NEWS ITEM: The price of gasoline and home-heating fuel will jump by
3.2 cents a gallon Monday night, both Imperial Oil and Gulf Oil, the
largest oil firms in the country, announced last weekend. The boost will
mean that consumers will pay about $20 more for their heating oil and
$32 a year more for running the family car. A similar increase will hit
consumers next March 1 in the second stage of the oil price boost
which the federal government has approved, adding millions more to

the profits of the oil monopolies.

Reduced daily rate urged
for new B.C. Care program

By ALD. HARRY RAINKIN

City Council, atthe request of the
minister of health R. H. Mc-
Clelland, has accepted respon-
sibility for administering the
province’s Long Term Care
Program in Vancouver.

Under this program, according
to the government, all persons in
B.C. will be eligible for personal
care, intermediate care and ex-
tended care at a patient charge of
$6.50 per day effective January 1,
1978. Where the services of a
homemaker are required for home
care service, there will be an
additional charge. The minister
says that although the program
will be concerned mainly with the
elderly, it will also cover the
mentally ill, the handicapped, and
later will apply to long term care
fer children.

It is estmated that 7 percent of
the elderly over 65 require some
form of institutional care and an
additional 8 percent require home
management services.

Burrard plant blocked

Anti-pollution fi

The people in the Lower
Mainland, and ‘particularly Bur-
naby and Port Moody, won an
important victory in the fight
against air pollution last week
when their opposition compelled
the B.C. Pollution Control Branch
(PCB) to reject an application by
B.C. Hydro to expand the Burrard
thermal generating plant.

In April, Hydro applied to the
PCB for a permit which would
have allowed the Burrard thermal
plant to boost daily emissions of
sulphur dioxide from 142 pounds to
453,600 pounds. The permit would
also have allowed the Ioco elec-
tricity generating station to raise

the maximum level of pollutants
from 3,240 pounds per day to 25,956
pounds and to emit up to 49,440
pounds daily of nitrogen oxide.
PCB director Bill Venables
announced last Friday that the
permit Hydro was seeking will not
be issued because the proposed
daily emissions far exceed the
standards for ground-level con-
centrations laid out in the PCB’s

air quality guidelines. Venables

said the PCB believed that if the
permit were granted ‘the air
quality could not be maintained at
acceptable levels — particularly
during adverse meterological
conditions.”

Socred Bill wipes out
public-owned companies

Premier Bill Bennett introduced
legislation last Tuesday which
would turn over to private business
the assets of four companies
acquired by the previous NDP
government.

The fact that the premier himself
introduced Bill 87, which sets up a
B.C. Resources Investment Cor-
poration, indicates the importance
the Socred government places on
this piece of legislation. It is one of
the major payoffs to big business in
return for support in the last
election.

In outlining reasons for the Bill,
Bennett said the ‘‘denationali-
zation’? would boost industry’s
confidence (meaning private big
business) in the government.

The legislation allows the
government to transfer its assets
in four companies to the new
corporation which will function as
a private company. Under the Bill
the Socred government will
transfer to private hands nearly
10,000 shares of Canadian Cellulose
Ltd.; about 160,000 shares in West
Coast Transmission; and the
government’s holdings in the fully
government-owned Plateau Mills
Ltd. and Kootenay Forest
Products Ltd.

Presented in the guise of a

‘able to immediately

scheme to allow B.C. residents to
share in a ‘‘Buy B.C.”’ plan, ob-
jectively its aim is to turn over
public assets to private business.
The premier said the new com-
pany will have large cash reserve
invest in
major resource developments, and
that shares will be available
through banks, trust companies
and bond houses.

It will not be long before the new
corporation will pass under the
control of the big business
establishment in B.C.

PREMIER BENNETT

‘PACIFIC TRIBUNE—SEPTEMBER 2, 1977—Page 2

ht won

Hydro’s application for the
permit was vigorously opposed by
the public and by civic and
regional government bodies. The
Burnaby and Port Moody council’s
opposed the application, as well as
the Greater Vancouver Regional
District. About 700 Port Moody
residents signed a petition against
it.

In its submission against the
permit, the GVRD charged that the
termal plant would be able to emit
12 times the entire amount of
sulphur dioxide presently given off
by all industry in upper Burrard
Inlet. Opponents of the permit said
that the level of pollution requested
by Hydro would have a: serious
effect on air quality in the area
which is already susceptible to
high concentrations of air
pollutants due to poor ventilation
due to geographical conditions.

A major consideration in the
PCB decision, said Venables, was
that large quantities of sulphur
dioxide in the eastern Burrard
Inlet basin could have detrimental
effects on the health of susceptible
groups of the population.

Recently Burnaby health unit
spokesman, Dr. John Blatherwick,
said that high concentrations of
sulphur dioxide could pose a
serious health hazard to ‘‘those
who are weak’’ — infants, senior
citizens and people’ with
respiratory problems.

B.C. Hydro chairman Robert
Bonner said Friday that the cor-
poration will consider appealing
the PCB decision to the B.C.
Pollution Control Board. Hydro has
not yet given up the fight to carry
through the highly .dangerous
project which is aimed at
generating electricity, much of
which is earmarked for export to
the U.S.

It was also implied in Bonner’s
statement that Hydro may use the
rejection by the PCB of its permit
to expand the Burrard thermal
plant to pressure the provincial
government to bring down an early
decision favoring the construction
of the Revelstoke dam, which a
cabinet committee has been
studying, but has not yet brought
down its recommendations. _

The minister also states that this
new program will replace similar
services presently being ad-
ministered for people on social
assistance by the Vanouver
Resources Board and_ the
Department of Human Resources.

There is nothing wrong in
principle with such a universal
care program, in fact it’s com-
mendable. The problems arise in
its practical application.

First of all the rate of $6.50 a day
is too high. It costs the patient even

more than when he goes to the.

hospital where the rate is $4.00 a
day. (It was $2.00. day but the rate
was doubled by the Social Credit
government). There are many
families that simply can’t afford
$6.50 a day for a member of the
family who requires care services.

Therate should, I think, be cut at
least in half. It certainly costs less
to take care of people outside of
hospitals than in; why then charge
them more? It doesn’t make sense,
unless, of ocurse, the aim is to shift
still more of the financial burdens
of medicare on the people who can
afford them the least.

Secondly, there is the problems
of providing decent facilities. At
present we have a combination of
both public and private facilities.
Some of the private facilities are
simply unfit for such care services
—no elderly person deserves to be
condemned to them. And the
number of units available is en-
tirely inadequate.

Vancouver has about 65 percent
of B.C.’s over 65 population. They
number approximately 60,000.
According to the government’s
own figures they require 4,200
institutional placements, while
another 4,800 require home
management services. Vancouver
is already deficient in intermediate
care services’ and some of the
specialized care services will
naturally attract people into
Vancouver from other
municipalities as this program
goes into operations.

So we have two problems in-
volvedhere. One is the need for the
government to set quality stan-
dards for care services for private
institutions that are not less than
those supplied in public in-
stitutions. The other is the need to
build many new facilities so that
all people who require care will
receive it.

Lastly, there is the question of
administering the program.
Vancouver requires at least 25
people immediately if the program
is to be operative by January 1,
1978. The minister of health is
offering us one! If this is to be
taken as an indication of the
seriousness of the minister in
getting his own program into
operation, then. it will take not
months but years for it to become
operative. That is why City Council
is insisting that it will accept
responsibility for the Care
program in Vancouver only if:

(1) The ‘provincial government
assumes 100 percent of all costs
including administrative overhead
costs.

(2) That before the’ end of

September the province provide
the city with an adequate budget
and sufficient. authority an
flexibility to appoint the necessary
staff and begin preparations im-
mediately to get the plan underway
by January 1, 1978.

‘Boost human
rights code’

A five-member committee of the
B.C. Human Rights Commission,
under the chairmanship of Bishop
Remi De Roo, has tabled a report
in the Legislature which recom-
mends that the Human Rights
Code be upgraded so that it
“suspercede any legislation that is
deemed to be in conflict with it.”

The report says that huma?
rights investigating officers find
that inconsistencies and om-
missions in the present code render
them helpless to control certaif
types of discrimination. The code
is also confusing since under most
sections race, sex, religion, color
ancestry, age and place of origi?
are prejudice areas, while other
sections also include marital

“status, political belief and criminal

charges.

The committee also states that
for human rights legislation t0
protect the public from all unseen
types of discrimination, 4
“reasonable cause”’ clause should
cover all sections which. would
mean that if a _ specific
discrimination was not in black
and white under the code, it could
still be considered a contravention
of the law if the board found there
was not reasonable ‘cause for the
prejudice. :

Programs to eliminate racism
andsexism in public schools is als?
urged in the committee report.

Take
time

Surrey forms
civic group

The Surrey Alternative
Movement (SAM) announced this
week that they will contest this
year’s municipal elections i?
Surrey with a “‘labor, farmer,
people orientated” program.

SAM met August 28 and adopted
the civic policy program of the
New Westminster and District
Labor Council.

The meeting elected Kosty?
Gidora chairperson, Dave Jense?
vice-chairperson, Frank Izzar
secretary, Dave Arland treasure!
and Joe LeClair organizer.

RIBUNE

Editor - MAURICE RUSH
Assistant Editor SEAN GRIFFIN
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