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Times-Advocate, 1978-04-13, Page 44 Tim«s-Advocate, April 13, 1978 Hardly a day goes by. it seems, without the Ontario government an­ nouncing the establishment of some new investigating commission or select committee. The members of those bodies con­ duct extensive investigations into a myriad of subjects, the end result often being to draw conclusions in keeping with what most people knew at the out­ set of the investigations. However, one of the problems associated with the commissions and committees, is the cost factor. Tax­ payers had their hackles raised when they were informed as to the cost of the recent LaMarsh study into violence on TV. The members ran up unbelievably high expense accounts, as they dined extravagantly and toured the province in luxury. There are other examples of ex­ cessive spending habits by the legislature's select committees. In January, for example, the 10-members of the all-party committee on company law spent five days at Miami Beach, where one evening, they ran up a bill of <$586.50 for food and drink. Their tab in­ cluded seven bottles of French wine. 38 mixed drinks and four Irish coffees The select committee on the role of the Ombudsman spent $83,000 on a three-week trip to Europe. While there is the basic question of the value of the investigations, plus the need for members to travel so far and so often, there is little doubt that they are living far beyond the taxpayers' means on such outings. It’s time they were placed on a flat daily expense allotment, similar to federal MPs. It’s also time that the benefits of the investigating trips be questioned. Most or them end up in lengthy reports that do nothing but gather dust. »ing-a-ling <JbecEn®SySavere by Richard Charles- Grab the heat while it’s hot Some progress! Bell Telephone seeks to spend millions to “improve” service and facilities, and those who can’t afford record price increases for phones are told to get a party line — circa 50 years ago! Among other things the admonition reveals an aloofness verging on arrogance and disdain. Perhaps such an attitude is inevitable in a protected, spoon-fed bureaucracy. Bell Telephone is thin-skinned about criticism and seems to take it personally if people don’t think it is just grand to be asked to pay more for phone service. They try to prove in a way mindful of shell-game operators, that extra costs are long overdue and are really the essence of restraint and economizing. Sure, and the emperor with no clothes is wearing an ermine robe! Bell contributes to national unity the way the CBC and Air Canada do — people can complain about them and feel a togetherness. Why this addiction to the god called “Progress?” Why do we have to pay 20% more, for gracious’ sake, than we did last year for phone service? To keep technological pace, sure, but why? We already have a reasonably good phone system, so why fool around with more gadgetry? Most would forgive Ma Bell if she decided to stand pat for a while at the same price. Or, let those who crave super-duper service pay extra. What Bellwants is the most advanced system in the world regardless of cost. What customers want is adequate service at a fair price. In a broader outlook, how on earth can we expect unions and workers to keep wage demands reasonable after price-income controls are lifted, if we permit government-controlled agen­ cies to go haywire? That also applies to Air Canada fare increases and inflated CBC costs. Not to mention public transportation, food, housing, etc. “He heard another satellite is ready to fall to earth. ” BATT’N AROUND ......... with the editor Thank goodness it's 'interim' Lack the skills Canada’s serious unemployment problem is really an “unemployable problem” declares at least one promi­ nent manufacturing authority. The reason this is cited is that most of the jobless seem to lack the skills to fill the available jobs. More than a million Canadian men^ and women are counted as un-’ employed, and yet industry in general is desperately in need of skilled tradesmen. An inadequate apprentice training program is said to be partly to blame for this. Many small firms do not have the necessary facilities — such as sur­ plus machine tools or capital — to properly train apprentices. Also the drop-out and turnover rates in these programs have been too great. Significant improvement in the jobless rate and Canada’s international trade position will only come with the increasing availability of highly skilled tradesmen. One helpful solution would be the growth of community college and vocational school training, but our educational values are going to have to be adjusted before this happens. As another industrial observer puts it: “We have to get away from the philosophy of today’s educational system that high school is merely a stepping stone to university training. In this sense we are not serving our young people adequately, with the result that many young people who should have otherwise been encouraged to learn a skilled trade, find themselves, too late, to be unskilled, uneducated and un­ employed.” Most anniversaries are cause for celebrations, particularly when they denote some milestone. Sixty years could fall into that category for some things, but the 60th anniversary of one Canadian institution this year is not apt to spur the public into any show of glee. This is the 60th year of direct taxa­ tion in Canada and Revenue Canada’s 50th year of collecting taxes. People across the nation are now engaged in figuring out what they’ll “contribute” to the celebration, although the majori­ ty would just as soon forget about the whole thing. Taxation is not new. There was taxa­ tion in Sumer (modern-day Iraq) 3,500 years ago. Egyptian bas-reliefs tell how the pharohs amassed untold riches from taxes. The Romans had so many taxes that they struck coins whenever a particularly noxious one was repeal­ ed. In the 14th century, the fathers of the city of Dijon in France invented an original tax. Citizens who failed in their business were required to pay a special failure tax. The first to do so was a Dijon doctor whose patient had died. Some 100 years ago, the State of Virginia put a $30 tax on every bathtub. Bathing was thought to be a luxury, a sin and unhealthy, so the bathtub tax was adopted to protect taxpayers’ health. In Canada, taxation has been a part of our life for over 300 years. The first recorded tax was levied in 1650. This was an export tax on beaver pelts and moose skins, which the king of France imposed on the citizens of New France. The nation’s first income tax was in­ troduced to help pay the costs of World War I. It was to be an “interim” measure only. That interim measure now collects $128,000,000 per day! Ten percent of it goes towards the cost of collecting it! Just think how much the government would save if they stopped the collec­ tion. * * * Speaking of taxation, it has been pointed out that our story last week about the levy for the Downtown Business Improvement Area was in­ correct. We said the under-levy en­ joyed in 1977 by most businesses would be added to this year’s levy. That’s not so. Only those who over-paid, such as the financial institutions, will have last year’s levy corrected through a credit this year. So the $50 to $100 that was owing by the majority of merchants won’t be collected, although they will face in­ creases of that amount this year if the same size budget is approved. The“‘loss” on last year’s levy will be paid through the general mill rate, to be shared by all taxpayers in Exeter. k k ★ Unless some unforeseen cir­ cumstance arises, area secondary school students should be back in their classrooms today. The board has already voted to accept terms of a new contract, while the teachers were do­ ing so after press time last night. There is no way of knowing what the terms of the contract are, due to a news black-out imposed by the negotiator. One might have suggested that the ratepayers should have been given some opportunity to have input into the matter, but that of course is too much to expect. After all, we only pay the bills. It would appear that the teachers and Wko’d be a farmer? the board reached some type of com­ promise and the end result is not a complete capitulation by either side. The encouraging aspect is that next year’s contract is part of the package, so there won’t be a similar situation next year facing Huron’s students. They were the real losers in the lengthy battle, although it is too early to tell how much they lost, not only in terms of their education, but also the respect for the teachers and the board. One of the fears we have expressed is that the ill-will generated during the strike will continue. Hopefully, this will not be the case. Under the laws of the province, both sides were acting within their rights, at least to themselves, if not the students. Now, let the “hatchet be buried” and everyone involved do his/ her utmost to make up for the lost time and without malice. While it will be dif­ ficult, it is essential that the ill-feeling be quickly obliterated and that the teachers and board operate as a team to get education in Huron back on the track. When time permits, it may be a valuable exercise for both sides to name a joint committee to review Bill 100 to see if they could provide some in­ put for the provincial legislators that would prevent further strikes in Huron, or other parts of the province. Many teachers have indicated they are not pleased with the current legislation and having experienced some of the pitfalls, they know better than others what changes may alleviate future problems. If you heat your home electrically, you are an above- average user of electricity, and therefore have a large stake in its proper use. But a lot can happen between its point of origin and the moment when you feel the warmth in your home. To illustrate, when a wave starts its run in the deep water, it looks like a great heaving wall that could go on for ever. Then, as it nears the beach, it starts to break and release its tremendous power, and soon ends up on the sand barely able to crawl the last few inches. If you have ridden the surf on a board, in a boat or as a swimmer, you know that the closer you are to taking the wave as its breaks, the better the ride. The way we use energy is something like that. It starts way back as, say, a barrel of oil or a waterfall, when we can assume that it is ready to give us one hundred percent. But, like the breaking wave, it begins to lose something at the moment of release some may go up in smoke, and some be absorbed by the generating equipment. The barrel of oil emerges as electricity with less than half of its original energy efficiency; then loses still more as it comes through the lines, until it is about one-third of its old self by the time it reaches the home .healing equipment. Hydroelectric power is less wasteful of the water’s energy, partly because there is no burning involved, but it’s still well below par at the end of the line. You can see, then, how important it is to make the most of your electricity by grabbing the heat while it’s hot. The following tips should help. • Dust and dirt on electric heaters mean that less heat is being delivered to you than the system was designed for. Vacuum the heaters regularly throughout the heating season. • Put warm air where it will do the most good. You can do this with wall-mounted convectors by seeing that they have proper deflectors on them it’s easy to tell where the heat is going by standing near the convector. • Let the warm air circulate freely in your rooms. In other words, don’t block off warm air outlets with furniture, and don’t cover baseboard heating units with drapes. • If you have heating cables in the ceilings or floors, you can help them to do a better job in two ways. First, make sure that you have them properly insulated, so that the heat radiates into the room. Second, look periodically for hidden faults such as a broken cable. You can do this easily by making spot checks with your hand against the ceiling or floor. Any cool sections will indicate that there is some kind of trouble there. As you can see, keeping an eye on electrical heating equipment is simple enough, and you will feel the dif­ ference in your comfort and in the heating bill. But there’s a lot more you can do with this as with practically every other kind of home healing. Number one: stop heat from escaping by having good home insulation all round. Number two: learn how to use your thermostat as a way of in­ creasing the heating efficiency of your home. Number three: before you go any further, find out about these and other basic improvements by reading 100 ways to save energy and money in the home. It’s put out by the Office of Energy Conservation, Department of Energy Mines and Resources, and it’s yours by writing to Box 3500, Station C, Ottawa, Ontario, K1Y 4G 1. Producing food is a mug’s game in Canada, 1978. Canadians who used to spend 25 per cent of their disposable in­ come on food, now only spend 18 per cent. The result is that in 1978 the buy­ ing power of farm income will be less than it was in 1966. And you think you have trouble keeping up with inflation! Efficient food production is the foundation of Canada’s life and economy but people who produce food, the farmers, are taking an economic beating which the rest of us do not seem to care about. Farm costs are ris­ ing much more quickly than are farm receipts. So, Statistics Canada forecasts a lower realized farm income for the third consecutive year. What hope is there then for Cana­ dian farmers in 1978? With any luck there will be increased sales of cheese, yogurt and ice cream and increased sales of fluid milk. But, these will be balanced by lower sales of industrial milk. Beef prices are expected to rise, but hog prices will fall. Cereal and oilseed prices are not expected to im­ prove. It certainly doesn’t inspire great confidence in farmers who face higher prices for equipment, fuel, fertilizer, labour and other production costs. Farmers, always at the mercy of the weather, always pressed by con­ sumers pleading for cheaper food, are worried and angry. From their point of view, Canadian consumers are expec­ ting the farmers to subsidize them. No wonder farmers see marketing boards with strict powers to control supplies and prices of farm commodities as agents of justice. They offer the farmers some stability of income, some protection against other parts of the food industry. Canadian farmers in 1978 are facing terrible uncertainties. Their efforts deserve our understan­ ding as well as our admiration. It's punishment enough! Times Established 1873 Advocate Established 1 88 1 I I imes-Advocate Wniett SeMh Hwoe, North MkMWset K A North Umbton Siece tWJ SERVING CANADA'S BEST FARMLAND C.W.N.A., O.W.N.A. CLASS 'A' and ABC Published by J. W. Eedy Publications Limited LORNE EEDY, PUBLISHER Editor —• Bill Batten Assistant Editor — Ross Haugh Advertising Manager — Jim Beckett Composition Manager — Harry DeVries Business Manager — Dick Jongkind Phone 235-1331 (♦CNA SUBSC____ _______ Amalgamated 1924 RlUI RI0RON MWARO 1974 Published Each Thursday Morning at Exeter, Ontario Second Class Mail Registration Number 0386 Paid in Advance Circulation September 30, 1975 5,409 SUBSCRIPTION RATES: Canada $11.00 Per Year; USA $22.00l Last fall, when it rained for 40 days and 40 nights and then began to snow for about a similar spell, I received a couple of pretty stern letters from readers. One was from an elderly gentleman, the other from a clergyman. Both ex­ coriated me, in their different ways, for being blasphemous. Cause of their concern was a pair of columns in which I suggested to the Almighty that we’d had enough precipitation, and He could stop dumping it on us any time. The E.G. wrote a cross letter to his editor and sent me a copy. The preacher wrote me a long, personal letter, telling me I shouldn’t be so “chummy” with God. He offered to pray for me, and sent along a modern version of the Bible, containing such words as “booby-traps,” which rather alarmed me, accustomed as I am to the austere and dignified King James Version. Well, I wrote some pretty bitter columns about the Canadian winter. But after six straight weeks of glorious, clear, sunny weather, I’m beginning to wonder who is right, me or my critics. Maybe the Lord does read my column, probably on one of His fre­ quent lunch breaks. I didn’t pray to Him for some decent weather. I told Him rather snappily, that we were fed up with what He was dishing up. He didn’t strike me down with a thunder­ bolt, although I noticed my arthritis became pretty keen there for a few weeks. Maybe the Lord mused, something like this: “By Jove, maybe Bill Smiley is right. Maybe I did forget to turn off the taps there for a few months. It wouldn’t be the first time. I remember a few years back that business of Noah and his family. I clean forgot about them until it was nearly too late. “1 get so darn sick of people praying for better health, better crops, more money, happiness, and their own worthless hides when they’re in a jam that I sometimes turn off My hearing aid. I’m supposed to see the little sparrow fall, so maybe I should pay attention when a smalltown columnist goes out of his way to remind me that there is a lot more than sparrows fall­ ing, and a lot too much of it. “I’ll let him sweat it out for another couple of weeks, just show him that you don’t challenge My will with im­ punity. Then I’ll turn on the sun for a solid six weeks, making the scoffers realize that the day of miracles is not past. Six weeks of sunshine in a Cana­ dian winter! That beats walking on water any day. “Just for the Heaven of it, I’ll dump some snow and wind and ice and rain on those fat cats who go south every winter, and let those Canadians who stayed home, not exactly my chosen people, but at least my frozen people, write nasty letters south, telling their relatives of the blue skies, radiant sun, and crystal air back home. “Smiley’s going to have to pay for it, of course. He might as well find out, once and for all, that you don’t get chummy or cocky with Me. That’s a special sphere reserved for preachers and politicians. “Let’s see. No use increasing his arthritic pain or his backache. That only drives him to blasphemy, and We don’t want to encourage that. I could wreck his golf shot. But that wouldn’t work either. It’s already so lousy he’d never even notice it. “No, it has to be something more subtle. Maybe I could put a bug in his wife’s ear, and have her drag him out of bed at seven every morning and share the agonies of that half-hour of ex’tfrtise she does with that dame on the TV. That would ruffle him more —----- ■' @ q. no^nmemory lane] than somewhat. ‘But it’s not enough. It wouldn’t be clear to him that I am an almighty, omnipotent, fierce and vengeful God. He’d probably think it was merely his wife being obnoxious. And He’d claim he couldn’t do the exercises with his bad back and his bad neck and his bad shoulder and his bad knee. “I could always rot the rest of his teeth, which are pretty well ready for the boneyard, anyway. At least he’d suffer the humiliation of going around drooling and gumming his food for a while. But with these blasted modern dentists, he’d soon be going around with a fistful of big, white, attractive molars, and thinking he could start smiling at women again. “Nope, it’s got to be something that would really get to him. I could easily have him fired from his job for vagrancy, bad shuffleboard, mopery, gawk and not preparing lesson plans. He’s guilty of all and each of them. But it wouldn’t do. He’s so lazy I think He’d go straight on unemployment in­ surance. “Got it! It will hit where it hurts. I’ll turn his grandsons against him. I’ll make them see that he’s spoiling them rotten warping their characters, that he swears, drinks, smokes, gambles, and is altogether a most reprobate and unfit grandfather, ‘But...would it take? They don’t real­ ly care if he drinks, smokes, etc. They need him for running across the room and jumping on. They need him for kisses when they hurt themselves. They couldn’t care less if he were Old Nick himself, aS far as morals go, “Ah, well. I guess I’ll just have to let him go to hell in his own inimitable way. That’s punishment enough for anyone.” 55 Years Ago Exeter is now assured that the unsightly post office site in the heart of town is to bo turned into a beauty spot and playground for the children. Mr. Linden C. Harvey. M.A., B.D., has been award­ ed the Sanford Gold Medal for proficiency in the whole B.D, course of three years. The Exeter Canning and Preserving Co. has this week sold out their holding in Exeter to the Canadian Canners. Mr. S.M. Sandors, who has been in charge of the factory since the first year of its operation, is be­ ing retained as manager. Mr. Charles Ford left Monday for Toronto where he has secured a position with the Toronto Telegram. 30 Years Ago Exeter is experiencing another building boom. Ex­ cavations have been made for the new turnip waxing plant on Hwy. 83. five new residences, a garage for R.E. Balkwill and a now bowling alley by William Sweitzer. Reeve B.W. Tuckev made the presentation of' crests and jackets to the players of the Lucan Irish Six hockey team. The town siren, which heretofore has been operated from a push button in front of the town hall was on Tuesday connected with the Boll Telephone system. A now shoe store operated by A.E. Buswell and son. Tod, is being opened in the former Jones and May seed store. 20 Years Ago (’aven Presbyterian WMS celebrated its 60th anniver­ sary in the church Thursday evening. Sunday'the new Sunday School room in the Exeter Pentecostal Church was dedicated. Tom Pryde's scat in the legislatures will be occupied by a neighbor when the next Ontario parliament opens. Charles MacNaughton won the seat in Monday's by­ election by a margin of 1.164 over Dr. Alox Addison. Clin­ ton Liberal. Friday evening marked a great day in the history of St. John’s-by-the-Lake Anglican Church when the dedication and opening of the now parish hall took place. 15 Years Ago South Huron Hospital, which completed 10 years of service to the community earlier this year, is making preparations to provide sur­ gical facilities in the near future. A now curve staked out at the intersection of Highway 4 and county road 4 is being installed bv the Ontario Department of Highways. PC D.M. Westover, who has been a member of the Exeter detachment of the OPP for the past four years has been transferred to Lion's Hoad where he will establish a now one-man OPP office. Mrs. Gordon Schwalm this week picked a lemon off her lemon tree which measured 14 inches in circumference and weighed about one pound. It yielded one and a half cups of lemon juice.