‘Prisons need far-reaching reform

By ALD. HARRY RANKIN

The wave of strikes, riots and
other forms of protest that have
swept Canadian prisons recently
have served to focus public at-
tention on the vile and inhuman
conditions existing in many of our
prisons and the need for far
reaching reforms.

The first thing I would advocate
is to tear down those two crime-
breeders and schools of crume —
the provincial Oakalla prison in
Burnaby and the B.C. Penitentiary
in New Westminster. I would
replace them with a number of
small institutions that would house
about 150 people each and they
would not be built like steel and
concrete fortresses. Then I would
shift the whole emphasis of prison
life from punishment to
rehabilitation.

A prison system based on in-
flicting as much punishment as -
possible, that encourages cruelty,
that is aimed at dehumanizing
people and breaking them men-
tally, morally and physically, is
not only in direct contradiction to
all the ethics our society professes

Tuition hikes
face students

Students at the University of
B.C. face a tuition hike in the
coming year from 25 to 40 percent,
according to this week’s issue of
the student paper, Ubyssey.

UBC Alma Mater Society
president Dave Theessen said the
university needs a 14 percent in-
crease in its operating grant from
the provincial government to
maintain this year’s programs at
the same level next year.

Theessen said UBC can reduce
its expenditures ‘two percent by
“streamlining,” leaving $4 million
to be raised by higher tuition fees.

Simon Fraser University faces
similar problems. SFU president
Pauline Jewett said this week that
the provincial budget is ‘‘a stand
pat budget’’ and “it’s about enough
for the university to stand. still.”

Execution opens window on sick society

MAURICE RUSH

arly on Monday morning, January 17, in the town of
Prova, Utah, four bullets were sent through the heart

but is. self-defeating. Instruments
of torture such as the feudal
solitary confinement cells (more
often than not just plain dirty
holes) where inmates are denied
food, light and any human contact,
must be abolished.

With a few exceptions, those
presently in our prisons will be out
one day. What do we want —
broken human beings, bitter men
and women, people who have
become hardened criminals? Or do
we want people who have become
rehabilitated to the point where
they can become useful members
of society.

My concept of rehabilitation is
one where every prison is engaged
in useful, value-producing work,
eight hours a day, forty hours a
week. And they should be paid full
wages. Some of the money they
earn could be used to meet their
personal expenses in prison, some
to help support their families,
some could go into savings for the
day they get out, and some perhaps
used for restitution for committed
crimes.

Hand in hand with work should
go job training and education to
raise their skills and knowledge.
There is no better therapy than
work and study: There should be an
expanded probation system for
people sentenced to short terms for
minor offences and ways devised
to help integrate these people into
their communities.

Those sentenced to longer terms
for more serious crimes should be

‘Present prison system aimed at dehumanizing people and breaking
them mentally, morally and physically . . .“—Ald. Rankin.

kept in more isolated communities,
under supervision. But even here,
they should be allowed to live with
their families at least part of the
time.

Of course, dangerous and in-
corrigible criminals should be
segregated from all other inmates.
And new inmates should certainly
be segregated from the old.

Prison guards, too, need better .

training so that they will be able to

help rehabilitate inmates and not
be expected to just keep them in
line or punish them. Guards need
better pay, conditions and benefits
with frequent and adequate time
on anti-social practices to satisfy
their greed for maximum profit —
profiteering in food and the
necessities of life, or polluting our
air and water with deadly

‘chemicals.

These crimes are carried on with
impunity, the corporate executives

Norman Levi backs Rankin

Norman Levi, NDP MLA for
Vancouver Burrard and former
minister of human resources, said
in a statement on Jan. 13 that the
people of Vancouver suffered a
serious loss when right-wing forces
on city council removed Ald. Harry
Rankin as chairman of city’s
resource board.

In a press statement, Levi said:

“Harry Rankin’s removal as
chairman. of the Vancouver
Resource Board is plainly a
capitulation to pressure from the

human resources minister, Bill
Vander Zalm. Vander Zalm was
afraid of Rankin. He could not deal
with a man who was informed on

the value of community par--

ticipation and the needs of the
poor:

“Mr. Rankin and I worked
closely in the development of the
Vancouver Resource Board bet-
ween 1973 and 1975. I repeat what I
have said publicly many times that
Rankin: was a key person in the

advertising for that super colossal “special.” Indeed, it is
already reported that a young movie. producer signed up
Gilmore before the execution for an exclusive movie

development of the community
resources board concept. Without
his tireless efforts we could not
have succeeded in Vancouver.

“His removal is a victory for the
millionaire and right-wing city
politician. It is a serious loss to the
battle being waged by ordinary
people who have demanded a voice
in decision making in their com-
munities.

“We must say at this time, thank
you Harry Rankin for being
there.’’

celebrity. One letter from an admirer, out of 7,000 he
’ received, said: “I admire you very much. I think you are
a very brave man ..

off from a job that is hard on the
nerves and difficult at the best of
times.

The benefits of this type of prison
reform would be two-fold. First, 2 —
good percentage of convicted
people, and certainly a far higher
percentage than now, would be
able to fit into society on theif
release. Secondly, the costs would
be cut down tremendously.

I am well aware that those who |
advocate prison reform are often —
called “bleeding hearts” by self |
righteous bigots and those wh0-
enjoy seeing cruelty inflicted on |
their fellow human beings. But -
there are some facts that-we must —
all face up to. And we should face |
up to them as civilized humaf )
beings. |

One is that Canada sends a far
higher proportion of its convicted
people to prison than almost any
other country in the world.
Secondly, the costs of maintaining
our prisons are going up at an
alarming rate. Third, our present
system just is not working. It 1s
only adding to the problem. It is
making hardened criminals out of
people who could just as easily
come out. useful members of
society. |

I am under no illusions  that—
prison reforms will solve the |
problem of our burgeoning crime
rate. The cause of that goes much
deeper — into the very heart of our
economic and political system. It
involves such matters as unem-—
ployment and deprivation,
alienation, despair and the
violence our society breeds. |

The war against the people of -
Vietnam, for instance, brought —
about a huge increase in drug”
addiction and drug traffic which
has been exported to Canada. And-
our whole system of values iS —
thrown into question when big —
corporations are allowed to carry —
responsible for them do not land in”
prison. ;

But while the causes of crime-
will not be solved by prison reform, —
at least society will benefit in some”
ways. That is why no.time should
be lost in bringing about some
substantial reforms now.

|
}
|
|
;

. I adore, love and respect and

of 36-year-old convicted murderer Gary Gilmore and once
again — for the first time in 10 years in the United States
—society took its revenge by legally murdering a human
being.

Gary Gilmore was not the victim in the early morning
light in that Utah prison yard. Society was. Every right-
wing advocate of capital punishment will hail it as a great
victory for “law and order’’ and their philosophy of ‘‘an
eye for an eye.” But by that action, mankind took a step
backward to the animal kingdom. Whether the execution
will have a sobering effect on the people in the U.S., or
lead to further executions of some 400 prisoners waiting on
death row remains to be seen.

Our concern is not with Gary Gilmore who was a cold-
hearted, brutal murderer who ended the lives of two
young married men and left wives widowed and children
fatherless. In two robberies he netted $300 and said he

killed the two men because he didn’t want them to be able >

to identify him. Life was very cheap to Gilmore. Society
made him that way. Wasn’t life cheap to the U.S.
establishment in the Vietnam war? Isn’t the cheapness of
life advertised a hundred times every day on U.S. TV,
movies and in the media? Is society any better having
committed this act of revenge on one of its victims?

The Gary Gilmore case opens a window on American
society today. And what we see is not a pretty picture. The
execution was nauseating and dehumanizing. But equally
obscene is the exploitation of the case by fast buck artists
andthe manifestations of deep rot and decay in the morals
of present day capitalist society inthe U.S.

Take as anexample the proposal first put forward a few
weeks ago by Nixon supporter and former Texas governor
James Connelly, that executions be televised on TV.
There are many promoters who would like to sell the

PACIFIC TRIBUNE—JANUARY 28, 1977—Page 2

contract. The film is to be shown on ABC. General Motors
and ITT will probably vie for the advertising rights of that
one — or perhaps Coca-Cola or some detergent company.

Hardly able to wait to get into the act to exploit this
sadistic, grisly and uncivilized murder ritual performed
by the state of Utah, several agencies tried to hire
helicopters to circle over the prison grounds with long-
lens cameras in the hope the shooting would be done
outdoors so they could film it for commercial purposes.

One leading news service, the Chicago Daily News-Sun
Times, offered its clients at a special price an exclusive
witness account of the execution by a former Gilmore
cellmate, but the news special fell through when it turned
out that the exclusive witness was not in jail and had been
arrested onarape charge a few days before.

Another promoter, anxious to get in on the takings, got
out a special Gary Gilmore sweatshirt. And you can bet
your bottom dollar that some enterprising song writers
are going to come along in the next few weeks with a flood
of ballads which will contribute to making this cold-
blooded murderer a celebrity — another Billy the Kid, or
Butch Cassidy, or Bonnie and Clyde. After all, isn’t the
idea in U.S. culture today to make heroes out of anti-

sheroes? There’s good money to be made in that.

There arealso reports of a taped death-row interview of
some 15,000 words which will soon be splashed across the
pages of our leading periodicals in the U.S. and Canada.
The influential West German paper, Frankfurter
Allgemeine wasn’t far out when it said: “Once Gilmore’s
body is mutilated, his ashes strewn over the site of his
crimes, the entertainment industry will begin its robbing
of the corpse in hooks and movies.”’

The money-hungry ghouls have already moved in.

Is the spectacle of the Gilmore case and execution likely
to be a deterrent to crime? Nonsense. The man was a
nobody.. Now he’s been turned into a somebody, a

worship you very much ... I hate to see such a very
handsome man die... You’re so manly, very masculine, ©
sexy, seductive, very appealing. .. .’’ Does that sound

like the kind of reaction which would shock others into not
following in Gilmore’s murderous footsteps?

case. We have our advocates of capital punishment.here
too who are generally of the same right-wing persuasion
as those in the U.S. who call for the death penalty and
tougher law and order. The answer to crime is stiffer
punishment, that’s their viewpoint. It’s also the viewpoint
of the Socred government. j

he stole a car and the state decided to place him in a
“secure facility’ for juvenile delinquents. That’s where
he started his apprenticeship in a life of crime, and he
never looked back. Now the Socred government is
proposing to build new ‘“‘secure facilities” (read jails) for
juvenile delinquents in B.C. I wonder how many future
Gary Gilmores will graduate from these ‘‘secure
facilities.” .

learn? When will we ever learn?”’

There might be a lesson for us in B.C. in the Gilmore .

Gary Gilmore’s life of crime began at the age of 14 when”

Inthe words of a popular ballad: “Oh, when will we ever

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