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HomeMy WebLinkAboutClinton News-Record, 1985-09-11, Page 4Page 4—CLINTON NEWS -R CORD, WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 11, 1985. The Clinton News-Recerd Is published mach., W..e sdoy at P.O. lee 39. Clinton. Ontario, Conde, NOM 11,0. Tel.: 4074449. Subsirlptlan Rale: Canada • 3%9.73 Sr. Citlaan • 8,16.73 per year 11.S,A, foreign • 539,00 per year IT Is rTlglsARred on *opted close mwil by Abe poo o w gndpr the permit number Oa17. Tho Nukes -Regard incorporated in 14$4the i'Iuron Mevgs-Record, founded In 1051., and The Clinton NeW Era, founded. in 1063. Total. pressruns 3,700. Clinton News -Record Incorporating THE BLYTH STANDARD J. HOWARD AITKEN - Publisher SHELLEY McPHEE - Editor GARY HAIST - Advertising Manager MARY ANN HOLLENOECK - Office Manager A MEMBER Display advertising rates available on request. Ask for Rate Card No. 15 efectivo October 1, 1984. BLUE RIBBON AWARD 1985 Beware of youth The resumption of the school year brings with it a reminder about extra caution and road safety. Both youngsters and motor vehicle drivers are reminded to pay special attention to their safety lessons and driving habits. .. Children must be reminded by parents and teachers to take extra care in their travels to and from school: In spite of their care free ways, youngsters must be warned, and warned again, of the dangers involved in careless actions and silly pranks in their travels with school chums. Likewise, drivers must take extra precautions on the roads, particular- ly when travelling in the vicinity of schools or near the familiar yellow schoolbuses. All drivers know, or should know, that flashing lights on the school bus indicate that these vehicles are in theProcess of picking up or dropping off children. The law clearly states that all other traffic must stop and wait until the lights stop flashing before proceeding. An exercise in patience is the best precautionary measure a driver can make. while travelling behind a school bus. Granted, school buses do travel slowly and their stops are frequent, but impatience on the part of a too -eager driver may be the difference between the life and the death of an innocent young school bus passenger. Likewise, in our towns and villages where school pedestrian traffic is • heavy, drivers are best advised to drive slowly and cautiously. Better yet, avoid the school areas if possible at those times of day when the school traffic is at its heaviest, close to nine in the morning, at noon and at 3:30 in the afternoon. Taking another, route is a sensible wayto avoid the ag- gravation that youngsters travelling on bicycles or on foot can cause. Road safety is' a two-way street. Children too must be made clearly aware of the danger that can arise through carelessness. Local police forces teach children at an early age, starting at kindergarten, the rules of road safety, and for the most part the children abide by the rules. However, a trait of youth, to balk rules and authority is often too evi- dent in our young people's haphazard respect for road safety. Older children and teenagers are most likely to abuse road safety laws. Their senseless actions, like riding two on a bike or walking down.the middle of the street proves nothing, only puts their liveS and the lives of others in jeopardy. Care free children and defiant teenagers - the motor vehicle operator must be prepared to meet them all with extra patience with the return to school. - by S. McPhee. Cattlemen ,petition politicians Dear Editor, Open letter to Right Honorable Brian Mulroney, Prime Minister. At a meeting attended by 150 cattlemen from the Huron, Bruce and Perth County Cattlemen's Association, the following mo- tion was unanimously passed. It reads: We urge the Federal Cabinet to implement the policy of tripartite stabilization for the beef cattle industry. We feel a coalition of 90 per cent of the cat- tle and 85 per cent of the cattle producers in Canada is sufficient concensus for legisla- tion. This will eliminate the threat of balkanization between provinces and the probably countervail action from the United States. This matter is very important to the beef industry in Canada and we, urge your sup- port. We expect your decision on this matter mid-September as previously committed by the Federal Minister of Agriculture II the Honourable John Wise. Your ruly, Ross Procter, President Huron Cattlemen Assoc. Glenn Coultes, Ontario Cattlemen's Director. u iidoscopQ Debbie Selkirk, a Goderich nurse, works, with .other people in her profession, by leading seminars that deal with family violence. She has advised dozens of nurses throughout thecoiinty on how to recognize abuse victims and how to offer help. Laurie Thomson and Doug Reberg, counsellors at the Huron Centre for Children and Youth in Clinton, are leading an in- novative and successful men's group to end family violence. Ten men are currently in- volved in the program, designed to offer group counselling and self-help in an effort to teach men to control their violence. Sergeant Wayne McF, *den of the Clinton Police sees first hand the immediate effects of violence in the home. He supports the crown attorney's recommendation that police be authorized to lay charges in such cases. Previously, police would advise abused females to lay charges. McFadden said that often the woman would do so in the moment of anger, but when the point of testimony came, she would back down. McFadden encourages abusive males to. seek help, through such programs as the men's group. "I encourage them that it's in their best interests to attend," he says. McFadden says that people like June Taylor of Goderich are making the dif- ference. June is the driving force behind the Huron County Friendship House, a crisis centre for battered women and children. What began as a self-help group back in 1983 now offers assistance for battered women, their children, separated women and single parents, teenagers from broken homes, and support for senior aged women 'who lived in a battering situation before help was available. This year Friendship House opened, an emergency short term shelter for women and their children who have been battered. The centre has been operating at capacity levels since it opened. "We're full, more than we can really han- dle, but we're making it," June Taylor reports. Valerie Bolton of Women Today, in Clin- ton is working on a new program this year, Women Being Well. It encourages women to be leaders, to be self-sufficient and works to break down the isolation of women throughout the county. From the program Behind The Scones' By Keith Roulston The road to success The mood of escapism has taken over in the summer of 1985 at people flock to movies like Back to the Future or Rambo or the latest James Bond movie or read detective novels or Harlequin romances while they lie on the beach but for real escapism, read the biographies of successful people. I just finished rereading an old biography of a successful Canadian and, although it was straight fact, I found it far more reassuring and pleasant reading than any fictional novel. The only thing I found slight- ly depressing was wondering "why can't my life be like that." The thing about biographies about suc- cessful people is that the success seems so preordained. This particular man went on to become a multi -millionaire of international fame. Sure he had hardship along the way but every hardship became important in his overall success in the long run. He went broke several times before he struck it rich but each time he made a mistake it just 'turned him more firmly on the route through which he would make his fortune, Reading it, it all seems so inevitable. In real life, many of us make mistakes that ruin our lives. Looking back, it's so easy to gloss over the agonies and the struggles in a life. The author made our millionaire -to -be seem to be a happy warrior who just went from one failure to the next success without a mo- ment of uncertainty or worry. Although he was in terrible debt, just keeping ahead of the bill collectors at times, he never seemed to worry. It can make a reader who does worry about things like where tomorrow's meal is coming from, feel absolutely in- By Shelley McPhee some 10 self-help groups are being formed, including those f br separated and divorced women, isolated farm women, women in sport and healing reproductive hurts. The programs are geared to improving women's mental and physical well being. They are' designed to promote good health and offer preventative education. b Rev. Gord Simmons, minister at St. Paal's Anglican Church in Clinton is active- ly involved in Friendship House and the Huron County Committee on Alcoholism and Drug Addiction. He is also particularly concerned with the issue of teenage battering in Huron County and the need to provide help and support for teens who come from families where violence in the home is a way of•life. Teens between the ages of 16 and 18, are without help. They're too old to fall under the jurisdiction of Family and Children Ser- vices, too young and immature to be out on their own. Friendship House, the Huron County Health Unit and the Huron Centre for Children and Youth have been able to offer some assistance as a stop gap measure. Since Friendship House opened, 11 teenaged girls have sought refuge at the shelter. Nine of those young women came from homes of common-law situations — liv- ing with mothers and their step fathers, or mother's boyfriends. New studies are uncovering greater evidence of teenage battering, both from parents and in boyfriend and girlfriend situations. Rev. Simmons urges, "there's no help for them in Huron County...some youths need to be taken from their home for their own physical and mental well being." ' Don Keillor is the director of the Huron Centre for Children and Youth. He is also in- volved in a Youth Needs Assessment Com- mittee,set up to study the problems and needs of troubled youth in the county. The committee was developed from the concern that adolescent needs were not be- ing met in Huron. The committee's first pro- gram will offer a 12 week professionally led, self-help treatment group for troubled teens. The committee will further aim to deter- mine the best use of existing facilities and services that are available to assist teens. These men and women who I've just men- tioneu are among a group or aerucaiea in- dividuals, working to fight family violence. The Huron Task Force, on Family Violence was formed in February. The in- formally based organization was designed to provide a networking of resources among • the county's health and social agencies. The task force offers an information gathering and exchange system for the peo- ple who are dealing with family violence in their work. Information sessions are held every three months or so. They have attracted lawyers, ministers, police officers, nurses and counsellors, representatives with the Huron Board of Education, Huron. County Council, Women Today, Friendship . House, the Huron County Health Unit, the Community Psychiatric Services at Alexandra Marine and General Hospital, Goderich, Family and Children's Services, the Alcohol Counselling Program in Goderich, the Huron Centre for Children and Youth. The task force is an awareness group. It promotes awareness of the problems that are evident in the county and it promotes the agencies and programs that are aimed at family violence. The Huron Task Force on Family Violence provides those who attend with a range of information that they can share with the people who need the assistance. Communication and sharing of informa- tion are two of the aims of the task force, the third, most important aim is public awareness. Huron County is fortunate to have a solid foundation of programs designed to help abused women and abusive men. Here's where you and your family can get help: •Huron County Friendship House - 524- 6245. Long distance callers, 1-800-265-5506. •Men's group to end family violence,_ 482- 3933. •Women Today, 482-9706. •Huron Centre for Children and Youth, 482-3931. •Alcohol Counselling and Educational Program, Addiction Research Foundation, 524-4264. •Huron County Family and Children's Services, 524-7356. ' •Huron County Committee on Alcoholism and Drug Addiction, 524-7111. Several avenues of help are available in Huron County. All you have to do is ask. Free trade plan needs more study ferior. But none of us is like the man described by the biographer. Even the people who seem so self assured when we meet them in real life, have their doubts and uncertainties. In fact some of the people who seem most in control of their own lives are actually the most insecure when they're in a roomby themselves. Our "hero" cheerfully admitted he had been unfaithful to his wife and the author left it at that. We don't know the agonies the woman went through, the fights they must have had along the way. Instead we see her as a paragon of motherhood, making do without much money, making do with a hus- band who was so obsessed with becoming a millionaire that he wan seldom home and knowing while he was off travelling that he was also sampling the delights of the local female population. The people around our success story are just rungs on the ladder for our hero. We don't know how bitter they may have been at some of the actions our man took on his way up. But through it all there's the sense of in- evitability that comes through. In fiction our hero gets in ,scrapes and we wonder if he'll escape. Even in a continuing series like James Bond, suspense is built up sufficient- ly that we begin to wonder if this is the time our hero will get in over his head. But our hero in biography is bound to come out safe. He may make the wrong move now and then, may regret something but the road to succtss, to a happy ending, is never in doubt. If only life could be se easy. By Jack Riddell, MPP Huron -Middlesex Free trade, freer trade, trade enhance- ment, liberalized trade, comprehensive trade agreements: all of, these terms have been in the news lately as the provincial and federal governments, along with business leaders, unions and consumers try to come to grips with what is meant by "free trade" with the United States. Premier David Peterson, in his presenta- tion resentation to the 26th Annual Premiers' Con- ference in St. John's, Newfoundland, told provincial leaders that a new, comprehen- sive "free" trade agreement with the United States would be a profound move for both Canada and' Ontario. There has not been enough "homework" done on the issue to provide some hard numbers on how a new agreement would affect the province and the country, the premier said. In his address, Mr. Peterson noted theim- portance of trade with the U.S. Canada is the largest and fastest growing export market for the United States, ahead of Japan and all of the combined European co . ity, "Tra with the United States," said- the premier, "is most crucial of all to Ontario, where one million jobs and $4,000 in per capita income are generated by exports to the United States." The premier underlined the importance of trade policy, not just to Canada's economic survival but to its political survival as well. Quoting the words of Sir Robert ,Borden, Premier Peterson said, "to determine trade policy is 'to deter- mine not a mere question of markets, but the future destiny of Canada."' The recent rise of the Canada -U.S. free trade issue may be traced to two concerns. The first is the mounting' aggressiveness of the United States on trade issues, including a growing demand for more protectionist legislation from the U.S. Congress which is concerned about their huge budget and trade deficits. The U.S. wants to protect its producers of forestry, fishery, agricultural and steel products by imposing higher tariffs on Canadian products entering the 'U.S. The second concern is promoted by the failure of Canada's economic policies to create jobs and promote economic develop- ment across the country. In a discussion paper released at the Premiers' Conference, Premier Peterson pointed to the many questions which must be answered before any action is taken on a free or comprehensive trade agreement. The questions included' •Is a comprehensive trade agreement needed? •What could be the economic impact of Such an agreement? •Will Canada lose the flexibility to set its own policies? Sugar and Spice •Is a comprehensive trade agreement realistically negotiable? •What are the alternatives? Premier Peterson said underlying all of these questions is the issue of jobs. "We have yet to see a systematic presentation on this issue," said the premier. "When con- sidering . what approaches the federal government might be prepared to take, we start with a long list of questions and not even a short list of answers." "Ontario is not agai ,t secure and enhanced access to the U.d. market," Mr. Peterson told the premiers at the con- ference. "We are only against a hasty and . uninformed approach to the issue. 'We do not expect benefits without costs. But we do ex- pect benefits to exceed costs, from whatever course we choose to follow." In other business closer to home concern- , ing the Farm Tax Rebate Program, I have been informed by the Ministry of Municipal. Affairs that forms will be mailed out by mid- September to municipalities who have already set their mill rate. Bonafide farmers who have paid at least 60 percent of their municipal taxes have un- til December 30, 1986 to claim the rebate on their 1985 tax. Rebate cheques will be mailed out six to eight weeks following receipt of the forms. We've changed There has been a tremendous change in the manners and mores of Canada, in the past three decades. This brilliant thought came to me as I saw a sign today, in a typical Canadian small town: "Steakhouse and Tavern." Now this didn't exactly knock me out, alarmme, or discombobulate me in any way. I am a part of all thatis in this country, at this time. But it did give me a tiny twinge. Hence my opening remarks, I am no Carrie Nation, who stormed into saloons with her lady friends, armed with hatchets, and smashed open (what a waste) the barrels of beer and kegs of whiskey. I am no Joan of Arc. I don't revile blasphemers or hear voices. I am no Pope John Paul 11, who tells people what to do about their sex lives. I am merely an observer of the human scene, in a country that used to he one thing, and has become another. But that doesn't mean I don't have opinions. I have nothing but scorn for the modern "objective" jour- nalists who tell it as it is. They are hyenas and jackals, who fatten on the leavings of the "lions" of our society, for the most part. Let's get back on topic, as I tell my students. The Canadian society has roughened and coarsened to an astonishing degree in the last 30 years. First, the Steakhouse and Tavern. As a kid working on the boats on the Upper Lakes, I was excited and a little scared when I saw that sign in American ports: Duluth, Detroit, Chicago. I came from the genteel poverty of On- tario in the Thirties, and I was slightly ap- palled, and deeply attracted by these signs: the very thought that drink could be publicly By Bill Smiley advertised. Like any normal, curious kid, I went into a couple, ordered a two-bit whiskey, and found nobody eating steaks, but 'a great many people getting sleazily drunk on the same. Not the steaks. In those days, in Canada, there was no such creature. The very use of the word "tavern" indicated iniquity. It was an evil place. We did have beer "parlours," later exchanged for the eliphemism "beverage rooms." But that was all right. Only the lower element went there, and they closed from 6 p.m. to 7:30, or some such, so that a family man could get home to his dinner. Not a bad idea. In their homes, of course, the Middle and upper class drank liquor. Beer was the working -man's drink, and to be shunned. It was around then that some wit reversed the old saying, and came out with: "Work is the curse of the drinking clans," a neat version of Marx's (?) "Drink is the curse of the working classes." If you called on(someone in those misty days, you were offered a cuppa and, something to eat. Today, the host would be humiliated if he didn't have something harder to offer you. Now, every hamlet seems to have its steakhouse, complete with tavern. It's rather ridiculous. Nobody today can afford a steak. But how in the living world can these same people afford drinks, at current prices? These steakhouses and taverns are usual- ly pretty sled y Joints. ona oar with the old beverage room which was the epitome of sleaze. It's not all the fault of the owners, though they make nothing on the steak and 100 per cent on the drinks (minimum.) It's just that Canadians tend to be noisy and crude and profane drinkers, And the crudity isn't only in the pubs. It has crept into Parliament, that august in- stitution, with a prime minister who used street language when his impeccable English 'failed, or he wanted to show how' tough he was. It has crept into our educational system, where teachers drink and swear and tell dir- ty jokes and use language in front of women that I, a product.of a more well-mannered, or inhibited, your choice, era, could not br- ing myself to use. And the language of today's students, from Grade One to Grade whatever, would curl the hair of a sailor, and make your maiden aunt grab for the smelling salts. Words from the lowest slums and slummiest barnyards create rarely a blush on the cheek of your teenage daughter. A graduate of the depression, when people had some reason to use bad language, in sheer frustration and anger, and of a war in which the most common four-letter word was , used as frequently, and absent- mindedly, as salt' and pepper, have not in- ured me to what our kids today consider nor- mal. Girls wear T-shirts that are not even fun- ny, merely obscene. M do boys, Saw one the other day on an otherwise nice lad. Message: "Thanks, all you virgins — for nothing." The Queen is a frump. God is a joke. The country's problems are somebody else's problem, as long as I get mine. I don't deplore. I don't abhor. I don't im- plore. i merely observe. Sadly. We are turn- ing into a nation of slobs. el •