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The Citizen, 1987-11-25, Page 4PAGE 4. THE CITIZEN, WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 25, 1987. It's worth a try There are those who criticize the Crime Stoppers program for which Huron County Branch was announced last week, but despite these criticisms, the past success of the program makes it worthwhile. Critics worry about a program that relies on anonymous tips to put police on the right track. The fact remains that police will have to gather enough information for a conviction without the use of the testimony of the caller. The success rate of the program in getting convictions shows that the police are still doing good work in getting supporting information. Others worry about paying people, often criminals themselves to give information. Past experience in other jurisdictions shows that about 60 per cent of the tips do come from the criminal element and 40 per cent from the general public. . The fact is that many innocent people have been holding back information over the years afraid of reprisals or of getting caught up in the legal system for months or years. The system gets more people involved in law enforcement. It’s worked elsewhere. It’s worth trying here. Creating our own jobs A study done in Newfoundland trying to find solutions to the chronic unemployment problem in that province may hold some insights for all of us in Canada. Speaking on Canada AM last week, one official pointed out that in Newfoundland people are introduced almost from birth with the idea they will work for someone else. In many parts of Newfoundland there is no one to provide the jobs so unemployment continues. People don’t seem to think that they might create their own jobs by starting their own business. The problem begins in the schools, he said, where there is little that is taught that encourages people to become entrepreneurs. The emphasis, often because of pressure from business lobbies, is to train people to fill jobs. There is an underlying assumption that graduates will go to work for someone else. In Newfoundland villages there is a second problem in the lack of role models. The best job in town, the spokesman said, is usually the school teacher’s and the second best the social worker’s. We in Ontario don’t have such a shortage of entrepreneurial role models, but it still often seems that going into business for yourself means working longer to earn less than those who hold jobs working for someone else. Year after year we bring up young people and educate them to take jobs that will mean they will have to leave rural Ontario to find work in large urban centres. We keep paying our tax money to drain our communities of their future lifeblood. If we could turn our education system around, if it could encourage more of the graduates to go out and make their own jobs, it could turn around the entire future of our communities. But as long as we continue to train people to work for big city corporations (or government agencies), we’ll continue to pay to speed the demise of our own rural way of life. TXNATO — Mabel’s Grill Free or forced trade? Recent trade developments, from U.S. demands on energy security in the Free Trade agreement to the GATT decision on Canadian west coast fishery regulations, lead one to wonder where free trade leaves off and forced trade begins. On a trade basis one can’t argue too hard against,the GATT decision against Canadian mark-ups on foreign wine and beer. We Canadians were discriminating against foreign competi­ tion (although the foreign wines were being brought to Canada at below cost because of huge European subsidies). But the GATT argument on fish goes beyond the right to fair access to the Canadian market for foreign competition. By saying that Canada shouldn’t have the right to demand fish caught in Canadian waters be processed in Canadian factories before being exported. GATT is saying we must trade and they will set the rules. They are telling us that we don ’ t have the right to control our own natural resources. Fisheries officials in BC worry that if GATT gets its way, any attempt to prevent overfishing of quotas in Canadian waters will be impossible. The fish stocks may be ruined for generations. Under the Free Trade agreement, what’s ours will also be the American’s when it comes to energy resources. We cannot charge more to Americans for the export of energy than we charge to our own customers. If at some future point we have a shortage of petroleum products, for instance, we must continue to sell to the Americans the same percentage of our production as we always sold to them. It all seems one step beyond offering free trade: or tair trade as the federal government promised it would get for Canada when we got into these discussions. What both the GATT ruling and the proposals of the Free Trade Agreement on energy are saying is that we Canadians cannot decide what to do with our own natural resources. If we are stuck in that kind of arrangement we may see ourselves slipping back into the kind ofeconomy we’ve always tried toescape: an economy where we preside the natural resources and every other country makes more money that we do by processing them. There are people who will tell you that the important decisions in town are made down at the town hall. People in the know, however know that the real debates, the real wisdom reside down at Mabel’s Grill where the greatest minds in the town [if not in the country] gather for morning coffee break, otherwise known as the Round Table Debating and Filibustering Society. Since not just everyone can partake of these deliberations we will report theactivitiesfrom time to lime. MOND A Y: Ward Black was saying this morning that we may have found a man who can single-han­ dedly get the European wine­ makers to drop their charges at GATT about Canadians unfairly markinguptheir wine when it’s sold in Canada. He pointed to the article in the paper that a guy from London paid $45,000 for a bottle of German white wine. “A bottle?”, Billie Bean won­ dered. "You sure he didn’t at least get a gallon jug or one of those plastic kegs in a box?” Billie shook his head even more when Ward told him the wine was 200 years old. He figured he’d head home right away and make sure his choke cherry wine was well stored away. He might not get rich from it but at least he’d have something to give his great-great-grandchildren. Ward quoted the London buyer as saying he didn ’ t plan to drink the wine. ‘ * A rare bottle of wine is like a good woman.” “Yeh”, Billiesaid, ‘‘butwho would be happy to get a good woman and just sit there and look at her. This guy’s really nuts.” TUESDAY: Julia said all this anti-Ontario stuff that’s coming out of the West because of Premier Peterson’s opposition to Free Trade kind of gets her down sometimes. Ward said that it’s Peterson that gets him down. Julia saidthat sometimes she starts to feel guilty because they keep telling us we’re rich in Ontario. Hank said if he was rich they sure must be poor in the West. Julia said that it was bad enough that she had to live with the guilt of living in Canada, being well-fed when people are starving in Ethiopia, having a big house when people live in tarpaper shacks on the edge of Mexico city or having a closet full of clothes when people don’t have any clothes but to have to feel guilty because she lives in rich Ontario as well is almost too much. Tim told her to stop complaining and look on the bright side. She could be well-fed, have a big house, well-clothed rich Ontarian and be a man too. Then she’d really be expected to feel guilty. WEDNESDAY: Hank was saying this morning that the Mulroney government seems to be keeping one promise at least about pulling the country together with the proposal to build a bridge or tunnel to link Prince Edward Island to New Brunswick. Yes, saidTim, but knowing Mulroney’s record would you want to go over a bridge he built? Julia said that with the way things are going in the country the Continued on page 12 [Published by North Huron Publishing Company Inc.] Serving Brussels, Blyth, Auburn, Belgrave, Ethel, Londesborough, Walton and surrounding townships Published weekly in Brussels, Ontario P.O. Box 152, P.O. Box 429, Brussels, Ont. Blyth, Ont. NOG 1HO N0M1H0 887-9114 523-4792 Subscription price: $17.00; $38.00foreign. Advertising and news deadline: Monday 2p.m. in Brussels; 4p.m. in Blyth Editor and Publisher: Keith Roulston Advertising Manager: Janice Gibson Production and Office Manager: Jill Roulston Second Class Mail Registration No. 6968