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MAGAZINE
SATURDAY, JANUARY 9, 1988
40 CENTS
Research and the sniffles 3 The search for justice 5 O'Sullivan knocked out 13
Ann Landers................20 Family .....................20
Bridge......................16 Gardening .................P2
Business...................8,9 Horoscope..................17
City, B.C.....................3 Movies...............P12, P13
Classified................14-19 New Adventure ............P6
Comics......................6 Religion....................10
Crosswords.............16, P2 Sports....................11-13
Editorial..................4, 5 Travel ....................P15
Entertainment...............6 *P — Plus Magazine
TELEPHONE: 562-2441
_
Grade 5 students at Hart Highlands elementa-, , ry school took a step into British Columbia’s
Discovering trie past fur-trading past, constructing 23 forts like
these on display in their classroom. The large
fort in the front took 70 hours to construct. It was done as part of a social studies unit the class did on the fur trade in New Caledonia in the 1800s. Citizen photo by Dave Milne
MOVERS OPT f6r ONTARIO
STEIN VALLEY CONTROVERSY
Indians want UN help
TORONTO (CP) — Ontario was the most popular destination for Canadians who moved to other jirovinces in 1986-87, raising the ^population by 45,278, Statistics Canada figures show.
Alberta, which began the decade ;with a large influx of migrants at ;the height of the oil boom, now is losing them. Its net loss of 29,731 -people to other provinces was Canada’s highest.
; The figures, released Friday, are ^preliminary ones gathered from family allowance files for the census year June 1 to May 31. Tax file ^figures yet to be compiled are considered more reliable.
- It was the fifth year in a row Ontario ranked as the leading destination for movers.
I Canada has always had a highly ^mobile labor force, said Terrance ilunsley, executive director of the ^Canadian Council on Social Development.
- As many as 400,000 households 3iave changed provinces in one Tyear, he said, about half of them ■Jot job reasons. Others move for -family reasons or to retire.
'j Ontario’s overall unemployment !rate was 5.4 per cent in November ;1987, while the rate in Toronto was -4.1 per cent.
In comparison, the Alberta jjnemployment rate was 7.8 per ;cent.
• The next most popular province •for migrating Canadians was British Columbia, which had a net gain :of 7,609 people.
VANCOUVER (CP) - Chiefs of two British Columbia Indian bands say they will file a complaint with the United Nations alleging the provincial government is violating international human rights by permitting the Stein Valley to be logged.
“We don’t know where else to turn,” Lytton chief Ruby Dunstan said Friday, while acknowledging that a meeting has been set for Feb. 4 in Lytton with provincial Forests Minister Dave Parker.
“We’re hoping that when we get the United Nations involved that people will start realizing that we are not invisible.”
Premier Bill Vander Zalm said the natives should think twice about taking “expensive trips” to the United Nations.
“British Columbia will be run by British Columbians and not by people from nations in Africa, Europe or Asia,” he said.
The Indians and the provincial government have been trading accusations for months about each other’s unwillingness to discuss the future of the pristine valley 160 kilometres northeast of Vancouver.
The government’s wilderness advisory committee, while agreeing there was room for logging in the area, called in 1986 for a formal agreement between Victoria and the Lytton band prior to any logging road being constructed.
The archeologically rich Stein Valley is a 1,100-square-kilometre watershed almost untouched by modern man.
Environmentalists say it is an
important example of first-growth forest. The Indians, who revere its spiritual value, are also concerned ancient rock paintings will be damaged if the area is opened to logging.
In September, the government announced it would allow nine per cent of the middle valley to be logged and that it would establish new recreation areas in the lower and upper Stein.
Dunstan said the Lytton and Mount Currie bands won’t wait for the outcome of the meeting with Parker before filing their claim with the United Nations, alleging violation of two articles of the international covenant on civil and political rights.
One article covers the right to self-determination and the protection of subsistence. The other pro-
tects freedom of religion.
“Those two are the most important things to Indian people, not only in the Stein Valley but all across Canada,” said Dunstan.
While many Canadians find God in churches, “to us, it’s not like that.”
“We can go out and stand beside a rock, we can stand beside a tree and our God will hear us,” said Dunstan. “When they’re planning to do road construction into the Stein Valley, that we know is very spiritual, that is taking that right away.”
The two forest companies with timber rights in the Stein — B.C. Forest Products, which would take most of the logs for its mill at Boston Bar, and Lytton Lumber — say it will be at least a month before road construction begins.
Edgy investors dump stocks
by The Canadian Press
Prices plunged on major North American stock markets Friday as edgy investors — worried about the U.S. economy — dumped millions of dollars’ worth in shares, wiping out the gains of this week’s rally.
“I’ve had better days,” mused Toronto analyst John Ing.
On the New York Stock Exchange, the Dow Jones industrial average — a key barometer of market activity — dropped a whopping 140.58 points to close at 1,911.31.
It was much the same story on
Staffs err,
ministers
convicted
the Toronto Stock Exchange’s — Canada’s largest stock market — as the closely watched composite 300 index fell 118.01 points to 3,151.
However, the Dow Jbnes average is still about 200 points above the low it hit when the market crashed on Oct. 19. The Toronto index, on the other hand, is more than 300 points above its recent low of 2,837.79 on Oct. 28.
Many investors were scared off by speculation that a report next week will show a higher-than-expected U.S. trade deficit, analysts said.
by GORD McINTOSH
OTTAWA (CP) — In a landmark decision, two federal cabinet ministers — Joe Clark and Flora MacDonald — were found guilty Friday of contempt of court because of the behavior of their officials in an immigration case.
The federal government said it may appeal the Federal Court of Appeal ruling. But if the decision stands, it could mean cabinet ministers would be held accountable for what their officials do.
In overturning a lower court ruling, Mr. Justice John J. Urie said Friday that Clark, the external affairs minister, and MacDonald, then immigration minister and now communications minister, were responsible for the failure of their officials to produce a visa file in a 1985 immigration case.
The case involved the struggle of an Ontario woman, Debora Bhat-nager, to bring her husband Ajay Kant Bhatnager to Canada from India and the failure of officials to obey a court order.
Liberal MP Andre Ouellet was convicted of contempt while he was in cabinet in 1976 for denigrating a judge in public. But Ouellet was convicted for something he did directly; Clark and MacDonald were convicted in connection with the conduct of their bureaucrats.
Toronto lawyer Clayton Ruby, who with Michael Code represented the Bhatnagers, said the case is a major step to evening the odds for citizens who take on the government in court. The case means ministers can be directly held responsible for what their officials do, Ruby said.
“If the minister chooses to act by agent, he can’t insulate himself from their (officials’) refusal to comply with a court order,” he said in a telephone interview.
In the past, governments could fail to produce evidence for one reason or another and the citizen plaintiffs could not pinpoint someone to blame. They can now blame the minister, Ruby said.
Neither Clark nor MacDonald could be reached for comment late Friday.
For five years, Debora Bhatnager tried in vain to sponsor her husband as a permanent resident. In June 1985, she took the Immigration Department to court to force officials to process her husband’s application.
The court ordered the government to produce the man’s visa file from the Canadian High Commission in New Delhi so the Bhatnag-ers’ lawyers could cross-examine federal officials.
But the file did not arrive in time for a scheduled hearing in September 1985.
Bhatnager won the right to bring her husband to Canada the following month, but was unsuccessful in January 1986 in having the two ministers cited for contempt.
But Urie found Friday that the lower court judge erred in ruling several pieces of evidence inadmissible. He also awarded costs to Bhatnager and ordered the lower court judge, Mr. Justice Barry Strayer, to determine penalties for Clark and MacDonald — the first ministers in the current Conservative government to be convicted.
They could face fines or be ordered to apologize, lawyers speculated Friday.
Tories gaining, says poll
TORONTO (CP) - The federal Liberals still command the most public support among decided voters but the Conservatives are gaining and moving closer to the New Democrats, a poll released Friday indicates.
The survey, conducted by Gold-farb Consultants for the Toronto Star, suggests that if an election were called now the Liberals would have the support of 38 per cent of decided voters, the NDP 34 per cent and the Tories 28 per cent.
The Tories have gained some support since a similar Star poll was conducted in June.
That poll had Liberals support at 39 per cent, support for the NDP at 37 per cent and for the Tories 24 per cent.
The recent survey of 1,000 eligible votors was conducted after the text of the free-trade deal was released Dec. 11 and before it was signed by Prime Minister Brian Mulroney and President Ronald Reagan on Jan. 2.
It is considered accurate to within plus or minus 3.2 percentage points, 19 of 20 times.
This means votor support for the Liberals could be as high as 41.2 per cent or as low as 34.8 per cent; for the NDP as high as 37.2 per cent or as low as 30.8, and for the Tories as high as 31.8 per cent or low as 24.8.
Posties eye court action
OTTAWA (CP) — The Canadian Union of Postal Workers may go to court in a bid to stop Canada Post from covering up mail stickers critical of post office policies.
“Our lawyers are studying it,” Deborah Bourque, national representative of the 23,000-member mail sorters’ union, said Friday.
Bourque said the union may try to fight the post office on grounds that it is interfering with the right of unions to communicate through the mail.
It may also argue that the cover-up violates equality and freedom-of-speech guarantees in the Charter of Rights and Freedoms, she said.
John Caines, chief media spokesman Canada Post, denied the crown corporation is trying to censor the union.
The red and blue stickers are interfering with the flow of mail because they resemble those used by the post office to flag Special Delivery mail, he said.
Thousands of stickers reading Stamp Out Privatization and Stop Contracting Out have been printed by the union and distributed to its members, other postal unions, unions outside the post office and the public.
Caines says all mail bearing the stickers is being returned if it comes from a postal union.
■Elmir
SASKATCHEWAN FAN? HE MUST BE GENUINE
'When I said I wanted heavy-duty shocks, I didn't mean the bill/'
REGINA (CP) — A query about the hapless Saskatchewan Roughriders was enough to convince Regina Mayor Larry Schneider a prisoner in a Mexican jail was a Saskatoon resident.
Schneider was vacationing in Mazatlan over Christmas when he received a call from the Canadian consul asking him to identify a man who had been arrested in a police roundup.
The man had no identification
but claimed to be from Saskatoon.
Schneider asked the unwashed, unshaven prisoner to name Saskatoon’s mayor and he responded: “Cliff, I think. Cliff Wright.”
The man spoke English like a Canadian and the mayor was sure he wasn’t Mexican, but he decided to press on.
“Do you know the name of Regina’s mayor?”
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“Umm, no, I don’t,” came the reply.
“Well, it’s Larry Schneider and you’re talking to him.”
The prisoner paused: “Can you tell me how the Saskatchewan Roughriders did? I heard the team wasn’t very good this year.”
That was enough to convince Schneider the man was genuine. On his word the police freed the man — whose name Schneider can’t remember.
Mexican police arrested the man a few days before Christmas when a brawl broke out in one of the beachside bars, Schneider said.
“I guess they just arrested everybody in the bar and on the beach and the ones who could prove their identity were let go.” Schneider said the Saskatchewan man had allegedly left his wallet and money with a man named Gomez, who had a bad reputation with the police.
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