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Page THE HERALD OUTLOOK Saturday July ISM the HERALD OUTLOOK is published each Saturday by Ihe 1 1 ALTON HILLS HERALD Home Newspaper of Hills A Division of Canadian Newspapers Company Limited at Street Georgetown Ontario L7G Second Class Mail Outlook Many young families cant afford houses Registered Number 8778822 STAFF Donna Kelt Your Business Diane Maley Thomson News Housing is the foundation of our social fabric The family farm the family home we view as a bir thright Most people in Canada own their own homes and most of those who do have little or no mortgage deb Behind this comfortable picture though trouble is brewing In a few years could face a social crisis so severe that it will shake our faith in the economic system A growing proportion of young families can no longer afford to buy a home These people will not share the interests of existing homeowners interests upon which many social policies are based A twoclass system will develop those with homes and those without As rents rise in line with the value of housing homeowners will grow richer and tenants poorer This problem is worrying governments federal provincial and municipal In the past the federal government has helped in a number of different ways all of them questionable In the 1970s it went into the development business building lowpriced townhouses that people coujd buy with very little money down The result was widespread defaults and a huge inventory- of empty houses Only the speculators benefitted WHATS AFFORDABLE Next the government started financing coops and other forms of socalled affordable housing Its a misleading term there is no such thing as affordable housing in most parts of Canada and certainly not where governments are Involved Fortunately Ottawa is pulling out of these programs The concept of coops lntended Rather than filling a building with people who need sub sidized housing coops offer a third of their space to the needy and the rest to people who pay market rents This way the poor are not crowded together in ghet tos Trouble is the market rents are substantially lower than the cost of building the unit So taxpayers must subsidize the poor and not- poor alike Take Toronto for example where the cry for affordable hous ing is rising to a deafening pitch The provincial government has come forward with a plan to build 30000 units all of which it must subsidize The cost of carrying this many units is estimated to be a staggering million a year For the first years the market rents will not cover the cost of building the units the subsidized rents will never cover it To tax payers who must foot the bill this is not affordable Provincial governments soon will run out of money for subsidiz ed housing dropping the problem back in Ottawas lap Federal of ficials are pondering what to do One plan would let people buy houses with as little as five per cent of the purchase price down The Canada Mortgage and Hous ing Corp would insure the mor tgage against default This would help people with big incomes but little savings Given the big monthly carrying costs it will leave the new homeowner feel ing vulnerable to sudden increases in interest rates But if inflation is muted in future many people could find themselves old and housepoor Their houses will be paid for but without their they will have little money in the bank Clearly the housing crisis is a pro blem that will not be solved easily Berrys World I would think the best way to handle this situation would be with a MEASURED RESPONSE PUBLISHER David A Seattle EDITOR Itrhin MacLeod AD MANAGER Dan Taylor sports WHITER Paul luiin Mam Tallinn Sail SNAFU by Bruce Beattie Preppy cattle rancher agonizing over whether to brand cattle with his monogram or coat of arms Third World countries deserve a hearing By VIC PARSONS Ottawa Bureau Thomson News Service Its regrettable thai leaders of the seven Western industrial powers did not seize the opportuni ty in Paris and agree to a con ference on Third World problems Rather they decided to turn their backs on a request from leaders of the worlds poorer na tions for a replay of the socalled NorthSouth meeting held in Mex ico some years ago In worldaid jargon North refers to the wealthier industrial countries while South means the almost invariably poor countries of Asia Africa and Latin America To their credit French Presi dent Francois Metterrand and Canadian Prime Minister Brian Mulroney pushed for a NorthSouth summit But while others mainly US President George Bush sup port conditional measures that would allow some debt relief to the Third World they apparently believe a facetoface session is not worth the trouble There are many authorities on Third World economics however who would argue that the trillion US owed by the worlds poorer nations is only a sympton and not the cause of the increasing gap between the haves and have- nots And a NorthSouth summit might allow a forum for discus sions on the causes not merely the results of the problem VIEWS EXPRESSED Not long ago some specialists on Third World issues appeared before a Commons committee to offer views on legislation that forgives Canadian government aid loans worth million to some of the poorest African countries Pierre a manager of the Canadian Council for Interna tional Cooperation noted that severe declines in commodity prices such as those for coffee and cocoa had led to a loss of revenue for countries in Africa This had also eroded con sumer buying power in those coun tries He gave a stunning example In i960 the Ivory Coast had to export three tonnes of bananas to buy a tractor A decade later the price had risen to tonnes Last year a tractor was worth tonnes of Moreover said bet ween and the economies of 25 of the subSaharan nations shrank in per capita terms And in the African continent receiv ed billion in development aid from the North but transferred billion in resources to the rich countries That transfer includes repayments or servicing of the debt There is a need for a revision of relations between rich and poor Harrisson said Worldwide forgiveness of debt will not get to the root of the problem he argued if the- relationships that cause debts are not dealt with Another expert Roy program director for international finance with the NorthSouth In stitute downplayed the contribu tion Canada was making to the poor of Africa through debt- forgiveness Because the million carries no interest charges and repayment was scheduled over SO years the effective cost to Canadian taxpayers and benefit to Africans was about onetenth of the face value of the loans In other words the relief was a welcome gesture but did little to help Africa Indeed if Western na tions were to forgive all their government loans to subSaharan Africa it would only relieve a tenth of the total debt Debt forgiveness would have a greater impact Culpeper sug gested if interestbearing loans made by credit agencies such as Canadas Export Development Corp and private banks were made less burdensome The banks are owed 30 billion by African countries But what wor ries private bankers who do not enter the business for the joy of handing out cash to the destitute is that any move to ease the burden on Africa will have reverberations elsewhere The biggest elsewhere is Latin America which owes billion to commer cial banks conditions are to be imposed the Third World deserves a hear ing and a NorthSouth summit would be the place to do it ADVERTISING SALES Jeanninc Valois Craig Teeter Roberts PRODUCTION DEPARTMENT Dave Hastings Annie DEPARTMENT Marie PRESSROOM FOREMAN Brian PRESS ASSISTANT Todd Tories tory objects to column Queens Park Derek Nelson Thornton Mm SmvIcb One of the things politicians dont do enough is argue with the people like myself who comment upon what they say and do Thus it was of interest to receive a letter from Progressive Conser vative Party strategist John Tory objecting to a column I wrote recently The column had rejected ideas Tory expressed in a speech to a private school audience I suggested Tory wanted the PCs to be just another liberal party like Premier David Peter sons bigL Liberals or Bob New Democrats and in that case why should anyone bother voting for them Tory suggested I misrepresented what he was really saying that he was urging the party not to make a radical turn to left of right Three topics from his speech were touched on in the column in a negative way fiscal prudence equal opportunity programs and official bilingualism You suggest wrongly that my initial point was that the previous PC government was a more pru dent fiscal manager than the Liberals My main point to be found but two paragraphs below is that fiscal conservatism and an attack on excessive spending high deficits and a growing public debt are absolutely necessary for the future Last time I checked the other parties didnt share this view In fact all of them attacked every at tempt at spending and deficit con trol and call for more and more public spending It was not by accident that I discussed that issue first as I feel it is of crucial importance to the maintenance of future business confidence and economic growth The emphasis was not as suggested on our past record which I in fact acknowledge in the speech as being less than perfect My approach to fiscal manage ment is very conservative and I believe lack of sufficient fiscal prudence represents the greatest single economic and social threat at present On equal opportunity he made this point You suggested that I for PC support for equal op portunity programs which you characterized as programs which attempt to ensure equal social results among all groups as op posed to society A careful reading of the text shows that I was saying nothing of the kind I was in fact rejecting the notion that groups should be dealt with as such in ensuring equal opportunity too many peo ple look at it that way in my view and suggesting instead that we concentrate on ensuring equal op portunity for all individuals whether they be black or white male or female rich or poor Space limitations prohibit reprinting all of what Tory wrote but the above catches the essence As much as it was interesting to hear from him in retrospect I see no reason to change anything I wrote about a PC Party by his principles being a mirror image of the other two parties