PAGE 4, WEDNESDAY DECEMBER 7, 1983, WHITBY FREE PRESS whitby w mm Volce of the Cou nty Town Michael l'an Burgess, F The only 'Whitby newspaper independently owned and operated by Whitby (Y Pub Pubisher - Managing Ediorj yresîaents for WliIWy residents. blislied every Wedsiesday by M.B.M. Publishing and Photography mnc. Phone 668-6il The F'ree Press Building, 1:11 Brock Street North. P.O. Box 206, Whitby. O)nt. SANDRA LUCCI Communlty Editor Second élass Mail Registration No, 5351 LETTE-RS TO THE EDITOR Gun Control: Dear Sir: SArnendments to the firear- ms provisions of the Criminal Code were considered by Parliament in 1977. A number of the new laws were per-- ceived to the thousands of safe honiest- gun owners and han- diers across Canada., The proof is now in with the com- pletion of a three year study provided to the Solicitor General, Mr. Kaplan. Let me focus on three key areas of concern and'demon- strate how these new firearmis laws have failed to serve the public interest. First, the Firearin Acquisition Certificate (FAC).- This document is now required by every Canadian wishing to acquire or possess a firearm. The government at- tempted to seil this concept to the public as a means of providing a screening process of those individuals involved in firearms incidents. The Decision Dynamics Report confirms that there is no corn- prehensive data on whether individuals involved in firearm incidents possessed an FAC. This means that the principal argument for im- plementing the certificate process is now without sup- port. Second, and perbaps most shocking ini light of the Con- stitutional protection f rom ",unreasonable Search and Sîeizure"l is the evaluation of the Search and Seizure Without Warrant provisions of Bill C-51. This provision was intended to allow police of- ficers to search and seize in A Case of Abuse situations where no criminal offence has yet occurred. As a safeguard, there "is a requirement that following any search with or without a, warrant that the Attorney General make a return to a magistrate or Court. 'This in theory would afford protection - all be it after the fact - to the rights of alI Canadians. The conclusions of the Report to the Solicitor General are alarming. Non compliance with the return procedures is widespread. This means that the Police and the Attorneys- General are breaking the law. This law of Search and Seizure without warrant - while perhaps of legal use on oc- casion. - is a Mack-Truck loophole allowing abuse of the privacy, and property of Canadians. One can only won- der why the police and politicians in power are not. functioning within the terms of the legislation. In the 1981 Supreme Court of Canada decision on this sec- tion of the law - Colet vs Queen, - the Supreme Court held that any statutory provision which encroached on the common law rights of property owners would be strictly ixterpreted in favour of the property owner. So here we have a law - search and seizure without warrant - legislated by the Liberals and enforced across Canada principally by Con- servative governments - that is being used carelessly and at least on occasion to the detriment of our rights. Third, and a powerful indic- tment of the haphazard nature of the new-firearms laws is the fact that the Courts are not imposing the mandatory prohibition orders. These or- ders are required where A firearm is used in an indic- table offence.. Less than 20 percent of criminal convic- tions has resulted in prohibition orders. Surely, where an individual is convicted of a serious criminal offence involving a firearmn - there should 'be a prohibition order to protect the public. There is not. In summary, Bill C-51 which was heralded by the Liberals as a means of reducing firearmn offences and protec- ting the public has failed. This failure involves not only the Trudeau government, but also the Police the almost entirely Progressive Conservative At- torneys-General of the provi n- ces and the Courts. This , situation must be addressed by legisiatures at both levels of government. -There is not in my view sub- stantial supportive evidence for the continued inclusion of many of these laws on the books. I have introduced into the House of Commons a private member's bill to remove certain provisions brought in by the infamous Bill C-51. I would be more than happy to make available a copy of this private member's bull and related background: information to anyone in- terested in writing to me in Ot- tawa. Jim Fulton, M.P. Skeena House of Commons Ottawa, Ontario KiA 06A Editor's'Note Once again the Whitby Fre e Press 18 undergoing a change in staff. During my brief stay as editor for the Free Press,. I was able to relocate to this quaint, but rapidly ex- panding community, and sink myseif in the midst of S the developments. I found dealing with the ýcitizenLs was flot only a good Iearning experience and very satisfying, but that the old saying holds true that S small towns host the friendliest of folk. Beginning as new Community Editor is Roy Cooper, a sociology major at the University of Waterloo, who also attended the journalism-print program at Conestoga College, Kitchener. Cooper, a former Oshawa resident, will return to the com- S munity after residing in the Kitchener/Waterloo area for eight years. Best of luck to you Roy! a w..u~ - o..........o I understand that anchor man Dan Rather feels the CBS newscast is under assault by the White House. Mr. Rather told the NEW YORK lIMESrecently that CBS gets more pressure and more criticism from the Reagan administration than any other network. However, he admitted that the pressure is above board. There has been no surreptitious White House campaign to influence companies who advertise on CBS, no federal threat to the network's broadcast licenses, and no attempt to get him, Dan Rather, fired. In Rather's words: "The fact that they do it regularly and in an in- telligent way, and that they gauge the level of pressure has at least this effect: it is designed to have us think twîce." Mr. Rather says that the White House knows where the levers of power are at CBS, and that the cam- paign has exquisite precision. The White House sometimes gets on the phone to CBS at 6:10 pm, a time when producers have the newscast lined up, but haven't yet made their final decisions. All I can say about this is, better CBS than us.. We have heat f rom timre to time, f rom the federal Liberals, about the way we've been covering affairs of state. We've aIse had trouble from the other two par- ties, and from advertisers. But thanks to the manage- ment of this place, very little of the heat ever reaches the -newsroom f loor, where the decisions are made. The la;te Bill Gaît,;a dear f riend vwho was, in his lInaer