AG - Wednesday, July 21, 1982 - North Shore News La . 8 In a little more than two months, the two consortia of ~ Companies bidding on the cost too much, can be - painted—gray, and sold as ..4 2 effective weapons *~ his NDP > impress on ee the recession worsens. are doing an energetic job < Socreds’ political “soft. sree. sthility::of the . op- position is to hold itself ready ‘to offer the electorate an alternative government. This | implies that an opposition party must have positive new policies and approaches ‘that will be an improvement on those of the incumbent government or, at any rate, promise to be. It is hard to discern any such policies and approaches emanating from the NDP at the present time. One reason may be the sentimental link between the party and organized labor. In his heart of hearts Mr. Barrett may well recognize the inevitability of wage restraints as a first urgent step towards solving our economic woes. But it would be political suicide for him to espouse such a policy publicly, even if the Socreds had not already pre-empted it. The traditional NDP concept of solving problems simply by throwing other people’s money at them is clearly out of tune with the times. This is the root of Mr. Barrett's current political dilemma. Meanwhile, the Socreds — accident-prone though they are — at least give signs now of coming to grips with the crisis in practical, comprehensible ways. By contrast our alternative govern- ment seems hogged down back at the starting post. Exploitation It is difficult, if not impossible, to fathom any justifiable rationale for the publishing of a book on the Olson murders, save that of profit. To claim the public interest is being served by that publication with its sen- sationalistic blood-dripping cover is to stretch the limits of imagination. Acceptance of this book demeans all of us as human beings. Free CENCE OF PLURTTE AED WERT VARCOUVER sunday news Disptay Advortising 980-0511 north shore Classified Advertising 986-6222 n ew Ss Nowsroom 985-2131 Circulation 986-1337 1139 Lonsdale Ave., North Vancouver, 6.C V7M 2H4 Publisher Peter Speck Associate Publisher Robert Graham Edltor-in-Chiot Noel Wright Advortisifl) Director Tim Francis General Manager, Administration & Personnel Mrs Bern Hilhard Circutation Director Bran A Eths Production Director Rick Stonehouse North Ghore News, founded in 1960 as an indapendent community Nowapaper and qualifiod undo: Schedvwo @ Porn @ Paragraph fli of the txcise lax Act ts pubtiahed oach Wednesday and Sunday by North Shore Free Press Ltd and distribted to every door on the North Shore Second Class Mail Registration Number 3685 Entire contents ‘ 1982 North Ghore Free Presse Ltd. All rights reserved Subscriptions North and Went Vancouver $20 per year Malling rates availatte on request No responsibility accepted foc unaaticited maternal inching manuscnpts and pictures witch showdtd be accCUmMparnod by «a stampod exicdressed envetope VE RIE IE O CIRCUA ATION 63,099 Wednesday 53.404 Sunday THIS PAPER IS RECYCLABLE contract fo build six new . _ patrol: ‘frigates for Canada | will make their. final sub- missions to the Defence - Department's : Frigate Project Office. By admission of the project office, the ““schéme to buy six new frigates is now nearly two years behind schedule, ’ Fhat means it will be late 1987 before the first of the six ships is completed, and late 1991 before the last ship is ready for turn-over to the Canadian Armed Forces. By that time the newest ships in Canada’s naval inventory at present — the four DDH-280 Tribal Class Destroyers — will be 20 years old and ready for retirement. Canada could well be down to a six-ship navy. That’s a prospect which doesn’t seem to worry federal politicians overly, despite the fact that Canada, with the world’s longest coastline, is a nation which lives by trading and has the world’s richest off-shore resources, without the means to protect them. The Frigate Project office iS quite open about saying that government instructions on the program dictate that all other considerations are secondary to cost. That means the politicians will be quite happy with second-rate ships, providing they don't politically. Cost considerations, example, dictate that no ‘ weapon be installed in our six new frigates unless itis an* “operational” weapon. That. -...; ‘submitted, means “operational” as of - for- = To comes into service, in cary 1988, the weapons on that vessel will already be out of date, because they will be 1982-83 weapons. In today’s world of weaponry, the effectiveness of weapons doubles roughly every five years. Imagine then, now ef- fective the weapons of the new ships will be by the time the last one comes into service in 1992. We'll have six new ships with weapons that are already 10 years out of date and roughly one quarter as effective as the state of the art will be in the early 1990s. It was thinking like that which condemned HMS Sheffield to destruction in the Falkland Islands. Sheffield, with extemely good long range air detection radar, did not have any close-in defence against missiles, and consequently fell victim to an Exocet from the Argentine air force. The British saved money by not fitting Sheffield class destroyers with anti-missile missiles. We're planning on saving money in much the same way. Does affirmative action work? By MICHAEL A. WALKER A recent survey = con- ducted by a local television station (CKVU) suggested that most people in British Columbia don’t know what affirmative action programs are. And, given the picthora of government § programs new and old, which populate the tandscape, the average citizen can be forgiven for such a lapse. For those who have not been introduced to this acw form of government help, affirmative action programs are effectively reverse discrimination programs. They involve singling out particular groups in socicty for special treatment when it comes to jobs, places in universitics or grants and subsidies. Fortunately, most of the evidence we have on the operation of affirmative action programs comes from the United States where there have been a varicty of programs to force employers to employ members of minority groups and also to force universities to ensure that a certain fraction of these minorities are registered in their various programs. Canadian involvement in the ficld started off slowly with ai federal cabinct decision calling for an af- farmative action program in May 1975, the establishment of an affirmative action secretariat in Novembcr 1975, and with the Pedcral Contracts program = of February 1976 The latter mandated that employers with federal service con- tracts of $200,000 per year or more and with 50 or more employees be asked to set up affirmative action programs on a “voluntary” basis. Support for affirmative action programs = gained momentum with the Canadian Human Rights Act of March 1978 which prohibited discrimination on the basis of age, scx, race, religion, marital status, colour, criminal conviction for which a pardon was received, and national otigin. And finally, Em- ployment and Immigration Canada's affirmative action stratcgy program of July 1978. Most readers of this article will wonder why = any reasonable person could oppose an_ affirmative program, a positive program, of assistance to the downtrodden, the neglected, and minority group members. Surely, it will be snid the plight of many minority groups crics out for adjustment and any legislative cndcavours in this regard which might succecd should be tricd. The reason why thinking people should consider these programs is because, first and foremost, they are not positive programs. They arc not’ programa of positive action; they are programs of ccverse discrimination. Thcy arc programs of cxcluding onc group from jobs or university places in order to make room for other groups Because they are, in ef- fect, reverse discrimination programs, affirmative action programs have the effect of increasing the animosity of majority groups toward the plight of minorities and have the effect, therefore, of worsening the ultimate position of minority groups. This was brought home with a chilling and frightening ring by the comments of onc of the leaders of the infamous Ku Klux Kian in the United States. Imperial Wizard Bill Wilkinson of Danham Springs, Louisiana; when asked why his group (which is onc of three major Klan organizations) has gained in membership, said without hesitation: “Affirmative action programs, and the Weber decision by the Supreme Court has done more to make a race war possible in this country than anything the Klan has donc.” While Klansman Wilkinson is hardly an unbiased source of information, he certainly indicates what the reaction of American whites has been to the exreme forms of affirmative action as now practised in the United States. Those who really are concerned about the position of minority groups ought to consider long and hard their casy acceptance of affimmative action programs and_ consider whether or not they are, in fact, in the interests of the minority groups who arc affected by them. (Dr. Walker is Director of the Vancouver-based Fraser Institute.) NOEL WRIGHT ON VACATION