The following text may have been generated by Optical Character Recognition, with varying degrees of accuracy. Reader beware!

" "Scugog"s Community Newspaper of Choice ; 185 MARY STREET - PORT PERRY, ONT. - LOL 187 PHONE (905) 985-7383 FAX (905) 985-3708 '1 Year - $32.10 6A s-$17.65 Foreign - -$90.95 includes $2,10 GST Includes $1.15 GST includes $5.95 GST Editorial comment Growing tired of labour disputes If you're developing an acute case of strike fatigue these days, you're not alone. It seems that as soon as one labour disruption ends, another begins. At any given time during the last couple of years, we've been watching at least one, and more often two, strikes. Many of these battles spring from the provincial government's funding policies, and union reac- tion to them. School boards have been the most obvious targets, with teachers holding their two- week walk-out to protest Bill 160 a couple of years ago, and, more recently, striking against Durham boards last fall. In Toronto, support staff represented by CUPE have hit the bricks, closing some schools. Meanwhile, Ontario public servants have voted in favour of a strike, and could soon stage a replay of the torturous work stoppage that affected all of us a few years ago. It is the fundamentally political nature of the disputes that prevents their being solved at the bargaining table, before strike action and lock outs are necessary. High school teachers in Durham Region, for instance, were fighting not only the board, but the Conservative govern- ment's entire education policy last September. How is that going to be solved by sitting and negotiating in Whitby? There are other strikes, of course -- CBC technicians, for instance, have made life miser- able for Hockey Night in Canada fans of late -- and there will be more, especially against pub- licly-funded institutions whose budgets have been cut, leaving management with the nasty task of implementing the austerity measures. The rest of us can be forgiven for having grown exceedingly weary of all the acrimony. We just want a province that works. Publisher... Shi Lea ntibisn J. Peter Hvidsten General Managing: Editor... Jeff-Mitchell @w Ana : Member of he. Carnation § Dot Newspaper Aus. Published every Tuesday by the Port Perry Star Co. LAd. - : 168 Mary Sirgat- Port Perry, Ont. PRODUCTION Don Macleod " Chris Hall Trudy Empringham, Pam Hickey, "Rhonda Mulcahy, Robert Taylor, Barb Advertising Sales: Deb McEachem, . Bell, Richard Drew, Daryle Wright ADVERTISING Advertising Mgr. ....,..... Don MacLeod Ginni Todd, Cindy Jobin, Galil Morse I KNOW OF SOMETHING ELSE AROUND HERE THAT COULD BENEFIT FROM AN EMISSIONS TEST! To the Editor: Recently I noticed a story about another complete waste of taxpayers' money. It had to do with some crazy idea of making pickerel 'spawning beds in Lake Scugog. Why would the politicians allow this kind of stupidity? Have they forgotten how many years it took the Westshore group to drive piles before they could even contem- plate construction? As for dropping a ton of stones into the lake this spring to make a spawning bed, I can tell everyone right now that it's not going to work. The bed rocks will sink so deep into the silt that they will never be seen again by fish, crustacean or alien. And, since when did pickerel need help reproducing? Lake Scugog offers pickerel - Pickerel project is just stupidity an ideal egg-laying habitat, as it is. And, usually when man starts to fool around with Mother Nature the outcome creates more problems down the line, in the food chain. Oh! One more point while on the subject. Won't the expensive new boardwalk require footings to support it? If so, get ready to + drive some very deep piles. Bravo, politicians. You've proven once again that you have no idea what you're doing when it comes to responsible leader- ship, with one exception - getting your pic- ture taken by the press with those hundred dollar smiles. P. McDermott, Port Perry 'Random Jottings by J. Peter Hvidsten "THE "DUFF" BRINGS SMILES TO SCUGOG 'Mike Duffy, who bills himself as | to 3 take part in a book launching by local historian, and Star columnist Paul Arculus. "And every eye, from every seat on the floor and in the balcony, was trained on this rather robust char- acter as he related his experiences as a TV. reporter on Parliament Hill. ~". Mr. Duffy, who's best known for his witty and enlightening comments on CTV news every Weeknight, and is the congenial host of CTV's Sunday Edition, kept the audience captivated with his torie 8 from tthe. 8 hill" and this brushes with _not one, but "two" of the top 10 "sexy men on Parliament Hill, rolled into Port Perry last Thursday night powerful political pundits. "Duff" as he's known to his many industry and political friends is probably one of the most knowl- edgeable, yet unlikely TV personalities in Canada. And while many of Canada's premier broadcaster head for the lucrative US markets, Duff has stayed _ at home. Probably because there's a good chance he'd never have made it in front of the' camera in the great U.S. ofA. where looks are considered more important than knowledge. (It's all about marketing, you knowl) Short, rotund and balding, Mike Duffy may not be a Peter Jennings (a Canadian export) but his likeable personality, insight and knowledge of Canadian poli- tics makes him one of the countries best Ottawa cor- respondents. And while he often takes sizzling shots at the prime minister, MPs and Senators, down deep he understands and appreciates the difficult job, and the sacrifices they and their families undergo while they are in'public life. "During his address, he revealed a number of "inside" stories. One of these he related by saying, "| know youl have a hard time. believing is, but, Bill I: Clinton (US president) cheats." The crowd roared with laughter as he went on to say that he was referring to the game of golf. He related how he'd heard a story about PM Jean - Chretein complaining about the number of "mulligans" the president uses during a golf game, but when 'Duff' confronted the Prime Minister about the accu- sations he replied ..."no, no, no... | did not mean to refer that he cheats... . he just practices a lot during the game," the prime minister replied. His topics amused the crowd, including a smiling MP Alex Shepherd, as he spoke about the office of .the PM and how well the prime ministers of both pre- sent and past have had good relationships with U.S. presidents.... Brian Mulroney with George Bush and Jean Chretein with Bill Clinton. The Clinton's he referred to on a number of occasions as the "Clintstones." Following his talk, he along with Paul Arculus, spent more than half an hour autographing books ~ and talking to some of the estimated 250 people who crammed into Town Hall 1873 for the unveiling of Paul's book, "The Merchants of Old Port Perry." Copies of the book are available at The Star.