Politics at is morally bankrupt worst

On Tuesday January 9, 2007 I sent a letter to CanWest and various newspapers expressing my thoughts on the complete lack of judgement evidenced by Global’s Vancouver television station and their telethon for Stanley Park. With all the important issues that need funding and public awareness it was to aggravating to remain silent on the insult offered to all those in true need of assistance.

Imagine then how infuriating it was on Thursday to watch the politically desperate behaviour of the NDP, a party that claims to champion those society views as disposable. There, in a disgusting display of opportunism, were various members of the NDP caucus and party as they sought to score meaningless political points against Gordon Campbell for the province not donating millions more to “restoring” Stanley Park. As if nature, another area it would appear the NDP pay only lip service to, were not capable of healing Stanley Park without any “help”.

To add further injury to the numerous insults good judgment, ethical behaviour and a sense of priorities have taken over Stanley Park this week, Gordon Campbell showed a total lack of backbone and jumped on this decadent and senseless Stanley Park bandwagon. Apparently Mr. Campbell’s “NO” is only firm when denying funding to the poor, homeless and those in real need. Appeasement is seemingly the policy of Mr. Campbell and his Liberal’s when the decision has such a potential to negatively affect Liberal party coffers or political fortunes.

Watching this vile display of moral bankruptcy and politics leaves one yearning, make that praying, for the addition to the BC political landscape of a new party with ideas, ideals, honour, the ability to say “NO” and a sense of priorities based on principal and reality. Otherwise I and many others are left disenfranchised, lacking as we do any party or candidates worthy of our support or deserving of being entrusted with the governance of British Columbia.

Rich – poor gap becomes a chasm

Toronto Star, January 10, 2007 Carol Goar
Churning out cogent new studies on poverty wouldn’t work, the research team decided. Canadians already knew how bad the problem was.


Making the case for fair wages, affordable housing, decent welfare rates and universal child care wouldn’t turn the tide, they agreed. Dozens of advocacy groups were doing that with negligible success.

What was needed was a catalyst to turn awareness into action.

It was the summer of 2006. The Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives had just received a generous donation to wake people up to the alarming rise of inequality in Canada.
The three lead researchers – Armine Yalnizyan, Hugh Mackenzie and Trish Hennessy – were brainstorming about how to get the message out, how to make it relevant to Canadians and how to get governments to move.

“We had to take it beyond poverty,” Yalnizyan recalled. “We had to give everybody a stake in the issue.

“We had to show what’s happening to us as a society. We had to get people talking about how disconnected the winners have become from the rest of us. This is the central economic and social issue of our day.”

On Nov. 20, the centre launched its “Growing Gap” project. Its aim is to convert people’s unease about the concentration of wealth into an active conviction that something is wrong when the economy is doing better than most of the population; when families are working longer and harder to stay in the same place; and when governments sanction this arrangement.

To kick off the initiative, the think-tank sent out pollsters to find out how Canadians are doing after a decade of strong economic growth. After interviewing 2,021 randomly selected adults, the pollsters came back with sobering – but not surprising – news:

– Fifty-one per cent said their standard of living had either dropped or stayed the same.
– Forty-nine per cent said they were one or two missed paycheques away from being poor.
– Sixty-five per cent said the benefits of economic growth had gone to the richest Canadians.
– Seventy-six per cent said the gap between rich and poor had widened.

“What’s clear in this poll is that Canadians are worried about their personal future and equally worried about the direction their country might be going,” the think-tank said.
Next, it backed up these perceptions with facts. It released a series of statistical sketches of inequality.

The research team was hampered by a scarcity of up-to-date figures (the census, the best source of information on wealth and income, is now 6 years old), but sifted through earnings reports, employment numbers, housing data, consumer debt, economic trends and the 2001 census.

What emerged was a picture of widening disparity. The top 20 per cent of families held 75 per cent of the nation’s wealth and were rapidly accumulating more. The bottom 20 per cent had no net wealth (their debts exceeded their assets) and were sinking deeper into poverty. The middle 60 per cent were struggling to hold their ground.

“Economic insecurity is now a fact of life for most workers, regardless of where they fit into the income spectrum,” the think-tank pointed out.

Shortly before Christmas, the research team issued a year-end review suggesting – hopefully rather than confidently – that the growing gap would be the “sleeper issue” of 2007.

“This is a problem looking for political leadership. Will 2007 be the year our political leaders take it on?”

To usher in the New Year, Mackenzie did a bit of number crunching and came up with an attention-grabbing comparison.

He showed that by 9:46 a.m. on Jan. 2, the country’s 100 highest paid chief corporate executives would make $38,010 – the same amount the average Canadian worker could expect to earn in the entire year.

In the coming months, the think-tank will explore what happens to a society when its privileged minority gets so far ahead of the rest of the population that there is no shared experience to draw on, no common set of goals and no basis for democratic dialogue.

The debate has already begun in Toronto, partly because of an alarming spike in gun violence in the summer of 2005 and partly because of the leadership of Frances Lankin, president of the United Way. She has been warning for three years that Toronto is developing enclaves of extreme poverty, social tension and urban decay.

The timing of the Growing Gap project could be auspicious. Neo-conservatism seems to be on the wane. Canadians are rethinking the trade-off between big tax cuts and threadbare social safety nets.

On the other hand, fate could play a cruel trick. Just as the initiative takes hold, it could be swamped by the environmental wave coming down the pike.
Yalnizyan and her colleagues are ready for either scenario.

They’ll fight as long and hard as it takes to convince Canadians that a strong society is one in which everybody moves ahead together.

(More information is available at www.growinggap.ca).

$$MILLIONS$$


… is the answer and the question is “how much is the ineptitude and laziness of senior city staff and council going to cost Abbotsford taxpayers”.

“… frankly I think our treasury board would have a great deal of trouble providing money for something that’s already been funded” said Premier Gordon Campbell during a visit to Abbotsford.

I enjoy being right. I really enjoy being proven correct when a position I take, especially in an area of personal expertise such as finance, is blown off as untrue and nothing to worry about; particularly when it is a point of plain common sense. But it is not enjoyable when it comes at such an outrageous cost to my fellow taxpaying citizens.

When asked during the NO Plan A campaign why senior staff and council had not bothered to seek funding from senior levels of government to reduce the burden on Abbotsford taxpayers, senior staff and council stated that was something to be done after borrowing the money was approved.

When asked why senior levels of government would contribute funds to a project after the City’s taxpayers were on the hook for the full amount, senior staff and council blithely stated that the fact that voting yes for plan A was also voting to pay the entire cost would be “no problem”.

Yes problem, big multimillion $$$$$$$ costly to the taxpayers problem given Premier Campbell’s statement: “… frankly I think our treasury board would have a great deal of trouble providing money for something that’s already been funded”.

If Abbotsford City Hall had not been so smug, self-congratulatory and busy cramming Plan A down the throats of the taxpayers and had actually listened to the questions of the NO side … well there is no way to tell how many millions of dollars this would have saved taxpayers.

$9.7 million Penticton; $15 million Langley; $0 Abbotsford. It is obvious why senior staff and council did not want to accept personal responsibility for taxpayer’s money wasted on Plan A. What is not clear is why taxpayers should be expected to just accept this demonstrated irresponsible behaviour and how much MORE the ineptitude and laziness of senior city staff and council is going to cost Abbotsford taxpayers

OK now I am incensed and disgusted


I got an e-mail from the publisher of Something Cool News asking my reaction to a planned fundraiser “Renewal of the Jewel” and comments by John McComb of CKNW’s “The World Today” on Stanley Park and homelessness. He called Stanley Park a “Jewel” and stated fixing it should be a major priority. When it was suggested by a listener that radio air time would better be spent on an issue such as homelessness Mr McComb’s reply was along the lines of “We did a whole week on homelessness on this station. How many shows on homelessness do you want?”

The publisher wanted to know what I felt about Mr McCombs attitude and about fundraising for the repair of Stanley Park since while I may be a passionate advocate on homeless and poverty issues, I am acknowledged as being objective, forthcoming and rational on the subject.

As I told him, I think that indeed it is important to aid Stanley Park recover from storm damage. The Park is described as natural and undisturbed old growth, leading to its description as a “Jewel”. I use the word aid deliberately. The damage from the storm is something that happens in the natural life of a forest and in due course the forest will heal itself as part of the cycle of life. But … such a self healing would be on the timeline of the trees of Stanley Park and on a plan that results from Nature, not man.

These calls for “repair” or to “restore” are about people’s wants and human hubris, because “we want OUR Park and we want it now”. It is not about Stanley Park. If it was about Stanley Park it would be about cleaning up the portions of the park – roads, causeway, paths – that give access to people to enjoy and commune with the park and letting the Park itself “decide” how, when and in what form it will heal and grow. If this is truly about maintaining the “spirit” or essence of Stanley Park then we must be willing to let Nature and the Park choose the HOW and WHEN.

I feel it extremely important that it is Stanley Park itself that dictates its growth and recovery; otherwise it will be no more than a very large garden or any other ordinary city park.

Still even doing a minimum to restore access and allow the Park to choose its own destiny will have costs and so I fully support the idea of a “Renewal of the Jewel” fundraiser. Especially since the funds raised may be needed for lawyers to protect the Park from overzealous human “friends”. Either way, a fund raiser of this sort seems a perfectly good idea for, hopefully, a sound purpose. Besides, as I rather snidely commented to the News a fundraiser such as this, while it would buy a good supply of Band-Aids for homeless issues, is not what is needed to fund programs to actually accomplish reductions in homelessness, addiction, poverty and a host of other related challenges.
Before I had the opportunity to formulate my thoughts on Mr. McComb I had the misfortune to see the Global 11PM news and their telethon. Seeing their self-congratulation on a telethon to raise money for Stanley Park left a foul taste in my mouth and granted me understanding of what is meant by “seeing red”. It is actions such as this that leave me despairing for the human race.

Several months ago in the Vancouver Sun Peter McMartin had a story about a church that was opening its sanctuary to those homeless who needed a safe place to sleep during the day. Included in this group were those who worked full time at night jobs such as cleaning office towers, but who cannot afford to rent housing in the very city they work in nor can they afford to live elsewhere and commute to work.

The church had accumulated a huge deficit and would continue to add to the deficit because they choose to live their faith and open their doors and hearts to those who needed help. Front page of the Vancouver Sun, a realistic need of hundreds of thousands of dollars, perhaps a million or two for a operating trust fund. Where was Global News that day?

Variety, the Children’s Charity; BC Children’s Hospital; a church in dire need because the pastor and congregation choose to live their faith; are worthy of a telethon. But trees? I just hope that there is someone at CanWest with common sense and clout enough to give everyone responsible for this display of thoughtlessness, bad judgement and a total lack of priorities the swift kick in the ass they deserve.

Although, it would appear that this lack of judgement and common sense is rife on the airways. “A major priority” Mr McComb? If you can look around Vancouver, at our province, our country and our world and consider, what is after all at its very root a bunch of trees, a major priority … well all I can say and/or suggest is that for you a major priority should be removing your head from where you obviously have it lodged.

The answer to the question “how many shows” is – as many as it takes. I am not advocating 24 hour homeless radio or television. But we have no hope of intelligently addressing the issues surrounding poverty and homelessness unless we can, over time, educate and get the public thinking about these complex and messy issues.

People can spend uncounted hours watching Jerry Springer, pseudo-news programs, televised poker or reruns. More hours listening to Mr McComb, Howard Stern and trash radio. They will spend hours, days even weeks arguing and thinking about the Canucks. But thought provoking programs on poverty, addiction or homelessness? Don’t wana see it, don’t wana hear it, most assuredly don’t wana to think… … … about it. Millions can be raised for trees, trendy causes, animals or politicians but people in need?

Maybe therein lies the lesson that Stanley Park has to offer us. On its own timeline, in its own fashion and in accordance with its nature the Park can, will and should be allowed to heal itself. But if we, as a society lack the wisdom inherent in this old forest, then a hundred years from now as the forest is invigorated by the changes that nature has wrought, camped out among its new growth will be the poor, the homeless and the other unwanted. A wise old Park watching over the same old human society, a society that itself remains still desperately in need of healing.