4 Terrace Review — Wednesday, March 5, 1986

“e Ovinions

Priority must be
job creation

In my recent Province-
wide speech, I talked
about the progress we've
made in diversifying our
economy and the grow-
ing signs of strength
we're seeing as a result.

by Premier Bill Bennett

And I talked about the
building consensus
across British Columbia
that our priorities must
be continued job-crea-
tion and improvements
to our education and
health services.

I said, as an example,
we would channel reve-
nues from expanding
economy into education
into one of the best in-
vestments I know — the
students of British Col-
umbia.

We have moved quick-
ly on that commitment.

Only days later, I an-
nounced we have estab-
lished a $110 million
fund for Excellence in
Education to improve
the quality of education
in our schools, colleges
and universities.

The fund will first be
used to finance two types
of spending.

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Review

Terrace
Review

Established May 1, 1985

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Operating
budgets

The first is adjust-
ments to the operating
budgets of schools,
universities and colleges,
and the second, special
initiatives to improve the
quality of instruction,
modernize facilities and
allow us to respond to
economic development
opportunities.

In year one of this
threé-year program,
we’re increasing spend-
ing on education by $110
million.

And as the economy
expands, there will be
additional funds allo-
cated in. years two and
three to reflect economic
growth.

I also said the Prov-
ince will provide approx-
imately $90 million to
schools from general
revenues to maintain
operating funds at the
1985/86 level and offset
school tax reductions an-
nounced in last year’s
budget.

The first allocation
from the fund for Ex-
cellence in Education —
an additional $24.5
million for schools to
cover non-salary infla-
tion, special education
enrolment and increased
costs of supplies, tran-
sportation and energy —
was announced the
following day by Educa-

Meeting

The next regular
school board meeting
will be held at
Caledonia Senior Sec-
ondary School Tues-
day, March 11 at 7:30
p.m. The meeting will
not be held at the
school board office,
3211 Kenney Street as
indicated in the Terrace
coming events column
on page 20 of this
issue.

Utility
costs

At its Feb, 24 meeting
Terrace council voted to
include utility costs for
the Kalum Hotel Muse-
um in the 1986 municipal
budget. The bills for
electricity and heating of
the structure came to
$469.19 in 1985.

tion’ Minister Jim

Hewitt.
Net increase

After adjustments to ©

reflect the overall decline
in enrolment across the
Province, the schools
will receive a net increase
of 15.5 million in new
money for operating
purposes.

But that’s only a start
and announcements will
come soon on the alloca-
tions to Ke made to our

colleges and universities. —

The fund will also be
used to allow our schools
and post-secondary in-
stitutions to develop
special initiatives to im-
prove the quality of
education.

At the school level, we
want to see proposals
that involve computers,
teacher training and
upgrading, curriculum
and textbook develop-
ment and other areas.

Our colleges will be
encouraged to bring for-
ward programs that re-
late to re-training for
laid-off workers, en-
trepreneurial training
and the development of
local business center.

Encourage
development

At the university level,
we will encourage
development of centers
of excellence in fields
such as bio-technology,
Pacific Rim studies,
computer systems, fores-
try research, interna-
tional business and new
links with the Province’s
cultural industries.

These priorities, how-
ever, aren’t carved in
stone, and our Ministers
will be consulting with
their respective educa-
tion communities to
determine their views
and their priorities in
terms of special in-
itiatives.

The fund for Excel-
lence in Education will
provide a major infusion
of new money for our
education system —.and
open up new oppor-
tunities for the institu-
tions in that system to
improve the quality of
education.

The end result will be
students with the skills
and training they need in
the new economy that
we’re building, and in-
creased prospects for our
Province as a whole.

“Tdon't mind...I’mhereto makea loan payment...”

Imbalances
can be corrected

by Frank Howard, MLA
Skeena

Postive action oft.

times results in
something positive hap-
pening. It certainly did
when I took the initiative
last spring to write to the
Prime Minister of Japan
about the tariffs which

Japan imposes against

B.C Plywood and B.C.
Lumber.

Many will recall that
Prime Minister
Nakasone told the
Japanese people that he
wanted them to buy
more imported products
to help redress the
balance of payments im-
balance. 1 took advan-
tage of that statement of
his to remind him that
the 15 percent tariff
against our plywood and
the 10 percent . tariff
against our lumber
didn’t quite fit with his
suggestion about buying
greater quantities of
goods from other coun-
tries.

Trade
balances

I told Prime Minister
Nakasone on May 2,
1985 that our perception
of trade was that we ex-
ported the raw materials
and thus exported jobs
to workers in Japan. I
also told him that trade
balances between nations
were expressed in dollar
terms and did not reflect
job-creation nor relative
wealth-producting ac-
tivities.

Part of my letter said,
“Some of the job-
creation imbalances
could be corrected if
Japan were to remove
the two tariffs referred
to above. The effect
would be to reduce the
cost of such products in
Japan and would help to
put more British Colum-
bians to work...’’

I was very pleased to
read in the newspaper
about two weeks ago
that Japan has agreed to
reduce the tariffs refer-
red to above. While it
was a reduction and not
a complete removal at
least it is a step in the
right direction. It will
help some, it will give us
better access to the
Japanese market for
dressed lumber and for
plywood,

That is what positive
thinking and positive ac-
tion is all about. I believe
in moving quickly when
the opportunity presents
itself, of taking advan-
tage of every open door,
of pushing the point
home whenever possible,
of doing what I can to be
helpful.

B.C.
taste

A delegation of B.C.
seafood processors,
under the sponsorship of
the Ministry of Inter-
national Trade and In-
vestment, is in California
to offer American food
buyers a taste of B.C,’s
catch,

The delegation, in-
cluding representatives
of eight seafood pro-
cessing firms, is partici-
pating in Seafare 86 Sea-
food Exposition in
Anaheim.

Council

Alderman Fred Mac-
Donald will represent
Terrace council at the
annual general meeting
of the Yellowhead
Highway Association in
Prince George April 18
and 19.

Wrong Direction
' Avoid ironing in a bias direc-
tions this gives the fabric a pebbly,
bumpy appearance.

Shuffle.
creates

problems

Frank Howard, MLA
Skeena

The recent Bennett
government -cabinet
shuffle wiped the slate
clean for a number of
ministers and appears to
effectively deny us the
opportunity to ask those
cabinet ministers involv-
ed in the shuffle
anything about what
they did or did not do
prior to the shuffle.

This situation comes
about because of the
Parliamentary rule
which says that one can
only ask a cabinet
minister about matters
for which he or she is
responsible at the mo-
ment the question is ask-
ed. The effect of this
rule, which the Bennett
government has. used
many times in the past, is
to sweep everything prior
to Feb. 12, 1986, ‘‘under
the rug’’.

For instance, suppose
we want to ask the
Minister of Forests why
the objective of having
25 percent of the Annual
Allowable Cut in our
forests set aside for the
small logger and sawmill
operator was abandoned
and favoritism given to
the big integrated forest
companies. The rule says
that we can’t ask Tom
Waterland that question
because he is no longer
the Minister of Forests.
The rule also says we
can’t ask Jack Heinrich
that question because he
was not the Minister of
Forests at the time the 25
percent goal was aban-

- doned. We are stuck.

The answers to that type
‘of question are ‘‘under
the rug’’.

The same is true of
educational matters. We
can’t ask Jack Heinrich
about his actions prior to
Feb. 12 because he is no
longer Minister of
Education. We can't ask
the new minister, Jim
Hewitt, for he just came
on the scene.

And so it goes about
health, human resources,
energy, mining policy,
lands, parks, housing,
international trade,
universities, agriculture,
elections act matters, lot-
teries, consumer affairs,
liquor licencing, last
year’s forest fires, and a
variety of other lesser
known subjects.

This recent cabinet
shuffle reminds me of
the old shell game. No
matter which shell you
looked under there was
no pea.

i