renee ine Se lien ian ee A4 - The Terrace Standard, Wednesday, May 28, 1997 TERRACE STANDARD ESTABLISHED APRIL 27, 1988 A Division of Cariboo Press (1969) Ltd. ADDRESS: 3210 Clinton Street Terrace, B.C. * V8G SR2 TELEPHONE: (250) 638-7283 * FAX: (250) 638-8432 EMAIL: standard@kermode.net Home invaders . DOWN IN the lower mainland the act of smash-. ing in a front door followed by terrorizing the occupants inside and ransacking their belongings is called home invasion. When the Liberal government does it, it’s called the seniors benefit program. And it’s not getting the profile it should this election. The seniors benefit program replaces the old age security program in the year 2001. What it. does is continue the trend of the 1980s and 1990s by instituting clawbacks for income supplement | programs. It does so by attacking the all-. Canadian attribute of being thrifty and saving. What’s worse, it has legislated women to the status of being second class citizens. : The current old age security entitlement is | reduced by 15 cents on the dollar for net income above $53,215. Beginning in 2001, age and pen- sion income tax credits are being eliminated and the entitlement is reduced by 20 cents on the dol- lar after only $25,921 of other income. The result? Less money for seniors — as much as $8.2 billion a year. People who take responsibility to provide for- their own retirement income will be punished while the guy down the street who blew his. money in the bar will do just fine. In other words there will be an incentive not to save money for retirement. As appalling as that is, there’s something more — a degradation of women. Many women who will be seniors in the next 20 years have never worked outside the home, made less money than their spouses if they did or worked in low-level occupations where there weren’t private pension plans. That translates into women having less retirement income then their spouses. Under.old age security these women aré treated |, as independent people, deserving of payments on an equal footing as their spouses. But since household income is to be used to determine the seniors benefit amount, this equality is to be wiped out. Women will get less than they would today because they are being lumped together with their spouses. In some cases, they might receive nothing. All of this adds up to a shameful cash grab from seniors and a loss of independence for women. The mystery is why the other parties aren’t at- tacking the Liberals on this vulnerable issue. Take note MORE THAN a few people connected in one form or another to the federal election are worried about what might happen on voting day, June 2. Suggestions that there might be a lot of un- registered people showing up to vote could cause line ups. And the change in voting hours might mean some people will come too late to cast their ballots. So give yourself plenty of time to vote and remember that the polls open at 7 a.m. | and close at 7 p.m. Le PUBLISHER/EDITOR: Rod Link ADVERTISING MANAGER: Rick Passmore PRODUCTION MANAGER: Edouard Credgeur NEWS Jeff Nagel * NEWS SPORTS: Dave Taylor COMMUNITY: Cris Leykauf OFFICE MANAGER; Kathleen Quigley ADVERTISING CONSULTANTS: Sam Collier, Janet Viveiros, Tracy Cowan TELEMARKETER: Tracey Tomas ADVERTISING ASSISTANT: Emma Law, Kelly Jean TYPESETTING: Sylvana Broman DARKROOM: Susan Credgeur CIRCULATION MANAGER: Karen Brunette SUBSCRIPTION RATES BY MAIL: $53.50 per year; Seniors $48.15; Out of Province $60.99 Outside of Canada (6 months) $149.80 (ALL PRICES INCLUDE GST) MEMBER OF B.C, AND YUKON COMMUNITY NEWSPAPERS ASSOCIATION, CANADIAN COMMUNITY NEWSPAPERS ASSOCIATION pare f Inpoeee SadUM Coleabte arf Katee AND BC, PRESS COUNCIL : Serving the Terrace and Thomhill area, Published on Wednesday of each weck by Cariboo Press (1969) Ud, at3210 Clinton Streal, Terrace, British Columbia, V8G 5A2. Stories, photographs, illustrations, designs and typestyies in the Terrace Standard are the property ol the copyright holders, including Cariboo Press (1969) Lid., its illustration repro services and advertising agandes, aa Rapreduection in whole or In part, without written permission, Is specifically prohibited. Authorized as second-clas$ mail pending the Pos! Office Dapartment, {of payment of postage in cash, Special thanks to all our contributors and correspondents for their time and talents EE EE STE eee ET ET eee ase eee Eee flee Men iin Dien 5 Whogpée... Nomore problems. ... We vote for Chretien. watt hes in ,.- and then we Select 4 fob from the many employment opoortunities he promised, se L ,1 YOU CWO VICTORIA -—- A few weeks ago, I said that the death of yet another child in the govern- ment’s care, this one at the hands of her foster mother, demanded the resignation of children and families minister + Penny Priddy. It was an unfair comment, and [ accept the admonitions, some gentle, some no so gen- de, fom many readers, It was a comment born of frustration and despair with a system that seems to be unable to protect society’s most helpless aad vulnerable. If we can protect our salmon stock — and I be- lieve we will — why can’t we protect our children? Priddy, an extremely likable and hard-working cabinet min- ister, is just as horrified by the deaths of so many children in her .ministry’s care, and her. resignation would, of course, not change anything, It would be a gesture, no more, Better to take action, and that’s what she did. Last week, no doubt under pressure’ from Priddy, the government got off its butt and introduced some changes, recommended more than a year ago in Judge Tom Gove’s .teport on child welfare, that just might offer better pro- ' tection to children at risk. ta . dninistry’s FROM THE CAPITAL HUBERT BEYER When passed, the new legis- jation will give social workers the tools to help troubled familics without actually hav- ing to remove children from the home, a process that can take some time. ; The new law will allow the child protection workers to apply directly to the court for supervision orders. Those orders will allow a child to remain in his or her home, but with supervision and monitoring provided by a min- istry worker, a contract worker or even an extended family member. Under existing legislation, the ministry must first remove the child from the home, and in some cases, it may then be possible io return the child un- der a supervision order, but only after protracted court pro- ceedings. Those legal hurdles proved fatal for little baby Molly who died recently in foster care, even though a judge had given custody of Molly to the birth mother’s sister, who was ready to care for the girl. “This new procedure will be much less traumatic for the child and the family than being uprooted and returned,”’ says Priddy. Supervision orders could also call for a plan of care which could include things such as providing support services for the parents, day care or respite care. If a parent doesn’t live up to the terms of a supervision or- _der and, thereby, put the child at tisk, the child could be . removed from the home forthwith. At the same time, the government moved to give new and expanded powers to Children’s Commissioner Cynthia Morton. One major change will give Morton the right to investigate critical injurics that occur to children who are receiving govermment services. Again, those new powers would apply to cases such as that of Baby Molly. The new legislation is vir- tually assured of sailing through unopposed, Liberal opposition critics have already indicated that they fully sup- port it. Their only negative reaction was that the changes should have been introduced long ago, and that’s a fair com- ment. Gove made the recom- mendations more than a year ago. No legislation will ever pro- tect all children from neglect or abuse, but the changes just introduced, along wilh existing legislation and the powers given to the children and families ministry, should go a long -way to stem the flood of child deaths that has horrified British Columbians in the past few years. We will never know how many children’s lives will be saved by the changes in legis- lation. But] fervently hope not to have to write about yet an- other child’s death. I wish Penny Priddy all the best in her difficult task. She is a good person who takes her duties seriously. And no, she shouldn't resign. ; Beyer can be reached at Tel: 920-9300; Fax: 385-6783; E- Mail: hubert@coolcom.com Doorways are RENTING MEETING space in a public building is easy; holding the exit door from lacking you out while you tote in your props is difficult. Over the years I’ve taught upholstery courses in several venues including Caledonia’s wood shop and Northwest Community College’s facilities in both the cafeteria and gym buildings. With rare excep- tions, ouldoor temperatures hovered at their lowest, Upholstery students gener- ally arrive loaded like a com- bination flood evacuec/overnigh! camper. Depending upon their choice of practice furniture, they may hau] anything from a footstool no bigger than a mandarin orange box to a Lazy boy _tecliner' that dismantles into four substantial chunks. In addition, students struggic with a roll of fabric, the old padding knotted into a plastic- MARTEN, WHY DO Te Because THEY WR CAN'T ENTO "k* SM PE PLEASURES THROUGH BIFOCALS. CLAUDETTE SANDECKI wrapped baile, a magnetic ham- mer and other tools, notebook, thermos, and brown bag lunch. Transferring these supplies from a parking lot to the mect- ing room often takes more than one trip. Since the exit door — usually the door most acces- sible from the parking lot. — must be opened from the inside or with a key, something must PEOPLE GET SO BIRME THE EVENING | SHORT- TEMPERED STAR RISE? fem DURING THE , ee DARK. PERIOD: ae Poi LUKE WATCHIAG§ a big hassle hold the door ajar or someone must be prepared to open it outward when the hauler knocks. Exit doors, such as R.E.M. Lee’s, may open out on to parking lots cratered with potholes the size of wheels, but offer not a single rock or Jum- ber chunk useful as a doorstop. Makeshift doorstops can be difficult to find inside the aver- age classroom, too, I’ve seen jackets, hammers and baoks pressed into service. And [ do mean pressed. Exit ' doors are made of stecl, under a powerful incentive to close and lock. But all that’s needed to prevent the door locking is a half-inch thickness io keep the mechanism from meshing. A strip of belting or flexible plastic that could be hooked over the inside doorknob and around to the outside doorknob would do the job. The gadget must be as visible as a Dal- WAVES KPT Rose! WHAT, 2G malian napping on a ruby rug. You wouldn’t want it in- advertently left in place. Fluo- rescent orange would be highly visible on most exit doors. Any production or replace- ment cost for such doorstops would be offset by the winter savings on heating costs, The doorstop is needed only for about ten minutes at the be- ginning and end of each room rental. Warm weather is no heating consideration. But in cold weather — when most adult activilics occur — heat Icaves the building in clouds thick as stage fog at a Rolling Stones concerl. Watching scarce tax dollars curl out into the parking lol bothers me, es- pecially when I- hear the furnace roaring. Every key to a rented community building should come with a lightweight doorstop — or a . Lilliputian doorman with x-ray vision.