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BEST AVAILABLE COPY Home Newspaper of Halton Hills Established A Division of Canadian Newspapers Company Limited Guelph Street Georgetown Ontario K ROBERT MALCOLMSON Publisher and General Manager COLIN GIBSON Managing Editor Phone DAN TAYLOR Advertising Manager ROB RISK Sports Editor Page THE HERALD Wednesday July IMP Gambling encouraged A press release was received last week outlining the On tario governments newest plunge into the lottery pool Tickets for Cleansweep went on sale to the public Mon day and supposedly the money raised is to be used to ad dress environmental concerns It is to laugh it is to cry It is to become increasingly agitated over government and bureaucratic assumptions on the gullibility of the public As with all lotteries Cleansweep simply represents another tax albeit hidden on the poor Your average uppermiddle and higher income earner only buys lottery tickets as an afterthought If a draw is missed so what No big deal Those hovering just below or just above the poverty line on the other hand view lotteries as an opportunity to start a new life and all too often spend money they can ill afford on the dream the chance of a lifetime A ticket for Cleansweep costs and there will be a minimum weekly jackpot of 225000 Approximately 40 cents from every dollar spent on the tickets will go the en vironment ministry Bafflegab or what Isnt the environment ministry already supposed to be using tax dollars to counter pollution problems Where does the balance of the money raised by the tickets go The profits from were supposed to go to the On tario health system so why is it in such dire straits Similarly Provincial Treasurer Robert Nixon collected 40 million in taxes to recycle tires and little has been done as yet to battle this environmental concern Environmental problems should be addressed by the On tario government without the need to resort to gimmicks like Cleansweep If the tickets fail to sell does that mean the Ontario government can wash its hands of environmental concerns and blame a seemingly noncaring public Basically put Cleansweep represents governmental en couragement to gamble For the most part those who buy the tickets will have little thought on how they are helping the environment In many instances they will also be tak ing much needed food off the table in order to play the game A sad commentary on supposedly responsible govern ment Hats off to Frank If actions do indeed speak louder than words then Frank Bruno is well on his way to finally lay in to rest the apocryphal words at tributed to venerated baseball legend Leo The Lip who is rep to have said Nice finish last Bruno if you will recall is the man who plays and has iciated in the Georgetowns Mens Flag Football League A promising athlete who tarred in sports al the Canadian College level Bruno suf fered a nearfatal head injury in an accident six years ago hat left him able to function it 70 per Although he with his Georgetown his adopted hometown and he was playing in he Georgetown Mens Flag Foot- League at the time of the in- accident In fact at the time he was leading the league in scoring and his soaring punts and punt and returners hither and yon to orbiting orb He embarked on a program and his progress the previous doom and His athletic feats at the National am staged in Richmond earned him a Canadian team which this past week Games foe the Colin Gibson ed in Holland He set two world records while winning gold medals in the 200 and metres and also won a gold medal in the metre event He also has won two silver medals in the long jump and the shot put Throughout his neartragedy and his triumphs Frank has remained the same unassuming and affable young man that I knew pnor to his injury The World Games for the Disabl ed end this Friday and no doubt Frank will be in attendance this Sunday when his flag football aiii the challenge Karry Kitchens in an a scheduled gameatGDHS No doubt Frank will once more reply Oh alright I guess in response to queries about his per formance on the World stage He deserves more The mantle of world athletic glory fittinp suits him perfectly TONIGHTS CHOICES CHANNEL JNECONOmiST DISCUSSES THE DIRECTION OF THE CANADIAN EXPLAIN WHY THE WDNT WHAT TREY PREDICTED WOULD CHANNEL FINANCE PREDICTING TOTAL DISASTER DOLLAR CHANNailM MINISTER TAKES CREDIT INTO WHY NONE CLOWNS HAVE RIM YEARS Worrisome numbers pointing to recession possibilities OTTAWA Canada may not of ficially be in recession yet but there are some pretty worrisome numbers floating around out there One of the latest batches is the business and personal bankruptcy figures released by the Consumer and Corporate Affairs Department earlier this week They showed a jump in the first six months of 1990 over the same last year If that pace of financial failures con tinues the final toll will be worse than the nightmare recession of 198182 In the period bankruptcies were declared according to the depart ments figures Much of the blame for this col lapse is being placed at the door of the governments high-mterest- policy which now is starting to shut down consumer and business spending In turn this puts the squeeze on corporate pro fits Obviously one way a vulnerable company or individual suffers is by having to pay larger interest charges on loans be they for in vestment mortgages or purchases of necessary equipment But federal policy is also pushing the Canadian dollar ever higher relative to its counterpart and thai is causing severe problems for exporters A strong dollar makes our products more expensive to foreign buyers US RATES FALL It could get worse Although Canadian rates have eased somewhat in the last few weeks are no tumbling as quickly as in the where the central bank has been careful not to force the economy into a recession Even a giant like Canadian Pacific Forest Products Ltd has been feeling the pinch The strong Canadian dollar said a vice- president this week is absolutely kilting us Pity then the poor smaller manufacturing firm struggling to compete for foreign business The bankruptcy figures show that businesses collapsed in the first six months of 1990 Thats a hike over the same period last year Retail trade construction and accommodation food and beverage firms are among the bankruptcy leaders To a degree thats expected Smalt retailers especially so- called momandpop corner stores companies building homes and doing renovations and restaurants all have comparative ly high startup and failure rates regardless of general economic circumstances But even in tough times they display enormous resiliency When the economy was slowing down in Vic Parsons 1989 the Canadian Federation of Independent Business estimates there was still a net growth of 28000 firms DECLINING SECTOR What may be more telling about the state of our economy however is the decline of the manufacturing sector Broadly speaking these are larger enterprises that require bigger cash investments in plants and equipment Staff are to be more highly trained and paid These are businesses which are expected to last for some time But what do the statistics tell us Jobs in manufacturing have been tumbling for some time Although the jobless rate has hung in at an unexpectedly chipper 75 per cent manufacturing jobs have dropped by 150000 from a year ago The bankruptcy numbers are gloomy too In Ontario for exam ple 120 manufacturing companies with debts totalling million bit the dust in the first half of- the year In Quebec another manufac turers collapsed Numbers for other provinces were British Col umbia 44 Alberta 26 Manitoba 17 Saskatchewan and Nova Scotia eight and New Brunswick seven Newfoundland and Prince Edward Island had no manufactur ing failures Theres no intention here to belit tle industries other than manufac turing Every failure means the loss of jobs the end of perhaps years of hard work and crumbled dreams But manufacturing bankruptcies generally affect more people involve greater sums of money and could mean the loss forever of business opportunities Canadian journalists show ugly traits TORONTO One of Canadian journalisms less charming traits is a tendency to feel superior Americans This is quite often manifest a belief that while Canadians know all about the United States Americans are ignorant of Canada It is a caricature of reality of course Informed Americans know a great deal about Canada just as informed Canadians are very aware of their nextdoor neighbor During a recent twoweek visit to the United States for example watched stories and analysis of and about Canada pop up almost daily in a wide variety of US media This included the replaying of the coverage of the July 1 Canada Day celebrations it was strange to hear Peter and Wendys familiar voices 1000 miles from home on the CSpan cable net work which is available across the entire US Such direct Canadian coverage is apparently a weekly feature Most interesting of all however was to see intelligent commentary on Canadian political matters ap pearing in the most unexpected places such as the S Deep South Historically Americans have tended to dismiss the entire coun try as did Henry David Thoreau who said- I fear that I have not Derek Nelson Queens Park got much to say about Canada not having seen much what I got by going to Canada was a cold The death of the Mecch Lake ac cord and what it might mean was not only in big city newspapers like the Atlanta Con stitution but in smaller cousins like the Star Anniston Ala is a city of 30000 people where Canada is hardly a household word yet editor and publisher Brandt had no pro blem devoting his entire editorial comment column to explaining what was happening here Whether one agrees with Ayers or not it would be nice if Cana dians looking at events show ed as much originality and fairness in their an sis a he does in his