In

“sunday

Home truths

The love of secrecy,
government departments seem increasingly
addicted, can liave particularly unfortunate
effects in the case of group homes for
handicapped or underprivileged youngsters.
Two recent examples have arisen in West
Vancouver and North Vancouver District.

On both occasions there has been an
outcry from neighboring residents — not so
much because of the group home as such,
but because they had not been adequately
informed in advance or. given an opportunity
to voice their views.
North Van District neighborhood
approval of a group home is not mandatory,
but this begs the question. Where a house in
any single-family area is going to be used for
a different purpose from that of adjoining
homes, the neighbors have the same moral
right to be told the facts — and to express
their opinions — as in the case of a rezoning.

These group foster homes typically ac-
commodate five or six deserving youngsters,
often from the district in which the home is
located, in charge of a trained supervisor.
There have been virtually no complaints
about the numerous such homes already
operating on the North Shore, nor any
evidence that they affect property values.
They provide an important service for
children and young people with problems
not of their own
indicates that local residents have nothing to
fear from them. —

Its a pity, therefore, to see initial relations
with the neighbors soured by bureaucrats
with a communication problem.

Late night sport

Marital bliss in Britain is taking a beating
from late-night soccer on TV. The doctors’
newspaper Pulse says more and more men
are complaining of headaches when bedtime
arrives.. Apparently the stirring play-by-plays
on the tube are exhausting their emotions,
leaving them with no energy for their
conjugal duties.

U.K. psychiatrists suggest the
solution may be to make sex sinful again.
Meanwhile, B.C. wives, too, should be on
the alert for that 11 p.m. excuse “Not
tonight, dear, the Whitecaps lost.”

rt ews

985-2131

Chlassified

Mandy Fraser

pecneey.
Excise+Tan Act, is
Non Shore Free

Free Press Lid. All

VERIFIED CIRCULA
50,870
Wednesday

news

NEWS ADVERTISING CLASSIFIED CIRCULATION

‘980-0511
Publisher Peter Speck

Associate Publisher Editor-in-Chief Advertising Director
Robert Graham Noe! Wright Eric Cardwell

& Office Administrator
Bemi Hillard

VTM 2H4
(604) 985-2131

986-6222

Production
Tim Francis
Faye McCrae

News Editor Photograph
Chris Lioyd y

end
Mail

1139 Lonsdale Ave.,
North Vancouver, B.C.

to which some

and the record

only

986-1337

Giisworth Dickson
Accounting Supervisor
Barbara Keen

North Shore News, founded in 1969 as an independent comm
under Schedule li, Part I. Paragraph Il of
published each Wednesday Sunday,
Press Utd. and distributed to every door on the
Registrat

Second Class lon Number 3885
Sutecriptions $20 por yeas Entre contents © 1980 North Shore
rights reserved

commun-

by

No reaponsibéity accepted tor unsolicited material, including
manuscripts and pictures, which should be accompanied by a
stamped, addressed ratumn envelope

<o.gia Gna SR" (Rh Ch)

THIS PAPER [S RECYCLABLE

By.W. ROGER WORTH

A youngster in Thunder
Bay, Ontario, missed part of
the hockey season this year,
even though he was ready to
sign the forms required by
the local sports association
and pay the annual fee.

The reason his application
to play minor hockey was
disallowed: the kid didn't
have a _ Social Insurance
Number.

That's just one example of
the creeping use of a
numbering system for people
that is causing widespread
concern in Canada.

Canadians have indeed
come a long way since 1964
when Parliament approved
simple legislation setting up
a social imsurance num-
bering system to control
information relating to only
two programs, the Canada
Pension Plan and the federal

unemployment insurance
scheme.
In fact, the only people

who legally require a social
insurance number are in-
dividuals over 18 who are

working in pensionable
employment.

So much for the law and
the Parliamentary activity
that resulted in a nine-digit
numbering system not unlike
the one presented in the
1984 scenario by George
Orwell.

What's happened with
Ottawa’s “restricted-use”
social insurance number, of
course, is history.

In efforts to upgrade
electronic accounting and
information systems, banks,
financial institutions, credit

card companies, schools,
libraries, even sports
associations are grabbing

individual numbers these
days.

The government has even
forced banks to withhold
25% of Canada Savings
Bond dividend payments to
people without. social in-
surance numbers.
Discrimination indeed.

Realistically, it’s difficult
to operate without a social
insurance number, no
matter what government
authorities say.

As.a result of concern
over the burgeoning use of
the numbers and_ the
potential for invasion of
personal privacy by making
private information readily
available to almost anyone, a

Commissioner has been
appointed to study the issue.
It’s about time.

Parliament should either
broaden legislation controll-
ing the social insurance

NTERNAL
REVENUE

Sea

numbers

numbering system or forbid
use of the numbers by
private groups and in-
stitutions. At least the public
would be re-assured that
Canada's legislators fully
linderstand what is hap-
pening.

(Roger Worth is Director,

Public Affairs, Canadian
Federation of Independent
Business.)

“One question in parting -- who audits yours?”

On government by consent

Do the people we vote into power to run our
affairs really have a clue what they’re doing some
of the time — or even most of the time? Has
modern government become much too important
to be left to the politicians? Can we any longer
afford to give our elected rulers a blank cheque to
do what they will with us for up to four or five years

ata stretch?

These are some of the
intriguing questions raised in
a paid advertisement in last
weekend’s Sunday News by a
group calling itself the
“Canadian Committee for
Constitutional Reform”. Its
chairperson, Andree Ross, is
a North Vancouver resident.

The ad takes the form of a
petition to MLAs and MPs
which eligible voters are
invited to sign. If its
provisions are ever adopted,
they will make the “par-
ticipatory democracy”
briefly promoted (and
quickly abandoned) by
Prime Minister Pierre
Trudeau in the late sixties
look like a party game.

Among other things, the
CCCR petition calls for the
following constitutional
guarantees:

© Referendums. A petition
signed by two-thirds of the
voters would have the same
force in law as any bill that
bad passed third reading. A
petition signed by onc-third
of the voters would force a
binding referendum on the
issuc in question within one
year.

e Firing. The ciectorate —
acting through an om-
budsman's tribunal — should
have the right to dismiss any
politician or civil servant
found to be “acting in a
manner conpery to the
public interest.”

¢ Government spending
increases should not exceed
the inflation rate nor result
in a budget deficit without
the express conscnt of the
clectorate in a referendum.

° Fixed elections. Federal
and provincial governments

to be appointed for a fixed
four-year term without the
government _— necessarily
resigning if one of its bills is
defeated. No prime minister
or premier would normally
serve for more than two
terms.
e Freedom of information
on all government activities
except where this could
threaten national security.
°A Bil of Rights which
could not be restricted by
any other legislation — with
specific safeguards against
discrimination, unreasonab-
le search and arrest, and
interference with the right of
assembly and petition.
Certain of these proposals
are calculated to make an
RCMP Commissioner's hair
stand on end. More
significant, however, is the
fact that numerous of them
appear to have _ been
borrowed directly from the
U.S. constitution .which
differs fundamentally in
theory and practice from the
British constitutional system
still largely followed in
Canada.

PEOPLE POWER

The U.S. concept, en-
shrined in the Declaration of
Independence, places
ultimate power with the
people at all times — not
merely at elections. § It
provides for referendums
with the force of law (as in
the case of the California
taxpayers’ famous
Proposition 13 “revolt” of
1978). It provides for direct
popular control
government budgets, a
standing feature, for
example. of the Oregon

over

by
Noel Wright

constitution. It provides for

the impeachment of the
President himself, a _ fate
which Richard Nixon
escaped only six short years
ago by resigning.

By contrast, the British-
Canadian approach to
government remains largely
paternalistic. It presumes
that the people's
representatives elected to
Parliament, legislatures and
councils will be endowed
with certain special wisdoms
and talents in the art of
ruling and, once chosen,
should be left to get on with
the job — without further
interference from the
ignorant peasantry.

If the peasantry finds it
doesn’t like what they're
doing, it has to wait as long
as five years to fire them and
choose a new bunch. Apart
from expressing its
displeasure through the
media, that’s about the sum
total of a Canadian elec-
torate’s direct control over a
majority government it has
once voted into power.

*BORN” RULERS?

Despite numerous reforms

. along the way in matters of

detail, the British-Canadian
approach still traces its
origins back to the com-
paratively illiterate England
of the eighteenth century
and earlier, with its sharp
distinction between a tiny
minority of “born” rulers and
the overwhelming majority
of the ignorant ruled.

It still tends to ignore the
enormous impact on the
democratic system of today’s
highly educated and amply
informed public. Pretty
obviously tens of thousands
of 1980 voters are at least as
well qualified, in terms of
knowlege and judgment, as
the MPs, MLAs and council
members they select on
polling day. Those same
voters also have a much
clearer grasp of the overall
political process than any
previous electorate in
history.

Our elected represen-
tatives, of course, remain
stuck with the often
thankless task of grappling
with the day-to-day details of
government — a job which
should not be underrated.
But it may be equally
nonsensical, in this day and
age, to confine the in-
volvement of the voters in
that crucial task to a 60-
second ceremony every few
years at the ballot box.

The CCCR proposals
contain some strong meat
which certain of our present
political bosses may find
decidedly indigestible.
Nevertheless, they provide
those of us on the receiving
end of government with
interesting food for thought
as we survey the handiwork
of the fellows we've put in
charge.

Who knows? Some of
them might cven welcome a
little firm guidance — and
consent — from the rest of
us along the way. At least
they wouldn't have to carry
the can for everything that
got screwed up.