Winnipeg Free Press

Winnipeg Free Press (Newspaper) - February 14, 2022, Winnipeg, Manitoba C M Y K PAGE A6 ● WINNIPEGFREEPRESS.COMNEWS I TOPICA6 MONDAY, FEBRUARY 14, 2022 Eliminate fire pits, hookahs Re: City looking at three options to deal with air quality (Feb. 8) As president of the Lung Association, Man- itoba, and writing on behalf of the one in five Manitobans with lung-health concerns, I applaud Winnipeg city council’s decision to explore ways to improve air quality. Taking the step to explore “clean air shelters” is an innovative move. Looking at increasing the number of air-quality monitors is also an import- ant action. Further, as the city is researching possible policy changes that could set guidelines for when the city should shut services that are riskier when air quality is poor, the following additional actions should be considered: 1) Eliminate residential recreational fire pits, or restrict their use to the new “smoke-less” ones, or propane fire pits as a harm-reduction approach. 2) Eliminate hookah use in public spaces such as lounges and their patios. 3) Further regulate vaping, cannabis smoking and tobacco smoking to reduce exposure in public spaces. NEIL JOHNSTON Winnipeg Pill rules hard to swallow Re: COVID-19 pill used to treat 83 Manitobans (Feb. 10) Let me get this straight: if I am over 40, am tri- ple vaccinated and have followed all public-health protocols but somehow still have contracted COVID-19, I cannot get the anti-viral drugs or the new anti-COVID medication even if I fear severe symptoms or long-term effects from the infection. On the other hand, if I am over 18, unvacci- nated and smoke (or simply over 40 and unvac- cinated) and I have objected to and refused to follow public-health orders and have come down with COVID-19, I am assured of receiving these life-saving medications. How is this possibly fair? ALBERT PARSONS Minnedosa Invitation to premier Re: Province lifting slew of public-health orders (Feb. 11) In another life chapter, I worked on the front lines of health care. One shift, a provincial politician visited the emergency department and sat with a patient for several hours. As they left, they pulled me aside and said: “You can’t truly understand what you haven’t seen first-hand. I had no idea how strained our hospitals are nor how hard health-care staff work. I have a new perspective now that’ll inform my decision-mak- ing going forward.” That was before the advent of the COVID-19 pandemic. When the premier admitted last week that she hadn’t stepped into a hospital since being sworn in, I had a flashback to this encounter. This might be a wild fantasy, but wouldn’t it be impressive if Heather Stefanson volunteered to “job shadow” a doctor, nurse, or health-care aide in a hospital emergency department or intensive care unit for an afternoon? SEAN PETTY Winnipeg Identify the protesters Re: City mulls court action on anti-mandate protest (Feb. 10) May I respectfully request that your newspaper post the personal names, company affiliations, telephone numbers and addresses of the protest- ers who are occupying downtown Winnipeg? This would not be a violation of their privacy, as it is often written freely upon their vehicles. By doing so, prospective customers will have the opportunity to decide if these individuals are those with whom they may wish to do business in future. RODERICK MACLEOD Winnipeg We are experiencing growing mob rule from a lack of government action. If there is no longer any consequence to illegal behaviour, the bullies are empowered, much like unruly children. This is not a political statement, but human behaviour. Governments are elected to provide service and action, which has dwindled for fear of upsetting fringe groups. Please show these groups they are not in charge. KELLY SVEINSON Winnipeg Bergen not a peacemaker Re: Tories put faith in peacemaker MP (Feb. 4) Please retract this headline as it was misguided to suggest interim Conservative leader Candice Bergen is a “peacemaker.” She is an opportunist who jumped on the protesters’ bandwagon to take advantage of political attacks on the prime minister. Where was this MP when COVID-19 was raging and people in her riding in southern Manitoba refused to get vaccinated? Where was she when our hospitals were overflowing with unvaccinated patients from southern Manitoba? We in Manitoba know her, and know she has demonstrated the worst kind of political leader- ship. RUTH SWAN Winnipeg Drug injection sites misguided Re: B.C. tour offers insight into local harm reduc- tion: Rollins (Feb. 7) City councillor Sherri Rollins continues to push for a safe consumption site for Winnipeg even though the province, not the city, has jurisdiction over health services, and the science on whether these places actually save lives and move users into recovery and treatment is limited and incon- clusive. This is nothing but a feel-good bandage solution that brings addicts out of the bus shacks and dark alleys but does nothing to help them. What it does do is encourage and enable drug use and other high-risk behaviours, and bring crime into the surrounding area. It does nothing to fight home- lessness and mental illness that many addicts suffer from. How about getting them real help instead of keeping them chained to their addiction, allow- ing them to harm themselves one injection at a time at sites that let them inject illegal and lethal substances such as fentanyl and meth with free needles manned by nurses, all paid for by the taxpayer? How is this compassionate when you are actual- ly promoting drug use? The act of saving lives is a worthy goal, but this is not a solution and it makes the “war on drugs” more of a joke. KIM TRETHART Winnipeg Coverage of trustee salacious Re: School trustee turfed from meeting for ‘im- proper conduct’ (Feb. 8) I was rather dismayed to see this headline and an article and pictures that took up half of a page. Seems to be extreme overkill. I really feel for trustee Cindy Murdoch. Per- haps there are emotional or mental-health issues affecting this woman. Since when do such inti- mate details need to be in the public domain? I am not saying the board should ignore what happened, but this salacious reporting could help destroy a person’s life. GAIL MACKISEY Winnipeg Appreciates editor’s ‘gems’ Re: Editor’s COVID-19 newsletters This is the first and perhaps the last time I will write the Free Press but, after reading each and every “blurb” editor Paul Samyn has writ- ten since the COVID-19 crisis began, and now covering the trucker convoy protest, I wanted to compliment him in the most sincere way possi- ble. I always look forward to reading his gems of wisdom. CORALIE BORNAIS Winnipeg Wary of wine’s ‘warm numbness’ Re: Breaking up with a bad habit is hard to do (Feb. 7) Shelley Cook’s columns are a breath of fresh air! Her words are insightful and usually from a very personal place. Her reflections on breaking up with bad habits strikes a note close to home for many of us who have made an evening glass of wine an all-to- frequent panacea for this crazy COVID-19 time. A “warm numbness” is something that has been needed over the last two years, to be sure, but Shelley, like many of us, saw this creeping habit for what it is and is working on it. Be strong, Shelley. There is nothing quite like a good cup of tea, especially when paired with a good book. ELIZABETH TYNDALL Winnipeg LETTERS TO THE EDITOR WHAT’S YOUR TAKE? THE FREE PRESS WANTS TO HEAR FROM YOU. The Free Press is committed to publishing a diverse selection of letters from a broad cross-section of our audience. The Free Press will also consider longer submissions for inclusion on our Think Tank page, which is a platform mandated to present a wide range of perspectives on issues of current interest. We welcome our readers’ feedback on articles and letters on these pages and in other sections of the Free Press ● Email: Letters: letters@freepress.mb.ca Think Tank submissions: opinion@freepress.mb.ca ● Post: Letters to the Editor, 1355 Mountain Ave., Winnipeg, R2X 3B6 Please include your name, address and daytime phone number. ● Follow us on Twitter @WFPEditorials OUR VIEW YOUR SAY PERSPECTIVES EDITOR: BRAD OSWALD 204-697-7269 ● BRAD.OSWALD@FREEPRESS.MB.CA ● WINNIPEGFREEPRESS.COM A6 MONDAY FRIDAY 14, 2022 Kicked cans create trip-and-fall hazards M OST people know what happens when you put off paying important bills: they pile up and, eventually, create a financial burden that impairs all aspects of your life. A good example of this has been authored by former premier Brian Pallister and the Progressive Con- servative government of Manitoba. In 2017, a year after being returned to power, Mr. Pallister introduced the Public Services Sustainability Act, which was intended to legally impose a wage freeze across the entirety of the public sector without having to engage in the sticky process of negotiation. That law was never proclaimed, but it essentially brought contract talks across dozens of different bargaining tables to a halt. Fast-forward to 2021, and the folly of Mr. Pallis- ter’s strategy starts to become crystal clear. Last October, the Manitoba Nurses Union rati- fied a new contract that will pay out $216 million in retroactive pay increases going back to 2017. Think about that for a moment: that is a nine-fig- ure settlement just to pay nurses for all the years the Pallister government essentially refused to negotiate a contract. The nurses are not alone; tens of thousands of other public-sector workers are also getting retro- active pay. From general government workers to teachers, the unpaid bills from the Tory wage- freeze strategy are just now coming due. Can government afford these retroactive set- tlements? That’s an interesting question. Unfortu- nately for Manitobans, while Mr. Pallister was not negotiating contracts, he was cutting taxes. Mr. Pallister initiated a one-point reduction in the provincial sales tax, and a 25 per cent reduc- tion in the education portion of property taxes. He shrunk the base on which the PST was charged, removing it from a number of financial services. These tax expenditures drained hundreds of mil- lions of dollars from revenues. But there’s more. In 2019, Mr. Pallister an- nounced with great gusto he was moving $400 million into the province’s fiscal stabilization fund to help the province weather future budgetary storms. It boggles the mind, quite frankly, that the premier could have celebrated such a decision when he knew the bills were coming due for all those expired contracts. Mr. Pallister appeared to have been wagering the future of the Manitoba treasury on the notion he could put off all those contract settlements long enough to bring the budget into surplus, thus softening the blow from retroactive settlements. If that is the case, then Mr. Pallister and the members of his government who remain to work with his successor, Premier Heather Stefanson, are guilty of the worst kind of wishful thinking. No government of any political stripe can succeed cutting taxes and deferring liabilities. Mr. Pallister frequently lashed out at the former NDP government for spending gobs of money it did not have and running up a huge deficit. While he was not wrong about the NDP, Mr. Pallister has demonstrated that fiscal imprudence can take many forms. Cutting taxes and building reserves while liabil- ities mounted only served to make this province even more vulnerable to the fiscal pressures that accompanied COVID-19. The Tory government now owns the infamous distinction of overseeing the largest deficit in Manitoba history. The ill-considered strategy, now laid bare by grim financial reality, is proof yet again of a constant in fiscal policy: if you continue to kick a costly can down the road, sooner or later you’re going to catch up and trip over it. EDITORIAL DAVID LIPNOWSK/THE CANADIAN PRESS FILES Former Manitoba premier Brian Pallister Published since 1872 on Treaty 1 territory and the homeland of the Métis A_06_Feb-14-22_FP_01.indd 6 2022-02-13 3:34 PM ;