I’m doggone mad about her dog
Does HM The Queen take her corgis to Westminster when she gives the speech from the throne?
No.
It is time Lt.-Gov. Janet Austin showed some understanding of the requirements of her office and left the dog at home.
She hauled it off to the opening of the legislature this week.
I was horrified to also see it at the Remembrance Day service last year. Such disrespect.
Not everyone likes dogs. Some of us are scared. Some of us are allergic. All of us expect the Queen’s representative to conduct herself with dignity.
Anne Moon
Victoria
We will be in debt until we die
While a throne speech is not a budget speech, this latest edition talks all about the so-called help on the way for B.C. residents.
The finance minister has said that the NDP government’s deficit may be $14 billion and the two leaders of the opposition stated “what has been provided is not enough.”
Does this scare the hell out of anyone else? The speech related all the help the government has provided and the minister has given the possible cost deficit, but no word of any revenue ideas, which of course will include an increase in the cost of everything, including your taxes and mine. The bad news is next!
If you are my age, you recall the days when governments shuddered at the thought of operating at a deficit and were held accountable at the polls if they did. Those days are gone.
The government was politically forced to provide billions in “aid” to save their future. When you divide the 14 billion, and it will be more than that, by the number of taxpayers in B.C., you get my drift.
B.C. will never legitimately be out of debt, not in our lifetime and it will bear consequences!
Jim Laing
Saanich
Democracy is missing in Langford decisions
On Monday, Langford’s planning committee approved sending a proposal to council for public hearing that involves rezoning several lots in a one- and two-family residential neighbourhood to a yet-to-be-defined City Centre pedestrian zone, which has no height restrictions.
This proposal provided no concept plan, although a rendering from the developer in the fall of 2020 suggested two towers of 16 or 17 storeys as a possible design. There was no notification of nearby residents because, as the applicant for the developer stated, there had been little feedback previously.
Two residents in particular from nearby homes spoke about feeling “forced out” of their older homes by the policies and practices of the city and council. They want to remain in their homes that they have lived in for over a generation and do not feel that their voices are being heard.
The representatives from the city and council, while professing to have sympathy for their concerns, reiterated that it’s unfortunate that they live in an area that the city has decided will become high density, but that the city has decided this is the direction they will go. So much for consultation.
In the end, the concession was given that the height will only go up to six storeys on one of the streets, but whether that concession remains after a public hearing is still to be seen.
Two longtime Langford residents, taxpayers, voters, and contributors to the community are being discounted and dismissed due to the city and council’s desire for more development, more money, more density, no matter what the cost to current residents. This is not democracy in action.
Laurie Plomp
Langford
Scotland is blessed with riches and smarts
Re: “Why it doesn’t make sense for Scotland to separate,” commentary, April 11.
I’m not clear if Lawrie McFarlane has a political axe to grind, but he’s not very well informed.
He seems to have bought into the “Scotland’s too poor” line of political verbiage. Take away the whisky and the oil and it seems we have nothing.
Really? Well, apart from the whisky and the oil being huge assets (both over £4 billion a year), Scotland has 70 per cent of the U.K.’s fish, 90 per cent of the U.K.’s fresh water, 60 per cent of the U.K.’s timber production, 26 per cent of the U.K.’s renewable energy generation and 90 per cent of its hydro power.
We have 25 per cent of Europe’s offshore wind and tidal power. We’ve got a strong digital economy and an excellent higher education sector.
If we couldn’t make all that work for us an independent country, then we really would be the stupidest people on the planet. And we’re not.
I wouldn’t mind so much if political opponents came up with some real reasons why we shouldn’t be independent, but all they can come up with is half-truths (at best) and put-downs.
Dr. Andrew Symon
University of Dundee
Dundee, Scotland
Giant trees have value to everyone
Any timber company or sawmill that is dependent on logging or milling the few giant trees left in B.C. does not have a future.
Our remaining giant trees are close to the creeks and rivers that provide our communities with drinking water. Our remaining giant trees shade the creeks and rivers that are the spawning grounds of our fading salmon stocks.
Our remaining giant trees are worth at least as much to our economy as tourist destinations as they are worth to our sawmilling economy.
Tourism is an industry that is sustainable and has the potential to expand. Logging or sawmilling giant trees is not sustainable and will not expand.
I can tour the interior of Vancouver Island and see a few giant trees here and there. I can see huge moss-covered stumps providing a nursery for new trees.
The second growth in some places tells me there will be giant trees again, in another 100 or 200 years, long after my grandchildren or great-grandchildren will be dead.
I hope my descendants will be able to tour the interior of Vancouver Island and see with their most of the giant trees that I can see now.
Steve Cooley
Campbell River
Another Yukon highlight from Prince Philip
I remember vividly my mother telling me the story about the Duke of Edinburgh, the pie and the fork.
I remember standing on the side of the road in 1959 when the Duke was riding past in a convertible. He shouted out to people watching: “Can you get the dogs off the road?”
Dogs running loose in the Yukon in 1959 was a normal occurrence!
Tanya Jarvis
Port Alberni
Hey Raeside, our children are beautiful
I take my two children to elementary school daily. They are beautiful.
Like all humans, they have 42 muscles which give their beautiful expressions. I took them there this morning to school and while dropping them off I watch briefly all the students interacting and using these amazing 42 muscles creating all the experiences which make us human.
Except for those children wearing masks, most of those muscles are hidden as if they have anything to be ashamed of. All of the children I saw were in good health, unlike the image from Adrian Raeside, which shows six of eight children being sick.
This cannot be more misleading and in such a societally harmful way.
Young families are struggling during this health panic. If you do not have young children you cannot understand the difficulties these parents are facing and it’s not from the virus.
Perhaps Raeside should stick to satire to improve government reporting. We need to relegate the rabbit hole of “expert opinion,” which is the lowest-quality science, and push authorities to start showing data and research.
The Danish mask effectiveness study and the Wuhan total population study would be good starts.
Dan Richards
Saanich
Music in schools needs our support
I taught Grade 1 many years ago in Esquimalt at schools where music and the arts were nurtured from an early age.
Around 40 years later, I started to hear from former students and noticed how blessed these children had been to attend schools where music was a priority.
Many of their life careers involved music in some way: a prima ballerina in the United States, a Canadian singing duo, an international authority on Renaissance music, to name a few.
As the B.C. government recently announced the Amplify B.C. Fund, which will give more than $22 million to the music industry spread over three years, perhaps $1 million could be retained as a perpetual loan fund for music education.
It seems whenever the school district runs short of funds, music programs are first on the chopping block.
Gail Brighton
Nanoose Bay
Virus fatigue is our own fault
For the past several months, I have decided to ignore most of the news relating to the current COVID-19 pandemic.
Why? Because the ongoing rhetoric and debate relating to it are too frequently wrong, stupid, misleading or alarmist in nature, or advocated by those who have no idea of what they are talking about. Sadly, it fuels anxiety, frustration and anger; exactly what we don’t need during this crisis.
The messaging by our experts (epidemiologists, virologists, infectious disease specialists) continues to be consistent and simple: “Don’t be a host, wear a mask, limit travel, and socialization, and sign up for vaccination.”
Those who chose not to follow this very simple prescription, the young, middle-aged or old, have only themselves to blame if they end being victimized by this pathogen.
For those who don’t follow the rules, because it is an infringement on “their rights,” let me remind them that it is my “right” not to be exposed or infected with this virus due to their failure to protect themselves and others from their narcissistic behaviour.
For the anti-vaxxers of the same ilk as the preceding anti-rule followers, stay at home and away from my family and friends.
Finally, if the younger male and female population feel especially hard done by due to accusations of their non-compliance, one need only drive by any one of our middle or secondary schools to see them congregating, unmasked, chatting it up with their friends.
Let’s quit debating the rules, blame-shifting in our frustration with our current reality, and simply do as we are asked; follow the protocols mandated by expertise in the field of infectious disease and pandemic management. I continue to take my lead from one voice: Dr. Bonnie Henry.
John Stevenson
Victoria
University field should be reopened
The COVID-19 pandemic has made those of us who live in a city realize the great importance of open space where walkers may feel safe and not be obliged to wear stifling masks.
To the southeast of the University of Victoria campus is a 16-hectare field that for 50 years was open to the public. It was a popular place for walkers, runners and people exercising their dogs.
At the beginning of the pandemic the gates to the field were chained shut with signs announcing that the field was now closed to the public because of the risk of COVID-19.
It is now recognized that the main factor in the transmission is crowds. Areas where walkers are widely spread are the best locations for public recreation. This of course was unknown to the university authorities when they prohibited access to the field.
I understand that the UVic has owned the field for 50 years. They have stated that it is “vital for the future physical expansion of the university.” I assume this means the construction of new buildings after due planning and permitting — an option that has been a possibility for the university for all the years that the field was open to the public.
What has changed to decide the university authorities to close the field? Certainly not the pandemic. While they deliberate on its future, I suggest it be used as a very important public amenity — as it has been for 50 years.
Robert Horn
Victoria
Mental challenges demand treatment
When will governments at all levels recognize that we are suffering from a failed mental-health experiment?
The closing of mental-health care facilities basically casting people out onto the streets to fend for themselves is an unmitigated disaster.
People with severe menta-health challenges many with addiction problems should be placed in protective, secure and safe treatment centres. These facilities should be designed for the purpose and run and staffed by the medical health-care system.
This is not a job for the police and others going from one crisis to another. It is not appropriate, efficient or economical. Most importantly, it does nothing to help those unfortunate people afflicted with mental challenges and certainly not society at large.
Bev Highton
Oak Bay
Wild salmon is local and even cleaner
I am not surprised — given the propaganda circulating throughout the industry — that well-intended but inexperienced workers in the open net-pen industry would worry about their future and not understand the long-term impacts and risks that technology poses to wild stocks.
Their jobs are not dependant upon wild stocks, and I can see why they would not understand those dynamics. I understand up until recently their world seemed a little rosier. I understand that they would feel confused about change.
Sadly, the situation in regards to wild salmon has not been rosy for some time. In part — the open net-pen technology is responsible for some of that decline in some areas. Worldwide, if there were any areas that did not have their wild stocks decimated after the arrival of the industry, I am sure we all would have heard about that exception straight from the PR machine of the industry.
It’s time to listen to what First Nations want as far as economic opportunities and risks in their territories. Reconciliation and UNDRIP is coming. There will be changes. I welcome them.
Dave Rolston
Port Alberni
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