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The Citizen, 1997-10-29, Page 5THE CITIZEN, WEDNESDAY, OCTOBER 29,1997. PAGE 5. Guest column Arthur Black Great story — but bogus I have never seen a situation so dismal that a policeman couldn't make it worse. Brendan Behan Ah, the poor old Fuzz. They can't win for losing. Here you have a group of men and women willing to put their lives on the line for a fairly paltry paycheque and what do they get? Sneers. Jibes. Put-downs. There's a story going around about a guy who witnesses a brute of a thug putting the boots to his (the thug's) wife. So the guy phones the police station, only to be told by an answering service that "no officer is available to take your call, but if you'll leave your name and number, the first available agent will get back to you." To hell with that, thinks the guy who hangs up and - inspirationally — calls the local Dunkin' Donuts outlet. "Let me speak to a police officer please," he tells the server droid who answers. Within seconds a cop is on the phone, and a squad car is dispatched to the scene of the crime. Great story -- but bogus. It's an Urban I /International Scene MMb i____________________________________________________________________ I By Raymond Canon Overproduction in car industry For most of us, getting into a car to go someplace is taken in about the same stride as getting out of bed in the morning. A two- car family is more commonplace than ever and, thanks to a number of aggressive foreign manufacturers, we have a greater selection than we ever had before. Four lane highways are commonplace in both North America and Europe and many people think nothing of driving half-way across a continent to go on a holiday. In short, the car appears to be here to stay. There is, however, currently one cloud on the horizon and that is the threat of overproduction. What this all adds up to is that we have too many producers grinding out too many cars. This is a situation where something has to give in the next few years. If it were any other industry, the fallout might not be so bad. But let's lake a look at cars in a global context. The world's three top manufacturing companies are General Motors, Ford and Toyota. If you look at the top 50, no less than 13 are in the car making business and they employ no less than 2.5 million people. Another 7.5 million work in garages or in auto-parts plants. In short, a total of 10 million people whose living depends on making or fixing cars. If all the manufacturing companies ran flat out, they could produce about 68 million cars a year. Right now they are not even close, since in 1996 they turned out only about 70 per cent of this amount and they need to Legend — one of those stories that's so good it ought to be true, but isn't. The fact is, we, the public are pre-disposed to snicker at cops. It helps us to feel superior. Cops, after all, are the folks who can flag us down on the highway, stop us in the shopping mall or pretty much pull us up anywhere they like and lecture us for misbehaviour like no one has lectured us since we were in knee pants in front of our mother. Which helps to explain the public glee that greeted a story which appeared in newspapers around the world last month: New London, Conn: A city that doesn't want police officers with "too high an IQ" has been sued by an applicant who lost a job because of his high score on an intelligence test. Robert Jordan claims the city of New London, Connecticut, discriminated against him based on his intelligence and violated his constitutional rights. He says an assistant manager told him: "We don't like to hire people that have too high an IQ to be cops in this city." "I know I would be a good cop," says Jordan, "but I had the misfortune of selecting too many correct answers." A would-be cop who was too smart to be a cop. Perfect. Fits right into the Urban Legend. reach 80- per cent in order to make anything like healthy profits. While the big three in North America appear to be making big bucks, this is a bit of an illusion since their returns compared to assets has been declining for the last decade. One of the reasons for the decline overall is that more of the car markets are finding themselves in what can be described as a mature market. This is especially true in Europe where new cars are now generally bought to replace old ones; there is, in fact, no net growth. Some automobile experts over there are of the opinion that, between environmental damage and road congestion, there may well be a reduction in the total number. Any readers from the German speaking area of the continent will know the word "Stau" by heart. Traffic delays are more and more the norm these days. The last lime I was over there, it seems some days I spent as much lime wailing for traffic to clear as I did actually travelling. When you drive by plants in Ingersoll, Cambridge and Allison, you realize that the manufacturers are strong on decentralization. No more does a company supply its entire market from locally located plants, exporting them where and when they are needed. In fact, in North America Toyota will soon overtake Chrysler as number three on our continent. This rush to build plants all over the place is only adding to the overcapacity. Nobody wants to be the first to bile the bullet. Nor are governments offering any encouragement. To cite on example, even though the Japanese have reduced their production over the past decade from 4.6 Why is it we the public - we fat burghers who take it for granted that the cops will always be there to do our dirty work - feel such delight when we read stories like the foregoing? Or the following: An old lady is driving along the highway, steering with her elbows as she knits away. She is swerving all over the road. A highway patrolman pulls alongside and shouts through the bullhorn, "PULL OVER!" The little old lady looks up smiling and says, "No, it's socks, actually." But cops aren't always the brunt of the joke. There was another story in the papers last month about a British Columbia motorist who was nabbed in an automated speed trap that measured his speed by radar and photographed his car. He was notified by mail, receiving a photo of his car and a ticket for $100. Being a lawyer and therefore an exceedingly clever fellow, the driver sent the police department a photograph of a one hundred dollar bill. Several days later, he received another letter from the police department. It contained another photograph. Of a pair of handcuffs. million vehicles a year to 2.9 million, only one plant has been closed. As far as governments are concerned, just look at the recent situation in Belgium. Renault decided that it could no longer afford to produce cars both there and in France and accordingly announced plans to close one plant; it caused a near riot. Tens of thousands of workers marched through the streets of Bruxelles in protest and local politicians got up in arms. In England, when Ford opted to close a plant, the English government, to eveiybody's surprise, found enough money to keep the plant open. One of the most logical solutions would be for the manufacturers to produce new types of cars, such as electric autos. However, the promotion of such cars can only be described as spasmodic and any surge in the sale of such vehicles will probably not take place for many years, if it does at all. Certainly not in time to do any good to the current surplus. In the meantime the producers arc making every effort to reduce the unit cost of production and are paying greater attention to consumer tastes. There may also be some nasty trade wars; look for the biggest to be between Japan and the United States since the Japanese are becoming the most aggressive in their marketing strategies. The next five years should prove to be very interesting. A Final Thought Even worse than a storm or a riot is a bunch of kids who are suddenly quiet. One student’s view By Amy Crawford Friday was my last day at co-op — at least for a while. Since September through school, I have been co-oping at The Citizen. It has been a very enjoyable and enlightening experience. I like coming to co-op every morning and doing something I take a great interest in. It's a way for senior students to see a career firsthand and possibly use that knowledge to continue in the future. To me that's important.. I have learned many of the ins and outs of the newspaper business. I have written articles ranging from sports reports to obituaries. This has given me a sense of my range and has also shown me how to keep it simple, get all the facts and organize my ideas. Going on a few interviews has shown me how to deal with individuals on specific topics. I have taken pictures for the paper, developed them, made prints of them and so on. I have also helped al deadline, learned how to make everything fit and use my judgement. So, my two months of co-op has been very beneficial for me. Now, the teachers are striking and if it continues too long I may lose the chance to leant more interesting and challenging things. I went and talked with my co-op teacher to find out exactly what was going to happen. He said if there is a strike going to my co-op placement would be treated as my own time. The employers and students can make other arrangements, but they will not be part of the regular co-op placement. Also if students attend co-op during the strike they are not covered by the school's insurance. He said that since some students who co­ op in public schools will have no placement to go to, he is unsure as to how hours will be counted, if any hours compiled during the strike will be used at all. If the strike lasts for a long lime a directive will come down from the ministry to tell us what the rules are but I don't know. I think the teachers should be supported, in that this is their last resort and they are standing up for some of the things that I believe in, but I am also scared of the future. What about the students? Because of this strike I may lose all my credits for this semester and I don't have the lime to lake these classes over again. I am taking advanced English this semester and plan to take OAC English next semester. Now I may have lost out on both English classes. Where will this get me? The government has a very narrow minded view of things and they need to open their eyes. Both the teachers and the government are acting like children. The strike is not going to make them change everything, they are willing to be as obstinent as the teachers and the bottomline is this is all going to affect the students, the innocent people involved. It wasn't a threat, the teachers are striking. But for this year's students are the teachers certain, this won’t be worse than what Bill 160 was going to do? Hopefully because of lost lime from the strike we are not made to stay longer in school when summer begins. Most students have summer jobs, and in my case it is lifeguarding at the local pool. Lessons start in June, usually within the first week and how can I concentrate and work hard at my job if I am still working on school work? Also outdoor pools will lose revenue because kids will be in school. I also feel the teachers' prep lime is not an issue. If you lose it, well you lose it. The issues are class sizes, and decreased funding. It's hard enough today for teachers to assist students in class but it will be almost impossible if the number of students per class increases. We are in a sorry state of affairs already and even though the strike may make the government wake up and take notice what about us? We are the ones who will be most affected. What are we going to do?