Winnipeg Free Press

Winnipeg Free Press (Newspaper) - December 21, 1986, Winnipeg, Manitoba Winnipeg free december Winnipeg free press Freedom of Trade Liberty of religion Equality of civil rights published seven Days a week at Sooj Catlton Winnipeg r3c 3c1 by Canadian newspapers company limited Telephone 9439331 Winnipeg free press est 1872 Winnipeg Tribune est 1890 Donald Nicol publisher John Dafoe editorial Page editor Murray Burt managing editor Rudy Redekop controller a member of the Manitoba press Council my Iper out of martyrdom the soviet governments decision to release dissident Andrei Sakharov and his wife Yelena Bonner from internal exile and allow them to return Home to Moscow will be As warmly welcomed in the West As it has been Long Sakharov is the Best known and most durable of human rights activists still alive in the soviet until he began to protest oppression in his Homeland in he had been regarded As a hero of the soviet an honoured scientist who had been instrumental in developing the Hydrogen since How he has been increasingly vilified and persecuted at Home while becoming More and More an object of admiration and respect in 1975 he was awarded the Nobel peace prize and has been for Many years the focal Point of the soviet dissident in he was exiled without trial to the City of which is closed to in an attempt to silence his criticism of the in who had served As his main Contact in exile with the outside was herself sentenced to five years of internal exile for ant soviet reliable news of the couples condition became increasingly hard to get although rumours the decision to release the Sakharov can be partly As an admission by the soviet authorities that Sakharov in exile had become an even More embarrassing Symbol of oppression than Sakharov in More than it also appears to be part of Gorbachev Campaign to create a better impression of the soviet system by a single he has removed an obstacle to better soviet Western relations and covered up a dark blemish on the soviet he has also added a final touch to what has been a remarkable year for soviet in Anatoly Shch Aransky was released in Yuri founder of the Helsinki watch was sent to the West last the poetess Irina a Kushinskaya was allowed to leave and other dissidents have also been Given or been promised exit jews and other soviets in the West hoping to be reunited with family members still in the soviet Union have been promised that their cases will be although there has been Little action in this area so in Gorbachev is compiling quite a this is the Bright Side of there a curiously schizophrenic Quality to soviet human rights policy and it has a dark Side As As promises of Reform Are particularly those of a nationalist or religious continue to be this month the writer Marchenko died in Christovol the cause of his death has not been but he is known to have been hunger strike and to have been brutally treated by his this dark Side is one that we Are familiar with what is new is the number of Bright spots that have appeared under Gorbachev it would be naive to believe that they Mark a fundamental change in the soviet system and premature to regard them As any thing More than Ari improved Public relations but no matter How cynical the motives for releasing the Sakharov May the act itself was humanitarian in effect and should be acknowledged As such and responded to by the Western time for a shakeup the Manitoba health services commission May be improved by a shakeup following study and report by one of the Pawley governments favorite former clerk of the executive Council Michael a government Agency with 660 employees administering about billion a year can easily develop weaknesses and infirmities which pass unnoticed in the immensity of the attention is More urgently to an other granting Agency of the provincial government the universities Grants the Urc is a tiny and ineffective scarcely More than a fictional mailing which has failed to thrive within the provincial administration despite the extremely important Job it should be Manitoba universities might be in better shape today if the government had a better developed something a Little More like the health services to watch the work of the measure the of their pro Grams and explain their needs to the a proper Grants commission need not be anywhere near As bloated As the health services doling out just million of Grants a it has no need of 600 employees nor even of it need a Good Deal More than the executive finance officer and Par time commissioners it has been relying frequent vacancies and High turnover this year have severely undermined the capacity even of that tiny the John assistant superintendent of the seven Oaks school brings to his University Grants Job a thorough understanding of primary and secondary schools and their the other Mem Bers of the primarily academics or other denizens of the Are Well equipped to state the universities Case for adequate government is not the Job that needs doing the universities Are entirely capable of speaking for them the Job that needs doing is roughly the one the health services commission tries to do in its Field Independent analysis of the programs and the institutions and the Job they the Grants commission As now constituted cannot provide that the Grants commission should perform a continuous operating audit of the developing tests by which the Quality of universities can be judged and applying those tests to Manitoba it should let the government know about the successes and the failures the universities achieve and about the gaps and the overlaps in pos secondary programs for Manito it should help find rational ways of administering student Aid and of dividing the Burden of University costs Between students and if it was doing these things with the support of a solid professional its advice would have to be taken seriously both by universities and by the the commission As now constituted is not taken seriously on either its recommendations have never been adopted by govern ment in recent the universities when they explain their needs to the that they Are wasting their selective pruning should have started a few years Manitoba universities Are trying to keep All their degree programs going and add new ones even though the province manifestly has not the will and the re sources to provide Grants that will finance the full erosion of the Quality of universities ultimately erodes the Quality of the degrees they once word gets around about the state of Manitoba it will take Many years to live Down the poor graduates bearing Manitoba degrees May soon wish they had gone paid a Little More and earned a degree people would take universities have enormous difficulty pruning politicians Are utterly unsuited to the an energetic Grants commission could bring the necessary choices into the food was pretty too Public Bucks for the pros few canadians living outside of Quebec will have any quarrel with the decision by the government of that province to donate to rendezvous the two game series Between National hockey league All stars and members of the soviet National team that will take place in Quebec City in most wherever they May Well quarrel with a Grant of million to the same event by the Federal in announcing the regional Industrial expansion minister Michel Cote described rendezvous 87 As a major occasion to promote our culture and National it should be remembered that Cote is not talking about a struggling regional the series is expected to make a great Deal of Money and to generate a lot of Money for Quebec City no sees the Grant As just another example of his governments Devotion to the National others will wonder what a donation to a tournament of professional hockey players has to do with the interest of anyone except the promoters and by Christopher Dafoe special to the free press this is the season of entertaining and heavy if your dinner party or open House goes thank your Lucky if it does not dont blame almost everybody gives dinner almost everybody goes to some Are a Joy to Many Are some proceed with great dignity others end in broken crockery and ends in shame almost everybody has a dinner party Story to As a Howe most people Are far More eager to talk about dinner parties Given by other especially when the party in question sit Down or stand up ended in shame and mortification for the Host and Host to hear some people their own dinner parties could have been arranged and catered by with Oscar Wilde and Prince Gur nonskid As guests of those Given by others frequently sound As if they had been catered by the old and notorious firm of Hardy and a Friend of mine tells of a Christ Mas dinner party at which an out of town who arrived late and far gone in promptly passed out with his face in a salad garnished with Caesar really bad cooking is not encountered As often As it once but it is still on even to sit Down to a meal of uncooked overcooked Spaghetti or Curry so hot that you feel that some body must have put sulphuric acid in the there Are dinner parties at which none of the guests seems inclined to you sit there in silence listening to the lettuce there Are dinner parties to which you Are invited for seven and actually sit Down to eat at wishing that you had not taken that fifth i know a Man who once stuck a Fork into his neighbors thinking it was a piece of thanks to a late Call of dinner is Christmas open House can be a dangerous form of people you have never Laid eyes on tend to show up Early and stay some i am have had to resort to hiring bouncers to stand at the door turning away Gate at one party the hostess Mother inlaw was thrown Down a flight of Steps before the hostess had the presence of mind or possibly the inclination to have you Ever noticed that a popu Lar topic of conversation at Christ Mas dinner parties is the topic of other Christmas dinner parties the guests have attended the Host can Only wonder what will be said of his offering a week there Are a number of dinner party stories that on closer to be apocryphal be cause a number of people believe that they happened to the Friend of a arrived Early one of i is the Story of the Man who arrived at a Christ Mas open House before the other the hostess was still in the bathroom putting on her face or whatever it is that women do to themselves before a she called to her Early guest to make himself at Home and have a he did so and to pass the time began to play with the hostess Small the proved to be unfriendly and the guest retreated to a the dog in hot the animal made a lunge at him and went through the falling 30 floors to its the other guests were arriving by now and the Early not wanting to spoil an other Wise delightful decided to say 1 there is also the Story of the flustered hostess in her served up cat food As several delighted guests asked for the Reci i am told that Many hostesses swear by miss Mew spread on crackers As an Ideal Christmas party after the third drink nobody cats love no deaths yet my own dinner i need hardly Are usually reasonably there have been no deaths so far and Only one or two of my cosy dinners have ended in tears and there have been i when i might As Well have sent out to Sanders for Fried Chicken and i once served a wild that somehow turned to rubber in the when i stuck a Fork into it blood squirted up the Wall and when my guests tried to Cut it their portions jumped around their plates like Tennis we dined on Broccoli and wild one of my guests was a prominent Vancouver restaurant dining at my House for the first and last it was Christmas when friends of mine in England bought a live tur key for a real country Christmas it escaped and was never seen system needed Bravo for your editorial Smith hears it again free december 3 on the interim report of the child abuse review child welfare agencies have been highly successful in identifying situations of abuse and caseloads have the provincial minis Ter of Community Muriel first approved some staff increases but then Cut on fund ing for treatment now she is proposing to Cut Back 10 Beds at the overcrowded seven Oaks Centre for while represents a further Ero Sion of the already overtaxed re sources available for children who Are at great it would be in the Best interests of Muriel Smith the children and their families for Smith to convince her Cabinet colleagues that it is Only through allocation of More funds for children to remain in their own or to receive treatment in out Home that we can Hope to address the problems illustrated in the review teams the report shows How Complex and widespread the problem of child abuse has we desperately need a system that has coordinating mechanisms and trained none of these Are possible with out the fiscal backing of the prov i urge All Las to make child welfare a top priority for financial Sandy Hyman coordinator inter Agency group Winnipeg Yule card postage i am not much impressed with the arrangement cooked up Between the Post office and the greeting card association in connection with the 29cent Christmas card it is annoying to find the postal code matrix imprinted on every envelope in a Box of what is one expected to do about out the country mail is one supposed to Purchase More if one can find the right this is a strange Way to save a in the Case of smaller size Enve there is scarcely room for the address and return card since the stamp and imprint take up so much As the imprint is easily read Only by those with reasonable it is Likely that the Cost of imprinting envelopes has increased the Cost of the Henderson Winnipeg letters the Winnipeg free press welcomes letters Tram writers must give their name and names will be used and letters Are subject to games Hydro contracts the article Hydro refuses to re veal All bids free december 9 and the editorial come clean on tenders free december 11 buried the facts about the awarding of a recent Manitoba Hydro contract for the Supply and installation of spillway Gates for the Limestone generating the million contract was awarded to Colaire Canada of As the result of a competitive tendering process which considered not Only the Price but Manitoba Content As Ecol Aires creative proposal included the establishment of a new manufacturing facility at the Pas where the majority of the components for the spillway Gates will be thereby creating both immediate and potentially Lon term economic benefits to the people of in choosing not to emphasize the positive aspects of the contract the free press provided erroneous information on Manitoba tendering our policy of not publicly disclosing the results of All tender openings has been in place for about 15 years with virtually no problems being brought to our in a number of suppliers who have bid on contracts have encouraged us not to reveal the names and amounts of unsuccessful they have indicated that they did not want their competitive position made regarding the spillway we have not received a direct re quest from one firm let alone five firms reveal the names and bids of companies involved in tend ering for the or for another contract awarded about a week ear Manitoba Hydro has always announced the name and Price of the Low in where the lowest tender was not we have made Public the Price and the reason for awarding the contract to someone if companies bidding on Manitoba Hydro contracts express a desire to have the details on both successful and unsuccessful bids publicly Dis Manitoba Hydro is certainly prepared to review its policy on this Verne prior Public Manitoba Hydro charities regarding the Story Christian charities prey on fears of the help less free december the free press should refrain from Tak ing studies and sensational izing them against Good sense when the study was not meant for Public re lease in such a glamorous i feel that the Story was not in Good not not considerate and not Charles the author of the has said he never meant it to be publicized in this Why Wash dirty Linen in Public like this if action needs to be proper channels should be used and not sensationalism and Edh Oyer director of information resources Christian direction regarding the article ninja linked free Decem Ber instead of linking violent acts with games such As dungeons and has anyone considered linking the murders with the fact that the perpetrators were soldiers trained professional killers Gary Dean Winnipeg i system in the article i system bilking shown free november 26 it was reported in the fiscal year ended March there were incidents of i fraud resulting in overpayment of these statistics invite a further analysis of the nature of unemployment insurance data compiled by the Canada employ ment and immigration commission revealed in the one year period ended june Only per cent of All i claims resulted in overpay overpayment were the result of Many including clerical errors by the i commis incorrect employer errors by employers in completing records of employment and incorrect agent to suggest that bilking of the i system is widespread not Only does a disservice to the one in four workers who receive i benefits in any Given but is further not supported by the fact that overpayment occur further illustrates the complexity of the i system and demonstrates the need for its these concerns were commonly expressed by those who made Public and writ ten submissions to the forget com Mission of inquiry into unemployment insure unemployment insurance is a valuable and necessary social insurance program which benefits some three million canadians annually who experience an interruption of earnings As a result of a employ there is currently widespread concern that the program is in Dan Ger of being dismantled As a result of the forget commissions recommendations and the Federal govern ments concern with deficit reduce reports of abuse of the system Only serve to further threaten the program and to jeopardize the entitlement of the Many canadians who rely on i Neil Cohen executive director Community unemployed help Centre Winnipeg what do you mean youre out of myrrh you cant be out of Myrrtis ;