6 - Friday, Fune 9, 1989 — North Shore News Reform Party tries ‘2X4’ to get the mule moving KNOCKING SENSE INTO OTTAWA about ‘‘deficit cut- ting’? has become the core of the Reform Party’s economic policy — and members are not pussyfooting around. They are appalled, like millions of other taxpayers, by the Mulroney-Wilson approach to the job — tax incteases nearly four times higher than spending reduc- tions. And by hypocritical lectures to the peasants on tightening their belts while the feds still show no sign of tightening their own to any effect. Hence, the party’s ‘“‘Resolution One,"* unanimously endorsed last weekend by some 200 delegates to its Lower Mainland convention in North Van with leader Preston Manning and Deborah Gizy, the RP’s first MP, in attendance. The resolution notes the stagger- ing $32! billion government debt accumulated by an unbroken scries of deficits since 1970, and interest costs that now eat up 35¢ of every tax dollar (compared to 5¢ in 1974), Taxation for al: taxpayers, it charges, is now at an unaccep- table level becanse the government has spent their money irrespon- sibly. Finally comes the two-by-four recommended for use on the head of a mule in order to get its atten- tion: “BE IT RESOLVED THAT the federal government shall forthwith enact a law under which all future increases in total federal revenue must be exceeded by reductions in overall expenditures until the budget is balanced, and in years when revenue has been reduced, there must be an equivalent reduc- tion in expenditures. “Furthermore, notwithstanding the *bove, the deficit must be reduced by a minimum of 20 per cent in any given year. “A breach of this law shall re- quire the resignation of the gov- ernment and a general election to tion’s (CMA) call Smokes and mirrors YNICS will view Monday’s removal of tobacco from the shelves of Caulfeild Village's Phar- masave drugstore as a grab for media attention, bui the decision should be hailed as a small step toward reducing the availability of the cancer-causing substance in the North Shore community. Store owner Rob Williamson said his decision was prompted in part by the Canadian Medical Associa- for a consumer boycott drugstores that sell tobacco. But the deeper motivation was his discomfort with dispensing, in an outlet dedicated to remedies, a pro- duct that, according to the CMA, causes the premature death of 35,000 Canadians annually. Williamson’s decision atone will do little to dissuade smokers from smoking and retailers from selling tobacco. Unless the federal government decides to control the sale of tobacco, it remains a legal substance and therefore availiable to the open marketplace. So it would be the height of self-righteous hypocrisy to adopt holier-than-thou attitudes retailers that continue to sell tobacco, until the public as a whole places enough importance on controlling tobacco sales to make it worth any government’s while to act against the tobacco industry from which it squeezes so many tax dollars. As it stands now, Williamson represents one small voice saying no. Enough voices with the same message might catch the practised deaf ears of government. PRESTON Manning ...cut deficit 20 per cent a year. be called."' For beleaguered Canadian tax- payers, Resolution One has some- thing of the same ring about it as the Declaration of Independence. But by itself, of course, the only reaction it's likely to produce in our spendthrift masters and their bureaucrat allies is a large yawn. However, some Reformers have more concrete plans for hammer- ing home to Ottawa the message: **Higher taxes stink — cut spend- ing!” Plans which, in the RP tradition, have some fun mixed in, too. More on Sunday about how they aim to get the Mulronceyites’ atten- tion. tee JUST 100 YEARS AGO a Scots immigrant who had fallen in love of toward those with the wild and rugged North Shore did the seemingly impossi- ble. George Grant MacKay had built himself a summer home on the east cliff of the Capilano Can- yon and was obsessed by the idea of exploring the virgin forest on the west bank. With the help of two native In- dians he managed to build a hemp rope bridge across the 450 ft.-wide gorge. The rest, as they say, is his- tory. So this Sunday, June 11, the now greatly improved Capilano Suspension Bridge, now owned and operated by Naacy Stibbard — a major Lower Mainland tourist attraction which draws over 400,000 visitors a year — celebrates its first century. Cere- monies start at i] a.m. with the cake-cutting, balloons and VIP speeches. At J p.m. they'll bless the centennial totem pole. And all day long there'll be native Indian dancers, park tours, children’s entertainment, salmon barbecue, clowns, antique cars, period costumes and music and singing galore. It promises to be a weekend par- ty in the best North Shore tradi- tion. wee TAILPIECES: A new chair of psychiatry at UBC devoted to schizophrenia rescarch is $7,408 closer with the cheque just pres- ented by Louise Harris, past presi- dent of the North Shore Friends of Schizophrenics to Dr. Jim Miles, UBC head of psychiatry ... Keith Lynn Alternative School students, sponsored by Clarkson Gordon, are guests at today’s Canadian Club luncheon in the Hotel Van- couver to listen to Stan Hagen, Minister of Advanced Education and Job Training ... Get-well-soon cards to North Van's Eleanor ‘WW. ac Publisher Associate Editor ... envelope Lee Peter Speck Managing Editor... . Barrett Fisher Noel Wright Advertising Director Linda Stewart North Shore News, founded tn 1969 as an mdependent suburban newspaper and quahled under Schedule 111, Paragraph It of the Excise Tax Act, 1s published each Wednesday, Finday and Sunday by North Shore Free Press Ltd. and distributed to every door on the North Shore Second Class Mait Regstzation Number 3885 Subscriptions North and West Vancouver, $25 per year. Marling rates available on tequest. Submissions are welcome bul we cannot accept responsibility for unsolicitet matenal including manuscipis and pictures e which should be accompamed by a stamped. addressed Godley, former longtime food columnist of the North Shore News, now convalescing at home after a 10-day stint at LGH ... And oops! — The-Better-Late-Than- Never Dept. did itself proud with West Van’s Bruce and Betty Grey. Congrats to these brand-new **Golden Club’? members, married 50 years ago last Saturday, June 3. een WRIGHT OR WRONG: There are two kinds of people who never amount to much: those who can’t do what they’re told — and those who can do nothing else. ates iy ia . " Proto submited. THAT WAS THEN...the 100-year-old Capilano Suspension Bridgeon a very early birthday. 1139 Lonsdale Avenue, North Vancouver, B.C. V7M 2H4 59,170 (average, Wednesday Friday & Sunday) SDA DIVISION Entire contents © 1989 North Shore Free Press Ltd. All rights reserved. Display Advertising 980-0511 Classified Advertising 986-6222 Newsroom 985-2131 Distribution + 986-1337 . preefiion att Subscriptions 986-1337 SUNDAY + WEQNESDAY + FHIDAY Fax 985.3227 North Shore owned and managed