HomeMy WebLinkAboutTimes-Advocate, 1999-04-07, Page 7Wednesday, April 7, 1999
Exeter Times -Advocate
Opinion&Forum
1 OYEARS AGO
April 5, 1989 - Friday was a
big day for the Exeter Lions
Club. That's the day their new
Youth Centre on John Street was
officially opened to the public.
Rick Hundey was named the
new administrator for the town
of Exeter Monday night. He has
been a senior planner for the
past two years in Southampton.
20 YEARS AGO
April 4, 1979 - Exeter council has approved in
principle a plan by the Downtown Business
Improvement Area to spend $150,000 to beautify
the core area, but stopped short of making a deci-
sion on a suggestion by the BIA that the town con-
tribute to the project.
A flock of Canada geese has been placed on the
Parkhill Dam Reservoir in an attempt to establish
the area as a permanent home for waterfowl.
35 YEARS AGO
April 6, 1964 - An enjoyable evening was spent
at the home of Mrs. Don Cooper in Exeter when
the local staff of Bell Telephone Co. met and pre-
sented her with a gift in recognition of her service
at the office.
The swimming pool thermometer erected this
week in front of the post office shows $25,000 has
been raised. The community hopes to have the
pool completed by the time school is out at the end
of June.
Exeter squirts won the Western Ontario Athletic
Association hockey championship in Elora Monday
night. Bill Gilfillan is the coach.
40YEARS AGO
April 7., 1959 - Exeter police chief C.H.
MacKenzie sounded warnings that the problems of
dogs and parking would be receiving more atten-
tion from the police in the next few months.
Pauline Boulianne, a grade 12 student at
SHDHS won third prize in lyrical verse speaking at
the provincial competition m Toronto this week.
Ontario's new point system, designed to help
bad drivers improve and remove chronic offenders
from the highways, went into effect, Wednesday.
The total number of animals in Huron county
which have died from rabies since the epidemic
broke here is now well over 100, according to
Health of Animals Branch of the Department of
Agriculture in Seaforth.
A two storey apartment building owned by Lloyd
Craig of Brucefield burned to the ground Sunday
morning.
50 YRS AGO
April 7 , 1949 - Two elderly farmers in Stephen
township about six miles west of Exeter were
robbed of $550 after the men had been bound and
the house ransacked, Tuesday evening.
Mr. Mose Beckler has disposed of his 150 acre
farm to Mr. William Rowcliffe.
The Royal Canadian Air Force noted its silver
jubilee on April 1.
The Huronia choir was placed third in competi-
tion with four choirs at the Stratford Music
Festival, Thursday evening.
60 YEARS AGO
April 4, 1939 - A safe in the Hensall Town hall
was robbed in the early hours of Sunday morning,
broken open with the aid of acetylene tanks from
Orville Ford's blacksmith shop. The takings were
said to be about $2 in cash.
Something no newspaper would dare print
today. "Some modern married women think they
should keep their maiden names, and usually their
husbands wish they had."
75YEARS AGO
April 6, 1924 - Miss Viola Hodgert and .Miss
Thelma Taylor have taken positions as operators at
the Telephone Central.
The Hurondale Women's Institute celebrated the
fifth anniversary of their organization Wednesday
at the home of Mrs. Ilenry Strang. Mrs. Mitchell
gave a brief summary of the progress made by the
Institute in the past five years, one interesting fea-
ture being that the membership had increased
from 19to52.
The sugar shanty belonging to Mrs. John Glenn
was noticed to be on fire shortly after '11 o'clock
Monday night. Mr. Glenn with the assistance of.
neighbours extinguished the flames with a large
quantity of sap that had been gathered for
Tuesday's boiling. Only the roof was damaged.
•
ROSSHAUH
SACK IN TIME
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
Bill C-68 Gun controls
Gun controls, registration, courses, permits and new
construction codes are besieging one of the safest
sports in Canada and all this because of the ignorance
of few political leaders who are supposed to be well
educated but have no knowledge of the shooting
sports.
I'm sure the majority of Canadian citizens are
unaware of how many civil rights and how much
money we have lost to be able to continue to shoot in
competition or even at our local clubs. We are being
treated as criminals even though we have never been
charged or involved in a crime in our life times. Bill C-
68 allows the RCMP to search our homes even, on
heresay evidence that we might have the audacity to
own more than ten guns. Many 1 )llectors have many
more guns than that but none have ever been used in a
crime.
Now they are even using safety on our civilian
ranges, as an excuse to shut down our operations
which are not private clubs but have always been open
to public membership and advertised as such. I have
been involved in shooting sports for the past 22 years
and participated in national and international competi-
tions at hundreds of clubs but have never witnessed an
accidental shooting. The only accidental shooting we
have ever heard of was at a police range a few years
ago. Civilian ranges do not need all this new regulation
to operate safely. They are trying everyway possible to
shut our clubs down.
Compare our safety record against other sports such
as fishing, skiing and even our national sport, hockey,
where every year thousands of serious accidents and
numerous deaths are reported. Our sport is being
attacked for many reasons but the obvious ones are
because owning guns is not politically correct and
politicians want more votes as well as a very large tax
grab.
The criminal element is a very tiny minority of our
population and even very few oT these use guns in their
activities but they are being used as the reason for all
this regulation. The government has already been
caught using phoney statistics to support this theory. In
any event the criminal element will not conform to any
of these rules especially registering their guns. The jus-
tice system itself is at the heart of any problem associ-
ated with violent crime, because of their lack of initia-
tive in dealing out punishment to suit the crime.
Murders, rapists and child molesters go into prisons
which are built with all the comforts of home including
TV's, weight rooms, libraries with computer access
and conjugal visits. Of course meals have to be deliv-
ered on time and of certain quality or prisoners will
riot and demolish a multi-million dollar facility and
nothing can be done about it because if you touch them
the government will appoint a lawyer for them to sue
you.
The latest case of the government taking care of its
own is the case of a former cabinet minister convicted
of murder and now is in a BC prison which has a golf
course. Times are really tough for this guy. Prison is no
deterrent to any criminal in Canada. As a matter of
fact many are better off in our jails than out on the
street. Our jails and the rehabilitation that goes with
them make us the laughing stock of the world.
Gun controls came into effect 10 years ago with a
police background check and a $15 fee. Now, these
permits require two separate courses which cost a
minimum of $500. and many hours which could be
used for much better use. The forms that have to be
filled out require the police to interrogate your neigh-
bours and your references which have to be used and
usually they are hassled at their workplace.
Storage laws came into effect many years ago but
none I know of have ever been checked, regulation
with no enforcement, what a novel ideal We are
against registering our guns for one main reason and
that is because we do not want any more of our guns
confiscated. Handguns have been registered since the
1930's but in the past few years the government decid-
ed in all its wisdom to outlaw thousands of these legal-
ly purchased and registered guns. Now these can not
be handed down to our children which has been the
normal routine. They will be destroyed without com-
pensation when the registered owner dies. Many gun
owners because of this will not register their guns for
fear of this happening again, so hundred of thousands
will bo hidden away instantly turning us into criminals.
If these guns aro found we will receive more jail time
than a murderer. .
Permits are needed to travel to compete at clubs. A
travel permit, the last time 1 heard that people needed
one of these to move around their own country was in
Russia. 1 guess communism didn't die after all, it just
moved to Ottawa. Another reason politicians might
See LETTERS page 10
Theme
TORONTO - Premier Mike
Harris has indicated the
theme he hopes to campaign
on in the imminent election --
he will warn not to change
horses in midstream.
The Progressive
Conservative premier's choice
of these had been awaited
eagerly, particularly because
he ran such an effective cam-
paign In 1995 it quickly
became regarded as a classic.
Harris then focussed almost entirely on
promising to cut government and taxes, which
rang a bell with voters, stuck to it and sounded
as if he meant it, which he d)d because he has
carried out most of it notwithstanding harsh
consequences for some.
Many have wondered what Harris can do for
an encore and he has given some clues in pre-
election wanderings, saying Ontario 'must stay
the course," meaning keep the Tories, or risk
losing gains made since 1995.
The premier said Ontario's economy contin-
ues to ,;row and leads the nation and his gov-
ernmer t made the tough decisions that got it
there, although he left out that much of its
prosperity is due to economic boom in the U.S.
He warned some, presumably the Liberals
and New Democrats, will feelthey can stop
worrying about jobs, growth and financial
security and turn to other priorities.
But Harris insisted Ontario cannot pause or
take economic progress for granted, as farm-
ers cannot plant and then merely wait for a
harvest.
Harris was helped in 1995 by the NDP gov-
ernment being highly unpopular because it ran
up huge deficits and the Liberals refusing to
announce policies until the election was under
way and then so resembling Harris they were
seen as plagiarists who waited to see .which
way the wind blew.
But the slickness of Harris's campaign was
acknowledged recently by even one of those
he brat, former NDP premier Bob Rae, who
said Harris defined issues and opponents well
and 'run a brilliant, focussed, tough campaign.
It was not pretty or fair, but it worked.'
Harris cannot run again solely on promising
more tax cuts, although leaks indicate he will
hold out this lure again, because he would
resemble too closely a one -trick pony.
Harris's principal secretary in the last elec-
tion, David Lindsay, who now heads a govern-
ment board while in practice working on elec-
tion planning, also has said Harris will want to
look for other issues.
Lindsay has now produced for Harris, conve-
niently as he is about to call an election, what
the government modestly termed a 'road map
for prosperity' and `economic plan for the 21st
Century.'
It proposes measures• including more and
better -directed skills training, promotion of
innovation and entrepreneurship, incentives to
invest and removal of red tape it says will help
make Ontario the best place in North America
in which to live, work, invest and raise a fami-
ly.
Both stressed how time is needed to achieve
this goal. Lindsay said it will take a few short
years (and Harris) that it is 'a plan for
Ontario's prosperity over the next five to ten
years.'
ERIC
DOWD
A VIEW FROM
QUEEN'S PARK
•
Voters can expect to hear Harris talk a lot
about this economic package,because it is
where he is strongest, and throw in promises
to continuo cutting taxes and restore family
values by cracking down on crime and lack of
respect, an issue that has not taken off as well
as he expected but is still useful.
When Harris announced his program, the
Common Sense Revolution, before the 1995
election, he said it would take five years to
achieve.
But in this election he will be saying the rave=
lution is far from over, that the Bastille has
been stormed, but more needs to be done and
it cannot bo entrusted to others.
Harris will ask like Winston Churchill in the
1939-45 War that he be given the tools so he
can finish the job -- Ilarrls will sound positive-
ly Churchillian.
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