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Terrace omneca Herald

The Terrace Herald is a member of the Canadian Weekly
Newspaper Association, The 8.C. Weekly Newspapers

Association, and Varified Circulation. Published every
Monday and Thursday at 3212 Katym Avenve, Terrace, B.C.
Postage paid In cash, return postage guaranteed. Second
class mail registration number 1201.

ASSISTANT MANAGER. - George T. English

PRODUCTION -- Gordon Hamilton

EDITORIAL - Rudy Haugeneder, George English

ADVERTISING - Bill Groe
fart eels ani RLS ER

= 5 :

P.O. Box 399
Phone 635-6357

Business address
- 3212 Kalum Avenue, Terrace, B.C. ;

pinion

“Booze ‘'n Baccy Plan”

The Herald , along with other
medias in the area and the province
will soon face the proposed September
1 ban on advertising of tobacco and
alcohol products. Charges and threats
from companies have been laid before
the steps of legislature in Victoria but
as yet to no result of re-investigation of
the matter. .

The clashes that Bennett and his
government have received on this
issue clearly satisfy the need for a
further look.

But Bennett, a devoted teetotaler,
fails to see the issues that could
literally force several small papers out
of business in British Columbia. But
this legislation is not only a scare to
income for the medias in question.

The great escape

Fivst sight was all that was needed to
observe that the new federal unemploy-
ment insurance scheme bore little re-
semblance to insurance — that is, the
purchase of protection against loss,

A whopping new welfare tax, and not
a very fair one at that, was a better
Gescription of Labor. Minister Bryce
Mackasey’s bill whipped through the
two Houses and given royal assent in
those hectic days of Parliament before
the simmer recess. ;

Indeed, the B.C. Liberal member, Ray
Perrault, used theoretical provincial
Savings in welfare to result from imple-
mentation of the plan to make it palat-
able, without much success, ott

Trouble was, the Mackasey legislation
was objectionable to too many people on
too many grounds. Although it was
touted as being universal, it wasn't; the
self-employed were exempted, leaving
the full premium burden on the poor
captives who get it in the neck every
time, the salaried working stiffs.

More unfairly still, premiums were to
be demanded from a broad new spec-
trum of payroll people who, because of
the stable nature of their employment or
high wage bracket or both, would. be
most unlikely beneficiaries by any
stretch of actuarial reasoning.

On top of that, there was a very real
concem that drastically increased compa-
ny and junior goverriment contributions
would be passed along in the form of
higher prices and taxes, and that hand-
somely augmented benefits available on
the most lenient of terms were an out-
right invitation to freeloading.

All in all, not a happy augury for a
scheme scheduled to be in full flower at
the beginning of the coming year.

Amazingly, worse was yet to come.
There was a loophole left in the Macka-
sey legislation to allow provincial gov-
ernments to opt in or. out of the scheme
so far as their civil servants were con-
cerned,

And, perhaps predictably, the province
of Quebec not only has exploited this
concession but, with almost contemptu-
ous ease, has made the whole package
look as though it is coming apart at the
seams. .

What the Quebec assembly has done is
simply pass a bill which, as closely as
one can make out from the news stories
from Quebec City, defines school and ©
hospital employees in the province as

- public servants, "

In any event, the effect is to remove °
200,000 contributors from the federal
scheme, a loss to its Ottawa administra.
tors of about $18 million a year, Despite
the appearance of composure on the
part of Mr. Mackasey — “I’m not going
to get worried about the Quebec action,”
was his Immediate reaction — whatever
universality he may have’ claimed. for

the scheme clearly is in tatters, and is
bound to become more ragged still.

Bet

IT'S A CRIME TO
&E IN ON A
1 \. BAY LIKE THis,
FLO — CARE
Th FOR A STROLL?

I FALL FOR IT
EVERY TIME

former,

It has been announced that four
major tobacco firms are expected to be
among plaintiffs in a writ shortly to be
filed with the Supreme Court of B.C. It
will argue that the booze ’n baccy plan
is unconstitutional.

Further comments on the ad ban
states that it was in the realm of
criminal law, which was the respon-
sibility of the federal government.

Perhaps more plainly and clearly
on the ban: It is a threat to every
British Columbian for freedom of
decision. A freedom that us Westerners
had been proud of for many years and
will now lose.

And with that loss will come a less
spirited (excuse the pun) Beautiful
British Columbia!

Because Quebec's rationalization is far
from unique. If Quebec can say that
school and hospital employees are “semi-
public workers because they work for
Institutions supported by the govern:
ment,” so can any province. If Quebec
can say that these people should not
have to pay unemployment insurance
because they have sufficient job securi-
ty, 80 can any province. If Quebec can
get away with it — and Mr. Mackasey
makes it apparent that it can -~ so can
any province.

Although the government of British
Columbia has been strangely silent since
the Quebec move, it's not its nature to
submit to ‘just another. form of taxa-

‘ts ‘described the ‘unemployment ‘insur-
ance scheme, when such an easy out
exists. Mr. Brothers says he will look
into the opting-out. feature, What he is
bound to see is that the withdrawal of
the province's 23,000 public school teach-
ers alone, perhaps by the Quebec device
of defining them as quasi-public serv-.
ants, would keep a very large amount
of money home that otherwise would
flow east.

In April, B.C, school trustees and
teachers, in a rare act of unison, protest-
ed that inclusion of teachers in the
Mackasey scheme would cost school
boards in the province $2 million in pre-
mium-sharing a year, not to speak of
the teachers’ equal contribution. School
district revenues, said the B,C, Teachers’
Federation, should not be used to support
a national social security measure; tax
dollars for education are hard enough
to come by already. ' ‘

If teachers and similar employees of .
“institutions supported: by government”
are withdrawn from the unemployment
insurance scheme across the land, the
financial damage Is incalculable. More
damaging, perhaps, is the precedent
such a mass desertion would create.
Even before Quebec engineered its great
escape, -the Canadian Federation of
Mayors and Municipalities told Ottawa
that it wanted “to obtain ... the same
right of choice for municipalities that is
accorded provincial governments, speci-
fically to cover all or none of their em-
ployees.”
4nd why shouldn't city governments

-—Ssuch as Vancouver's, whose share of

civic employees’ premiums will increase .
by $250,000 a year under the broadened
scheme — have the same privilege? And
if city governments warrant such a con-
cession, why, not industries and busi-
nesses which also offer their employees
high job-security? . = - |

The word sanguine has two meanings:
optimistic and bloody. If the federal gov-
ernment, ‘bulls ahead with a thinly-dis- -
guised welfare program funded .on a
basis this unequal and unjust, the re-
sult is more apt to be the latter than the

Gn,” “as Education Minister Don Broth- “> would have had no chaice butte

TERRACE HERALD, TERRACE B.C.

"With a house like that who would wani to move to the city". > ae

Q

~RUDY'S

How can you tell ils an
‘election year? On the Federal
scene NDP Skeena MP Frank
Howard has been sticking his
Quebec City head around the
constituency and appearing ata
lot of functions throughout the
region lately.

The likable Howard has also
sent in more press releases in
the past two weeks than he had
in the previous three months
I’ve been in Terrace...an
election in the fall or spring of
‘72,

Major Victor Jolliffe is again
talking to the press but is still
bitterly complaining that he
isn't hitting the front page
enough, Strange. He and the
city-administrator have just
returned from Vancouver and
Victoria where ‘‘headline
stories” happened but on his
return to Terrace said I'm
sorry. If you'd have printed my

: departure in a: better way I

‘give you the information, -he
says. So no word on what’s
happening to the surplus
$100,000 in the municipal kitty,
Just want to show that we
really do need a gossip type of
column which prints local
arrivals and departures,

Ev Clift, a current alderman,
has been making a lot of newsy
type of noises in the last while,
Could he be a mayorality
contestant this winter: You
must have noticed his
contribution at the last regional
district meeting where he said a
lot of things that were printed

_and heard over the media. But
summer months here are not te
newsworthy anyway.

OS 1

The anti-Jolliftfe
people.,.frequently referred to
as the B.M.G. or Better
Municipal Government or Big

‘Money Group, depending on

your political affiliations...have .

been heard to celebrate
Jolliffe’s downfall already.

You(B.M.G.) were fooled by the.

electorate last time. Don't
choke in your champagne too
early. A lot of people think he's
great.

A couple of aldermen may
have their eyes on the chief seat
but unless they do something
outstandingly newsworthy in
the next while they'd better «7
sit on their money. Anyway no
one has really committed
themselves yet although you
can bet they'll all be running
when the time comes this fall or
next fall. ; ;

‘Evidently the arena fund -

organizers are still mad.about.
our slam at Col Cel’s pettiness, |
Incidentally its been reported
by various individuals that. this
wasn’t the first. time that
company has offered and
withdrawn its support.

Ah well, Maybe its not a bad .

company to work for.

On snooping around town and
talking to the right people at the
right time many interesting
details about certain activities
in this community have been
disclosed. As soon as they are
thoroughly checked out and
beyond any libelous doubt this
paper may offer that Freedom
of the Press that is, believe it or

not, supressed by certain

elements...Why do small town

please.

commercially dependent?

Cough. One of the reasons the
federal government campaigns
(silently) continue to permit the
sale of tobacco is that they
realize heavy tax revenue from
its sale,

Cough. The ‘federal
department of agriculture,
cough, however, cough, claims
il needs more information about
the tar and nicotine levels in
tobacco. Quite dangerous to
humans they suggest.

However, cough, it . has
pledged continued research
support for the Canadian
tobacco industry. Cough, cough.

Dr. G.H. Hamilton, assistant
director-general(eastern) of the
Agricullure ‘research branch
said recently:

“Research into tsbacco

production is justified just as

long as there continues to be a

market for cigarettes in Canada
_ang for, tobacco imports."

‘{note...damn those mid-
eastern countries who grow
dope for sale in North
America...it’s nice to see we're
hitting back at them.)

Hamilton dismissed criticism
from those whe claim the
federal departments - of
agriculture and national health
and welfare are working: al
cross purposes, (7): =

A couple of issues ago ‘we
printed a guest column which
suggested a parlicular industry
was writing a top civil servant’s
material, Really?

If you're an avid newspaper
reader and. can overlook” our
_paste-up errors you may have

noticed the native column that
appeared in the last issue.

Indians comprise a large part
of this areas population but
have very little representation
either in the media, in white
‘society or in government.

The Herald recognizes that
“Indians exist andinvitesthem to
submit editorials, news
features, ele., whenever they
choose. Other minority groups
reside in this area and if they
have any articulate spokesman
.. drop in and talk.

Various service clubs and
organizations in the community
reportedly have very few Indian
or non-English speaking
members among them. Is it
true?

If you've noticed the drug
articles in the large dailies
lately you'll also appreciate

that Terrace youngsters ARS. . .

participating in similar ‘abuseli§
activities. .

Seth Essenfeld, our mod-type
columnist, has urged that some
of the $200,002 surplus leftover
from the proposed sewage
construction project be utilized
to develop a drop in centre for
youth:..a ~ noteworthy

* suggestion. How about it City
Fathers?

Newspapers aren’t the things
some journalists’ claim they
are. Checking the dailies under
the help wanted classified
section reveals that whenever a

‘need for a reporter is advertised
i's always under the Help
Wanted Male Section, Ajoily lot
of hypecrites we are
occasionally, umph.

-ta obtain sponsership and the

. THURSDAY, JULY 22, 1
. a . .
Written wor
can often
go astray. .
‘A small pocketbook, ca
“Press Boners'’; compiled
‘Earle Tempel must ha
caused many a reader §
chuckle as he came ac
them in this newspaper.
_ Some that would surely be
‘interest to women, since th
- were taken directly from
social ‘pages. of . vari
Newspapers are:. ; :
‘When the baby is do
drinking, it -should be
screwed and laid in a oc
place under a tap. Ifthe bab
does not thrive on fresh mil
it should be boiled.” a
“The _ bride-elect and he
mother were in the decelvi
line,’ -
' One of the how’s-that-agai
variety: “After an hour rins
thoroughly in warm water in
~ whicha large lump ofsoda ha:
been dissolved, aiterward
boiling throughly in cold
water,” . . :
MORE LAUGHS

And ticklers from othe
pages were:

“Just before the cour
sentenced Cockrell was asked
if he had anything to say. Ina
calm voice ard without the
least sign of emotion he said
nothing.” =

“Of. this total 204 were
determined to be from natural
causes and 221 occurred in the
city of Los Angeles.”

“Three hundred deaf mutes (a
sang ‘The Star Spangled |
Banner’ with their hands.
They had no trouble reaching {f
the high notes,’ — another
bright one. a

Here’s an example of a
reporter not’ listening to
himself think: -'Miller’s ice-
-house caught fire... with it
20,000 pounds of ice were
reduced to ashes.”

“He then attempted to shoot
hiraself in the head but the
bullet apparently only creased
his scalp and ran out of the
‘tavern and drove off.”

'

Your
Opinion

To the Editor:

For a-number of years we
have been privileged to conduct
the Elmer Summer Safety
Contest.

The purpose of the contest
was to provide a summer
reminder of traffice safety rules
for children. ;

This year, it was impossible

we
ah

promotion had to be cancelled.
Weare hoping to reinstate the
contest in 1972 and would §
appreciate receiving your
comments. -
Yours truly,
George G. Ham
Manager
Family Safety Department