6 — Wednesday, May 20, 1998 - North Shore News UTH j justice reform proposals released last week by the federal _ government shine glimmers of light upon an issue that has languished too long on political backburners. ~ . As Justice Minister Anne McLean was quoted as saying in releasing her proposal package: “The current system is not working as it should in many significant areas. We need to do more to‘ prevent youth crime in the first place...” To say that McLellan’s statement is “” behind the curve would be charitable. . The outery from parents and crime victims across the country over the . past decade and half that the current “Young Offenders Act has been in place .. would have been hard for anyone to ; ignore. “Even ‘youth _ no, especially youth | = —- knew there was something wrong ia pe eason the name of their chelner from ay SAGE. Transition House totally, uncon- : “House north shore news VIENPOINT with a system that was held in such contempt by groups on both sides of the judicial fence: juvenile delinquents, budding career criminals, victims and the public. McLelian’s proposals include lower- ing the age limit from 16 to 14 for young offenders who can be handed adult sentences; special sentencing for the most violent, high-risk offenders; encouraging restitution to victiins and other alternatives to jail; and permit- ‘ ting the publication of names of young offenders convicted of such serious crimes as murder, attempted murder and aggravated sexual assault. The proposals ali have merit. They xecognize the deficiencies in the current system. But they are still proposals, and unless they are institut- ed and executed, they will be little more than political lip service. CIR Lis Commtnr- Bp. Symes Pte wit. iN tate. (A nAOLAT Oa Loon BUMMER! THAT MEANS. INSTEAD OF DONG TWELVE MONTHS FOR ONRDER, WELL HAVE Tb DO EIGHTEEN. = Siehalleation watchdog needed THE tragic chaos erupting last week in Indonesia is a timely warning of what’s wrong with today’s Simple-Simon concept of “globalization.” Nobody is in _. charge. As noted here some wecks ago, globalization — promoted by the big ners, | held a strong opinion “about : crsons” and to: participate fully in pursued this all the way to the Privy Council in’ England and ‘won. id “strong opinions. about’ 1 many other “subjects, rhich, rightly: o ‘od; ‘rongly, were common in her time peri- are. still held by many people. - ions are not-politically correct today, is Services Society. have. decided that Emily: y’s freedom to have held these outweigh her good nd: they no longer want her name associated with for helping abused and battered women. |” Emily Maury rphy’s views were known when Emily Murphy : r ‘Begun aid named and there ‘were no objections. has: been; ;no public outcry since,-and to propose am hange’ ‘at this’ late! date, -perely for reasons: of “political correctness” is'an insult to her memory and the rk she-did on women's behalf. .° he society’s board of directors should reconsider. onald M. Currie 4 ‘or mist be legible (preferably type: a ie written) and include your name, full address and telephone number.Due to ‘space constraints the North Shore News nnot publish’ all letters. - : North Shore News, founded in 4969.5 an under Schedule 111, Paragraoh 191 of the Enise Tax Act, is published each Wednesday, Friday and Sunday by Norra Shore Fee Press : Jonathan Geil Creative Servines Matager “ 9BS-2431 (127); re fs _ 6 eam et ey : 988-1337 (124) . : newspaper and qualified transnational corpora: °. tions as the flavor-of-the- month answer to all* humanity’s woes — paints a warm, fuzzy pic-_-. ture of everyone from “ California to Kenya, from Cape Horn to Korea, happily mak- ing zillions of goods of every kind, selling them to each other and everyone enjoy- _ ing a North American living standard as a result. A wonderful idea — the only problem being that it doesn’t work and never can, "certainly not as long as the outcome is left to independent sovereign states. Last year’s economic mefrdown in Indonesia and other East Asian countries had a common pattern: borrow wildly from unregulated banks in order to pro- duce far more goods than you can sell. Soon, of course, so many of the borrow- ers go broke that the banks — stuck with thousands of bad debts — also go broke. And when enough banks go broke, the nation itself finally goes broke. Then along comes doc, in the shape of the International Monetary Fund (IMF), to treat the bankrupt country’s condition with multi-billion-dollar injections PETER SPECK — Shaliwal Publisher ° Human Resources Manayer “985-2131 (101) 905-2131 (171 Terry Peters Photography Manager 985-2131 (160) Doug F bot Comptrolter 985-2131 (133) Stephanzon Classified Manager 986-6222 (202) Entire contents © 1997 North Shore Free Press Lid. All rights reserved. accompanied by extremely painful side-. effects for the whole population — like soaring unemployment, steeply rising prices, a heavily devalued currency and _ shortages or disappearance of mast imported goods. In more or less democ- ratic states like South Korea, Singapore and Thailand the painful therapy at least has'a chance to work, °° because such govern- ments get a mandate from the electorate 10 - endure the EMF trear- ment in return for the promise of eventually restored health. But Indonisia being run by ailing 76- year-old dictator Suharto and his army, there was, never any popular consensus to back the IMF demands. So when food, fuel and other, prices shot sky-high, the people’s anger finally boiled over, leading “to, looted and torched Jakarta shopping malls with hundreds left dead on its streets... Meanwhile, the East Asian economic collapse points up globalization’s biggest weakness: the absence of any universal - rules to contro! irresponsible financing, - production and trade. Such rules have long been developed by the top industrial nations. In Canada, for example, our internal banking system comes under strict government scrutiny. Much of our production requires some form of government licensing to ensure adequate standards. Our trade is subject to suff anti-monopoly laws. Asia’ 's former “little tigers” — now _ ussycats meowing for IMF milk ignored the need for such rules, especially ‘in their wild:and wacky banking system nd as globalization accelerates, exactly the same kind of disaster lurks for devel- oping countries in Africa, South and Central America. The only thing that can save devel- oped and developing nations alike from repeated attacks of cconomic “Asian flu” is some form of financial and economic: . world policeman.to enforce globally the ground rules long followed by the. U.S:, Ganada and their leading First World “. - : partners. In other words, preventive mied-- icine instead of the present nasty IMF = therapy only after the disease has struck: In inter-governmental circles thig id is already being : activ ely ex, problem, of course, Seing’ LOW tq récon-: cile such a world watchdog with the’... national sovereignty of the unsophisticat- ed developing nations primarily affected: Morcover, the Internet's ability to trans: | fer vast sums of capital around the globe in seconds with a few quick keystrokes : does nothing to help economic sani So for now keep up your anti-glo al ization shots. It can be a nasty illness, with no certain cure! ‘ 7 004. : . AN 80-CANDLE birthday salute #2: Saturday, May 23, co. North Van City Mayor Jack Loucks... And 1 many: happy returns of that day.to Highlands United Church's Diaconai’ ‘Minister Ross Wh vo O a WRIGHT OR WRONG: If you can’t relax, maybe you: haven't forced d yourself, cnough. : LETTERS TO THE EDITOR Leiters must include your nane, tult address & teleptione number. imethy Rexshaw Managing Editor 985-2131 (116) Genera! Office Manager intemet- http://worw.nsnews.com 1139 Lonsdale Avenue Worth Vancouver, B.C., VIA e-mail: trenshaw @ direct.ca Display & Real Estate Fax _. fiewsroom Fax: Classified, Accounting — & Main Office Fax ~~ Michael Becker - News Editor’: 9B5-213t (314) Andrew McCredie - Sports/Community Editar 985-2131 (147) - Galt Snelgrove 985-2131 (105) VIM 2He -