logo design contest. He says such work
should go through design firms and not to the general public because such
contests "demean the profession and make it seem like anybody can do it."
There are
many talented, hard-working freelance artists across
To say that
the "top, most qualified designers across
To ask the
public to shell out hundreds of thousands of dollars to go through a process of
short-listing private companies to make paid presentations is also an insult.
You'd think
after the recent sponsorship scandals in
And let the
best artist win.
Pia Guerra,
The Province, Page A18,
17-May-2004
In other words: Nine steps to top
health care
The health
care debate in
- Modernize
the Canada Health Act so that all Canadians have access to quality health care
for essential services in a timely fashion. In this system, any Canadian would
have the option to purchase services in the private system. Those who access the
private system will be freeing up space in the public system without removing
resources.
- Introduce
a system of accountability for patient and provider by each receiving a printout
of the cost of services used/given.
- Allow
provinces to institute a system of medical savings accounts.
- Implement
prevention models that have proven to work for medical problems such as obesity,
foetal alcohol syndrome, cardiovascular problems, malignancies and social
problems such as criminal behaviour, unemployment, teen pregnancies, dropping
out of school and drug use.
- Better
utilize information technology and telemedicine.
- Increase
the number of students entering health programs. Devise an incentive program
that pays the tuition fees for a number of medical students, nurses, etc., in
return for an equal number of years working in an under-serviced area.
- Control
costs by involving the sharing of best practices amongst physicians. Utilizing
information technology to monitor prescribing habits and drug use will help to
reduce poly-pharmaceutical abuse.
- Develop a
national strategy on mental health and on seniors' issues for housing, wellness,
and tax issues that will enable people to stay at home to care for sick family
members.
- Reform
our pension systems to save the CPP, OAS and the GIS.
Implementation of these solutions will improve the
health of Canadians and prevent the rupture of our public health care system.
-- Dr.
Keith Martin is Independent MP for Esquimalt-Juan de Fuca.
It's time to give voters fixed
federal election dates
By Charles Gordon
Yes, it's
the election song, heard from time to time whenever the party in power decides
to do the right thing for the wrong reasons.
Thanks for
the money, by the way.
Looking
beyond it, scanning the horizon behind the growing piles of politically inspired
regional booty, it is possible to see that the main argument against fixed
election dates no longer works.
The main
argument against fixed election dates was that the period leading up to them
would involve non-stop political grandstanding. In fact, what we are seeing is
non-stop political grandstanding anyway.
Moving to a
fixed election date would level the playing field, give the opposition parties a
chance to increase their non-stop political grandstanding. Right now, the
government, which knows the election date, is in a far stronger grandstanding
position.
This may
not be exactly what Prime Minister Paul Martin refers to when he speaks of a
democratic deficit, but it should be thought of that way.
The
government can call unnecessary elections merely because it sees a chance to win
them. That was the case with the Liberals in 1997 and 2000, both called with the
government in a majority position and having served less than four years.
The
government can also delay necessary elections because it thinks it may lose.
That was the case with the Trudeau Liberals in 1979 and the Mulroney
Conservatives in 1993. Add a couple of more scandal stories and it could be the
case with the Martin Liberals in 2004.
Anybody for
2005?
Fixed
election dates would, um, fix that. The government couldn't call snap elections
for its own convenience. It couldn't delay elections past four years. Yes, there
would be the phenomenon known in the
The
advantages of incumbency are considerable and well-documented. The government
sets the news agenda and can time its announcements to maximum advantage. In all
but the most exceptional circumstances, it enters every election campaign with a
head start. That head start lengthens when the government also controls the
timing of the election.
One factor
and only one factor matters when choosing an election date: can the government
win? If it can, then it does not matter, say, that one province is underwater,
as
And it
especially does not matter if one of the opposition parties has a new leader who
is unfamiliar to the public. Quite the contrary. In 2000, the Liberals took
advantage of the new Canadian Alliance leader, Stockwell Day. He was so new to
the job that the public could not know him. The same strategy appears to be
directed this year at the new Conservative leader, Stephen Harper. In the
absence of public familiarity with Harper, the Liberals hope that they can
define him in the public mind, as they did with Day four years ago.
For voters,
that is the reverse of what should happen, and voters are what elections should
be about. From the point of view of the voters, the ideal election takes place
after a new party leader, or a new prime minister, has been in office for some
time, at least a year. That way, the voters can develop a sense of the new
government's purpose and performance or the new opposition leader's competence
and ideas.
For a new
government, calling a snap election defeats that purpose. Calling a snap
election to catch a new opposition unprepared is unfair to the voters as well as
the parties.
The time to
call an election is when everyone is prepared, including the voters. That means
a fixed date.
Traditionalists who oppose the idea say it is
inconsistent with our parliamentary system and that it will somehow
"Americanize" our politics. To take the last first, our politics is fairly well
Americanized already, and it is difficult to see how fixing election dates will
make it more so.
As for the
parliamentary system, the important aspect of it that we must keep is the
provision that the government must resign, causing an election, if it loses a
confidence vote in the House. If we keep that, but deny the government the right
to call an election whenever it fells like it, we will do away with a large
component of the democratic deficit in
United, municipalities will prosper;
divided, they cannot survive
By Maurine
Karagianis
On the
thorny issue of amalgamation, hats off to
As the
Capital Regional District arts chair, I recognize the frustration that our
municipal "diversity" causes with federal grants. The CRD arts committee was
created to show regional support for arts organizations that were being left out
of federal funding programs because only four of 13 municipalities supported
them.
Although at
the end of the process the funding remains much the same, the support of the CRD
carries bigger clout and increases the chances of leveraging more national
dollars. So, I say, let's wade right into the discussion on amalgamation.
Our
individual municipalities can no longer ignore the growing pressures to maintain
services, keep taxes low and plan for future crises like homelessness and
poverty without seriously expanding our current co-operative relationships.
The CRD has
been unable to achieve its full promise of addressing the growing demand for
inter-municipal co-operation. It has worked well for sewage and garbage but has
fallen woefully short in addressing most of the other social, environmental and
economic issues looming over us.
Let's look,
for example, at fire protection. We have as many as four municipalities
preparing to invest huge tax dollars in pumper or ladder trucks. While it would
be nice to have a pumper truck on every block, with only 300,000 residents in
the Capital Region, does it make sense for every community to purchase one?
Communities like
How can we
expect to survive, let alone provide the services and safety provisions our
community deserves, to fund services like fire protection at competitive levels,
as a stand-alone municipality?
Add to this
ever-increasing downloading from senior governments, including abandonment of
funding for social service programs, and it's evident the poor beleaguered
property tax will not suffice.
Local
government must show some true leadership and initiate intelligent, practical
and sensible debate on how we can band together. We must find better ways to run
our municipalities than relying on the taxpayer to bear the growing burden. And
adding more taxes to the cost of housing just moves us further and further away
from ever being able to provide affordable housing for anyone.
If, as some
might say, the word amalgamation is too controversial, then let's call it
integration or collaboration.
But,
whatever we call it, let's move forward with a cohesive strategy to join forces.
It makes a lot of sense.
Maurine
Karagianis is an
Charting a course over urban
scrawl
By Norman Gidney
The metal
boxes clamped to lamp standards on downtown street corners used to attract
stickers and graffiti. Now they help tourists find their way.
The cases
that house controls for traffic lights have been adorned with colourful maps and
"you are here" arrows.
The
dual-purpose graphics help lost visitors and -- thanks to a slippery, clear
anti-graffiti coating -- deter "taggers." Several dozen utility boxes downtown
have been covered with the street maps.
Factory
Print Shop, a spinoff business of the Rock Solid Foundation, did the work at its
"It's a
great concept and it looks good," she said. If the maps do get tagged by felt
pen or grease pencil, "all they need is a good wipe."
The city of
Lise
Pronovost grew up in
"There are
locks and hinges on the boxes and you have to work around it," she said.
"It's a
neat idea. It's working out really well," said Emmet McCusker, the city's
supervisor of traffic signals.
So far, 42
boxes have been transformed.
McCusker
said
The
production cost is about $80 per box and it's been a worthwhile expense, said
McCusker.
Previously,
the boxes were painted a uniform pale grey, providing a perfect canvas for
graffiti scribblers.
Graffiti
still get scrawled on them, but are much less visible against the colourful
high-contrast background.
The city's
full-time graffiti cleanup staffer won't be out of a job anytime soon, but the
new more easily-cleaned utility box coverings have allowed him to get to more
sites in a day.
"We're
doing a better job of it," said McCusker.
"If you
take them down two times, three times, they get the message."
The city
has other downtown fixtures that could benefit from a similar custom covering,
such as power kiosks.
Telus and
Canada Post have used similar colourful graphics developed by Factory Print
Shop. Thirteen mail boxes and relay boxes for letter carriers have bright
stamp-related graphics,
Each phone
box has a unique design, a piece of art created by an
McCusker
likes the project because Factory Print Shop's earnings support the youth
programs and anti-violence work of Rock Solid.
The sign
business started when Rock Solid acquired the computer graphics and
sign-printing equipment to mount the
Once thick
with graffiti, the walls now sport billboard-sized original artworks. TAG
debuted two years ago and will add 16 more pieces by local youths and
professionals in September.
Factory
Print's aim is to be one of the foundation stones of Rock Solid's "social
enterprise," which has an ambitious business plan to create 300 jobs for youths
over the next seven years.
HYPERLINK "mailto:ngidney@tc.canwest.com" ngidney@tc.canwest.com
Environmentalism key issue for new
lobby group
By Judith Lavoie
A newly
formed political arm of B.C.'s environmental movement is hoping to shape B.C.'s
next government.
The
Conservation Voters of B.C., a non-partisan group, will be quizzing prospective
candidates about their environmental views, checking on voting records and then
throwing their weight behind the candidate who they believe will best reflect
environmental values.
The
Conservation Voters is being modeled on the League of Conservation Voters in the
Matt Price,
Conservation Voters co-ordinator, said the group will pick its battles carefully
for the provincial election next year and will be looking for ridings where the
vote could go either way.
The board,
made up of community volunteers and people who have been involved in the
environmental movement, will then look at the prospective candidates and make a
choice.
"Places
like Oak Bay-Gordon Head are very interesting to us because they could go either
way," he said.
The
emphasis will be on looking at the candidates, not the parties, and Price
expects that some of those they choose to support will be Liberals, despite the
doubtful environmental record of the Liberal government.
The group
will be looking for candidates who can win, and, in some cases, that will mean
not supporting traditional environmental candidates like Greens, he said.
When
someone has already held office, the Conservation Voters will check Hansard for
signs of environmental awareness and, if the candidate has not held office
previously, volunteer activities and community work will be taken into account.
"We know we have to be systematic, credible and fair," Price said.
Once a
candidate gets the Conservation Voters endorsement the group will throw the
efforts of its volunteers into the campaign. And the involvement will not end
with the election.
"Between
elections we will be sitting down with the politicians and saying, 'We are still
doing outreach to your constituents.' We are looking for accountability," Price
said.
Most
environmental organizations cannot be active politically or they risk losing
their charitable status. The Conservation Voters, which is already incorporated,
is a non-profit society, but will not seek charitable status. That means the
group will be looking for donations, but will not give tax receipts.
One aim of
the Conservation Voters will be to stop wild pendulum swings.
"One party
passes laws and the next one undoes them. Is that progress?" Price asked. "We
need to break the cycle by having all parties raise their environmental
performance and that will happen with getting strong candidates elected."
Green Party
leader Adriane Carr said she applauds the focus on environmental issues and
trying to get good candidates elected.
But, Carr
hopes the group acknowledges that there are ridings where Green candidates are
electable.
The
Conservation Voters will be officially launched Thursday evening at an event at
the
HYPERLINK "mailto:jlavoie@tc.canwest.com" jlavoie@tc.canwest.com
Globe and Mail, Page A13,
17-May-2004
Contempt, stupidity, or good old
patronage?
By Lysiane Gagnon
Nobody
likes to be taken for an imbecile. It is precisely because the federal Liberals
treated Quebeckers like imbeciles that the sponsorship scandal is having such a
lasting impact on
While the
Liberal Party seems to be more or less recovering from the scandal in the rest
of
Let's
forget for one minute the financial aspect of the sponsorship scandal, the
alleged frauds, the patronage and the squandering of public money through a
secret slush fund.
This would
be enough to anger any citizen but in
The
revelations about the sponsorship affair blatantly exposed the contempt in which
the Chretien government held the
So first
there is this angry feeling of having been treated like morons, to borrow a word
from the lexicon of one of Mr. Chretien's press secretaries. The sponsorship
scandal also had another effect. It reawakened the frustrations of the Yes
voters of the 1995 referendum.
Because
they were defeated by a razor-thin margin, many suspected that somehow they had
been robbed of a victory by some unspeakable trick of the federal government.
This suspicion, as well as the anger, waned over the years; six months ago, only
the diehard secessionists were still mulling over the referendum defeat. People
wanted to turn the page, and as recently as last winter, polls were showing that
the Martin troops could actually sweep away the province; some were even
predicting that the upcoming election would mark the beginning of the end of the
Bloc Quebecois.
Then the
sponsorship scandal erupted. And Quebeckers learned about the secret unity fund
aimed at battling
So there it
was! hissed the Yes voters: "While we played by the rules, the Ottawa Liberals
shamelessly inundated the province with costly propaganda material."
This led to
a resurgence of the nationalist sentiment from which the Bloc Quebecois
naturally benefited.
Now it is
quite possible that Mr. Chretien and the operators in charge of the "national
unity" file did not really despise Quebeckers. They might have been inspired
instead by sheer stupidity - a possibility that cannot be discounted, since
there is no other way of explaining why the larger portion of the discretionary
fund was spent after the referendum, rather than before.
In the
years following the referendum, support for sovereignty fell and Lucien
Bouchard, the great hero of the referendum campaign, was busy reducing the
province's deficit. In other words, it is precisely when the separatist threat
was at its lowest that the Chretien government spent most furiously in
This leads
to another hypothesis. Far from being stupid, the Liberals might have been
shrewdly using the noble cover of national unity to hand out handsome contracts
to the friendly advertising agencies whose "free" services they would need for
the 1997 and 2000 elections.
So it boils
down to a choice between contempt, stupidity and good old patronage.
HYPERLINK "mailto:Lgagnon@lapresse.ca" Lgagnon@lapresse.ca
Globe and Mail, Page A13,
17-May-2004
Forget crocodile tears - the West has
reason to weep
By Norman Spector
If, as
promised, Paul Martin is serious about reducing British Columbians' alienation -
a big if - you'd have to say he's not off to a good start.
It's not so
much that parachuting "star" candidates contradicts another promise: that Mr.
Martin wouldn't do politics the same way the "friendly dictator," Jean Chretien,
did. Though a bit soggier than other Canadians, we British Columbians are
sophisticated enough to understand that all Mr. Martin's talk about slaying the
democratic deficit, though it's very, very important, is just that. Talk.
Nor do
British Columbians give much credence to the allegations of racism levelled by
Tony Kuo, the disappointed candidate for the Liberal nomination in the riding of
Burnaby-Douglas. You can say many negative things about the Liberal Party (and
I've said most), but Mr. Martin's decision to appoint backroom boy Bill
Cunningham was not due to the colour of the Cunningham skin. What sort of MP
would Mr. Kuo be, given his penchant for gestures like holding up a bag of empty
Kleenex boxes to illustrate the tears he claims his visible minority supporters
have shed?
What irks
British Columbians is the sense we are a sideshow in the game of spin being
played in the national media.
Out here,
the Martin team has been criticized for mass membership signups in universities
and ethnic communities - with the odd dead dog thrown in - to seize control of
the Liberal Party and overthrow Jean Chretien.
But rough
tactics are also preferred by Mr. Kuo and others, who've been battling for
nominations. Last Sunday, Mr. Kuo appeared on CTV and, next to tears, said it
was a "sad day for Canadian politics." On Monday, he told Global's Kevin Newman
that the Prime Minister was "virtually killing democracy." And on Tuesday, Mr.
Kuo sang the same tune for the CBC's Terry Milewski. Not a question was asked,
nor an answer given, about why Mr. Kuo wanted to be a Member of Parliament or
what he would do for British
Columbians.
The term
"dream team," so often heard in the national media to describe Liberal
candidates in B.C., is not on many lips in
Unlike the
other parties, the B.C. Liberals have essentially been a patronage machine over
the years with virtually no grassroots organization. What's new today is
that the
shots are visibly being called from central casting in Ottawa, which is the only
way a spin operation like Mr. Martin's can function.
With the
Conservatives reunited, Mr. Martin goes into the election in a more precarious
position than Mr. Chretien ever faced, which is why his team is preparing
negative attack ads.
Out here in
B.C., the Liberals are 10 points lower, and the NDP nearly 25 points higher than
they were going into the 2000 election (as measured by Ipsos-Reid). Nationally,
in the same poll, the Liberals are 12 points below the level of support they had
on the eve of the 2000 election. Mr. Martin is still flirting with a minority
government, especially since the incumbent party usually loses support during a
campaign.
Pundits and
pols who predicted a united party would not hold onto most of the centre-right
vote have already been proved wrong; though the Conservatives go into the
election four points behind where their two parties were in 2000, they are
poised at last to make a major breakthrough in
In
English-speaking
In
HYPERLINK
"http://www.members.shaw.ca/nspector4" www.members.shaw.ca/nspector4
Globe and Mail, Page
A13, 17-May-2004
Whistleblowers: why they do
it
By Antonio
Gualtieri
The
prominence of whistleblowers in
Stewardship: By this I mean the responsible use of
resources with which one has been entrusted. This is a recurrent theme in
Christian tradition which draws, in turn, on the Hebrew scriptures: "The Earth
is the Lord's and the fullness thereof. The world and those who dwell therein."
(Psalm 24:1). Humans do not possess for their own purposes the bounty of the
Earth. They are only stewards or trustees on behalf of God, morally obligated to
use the Earth's abundance in conformity with God's good intentions.
How does
this apply to governments, civil servants and financial dereliction? The sweat
of the taxpayer's brow is entrusted to politicians and bureaucrats with the
charge to spend it wisely and well for the common good. Is it too grandiloquent
to say this is a high and noble calling? The way some observers have dismissed
$100-million (or $13-million) of sponsorship mismanagement as peanuts in the
context of the global budget suggests that we exaggerate; that we have set the
bar too high. But those who operate as conscientious stewards of money that has
been entrusted to them cannot sit so cavalierly to violations of that trust.
Witness:
The moral meaning of witness is to testify to the truth one has seen. This is a
pivotal principle in many religious traditions. The first pillar of Muslim faith
is the Shahada or witness statement: "I bear witness that there is no God but
God and that Mohammed is his Messenger." Those who have seen the truth of this
are obliged to bear witness to it. The idea of witnessing to Jesus Christ runs
through Christian tradition. An apostle is an eyewitness of the resurrection of
Christ upon whom has been laid the burden of testifying to it. "You killed the
author of life [Jesus] whom God raised from the dead. To this we are witnesses."
(Acts 3:15).
Much
Holocaust discussion has stressed the obligation to eschew silence and to bear
witness to the genocidal experience of the Jewish people that unmasks optimistic
pretensions about human benevolence. This insight is persuasive even to those of
secularized consciousness. The universal theme is that human dignity and
integrity demand bearing witness to the truth one has perceived - especially
when one is ranged against powers and interests that want to hide the truth. In
their humble way, those who expose stupidity and corruption, greed and
falsehood, in the governance of their society stand in this moral tradition of
steadfastly and courageously bearing witness to what they have seen.
Warning:
Finally, I want to draw attention to the obligation whistleblowers feel to utter
a warning against deformed and deviant institutions. This note of warning finds
its religious precedents in the series of woe sayings uttered by Jesus against
the religious authorities of his time, such as "Woe to you scribes and
Pharisees, hypocrites! For you are like whitewashed tombs, which outwardly
appear beautiful, but within they are full of dead men's bones and all
uncleanness." (Matthew 23:27). A secularized contemporary version of
condemnation directed against the elite of political institutions might be "Woe
to you cabinet ministers and directors, hypocrites! Outwardly you profess
honesty and fairness, but inwardly you are devious and self-serving, replacing
public good by private and party gain." Muslims look on the Koran not only as a
word of grace and guidance, but also as a warning about the judgment of the Last
Day to those who deviate from the revealed way for social life.
If
hypocritical, wasteful, failures of stewardship are not exposed and denounced,
the long-term consequence is further deterioration of important social
institutions by public despair and cynicism. Some whistleblowers are morally
impelled to issue warnings, which if heeded, can lead to social and political
renewal and the restoration of institutions to their rightful civilizing
mission.
There is a
disposition on the part of institutions of whatever sort - governmental, health,
educational, ecclesiastical - to devote much of their energy, not to original
purposes, but to self-perpetuation and self-aggrandizement.
This
probably has a great deal to do with the ego and material needs of the
institutional elite - but the consequence of this is the contempt in which these
elites, whether they be bishops or deputy ministers, tend to hold those who
challenge the customary ways of doing things and threaten their authority. Such
disdain easily passes into irritation and anger, and a strategy to punish those
who seek to expose wrongdoing.
This is why
so many whistleblowers have suffered humiliation, calumny, firing, cessation of
promotion, ill health and extinction of career.
Why then do
they do it?
Some, at
least, are driven by the moral demands of stewardship, witness and warning that
will not allow them to do otherwise.
Antonio R.
Gualtieri, professor emeritus of religion at
Globe and Mail, Page A06,
17-May-2004
The cost of
communicating with Albertans is growing by leaps and bounds.
The
Last year,
the
Globe and Mail, Page A06,
17-May-2004
Key aide gave direction in scandal,
MP says
A backbench
Liberal MP says he is convinced that a key aide to former prime minister Jean
Chretien gave political direction in the sponsorship scandal.
Speaking on
CTV's Question Period yesterday, Walter Lastewka, MP for
The MP said
Mr. Pelletier told the committee that he worked with Chuck Guite, the bureaucrat
who ran the sponsorship program and who has been charged with fraud by the RCMP.
Mr. Lastewka said Mr. Pelletier also pointed to the office of former public
works minister Alfonso Gagliano.
Mr.
Lastewka said the committee has been told enough to write an interim report.
Liberal MPs
voted last week to end the committee's work after almost three months. CP
Globe and Mail, Page B03,
17-May-2004
New national regulator topic of
meeting
By Sinclair Stewart
Some of the
biggest names on
The
luncheon meeting was put together by Management Board chairman Gerry Phillips,
the minister responsible for the Ontario Securities Commission, who has been
trying to persuade other provinces to cast aside their differences and support
the formation of a single national securities watchdog.
Much of the
debate around this issue has been confined to sniping between a handful of
provincial commissions, particularly
Key
business leaders have recently begun to speak out on the need for a central
regulatory agency, but until today's gathering, these have been mainly isolated
events.
The
luncheon is expected to include Toronto-Dominion Bank chief executive officer Ed
Clark, Scotia Capital Inc. chairman David Wilson, RBC Dominion Securities Inc.
chairman Tony Fell, and Toronto Stock Exchange CEO Barbara Stymiest. Bob
Bertram, executive vice-president of the Ontario Teachers Pension Plan Board,
has been invited, as has CPP Investment Board CEO John MacNaughton and corporate
lawyer Purdy Crawford, who headed up the
Sources
describe the meeting as a brainstorming session, where senior business
executives can share ideas and discuss possible solutions with government
officials.
The
Other
provinces, however, are dubious of the benefits, and there is suspicion that a
"superagency" would really be little more than a beefed-up
Globe and Mail, Page B01,
17-May-2004
No merger guidelines for banks until
fall: Goodale
By Sinclair Stewart
Finance
Minister Ralph Goodale has privately told
Mr. Goodale
telephoned chief executive officers at a handful of the country's largest banks
late last week, and explained that he would be unable to release the much
anticipated report because of the looming federal election, according to
sources.
The Finance
Minister hinted publicly last week that there could be a delay, and The Globe
and Mail reported he would likely announce a new time frame shortly after the
election.
Originally,
he had promised to stick to a June 30 timetable put in place by his predecessor,
former finance minister John Manley. But the deadline was clearly in jeopardy as
soon as it became apparent that Canadians would probably head to the polls on
June 28.
One bank
CEO told Mr. Goodale that he understood the reason for postponing the report,
but at the same time reiterated that the financial services industry sorely
needs clarity on consolidation, specifically on the ambiguous public interest
test that
Another
banker, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the industry would prefer to
wait a few extra months for a considered approach to mergers, rather than have
Mr. Goodale
said recently that he is aware of the issues facing the banking sector, and the
need for clarification on the merger process. Many industry watchers believe the
uncertainty about domestic mergers has effectively paralyzed the banks, and
prevented them from pursuing larger acquisitions in the
Under the
previous timetable, banks would not be allowed to bring merger proposals to
But with
updated guidelines not expected until the fall, it is unlikely banks will be
pitching deals before year-end, even if the government does eventually give the
green light to consolidation.
There has
been considerable speculation that the federal government would attribute the
delay to the need to study so-called "cross-pillar" mergers between banks and
insurers. All of the major banks support the idea of allowing such deals, which
are currently prohibited by
Toronto-based Manulife Financial Corp., however, is the
only major insurer lobbying for the ban to be removed. Rivals Sun Life Financial
Inc. of
Manulife,
which recently swallowed
Merger
policy has been effectively up in the air since late 1998, when Paul Martin,
then the finance minister, quashed proposed unions between Royal Bank of
Globe and Mail, Page
B10, 17-May-2004
Mining sector powers jump in
profits
By Carolyn Leitch And Diana
Clifford
According
to a Report on Business survey of 284 Canadian companies, first-quarter profits
rose a solid 9 per cent from the same period last year. Companies in the survey
tallied a collective profit of $14.4-billion, up from $13.3-billion in the first
quarter of 2003.
Douglas
Porter, senior economist at BMO Nesbitt Burns Inc., said company profits in this
year's first quarter were solid as
"Over all,
the industrial world has obviously turned the corner."
Mr. Porter
added that
Mr. Porter
said the first quarter was also notable because it marked the first time in two
years that profit growth at corporations in the S&P/TSX 60 index of
blue-chip companies lagged the surging profit growth of
Market
watchers estimate that S&P 500 companies saw collective profit growth near
the 20-per-cent mark in the first quarter.
Looking at
specific sectors, Canadian companies saw a wide range of first-quarter results.
Mining
companies were the big winners as metals prices soared. Companies in the
integrated mines group saw profit rocket ahead 1,448 per cent to $1.13-billion
from $73-million in the first three months of 2003.
"We are
experiencing the best fundamentals the base metals industry has seen for more
than a decade," Derek Pannell, Noranda Inc.'s president and chief executive
officer, said in a statement when the company reported first-quarter numbers
last month.
Toronto-based Noranda, which produces copper, nickel,
zinc and aluminum, posted a profit of $201-million - a sharp turnaround from the
$61.5-million loss the miner reported in the same period last year.
(For survey
purposes, results of companies such as Noranda that report in U.S. dollars have
been converted to Canadian dollars.)
Inco Ltd.
said it is on track to hit its highest annual nickel production in nearly 30
years as demand continues to climb. Inco's first-quarter profit jumped to
$336.3-million from $43-million in the same period of 2003.
Teck
Cominco Ltd.'s profit swelled to $96-million in the three months ended March 31
from $5-million for the first quarter of 2003. Teck said its substantially
higher profit was mainly a result of higher copper and zinc prices.
During the
quarter, average copper prices were up 65 per cent from the previous year,
nickel prices were up by more than 75 per cent and zinc prices jumped by 35 per
cent.
Montreal-based aluminum giant Alcan Inc. swung to a
first-quarter profit of $139.8-million from a loss of $40.8-million a year
earlier.
The
company's first-quarter results were the first to incorporate results from
former French competitor Pechiney SA, which Alcan acquired in a takeover last
year.
While
acquisitions boosted Alcan's sales and profits, higher commodity prices and the
stronger euro also bolstered results for the mining sector.
Mr. Porter
said that profits for the country's metals producers would have been even fatter
if it weren't for the tail end of a massive upswing in the Canadian dollar.
Steel
companies also saw heavy demand for their products as the global economy roared.
As a group, steel companies enjoyed a profit rise of 434 per cent in the first
three months of the year from the same period last year.
"We saw
steel prices take off like a scalded cat in the first quarter," Mr. Porter said.
Energy
prices were also on a tear, but the strong dollar took a toll on oil and gas
producers, whose profits fell 55 per cent from last year's eye-popping first
quarter.
Integrated
energy giant Imperial Oil Ltd. said the Canadian dollar, which was 15 per cent
higher in this year's first quarter than in the same period in 2003, lopped off
its profit in the quarter.
Broadcasting and cable companies saw their collective
results slide into the red in the first quarter from the same period in 2003.
Companies in the biotechnology and pharmaceuticals group reported collective
profits 35 per cent lower than a year earlier.
Mr. Porter
noted that many of the drivers of first-quarter results have already changed
direction in the second quarter. The Canadian dollar has retreated, he said, and
With the
Who's hot
by sector
First
quarter
Oil and gas
producers
2003: $2.9
billion
2004: $1.3
billion
Integrated
mines
2003: $73
million
2004: $1.1
billion
Booming
TSX share
price and earnings
Inco, N-TSX
Profit
($
2004: $255
million
2003: $33
million
Dofasco,
DFS-TSX
2004: $54.6
million
2003: $46.9
million
Who's not
Broadcasting
2003: $18.8
million
2004:
$201.8 million
Biotechnology & pharmaceuticals
2003: $129
million
2004: $83.8
million
Bashed
Canwest,
CGS.S-TSX
2004:
($211.3 million)
2003: $9.9
million
Biovail,
BVF-TSX
2004: $21.1
million (
2003: $57.6
million (
First
quarter earnings survey: 2004
Survey of
284 companies by sector, $million
Sector.......................Companies....
2003...........2004... % change
NATURAL
RESOURCES.......59..$5,419.8... $4,493.2... -17
Mining.................................23......382.7......
1,453.5...+280
Integrated
mines.......................8........73.0.......1,130.4... +1448
Metal
mines............................4........20.3..........84.7... +319
Other
mines............................4.......146.7..........14.2....-90
Precious
metals........................7.......142.8.........224.1....+57
Energy.................................23.....4,706.2.......3,079.8.....-35
Integrated
oils..........................4......1,696.0.......1,617.0.....-5
Oil and gas
producers................13.....2,860.1.......1,274.2....-55
Oil and gas
field services..............6.......150.0.........188.6...+26
Forestry................................13.......330.9.........(40.0).....nm
MANUFACTURING..............71......(189.7).......614.4....nm
Consumer
products...................19........279.8........233.6....-16
Food
processing........................4.........13.7.........36.8..+169
Household...............................1...........4.3..........3.5....-19
Clothing
& textiles......................1...........0.5.........0.5....+17
Appliances...............................2...........1.4.........0.8.....-41
Biotechnology &
pharmaceuticals.....6........129.0.......83.8....-35
Misc.
consumer products...............5........131.0......108.2....-17
Industrial
products......................52.......(469.5)....380.7.....nm
Steel......................................13.........20.4......108.9...+434
Metal
fabrications and machinery......7..........9.1........31.3...+245
Transportation
equipment...............4......1,029.1)....(424.5)...nm
Electrical
& electronic..................4.........(44.6).......54.5....nm
Cement
& concrete.....................1.........(13.7).....(19.3)....nm
Chemicals................................6...........132.9....160.0....+20
Packaging
& containers................4............32.4......25.1.....-23
Computer
software & processing......6...........87.4......97.5....+12
Automotive...............................7..........335.8.....347.4.....+3
SERVICES..........................
135.......7,569.8....8,877.9...+17
Utilities..................................
10..........885.4...1,065.0...+20
Gas &
electrical..........................5..........252.1......246.4....-2
Telephone
utilities........................5..........633.4.....818.6...+29
Commuinicatons &
media..............18.........255.5......(11.2)...nm
Broadcasting..............................3...........18.8....(201.8)...nm
Cable......................................
3............4.7......(48.2)...nm
Publishing
& printing.....................5.........176.3.....150.3....-15
Telecommunications......................5..........34.8.......64.1...+84
Entertainment
services...................2.........20.8.......24.4...+17
Merchandising............................29.......770.3......856.0...+11
Wholesale
distributors................... 8........50.7.......65.0...+28
Food stores
& services...................7........426.7.....450.8.....+6
Department
stores........................5........164.0.....153.0......-7
Clothing
stores.............................3.........(5.5).......5.5....nm
Specialty
stores............................6.......134.4......181.8....+35
Finance....................................45.....5,149.3...6,472.5....+26
Banks.......................................
8......2,760.3...3,447.5...+25
Investment
houses........................ 8........395.5......437.1...+11
Insurance...................................
4........966.4...1,220.6...+26
Finance,
leasing & investment houses...6........348.0.....465.7... +34
Management
& diversified............... 7........537.3.... 744.6... +39
Computer
software & processing....... 6..........87.4..... 97.5... +12
Business
services......................... 6... .......54.5.... 59.6..... +9
Real estate
& development.............. 8... ......151.0... 146.6..... -3
Transportation............................
11..........27.7.....(11.0)... nm
Pipeline.....................................
3.........227.6....244.0.....+7
Lodging......................................3..........95.7......84.8....-11
Agriculture.................................
3.........(34.4)....(16.9)....nm
Other
services..............................5.........41.7.......48.1....+15
INCOME
TRUSTS...................... 25.......545.3......512.6......-6
TOTAL...................................
284...13,257.9...14,400.6.....+9
Figures
represent after tax profits or losses and preferred share dividends; U.S. dollar
results converted to Canadian; first quarter may end in January, February or
March; nm-not meaningful.
Globe and Mail, Page B07,
17-May-2004
Water tension rising between Canada
and U.S.
By Wendy Stueck
As if
softwood lumber, wheat and border security weren't enough, add another item to
the list of potential sore points between
"Water
issues between the
A water
specialist who has written widely on resource issues, Mr. Gleick said population
growth on both sides of the border is putting more pressure on shared rivers and
lakes. And water controversies, including deaths from E. coli-tainted water in
Walkerton, Ont., and proposals in both countries to divert or store water, have
raised public awareness.
"We realize
increasingly that it's hard to touch one piece of the system without affecting
another piece," he said. "Because of that, there is increased sensitivity to
water policy actions on both sides of the border."
That
sensitivity is evident across the country. In southeastern B.C., a coal mine
proposal has raised worries about environmental effects and led to calls for
governments to review a previous International Joint Commission decision.
A
Canada-U.S. agency set up to handle boundary water disputes, the IJC in 1988
recommended against government approval of a proposed coal mine in the same
region, the
This time
around, critics say concerns flagged by the IJC nearly 20 years ago still exist
and that no development should go ahead unless those issues are addressed.
As the coal
issue heats up, the Canadian government has already asked the IJC to review
Meanwhile,
Canadian and
Last year,
the company and the EPA spent months working on a plan for assessment and
possible remediation of decades' worth of pollution in
Talks broke
down in late 2003 over the EPA's insistence that it control the studies, a
stance Teck Cominco read as an attempt to impose
Such water
fights are unsurprising to Wendy Holm, a B.C.-based agrologist and North
American free-trade agreement specialist who, in the 1990s, fought -
unsuccessfully - to have water excluded from the treaty.
At that
time, public debate focused on bulk fresh-water exports, an issue that raised
the spectre of huge tankers siphoning the Great Lakes to ship water to parched
parts of the
That
debate, she says, bypassed more important issues - including the impact of
Under the
current treaty, she argues, American companies using water in
Currently,
Ms. Holm is co-ordinating a new campaign to have water excluded from the treaty
by targeting those who could be most affected by a water shortage - farmers. She
said she didn't know whether American authorities were yet aware of her
campaign, but said she expects more Canadians to sign on to what she sees as a
fight for sovereignty.
"Around the
world, we're seeing an increasing argument between commodity and community, and
where the rights of one ends and the other's begins," she said. "Water has to be
the dividing line."
Globe and Mail, Page A07,
17-May-2004
New federal health agency to be
located in Winnipeg
By Helen Branswell
After weeks
of political wrangling at the highest levels, federal politicians will formally
announce today that
Public
Health Minister Carolyn Bennett, who fought to keep the agency's head office in
Ottawa, will make the announcement in Manitoba's capital with the man who bested
her in the argument - Treasury Board President Reg Alcock - by her side.
Related
news conferences in
The
collaborative centres, as they'll be called, will tap into expertise across the
country and build the strong links that were missing last year during
Last year's
SARS outbreak provided the impetus for the creation of a federal public health
agency. Still, infectious disease control will only be part of its mandate. The
agency will also head the fight against chronic diseases and take the lead role
in emergency preparedness.
Ms. Bennett
will confirm Frank Plummer, scientific director of the National Microbiology
Laboratory - also in
Federal
officials see Dr. Plummer as the logical person to step into the job at a
crucial period while the new agency is taking shape. Ms. Bennett has said she
wants the job filled by summer, but with the expected federal election and
summer vacations posing as potential delays, that timetable may not be workable.
"You
realistically could be looking at four to six months and are you going to wait
until then before anything is done?" asked Donald Low, a leading infectious
disease expert who was on the search committee that named Dr. Plummer scientific
director for the national lab in 2000.
"I can
guarantee you they will not have a head picked within the next four months,
unless this is already decided on."
Preliminary
work has already begun, with a search committee established and a head-hunting
firm gathering names of prospective candidates.
Dr.
Plummer's name has been put forward and he has made it clear he wants the job -
wants it so much, in fact, that the inveterate smoker is giving up cigarettes
with the help of nicotine patches.
A scientist
with a world-class reputation earned by groundbreaking HIV/AIDS research in
Kenya, Dr. Plummer acknowledges that it would send the wrong signal if Canada's
chief proponent of health were a smoker.
"Oh yeah,
for sure," he said. "I need to quit smoking. There's no question."
Globe and Mail, Page A04,
17-May-2004
Liberals slam Tories over proposed
tax cuts
By Jeff Sallot
A
Conservative election promise of big tax cuts inevitably will mean chopping
important social programs for the poor, Liberals say.
In a
preview of what is to come, Liberal and Conservatives argued about taxes and
social programs yesterday as each party tried to paint the other as fiscally
irresponsible.
The
Conservative tax-cut plan got a premature debut on the weekend with leaked
copies circulating in
The plan
would reduce the personal income tax for most middle-income taxpayers - those
making between $35,000 and $70,000 a year - to 16 per cent from the current rate
of 22 per cent.
The
Conservatives say this means taxpayers making $50,000 annually would see their
taxes reduced by $1,000 when the plan is fully implemented in four years.
The party
also promises to phase in a child tax deduction during the same period. The
deduction would ultimately reach $2,000 for each child under age 16.
The leaked
document also outlines the elimination of various corporate "subsidies" in
favour of lower corporate taxes.
The
Conservative document says the party would also get rid of the $12-per-ticket
air-security tax and cut employment-insurance premiums in order to eliminate the
surplus in the fund.
Conservative House Leader John Reynolds said party
officials were caught off guard by the leak, but added the document is getting
rave reviews from voters in his
He said a
Conservative government could make these tax cuts handily without running a
budget deficit.
"We aren't
going to waste money the way the Liberals have. . . . There are literally
billions of dollars they've wasted."
His
campaign workers "were happy as hell" when they learned of the tax-cut plan, Mr.
Reynolds said in a telephone interview after attending several public events in
his riding. "So the campaign is under way."
Prime
Minister Paul Martin is not expected to officially call the election until later
this week for a June 28 vote.
But with
the Commons in recess, the party leaders are already on the hustings. Mr. Martin
makes appearances today in Laval and Mirabel, Que. Mr. Harper is speaking in
Liberal
strategists say the Tory tax cuts will cost the treasury $32.3-billion when
fully implemented in four years, money that will have to come from social
programs.
"We don't
doubt that they will implement this," said Pat Breton, the spokesman for Finance
Minister Ralph Goodale.
The Tory
numbers don't add up when considering that federal revenues are projected to
increase 3 per cent annually, but costs of programs such as the old-age security
payment and the guaranteed income supplement are increasing 4 to 5 per cent each
year, Mr. Breton said.
The Tories
are also committed to big increases in defence spending. "The trouble is where
are they going to have to cut."
The
Conservatives will have to take the money from social programs, such as old-age
security payments or the guaranteed income supplement for poor pensioners, Mr.
Breton said.
"As my boss
says, I don't see how you're going to square the circle."
Mr. Goodale
is expected to give a detailed critique of the leaked Tory platform later today.
Globe and Mail, Page A01,
17-May-2004
By Shawna Richer
PORT
In the
The
Some
retailers have let go of staff because of the drop in business when they stopped
shipping south. One, Sun Valley Pharmacy in
Mr. Byers
has been a country pharmacist for 25 years and runs the small Village Pharmacy
in Port Elgin, a community of 436 near the bridge to
In
February, Pfizer ordered his store and dozens of other Canadian pharmacies, many
of which mix Web sales with store sales, to stop shipping to the
For two
months, Mr. Byers tried to defy the multinationals, filling about 60
prescriptions a week for his
With
regret, he signed a pledge to Pfizer that he would no longer ship drugs to
Mr. Byers
has not received any products from Pfizer for several months, but had enough
stock to last. Now, he is waiting for the world's largest drug company, with
sales of $44-billion in 2002, to resume shipments to him. And he did not receive
his Glaxo shipment this week.
He said he
had wanted to help his
"Obviously,
we're not a charity. We're running a business," Mr. Byers said. "But this is a
small part of my operation. It's not all about money. I'm sending a few
prescriptions across the border to help a couple of hundred people who can't
afford to get the drugs they need any other way. Most are seniors. They're
crying to me on the phone every day. You feel a bit of moral obligation to help.
"But it was
getting to a point where I had to think about my own customers. I held off as
long as I could, but I couldn't hurt the community I'm here to serve."
For a
half-dozen years, it has been popular for Americans, often seniors, to take bus
trips to Canadian border towns to buy cheaper, prescription drugs.
An
estimated 1.5 million
(It is
legal in
Don
Sancton, spokesman for Pfizer
"What we
are doing is safeguarding the integrity of our pharmaceutical supply to make
sure we have adequate supply for use by Canadians," he said. "We've taken steps
with a number of pharmacies that aren't complying with our terms and conditions
to cut off the supply."
Lyle Butts
of Cape Cod, Mass., has been ordering drugs from
"He doesn't
have a lot of money to spend and he wouldn't last very long without his
medications," Mr. Butts said. "I'm just one of many Americans who cannot afford
drugs. So what do you do? Where are you going to get them if you can't pay for
them? What is happening down here is absurd. If my father didn't have his family
to help he couldn't afford them. Even still, it's a struggle."
Ordering
from
"I hate to
see Canadians get kicked in the teeth by the drug companies just for helping us
out down here," Mr. Butts said.
Dave
MacKay, chief executive of the Canadian International Pharmacy Association, said
"Dave Byers didn't have a choice but to give in to Pfizer. The drug companies
wanted to make an example out of him and they hammered him."
That
atmosphere may be changing. In the
The
movement secured victory earlier this week when the Minnesota Attorney-General
received permission from a judge to continue an investigation into whether
GlaxoSmithKline conspired with other drug companies when it decided to restrict
sales to Canada.
Still,
everyone agrees it is a
"It's not a
long-term solution for Americans to get their drugs from us," Mr. Byers said.
"But if we can fill a desperate need in the meantime, we should being doing it.
When you're in this business, it's because you care about people and want to
help them. All Pfizer and the other companies are doing now is working to ensure
I can't even service my Canadian customers."
National Post, Page
FP12, 17-May-2004
By Jeff Mason
Though the
ministers declined to draw a specific link between
"From their
perspective, the whole WTO process and
"I think
that the signals coming out of
"
The EU has
put heavy pressure on
Getting
The pact
has had mixed support in Russia, however, with some in favour of ratification
but others -- notably President Vladimir Putin's economic adviser Andrei
Illarionov -- opposed on grounds it would strangle the recovering economy.
Although
the EU needs Russian ratification to prevent
"The
Russians continue to say that they will ratify at some point," British
environment secretary Margaret Beckett told Reuters. "I don't think that you
would ever find that the one is a tradeoff for the other. On the other hand,
there is no doubt that there are economic advantages to
"They're
part of the same overall picture. That's not the same as saying they're part of
the same negotiation."
Many
analysts say
"The
Russians see a very tight connection there," said one minister who asked not to
be named. "We would never speak of a link. We believe that we can solve both on
a parallel basis."
The
European Commission said on Thursday the EU and
EU
environment ministers played down concerns that failure by several member
countries to turn in their plans would halt a January, 2005, deadline to start
trading greenhouse gas emissions.
"I wouldn't
present even the lateness of some of the submissions as any particular
difficulty," said
The
European Commission said last week only 11 out of the 25 EU states have sent
their planned cuts in industrial carbon dioxide emissions to the EU executive,
which polices the scheme to meet global pledges in curbing global warming.
National Post, Page FP8,
17-May-2004
Telus gives RBC a
turn
By Barry Critchley
Nothing is
permanent, at least as far as the relationships between issuers and their
financial advisors are concerned.
Another
illustration of that adage was played out this past week when Vancouver-based
Telus Corp. launched a hostile $1.1-billion offer for Microcell
Telecommunications Inc.
For this
transaction -- which may end up getting topped by either BCE Inc. or Rogers
Communications Inc. -- Telus used a different advisor than it did on its last
mega acquisition. That was the $6.6-billion purchase of Clearnet Communications
Inc., a deal that was announced in the summer of 2000. Back then, J.P. Morgan
& Co. Inc. and TD Securities were advisors and lenders; this time round RBC
Capital Markets -- which last time advised Clearnet -- is the sole financial
adviser to Telus and the provider of the necessary wherewithal to fund the
all-cash purchase.
Robert
McFarlane, chief financial officer for Telus, said: "TD has been one of the
primary bankers for Telus over the past number of years. RBC Capital Markets has
had a relationship with Telus as well. But we have never had an exclusive
relationship. TD is definitely one of our primary bankers and advisors. But this
time round we decided to spread it around."
McFarlane
added that awarding the mandate to RBC is "no reflection of any animosity. We
don't give everything to one firm," he said, noting "the Microcell transaction
was initiated internally."
McFarlane
said the company didn't have a beauty contest prior to awarding the business to
RBC, "because the whole Street knows what you are going to do before you do it.
We take pride because there was no leak on this deal," he said, noting that
there are two elements to the $2.1-billion bank credit facility that will be
used to fund the Microcell purchase: a $1.6-billion facility that was recently
renewed and on which TD Bank and RBC are co-leads (there are 16 other
institutions in the facility that was renewed at the same time as Telus held its
annual meeting); and a $500-million bridge facility that is being provided by
RBC.
"The bridge
will be syndicated," said McFarlane, adding that TD found out that it wouldn't
be involved at the same time as the market was told about the offer for
Microcell. TD Securities wasn't saying anything at week's end. There has been
some speculation that it was conflicted because it is acting for another buyer.
"It's pretty close to
Adds
McFarlane: "The point is that no one has an exclusive. TD has been our primary
advisor, but not the exclusive one."
But for the
past 3 1/2 years, TD has been all over Telus. Here's a potted history of the
bank's involvement:
- August,
2000: Telus announced that it had reached an agreement to acquire Clearnet
Communications for $6.6-billion. That deal was part cash and part paper and
valued each Clearnet share at $70 a share. TD Securities and J.P. Morgan acted
as financial advisors to Telus and fully underwrote the debt component of the
transaction's financing. In total, the two lenders ponied up $7.7-billion of
credit to Telus to enable the purchase to proceed.
- March,
2001: Telus said it had entered into a fully underwritten $4.5-billion
commitment with TD Bank for a new senior unsecured credit facility. "This is
believed to be the largest underwriting of credit facilities ever completed by a
single Canadian bank for a Canadian corporation," said Telus at the time. There
were three aspects to the credit facilities: a $1.5-billion, three-year
revolving credit facility; a $1-billion 364-day extendible revolving credit
facility converting to a one-year non-revolving credit facility; and a
$2-billion 18-month non-revolving credit facility.
Proceeds of
the credit facilities were used for general corporate purposes, including the
refinancing of existing debt and to support commercial paper programs.
- May,
2001: Telus announced the pricing of concurrent Canadian dollar and and U.S.
dollar unsecured note offerings for total gross proceeds of about $6.7-billion.
Telus sold
$1.6-billion of five-year notes and US$3.3-billion of notes with six- and
10-year maturities.
"These
combined offerings are believed to represent the largest public debt issuance
ever by a Canadian corporation," said Telus at the time. TD Securities was lead
manager on the local-currency offering, while J.P. Morgan Securities and TD
Securities jointly managed the U.S. dollar offerings. At the same time, Telus
said it had also signed a new $2.5-billion credit facility with TD Bank. Telus
ended up borrowing a smaller amount than the $4.5-billion originally anticipated
"because of the success of the note offerings." In time that $2.5-billion
facility became the recently renewed $1.6-billion facility. (McFarlane said that
Telus hasn't drawn on the facility.)
-
September, 2002: Telus raised $337.4-million via the sale of 34.3-million
non-voting shares, with each share priced at $9.85 a share. TD Securities was
the lead manager on that financing, which generated $13-million in underwriting
fees.
Net
proceeds from the issue were used to repurchase and repay debt, including bank
debt incurred to repurchase notes of Telus and notes and debentures of Telus
Communications. Telus repurchased about $400-million principal amount of such
notes for a cash outlay of approximately $308-million.
National Post, Page FP3,
17-May-2004
In search of an oilpatch Liberal for
Ottawa
By Claudia Cattaneo
Last fall,
for the first time after many years of hostilities, it looked as though Paul
Martin's Liberals and
Well, the
whole thing flopped.
In fact,
some say the strategy backfired to the point the Liberals may be no further
ahead to end their 36-year drought in Cowtown in the coming federal election.
What
happened?
Observers
say the plan fizzled largely because of Mr. Martin's inability to build on the
momentum he ignited in the city last year. At the time, Liberal pundits felt
Calgarians, fed up with having no voice in Ottawa on major issues relevant to
Western Canadians, were warming up to giving him a go.
"The
analogy I use is that of surfing," said Roger Gibbins, president of the Canada
West Foundation. "The hope was that Mr. Martin would create the wave, and then
the star candidate would be able to ride that wave. If you don't have the wave,
no matter how good a surfer you are, you are left standing on the shoreline."
But the
wave went flat amid the Liberal sponsorship scandal and Martin's broader agenda
going off the rails, Mr. Gibbins said, so "everything that went wrong nationally
with the government meant that it was difficult to generate that essential boost
in the province or in the city."
There were
other problems, too. It didn't help that the Liberals failed to line up a star
candidate with oil connections.
The star
would have represented Calgary South Centre, a new riding created by the
division of Calgary Centre, held by former Tory leader Joe Clark. While
Many were
courted. In the end, the overwhelming response was: thanks, but no thanks.
Across the board, it was felt the risk of giving up an executive career to run
on the Liberal ticket, in such a right-wing stronghold, was just too great.
People were
also miffed that Mr. Martin and his advisors wouldn't go out of their way to
make it happen, either. It appears the Liberals could have helped their cause by
offering the candidate a cabinet seat ahead of the election, a gesture that
would have ensured profile, power, and the glow that comes with having been
handpicked by the Prime Minister.
"The view
[by Mr. Martin and his office] was that that was an unusual step that would be
taken only for an outstanding candidate like [former
One
observer said there was a feeling that
In the end,
the Liberals did -- briefly -- find a star of sorts, but not with an oil
industry background: former
That, too,
got messy. Ms. Silverberg, who would have taken the riding away from Julia
Turnbull, a long-time Liberal who'd been campaigning for two years, backed out
almost immediately. And an irate Ms. Turnbull blasted her own party for treating
her so poorly. Ms. Turnbull was eventually cleared by Mr. Martin to run.
Observers
say if there's one winnable riding in
And there
are many. The sector's current wish list includes: a rationalization of federal
and provincial regulatory processes the time it takes to get projects permitted
in places like the East Coast offshore; a desire to see governments return to
research related to energy, such as enhanced recovery of low productivity wells
and from the oilsands, as well as to reduce the environmental impact of energy
development; and help on the human resources front to ease manpower shortages
that are expected to get bigger with oilsands expansions and the building of new
pipelines.
If there's
one bright spot for
Federal
Resources Minister John Efford has impressed oil types by showing enthusiasm for
the industry for first time since Anne McLellan held the portfolio between 1995
and 1997.
Ironically,
though, the improved relations may have also tempered
National Post, Page
FP1, 17-May-2004
OPEC under pressure on oil
prices
With record
high oil prices threatening the global economy, ministers from the Group of
Seven pledged yesterday to pressure OPEC into increasing production.
According
to reports from
The G7
ministers will meet in
Gordon
Brown, U.K. Chancellor of the Exchequer and chairman of the International
Monetary Fund's ministerial steering committee, will also urge the OPEC nations
to take urgent action to ease the oil price crisis, which is hurting industry
and consumers alike.
The impact
of the high crude price on the world's leading economies is expected to show
through in inflation data released this week.
John
Howard, the Australian Prime Minister, said yesterday sustained high oil prices,
now at 21-year highs, would affect inflation.
Benchmark
"If the
price stays at the current level for a long time, of course it will have an
impact on inflation," Mr. Howard told Australian television's Ten Network. "But
it's too early and it would be wrong of us to make that judgment."
Record oil
prices and the prospect of higher interest rates in the
Juanita
Amatong, Phippine Finance Secretary, said the government would lower its growth
forecast for this year because of higher oil prices .
"Because of
oil prices, we'll have to revise down the growth forecast" from 4.8%, Mr.
Amatong said in Jeju, South Korea, where officials were attending the annual
meeting of the Asian Development Bank.
A steep
rise in oil prices hits economies in several ways. There is the effect on
inflation, pushing central banks and governments towards tighter monetary and
fiscal policy. There is also a transfer of resources away from oil consumers to
oil producers. Because the producing countries tend to increase their spending
by less than the consuming countries cut theirs, the net effect on global demand
is negative.
Also, in a
subtler effect, which some economists believe is the most powerful, a steep rise
in oil prices upsets the pattern of demand in the economy.
Meanwhile,
key OPEC producer
"A possible
increase of OPEC production by 1.5 million barrels per day would display the
organization's co-operation and understanding with consumers even though OPEC is
not responsible for the situation," Hossein Kazempour Ardebili, Iran's OPEC
Governor, said on the state oil company's Web site.
The
official from
"We are
still concerned about the trend of crude oil stockpiling by the consumer
countries ... that may push prices down in the future as we enter into autumn,"
he said.
Mr.
Kazempour said the proposed 1.5 million bpd increase in OPEC's output ceiling
would only legitimize current leakage over official cartel supply limits.
"Secondary
sources" that regularly monitor output from the Organisation of the Petroleum
Exporting Countries say the producers are pumping more than 1.5 million bpd over
their formal 23.5 million bpd output quotas, he said.
"Whatever
agreement is reached on raising the OPEC production ceiling, or quotas, would in
practice be a formalization of the presently available surplus in the market,
fully evident in the consumer countries' rising level of stockpiling," said Mr.
Kazempour.
Mr.
Kazempour said OPEC was not to blame for shoving
OPEC is due
to discuss
Of the
11-member producers' group, only
National Post, Page
A04, 17-May-2004
PMO involved in sponsorship program,
Liberal MP says
By Kate Jaimet
Speaking on
CTV's political program Question Period, Mr. Lastewka said statements by Mr.
Chretien's former chief of staff, Jean Pelletier, made it clear the Prime
Minister's Office and former public works minister Alfonso Gagliano gave
political direction to the program.
"I think it
was very clear," Mr. Lastewka said in response to a question. "Mr. Pelletier ...
said: 'My office was involved.' He said the minister's office was involved. We
know that there was over-involvement by the minister and the Prime Minister's
Office."
Mr.
Lastewka stopped short of saying Mr. Chretien himself was involved in the
awarding of sponsorship contracts to events and to advertising agencies.
"The other
unanswered question is: To what extent did [Mr. Pelletier] get directions from
his boss, the prime minister himself?" Conservative MP Jason Kenney said. "We
also don't know exactly what the current Prime Minister, Mr. Martin, knew, and
when he knew it [and] why he authorized hundreds of millions of dollars to flow
into this secret unity slush fund."
The
sponsorship program channelled $250-million of public funds into events, mainly
in
(Ottawa
Citizen)
National Post, Page A09,
17-May-2004
Foreign journalists' tests of
National Post, Page
A11, 17-May-2004
The saga of an agrarian
plagiarist
By Colby Cosh
The Supreme
Court's decision in Schmeiser v. Monsanto, expected on Friday, will mark the end
of a drama that has lasted about six years -- except it won't be, if I know
Percy Schmeiser. Which I don't.
But I
surely do know his type. One almost pities the U.S. agri-giant, for while it
will almost surely win in court on Friday, and win big, it has picked a fight
with the kind of guy who just won't quit --the cussed, unrelenting small-holding
farmer, whose distrust of big institutions was the seedbed of Hellenistic
civilization and the American Revolution.
Mr.
Schmeiser, who grows canola near
The battle
began when Monsanto got an anonymous tip that Mr. Schmeiser had an unauthorized
field brim-full of the company's Roundup Ready canola. The patented Roundup
Ready is genetically engineered to resist the powerfully lethal glyphosate in
Monsanto's Roundup brand herbicide, so it allows farmers to plant earlier and
spray more often, wiping out a broad spectrum of weeds without hurting the crop.
That means higher yields, and authorized growers are insured by Monsanto for the
cost of the seed if weather wipes out the crop. Since its 1996 introduction, the
product has taken off in
Of course,
there's a catch: To legally grow Roundup Ready, you have to purchase it by the
acre and agree not to save the seed for planting in the next crop year. You're
supposed to buy it anew from Monsanto every time out. If you're found growing a
glyphosate-resistant crop without having signed a user agreement -- and Monsanto
has private detectives on the payroll to catch such people out -- you can end up
in court. That's what they did with Mr. Schmeiser when samples from his crop
were found to consist of more than 90% Roundup Ready canola.
Mr.
Schmeiser disputes this figure, though the tests were made independently and the
samples taken with his permission. His story is that some of Monsanto's
demon-seeds blew onto his land in 1996 from a neighbouring quarter and
adulterated his crop, mixing with the seed he was setting aside year after year.
One way or another, he ended up with much or most of his crop being Roundup
Ready, and he knew, and didn't report, that it was there in the mix. He is not
alleged to have stolen the seed or bought it illicitly. It's a pure patent case:
he is accused of knowingly using a particular genetic sequence without
permission of the inventor. Of being an agrarian plagiarist, if you will.
Although he
has become a hero of the Luddite anti-genetic-modification movement, Mr.
Schmeiser is hardly a squeaky-clean organic farmer; like so many canola growers,
he was a willing user of Monsanto's pesticides before he fell into this legal
pickle. But his lawyers are now fighting the whole idea of a patent on a plant,
pointing to the 2000 Federal Court decision that made it illegal to patent
"higher" life forms in
In the
prelude to the Supreme Court hearing, the Federal Court found that Monsanto was
entitled to about $20,000 in damages -- the hypothetical cost Mr. Schmeiser
would have paid for the seed, plus a modest quantum for harm done to the patent.
But the court also stuck the
The legal
regime that makes farmers police their own crops for Monsanto's intellectual
property is certainly lamentable, and a little repellent, with its neighbourhood
informants and back-road gumshoes. But Monsanto's Canadian patent on Roundup
Ready runs out in 2010, and every farmer knows the rule about making hay while
the sun shines. It goes without saying that Percy Schmeiser, however the coin
comes up on Friday, will continue to regret nothing.
National Post, Page A11,
17-May-2004
Shrinking
The
Conservative party's decision to make tax cuts a central plank of its election
platform is welcome news: Canadians, particularly middle-income Canadians, are
overtaxed. Even after accounting for inflation, the average family's tax burden
has increased 40% since 1961, and now stands at 47% of income, up from 34%,
according to
Citing
recent polls, Mr. Harper's detractors will no doubt claim Canadians don't want
lower taxes. But pollsters typically ask voters either/or questions about health
care and tax breaks that make it hard to say no to more social spending. The
beauty of the Conservatives' plan is that is does not force voters to make that
choice: They propose to fund their $18-billion tax reduction scheme by honestly
accounting for expected surpluses. Rather the copying the Liberal habit of
lowballing expected revenue each year, then -- surprise! -- ending up with an
"unexpected" year-end surplus to dole out on pet projects and friendly
constituencies without Parliamentary oversight, the Conservatives would give
this extra revenue back to taxpayers from the outset. As Conservative leader
Stephen Harper says, there are also billions to be saved from dismantling the
Liberals' sundry "sponsorship scandals, HRDC boondoggles, [and] gun registry
fiascos."
Conservative tax reduction would save Canadians earning
$50,000 a year about $1,000 annually. By comparison, the Liberal cuts announced
on the eve of the 2000 federal election cut those same Canadians' levies by just
$200 a year. The Conservatives will also seek elimination of most corporate
welfare -- nearly $5-billion annually -- in favour of lower taxes for all
companies, an increased child tax deduction, lower capital gains taxes and
removal of the astronomical airline security tax. Combined, all this relief
should spark a major economic surge in this country, akin to the rapid growth
In addition
to tax cuts, the Conservatives' economic and fiscal plan calls for bringing more
spending under the review of Parliament. (Under the Liberals, only about
$55-billion of the $186-billion
Taken
together, these proposals would correct many of the fiscal excesses of the past
11 years. Going into an expected June election, we are gratified that at least
one national party will provide voters with a blueprint for a smaller government
and a more productive economy.
National Post, Page
A01, 17-May-2004
By Adrian Humphreys
A major
government report on the handling of war criminals in
Of five war
criminals the government claimed it has removed from
For the
other two whom
''Our ...
efforts in managing
A closer
examination of the report, however, calls into question the government's
thoroughness on the file.
When Dejan
Demirovic appears at a closed-door admissibility hearing tomorrow morning in
Mr.
Demirovic, 28, is accused in
Mr.
Demirovic came to
Despite his
continuing appeal to remain here, Mr. Demirovic is one of five alleged war
criminals whom the federal government told the Post had been deported for war
crimes between April 1, 2002, and March 31, 2003, the most recent figures
available.
"I have
absolutely no idea how that could be. He has not been deported, he hasn't even
been in custody," said Dragi Zekavica, Mr. Demirovic's
"He has not
left
In the War
Crimes Program report, released on May 4,
In the
report, the government said officials had prevented successful immigration and
refugee claims in
It is in
the numbers of those claimed to have been removed, however, that the statistics
are found wanting.
Aurelio
Amaya-Zelaya is also one of the five removed from
Now 39, Mr.
Amaya-Zelaya was born in
He was
granted refugee status on Nov. 22, 1989, and two days later was arrested by
Over the
next few years, he faced more convictions for violence, drugs and other crimes.
By the
summer of 2002, the government appears to have run out of patience. "The
Minister of the Department of Citizenship and Immigration is of the opinion that
you constitute a danger to the public in
He was
facing yet another round of charges, including assault and threatening, when
immigration officials and the RCMP visited his apartment in June looking to
arrest him but could not find him, government documents say.
It was not
until July 24, 2002, that he was arrested and 10 days later he was flown out of
However,
his deportation order, obtained by the Post, cites as the sole reason for his
removal his assault convictions in
There is no
mention of foreign crimes anywhere in his lengthy government files that were
made public, although an early immigration document shows Mr. Amaya-Zelaya's
reason for seeking refugee status is his claim he was kidnapped by guerrillas
and forced to work with them before escaping. He said he was in danger from the
military in his homeland because of his forced involvement with the rebels.
Also one of
the five is Jorge Anibal Azalgado, according to the government.
Mr.
Azalgado, along with his wife, Erica Moyanao Castro, and three children arrived
in
It took a
year for their applications to be heard. At the private hearings came dark
allegations by both sides. From the Azalgados, there was talk of a kidnap plot
against the children and Ms. Castro being the victim of rape.
From the
government came allegations against Mr. Azalgado from his time in the
Argentinian army, the details of which the government will not release.
On Aug. 2,
2002, the family's claims for refugee status were turned down. Mr. Azalgado was
refused under Article 1 (f) (a) of the United Nations Convention Relating to the
Status of Refugees, according to immigration documents. It is an ominous mark
against him; that section strips refugee status from anyone who has committed a
crime against peace, a war crime, or a crime against humanity. The rest of his
family was refused entry because they did not meet the definition of a refugee.
When the
government went looking for the Azalgados, however, they could not be found.
For nearly
a year the family remained secretly in
Then, on
March 20, 2003, Ms. Castro's car was stopped by
"I beg you
to soften your heart," Mr. Azalgado implored the adjudicator at a March 31,
2003, detention review hearing before the Immigration and Refugee Board.
It appears
that Mr. Azalgado was removed from
National Post, Page A02,
17-May-2004
Air
By Paul Vieira
Air
The
Canadian Union of Public Employees, which represents 5,000 flight attendants,
and the Canadian Auto Workers are the only two unions that failed to strike
deals as of last night, after a weekend of around-the-clock negotiations. The
five other labour groups -- representing plane mechanics, pilots and dispatchers
-- have signed pacts with the airline that will collectively shave $85-million
from Air
But Air
Air
Alejandra
Bravo, a spokeswoman for CUPE's Air
Meanwhile,
Buzz Hargrove, president of the CAW, said the union was engaged in a ''very
difficult'' round of bargaining.
''The
company and the creditors are just asking us to carry too big a load. It's
unfair and unjustifiable,'' he said. He was not optimistic about closing in on
an agreement. ''I don't feel good about where we are at.''
His union
represents ticket agents, call-centre employees and maintenance workers at Air
Both CUPE
and CAW have said the concessions sought by the company would result in its
members losing up to $11,000 a year in income.
Sources
close to the airline's restructuring said the Ontario judge overseeing the Air
Canada file, Mr. Justice James Farley, may have to get involved if one union
holds up a deal. All the unions must agree to concessions, otherwise all deals
previously reached are null and void.
Deutsche
Bank wanted the savings found by Saturday at midnight, or else it threatened to
walk away from its financing deal. It has yet to pull the plug on its
$850-million financing, sources say, because talks between company management
and organized labour were producing results.
Air
Deutsche
Bank's agreement is seen as Air
Mr. Li's
withdrawal was a big blow, as the airline had spent four months in a search for
an investor.
Clearing
the Deutsche Bank hurdles was also key because the airline's largest aircraft
lessor, GE Capital Aviation Services (GECAS), threatened to pull its
US$1.5-billion of financing for Air
Each of the
airline's seven unions was asked to come up with its share of the missing
$200-million in annual savings.
But some of
the unions argued the airline had miscalculated how much they owed. The CAW, for
example, said its shortfall was $18-million, not the $50-million assigned by the
airline. Also, it said the airline has failed to shrink its business as
envisaged last year during labour negotiations.
The
additional savings were found mostly through wage cuts. For example, the
International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers, which represents
10,000 maintenance workers and cargo handlers, agreed to a 6.2% salary rollback,
increased use of part-time workers and changes to its sick leave benefits to
find the $40-million for which it was responsible.
Ron
Fontaine, a national representative with IAMAW, said the biggest hang-up to
securing its deal was the inclusion of a clause to ensure all the labour groups,
including management, would sustain similar-style wage cuts as opposed to opting
for so-called "soft" sacrifices, such as productivity enhancements and changes
to work rules.
"We wanted
to make sure that people were going to step up to the plate," he said yesterday.
The
$200-million in savings will help Air
Nevertheless, some analysts and lawyers for airline
creditors are concerned the additional $200-million shaved from payroll costs
will not be enough to turn around Air
Besides
cost savings, Deutsche Bank had other conditions, such as the unions agreeing to
a mechanism to settle outstanding grievances before Air
But on
Friday, the company cleared a significant Deutsche Bank hurdle when it received
approval from the federal pension regulator to pay back its $1.2-billion pension
shortfall in 10 years, as opposed to five as dictated by law.
Air
National Post, Page A04,
17-May-2004
Martin determined to let MPs screen
judges
By Janice Tibbetts
"The Prime
Minister has said there must be parliamentary review and input of nominees and
he's committed to seeing that happen," his spokesman, Scott Reid, said.
Mr. Reid
said the new system will be in place to fill two seats on the Supreme Court that
open in June with the departures of justices Frank Iacobucci and Louise Arbour.
In a report
last week, the all- party justice committee steered clear of the controversial
prospect of allowing politicians to scrutinize nominees.
Instead,
the majority recommended changing the 129-year-old Supreme Court appointments
system by establishing an advisory committee that would privately prepare a
short list of candidates for the Justice Minister, who would make one or more
recommendations to the Prime Minister.
The panel
would be composed of members of the public, MPs from all parties, judges,
lawyers and provincial representatives.
Under the
current system, the Justice Minister privately and informally consults with the
legal community before making one or more recommendations to the Prime Minister.
Mr. Reid
said Mr. Martin is "positively inclined" toward the report's proposal, but he
plans to take the committee's advice a step further to fulfill a promise to give
MPs a role in scrutinizing the Prime Minister's chosen candidate.
Liberal MP
Derek Lee, chairman of the justice committee, said he thinks his Liberal
colleagues, who signed the majority report, were overly cautious in their
recommendations after experts advised against political vetting of nominees for
fear it would taint the respected Supreme Court and discourage the best
candidates from coming forward. "They may have been so cautious that they
lowballed a potential role for Parliament."
But he said
he believes MPs can avoid a "public circus" by scrutinizing a nominee behind
closed doors and having a formal protocol that includes "no-go areas" so
questioning does not become too personal. "Transparency doesn't mean you do
everything in public; it means parliamentarians acting on behalf of their
electors get to see what's going on."
The
majority report from the committee made a more watered-down recommendation that
the Justice Minister should appear before the committee to explain an
appointment rather than subjecting a judge to questioning.
Mr. Lee
defended the Prime Minister's plans to override the report, saying it was only
"advice" and it was not unanimous. The Conservative, Bloc Quebecois and NDP
members on the committee all wrote dissenting reports.
Mr.
Martin's plans are more closely aligned to the Conservative party
recommendations.
Chief
Justice Beverley McLachlin said recently she wants the coming vacancies filled
by the end of July to give the judges time to prepare for the busy fall session.
It opens in October with a case on whether gays and lesbians should be allowed
to legally marry.
National Post, Page A04,
17-May-2004
By April Lindgren
The
provincial Grits will fire the first salvo tomorrow in a budget that devotes a
section to the need for additional federal health care money, said a senior
Ontario government source who noted the matter has taken on added urgency in
light of the Conservatives' national campaign pledge to slash federal income
taxes by 25%.
"It's just
not possible to have a Canadian health care system and U.S.-style taxes," the
official said.
The
Liberals, who are expected to table a budget with a $7.8- billion deficit, fear
there will be little left in the federal coffers to bolster provincial health
budgets if the race to form the next national government turns into a tax-cut
competition.
While
provincial Cabinet ministers have campaigned for candidates in past federal
elections, the difference this time is that the
National Post, Page FE1,
17-May-2004
By Mitch Moxley
Eight out
of 10 senior executives in Canada say this country's business schools, led by
the Queen's School of Business, are just as good as schools in the United
States, according to a new survey.
"The
perception of Canadian schools is improving," says Derek Leebosh, a senior
associate with Environics Research Group, which conducted the study. He says
many of the business leaders surveyed have first-hand experience with Canadian
and American business graduates, and the graduates here fared as well, and in
some cases better.
Nearly half
of those surveyed identified Queen's as the best business school in
"I'm
certainly happy Queen's is out in front," says David Saunders, dean of the
Queen's program and chair of the Canadian Federation of Business School Deans.
"But it's great for the country that this group of schools, period, are doing so
well. I think that's a testament to the quality of our education system, and the
products and services that our business schools -- all our business schools --
are offering. On average, it really is an outstanding product."
Queen's was
on top for non-degree executive education programs as well, with 29% of
executives favouring the school. Ivey finished second at 15% and
Queen's
also placed 12th on the sixth annual Financial
Mr.
Saunders says he is not overly concerned with the slight drop. "It's highly
competitive. While we always prefer to be going up, not down, I'm certainly not
hitting the panic button because it reflects the strength in the sector."
Queen's
finished in the top 10 in four of the 16 categories, ranking third in the
"follow-up on graduates" category and 10th in "preparation" (not shown), but
24th in the "quality of participants" category.
Other
Canadian business schools on the Financial
National Post, Page FP1,
17-May-2004
If Wal-Mart is worried, maybe we
should be, too
By Peter Morton
Lee Scott,
chief executive of the world's largest retailer, was fretting out loud the other
day about the impact of higher energy prices on Wal-Mart Stores Inc.'s
customers.
From
Wal-Mart's perspective, skyrocketing gasoline prices are taking US$7 each week
out of the average Wal-Mart customer's wallet. One hundred million people shop
at the 1,475 Wal-Mart stores each week, a reason why the Arkansas-based chain
earned US$2.2-billion during its first quarter this year.
"I started
the year with an optimistic view," Mr. Scott said. "I still feel that way.
Although I am concerned about high gasoline prices, I believe that growth in
employment and real income will lessen the impact."
Consumer
spending has been one of the few stabilizing forces in the
Despite the
disappearance of 2.3 million jobs, worries about terrorism and
It may be
too early to tell, but there is concern rising oil and gasoline prices could
undermine the
"This oil
and gasoline price increase will dampen spending," said Larry Jones, a manager
at Durham, N.C.-based NCM Capital Management Group. "There's reason to be
cautious about that."
Part of the
impact will depend on how long oil prices remain high. Each US$10 hike in crude
costs clips about 0.3% from
Last week,
the International Energy Agency said the countries in the Organization for
Economic Co-operation and Development, which includes
However,
pinpointing why oil and gasoline prices are skyrocketing, especially in the
Much of the
blame has been laid on
Yet there
are more fundamental reasons why gasoline prices are so high in the
Purnomo
Yusgiantoro, OPEC's secretary-general, insists there is plenty of oil on global
markets.
"The recent
high prices are closely linked to geopolitical uncertainties, inadequate
refining capacity in the
That is
what refiners told Congress last week during hearings on soaring gasoline
prices.
In the past
20 years, the number of
"Unfortunately, our rising gasoline demand and the need
for more domestic gasoline production capacity collide with public policies,
local opposition and regulatory obstacles that deter increased domestic refining
capacity," said Bob Slaughter, president of the National Petrochemical and
Refiners Association.
In the
"We don't
think environmental requirements are a major factor in the run-up of gas
prices," Don Zinger, chief of staff of the Office of Air and Radiation for the
U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, said recently.
Even with a
reduction in global prices, however, few expect relief at the pumps soon. "There
is a need for consumers to fasten their seatbelts," says Richard Levitan, a
Whether
that ultimately hurts the
Bill
Cheney, chief economist at MFC Global Investment Management in
"Oil prices
have a nasty history of being associated with drastic falls in consumer and
business confidence which could, in principle, be a bigger deal," he says.
And that
means Mr. Lee may not get his US$7 back for some time to come.
The Daily News (
B.C. Liberals face horse race with
NDP next May
Premier
Gordon Campbell's Liberals captured 77 of 79 seats in the May 2001 election
while on their way to dumping the two-term New Democratic Party government and
winning the most lopsided electoral victory in
One of the
party's first moves was to legislate fixed election dates, giving British
Columbians -- and the opposition NDP -- a clear view of the path to the next
election exactly a year away.
On May 17,
2005, the surprising consensus from business, opposition and even some Liberals
is that the
Or, as one
business leader suggests, are voters witnessing an extreme example of a
B.C.-style political correction?
''Obviously
77 to two was an extraordinary result and they obviously had one way to go and
that was down,'' said Jock Finlayson, B.C. Business Council vice president.
The NDP
traditionally receives between 30 per cent and 40 per cent of the popular vote
in
''Most
people in the business community expected that we would have a real political
contest in the province going into the 2005 election,'' he said. ''I didn't
think they (NDP) were going to disappear.''
The
ace-in-the-hole that gives
''The
Joy
MacPhail, the retiring NDP leader, said the Liberals may try to focus on the
economy as a success, but they can't hide that they've cut out the hearts of
many British Columbians to get there.
Hospital
closures, labour battles, job cuts and broken promises, especially surrounding
the B.C. Rail deal, have voters looking again to the NDP, she said.
The
majority of women voters left the Liberals long ago and now even male voters are
considering the government too mean-spirited, said MacPhail.
Recent
polls have shown a deep male-female divide among B.C. voters, she said. Almost
50 per cent of B.C.'s women voters support the NDP, while 49 per cent of male
voters back the Liberals.
''There is
a substantial chance that the Liberals will lose the next election,'' said
MacPhail. ''Right now the people are saying that they don't want the Liberals to
govern, but they are still asking some very pertinent questions of New
Democrats.''
However,
Finlayson said
B.C. will
likely outpace the country in growth next May, spurred on by rising housing
starts, booming energy development and increasing business investment, he said.
MacPhail
said the NDP is already putting together an election strategy that focuses on
portraying the New Democrats as the positive alternative to the extreme agenda
of
The NDP,
under new leader Carole James, wants to end the B.C. political tradition of
voting out the current government and replace it with a decision by voters to
support a new government, MacPhail said.
The fiery
debater couldn't resist taking a shot at Campbell, who she said lost the hope
and trust of voters.
''The
biggest single fault of this government is Gordon Campbell losing the trust of
British Columbians,'' MacPhail said. ''They may have early on been troubled by
some of his personal characteristics, but now they actually don't trust him at
all.''
The Daily News (
PM no closer to the
truth
When Prime
Minister Paul Martin rode into office on a wave of goodwill only to be caught in
the undertow of the sponsorship scandal, he promised to get to the bottom of the
mess before calling an election.
He's riding
his surfboard again these days, though, buoyed by a surge in the polls as
outrage over the $250-million sponsorship scandal dissipates. He is poised to
drop the writ for a June 28 election.
But Martin
is nowhere near honouring his promise to root out wrongdoers, and Canadians are
scarcely closer to the truth than they were when Jean Chretien rode off into the
sunset.
The arrest
for fraud this week of Chuck Guite, a relatively low-level bureaucrat who had
access to Ottawa's movers and shakers, and Jean Brault, the president of
Groupaction marketing, has done little to clear the air.
Conservative Leader Stephen Harper called the timing of
the charges ''more than a little suspicious'' considering recent calls made by
Martin's chief
''It would
provide relief, because I think people want to see people found guilty,''
Lapierre said April 21. ''They want to see people accused and eventually found
guilty, that's clear.''
No one is
yet accusing the RCMP of cowtowing to its federal overseers and the RCMP
vehemently denied it was influenced, but the optics are certainly bad. Martin's
man calls for charges and arrests are made on the eve of a campaign, providing
Grits with both ammunition and cover.
Liberals
can now point to the arrests as proof they're serious about finding out how $100
million in tax dollars was funnelled to Liberal-friendly advertising firms in
They can
also clam up when they're asked pertinent questions on the campaign trail,
citing the confidentiality of criminal proceedings.
The
parliamentary committee probing the scandal was suspended Tuesday after Liberal
MPs flexed their majority muscle and will be terminated with an early election
call. That means some 90 witnesses, including Liberal power brokers, won't
testify before the drafting of an interim report.
Calling the
election now also enables the tarnished Liberals to paint Guite and Brault as
scapegoats and Guite, in particular, as a rogue bureaucrat operating without any
political direction.
But the
notion Guite was flying the sponsorship plane solo is laughable at best. Martin
himself has admitted ''there had to be political direction'' in the sponsorship
scandal.
Canadians
still don't know the truth and Martin is insulting voters -- not to mention
breaking an oft-repeated promise -- if he pulls the plug on the probe before it
answers the central question: Who gave Guite direction and, if he were
fraudulently freelancing, why was he never found out?
The buck
shouldn't stop in the bureaucracy.
Even though
he has articulated no bold vision, Martin now claims he needs a mandate from the
Canadian people. Curious.
He's
already reigned unelected for more than 150 days without dropping the writ,
approaching the record set in 1949 by Louis St. Laurent.
Why has
Martin been hit so hard with spring election fever? Maybe it's because he
doesn't know where the RCMP investigation might lead to by fall. Maybe it's
because he does.
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