WHISTLER — WITH the
nine English premiers of
Canada meeting here this
weekend, it seems only right
to devote a column to poli-
tics.

These premiers do not rule, but
they reign. They are like Czar
Nicholas J] of Russia who said ‘‘!
do not rule Russia. Ten thousand
clerks rule Russia."’ Like the old
autocrat of all the Russians, the
premiers deserve a proper degree
of respect and attention.

I shall be over at the Skookum-
chuck trying to find an
uneducated fish at the time the
premiers are here, but they have
my warmest regards, particularly
the three Maritime premiers,

I grew up in Nova Scotia and
had cousins in New Brunswick
and Prince Edward Island. There
wasn't much about politics we
didn't know by the time we were
out of three-corneted pants.

It was not like politics in British
Columbia, where we pay attention
only when there are enough cabi-
net ministers out on bail to form a
quorum.

Allis different here. In B.C. we
have those funny new parties like
New Democrat and Social Credit.

In Nova Scotia and the other,
minor Maritime provinces, there
were no new parties in my youth,
There were no doubts about poli-
tics and there were no surprises.

Forty-nine per cent of the Nova
Scotians were Liberals or 49%
were Conservatives. Why Liberal?
Why Conservative? Simple ques-

tion, simple answer. They were
born that way.

During the One Big War, when
my own glands were affecting my
brain, a complication of the
system arose. Intermarriage
(monerelization, it was called) oc-
curred here and there between
Liberal and Conservative families.
It was that new, permissive age.

The offspring of these unions
were the ones you could expect to
suffer, being born, poor little
tykes, neither one thing nor the
other.

However,that didn’t happen, at
feast up to the day | said my final
goodbye to Nova Scotia in 1945
and came West looking for work.
(I was never able to find any and
took up writing instead, bat that
is another story.)

When I left the Atlantic Coast,
babies were still being born either
Liberal or Conservative.

To this day J cannot tell how
the children of intermarriage had
their politics fixed for them, Mar-
riage contracts were unknown,
The church could not decide, poli-
tics being far too important to be
entrusted to God. ft must have
come about by the same silent but
incredibly powerful consensus that
decided mayoralty elections in
Halifax.

Halifax, one of the oldest cities
of Canada, had the free and seeret
democratic ballot. Yer all those
voters decided by seeret ballot that
the number of Catholi¢ mayors
should exactly equal the number
of Protestant mayors, generation
after generation. Nothing was

Police crack down on speeders

THE POLICE on the North Shore
and across B.C. are tuning up
traffic radars and stocking up on
ticket books in preparation for an
Aug. 24 to Sept. 6 campaign
against speeding.

The police forces are being
joined by the Insurance Corp. of
B.C.’s (ICBC) Traffic Safety
department and community traffic
safety groups to urge motorists to
slow down,

Speeding, according to the
police, is exceeded only by driving
without due care and attention as
a contributing factor in traffic
fatalities or injuries. Last year
alone, unsafe speed contributed to
nearly 5,6C0 accidents.

Police accident’ reports show
speeding and alcohol often ‘ride
together’’ into disaster on our
streets and highways.

ICBC president Tom Holmes
said the rash of motor vehicle ac-
cidents over the recent B.C. Day
long weekend underscores the
need for public awareness and en-
forcement initiatives.

“The upcoming campaign wil!
see police monitoring the high
traffic volumes we traditionally
experience throughout Labor Day
weekend,”’ said Holmes. ‘*We
want everyone to know this in ad-
vance because both ICBC and the
police want to see fewer tickets
handed out and fewer people in-
jured or killed on our roads.””

Only 2 weeks left —
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Paul
St. Pierre

PAULITICS & PERSPECTIVES

said. Nothing needed saying. It
was understood.

In 1945, when Mayor Alan
Butler, a@ Protestant, attempted to
run for an extra term, the voters
of both religions united to smite
him hip and thigh. In the living
rooms of his former supporters,
his picture was turned to the wall.

In Nova Scotia, politics wats at

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Friday. August 23, 1991 - North Shore News - 9

Of politics, premiers and princes

least as important as religion and
more so than sex, of so our elders
told us. It had its advantages.
Politics offered a certitude not
known to sex, baseball and com-
merce.

When my second cousin once-
removed, Joan Chisholm of the
Gaelic Presbyterian Chisholms,
was taking music lessons she was
asked if she attended the Halifax
Conservatory of Music.

“Oh no,”’ she said, ** We're
Liberals."

She was only six years old, but
she knew her politics.

Everybody knew except for that
rag, tag and bobtail 2% of the
voters, the rabble, the poor
hangashores, the seventh sons of
seventh sons. They had no
loyalties, no political principles
and no sense of responsibility.

They were capable of selling
their vote for a drink and often
did. Those were the people who
decided which party should form
the government of Nova Scotia,
election by election.

The comparison between
yesterday's Nova Scotians and to-
day's British Columbians offers
itself: In my youth 982% of our

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neighbors believed that govern-
ment had the solution to their
problems and only 2% peed into
the ballot boxes. Today in British
Columbia 2% of the population
think the government can solve
their problems and 98% think
government is the problem.

Neither gentle nostalgia nor any
irritating speck of the grit of hope
will keep me in Whistler this
weekend when nine of the coun-
try’s 10 littie princes come bearing
their expense accounts. | will be
throwing one-ounce Kastmasters
at fish.

But let us wish them well, even
while remembering the words of
another Czar, this one the last of
the strain. Being shown a Ukrai-
nian hospital in ruinous condition
he said, sadly, ‘‘if only [ were one
of my bureaucrats, | could order
that repaired.’

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