6 - Friday, September 8, 1989 - North Shore News

Mucksters hustling
flawed merchandise

READING THE GOVERNMENT NEWS releases out of
Ottawa these days, you’d think Canada was being run by a
marketing and sales department, headed by a committee of

M.B.A.s.

**Sell’’ is now the unabashed
buzzword. Tory ministers and MPs
are ordered to get out and ‘‘sell"’
Meech Lake to an increasingly
hostile anglo Canada. They must
get out and ‘‘sell’’ the nine per
cent Goods and Services Tax to an
even more hostile public, just as
they got out in the 1988 election
campaign to ‘‘sell*' free trade —
the benefits of which remain
obscure so far for the average Ca-
nadian.

Any pretence of seriously
heeding the views of the 43 per
cent of the electorate which
returned them to power has clearly
been dropped by our 1989 Tory
snake oil salesmen. Their full-time
job now is cajoling or conning
those dumb voters who don’t un-
derstand what’s good for them in-
to buying the ‘‘truth"’ as revealed
exclusively to Brian Mutroney,
Michael Wilson and Premier
Robert Bourassa.

Government by propaganda is
nothing new, of course. Some-
where along the way from Abe
Lincoln to modern democracy the
noble concept of government “by
the people, for the people’ got lost
— drowned by a political system
that requires an MP to obey his
party leader, not his constituents.
This ensures that any party with a
solid parliamentary majority can
govern as a virtual dictatorship for
up to five years.

With a few honorable exceptions
like Edmonton’s maverici Tory,
David Kilgour, MPs today serve
constituents merely as mailboxes to
Ottawa and as delivery boys ad
girls for periodic goodies from
government departments ap-
pointed to keep the peasants quiet
that way.

This may largely explain why
Preston Manning’s new Reform
Party has achieved such significant
growth in the western provinces
and, barely two years from birth,
already has its first MP in Ottawa.
A basic RP policy is that MPs
must obey their constituents even

BREAD LIKE BILL BAKED IT...today's cenfenarian Bill Wilson (inset) — and at left, aged 35 in this 1924

if the latler oppose the party line.
Moreover, their constituents can
fire them if they fail in that duty.

Given the complexities of na-
tional affairs nowadays, there’s no
telling how the idealistic Reformers
would work out in practice if ever
they won the hot seat of govern-
ment. Maybe a better role would
be that of a strong, permanent and
truly populist opposition.

But either way, it’s an appealing
picture to toy with compazed to

the situation, between elections, of
today’s voters — seen simply as a
captive market for political
hucksters hustling flawed mer-
chandise for their own benefit.
kh
TAILPIECES: For the Boy-
Makes-Good Dept. some happy

BAKERY

Photos submitted

photo, outside the Model Bakery he owned and operated on East 8th in North Van.

Waste dilemma

HE RECENT move by a Washington State
county to ban the importation of medical waste
is a warning signa! that should be picked up and

¢ friday focus ©

local theatre memories from Mare
and Jacqueline Howard, recent
guests of North Van's gift to
showbiz, comedian Dave Broad-
foot, in Toronto. In a one-man
show there Dave kept the laughs
rolling with reminiscences of his
youth in Lynn Valley, at Ridgeway
School, in Woodward's men’s
department and his stage debut
with the North Van Community
Players ——- where he iearned the
comedy trade as straight man in
Marc’s ‘tRow Boat Follies’’ of
1952-54. Thence he graduated to
Toronto, to national fame in
“Spring Thaw’’, the CBC’s ‘‘Air
Farce’’ show and the rare success
of a full-time career in humor... In
another North Van flashback,
congratulations to West Van Care
Centre resident Bill Wilson who
today, Sept. 8, chalks up the big
One-Oh-Oh. An 1909 immigrant
from Britain who served in Europe
with the Canadian army in World
War One and later became a North
Var City alderman, Bill is still best
remembered by hundreds of North
Shore residents for his tasty bread!
For 2? years until his retirement in
1960 he owned and operated the

‘Model Bakery on East 8th in

North Van — today the site of the
B.C. Tel building... And get a
good night’s sleep before Sunday
to be in top form for ail the day-
long exercise, eating and enter-
tainment at the Coho Festival in
Ampieside Park — the weather
forecast is great and non-stop fun
starts with pancake break fasts
from 3:30 a.m.

tee
WRIGHT OR WRONG — A
though: for the upwardly mobile:
the h her a monkey climbs, the
more .2u see of his behind.

addressed now by the provincial government before a
garbage crisis hits Lions Gate Hospital and other pro-
vincial health facilities.

Whatcom County, whose Ferndale incinerator cur-
rently burns the bie-medical waste produced by LGH
and a host of Lower Mainland hospitals, passed the
county ordinance banning the importation of that
waste after its citizens raised pollution concerns over
the practice.

If it passes constitutional! musier in U.S. courts, the
ordinance will go into effect Jan. t.

The cest of its successful passage will be paid by
hospitals such as UGH, and ultimately. the provincial
taxpayer.

Because B.C. currently has no tacility to process
potentially hazardous medical waste, it must be trans-
ported out of the province.

If Ferndale’s incinerator is suddenly closed to area
hospitals, the next closest one available to the company
that transports the waste is in California. And there is
no guarantee against the same hing happening there.

Hospital garbage disposal costs at LGH have already
increased 10-foid since it began shipping its bio-
medical waste to the U.S. With the growing complexity
of ridding itself of that waste, LGH faces ever-increas-
ing garbage removal costs.

To ayoid being held te ransom over its daily lo-
tonne medical waste production, B.C. needs a facility
to process that wasie, and it needs it now.

ANG

. Peter Speck
Managing Editor Barrett Fisher
Associate Editor Noel Weight
Advertising Director Linda Stewart

North Shore News. taunded i 1969 as av indennngat
suburban newsnane’ and ouavhed under Scredme —”
Paragqrant. Ut a Eacigse “r Act is nuglisnes each
Weanesaas, Eraav and Sutitay Ov North ore Sree

, Mes 14 ans gistepule 4 avers IO"
Shar oecond Crass Mar searst ate ‘
Subscuphong Norte anc wes .ance.

( Maing fates availatle of regues.
welcome but we Cannot acu
unAsolbeted matenal inciudiac manu:
which snouid be accompanied Dv 4 stant,
envelore:

Publisher

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