o COPE aldermanic candidate David Schreck released figures this week showing that a graduated business tax would benefit small business in Vancouver and reduce business taxes for some by 38 percent. Schreck, a PhD economist, is former manager of the Van- couver Resources Board. —Sean Griffin photo Tax proposal to shift burden to big business Continued from page 1 uwfftrates the major philosophical difference between COPE and the other major civic parties,” he said. Mayor Jack Volrich also sup- ports a reduction in the business tax for small business, Schreck said, but Volrich will not:say how the reduction will be financed. ‘In other words, it will be financed by higher property taxes on homeowners,”’ he said, “COPE . says it should be financed by big ‘business, on the ability to pay.” The city collected $19.4 million in business taxes last year, according to data from the city finance department, and the COPE proposal would bring in $19.3 million. But with a graduated tax, $13.25 million would come from the largest 10 percent of businesses with annual rental values of more than $24,000 per year. Those 10 percent of businesses account for 58.9 percent of the total rental values in the city. _ COPE’s proposal would also have $5.3 million of the total business tax paid by 72 city . businesses with annual rental values of more than $240,000. Those 72 firms have properties with rental values amounting to 20 percent of the total rental values of the over 15,000 businesses in Vancouver, Schreck pointed out. The business tax proposal ‘‘sorts out hot air from what council can actually do’’ Schreck said, claiming that the city already has the power under its charter to make the changes he proposed. Peal -PEOPLE AND ISSUES | lietteseesrs ieee reser er ‘Stupid’ citation By ALD. HARRY RANKIN In honour of the board of directors of the PNE, 1978 should be called the Year of the Stupid. I “ ean’t think of any other more suitable term to describe the proposals of its president, Erwin Swangard, concerning the building of a $163 million multiplex (new 60,000 seat stadium) on the PNE grounds. It's not that the idea of a new ’ stadium is necessarily wrong. It’s got a lot going for it, including the fact that many sports fans want it.. But surely common sense, and also I would say a sense of being on the level with the public, should compel the PNE board of directors and .its noisy propagandist, Swangard, to come up with an- swers to a few related questions on which the success and future of the whole project depends. For in- stance: es Where is the $163 million to come from? (It will more likely be well over $200 million, of that yéu can be almost certain). Will Vancouver taxpayers be forced to foot some or all of this bill? The PNE board has not come up with any answers. The sponsors of the multiplex admit that it will have an annual operating deficit running into millions of dollars. Who is going to foot this bill? Again no answer from the PNE. The traffic problems generated by the PNE today, are already more than a nuisance and irritation for the 400,000 residents who live in the Hastings Sunrise area. The traffic generated by another 60,000 to 100,000 people at the PNE would create an un- berable situation. What solution has the PNE board of directors for this problem? None, they don’t even want to talk about it. If the new stadium were built at the PNE, both Hastings and Cassiar would certainly have to be double-decked, so that traffic destined for the stadium could enter the grounds separate from the other traffic. City engineers estimate that the cost of this would _ oes to Swangard be at least $3 million. Who will pay the bill? The PNE board of directors says nothing, knowing damn well that it would be the taxpayers of Vancouver. What about the many other costs generated by a new stadium — extra policing, extra traffic control costs, fire protection, etc., etc. Who will pay these? Again the PNE board of directors and its salesmen and propagandist Swangard, say nothing. That’s because they ex- pect to keep this fact hidden for the time being. How can the question of a new stadium even be discussed without at the same time discussing a transit system to move people to and from the stadium quickly and efficiently? Not a word about this from the PNE board of directors either. Now I know that your spouse wouldn’t do such a.stupid thing, but what if she or he came home one evening and said, “‘I wanttobuilda - $200,000 home for us and I want it built on. a site I have chosen. Now all I want from you is agreement on the site so I can go ahead.” I think I know what your reaction would be, that is after you came down from hitting the ceiling. Yet that is exactly what Swangard proposed to city council. “The matter before us tonight’’, he told council on October 17, ‘‘is simply a decision by council as to the suitability of the PNE site and ~ nothing else.’’ This must indeed be the Year of the Stupid for the PNE’s board of directors if they can’t come up with anything better than that. is the fact that the PNE’s demand for agreement from the city was - defeated only by a 6 to 5 vote. And do you know who the aldermen were who voted for it? (The mayor was one of them, of course). They were the same ones who are talking about ‘‘fiscal respon- sibility”, the ‘‘need for economies and cut-backs at this time of grave government crisis’, etc., etc. = How stupid do they think we are? t’s not something that the more than 47,000 employees can derive any satisfaction from — nor is it likely to cause more than a passing murmur in the operations of the vast corporate empire — but it will be reassuring to some to see that W. Garfield Weston, the baron of biscuits and bread-baking, is indeed mortal. The man who once said, ‘‘We make ~more money out of men than we ever make out of things” and then proceeded to build a multinational empire on just that economic principle, died Sunday, having spent most of his 80 years amassing his fortune. Ironically, he had moved from London, England to Toronto, where he died, only two years before, but the move prompted an obliging Statistics Canada to reclassify the W. Garfield Weston Charitable Foundation, through which control is wielded over the “empire, as a ‘“‘Canadian’’, rather than a British-owned company. However Statistics Canada has listed the ownership of the conglomerate, it operates — quite profitably, we might add — in countries all over the world including the U.S., Honduras, Jamaica, Britain, West Germany, France, Australia, Rhodesia, South Africa — and, of course, Canada. In fact, according to the Financial Post, the Canadian wing, George Weston Ltd. has chalked up what must surely be something of a record for profit increases. Even though sales for the 12-month period ending June 30, 1978 increased by only a modest 7 percent over the previous 12-month period, net income for the company increased by a monumental 884 percent — which goes a long way towards PACIFIC TRIBUNE—October 27, 1978—Page 2 explaining the soaring cost of groceries. There is also, perhaps, a final irony. At least one Vancouver supermarket has begun promoting imported products from the venerable British firm, Fortnum and Mason, which caters to London’s wealthy. That company, too, is owned by the Weston empire — but when he took it over many years ago, the move prompted an indignant outcry in Britain about foreign control. But Weston, unabashed in his multinational gall, argued that, as a Canadian, he was also British. * OK Ithough we haven’t heard anything further from manpower and immigration minister . Bud Cullen since he admitted that local jobless figures were ‘‘embarrassing” him, we have heard that the prompt action by the United Fishermen and Allied Workers Union has headed off over-zealous UIC officials who have been using unemployment statistics to demand return of “overpayments” to unemployment insurance claimants. ; Readers may recall several weeks ago that the UIC claimed that a number of jobless workers, UFAWU members among them, had remained on claim for a longer period than strict regulation dictated — all because of a computer error which made the jobless rate appear higher than the official Statistics Canada figure. And even though StatsCan figures have been shown to understate the unemployment rate bs a substantial margin, the UIC pressed on relentlessly in its demand for the return of the so-called overpayments which ranged anywhere from $150 to $700. However, according to UFAWU welfare director-Bert Ogden, the appeals launched by th ion h resulted in the i some 20 union members having either been dropped or the claim reduced. Ogden says that the Commission acknowledged that the regulations were misapplied or misdirected in the cases where appeal was upheld and he hopes that the same principle can be made to apply in other cases. Both the UFAWU and Nova Scotia unionists who are fighting a similar case in that province, are arguing that the error was the Commission’s and that it would be “blatantly unfair” to make claimants pay for it. _ * t’s been 40 years for most of them. And for others, the opportunity to return to a democratic Spain never did come. But now, as a result of a decision of the recent annual meeting, some of the Veterans of the Mackenzie-Papineau Battalion will. be retur- ning as a group to the country whose embattled Republican government they defended against ' facist insurgence in the years between 1936 and 1938. Veteran Len Norris, who went as a delegate from this province to the annual meeting in - Toronto, tells us that the trip is only in the planning stages thus far but it’s intended that it will be made in September, 1979 — 40 years after Western ‘‘non-intervention’’ paved the way to Franco’s victory. Toronto veteran Wally Dent will be going to Spain some time within the next several weeks to: begin meeting with Spanish committees arranging the tour. At the top of the list of the places the group will visit will be the sites where Canadians fought four decades before ... Jarama, Belchite, Quinto, Teruel, and the training base at Albacet DOROTHY LYNAS... Popular school trustee runs again for North Vancouver district board. Lynas to defend seat on N. Van School Board Veteran school strustee Dorothy Lynas this week announced that she will.contest re-election to the North Vancouver School Board on a program of preserving high educational standards while cutting local taxes on education through greater provincial government commitments. “The declining level of financial commitment to education on the part of the provincial government is placing quality education in B.C. in jeopardy,” she said, “Over the last three years the provincial government has raised the basic mill rate by 50 percent. In North Vancouver this has added $7.4 million to local school tax bills.” North Vancouver taxpayers are carrying 62 percent of education. costs with more than a million dollars in school taxes added this year’ by the raising of the provincial school tax mill rate. “RKducation is a service to people, and shouldn’t be a tax on | property,’’ Lynas said while - ° * . of But what is almost equally stupid: - calling for the implementation -the MeMath:Report on taxation by which the province would pick up 75 percent of education costs. Also running in North Vancouver » District, Ernie Crist is a front runner for an aldermanic seat on the district council. In a detailed policy statement released this week to North Vancouver residents. Crist at- tacked the district council for refusing to integrate north shore development into the Greater Vancouver Regional District’s liveable region plan. © The campaign against education spending in B.C. is misplaced and could threaten academic stan- dards built up over years, Lynas warned. North Vancouver has an | reputation for its — enviable educational programme, she said, but it must include more than basic skills. Students need ‘‘a program that will equip them to — meet the’ challenges of a highly complex world,” said Lynas, “My priority has always been to provide an educational programme which — develops a student’s personal, social and academic potential.” COPE election funds requested COPE’s campaign committee has issued an urgent appeal for funds to meet expenses during the current Vancouver civic election campaign. 2 A campaign committee spokesman said this week that - although COPE stands by striking postal workers, the strike has seriously reduced the number of donations coming to the election fund. All COPE supporters who intend to contribute to the election fund are requested to bring their con- tributions to COPE election headquarters at 1588 Commercial Drive, Vancouver, as soon as possible.