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The Straight Goods Report
Consumers and Politics, Logs and Democracy, Ordinary Folks and Economic Disruption, Summer
By: Ish Theilheimer
The reason why Straight Goods is always trying to link up consumer and political issues is because most of the big consumer issues ARE political. For instance, when we in Ontario voted for the Mike Harris Conservatives for a second time, we were ordaining cuts to extra-curricular school activities and home care - extremely expensive consumer services - by virtue of voting for a party that explicitly favoured cutting taxes mostly for the wealthy. Of course that part wasn't emphasized.
Now the rubber is hitting the road and the results are frightening.
A friend started an argument with me the other day - why with me? - saying there was too much bureaucracy and regulation. I asked her "Just exactly which part of deregulation do you think the people of Walkerton like?" That shut her up, at least for a minute.
In my county, (Renfrew) the local CCAC - the agency the Tories created so they could privatize home care and shut down non-profits like VON - has been forced to cut $2.5 million in services locally - which is what's happening all across Ontario. Fifteen hundred of the most vulnerable local people will lose vital home making services. These are existing services being cut, not new ones, being cut.
Congratulations are in order for Mike Harris, Paul Martin, Jean Chretien, Stockwell Day, and everyone else who thinks you can cut taxes for the wealthy and corporations without affecting public services. Your experiment is complete.
You may stop now. The experiment is a total failure. Yes, the provincial and federal governments have cut taxes for the rich and reduced deficits. But the impact on ordinary families is heavy: user fees every time you turn around. No extra-curricular activities in our schools. Rising municipal tax rates. Lethal environmental catastrophes. Now the abandonment of our seniors and others needing home care - the very people who voted Tory last time out.
How many warnings like this do the something-for-nothing, more-for-less crowd need? I had a teacher once who used to say "The sign may say free beer here, but it doesn't necessarily mean free beer here."
For those who still think you can cut taxes and not worry about funding public services, I've got some oceanfront property for you in Stockwell Day's home province.
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I visited with my friends Donnie and Rita Etmanskie the other day near Wilno. Donnie runs a small forestry business he took over from his father with about 25 direct and indirect employees. Rita works at the local nursing home and is a union member.
Donnie and Rita and their family know what life's about. They understand power because they've been shafted often enough, and they've become pretty good at defending their rights. They are hard-working and honest and treat their employees well. Their company is committed to good logging practices, and they never lose sight of the future - and jobs - for their children and grandchildren.
Donnie and I worked together in the heady early '90s in Ontario in a community coalition of loggers, environmentalists and community business people working to democratize forest management and land use planning. A sympathetic NDP government listened to voices and groups like ours and brought in sweeping changes that enabled people like Donnie - not just the bigs - to have a voice in resource planning.
Not many people know about this exercise in local democracy. It wasn't flawless, but it has had important impacts, like more buy-in from workers on forest planning, and a bigger share of public resources for small operators like the Etmanskies. But the gains did not come painlessly. Many in the county felt quite threatened by us. Even though the coalition has gone from the scene - and parts of it became a kind of forestry co-op - the reverberations continue to be felt, and it's not always pleasant.
This kind of thing is called local economic democracy. It doesn't win a lot of political points for anyone. Usually it is poorly understood by most people and stirs up more controversy than support. That's the nature of local democracy. Like sex, it's good but messy.
When advocates like Naomi Klein say that a new left party needs to emphasize the need for more local democracy, I just say good luck. It's a great thing to emphasize and do, but it doesn't necessarily win friends.
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I interviewed Judy Darcy this week, intrigued by her call for union militancy to stop the Harris Conservatives. Judy's a big supporter of OCAP, which received a lot of attention again this week both for vandalism at Ontario Treasurer John Flaherty's riding office and for police and school board suppression of a planned rally in downtown Toronto. Gary Morton has posted first-person reporting of that abortive rally.
OCAP and confrontational street tactics raise the same questions for "moderates" like me as they did in April in Quebec:
Why act offended when police mobilize in anticipation of a "a diversity of tactics" from a group or groups that espouse "economic disruption" e.g. vandalism? Wouldn't you, if you were charged with keeping public order and enforcing the law?
Will your tactics turn off or appeal to honest, hard-working people like my friends the Etmanskies, or will it buttress support for the Right - as I believe it will.
If we condone violence for left-wing protest groups, doesn't that make it hard to condemn similar behaviour of anti-abortion protesters? Is it OK to trash abortion clinics as long as abortion docs aren't shot?
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With this edition, Straight Goods is taking summer leave. We'll be offering the best of Straight Goods plus a few new items over the summer to maintain everyone's interest. Our publication returned from the dot-com dead last fall, and we're proud of the contributions we've made to Canadian journalism and public knowledge. We know we have lots more growing and evolving to do, and we plan to devote a lot of energy and time this summer to improving our publication and also its likelihood of economic survival.
Thanks for your readership. If news or consumer info comes your way that you'd like to share, please send it along to thegoods@straightgoods.com.
Ish Theilheimer lives on a farm near Killaloe in Eastern Ontario and is Publisher of Straight Goods.
The Straight Goods Report is a new weekly column being distributed to newspapers, web 'zines and portals, and radio stations all over Canada. You need not ask permission to reproduce it in your print or web publication, but please include our URL and let us know where you are posting it.
- Ish Theilheimer
- Killaloe, Ontario
- June 18, 2001
- ish@straightgoods.com
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