4 - Sunday, Aprii 12, 1987 - North Shore News

Bob Hunter

strictly personal ®

AS A YOUNG reporter, one of my first political assign-
ments was to cover the founding meeting — it was held in
the Winnipeg arena — of the New Democratic Party.

Among the older, wiser
| reporters, there was. much
snickering over the raw cynicism
of it all. Everyone knew perfectly
well that the old CCF was simply
trying to cover up its socialist
past, putting on a new but essen-
tially fake ‘middle-of-the-road
look.

The hoopla at the NDP’s
founding meeting struck me,
poor journalistic novice that I
was, as unutterably phoney.

It was rather dismaying. I'd
met Tommy Douglas a couple of
times and had been mightily im-
pressed by the little guy’s sinceri-

f ty and compassion. Hardly
anybody who met him could feel
otherwise.

Also, whatever one’s political
convictions, it had to be admitted
that the CCF had fought the
good fight against the various
robber: barons on behalf of the
poor and oppressed, etc.

But here were. the dedicated

idealists putting on a show that
was all bunting and balloons and
frnny hats, just like the Grits and
Tories, who had picked ‘up the
shallower convention habits of
the Yanks: .

It was sad, really. A coming-
of-age; “maybe. A loss of in-
nocence, for sure. The integrity
might still be there, but Madison
Avenue. had somehow. triumph-
ed, no matter what the future
might bring...

What: would this new NDP
outfit do? It was obvious the old
socialist gang: was crowding
toward the centre, putting the
stark imperatives of class warfare

on the back burner in the quest —

for mainstream votes and re-
spectability.

WW V. Ald.

alls for
nuke Ship
inquiry

NORTH VANCOUVER City Ald.
Dana Taylor wants the federal
government to look into the safety
of nuclear weapons-capable vessels
stopping at Canadian ports..

Nuclear weapons-capable
American ships often dock at Ca-
nadian ports and ‘“‘the U.S. Navy
has admitted to more than 600 ac-
cidents with the nuclear weapons
in its possession between 1965 and
1985,” he said in a notice of mo-
tion Monday.’

‘*A serious nuclear accident in a
Canadian port would be an unpar-
alleled catastrophe for the citizens
of...the surrounding municipali-
ty,’’ he added.

In an interview later, Taylor
pointed to information from the
activist group Operation Disman-
tle. ‘‘What they’re saying is there
are numerous reasons to think
there are risks (with nuclear
weapons-carrying ships),’’ said
Taylor.

“My concern here is for the City /
of North Vancouver,’’ he explain-.

ed. ‘If there is a danger with these
visits we ought to be concerned
about that.’’

City council is expected to
debate Taylor’s notice of motion
April 13.

Down at the Press Club we
sang a song that went:
Listen to the NDP
Listen to the NDP
They are marching
From the cradle
To the grave.

Which just goes to show how
clairvoyant newspape:men really
areinthe crunch.  .

That was 1961. Today, the
‘phoney’? NDP stands so tall in
the. polls that even hardened
pundits are beginning to mutter
seriously about the chances of Ed
Broadbent becoming the next
prime minister. Or if not the
next, the one after that.

This is more than slightly in-
credible, especially since, when
you get right down to it, poor
Brian Mulroney hasn't really
done anything much more awful
than the usual prime ministerial
boondoggling.

The scandals that have plagued
his administration haven’t, on
balance, been all that terrible,

certainly nothiig compared to
the kind of pri-blems that were ’

characteristic o: the regimes of
Lester Pearson or Trudeau the
Tyrant.

As for the economy, hell,“ex-
cept for the bookend basketcases
of B.C. and Newfoundland,
there’s a mini-boom happening
out there, at least in, central
regions, which is all that is sup-
posed to matter politically.

At the national level,

unemployment is down, The def-
icit and government spending are.

actually being held in check.

Yet, for all intents and pur-
poses, the gallows trap door ap-
pears to have opened and the on-
ly question is how long the Tories

Personal Injury |

Hunter

Ardagh

_and disarmament _
‘nothing of pirouetting gutlessly

will dangle before they die a hor-
rible political death.

Without having committed any
major single blunder — unless it
was appointing a zillion cronies
to the Senate immediately after
successfully campaigning against
Liberal patronage — Mulroney
has managed in just 2% years to
drag his party from an awesome
height to an equally awesome
low.

It is all very well to say that
Mulroney’s personality has worn
a bit thin, that people are fed up
with his strutting and blarney and
overblown rhetoric and that he
can’t be trusted. But surely every
informed voter knew that’s what
we were getting in the first place.

The flight of voters from the
Tories to the NDP. doesn’t come
as too much of a‘surprise when
one considers the’ pitiful spectacle
of John. Turner; one minute prat-
tling on about being the champi-
on of his party’s grassroots and
the next minute betraying those
same naive little followers on
such issues as the cruise missile
to say

around the free trade issue.

In ‘the: context of that long
march from | Winnipeg in 1961, I
don’t think the NDP’s current
popularity actually has anything
at. all to do with the party’s
policies or philosophy. Simply, |
think it is the result of disen-
chantment with Mulroney and a
widespread loathing of Turner.

In the television age, the lead-

_.er’s personality becomes nearly
“all.

The Liberals missed their
chances to dump Turner. The on-
ly way an NDP upset can be
avoided at this stage, it is clear, is
if the Tories can muster the will
to dump Mulroney before the
next election. .

Turner

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Residents vote
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MEMBERSHIP of Cedarbrooke
Apartments Ltd. has voted 95 per
cent in favor of buying the 7.5-acre
property in an attempt to head off
a 1,500 per cent increase in land
lease costs.

The vote was taken in a meeting
Tuesday called by management of
the company, which operates as a
co-operative apartment complex,
following discovery of a lease
escalation clause that will increase
Cedarbrooke land lease costs from
$21,000 annually to 7.5 per cent of

the property’s assessed value in
1990.

‘now approach

Current assessed value of the
property is $4.2 million.

The escalation clause will drive
monthly land lease. costs for a
two-bedroom unit at Cedarbrooke
from $12.10 to $181.72.

Cedarbrooke spokesman David
Chodzko said the company will
the property’s
owner Standard . Life Assurance
Co. with a purchase offer.

Of the vote Chodzko said,“‘l
think everybody realized that it’s
the only way to safeguard the
equity they have.””

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