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THE HERALD Wednesday January 3 1990 Page Public will get to speak out at town hall meetings Well the GST Goods and Ser vices Tax is down to seven per cent the feds are debating a new abortion bill Mike Wilson is pondering what spending cuts to make and theres pressure on Ot tawa to ban semiautomatic rifles The RCMP seem to be doing a number on the image of MPs and the government could be losing the battle with the deficit largely because of a high interest rate policy at the Bank of Canada Finally every agricultural pro gram and subsidy in the country is being reexamined and the soar ing Canadian dollar seems be blowing holes in our exports In short theres a lot to talk about right now And as a result I think its time for a Town Hall meeting or two As before Id like to make myself available to answer questions to do a tot of listening and then to take your messages back to Ottawa The last time I had a series of these meetings was in late sum mer just after details of the Goods and Services Tax bad been reveal ed There were some lively moments and I met a lot of people who came so they could yell at me Out of that I got the clear message that any GST acceptable in these parts would have to have a lower rate come with serious cuts in government spending and result in a lower deficit So far weve got two out of three and Im working on the rest The meetings this time- Glen Williams Town Hall Wednesday Jan 17 at 730 p and Albion- Bolton Community Centre Bolton ThursdayJan Everyone is welcome Every topic is open for discussion A consistent theme which has come out of former meetings from your letters to me and from my discussions with community groups is that the feds spend too damn much money While the government has trim med its fat a let in recent years the perception remains that more needs to be done This year Ottawa will spend about billion more than it takes in a situation which obviously cant continue The GST as I mentioned is designed to help But I have always said that reducing the deficit cant be done solely on the backs of middleclass taxpayers I said that before I got into politics and I am saying it now in Ottawa We also need real spending cuts in some of our established programs Maybe we could even eliminate an entire federal department Many people have asked me to provide them with something spell ing out exactly where all the tax dollars go so they could give valid suggestions on where the govern ment should slash In the next few days youll be getting exactly that Its a brochure called You be the Finance Minister and Ive designed it so you can actually come up with a federal budget tailoring where tax revenues RECYCLING Il on I works if we all do our part Please Remember to Recycle This Newspaper should come from and where they should be spent Youll find the complete spen ding of more than 30 federal departments including about programs Everything from health care to pensions to defence and foreign aid I talked with Finance Minister Mike Wilson the other day show ing him the brochure and telling him that each of you were going to get a copy His response was really positive and hes spoken to me a couple of times since asking to get copies of all the brochures which you return to me In fact hes encouraged all other government MPs to use the same brochure across the country so he can get some real feedback from normal Canadians as opposed to politicians on where cuts should happen So really hope you will pretend to be finance minister fill in the brochure and then fire it back to me When theyre all back Ill let you know what government spen ding the taxpayers of want trashed Lastly on of the newspapers honored me I think with the title of Personality of the Year My weekly column the paper said has given new meaning to the words political propaganda Im also said to have walked the edge of politics never outright offending his constituents rarely completely at odds with his own party Well I wont try to defend myself heaven knows how many people I skewered when I used to write a newspaper column instead of this propaganda But my point is this- Ill attempt to do whats right Sometimes that will be what my party also wants and sometimes it wont I didnt get into this as a career Instead I did it to try and Influence the decisionmakers The old ways of overtaxing so government can overspend must end The days of caving in to special interest groups must be over The constant threat to our environment must be ad- To help achieve that Ill walk lots of edges Happy new year happy new decade Fashions For The Young At Heart 115 MAIN ST GEORGETOWN from Knox Church 8732651 OPEN DAYS 8732151 Sal pm Sun 11 am pm CALL TODAY FOR A FREE NO OBLIGATION CONSULTATION 8731900 290 GUELPH ST GEORGETOWN In The Georgetown Market Place Special offer consists of 3 weeks of NutrffSystem services Does not include cost of exclusive food diaries and maintenance program Offer valid at participating yyyAyyyyA centres