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Home Newspaper of Halton Hills Established A Division of Canadian Newspapers Company Limited Guelph Street Georgetown 3Z6 Ontario DAVID A BEATTIE Publisher and General Manager BRIAN Editor Phone DAN TAYLOR Advertising Manager rcondCliMH RrgiitrrrdNiimbrrll Page THE HERALD Septembers Read on It may be hard to believe but there are over 3 people in Halton Hills who can read or write at a Grade 9 level That figure according to the North Halton Literacy Guild means just under 10 per cent of Halton Hills residents fit into that category But through efforts of groups like the guild and Halton educational we re actually better off than the rest of Canada One person in five can t read or write at a Grade level Canada the guild says The tales told by three students and the guild tutors in our special on literacy this week are incredible People who couldnt read would actually watch the ex on the faces of other people so they could imitate them when a document was passed around Others would say forgot their glasses- and get strangers to read labels in a grocery store Still others would disguise their poor spelling with messy handwriting Because these people are coming forward with their stories of persistence in their quest to read and write others may seek help The tutors are waiting to help those who need it In our civilized country it s heartening to know there help for those who seek and desire basic com munication skills Strange days Brian MacLeod Ed Notebook Well Sunday certainly your average day at the Ex I set off early from quiet Cambridge with my better half the names Karen she s quick to remind me but all quiet on Lakeshore Boulevard After grinning at those poor unfortunate souls pulled over on the side of the road with their hoods up smoke belching out of their radiators I joined them Sit ting there on the edge of my car water boiling up through the overflow container watching motorists grinning at you as much fun I guess this is our 15 minutes of fame Karen chuckl Not funny But a visit from a friendly neighborhood Metro Toronto police officer certainly changed our for tunes He began inspecting my engine Oops Isn today my birth day I remembered I wondered if my license sticker which read September 89 so clearly was still valid As our constable cheerfully named off a list of things which could be wrong with my car I listened attentively nodding and agreeing as I attempted to place myself strategically between him end my license plates I only didnt he notice he had a interesting parking idea w store Is money really the for women entering Derek Nelson Queen Htm Would more women run for political office if the government took over total financing of political parties The Committee For thinks so It recently wrote Premier David Peterson advocating that the government cover the expenses connected with nominating and electing all provincial and municipal candidates This it said would permit more women to seek elected office The Committee of 94 describes itself as a non partisan group of activist women dedicated to get ting more women into elected of fice We are committed to public funding because we believe that more women would run for political office if the increasingly high costs of candidacy were not a barrier the letter said Well maybe The committee s letter quotes approvingly an earlier study by the Ontario PCs which identified four reasons for low female Hon in politics These were constraints on be ing wives mothers and low income earners the socialization process which from childhood discourages females from competing the bias in candidate recruitment toward the male model of what makes an electable politician and the power male elites enjoy to favor male candidates MOST FORMIDABLE The committee then somewhat dubiously draws the following con clusion The experts isolate the first reason money as the most formidable barrier to women seek election Actually expert opinion isn t really that clearcut Money in politics has never really been a problem in and of itself The dif ficulty is in getting plugged into the proper network that gives access to money a problem hardly restricted to women Try being a poor male from the boomes and see how far you get The committee blind spot is that it sees low female participa rates solely through feminist Women are per cent of the population why then aren women 51 per cent of the elected politicians they ask This in is where the name Com nuttee for came from with its stated goal of half the House in In fact the PC analysis explains quite well why women will never compete oh equal grounds in the political system with men either in numbers or in success Women are wives and mothers and to the majority that is their first priority The practice in our society and perhaps all societies is problem politics husbands and children almost always come first Whether women necessarily choose those roles voluntarily is open to argu merit but it is absurd to pretend that anything else is the norm And all feminist propaganda aside that t like to change It is also a matter of record thai the socalled low income of women also mainly a consequence of marriage and children According to the Fraser Institute unmarried women without children have in comes almost identical to men of comparable age education and skills TOUGH ON BOTH Frankly politics is tough on both sexes To do it right is time consuming and allencompassing which is why it wrecks marriages and makes difficult the raising of children at the same time Women have an added burden too in the sense they arent men and never can be men m terms of what is sometimes called male pair bonding a non sexual biological affinity among men that doesn t seem to have a counter part amongst women and leads to them being seen as outsiders by old boy networks That doesn stop women sue ceeding in politics as everyone from Agnes Macphail to Margaret Thatcher shows If Stephen son had wanted the premiers job in the PC leadership race of she d have won easily But for cultural reasons it is harder for them The committee idea that government money is the key to female success in politics is just too simplistic for me At our Scottish friend in sistance we parked on the grass beside Boulevard He then placed his card on our wind shield and sent a message to dispatch that the car t to receive a ticket or be towed Then he showed us the back seat of a Metro police car while he navigated the back streets of Toronto with some interesting bylaw infractions eventually dropping us off near the front gates of the Ex So it was into the Foster building Snowbirds screaming overhead The two of us were on our way to the when I glanced out of the window I was stunned A tiny area of the lake was alt I could see but 200 feet above it was a fiery object tumbl into the water It was a Snowbird jet I grabbed Karen and heaved her in front of the window Look look was all I could say The jet crashed into the lake There was no gasp from the people watching Only dead silence This was no movie And the flames weren t special effects The condi tion of the pilot wasn announced When we saw a parachute falling into the water a few seconds later we assumed it was the pilot from the jet which just crashed into the sea But that wasn the case as we found out on the 10 news Seeing such an event live makes those attempts by the movies to imitate them kind of crass Everyone in the crowd at the air show just stood silently waiting for word of the pilot Somehow movies simply forget that part Oh yes eight hours later at the end of the day after a two mile walk our car was still there along with about others Norval Flour Mill The Noble Mill In was one of the early in In the village The mill was located about where Club sits today The Esquesing Historical Society is planning an historical walk around LETTERS- Valley should be left parkland Dear Sir Mr Al in his recent remarks to Hills town coun cil concerning lands behind Drive Cresctnt and Wilson Court is somewhat off base He referred to the area as a gar bage dump not a valley and a place where dog droppings prevail He is right on the third count as many residents use the green belt as a hiking trail and a most ex cellent place to exercise their dogs rather than on town streets Town councillors should definite ly inspect the properly Mr wants to toy Jback from the town for a measly This land has been known as a conservation area and treated as such by local residents for over years Mr claims it is not a recreational area perhaps the town doesn t recognize it but local residents have over the years cut the grass planted trees built skating rinks and currently make wide use of this area for hiking biking and simply enjoying a nature trail through the trees near old camp His statement that building houses on this land would bt a benefit to the town and the residents is preposterous The town has a petition signed by every resident boarding the pro perty They clearly want the land left as it is and they continue to care for it with no expense to town There are many acres of fresh land dlable for development away from one of Georgetown s most attractive and cared for residential area let him pay the going price and leave the natural recreation area to the citizens who simply want peace and quiet and a natural valley parkland left as it was intended Sincerely Georgetown