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Ian Oliver Publisher Robert Glasbey Advertising Director Norman Alexander Editor Geoff Hill Circulation Director Teri Casas Office Manager Tim Coles Production Manager The bill, which the NDP majority government passed Wednesday night, conâ€" tained a battery of policies that on first glance appeared to show taxpayers Queen‘s Park was serious about dealing with government spending. One section dealing with unpaid leave sets the tone for the bill. It would allow essential service workers, such as firefighters, to be paid for up to 36 days of unpaid leave when the social contract legislation expires in 1996. illâ€"founded. And no more shining example of this reality can be found than the action of our elected politicians in dealing with the controversial social contract legislation, otherwise known as Bill 48. â€" But it quickly became obvious that this wasn‘t the case. In fact, just the oppoâ€" site was true. So while putting forth a tough exterior of economic reform, the bill merely delays the pay day until later...and what a pay day! There‘s no doubt that the NDP had the right idea as far as a social contract is concerned but it fumbled the ball badly on this one and attempts to try and modify the plan fell on the deaf ears of both the government and opposition Liberals. There are many nice things about being in town during the summer includâ€" ing the two harbors and Bronte Creek Provincial Park. The trouble with this twisted kind of political action is that another governâ€" ment will have to deal with the problem and mop up after this inept group of politicians masquerading as a government. The bill is so bad that even union types, the traditional backbone of the NDP, are up in arms over the deal. In putting forth 29 amendments, the Progressive Conservatives tried to mainâ€" tain the legislation while eliminating some of the policies that would adversely affect workers and taxpayers. All amendments were voted down by the Grits and the NDP. This bill presented a golden opportunity for both the Liberals and the Conservatives to act together to try and make positive changes to the bill. But this would have been too much to hope for. Instead, we have Oakville South MPP Gary Carr slamming the Liberals for killing his party‘s amendments and we have Halton Centre Liberal MPP Barbara Sullivan condemning the bill because it defers millions of dollars to 1996. Of course each party has its own agenda and that‘s unfortunate because if the overâ€"taxed and tired Ontario taxpayer wants to see something, it‘s an end to the bickering and fingerâ€"pointing among opposition parties. What taxpayers want to see is some kind of concerted effort on the part of opposition politicians to work together to try and reelâ€"in a government that has no concept of how to deal with the province‘s economic woes. That‘s true but where was any kind of cooperation with the Tories to try and put forth agreedâ€"upon changes to the bill? For the opposition is the only voice the average Ontarian now has at Queen‘s Park, the NDP having lost any semblance of its former image as a party of the people. Both the Liberals and the Conservatives in playing the same old games, have lost more respect of taxpayers and voters. Little wonder that all Ontarians are disâ€" illusioned with the political system and those who purport to represent the averâ€" age person. What‘s the best thing about summer in Oakville? ONE E Playing politics hen the 1990s dawned, there was some room for optimism when it came to the way in which politicians conducted themselves. But as we enter the second half of 1993, we see that any previous optimism was 467 Speers Road, Oakville, Ont. L6K 3S4 845â€"3824 Fax: 845â€"3085 Classified Advertising: 845â€"2809 Circulation: 845â€"9742 or 845â€"9743 Distributing Lid. of suburban newspapers which includes: -Pum’ News Advertiser, Advance, Brampton Guardian, Bufifi;bn Collingwood Connection, Etobicoke Guardian, GOORGW Independent! AcnnFmePress.nwnnisWeek.memhww.Mmmm Economist and Sun, Stoufville/Uxbridge Tribune, Canadian . News, Newmarketâ€"Aurora Eraâ€"Banner, North York Mirror, Beaver, Orilia Today, Oshawa/Whitby This Week, Peterborough This Week, mfl oo m‘hal Liboral, Scub:nugh Mirror. iC A mmmm“hwdmmtwwmm ho The Oakville Beaver, published every Sunday, Wednesday and Friday, at 467 QUESTION OF THE WEEK Give us your opinion on this topic by calling 845â€"5585, box 5012. All callers are allowed 45 seconds to respond and must provide their name, address and phone number for verificaâ€" tion. A sampling of the best answers will be published in the next Weekend edition of the Oakville Beaver. J. Johnson The other day for instance, I read in my newspaper that Japanese boffins are working on a project to put a nuclear power station on the moon. I have only one response to these Brave New technological breakthroughs: Are we nuts? â€" Has mankind, long the looniâ€" est of earthly critters, finally come completely unhinged? Chernobyl and Three Mile Island weren‘t big enough toxic playgrounds? Now we have to go galactic with our meltâ€" downs? e <live in perilous times. Nowadays, the simple act of reading your newspaper can be dangerâ€" ous to your health. The sameâ€"edition of the newspaper informs me that Russian scientists have already managed to launch a mirror into space that can be used to reflect the suns rays to "turn night into day" here on earth. Truth to tell, I‘m not really worried about the Japanese plan yet. It‘s still at the blue sky stage (ironic cliche, that). The Japanese _ _Science and Technology Agency is merely setting up a five year project to study the feasibility of their interplanetary reactor brainâ€" wave. A lot of things can hapâ€" pen in five years. Including common sense. Because they‘ve already done it. One night last month No, it‘s the Russian mirrorâ€" inâ€"space initiative that really gets my goat. Mucking around with nature not worth the consequences while you and I slept snug in our beds, an unmanned Russian spacecraft winging around earth deployed a very thin plastic mirror about 65 feet wide. The mirror was angled to pick up the sun‘s rays and deflect them down to the darkened European continent below. , Not a whole lot of it, and not for very long. It was more like a twoâ€"mileâ€"wide flashlight beam that skipped across France, Germany, Austria and what used to be Yugoslavia for a grand total of about six minutes. Still, it was an historical occasion, and it must have been something to see from the ground. An insomniac in Lyons described the flashing strobe that emanated from the satellite as looking like "luminous diaâ€" monds following one another across the sky." And it apparâ€" ently lit up the earth like a pho- tographer‘s flash. The theory behind the space mirror rests on the same guiding principle that drives our It worked. That night across Europe, something happened that has never occurred in the history of the planet. There was sunlight in the middle of the night. Nevertheless, I repeat my earlier question: are we nuts? And some day I imagine we‘ll have the planet wired up just like a corner convenience store â€" floodlit, open 24 hours. Oh yes, and it would save electricity too. By turning dawn and dusk into more hours of daylight, billions of dollars in electric lighting would be saved. But we will fool with it. We‘re human and we can conâ€" veniently label it ‘progress.‘ That guarantees that we wille fool with it. approach to all things agriculâ€" tural â€" namely, how can we milk a little more juice out of this sucker? We pump our cattle full of steroids to fatten em up; we pump our wheat fields full of fertilizer and pesticides to accomplish the same thing. The space mirror, once perâ€" fected, will mean we can put our farmlands on unpaid overâ€" time â€" extend harvest and plantâ€" ing periods, resulting in bigger, more frequent harvests. So by extending daylight we would save on electric light. Which was created to extend daylight. Truth is, we don‘t know what we‘re meddling with. The earth and all the creatures on it have marched to an unseen biological thythm since life began. Fool with the cadence of life itself and knows what Frankensteinian consequences you unleash? Personally, I prefer going out in the inkâ€"black night to look for the Big Dipper.