Canada

Senate joins debate on GST
as hearings into the tax open

By KERRY McCUAIG

The Senate opened hearings on the
Goods and Services Tax in Ottawa last
week with the focus as much on constitu-
tional power as it is on the controversial
tax.

Liberal Senator Sidney Buckwold, chair
of the Senate banking committee which is
considering the legislation, has called the
‘seven per cent tax “fundamentally flawed”
and speculates that it is probably not amen-
dable.

Nor is the Senate prepared to expedite the
bill through the public hearings and debate
process. The Thanksgiving weekend is the
earliest Buckwold sees the committee finish-
ing its work. Whether the Senate kills or
amends the tax bill, the delay will seriously
hamper government efforts at bringing it on
line by its Jan. 1, 1991 implementation date.

This is not the first time the Liberal-
dominated Senate has stalled or amended
government bills. But its open defiance over
the GST bill, close on the heels of its major
rework of the Unemployment Insurance
Commission, has got the Tories visibly
angry.

An orchestrated attack appears to have
been launched. Pundits and parliamentary
commentators have made.a sharp break
with the appointed body, attacking its con-
stitutional, democratic and even moral cre-
dentials.

Conservative House leader Harvie Andre
says Ottawa is prepared to invoke a never-
used section of the British North America
Act to increase the size of the upper
chamber by up to eight seats and break the
Liberal majority.

Two-tiered

Continued from page 1

Bill 11, the School Amendment Act that
has yet to be passed by the legislature, stipu-
Jated that districts seeking money above the
government’s new block-funding formula
would have to go to referendum May 5.
Education groups, citing examples from
B.C. prior to 1973 and current practices in
several U.S. states, decried the referendum
notion when it was proposed by Education
Minister Tony Brummet last January.

They pointed out that few people would
actually approve a rise in their own taxes,

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This leaves Mulroney in a catch-22. It’s a |

bit hard to hit the Senate for being undemo-
cratic, and then use an undemocratic
procedure, fraught with patronage, to push
through a very unpopular piece of legisla-
tion.

The tax’s future could also depend on the
success of the Meech Lake Accord. If the
Accord dies on June 23, Mulroney would
be free to fill the 17 vacant seats in the
House with Tories, whittling the Liberal
majority to 51-48.

The irony is the government has two
major policy initiatives — the GST and
Meech Lake — and getting the first would
be facilitated by the demise of the second.

But while Liberal Senators seem to have
openly joined in the campaign against the
GST, activists warn against getting compla-
cent. Today’s allies may not necessarily be
on side tomorrow. —

“There are so many variables,” says Peter
Blyer, on staff with the Pro-Canada Net-
work, which is heading up the anti-GST
fight.

“Whether the Senate considers itself part
of the campaign or not, our role is to keep
the pressure on, and make sure they per-
form their duties, which is to reconsider and
amend legislation.”

Pressing the Senate to hold extensive,
cross-country hearings and calling on it to
kill the bill is central to the PCN’s Cam-
paign for Fair Taxes in the coming period.

Polls indicate 80 per cent of the popula-
tion are opposed to the tax. The PCN wants
to focus the debate on alternative, progres-
sive tax measures, rather than tying into
right-wing populist sentiment to cut
government spending on social programs.

“The principle here isn’t non-elected
senators responding to their constituents,”
says Blyer, “‘it’s that elected representatives
are not.”

The PCN is also considering borrowing a
page from the peace movement and push-
ing to have municipalities and provinces
declared “GST Free Zones.” This would be
more than symbolic since the GST will only
work efficiently if the provinces agree to
co-operate with Ottawa.

Also up its sleeve are plans to recall Tory
members of parliament based on their sup-
port for the GST. A version of this is
already happening in Alberta where riding
associations are revoking their support for
elected members and giving notice that they
won’t support the incumbent’s bid in the
next election.

Also on the streets is “The Big Tax Pic-
ture,” a cartoon booklet unveiling the
hypocrisy behind government claims the

GST is all part of making a fairer tax sys-
tem.

education system seen

and noted the inequities that have built up
between richer and poorer districts where
referendums are an established funding
method.

The new bill tabled last month further
defined the referendum by limiting items
districts could ask voters to fund. The May
5 referendums were limited to three catego-
ries: new programs, enhancement of exist-
ing programs, and minor capital expendi-
tures.

Notably excluded were wages and salar-
ies. These items will be set by the provincial
government, indicating that once again the
Socreds are targeting teachers and support
staff through education spending ceilings or
cutbacks. ad

Jones said salaries and wages account for
80-85 per cent of a district’s funding, so the
new formula “obviously impacts heavily on
operating costs.

“Tt certainly doesn’t speak to the issue of
local autonomy,” said Jones, elected
BCSTA president at the annual convention
April 28. She pointed out the BCSTA
member districts support local control of
budgets by trustees. Members also have
protested the three-year, uniform terms
imposed by the province through legislative
amendments, she said.

Trustees still don’t know what the tax
rate in their districts will be, Jones said.
Setting the mill rate for residential taxes was
the last vestige of local control for districts
after the provincial government seized
commercial property taxing powers during
the restraint program established in 1982.

“We agreed with the idea of block fund-
ing, but we definitely do not agree with
referendums,” Jones stressed.

She also noted districts which held refer-
endums are thousands of dollars poorer in
their operating budgets because the govern-

ment did not provide funding to hold the
costly referendums.

Jones said the association will address its
concerns through government-established
Education Advisory Committee, which
meets two days ever few months.

The BCTF president said the federation
will “renew our efforts to end such (referen-
dum) funding” in the wake of the referen-
dum defeats.

Novakowski said that given the current
financial situation facing many households,
“it’s miraculous that two districts got a yes
vote.”

He charged the government also “stacked
the deck” by not applying the homeowner
grant to offset the referndum increase, by
stipulating that all monies for the new or
improved programs be raised in one
year — one referendum — and by the per-
sonal interference of Vander Zalm and
Brummet in the referendum procedure.
(Brummet threatened to put out a counter-
leaflet to a leaflet the Surrey board distrib-

_ uted urging, unsuccessfully, a yes vote in its

referendum.)

Novakowski noted the loss of the refer-
endum in Coquitlam, where 22 per cent of
the voters rejected increased funding by 61
per cent, means the district is preparing to
increase class sizes by freezing hiring of
teachers for growing areas.

In Surrey, the fastest growing B.C.
municipality, 15 per cent of the voters
rejected further funding by 65 per cent. Cas-
tlegar’s proposal went down to defeat by 95
per cent, with a 23-per-cent voter turnout.

In other districts that suffered defeats, the
results were: Powell River, 83 per cent
against (21 per cent turnout); Prince
George, 74 per cent (12.5 per cent); Abbots-
ford, 66 per cent (19 per cent); Queen Char-
lotte Islands, 65 per cent (25 per cent).

Beatty promises
child care

Health Minister Perrin Beatty has
promised a new national child care pro-
gram by 1993. Emerging from a meeting
with the child care committee of the
National Action Committee on the Sta-
tus of Women, Beatty promised to con-
sult with constituency groups when
redrafting new federal child care plans.
He gave no indication of how much
funding the government would be pre-
pared to make available for child care.

The federal government's last child
care initiative, announced prior to the
1988 election, committed $7 billion over
seven years to a program. It was roundly
criticized because $3 billion of the pro-
gram was earmarked in small tax credits
to all parents and did nothing to create
new spaces.

Finta awaits
jury verdict

After four months of submissions and
testimony the accused Nazi war criminal
Imri Finta now awaits the jury’s verdict.
Videotaped testimony from survivors
now living in Israel, and several experts
on the role of Hungarian Gendarmes in
the Second World War lent strong evi-
dence to charges that Finta organized the
deportation of thousands of Jews to Nazi
death camps.

Evidence was also brought forward
that Finta supervised the stealing of the
victims’ personal belongings and inflicted
cruelties on men, women and children.

_Finta is charged both with war crimes
and crimes against humanity involving
the forced confinement of Jews and their
transportation to death camps. He is also
being held responsible for the deaths of
those who did not survive the train ride.

Finta’s lawyer Doug Christie offered
no witnesses, much to the surprise of the
court. Instead he relied on putting prose-
cution witnesses under vicious cross-
examination, questioning their legitimacy
and challenging whether there was any
planned extermination of Jews during
the war.

Finta is the first Nazi war criminal to
be brought to court under a 1984 law
which opened the doors to prosecution
of war criminals whose crimes were
committed outside Canada.

Goodwin’s award
to AIDS victim

An AIDS victim has been posthum-
ously awarded the Goodwin's award for
excellence in alternative journalism.
Chuck Grochmal, who died Feb. 4, was
chosen from a record 60 submissions.
Grochmal wrote the column on coping
with AIDS in Xtra, a Toronto gay news-

paper. os eed =<
His “brutally frank and fascinating
column was a source of courage and
support for many AIDS sufferers, said
Ron Verzuh, president of the Goodwin's
Foundation which sponsors the award.
The first runners-up were Linda
McQuaig and Neil Brooks for “O.K.
Michael Wilson, Here’s the Alternative
in Toronto’s This Magazine. Second
runner-up was Kathyrn Morse for “Net
Results — Sorting Through the Fisher-
ies Tangle,” in Halifax's New Maritimes.

Pacific Tribune, May 14, 1990 e 3