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THE HERALD Wednesday August Page Solutions to problems not always wellreceived Being an MP is like having two jobs Here in the it s a mat of solving problems for people meeting community groups representing federal policies and listening to local opinion fn Ottawa its making laws voting debating battling bureaucrats and trying to in fluence the political gods who set policies Some days you win Some you crash and burn Let me give you a small example AMO delegates face challenges Delegates to Ontario s largest municipal gathering the annual conference of the Association of Municipalities of Ontario will be debating a vanety of topics including deposits on pop cans storage of used tires and the countability of municipal police forces AMO president Grant Hopcroft of London said Municipalities have the responsibility and the power to implement many of the changes that large numbers of peo ple want to see in waste manage ment in protection of the environ and in dealing with our transportation problems As the public focus increasingly moves to these issues you will see municipal governments take tre stage Our association with over individual local governments as members exists to unite municipalities In the coming decade we in municipal govern have a tremendous op to get past the financial crises that have been holding us back and become masters our own house can be a powerful voice on behalf of municipalities as people across Ontano start to realize what it really means to act locally as well as think globally Acting locally often means acting through local government The AMO annual conference held at the Royal York Hotel on Aug will have about 1 delegates from across the pro vince elected representatives of per cent of the Ontario population Several prominent provincial politicians including John Sweeney Minister of Housing and Municipal Affairs and Gerry Phillips Minister of Labour will address the conference Other issues to be discussed at the AMO conference are employ equity revision of al ser vices and handicapped pirking Lung Association to introduce new program It is a fact that approximately one million Canadnns or per cent of the population has asthma The Lung Assocntion Halton Region is taking action now through its new Air Force Asthma Program for children to 12 years of As members the Air Force children will investigate asthma they find the clues or warning signals of t asthma in the program become detectives and gain a better understanding of what happens during an at tack Children who attend the Air Asthma Program will be able to manage their own asthma mort effectively Parents also participate by at tendtog short lectures demonstra tions and group discussions Guest speakers add their knowledge to the program as well The four sessions which com pnsc the program will be held at the Health Centre in Georgetown from 7 on the following dates September 26th October October 10th and October 17th To register or for more information call The Lung Association 632 PHOTO REPRINTS appearing in The Herald 8772201 of what can happen in Ottawa to an idea It struck me some months ago that if we re ever to cure our debt woes without raising taxes more the level of government services must be cut back And one way of doing that would be to attract more volunteers In fact if we could get more peo ple to donate their time and talents to the fire department the am bulance brigade youth training seniors care home nursing teaching assistants society could really come out winning Volunteers are amazing people I ve seen them at work driving the ambulances in Bolton putting out fires in Halton Hills leading the cadets in Acton and working for all the candidates on election cam paigns But in Canada there is no special encouragement for being a volunteer Under American law if you suf fer out of pocket expenses being a volunteer it could be bus fare or parking or whatever you can claim that as a tax deduction The idea behind this is that people who serve in unpaid public service should not be penalized financially Peel PROGRESSIVE CONSERVATIVE A good idea I thought it might be and so I set the wheels in motion to see how Canada might follow suit A few days ago the research report I asked for from the Economics Division of the Library of Parliament arnved In drawing the information together research had been done into current S law Canadian practice now lion from volunteer organizations and how the Department of Finance felt about my idea The arguments were carefully laid out On one hand giving tax deduc tions to volunteers rewards unpaid work that benefit society It might also increase the number of volunteers It might even allow these volunteers to start perform work which taxpayers now foot through full time government workers It would also send out a signal to that the govern ment was willing to encourage peo ple to be nice to each other Then there was the other hand My report tells me that all of the above runs counter to a basic premise in the tax system name ly that tax deductions are normally provided only to cover expenses borne to earn income So if volunteers could claim deductions then It could come to be used as a form of tax avoidance Higher income spouses for exam pie could even use it as a form of incomesplitting Hmmm Things were getting more complicated But the worst was yet to come Now the boys at the Finance Department had their go at the idea Finance came back and said allowing tax deductions for volunteers would impose ad mimstrative burdens on everyone They would cost the feds a lot of money because nobody seems to believe more volunteers could substitute for some government services They w impose a new meaning to the word volunteer They me there s no demonstrated need for more volunteers than we have now Thej told me the scheme would create pressure for a refundable tax credit and would lead to higher income people benefitting most And they said it would be lmpossi ble for tax purposes to define ex what a volunteer was In short they were not impress ed And it reminded me of the hassles I got in Ottawa last year when I tried to drum up interest in a replacement for Canada Savings bonds which would be used ex clusively to refinance national debt If people bought bonds which they knew would go for the pur pose I thought then they would No politicians would be able to get their hands on that cash and spend it But that t fly either Well I shall not give up We need new ideas new solutions and new ways to look at the old problems If you have any thoughts on any of this I d enjoy hearing them Losing 42 lbs with NutriSystem improved my looks And my health When I was heavy it took all my energy just to walk to the mailbox Then I went to Nutn System They were really concerned about my well being The counselors taught me good eating habits and took really good care of me Now that I m busy doing aerobics playing softball and swimming I feel like a new 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