Regina,
Crime Capital of Canada, Saskatoon Makes it to Number Three Spot!
Regina,
Crime Capital of Canada, July 24, 1998
I can't get over it sports fans. The highest level of violent crime in Canada is
in Regina, and Saskatoon
is number three. From what I can see, the press is just shrugging it off. The police
chiefs of both cities said that more money needs to be spent on social programmes,
the provincial government responds with nods and nothing, and a few are demanding
increased levels of policing. The British North America Act stipulates that
there shall be "Peace, Order and Good Government." So if a balanced
budget is good government, is one out of three acceptable?
Look everybody, this is a matter not only of safety and civility, but it also involves
pride and concern for the lives of all of us. I want to hear some shouting about
this. Mumbled comments about social programming and more police is "lip service"
when you are the Detroit of Canada you better "do" something instead of
cheap low cost talk.
Law enforcement does not mean jackboots, riot squads and German shepherd dogs slobbering
and pulling at their chains to attack innocent people. Law enforcement means enough
uniformed, well trained officers, out and about the neighbourhoods showing that they
care for the safety of the public, response to a 911 call in minutes, not hours,
and attention, hard nosed get your man attention, to each and every case, big and
small. No spitting on the sidewalk, no littering, no graffiti, no jay walking and
your in court this afternoon for petty shop lifting.
The cuts in the court system, returning and remanding for years on end, has made
a mockery of the legal system and the blame rests firmly, like a pile of cow pies
on the balanced budget premier's desk. He is responsible and he has failed in his
duties. Cries for his resignation would be appropriate.
Unemployment and overcrowding in Regina
and Saskatoon coupled with alcohol and drug abuse that is going completely unchecked,
are turning both cities into ghettos. The folks who have left their reserves because
of unemployment, no opportunity, no privacy, no place to live and no hope, has driven
massive numbers of people into the urban areas. NO ADEQUATE RESPONSE HAS COME
FROM PROVINCIAL OR FEDERAL GOVERNMENTS. The cities have had to cope on their
own from their own tax base and they just can not handle the problem. This is not
to say that the high crime rates rest solely with any specific ethnic group because
poverty and loss of hope affects everyone. With huge numbers of unemployed aboriginal
people the level of acceptance of some folks being poor is extended and instead of
action, the response is food banks and the degradation that comes with welfare. (Remember
folks every time you contribute to a food bank you are adding to the misery of the
poor. Instead of a solution being found by people having to rely on food banks,
the situation is perpetuated and you are smugly thinking you have done your part,
when you only have fed someone for a day, tomorrow they will be hungry again. That
poverty is a direct result of government policy and your contribution endorses the
concept that our society needs lots of poor people.)
On top of all this, the level of caring and concern by the middle class is appallingly
subdued! 
That
attitude that, better it be someone else, rather then me, comes from years of low
expectation from the economy and the oppression that comes with ultra low minimum
wages, even for those who work, while major employers shirk their responsibilities
by forcing their employees to accept part time work as opposed to no work at all.
This acceptance of conventional broadly based poverty is especially the view of
the suits who have been elected. They want balanced budgets and no hassle What
they have produced is the highest violent crime rate in the country, with more murders,
more assaults, more rapes and more pain and suffering then anywhere else in Canada.
Think about that folks, more then Vancouver with is hordes of HIV positive druggies,
more then Toronto with its massive ethnic populations of new Canadians, more then
Montreal with its organised Motorcycle gang crime syndicates, Shame, Shame Shame.
If you know a politician, any politician give him hell, no mercy, no excuses, no
"we're doing the best we can", they take the rap for this and the premier
should ask for the resignations of each of the members of his cabinet, he should
then resign himself and call an election.
Sincerely
Timothy W. Shire
Please tell me what you think, send email to me timothy@ftlcomm.com,
snail mail: Faster Than Light Communications, Box 1776, Tisdale, SK, S0E 1T0
or fax 306 873 2155.