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PAGE A4 THE CANADIAN STATESMAN, NOVEMBER 20,2002 Tim Whittaker Publisher Joanne Burghardt Editor-in-Chief Chris Bovie Managing Editor Judi Bobbitt Regional Editor Fred Eismont Director of Advertising Eddie Kolodziejcak Classified Advertising Manager Kirk Bailey-Distribution Manager Lillian Hook Office Manager Barb Harrison Composing Manager Clarington's Award-Winning Newspaper Since 1854 Œfje Canadian Statesman ■ Nov. 20,2002 Metroland Printing, Publishing & Distributing Ltd. www.durhamregion.com ' Phone 905-579-4400 Classifieds 905-576-9335 Distribution 905-579-4407 General Fax 905-579-2238 Newsroom Fax 905-579-1809 E-Mail newsroom@durhamregion.com 865 Farewell St., Osliawa ON L1H 7L5 Publications Mail Registration No. 07637 inf odurhamregioei.com EDITORIAL e-mail letters to ncw.sronm@durliiimregion.coni Battle to stop teen smoking before it starts is ongoing T obacco advertising, once prevalent in all forms of media, has now found its way into product product placement on TV shows and in movies. That was part of the message message delivered to Grade 7 and 8 Northumberland and Durham Region students during during the sixth annual Teens Tackling Tobacco event at the Durham District School Board Education Centre. As part of a presentation on tobacco advertising, which has essentially been legislated out of existence by federal law over the past few decades, Durham public health nurse Mary Sue O'Connor pointed to the movies as one culprit. Ms. O'Connor said the family movie MOI Dalmatiens' Dalmatiens' has 299 images of tobacco tobacco in a film geared primarily primarily to lhree-to-six-year-olds. The need to find ways to reach under-20s is critical .for tobacco tobacco companies as very few people people apparently take up the habit once they pass age 20. Durham Region Health Department Department statistics from October October 2000 show the number of Combined with television anti-smoking ads which show the damage smoking has wrought on individuals and families, young people need the knowledge to protect themselves. "I know it's bad for me...I don't want to die from smoking," smoking," said Alicia Guzzo, an Ajax Grade 7 student. Grade 8 Whitby pupil Jessica Forrest added, "I won't smoke." And Daniella Peligra, a Grade 8 Pickering student said, "I'm so excited because when I go back (to my school) I can tell my friends, teachers and the rest of the school (what 1 learned)." The goal of preventing a potentially fatal habit from taking root is entirely laudable and deserves our support. It all comes down, as it does so often, to education. Teens, particularly, enjoy it when they are provided with information information so they themselves can make intelligent choices. They're not being told they can't smoke, though it is illegal illegal to sell cigarettes to anyone under 19, they're just being informed of the ways in which teens who smoke Jbetweenvthe ages of 12-19 is ' static, at about 18 per cent since 1990. The tobacco companies have to keep or grow this market share to continue ■ making a profit. It's this prime target group to which tobacco companies companies market. The only way to battle this insidious product placement advertising is to be self-aware. tj]e tobacco industry tries .to '"book them tcfaflifelong, un-: healthy, habit. Armed with enough information information and self-awareness teens can make intelligent choices about tobacco use. The answer is to provide continuing continuing education and apply pressure to the entertainment industry to stop glamourizing cigarettes in productions. LETTERS TO THE EDITOR e-mail letters to iicwsroom@(lurhamregion.eom Regional headquarters bad for taxpayers To the editor: Re: The proposed new regional regional headquarters. 1 can only assume Durham taxpayers will not sit back without without fighting this extravaganza Durham Regional council will make a reality. For their own legacy - where have we heard that before - they are "proposing" "proposing" to build a $70-million headquarters at taxpayers' burden. burden. I use the word "proposing" loosely because when you live on someone else's credit card, money is no object. This "proposal" is quite similar similar to the Durham Board of Education Education before it built its own "castle on the hill" at a cost that more than doubled from what the management convinced the trustees it would cost. As a trustee, at the time, I was strongly opposed to such an outlandish expense as I am now with this council ego building. We, the taxpayers, cannot afford afford this luxury coupled with Regional council raising its pay twice in 2001. , . This free-wheeling council should realize a day of reckoning reckoning is in the forseeable future and some of them might fall off their pedestal and have to go back to work; Council should wake up as to who elected them and who can defeat them. Lloyd Clarke Oshawa OPINION OPINION e-mail letters to ncwsroom@durliamrcKion.com Hydro debt will continue to grow e-mail letters to ticwsroom@(liirliamrcgion,com Bike helmets may be back on the road for adults N ow that the government government is subsidizing our hydro rates again, I guess we can enjoy another Griswold family Christmas at the Mclnnes homestead without without going broke from the hydro bill. The good news is those of us who enjoy a Christmas light show can afford this little luxury now that the provincial government has done a major backstop on its plan to make us pay the real price of hydro in an open market. With rates frozen for another four years, we will be able to keep tradition tradition alive. The bad news is, as 1 string my bulbs this year, 1 will know those less fortunate, fortunate, whose Christmas doesn't include such perks, will be helping to pay for my extravagance extravagance in their tax bill sooner or later. The government first froze hydro rates eight years ago to help kick- start the sputtering economy. In reality, since then every taxpayer has been helping pay the difference between the 1994 rate of electricity and the real cost of the commodity on their neighbour's hydro hill, even if their neighbour happens happens to be a major corporation and heavy user of electricity. We just weren't conscious of it until now, In the meantime our debt has continued to grow. It's an estimated $38-hil- lion whopper that grew over decades of mismanagement of Jacquie Mclnnes Staff Writer the public utility. Our own Darlington nuclear plant, which God bless it, is a boon to the economy here and to the municipal coffers, ran millions millions of dollars over budget in the making. Like so many other investments and decisions decisions made at the former Ontario Ontario Hydro the over-runs made the idea of privatization seem logical. Surely the private private sector could operate the industry more effectively than the system that ran itself into the ground. Clearly something went wrong between best-laid plans and execution as last week's flip flop will attest. With Ernie Evcs's latest latest announcement, the pain's not in our hydro bill now so it will be in our taxes later. But this way the onus for the bill is not on the one eating the meal. Like subsidized health care, transit and many other services, in Ontario we all contribute whether we use them or not. Is that a bad thing? It depends depends which side of the fork you are on. Arguably what is good for business is good for the economy and that's ultimately ultimately good for all of us. But trying to gel this debt under control will be like trying trying to pay off your Visa with a reasonable payment plan while your spouse is on a shopping spree. Between the proposed rebates to consumers and the tax incentives to encourage encourage the private sector to build new generating stations, we are a long way from culling culling up our,credit card, O ntario's Progressive Conservatives are reluctant reluctant to get between a man and his car - or even his bike. Former premier Mike Harris, Harris, as one of many examples of Tories being soft on motorists, abolished photo radar the moment he stepped into office. His bizarre excuse was it violated their freedoms and was Big Brother watching them. The Tories under Mr. Harris and his successor, Premier Ernie Eves, have kept the brakes on installing installing cameras at busy intersections, which catches motorists motorists driving through red lights, so they still arc used only in scattered pilot projects. The Tories, according to one suspicion, would not want someone who may vole for them snapped driving in the wrong part of town with someone someone else's wife. An earlier Tory premier, William Davis, said in the 1970s lie would make fastening seatbelts compulsory after tests elsewhere showed they save lives, hut hurriedly reversed when car owners insisted they had a right to choose. Mr. Davis made buckling tip compulsory only alter he lost his majority and the opposition parlies forced him to. One more example was when the Tories, in opposition under Mr. Harris in the early 1990s, pushed to force all ey-, clisls to wear helmets to reduce head injuries, the most devas tating form of injury for cyclists. cyclists. But when the Tories became government, they back-pedalled back-pedalled and compelled only those under 18 to wear them and exempted exempted older cyclists who can vote. This issue is now being reopened, because because research by a hospital and university has shown that since it became mandatory for young cyclists to wear helmets, head injuries among them have been reduced by 45 per cent. The Ontario ministry of transportation has found in the last year for which statistics arc available nine cyclists were killed in Ontario and none was under 18. This should nudge the Tories to reappraise the idea of having all cyclists wear helmets, which they once championed, Tory MPP Dianne Cunningham, Cunningham, who ran for leader against Mr. Harris and now is a minister, minister, began introducing private member's bills to force all cyclists cyclists to wear helmets in 1991, when the New Democrats were in government, after a son suffered suffered severe head injuries while cycling. Those who supported her included included parents who said their children would have lived if they had worn helmets. She was also hacked by doctors drawing on , their personal knowledge of eyclisl injuries and deaths hut without much statistical evidence of how helmets helmets prevent them. Opponents retorted helmets are big, ugly and uncomfortable, uncomfortable, cyclists love to feel the wind in their hair and wearing helmets would give cyclists a false sense of security, so they would take more risks. Others scoffed it would be just as logical to force cyclists to wear full body armour or pedestrians to wear helmets, because they might slip on ice. There were arguments police do not have the resources to catch all who cycle without helmets, helmets, people were tired of special special interest groups dictating to them and, yes, this would be another case of individuals losing losing a right to control their own destinies. Ms. Cunningham's legislation legislation nevertheless was approved in a rare non-partisan vote and a dale set for it to come into effect, effect, but meanwhile Mr, Harris defeated the NDP and became premier. Mr. Harris first said he would implement the law as planned, because it was the will of the people, but then caved in and said it would apply only to under-18s. More than half adult cyclists still do not wear helmets, according according ■ to a recent survey, claiming they are uncomfortable uncomfortable or make them look geeky. Premier lives now has valid reasons to force them to wear helmets. The issue never went away. The Liberals have their own hill that would require all cyclists to wear helmets wailing to he debated, debated, Their scrappy chief whip, Rick Bnrtolucci, says they will force a vote on it. Hither way the move to compel compel adult cyclists to wear helmets helmets seems back on the road. Eric Dowd Queen's Park CLICK AND SA Today's question: % Do you support the current campaign against a proposed new regional headquarters for Durham? □ Yes □ No Cast your vote online at infodurhammgie^.com * Last week's question: Is the Province's hydro rebate and capping of costs the right answer to controlling higher prices? □ No 55.9% □ Yes 44.1% Votes cast: 68 HAVE YOUR SAY Question When are you starting your Christmas shopping? Adam Amsley Alex MacMillan Chantal Ayotte "(I started) the 15th of' November." Elic Cmmtiimi Statesman is one of the Metroland Printing, Publishing and Distributing group of newspapers. The Statesman is a member of the Bowmanville Clarington Board of Trade, the Greater Oshawa Chamber of Commerce, Ontario Ontario Community Newspaper Assoc., Canadian Community Newspaper Assoc., Canadian Circulations Audit Board and the Ontario Press Council. The publisher reserves the right to classify or refuse any advertisement. 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