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HomeMy WebLinkAboutThe Citizen, 2017-04-06, Page 5THE CITIZEN, THURSDAY, APRIL 6, 2017. PAGE 5. Other Views Denying facts doesn't change fact We live in crazy times when everything seems to be upside down and backward. Experts are not to be trusted but gut instinct is. Facts are lies and lies are "alternative facts". This topsy-turvy world reminds me of the situation in the now -ancient Al Pacino movie Serpico, based on the book by a real-life cop who battled corruption in New York police force. In a scene in the movie Frank Serpico tells his girlfriend that all he ever wanted to do was become a police officer but now he is regarded as a bad guy by his fellow officers because he won't go along with them breaking the law to enrich themselves. The girlfriend tells him the story of the wise king who was loved by his people until one day a witch put a potion in the well in the centre of the small kingdom which was used by all the king's subjects. After drinking the water the people all go mad and decide they must kill the king because he's crazy. Hearing this, the king solves the problem by drinking the well water himself, so that the people and the king were crazy together. The girlfriend was suggesting Serpico should go along to get along. Sometimes when I listen to Canadian business leaders and business commentators these days, I think they must have drunk at the same well as U.S. President Donald Trump. While the majority of Canadians wonder about Trump's sanity, spokespeople for the business community regularly urge our governments to abandon their own policies and adopt the Trump agenda: lower taxes for business and the rich, slash regulations and stop worrying about the environment. From a business -person's standpoint there is a dab of logic. The U.S. is our largest trading partner and competitor so if the rules of doing business there change, it can alter reality here, even if our government policies Keith Roulston From the cluttered desk don't change. Lower taxes and lax regulations might make it easier for companies to make larger profits down south, so they may pack up and move. But Trump also is a handy tool for business leaders to get what they wanted all along: higher profits through lower taxes; easier operation of their business through reduced regulations, and letting businesses do whatever they want without worrying about the environment. Trump's "Make America Great Again" campaign theme goes right along with the mindset of many business people that they are victims of government and that things were better before government started interfering. Just as Trump's supporters had this hazy idea of what a "great America" was like, so many business leaders forget all they gain by our modern society. Lower taxes? Canada already has lower corporate taxes than the U.S. Trump's reforms would bring the U.S. corporate tax rate closer to Canada's, which business leaders say will take away Canada's advantage so our taxes must be lowered even more. But despite what many business -oriented people think, money from taxes isn't just wasted. It buys things businesses need. Taxes pay for roads factories need to transport their goods. They pay for schools that give businesses the highly -educated and skilled workers needed for them to thrive. So what are you going to cut — besides the jobs of anyone involved in protecting the environment? Health care costs? You want to adopt American private healthcare? One of the greatest advantages Canadian businesses have had is government-sponsored health care, taking away expensive employer -paid health benefits that U.S. businesses have to pay. Our healthy, well-educated, long-lived population is important to business not only in providing a good workforce but by being good customers for the goods and services businesses produce. How about cutting regulations then? We all hate rules and red tape. But regulations rarely happen out of thin air. They're usually the result of popular demand because power was abused. Right now, all Ontario taxpayers are contributing to the clean-up of mercury released into a river by a Dryden paper mill in the 1960s that has been poisoning the people of Grassy Narrows for decades. Elsewhere, scam artists give all businesses a bad name. If I'm a hard-working, honest business leader, I don't want to have to help pay for the sins of self-serving scoundrels. And finally there's climate change, which Trump claims is all a hoax perpetrated by China. Just as Trump claims facts are fake but they remain facts anyway, no matter how powerful or influential he thinks he is, he cannot make climate change go away simply because he doesn't believe in it. Canadian business leaders may gain short- term profits by our governments abandoning the fight against climate change, but they, and all the world's residents will eventually pay the price. Violent weather cuts corporate profits when factories are destroyed by tornadoes or transportation is disrupted or insurance costs soar. More than that, business leaders will have their lives disrupted just like the rest of us. Denying climate change won't stop the storm. Paying attention to (useless) details Jf you jump in my ride and turn the radio on, you'll find that I was likely listening to either a CD or CBC Radio. As part of my job, I do an awful lot of driving. We cover a pretty big area so, even going to and from council meetings puts me on the road for at least four hours a month. While I could sit there and groove to tunes the whole time, sometime I find it a nice change of pace to listen to some intelligent discourse. Unfortunately, that isn't always the case, like on Sunday afternoon. On my way back from covering an event in Central Huron, I was listening to the radio and heard a bit on the hundreds of people who act as "seat fillers" at the Juno Awards, the annual ceremony that recognizes the best Canadian musical artists and bands. The Junos, whether you agree with their choices or even know the names of the majority of the acts, are usually a pretty good show in my opinion. It's nice to see Canadians getting recognition from their own country whether or not they find it on the world stage and it certainly helps drive the number of viewers when people like Russell Peters and Bryan Adams host the show. This year, however, I was slightly distracted for the bits and pieces of the Junos I caught thanks to the coverage of seat fillers I had caught on CBC Radio. The story was about an individual who was in his second year of the job. If you aren't familiar with the idea, the producers of televised awards program don't like empty seats in shots so there are people (volunteers for the Junos) who will be directed to run and fill in for a celebrity when they get up to present an award, perform on stage or even make their way to the washrooms. The individual being interviewed admitted that he was used for the nosebleed sections last year. He felt he hadn't "dressed up" enough to make it to the floor to fill in for the big-time celebrities. Tips for those looking to get included as part of the elite group that stands in for front -row celebrities included dressing well and blending in. After that, the person who is responsible for those filling seats was interviewed and said the volunteers need to be professional, courteous and be prepared to give up the seat when the person returns. She explained how it was imperative that no empty seats be shown as the camera pans through the crowd, showing the targets of thanks and jeers courtesy of Peters. The story ended mentioning that some seat fillers, approximately 150 of them, fly to Ottawa for the event from all over Canada. The story left me with a few thoughts. Primarily, I wondered why the tale was on a news program for the entire province. Surely there must be something a little more newsworthy than, "People occasionally fill seats at awards show and here's their story." Secondly, I wondered why such pressure was put on not having empty seats as the cameras at the show panned over the audience. Honestly, it's not something I had ever put any thought into before. If I saw an empty seat I assumed the person was either involved in the show somehow, getting a snack or drink or using the facilities. It wasn't something I dwelled on. Thirdly, I wondered if having such a story done wouldn't defeat the purpose of the seat fillers, which it certainly did for me. Sure enough, when Peters started in on his jokes about the stars present at the show, I spied an empty seat and thought someone wasn't doing their job. Before hearing the story, however, I can't imagine that I would've noticed it. Lastly, I wondered why people would want to be involved in such a practice. Sure, I get that there is a slim chance these seat fillers will get to catch a presentation, meet a favourite celebrity or see a performance but is that really worth switching seats every three minutes? It seems to me that it would be better to sit in the comfort of your own home and catch the entire show, only having to move when you can see the bottom of your glass. The last thought I had, as I was pondering the necessity of keeping seats filled is why was this even a practice? This goes beyond the pressure of having someone coordinating all these space -fillers and to the actual need for the practice at all. What is so important about an empty seat that people will line up by the thousands to do it and someone else is (likely well) paid to make sure empty chairs aren't spotted? Sure, image is important, but I'm not going to assume bad things about an event if there isn't a person in every chair, I'm just going to assume that someone, somewhere, had to answer nature's call and that makes the show and the celebrities seem more like real people than laughing faces on a screen. Shawn Loughlin Ajliali Shawn's Sense The end of the road ast week, David Sparling retired from the Fire Department of North Huron after over 25 years as a firefighter, three and a half of which he served as the department's chief. At a private event, Sparling was honoured by a number of the people he's worked with over the years in one capacity or another, including the Ontario Fire Marshal's office, North Huron Council and staff, the local firefighters' associations and, of course, his fellow firefighters. In speaking to the dozens assembled at the Emergency Services Training Centre, Sparling discussed his years as a firefighter, covering a number of different topics. One thing he did say was how "blessed" he and other members of the community are to have such "high-calibre" media here, highlighting me and Denny Scott by name — but that's neither here nor there (for you guys anyway — for me it was both here and there... and maybe even everywhere). Getting back to my point, I have always been fascinated by retirement speeches. I have always watched with a great amount of interest as someone looks back on a life's work in front of the people they love, whether they be family, friends, co-workers or even one-time adversaries (because it's impossible to complete a life's work without butting heads once or twice). Sparling said he was extremely proud of the department that's been built in Blyth, as well as in Wingham in recent years, crediting previous chiefs like Paul Josling and John Black for the parts they played in that work. He also said that he couldn't believe it had been a quarter-century that he'd been working in fire prevention — a realization he said made him feel a bit old. But he also reflected on the lighter side of the job, while at the same time acknowledging that side isn't necessarily for everyone. As in many other professions, there is industry - specific humour. With emergency services things are different and often you can only relate to others who have worked the job when it comes to humour with a bit of a dark side. My dad was the same way. He worked for the Toronto Police Service for nearly 35 years and humour in the squad car was a lot different from humour at the dinner table. I learned this as I got older and my dad learned to take down his walls a bit. When I was young, he wouldn't share much about the job for fear of scaring us by telling us the truth about the danger he faced every day. I suspect the same is true of Sparling and other firefighters. The reality, for someone who doesn't face it on a day-to-day basis is simply too harrowing. So when my dad would tell a story about having to "babysit" a man who had died in his apartment the night before or being chased by a lunatic with a machete, people who work in an office might find those stories off-putting, but to another police officer or a firefighter, it's just another day at the office. Back to retirement speeches... I thought it was amazing how Sparling was able to sum up a 25 -year career in just a few minutes. Like any other job, you remember situations that left you happy or that challenged you, but what you always remember at the end are the people you worked with. You trust firefighters with your life and with the lives of those in the community. Sparling's retirement speech had me leaving his party thinking that Huron County residents are pretty lucky.