The hypocrisy of our leadership: Roy Romanow says "act like Canadians again"

Nipawin - Thursday, August 16, 2001 - by: Mario deSantis

leadership
It has been my contention all along these pages of Ensign that our health care crisis has been a crisis of leadership. I showed how the root of this crisis was the dismal economic performance of the Canadian economy in the last some thirty years, and especially in the last ten years. Economist Lars Osberg has shown that the increasing Gross Domestic Product (GDP) numbers are not evidence of an increasing quality of life, and in fact he has found that in the last ten years our quality of life could have decreased by more than 10 per cent.

negative
For the record, Canada was the only country out of thirteen OECD countries to show a negative per cent change of per capita real GDP for the period 1989-96.

poverty
by
choice
I became so incensed when in the fall of last year Saskatchewan union employees rallied around Roy Romanow to save medicare. We have a health care crisis and an economic crisis because our politicians and their corporate friends have been making money at the expense of the public at large. Our politicians and corporate friends have been listening to economic gurus for directing our public policies, and one economic guru is Fred McMahon of the Fraser Institute. This economic guru has been saying that we should end poverty by ending welfare and that "the cycle of poverty is perpetuated through voluntary choice." I repeat, McMahon says that poverty is a voluntary choice, and I ask why we should continue to listen to people like McMahon.

MPs
20%
Today, 30,000 public servants went on strike to demand a fair pay raise, and union spokesman John Baglow has stated that "over the past ten years we've lost more than eleven per cent of real purchasing power... " In the meantime, Members of Parliament are enjoying a long summer vacation and their twenty per cent raise, senior managers are offered nine per cent, while federal government workers have been offered 2.5% or less. The hypocrisy of our politicians continues as patriot Roy Romanow tells 500 members of the Canadian Medical Association to cooperate to improve health care and "act like Canadians again."

------------------References

Related social and economic articles published by Ensign

Lars Osberg, McCulloch Professor of Economics , Dalhousie University http://is.dal.ca/~osberg/home.html

Canada's Disappointing Economic Performance, The Centre for the Study of Living Standards http://www.csls.ca/pdf/disecper.pdf

End poverty by ending welfare, by Fred McMahon, The StarPhoenix, August 14, 2001, Saskatoon, Saskatchewan

Federal workers hit picket lines over wage offer, CBC Canada, August 15, 2001 http://cbc.ca/cgi-bin/templates/view.cgi?/news/2001/08/15/psac_strike010815

Stop finger-pointing:Romanow, Canadian Medical Association in Quebec City, The StarPhoenix, August 15, 2001, Saskatoon, Saskatchewan


Nipawin - Thursday, August 16, 2001 - by: Mario deSantis

leadership	It has been my contention all along these pages of Ensign that our health care crisis has been a crisis of leadership. I showed how the root of this crisis was the dismal economic performance of the Canadian economy in the last some thirty years, and especially in the last ten years. Economist Lars Osberg has shown that the increasing Gross Domestic Product (GDP) numbers are not evidence of an increasing quality of life, and in fact he has found that in the last ten years our quality of life could have decreased by more than 10 per cent.

negative	For the record, Canada was the only country out of thirteen OECD countries to show a negative per cent change of per capita real GDP for the period 1989-96.

poverty by choice	I became so incensed when in the fall of last year Saskatchewan union employees rallied around Roy Romanow to save medicare. We have a health care crisis and an economic crisis because our politicians and their corporate friends have been making money at the expense of the public at large. Our politicians and corporate friends have been listening to economic gurus for directing our public policies, and one economic guru is Fred McMahon of the Fraser Institute. This economic guru has been saying that we should end poverty by ending welfare and that "the cycle of poverty is perpetuated through voluntary choice." I repeat, McMahon says that poverty is a voluntary choice, and I ask why we should continue to listen to people like McMahon.

MPs 20%	Today, 30,000 public servants went on strike to demand a fair pay raise, and union spokesman John Baglow has stated that "over the past ten years we've lost more than eleven per cent of real purchasing power... " In the meantime, Members of Parliament are enjoying a long summer vacation and their twenty per cent raise, senior managers are offered nine per cent, while federal government workers have been offered 2.5% or less. The hypocrisy of our politicians continues as patriot Roy Romanow tells 500 members of the Canadian Medical Association to cooperate to improve health care and "act like Canadians again."

------------------References
	Related social and economic articles published by *Ensign*

	Lars Osberg, McCulloch Professor of Economics , Dalhousie University http://is.dal.ca/~osberg/home.html

	Canada's Disappointing Economic Performance, The Centre for the Study of Living Standards http://www.csls.ca/pdf/disecper.pdf

	End poverty by ending welfare, by Fred McMahon, The StarPhoenix, August 14, 2001, Saskatoon, Saskatchewan

	Federal workers hit picket lines over wage offer, CBC Canada, August 15, 2001 http://cbc.ca/cgi-bin/templates/view.cgi?/news/2001/08/15/psac_strike010815

	Stop finger-pointing:Romanow, Canadian Medical Association in Quebec City, The StarPhoenix, August 15, 2001, Saskatoon, Saskatchewan