Two bills guaranteed to make voters gag Stephen Hasper Contributing Writer IF at first you don’t succeed trial, trial again. That seems to be the motto of Canada’s politicians when it comes to election gag laws. Every time they try to pass one, the courts shoot them down. Yet the gag laws keep on coming. Election gag laws, by the way, are laws which make it a crime for citizens to spend their own money to express their own views during elec- tions. Four times in the past 17 years politicians have tried to impose such laws on the country. And four times the group | head, the National Giizens? Coalition, has helped challenge these laws in court. Each time the NCC has won. Gag laws clearly infringe on the right of citizens to freely and peacefully express themselves, and to work with other citizens to advance their views. Freedom of expression and freedom of association, as well as the right to an informed vote, are guaranteed in the Charter of Rights and Freedoms. It seems obvious. Yet some politicians — like Prime Minister Jean Chretien and Manitoba’s NDP Premier Gary Doer — just don’t get it. Like mad scientists in some cheap horror movie, they keep trying to bring the gag law monster back to life. Take Prime Minister Chretien. He recently enacted Bill C-2, an election gag law that will effectively shut up and shut out independent voices during federal elec- tions. Private citizens are not allowed to spend more than an average of $500 per riding to express their views. But under C-2, the Liberal Party of Canada and its candidates will be allowed to spend over $30 miilion to get itself re- elected -- and most of that comes from the public purse. Liberal government offi- cials have boasted that Chretien’s odious gag law is ALL SERVICE BY GOVT. REGISTERED echCone te 41 999 eS Helee er eta reading & full road test | Senvce CoouncSysra: my. Pressure test rad, CK water pump, hones, belts, bon Grain 8 renew antieeze. 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Just days after I filed papers in Alberta's Court of Queen's Bench to challenge the constitudonality of Bill C- 2, rumours started coming out of Ortawa suggesting the gov- ernment may refer the case direcly to the Supreme Court of Canada. This will allow Chretien to bypass the Alberta court sys- tem — which government Officials see as too “libertarian” — and have the case heard before a court they hope will be more sympathetic. [t could also prevent a full-blown trial, limiang submissions to legal briefs and excluding much of the evidence on which Charter lidgation is supposed to be based. Meanwhile, as all this is going on, Premier Gary Doer concocted his own a gag law: Bill 4. Bill 4 is the “Mother of all Gag Laws” because it goes beyond stifling the rights of private individuals; it also places severe limits on the rights of opposition parties. Specifically Bill 4 imposes tight limits on the ability of political parties to advertise any political message benveen elections. But nothing in the law limits how much the NDP government can spend for its own political benefit. In other words, Premier Doer will be free to spend as much as he wants on multi- million dollar selfpromotion- ai government ad campaigns; he can still conter grants and subsidies; and best of all he can do all this with taxpayer dollars. This is one-party dic- tatorship stuff. And it shows why gag laws are a bad idea: they never control the ability of the incumbent government to use taxpayer dollars to their own advantage. And there is no bigger advantage in an elec- tion than being the incum- bent, and never a bigger pot of money than the public purse. That’s why the NCC will fight the gag laws of Doer and Chretien. We will do so through the media and through the courts. Will . these efforts be costly? Yes, but losing our freedoms could be costlier still. — Stephen President of the National Citizens’ Coalition. He can be reached at . Harper is Balancing act NEWS photo Paul McGrath : SAILORS catch a ride on the breeze near West Vancouver's John Lawson Park. ; Recent weather has been kind to the nautical set — wind, active surf and Plenty of sunshine. Boy suffers head injury THE Deep Cove Lifeboat was involved in two recent incidents. On Saturday Aug. 19, the’ lifeboat was dispatched by the Rescue Coordination Centre in Victoria to Camp Jubilee at Indian Arm. A 12-year-old boy was unconscious after receiving a head injury. When the Jifeboat arrived at Camp Jubilee, the boy had recovered consciousness. He was treated at the scene and transported to the govern- ment dock at Deep Cove, where he was transferred to an ambulance and taken to Lions Gate Hospital. Just after midnight ‘on Aug. 22, the Deep Cove - Lifeboat was called after a night watchman at the Reed Point Marina in Port Moody had spotted a distress flare ignite in the sky — near Admiralty Point. ° ’ The lifeboat arrived a at the’ area at 1:10 a.m. and searched for two hours. No’ vessel: or -- person -was found, although. . the flare was reported by.two separate sources... Jimmy ~~ Watt, -; Lifeboat, would. like:-: . remind people that s setting off - distress flares in non-emer- gency situations is against the’ 7 — Marcie Ga ft “Base - Coxswain of the Deep Cove a