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I Campaign to raid public purse Home Newspaper of Halton Hills Established A Division of Canadian Newspapers Company Limited Street Georgetown Ontario DAVID A BEATTIE Publisher and General Manager DAN TAYLOR Advertising Manager RrKblrnd Ml BRIAN Editor Phone 8772201 Pages THE HERALD Wednesday April 1989 Crying foul Halton councillors are crying foul over the Ministry of Environments decision to tell the Region to close down Miltons hazardous waste disposal site or face fines The has decided that hazardous wastes arent be ing handled properly on the site Labelled by Milton Councillor Bill Johnson as the big bad ministry the looks to us like the good guy in this case What the ministry has done is examine the site found problems then issued a notice saying fix them or be fined So why the big bad MOE In fact several Regional councillors seem to feel slighted by the ministry for simply doing its job If a site specially designed for handling hazardous waste isnt working how can we expect tjie private sector to put the effort into properly disposing hazardous waste If a large corporation had been found improperly ing hazardous waste and the MOE issued such an order wed all be pointing fingers at that business for polluting the environment The Milton depot which handles waste from all of North Halton including Hrils must follow the strict guidelines of hazardous waste disposal even better than private companies in order to set a good example Johnson said the is attempting to embarrass by issuing such an order If Halton is embarrassed it has only Halton to blame Region is a leader in the recycling held and its foi to divert hazardous waste such as paints turpentines and bleach bottles away from landfill sites are- admirable But Halton as a leader must follow the rules and guidelines of hazardous waste disposal or the whole effort is put to waste Instead of creating such a hue and cry about the big bad ministry councillors should be saying okay weve got a problem lets fix it No doubt Halton will open the depot again but in politics unfortunately we must always listen to a round of deflec ting blame before the tough get going Queens Park Derek Nelson Thornton Strvtci A wellorchestrated campaign to raid the public purse on behalf of welfare recipients and social workers is under way here It began several months ago and has gradually escalated over tune with the climax expected to be a mass rally in front of Queen Park April 8 The effort is impressive the cause terrible The campaign supposedly aims at getting the provincial govern to implement what is known as the Thomson or SARC report This report from the Social Assistance Review Committee chaired by former ly Court Judge George Thomson took two years of effort and million to produce Although badly organized poor ly thoughtout and indifferently written the report draws from professional welfare ac It calls for a neardoubling to 4 billion from last year 3 billion of the money spent on welfare The total Ontario budget is billion The SARC report was labeled Transitions and the theory behind it Is that lots more money and more social workers will help people help themselves out of the welfare system entirely But that then end the need for social workers Not according to which believes that the new program will be a much better one for those who work in it and that the overall result will be additional skilled personnel providing income sup port and opportunity planning to people in need It centres on opportunity ing with a kind of permanent social worker advocate to help welfare recipients to use the system No wonder ISO student social workers turned up here this week to demonstrate There are good for them in a future with more dollars In their own in imitable words poverty sucks so get the bucks They too are part of the cam paign to get the first million in new cash pumped into the Com munlty and Social Services budget in Treasurer Robert Nixon May provincial budget So also is a march on poverty that is making its way from Ot Windsor and Sudbury star ting points PRESSURE And the usual other pressures are being applied ranging from sympathetic newspaper articles about the poor to political dorsements including a surpris ing announcement of support for SARC from multimillionaire businessman Conrad Black who usually shows more sense in what he says What makes a lot of the ad vocates of Big Spending optimistic is that Premier David Peterson and Community and Social Ser vices Minister John Sweeney have already accepted Thomson s con elusions They haven t quarrelled with a single one of the report recom mendations or observations even though it contains plenty to criticize It appears the Liberals reacting to the united front the welfare establishment has put up in sup port of Thomson s document believe that it is easier to mouth supportive platitudes than ask an hard questions about the SARC schemes In fact the only negative com ments so far have come from Nix on and Peterson and these are always couched in terms of perhaps not being able to afford to implement SARC Actually the assumption or pipedream is that the federal government will kick in half the new funds But killing SARC by starving it of cash would be a copout There are really two tal questions that need to be asked Only one of them is whether we can afford it More important is whether we should afford it And a dose look at the commit tee confused bureaucratic legalistic and expensive solu lions to welfare reform leads to the obvious conclusion that the report should simply be junked THIS WELCOME YOU A ICN5AWHAPPY LETTERS- Going public MP s should rescind Editors Notebook Brian MacLeod Editor Councillor Marilyn Serjeantson is right There must be a better process for public meetings conducted at town council Coun cillors argued last week about the public meeting process and whether councillors should be allowed to participate They decided to keep a hands off approach to public meetings which while noble often leads to awkward situations at council meetings Currently the general commit tee chairperson reads a form call for an explanation of a proposal by town planners and the appli cant Then comment from the public asking for clarification are allowed followed by comments in favor or opposed to the application But the ensuing discussion and question and answer period often begs for questions or at least clarification That where the awkward come In Often members of the public are just left glaring at silent councillors awaiting some sort of direction on issues There were good points made in the debate about public meetings Like the fact that councillors could start grandstanding during such debates in front of the public However if each councillor were allowed one or two clarification questions to the public or town staff during debates it would leave a better taste in the public s mouth after important meetings If you live in an apartment in Hills you may start blue bagging it fairly soon The blue bags are answer to the blue box recycling program now in place throughout the Region Join in the program You help own tax dollars EDITORS NOTE The following letter to Peel MP Garth Turner was filed with the Herald for publication Dear Mr Turner The Hon Michael Wilson has recently informed us we must ac cept cuts in social programs and higher taxes when he brings down his budget later this month It would make some sense and show good faith on the part of the Honorable Members of Canada s Parliament if the recent increase in salary to themselves was rescinded After all you yourself said the country should be run on a business basis and when a business has a deficit management does not vote themselves a raise even for cost of living Increases However this is just what Parliament has done and now ask John Public to take cuts and pay more taxes Do you remember when you were with the Toronto Sun and led the protests to Parliament Hill when the Conservative govern ment tried to deindex the Old Age Pension and again when you thought the government was over taxing us Things are no different now Most pensioners today have come through the depression in the 1930s and were unable to save for their retirement or even have com pensions to augment the old age pension Many are living- on in comes below the poverty level and are even taxed on that As for your suggestion of deficit bonds most pensioners are unable to manage on their pensions and are using their savings if they have any to get by so how could they afford to lend the Government their money that they need to live on When people see the Govern ment assume some fiscal respon sibility by cutting back on their own perks and we have less feeding at the trouth then perhaps we might save this great country for future generations Put the country on a business basis When a company is facing bankruptcy it cuts back at all levels not just the bottom half You don see the top brass raises and the working takes Another idea would be for all Members of Parliament to become a year men for one year with on increase ly minimal expenses paid But that is hoping for too much If the government wants the people to willingly bite the bullet let Parlia ment set an example by cutting out their own extravagances Instead of cutting back on the middle and lower class let the wealthy pay their share by taxing 50 per cent tax on taxable income over instead of per cent We pensioners have had to cut back in many ways to be able to ford a few luxuries so why shouldnt our Honorable Members of Parliament c back too Put into force an austerity program un til the deficit is paid off All the ex teas like travelling and entertain on expense accounts No more free passes or supposedly factfin ding trips to exotic places when it is wintertime in Canada Also a moratorium should be put into place on all loans and gifts to other countries until such time as we have taken care of our own poor and homeless and our country fa back on the black side of the ledger Sincerely Florence Bell