6 - Wednesday, January 22, 1986 - North Shore News

Editorial Page

° . é a uh
Premium plot?
“| kyrocketing premiums in recent months
for liability insurance hit everyone. They
# lead directly to higher taxes, higher
health costs and higher prices for most goods
and services.
Premiums that soar by as much, in some
cases,.as 800% in a single year clearly demand
a public accounting.
Liberal MPs are therefore more than
justified in demanding a federal probe of what
. they suspect to be a conspiracy. Nobody has
* yet given a convincing explanation of why the
hikes have been so sudden, so universal and so
simultaneous.
Insurance industry spokesmen blame a cost
_ Squeeze: on big international re-insurers who
ca finance the primary insurers to whom they are
now passing on the squeeze. They attribute this
: to recent major disasters like the Bhopal gas
> leak in India, an unprecedented series of air
: crashes, - ‘the Mexican. earthquake and hur-
|: ticanes in the U. S. plus increasingly high claim
= awards by courts and ‘Canada’s drooping in-
: terest rates last year, which brought a lower
: return on insurers’: investments.
AS a result, they say, B.C. insurers paid out
7 nearly twice as much in 1985 claims as they got
“back. in-premiums..-
Did this shortfall take into account invest-
q ment revenue as well as premiums? How are
he. final « claims. from. the 1984-85 disasters _

‘sue thie bastards”. trend. by: liigious-minded -

|. claiman and fee-Lungry lawyers? Why did vir-
* tually all insurance companies — whose in-

£0. ‘the: ‘same route so abruptly at the same time?
»-These are just a few: of the questions deman-
lic

jt is. not being: ripped. off by Ls ‘Premium plot.

Just in case!

0 ing o worry ‘about, of. course, in
the ‘news that a manufacturing sub-
idiary ‘of Urban Transportation

Development Corp. — the Ontario Crown cor-
; poration ‘that supplied Vancouver’s SkyTrain
; — is busy: laying’ ‘off workers. Or: that UTBC

itself, meanwhile, is up for sale, Just the same,
. we can’t help hoping the SkyTrain people have
stocked up with: plenty of spare parts.

. St voce Or Nomi Ato EAT VANCOUVER .
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1139 Lonsdate Ave., North Vancouver, B.C. V7M 2H4

Publisher: Peter Speck

Editor-in-Chiet
Noel Wright

Operations Manager
Berni Hilliard.

Advertising Director
_Linda Stewart

Managing Editor ©
Nancy. Weatherley

. North Shore News, founded in 1989 as an independent suburban
newspaper and qualified under Schedule ili, Part 41, Paragraph I ot
the Excise Tax Act. is published each Wednesday, Friday and Sunday
by North Shore Free Press Lid. and distributed to avery door on the North
Shore. Second Class Mail Registration Nutnber 3885. Entire contents
©1986 North Shore Free Press Ltd. All rights reserved.

Subscriptions North and West Vancouver, $25. per year, Mailing rates
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unsolicited material including manuscripts and pictures which should
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Member. of. the B.C. Press Council

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Nactena

| dividual profit positions presumably differ — .

f ding’ answers if the public is to be reassured that -

ip

THROUGHOUT THE AGED.

IMPLEMENTS USED FOR EXTORTION AND ROBBERY

THe MUSKET.

los

Mate

|New poker game in Geneva?

“THE WORLD CAN SLEEP EASIER
TONIGHT,’’ declared Ronald Reagan after his
-November summit with Mikhail Gorbachev. Cynics

may have sneered a bit too scon.

‘ Cautious :as one must be, ©

there are some first faint signs
that the U.S. President may
have had more in mind than
shraply throwing off a catchy
headline.

And so may the Soviet
Jeader with his spectacular call
for a sweeping, three-stage
disarmament plan to rid the

world of nuclear weapons

within 14 years.

” It's easy to dismiss the plan
as. merely. another high-
powered propaganda offen-
sive by Moscow, which in part
it undoubtedly is. But this time
there are several more positive
aspects for which Reagan
himself can also take credit.

The mere fact that Ronnie
describes certain of the Rus-
sian proposals as ‘‘construc-
tive’’
study them carefully is, in
itself, quite a major break-
through, That alone sets a
healthier tone for the U.S.-
Soviet arms talks that resum-
ed last week in Geneva,

At the same time, Gor-
bachev — a schoolboy when
World War Two began — is
obviously a very different

and has promised to”

v
/

character from his aged andail-
ing predecessors Chernenko,
Andropov and Brezhnev. |
This in no way makes him
any, less toughly dedicated to
furthering Soviet interests. But
he comes across very clearly as
_a man of the eighties and

“nineties, a realist looking for-

ward to many years of power
still ahead if he plays the right
cards in the domestic and
world poker games.

The most important card
may well have become the
sheer cost of the arms race and
its crippling effect on the stag-
nant Russian economy.
Similar thoughts can’t be ab-

sent from Reagan's mind,’

LETTER OF THE DAY

Bugged by

Dear Editor:
Whatever happened to the

" anti-litter law? While mil-

lions of dollars are being
spent upgrading and beauti-
fying the Lower Lonsdale
area and elsewhere, the lit-
terbugs counteract with their
brainless deed. I for one am

fed up.
Here we are with Expo
around the corner, with

people both at the provincial
and municipal! level spending
a lot of money to make this
part of our world a better

place to live and to look as
presentable as possible for
all the visitors we expect in
the “ear future, and yet this
atrocity is allowed. The
boulevards in many places
are regular dumps
Street East, north side).

Most of us want to be
proud of our city. So please
folks, although you may not
be responsible for the mess
some thoughtless person
placed at your doorstep,
please be responsible for its
removal. It is such a small

‘Noel Wright

(3rd.

even though the U.S. is
economically better equipped
to handle the cost.

- In 1984 the world spent

© focus ©

’

" $800 billion on arms, or $130

for every man, woman and
child on the planet — the
largest portion on the huge
Warsaw Pact and NATO
arsenals. Given the ongoing,
35-year arms stalemate bet-
ween the superpowers and, in
particular, Russia’s desperate

need to improve the living -

standards of its people, the
idea of bringing the staggering
bills to an end could be one
whose moment has secretly ar-
rived in Moscow and
Washington alike.

Meanwhile, the poker game
must go on. [tt was Reagan’s
tenacity in playing his ‘‘Star

Wars” hand that brought the
Russians back to the bargain-
ing table 15 months after their
1983 walkout and paved the
way for the summit fast fall.

The first stage of the present
Soviet scheme envisages, on
both sides, a 50 per cent cut in
long-range nukes and the
elimination of medium-range
missiles (battlefield nukes)
based in Europe. Stage two
would be a worldwide nuclear
weapons freeze, leading to.
stage three: total nuclear
disarmament by A.D. 2000.

The Soviet condition for
this plan is the cancellation of
“Star Wars’, which Reagan
refuses, so far, to consider.
But he also stresses that the
“Star Wars’’ program is cur-
rently limited to research and
development, and wouldn’t be
made operational without ad-
vance warning.

That’s where the latest game
detween U.S. and Soviet
negotiators in Geneva starts:
Following on the Ronnie-
Mikhail eyeballing session, it
could well prove more fi ruith ul
than the earlier rounds,

As: any poker buff will -
Tecognize, the way is .now
open for all kinds of in-
teresting. new hands to be
played.

litterbugs!

price to pay for living in an
otherwise lovely community.
As for the litterbugs,”
them! Fine them plenty!

I can't believe, that we
perceive the filth and clut-
ter
That frequently is strewn in
in street and gutter
Enhance and beautify ’tis
noble city
To do so, fie for shame!
is cause for pity.
Therefore, may | suggest an
instant cure;

fine ©

That it will work, I guaran-

tee
for sure; -.

Just nab the litterbugs, both
male and bunny

Each time they’re at it and
extract their money!

P.S. This cure would make
our

city clean and fair
And, frankly, what’s wrong
with

it becoming a millionaire?
Heddy Andersen

North Vancouver