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Soon A YE ANE Y EOL PSS NSE RE NGI LI FREER RVI ETM 4 -- PORT PERRY STAR -- Wed. May 25, 1983 editorial co hatterbox by John B. McClelland AN HONEST MAN Now that the Stanley Cup final is history for this year, what hockey fans may remember is not the fourth straight victory for the New Yorkers, or the collapse of the Edmontonians (although both are significant to a degree). But what I will remember for quite some time was the brutally honest statement made after the final game by goalie Billy Smith. Sure, I took and dive and made like I was dying of -pain, said Billy. in a post-game interview with NHL -- president John Ziegler standing beside him. Billy was referring to a tap on the side of the head he took from Glen Anderson's stick. It came late in the game with the Isles nursing a one goal lead. Billy real- ly did look like he was dying and Anderson got a five minute major penalty for the infraction. As it turned out, the penalty did not register on the outcome of the game, and certainly not the series. But Billy told it like it was. If the Great One can take a dive when he gets a tap with a stick (and draw a ma- jor penalty) then two can play this game. It was an honest statement, but it needed to be said. Good for Billy. ' . . Ee As far as I'm concerned, the game of hockey and sports in general need more guys like Smith who get embroiled in one controversy or another, but don't try to stick-handle their way around it later by saying it was all just a mis-understanding blown out of proportion by the media. Smith plays a tough brand of shinny. He means it when he says he does not like his opponents and sees no reason why he should hang around at centre ice after a brutal game waiting to shake hands with a guy who just tried to part his hair with a hockey stick. A final word on the hockey season which began way back when. As I watched the champagne celebration at the conclusion of last Tuesday's game, my wife (who is not a hockey fan) looked at the TV set and said in amazement, 'Is the season over? Is this really the last game? Good, now maybe the weather will warm up." I nodded in the affirmative. She just smiled no doubt thinking it's about bloody time. (Like I said she is not much of a fan). I was tempted to tell her that a new season starts in about 18 weeks, then thought better of it. It has been a long season, so best leave well enough alone. And besides, now that hockey is finished, I can start paying more attention to the Expos and Blue Jays. My wife doesn't like baseball very much, either, Last week was not a very good one for hockey in western Canada. No sooner had the Oilers gone out in four straight, when the NHL team owners told Saska- toon it's not ready for the big time. When you strip away the emotions of nationalism, they are quite right in turning down Saskatoon. They don't even have an arena there, although the promoters promised to have one built in less than five months. Sure, it would be nice to see another Canadian city with a team in the NHL, but let's face it, there are already far too many teams in the league, the quality of play during the 80-game schedule is poor, and the pre- sent playoff structure makes those 80 games almost meaningless, anyway. _---- NHL hockey will start to mean something again. | when the-league gets down to about a dozen teams. The leagues must stop moving these marginal franchises "from city to city as it has in the past few years. It is the only way to improve the overail calibre of the game at this level. Let the weak ones go under. OUT OF WORK, FOREVER Ask the average Canadian what the number one problem in the country is right now and the answer most likely will be: unemployment. And why not. Canada has a jobless rate of some 12 per cent, though many calculate that the so-called **hid- den unemployment" those who don't show up in govern- ment statistics, push the real figure much higher. Even the federal government admits the picture is not going to get much brighter over the next few years with the "official rate'" probably staying in the ten per cent range. That's a little frightening, to say the least, for essen- tially it means that nine people with jobs are carrying one without a job. What does it mean for the country over the long haul when one out of ten have to rely on government hand- outs of one sort or another just to stay alive? What does it mean when ten per cent of the working population of a country is making no contribution in the form of labour or services? Can a country like Canada just go on and on with ten per cent unemployed? I suspect that we have no choice in the matter. In fact, ten per cent unemployed is a fact of life we are going to have to get used to. Even when the national economy pulls itself out of recession and begins to function as it should, the jobless rate is not going to respond as it might have twenty or even ten years ago. ; . Look at it this way. There will always be a certain percentage of people who just won't work, or hold a job just long enough to quality for benefits. Society is stuck with these dead-beats, always has been. But is is also becoming evident that it takes less people power to do the necessary work for society. We (Turn to page 7) To Russia? Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau has been invited to make an official visit to the Soviet Union. The invitation last week came in a letter from Soviet boss Yuri Andropov, and expressed hope that relations between the two countries might be improved. The Canadian Prime Minister should accept this in- vitation and use it as an opportunity to tell the Soviet leaders to quit dragging their feet and get down to some serious negotiations to put an end to the horrendous build-up of nuclear arms. Mr. Trudeau should tell the Russians that if they want a return to 'normal' relations between the coun- tries, more trade, scientific, educational and cultural ex- changes, it might do well for them to cut the garbage rhetoric and start acting like responsible citizens of this planet. i Would it do any good? No likely, if one looks at their record in the past decade or so. It is more likely that the Russians want Trudeau to visit Moscow in the hopes that he will be a little more sympathetic to their point of view in international relations. However, with relations between east and west now as cool as they were during the Cold War, it might be argued that any contact between heads of state and government is better than none at all. And Mr. Trudeau, no matter how unpopular he may be as a politician in his own country right now, still com- mands considerable respect in the international community. Possibly, there is a role for him and this country to play in helping to de-fuse the tensions in the world. An inch of progress would be better than none at all. A Bilingual PM? As the Conservative leadership convention draws closer, there is an interesting side-debate raging in some circles in this country. Does the Prime Minister of Canada, an officially bil- ingual country, need ta be fluent in both our major languages? The debate is being discussed on two planes: one poses very logical, rational, even intellectual arguments pro and con on this issue; the other is based on the cheap-shot anti-French sentiment (they're ramming it 'down our throats) most often heard in the coffee shops and taverns outside Quebec in recent months and years. It may not be just a coingidence that the debate is on the minds of Canadians at a time when one of the candidates for the Tory leadership is starting to peak, as they say, and may be garnering enough support for a third or even fourth ballot victory at the convention next "month in Ottawa. ~~ That candidate is. Newfoundland MP John Crosbie, a ~ former minister of finance, who by his own admission understands little French and speaks even léss. Crosbie right now appears to be running a solid third behind Joe Clark and Brian Mulroney, both of whom are considerably more proficient in the French language. Mulroney speaks French like a Quebecois and Clark has \ studied the language to the point where he can hold his own in just about any conversation. The point for Canada, and especially English- speaking 'Canadians is whether being bilingual is pre- requisite for being national leader of a major party and/or prime minister of the country. } Is it a fact, as some have argued, that a unilingual English-speaking PM would in effect be cut off from com- munications with several million French Canadians? We think not. If there is one thing Ottawa is capable of doing, it is providing government information in both languages. Also, we would suspect (and hope) that a unilingual PM would go out of his/her way to ensure that com- munications with Quebec are given high priority by staff, advisors and so on. And it should be enough for a unilingual leader or Prime Minister to at least appear to be trying to become hesitantly proficient in both languages. What exactly does bilingual mean, anyway? There is a big difference between someone who can carry on a casual conversation, make small talk, etc., and the per- son who explains complicated government policy or writes learned articles in both languages. After all, there are other problems in the country that need to be addressed by someone. Many believe the policy of official bilingualism in Canada, and the way it has been implemented, has led to divisions among Canadians. And it looks like the language issue is going to hit the Tory convention floor. Hardly surprising in a country that has used language as a political football for years.