Paul S. Graham

Yesterday Manitoba’s provincial government announced plans to rebate $2,000 to every citizen who buys a hybrid vehicle before Nov. 15, 2008. When I look at the gas guzzlers my tax dollars are going to support, I have to ask WHY???!!!

Here’s the list of vehicles that Manitoba will now subsidize and their respective fuel consumption estimates (miles per gallon) in parentheses (city/highway). Unless otherwise noted, fuel economy estimates come from the US Department of Energy/Environmental Protection Agency web site on fuel economy.

Trucks

• Chevrolet – Silverado 1500 LS Hybrid (17/19)
• GMC – Sierra 1500 SLE Hybrid (18/21 2WD; 17/19 4WD)

SUVs

• Ford – Escape Hybrid (36/31 FWD; 32/29 4WD)
• Lexus – RX400H (32/27 2WD; 31/27 4WD)
• Mercury – Mariner Hybrid (32/29)
• Saturn – VUE Green Line (27/32)
• Toyota – Highlander Hybrid (32/27 2WD; 31/27 4WD)

Cars

• Honda – Accord Hybrid (28/35)
• Honda – Civic Hybrid (49/51)
• Honda – Insight (60/66)
• Lexus – GS 450H (25/28)
• Toyota – Camry Hybrid (40/38)
• Toyota – Prius (60/51)

Now I drive an aging (1997) but still quite serviceable Mazda Protege which gets 25 mpg in the city and 33 mpg on the highway. Seats four; lots of room for groceries. I don’t drive it much, but when I do, it compares favourably with the brand new SUVs my government is subsidizing and beats the pants of those trucks.

This policy is wrong headed in the extreme. Not all hybrids are equal; nor are they equally worthy of support.

All this policy achieves is the public bankrolling of middle class luxuries — which may play well in a pre-election period, but does nothing about global climate change except perpetuate the myth that we can not only continue to have our climate destroying toys, but that the public should pay for them.

If hybrid vehicles are to be subsidized, at least be selective and support those products that have obviously raised the bar (such as Toyota’s Prius).

Better yet, spend more on improve public transportation systems and legislate fuel economy and emissions standards that challenge automakers to build green vehicles or get out of business.

Seventy women, members of COPE Local 343, have been on strike against the FirstOntario Credit Union in Hamilton, Ontario since October 20, 2006. The workers are striking because of management demands to roll back health, vacation and retirement benefits. Also at issue are job security provisions in the collective agreement.

More information from the union perspective is available here, where you will find a series of strike bulletins. What little information FirstOntario is providing, is available here, as far as I can discover from their web site.

As a life-long credit union member in Winnipeg, it breaks my heart to see supposedly co-operative institutions abusing their workers. COPE 343 deserves our support, not only because their demands are just, but because their bosses need to learn that credit unions should not do their business on the backs of their employees. (How ironic it is that FirstOntario grew out of credit unions set up in the 1930s and 1940s by trade union members who wanted a cooperative institution to provide financial services to working people!)

One way to show your solidarity with COPE 343 members, is to point your web browser to Labour Start. There you can send a clear message to the management of FirstOntario. In doing so, you will also be sending a supportive message to the members of COPE 343.

Mohammad Mahjoub, Mahmoud Jaballah and Hassan Almrei, inmates of Canada’s “Guantanamo North” are on hunger strike to protest their indefinite detention at Kingston’s Immigration Holding Centre. After two months without food or medical care, they are extremely weak and suffering from various medical problems.

According to rabble.ca, “Despite last week’s visit by Public Safety Minister Stockwell Day, who did not meet with the detainees, there has been no negotiation with the men, and no effort to end a critical situation that could turn deadly at any time.”

Their crime? No one, least of all the prisoners, knows. Under the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act, the Canadian Security Intelligence Service can initiate a process which leads to the arrest of permanent residents or refugees who have committed no crime, throw them in jail, and detain them indefinitely with the aim of deporting them, even in the face of potential torture and death. Neither they nor their lawyers are allowed to see the “information” upon which CSIS makes allegations against them.

Consequently, all have been imprisoned under a “security certificate,” Mahjoub, since 2000 and the others since 2001.

As the revelations surrounding the illegal deportation, imprisonment and torture of Canadian Maher Arar show, the shadowy, undemocratic processes of Canadian and American intelligence agencies violate human rights, rather than protect them. If there was ever a time to demand that the Canadian government respect human rights, it is now, and a good place to begin is to join with the hundreds of organizations and individuals who have demanded an end to the use of “security certificates” by the government of Canada.

How? You can begin by endorsing the following statement by sending an email to tasc@web.ca with your name, title, affiliation and address, saying: “I ENDORSE THE STATEMENT”

Statement Against Secret Trial Security Certificates
We, the undersigned, have grave concerns regarding the continued use of sections 9, 76-87 of the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act, which allow for the imprisonment in Canada of refugees and permanent residents under the authority of a “Security Certificate”.

We are particularly concerned that those detained under security certificates are:

• Being imprisoned indefinitely on secret evidence, though no charges have been laid against them;
• Tried in unfair trials where the evidence is not disclosed to the detainee or their lawyer;
• Denied the right to appeal when the certificate is upheld in a process that uses the lowest standard of proof of any court in Canada;
• Subject to deportation even when they face unfair imprisonment, torture or death.

We believe that the Security Certificate process is undemocratic and that it violates fundamental human rights, which the government of Canada has committed itself to through the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, the UN Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the UN Convention on Refugees, the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and the UN Convention on Torture. Accordingly, we demand that the Security Certificate process be abolished. For those currently imprisoned under security certificates, we demand:

• That they be released immediately; or, if any case against them actually exists, that they be allowed to defend themselves in open, fair and independent trials with full disclosure of the case against them.
• That they not be deported.

While you’re at it, write your MP. Better yet, insist on a meeting. The existence of “Guantanamo North” is a national disgrace, and the sooner we put an end to it, the better.

Resources

• Justice for Mohamed Harkat
• Homes Not Bombs

Labour in Love: the Mayworks Valentine Social

“Join us as we celebrate romantic unions — and unions in general!”

With music from singer-songwriter Adi Sara Kreindler & friends, Hugo Torres-Cereceda and Johnny Broadway.

Friday, February 9, 2007
Winnipeg Press Club (331 Smith St.)
Lower Level, Ramada Marlborough Hotel
Doors open @ 7 pm • Admission: $10

Proceeds support the Mayworks Arts Festival.

Tickets available at: Press Club • Winnipeg Labour Council Offices (502-Union Centre, 270 Broadway Ave.) • Workers Organizing Resource Centre (Mezzanine, 280 Smith St.) • or call Derek Black (256.9818) or Glenn Michalchuk (589.7840).

Download and post the Labour in Love Poster.

Winnipeg’s mayor, Sam Katz, has established something called an Economic Opportunity Commission to identify how the City can offset the approximately $62 million in business tax it collects every year.

In the words of the Mayor, “Unfortunately the business tax has long been identified as an impediment to growth. Fortunately, we’re going to eliminate it.”

This suggests to me that the Mayor has made up his mind. Axing the business tax has been a key plank for Katz in his last two elections. Regardless of the nature or quality of the EOC’s recommendations, he plans to deliver on this one. The EOC process is window dressing and will likely provide a platform for promoting other aspects of the Mayor’s pro-business agenda, such as privatization, contracting out, and reductions in services.

The EOC process has a veneer of democracy insofar as the public is invited to submit suggestions, in writing or online. But bear in mind that the discussion is about how businesses taxes should be eliminated, not if. And it is very much a one way process in that citizens are invited to submit recommendations, but there is no forum for citizens to see which recommendations have been submitted and who made them. Neither is there a way to debate them. This is unfortunate, because internet technology makes it easy to set up web forums that would facilitate the lively public debate that this issue deserves.

The makeup of the EOC is revealing. The members are all, in one way or another, strongly linked to the business community. Conspicuously absent are people who would bring alternative perspectives. There are no members associated with labour, or community development, aboriginal people, social services – and certainly no representatives of the workers who provide Winnipeg’s public services.

Also revealing are the links the EOC site provides for further information. In addition to links to various City sites and reports, there is a list of pro-business sites that clearly support the Mayor’s one-sided rightwing vision. As with the EOC membership, alternative visions are not present.

While the fix is in, the EOC process does provide at least a partial forum to debate critical issues underlying the future of Winnipeg. Although we can’t afford to limit our activities to making submissions that may never see the light of day, we shouldn’t ignore the opportunity to express our views.

Disclosure Time: I’m not a fan of our Mayor. And last year, I managed the electoral campaign of Marianne Cerilli, in which we put forward a positive, constructive vision for Winnipeg that remains relevant. I invite you to review these ideas here.

The Canada-Palestine Support Network-Winnipeg (CanPalNet) presents:

DANCE DOWN THA WALL 3!
A fund raiser for the International Solidarity Movement, Winnipeg Local featuring Winnipeg’s funk & rap road map to dance floor justice and harmony, DJ Co-Op and Mama Cutsworth!

Saturday, February 3, 2007
Winnipeg Press Club
Lower Level, Ramada Marlborough Hotel
331 Smith Street
Winnipeg

Doors open at 8:30 pm
Admission: $10.00
Tickets are available at Mondragon Bookstore and Coffeehouse (91 Albert St.) and at the Winnipeg Press Club.

This social event is co-sponsored by the Uniter, CKUW 95.9 FM, Mondragon Bookstore and Coffeehouse, G7 Welcoming Committee and Peace Alliance Winnipeg. For more information, please contact CanPalNet at 942-1588 ext.1 or at 947-5093.

CanPalNet-Winnipeg is the local chapter of the International Solidarity Movement: a non-violent international organization working for peace in Palestine and an end to Israel’s longstanding and illicit occupation. (You might recall the ISM American member Rachel Corrie, who was crushed to death by an Israeli bulldozer while standing in front of a house set for demolition.)

The monies raised by CanPalNet-Winnipeg are used for educational seminars, panel discussions and other events, but the overwhelming majority of funds are used to dispatch volunteers to Palestine as witnesses to the occupation, and as workers in defense of ordinary Palestinians. They also hold an annual Canada-Palestine film festival, which so far has showcased over 20 films (feature length and documentary) on the conflict — films which rarely see the light of day in North America.

So, mark your calendar for February 3.

According to an article in today’s Winnipeg Free Press, the projected cost of Canada’s “mission” (i.e., aggression) in Afghanistan will be, by 2009, about $4 billion. To date, the invasion has cost Canada $2.2 billion and 45 lives.

Of course, the numbers don’t convey the real magnitude of the tragedy involved– the tens of thousands of Afghanis killed, the hundreds of Coalition deaths, the thousands of wounded on all sides, and the profound suffering of the families and communities left to cope with the aftermath.

On the fiscal side, I suppose Canadians can be grateful we’re not Americans. Those folks have been saddled an estimated $76 billion tab so far, and they still haven’t nabbed bin Laden. Nonetheless, imagine what we might have accomplished with the $2.2 billion we’ve spent to date on the war. For example:

• Housing: We could have built about 15,000 modest bungalows and given them away to homeless people.
• Employment: We could have paid 73,000 person years of employment at a living wage ($30,000/annum/worker).
• Daycare: We could have created more than 200,000 new child day care spaces.
• Medicine: We could have trained 20,000 doctors or 80,000 nurses or some combination thereof.

Admittedly, my calculations are crude, but the point is, one can do a lot with $2.2 billion. How would you have chosen to spend this money?

How can someone hold both progressive and conservative values at the same time? And how do folks on the Left communicate with them?

Trish Hennessy and Keri-Anne Finn address these questions in the December 2006 issue of the CCPA Monitor, in an article entitled Facing Some Hard Truths: Progressives need to relearn how they “frame” their message.

The key to unwrapping this apparent contradiction and effectively communicating a progressive message is to grasp that we have grown accustomed to placing people on a continuum — left-centre-right or progressive-moderate-conservative — or mainstream versus fringe. Unfortunately, such distinctions are misleading. Most folks just don’t fit neatly into tidy categories. Many if not most of us are “biconceptuals” — folks who can, for example, support unions and care about the environment on one hand and crave tax cuts and vote Tory on the other.

We respond to politicians (and presumably to activists) not so much according to the policies they espouse but to the values we perceive they represent. If their values overlap with ours we are more likely to support them.

We can have the most wonderful set of social or economic policies in the world, but if we do not “frame” these policies in terms of the values espoused by our fellow citizens, our policies will be misunderstood, opposed or ignored.

Finn and Hennessy draw on the work of Dr. George Lakoff and his new book Thinking Points. Lakoff is a senior fellow at the Rockridge Institute, which describes itself as “a non-profit, non-partisan think tank dedicated to strengthening our democracy by providing intellectual support to the progressive community.” At Rockridge, the stated mission is to use “research in human cognition to help progressives make arguments that make sense to their audience.”

I’m not going to recap either Lakoff or Hennessy and Finn’s treatment of his analytical framework. Follow the links and go directly to the sources. I think you will find their discussions interesting and compelling.

What I would like to do, though, is to invite a discussion on values — not the values of the teeming masses of “biconceptuals” out there who stubbornly insist on voting for the status quo. No, what I think we need to talk about are “our” values.

What values mark those of us who consider ourselves “progressive” or “on the Left” or however you want to characterize it? What do we stand for? What is the moral foundation for socialism, feminism, environmentalism, your-favourite-ism?

Try not to confuse “values” with “policies.” Dig deep into your core.

Why is this important?

Because, I don’t think we can begin to convince other people of our ideas unless we can empathize with them. And we cannot begin to empathize until we have a clear understanding of where we are coming from.

That’s the mission. I intend to take a whack at this, myself, in future posts. I hope you will join in.

Canada’s national phone-in show, CBC’s Cross Country Checkup, invited listeners, yesterday, to call and write in on the topic of charity. The question: “What motivates you to give charity? What puts you off?” And for two hours, listeners told their stories.

We learned that most charitable giving in Canada involves the faithful supporting their churches, that people are increasingly skeptical about professional fund raisers and the charity industry, and that many, if not most of the people who phoned in were somewhat self-satisfied with their contributions.

Listeners were invited to email comments as well, and you can find a selection here.

I’m the last person in the world to criticize generosity. I believe that people who share their money and/or their time to help someone else deserve respect. But I gotta tell ya, I really wish someone had seriously questioned why one of the wealthiest countries on the planet needs so many charities in the first place.

Leaving aside whether churches and think tanks (like the Fraser Institute) should be recipients of tax deductible charitable donations in the first place, why do we have so many people in need and why do they have to depend on the charitable whims of their fellow citizens?

Forgive me for stating the obvious, but people are poor when they do not have enough money. And dependence on charity arises when governments evade their responsibilities.

So what is poverty, anyway? The Canadian Council on Social Development (CCSD) has published a handy little fact sheet that sets it out in tabular form. A single person living in a major Canadian city would be considered poor if she earned $20,778 before taxes. The same person living in a rural area could evade poverty by making $14,303. A family of four would need an income of $38,610 to live in Winnipeg, and only $26,579 to live in the country, and so on.

According to the Canadian Union of Public Employees: “A wage of less than $10 an hour is widely accepted as a low pay poverty wage because a single individual working full-time all year would need at least this amount to earn above Statistics Canada’s low income levels for a larger Canadian city. Single parents and those supporting more than themselves require at least $13 an hour to reach these low income levels.”

Also according to CUPE: “analysis of detailed labour force survey data for 2005 shows:

• Over 17% of Canadian workers (more than 2.3 million) were paid less than $10 per hour in 2005.

• More than one in five of all working women – over 1.4 million – were paid less than $10 an hour in 2005.

• One in eight male workers (12.8%), or 892,000 workers, were paid a poverty wage in 2005.

• Over 1.1 million of those working for less than $10 an hour were 25 years of age or older.

• More than 50% – or over 1.3 million – of all young workers were paid less than $10.

• A high ratio of seniors – more than 21% — also work for less than $10 an hour.

• More than 1.2 million “full-time” workers (defined as those who worked more than 30 hours at their main job) were paid less than $10 an hour at this job. Many other low paid workers worked multiple jobs at low wages, but were classified as part-time.”

That’s the so-called “working poor.” Folks who rely on social assistance are worse off, both financially and in the sense that they are in most cases unable to escape dependence on a miserly state.

So, how poor are they? Once again, the CCSD has a useful fact sheet. Check them out. Social assistance rates, depending on where you live and if you have dependents, provide from 20% to 73% of what you need to reach the poverty line. They are a disgrace. And 2.5 million Canadians live that reality.

Is it any wonder that the number of food banks in Canada has grown from one, 25 years ago, to 649 this year. Or that the Canadian Association of Food Banks reports that over 750,000 people per month use their services?

As I stated so simplemindedly: people are poor when they do not have enough money. And dependence on charity arises when governments evade their responsibilities.

We are long overdue for two reforms in this country that would go a long way to relieving poverty:

1. increase the minimum wage to a living wage
2. increase social assistance rates to enable those who are unable to work to live above the poverty line

We can afford it. The federal government (and every provincial government, excluding that of PEI) have posted budgetary surpluses in the past year. There is no shortage of cash; all that is needed is political will.

If every person who made a charitable donation in the past year (however this is defined) were to insist that our elected officials would enact these two measures, the need for charity in Canada would diminish greatly.

Charity, on the domestic front at least, would be reserved for exceptional circumstances. What an uncharitable thought.

In Canada it is an unquestioned article of faith that taxes are – at worst, a Satanic invention – at best, a necessary evil that needs to be restrained. Opponents of taxation argue that government taxation restricts economic growth and makes us poor. The sooner taxes are reduced, the better for all, they say. In the words of Prime Minister Stephen Harper , “all taxes are bad” (presumably this includes the ones that pay his salary).

The tax cutters come in all sizes, shapes and political persuasions. Even Manitoba’s NDP Premier, Gary Doer, boasts of having brought in “significant and sustainable tax cuts in four main areas: personal, business, property as well as Manitoba’s first corporate income tax cut since the Second World War.”

When social democrats like Doer shamelessly proclaim neo-con dogma, it seems unlikely we will find politicians who favour maintaining taxes, or good heavens, increasing them. And it’s too bad, because there is strong evidence that taxes are good for us. A study conducted by Neil Brooks and Thaddeus Hwong, and published by the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives December 6, 2006, argues convincingly that “tax cuts are disastrous for the well-being of a nation’s citizens.”

The study compares high-tax Nordic countries and low-tax Anglo-American countries on 50 social and economic measures and finds the high-tax Nordic countries score better in 42 of them. For example, the high-tax Nordic countries have:

• lower rates of poverty, more equal income distribution, and more economic security for their workers

• a higher GDP per capita (GDP is “gross domestic product” — the total market value of all the goods and services produced within the borders of a nation during a specified period.)

• higher rates of household saving and net national saving

• greater innovation, including a higher percentage of GDP spent on research and development

• a higher ranking on their growth competitiveness by the World Economic Forum

• higher rates of secondary school and university completion

• less drug use, more leisure time, and higher life satisfaction

The CCPA says “the U.S. falls near the bottom of the 21 industrialized countries in a strikingly large number of social indicators. It also ranks as the most dysfunctional country by a considerable margin. In contrast, Finland ranks near the top of the industrialized world in most of the social indicators and has been named the most competitive country in the world by the World Economic Forum four years in a row.”

Canada falls somewhere between the two extremes but our political and business elites seem dedicated to accelerating our race to the bottom.

The 55-page study is available for download free of charge. You’ll need Adobe Reader to open the 512kb file.

It’s well worth reading. And the next time you hear politicians chanting neo-con mantras (taaaaaxxxx cuuutttsss . . . taaaaaxxxx cuuutttsss), spank them with it (metaphorically speaking, of course). Then, sit them down and educate them. With a federal election (and a Manitoba provincial one) around the corner, there will be lots of opportunities.