Winnipeg Free Press

Winnipeg Free Press (Newspaper) - April 15, 1981, Winnipeg, Manitoba Winnipeg free press wednesday april 15, 1981 listening to our far Flung diplomats by John Best special to the free press Ottawa mention of the Canadian foreign service conjures up images of expenses paid travel in exotic locales. It also suggests a Chance to see the world on the Canadian taxpayer Cut rate booze cigarettes and cars can dle lit dinners and leisurely office hours chauffeur driven cars for ambassadors and a few other Lucky ones plus their families. Is there any place you would rather be for a surprisingly Large number of people in Canada s foreign service the answer to that question apparently is yes. Dissatisfaction is prevalent among them. They no longer have the Moti vation they once had. Morale is sink ing to a level at which the service s efficiency is threatened. We have All this from prime minister Pierre Trudeau. To get some advice on How to Correct the situation Trudeau has established a Royal commission in the person of Pamela Mcdougall. Mcdougall is a career woman who joined the external affairs department 32 years ago As a clerk and worked her Way up to become an ambassador. Later she was chairman of the Tariff Board and More recently Deputy health and welfare minister. Monumental task a business like professional Mcdougall faces a monumental task. Not Only does she have to find out what is bothering the is she must also offer the prime minister some ideas on How to Deal with it. The Assumption that it is not abreast of the times is implicit in a letter Trudeau wrote to the commissioner at the time of her appointment last August. Present concepts of the service May be grounded in an age which has disappeared and which in any Case pre dates Canadian the letter said. Trudeau added that he was not convinced Canada s approach to foreign service adequately reflects the new Era of instant world wide communication and of top level Diplo Macy. Thus depending on How widely she casts her net the Mcdougall inquiry could turn out to be the most comprehensive yet on the management of Canada s external operations and relations. My mandate makes Clear thai i have to look at the existing situation in the foreign service and the changes that have taken the commissioner said in an interview Between trips abroad. I have to make recommendations As to How the government might change its management of the foreign service its foreign operations to do that you have to cover the her in a physical sense is the world. She is travelling u its four Corners to find out from be personnel in the Field the reasons Foi the declining sense of motivation Trudeau s expression in their ranks. The Canadian foreign service com Prises about officers under the external affairs department and the Trade commissioner service of the Trade and Commerce department to Gether with support staff such As clerks and secretaries. Recently under a consolidation plan 350 is personnel of the immigration department were transferred to the external affairs department. Mcdougall who has a staff of 26 helping her says she is letting herself hang Loose and listening to whatever people in the service want to Tell her about their jobs. Nevertheless some of the Broad issues she will have to come to grips with Are already Clear. Probably Foremost is the upheaval in family life caused by periodic assign ments abroad. Typically when an offi cer is Young and single he cannot see enough of the world. But when he grows older and acquires a family he often finds it harder to pull himself away from the Good life in Canada for what May be a relatively primitive existence in a steaming hot country Miles away. Under certain conditions Perks and privileges May not count for much. Working wives May have to give up careers in Canada to accompany their husbands to some place where career opportunities for women Are non exis tent. Teenage children often have to be left in Canada or sent to a third country for schooling. We have to accept that families Are going to be the Central unit in the foreign says Mcdougall. We have to address the problems that families in line with her policy of exploring All the angles the commissioner is asking is wives whether they think they should be paid for helping their Hus bands discharge their responsibilities especially on the entertainment Side and generally what kind of recognition they would like. Physical Security is another problem. Although Canadian personnel have scarcely been brushed by the violence increasingly directed at diplomats these Days they still Are More exposed abroad than they would be in Canada. Should there be a system of danger pay for personnel serving in unduly hazardous posts on top of the bonuses now Given for service in hardship posts the problem would be to identify which postings Are hazardous. As for the problem of motivation Mcdougall probably will not have to Lake too Many soundings before she begins to suspect it has something to do with a rather widespread disenchantment in the Field at the Way things Are run from Ottawa. Officers abroad frequently complain of clogged channels of communication to Headquarters of slowness and some times confusion in the delivery of instructions of a Cabal like atmosphere in the upper echelons of the external affairs department of promotions based on who you know rather than what you can do. Mcdougall is not tipping her hand on what she has discovered in these Sensi Tive areas so Central to Good morale. I am listening to everything anyone wants to say to was her Only comment. Trudeau however alluded to some of these matters when he wrote the com missioner that lagging motivation in the foreign service May be based in the related acts of the growth of that service and its increasing Reliance on systematic and bureaucratic de Man he asked her to enquire into the perceptions of foreign service management from our posts in addition to individual is personnel Ai Home and abroad Mcdougall is seeking the views of is staff associations and All Federal departments and agencies involved with the is As Well As provincial government departments Canadian corporations doing business abroad and Export groups practically anyone who has an opinion to express. However she has decided against holding Public hearings Public hear Ings sometimes become adversarial and i Don t really think the adversarial approach is relevant to what i m John Best is a freelance journalist burned in Ottawa. Pamela Mcdougall is inquiring into foreign service conditions. Western canadians Are internationally aware by Ben Malkin special to the free press Ottawa Western Canada is the country s most International conscious Region judging by the testimony of witnesses from the United nations children s fund to the commons com Mittee on health welfare and social affairs. At a recent sitting representatives from Unicof Canada reported on the work done during the International year of the child in 1979. Among other projects it got the agreement of the ten provincial education ministers to the distribution of special Unicof pre pared materials that could generate interest in International development within the schools. Following through on this project to make International economic develop ment part of the school curriculum we find Saskatchewan farthest advanced. Alberta and Manitoba Are close behind. The Central and Eastern provinces lag. David Hahn chairman of Unicof Canada told the committee last year we raised through our greeting card programs our halloween pro Grams and our other fund raising activities with the support of about volunteers and i guess a million Cana Dian school children about million for Unicof projects. The funds we raise in Canada Are used to support very specific projects that we select around the world. Currently we Are supporting something Over 20 projects in the Caribbean Cen trial and South America Africa and Asia countries of All language groups and All types of countries. The projects that the Canadian in ice committee supports Range from clean water projects through to projects involving nutritional training of mothers All projects at the Village level help people to Start producing food we Are also involved in teacher training medical assistance and so one flaw in the Canadian approach to International development Aid of the Unicof kind is the Gap in education on the subject. In discussing the Back ground to the special project in the schools or. Hahn said we have Felt for a Long time that International education has been inadequately carried out in this country. For example it is not part of the curriculum. Informing the children depends on the interest of an individual teacher and it depends on the teacher having Access through organizations like ours to materials that will help the teacher carry out this Type of teaching. The method is very hit or miss and we feel it is very inadequate. One should remember that we Are producing children who Are going to have to try to solve problems that our generation has not been Able to solve and that is the disparity Between the Rich and poor nations of the world. And through our educational system we Are not equipping them to solve those prob lems or to even recognize them let alone effectively Deal with them can the addition of this subject to school curriculum do any Good or. Hahn said that feedback from the Spe Cial project in 1979 indicated it would. Comments such As it opened our eyes to realities of the and so on were repeated Many Many times by Volunteer organizations Are doing what they can. Mrs. Gail Smith Deputy executive director of Unicof Canada reported that with funding from the Canadian International development Agency and from Unicof in new York the Canadian Section is taking 12 teachers from across the country to Tanzania in August. The tanzanian education ministry is co operating. The teachers have made a two year mrs. Smith said that when they go Back to their provinces they Are going to speak to their communities wherever they can find a forum on the issues of develop ment and Why Canada is so concerned and involved in matters like the Norih South but essentially it is up to the Provin Cial governments because they control school curriculum. On the question of How far advanced they Are mrs. Smith said Saskatchewan has it together better than most. They Are already in the process of writing a report to their provincial government encouraging it to make development education part of the curriculum Alberta is quite advanced too Manitoba is another Good at this Point or. Hahn interjected it is interesting that the Western prov inces Are the provinces that have sup ported International activity generally through Matching Grants. The Eastern provinces and Ontario and Quebec have a record deficit with flights of fiscal fancy on april then finance minis Ter Don Craik Rose in the legislature to deliver the first budget of the new progressive conservative administration elected six months earlier. The people of Manitoba knew when they went to the polls on oct. 11, that it would not be an easy task for a new government to turn the Economy around and to bring Public spending under he said. The Finan Cial situation which we found when we took office has made it impossible for us to balance the budget this year. However with improvements in the Economy and in our Revenue position we believe a balanced budget is a realistic goal. Of course much will depend not Only on Manitoba s economic performance but on Canada s As on May 15, 1979, Craik presented the government s second budget to the peo ple of Manitoba in the midst of a Federal election Campaign. For 10 years and longer senior governments both Federal and Provin Cial have been mortgaging the future of this he said. We believe that a permanent budget deficit would mean permanent disparities and per manent erosion of our economic strength and our ability to maintain services a balanced budget on a combined basis and even a modest surplus to provide flexibility for special Frances Russell initiatives and to reduce our debt Load is not an unrealistic possibility and it remains our objective and that of All reasonable on May 13, 1980, Craik delivered his third and last budget address. Our Long term objective will continue to be a balanced budget on a combined basis As and when economic conditions per on april 14, 1981, finance minister Brian Ransom Rose in the legislature to present Manitoban with the lories fourth budget. His predecessor s cautionary words were borne out. The deficit is the highest projected in a budget in Manitoba history Mil lion. Briefly upon taking office in late 1977, the tories forecast a deficit of million for the fiscal year they inherited from the nip. However the figure was never attached to anything More than the new government s claims about the spending projections of its political foes and the 1977-78 deficit actually ended up at on a Sheet of Blue paper containing the budget highlights the government attempted to eat its collective words of three and a half years with this Tor tured phrase deficit is seen As a temporary increase to be reduced As Economy expands and Revenue growth follows amount remains within manageable limits. This year s deficit lower in relative terms than 1977-78 year end deficit. Bottom line of million in 1977-78 would be million expressed in 1981 dollars this year s deficit is 20 per cent lower. Long term subject Ivy of balanced budget Bui that did not come close to match ing the flight of fancy in the budget address itself when the government attempted to project what would have happened if the nip had continued in office and had persisted in its spending habits. If his government had t acted Deci sively to restore sound budgetary procedures Ransom said we have Esti mated by projecting Iho average rate of growth in provincial expenditures in the last four Complete fiscal years under the previous government and using Revenue estimates adjusted by adding Back the tax cuts we have implemented since 1977, that by 1980 1981, the province of Manitoba would have faced a cumulative deficit for the past three years of More than such Mambo jumbo political economics provided about the Only comic Relief in an otherwise stale and stand Pat budget document. The longest in recent years the budget contained a thin Gruel of tax tinkering together with lengthy bromides about Hope Confidence in the future and Manitoba s Quality of life laced with Liberal denunciations of Ottawa and socialism. The budget was Neutral As far As forecasting the Date of the next election is concerned. While it provided no major goodies aside from remedying the inequities perpetrated by last year s tax Reform on married couples collecting the Cost of living tax credit and increasing the property tax credit by it also did not impose any major tax increases. And the record deficit Likely 10 alarm chiefly the government s own apostles of fiscal orthodoxy. As far As the average citizen is concerned ii is unlikely to produce sleepless nights merely amused cynicism. More seriously however the govern ment s conversion to keynesian economics is a Frank admission that balanced budgets Are impossible in hard times. It is also a confession that the past three years of near balance have not revived the Economy and Likely have contributed to stagnation. Tax increases Ransom said simply were not appropriate despite the huge deficit. Had he become a keynesian i Don t accept the tags that go with these he replied. The Lyon government is much reduced from the Days when it Allied itself with Britain s Margaret Thatcher As a Beacon of Neo conservative fiscal rectitude in a world of socialist spend ing sprees. Entering its fourth year and preparing to face the voters perhaps before another budget it is left with a record deficit no manoeuvring room. A lot of rhetoric to eat and an acute protracted restraint program that pulled Down the Economy. Doonesbury Skoryi Msisie Baki endur. In in on your. Of How first Piffl zincpkxr1 who Tah Honor ;