VOL. 4 ISSUE 35
—
ST. JOHN’S, NEWFOUNDLAND AND LABRADOR — SUNDAY THROUGH SATURDAY, SEPTEMBER 3-9, 2006
GALLERY 14
—
WWW.THEINDEPENDENT.CA —
$1.50 HOME DELIVERY (HST included); $2.00 RETAIL (HST included)
Targa team gets ready to cruise
SPORTS 28
Don Lane celebrates 30 years in the photography business
Disgruntled workers Unresolved contract issues fuel resentment in NAPE rank and file IVAN MORGAN
I
t has been more than two years since striking NAPE workers were legislated back to work by the Williams administration, and NAPE president Carol Furlong says unresolved issues left over since then have eroded morale among the rank and file. Once a collective agreement is forced on workers, Furlong continues, there is no real ability to negotiate outstanding issues such as student assistants, summer layoffs and items specific to different bargaining units. “Workers will be disenchanted with a system where the employer, in this case government, can use the power of the legislature to force a collective agreement on you,” Furlong tells The Independent. “No other employer has that kind of power, so it really interferes with your whole ability to have some empowerment with respect to your own workplace, and your collective agreement.” Furlong points to a few successes her union has achieved in the past year, such as the additional one per cent wage increase, the agreement to adjust mileage rates to the price of gas, and the resolution of the pay equity issue — but says it’s not enough. “I’m not surprised to hear that people are unhappy with an employer who takes what I would consider a somewhat unethical approach to collective bargaining … the very fact that people had no opportunity to vote on a contract is a big issue. “It’s fairly mean-spirited. People may have voted to accept something anyway but the reality is they had no opportunity.” She says it’s tough to deal with government when you have little or no negotiating power. “You are trying to go in there and convince somebody to give you something when that employer doesn’t have to.” See “We did what we had to,” page 2
QUOTE OF THE WEEK “Because of all I’ve discovered, the people I’ve met, and what I see every day in the arts, economy and life here, I know Newfoundland and Labrador is about to enter a phase of bright horizons.” — Clare-Marie Gosse says good-bye. See p. 16
Premier Danny Williams and Irish Taoiseach (prime minister) Bertie Ahern on Signal Hill in St. John’s in September 2005.
Paul Daly/The Independent
‘They are all found out in the end’ Call girls, drugs, ministers handing blank cheques to the prime minister, bribes from big business … Ireland has been dealing with a political scandal for more than a decade, an on-going story that makes Newfoundland and Labrador’s expense scandal look mild
By Ivan Morgan The Independent This is not a story about fridge magnets or gold rings. In 1992, Irish business magnate Ben Dunne was caught by police in a Miami hotel room with a call girl and a very large quantity of cocaine. He climbed up on the balcony and, high on booze and coke, threatened to jump. He didn’t jump, but he did unwittingly instigate a scandal in Ireland so sweeping, so outrageous, and so entrenched in the highest echelons of politics and business that the Irish public has become numb after a decade of revelation after jaw-dropping revelation. Corruption on an astonishing level seems to have been the norm among many of the most powerful politicians and business people in the country, and the story is far from over. Newfoundlanders are often told about the “Irish experiment” and the “Celtic tiger.” The Danny Williams administration has made a lot of effort to promote Newfoundland’s connection to Ireland. Indeed, Newfoundland’s ties
with Ireland go back centuries. The province has been actively seeking connections with Irish business since 1996. In 2004, Williams renewed an agreement with Irish government to promote trade and cultural relations between the two countries. The current Taoiseach (prime minister) of Ireland, Bertie Ahern, visited Newfoundland last year as a guest of the premier. Little is known on this side of the Atlantic about the downside of recent political and business culture of Ireland. It’s fair to say our own current government scandal looks petty in comparison. Irish journalist Frank Connolly has followed the unravelling story from the beginning. His work led to the striking of a national tribunal, which sent politicians to jail for corruption. He says it all began on that balcony in Miami. After Dunne was arrested and charged, his family — fed up with his erratic behaviour and the bad publicity it generated — began proceedings in Ireland to have him removed from the See “Only two,” page 8
BUSINESS 21
What the new soccer field brings to the city STYLE 17
Looking for a budget booze? Nicholas Gardner has an idea OPINION 5
Ray Guy investigates the true meaning of the word ‘secretariat’ Life Story. . . . . . . . . . 10 Voice from away . . . 11 Noreen Golfman . . . 15 Ray Dillon . . . . . . . . 21
Going abroad Unable to find even Newfoundlanders to fill jobs, controversial Alberta beef plant looks overseas By Pam Pardy Ghent For the Independent
O
fficials with Tyson’s Lakeside Packers beef plant in Brooks, Alta. will travel overseas to fill 250 positions — and the Canadian government is helping them do it. The company has, over the years, employed hundreds of workers from Newfoundland and Labrador. Since the at-times violent strike at the facility in 2005, employees say there are fewer workers from this country than
ever. Or, as former employee Dianne Jones says, “it used to be a lot of Newfoundlanders worked there, but they all wised up” and found work in the oil fields. The federal Human Resources Development Corporation (HRDC) is providing funding for Lakeside’s human resource department to look for workers in China, El Salvador and the Ukraine. A representative from the Alberta government has already accompanied company recruiters on some of these trips.
While overseas, company representatives screen potential employees and offer successful candidates free airfare and help in finding accommodation in Brooks. “Lakeside and some other companies in the region are working Brooks Mayor Don Weissbeck co-operatively with the Alberta However, as you know, the government to supplement our Canadian economy is robust and Canadian-based hiring efforts by the labour market is extremely recruiting workers from other competitive. A combination of countries,” Tyson company pressures from a strong oil, gas, spokesman Gary Mickelson tells resource sector and an equally The Independent. “We continue to hire in Canada. See “No unemployment,” page 2
L
2 • INDEPENDENTNEWS
uxury
SEPTEMBER 3, 2006
‘We did what we had to do, we paid the price’ From page 1 Furlong says there is a view among union members that their contribution hasn’t been truly recognized. When times were tough, she says, the public service employees carried an unfair share of the burden, through wage freezes and imposed concessions. “Now our economy is in a far better state and public employees are saying ‘We did what we had to do. We paid the price when it was required of us, and now we think we should be recognized now that times are far better economically.’” Is this affecting productivity? Furlong says if it is, it’s not because of NAPE workers, but because of endless rounds of layoffs. Remaining employees are taking on the extra work, while worrying about their own jobs. But, she says, “most people’s work ethic is very genuine, and regardless of the circumstances, people are going to try and do their very best.” The latest allegations on financial
misconduct by some MHAs don’t help morale either. While Furlong won’t comment on the specifics of the issue currently under investigation, she does say government spending practices impact NAPE members. “When you hear that there is a lot of money being flung around, that there is money for every little pet project, but there is no money to keep you employed for the summer months, or no money to give you a salary which is comparable to a salary in the private sector, that reaches out into the workplace, and of course you are going to have disgruntled workers,” she says. Furlong says NAPE is ready for negotiations when this contract expires. The economy of this province has improved tremendously, and in 2008 the province will have more money. She says public employees are not going to sit back and accept nothing. “I think everyone recognizes there is going to be more money available, and we have some issues that need to be addressed as well.”
No unemployment in Brooks From page 1 robust manufacturing sector have caused particular labour shortages in Alberta — especially in regions where the energy sector is strongest.” Brooks Mayor Don Weissbeck says just because Lakeside is trying to attract workers from overseas, it doesn’t mean they don’t want to recruit locally. “Anyone who wants a job is welcomed at Lakeside, I’m sure,” he says, adding the company lost a large percentage of its workforce after the strike in late 2005. Weissbeck says he can’t blame folks for leaving Lakeside, where the hours are long and the work cold, hard and tedious. “We don’t have an unemployment rate, so if the average person wants a good-paying job, they can find one. The workers they are bringing in are not taking a job away from anyone in our province,” he says. “We will be 40,000 workers short in 10 years’ time, even McDonald’s here are looking for foreign workers.” The mayor says the strike at the meat plant in 2005 was a black mark for Brooks. It started amidst charges of
unfair and inhumane business practices, and the picket lines turned violent at times, requiring police presence on more than one occasion. When the strike ended, many workers didn’t return to their old jobs. Weissbeck acknowledges that Lakeside has had a bad reputation, but says he does know workers there who are “quite happy” with their jobs. YOUNGEST COMMUNITY “We are the second youngest community in Canada, the average age here is between 21 and 25, and they are the ones out to make the big bucks and working in the oil fields, they are not going to work at the meat plant.” So, he says, if the workers won’t come to them, Lakeside needs to go where there are workers who will learn, work, and stay. Newfoundland and Labrador, with a jobless rate of 14.6 per cent in July (a slight decline from June’s 14.8 per cent) has the highest unemployment rate in the country. Alberta continues to enjoy a jobless rate of just 3.6 per cent, Canada’s lowest. So far this year, job growth in Alberta has risen at three times the national average.
SEPTEMBER 3, 2006
INDEPENDENTNEWS • 3
SCRUNCHINS A weekly collection of Newfoundlandia
Kelland-Dyer never gets credit, which is all she’s after …
S
o what exactly was the “noise” that caused Dean MacDonald to give up his position on the board of directors of Aurora Energy on Tuesday, the day after he was appointed? Well, none other than the queen of open-line radio herself, Sue Kelland-Dyer, who broke news of the appointment on her blog (weblog) earlier this week. Kelland-Dyer raised questions about potential conflict of interest between the appointment and MacDonald’s role as chair of Newfoundland and Labrador Hydro. Turns out that Aurora is heavy into uranium. The Michelin deposit in Labrador, which Aurora owns, is said to have enough uranium to power over 40 million homes for an entire year. Meantime, Hydro has expanded its mandate to include “any energy-related matters cabinet may see fit to direct it to,” Kelland-Dyer pointed out. “Mr. MacDonald — if you want to sit on a private or publicly traded energy boards, resign from Hydro,” she wrote. “Your interests must not seem to be in a conflict or potential conflict.” Contacted by the local media, Macdonald acknowledged there was “some noise” about a possible conflict with his appointment.
By Ryan Cleary The Independent
MONKEY BUSINESS Handsome Rex Goudie did a fabulous job as guest singer on Canadian Idol this week, but did you notice what he wore on his wrist — a Pink, White and Green bracelet. He also wore the colour of the old flag at least once during last year’s show. Now for a spot of Rex trivia … what was the name of Rex’s first band? Why none other than Purple Monkey Bomb Squad. Not exactly dripping of outport flavour … NORTHERN ROCKEFELLER The September issue of The Globe and Mail’s Report on Business magazine included a profile of John Risley, “the northern Rockefeller.” Risley, well known in these parts as a shareholder in Fishery Products International, which hasn’t fared so well since he took it over, is also chairman and founder of Clearwater Seafoods. According to the article, Risley’s first job was mowing lawns (“an average lawn was $1; a big lawn was $2”). He started out dirt poor and earned his fortune in the lobster industry. “Risley says the Rockefeller family, with its wealth and history of
UNION DUES Stella Thorne isn’t exactly a household name in Newfoundland, but the Torbay native made her mark in Canada as a union activist. Thorne worked years ago as a cook at the old Newfoundland Hotel in St. John’s. She also served as recording secretary to local 779 of the international union of Hotel and Restaurant Workers — for 38 years. It was during that time, around the mid1950s, that she negotiated what may have been the
Paul Daly/The Independent
a whole bunch of companies each out doing their own thing is there’s not much co-ordination,” he says. “Whether any of that would have helped in this year’s squid fishery is debatable but certainly wouldn’t hurt us.” McCurdy says the problem with the squid fishery is there could be no squid for years, followed by a squid glut. “Having said that, squid respond to water temperatures so we’re on notice for next year that we should be hustling to identify possible homes for squid.” The squid fishery on the Bonavista Peninsula ended in early August this year when Fishery Products International said it was no longer buying squid at its plant in the town on the
Winner
squid. “I never heard tell of it,” says McCurdy when asked if he knew that foreign vessels had been brought in to fish squid in Canadian waters. When it became clear local fish plants weren’t interested in buying much squid, McCurdy says the union checked into the possibility of selling fish “over-the-side” to vessels at sea. “We weren’t able to pinpoint anyone who had vessels available that were interested.” McCurdy reiterated the union’s position that there must be a co-ordinated approach to marketing Newfoundland seafood in a bid to maximize the return, “but also from the point of view of product and market development. “One of the problems you have with
DRIVE Our
president of the Fish, Food and Allied Workers’ union, says there was plenty of squid in Newfoundland waters this year. “Unfortunately, there was more squid than there was market,” he says. Local fish processors paid 15 cents a pound for squid, which is widely used for bait, primarily in the crab fishery. “Quite a number of companies bought enough to satisfy their bait needs for next year, with maybe limited exceptions — which is largely a function of that there happens to be a lot of squid around the world generally,” McCurdy says, adding he estimates 6,000 tonnes of squid have been taken to satisfy local markets. He says landings would be significantly higher if there was a market for
The runaway favourite best selling car in Canada for eight years straight. Totally redesigned... unequalled in its class.
Civic Sedan DX
$
†1
$0
Security Lease
Lease
$
218 $2 60
Down or Tra de $
2,165 $0
*
cial Spe/ Finance
se Lea from
†
%
5.9
60 M O N TH S
†5
MOTOR TREND ™
Car of theYear
‡
2006 Civic Sedan DX All Honda vehicles are delivered with a full tank.
Best New Economy Car †3
Automobile Journalists Association of Canada
North American Car of theYear †2
†4
www.honda.ca
All lease and finance offers are from Honda Canada Finance Inc., O.A.C. *Lease is based new 2006 Civic Sedan DX 5-speed manual (model FA1526EX) for a 60 month term, OAC. Monthly payment is $218/$260 with $2,165/$0 down payment or equivalent trade-in. Payments include $1,225 freight and PDI. $0 security deposit required. First monthly payment due at lease inception. Lease rate is 5.9%. 120,000 kilometre allowance; charge of $0.12/km for excess kilometres. Total lease obligation is $15,042/$17,940. License, insurance, applicable taxes and registration are extra. Option to purchase at lease end for $6,283 plus taxes. Special 5.9% lease financing for 60 months only available to residents of NS/PEI/NB/NL and only available on new 2006 Civic models (excluding Civic Coupe Si and hybrid models), O.A.C. †: 5.9% purchase financing for 60 months available on new 2006 Civic (excluding Civic Coupe Si and hybrid models) , O.A.C. †1: Based on annual sales by category in Canada as reported by AIAMC, January 2006 †2: North American Car of the Year awarded to 2006 Honda Civic at Detroit Auto Show January 8, 2006. †3: Best New Economy Car awarded to 2006 Civic Sedan by Automobile Journalists Association of Canada on December 6, 2005; www.ajac.ca. †4: 2006 Car of the Year awarded to 2006 Honda Civic by Motor Trend on November 22, 2005; www.motortrend.com. †5: As reported by EnerGuide published by NRCan – see www.vehicles.gc.ca for full details. Limited time offers. See your Honda dealer for full details. .
Kenmount Road 579.1999 / 800.667.9900 www.cityhonda.com
5-speed
218
hwy: L/100km
8 YEARS STRAIGHT
island’s northeast coast. Bonavista deputy mayor Hedley Butler told the CBC that fishermen were counting on the season to last for at least five weeks. Butler said there is an abundance of squid in the area, and he didn’t understand why FPI couldn’t find a food market for it. “We have a squid fishery that can, you know, keep more people home and give fishermen their unemployment and we cannot do it,” he told the CBC. “It’s very unfair, you know. I mean, millions and millions of people in the world starving to death and we have a fishery, a squid fishery. There’s lots of squid around and we cannot sell. It’s ridiculous in this day and age.”
From
50 5.7
h wy : m p g
HEALTH STATS Finally, this week, some stats from the Canadian Institute for Health Information. Newfoundland and Labrador had the highest rate of coronary artery bypass graft surgery in the country in both 2003/2004 and 2004/2005; the province had more registered and licensed practical nurses —1,055 and 524 per 100,000 people — than the national average; and we also had the lowest rates of dentists (33 per 100,000 people) and dental hygienists (16 per 100,000 people) in the country. Bad hearts and bad teeth but good people to look after us … ryan.cleary@theindependent.ca
Domestic companies try to hire foreign vessels to fish squid in Canadian waters; ultimate prize may be cod
CIVIC
Civic
BLAME GAME Risley also writes a column for Atlantic Business magazine. In the September/October issue he writes about taking a “shared responsibility” for getting Newfoundland and Labrador back on its feet. “It may appear self-serving of me to say so, but frankly it’s not helpful to retreat to a position of simply allocating blame on others whether those others might include me, my corporate interests or the government.” Risely’s right, of course. I say we blame seals for everything …
first equal-pay-for-equal-work contract in Canada. In a column for the Ottawa Citizen, Janice Kennedy wrote about Thorne and her life. Thorne, who passed away this past July, was the mother of Austin Thorne, who’s married to John Crosbie’s tequila drinking buddy, Sheila Copps. Wrote Kennedy: “Before Mrs. Thorne made the bold move of putting the equal-pay principle on the negotiating table, new contracts would invariably award raises and back pay to these inexperienced men. ‘And they not able to cook a herring. That’s true, now. That’s no lie or bluff.’ The women would keep earning what they’d always been earning. ‘When the time come for payday, they’d get about 200 bucks, and you’d get about 30 or 40. That was scandalous. And I thought, you either got to get it, or get out of it altogether.’” Rest in peace, Mrs. Thorne …
Squid jiggin’ grounds
T
here may be little money in the squid fishery for local fishermen, but two Canadian companies are in the process of hiring foreign vessels to fish squid for them inside the 200mile limit on the Grand Banks of Newfoundland. The companies — Sea Arrow, based in St. Anthony, and D’eon from “the Maritimes” — have asked the federal Department of Fisheries and Oceans (DFO) for permission to use foreign boats to fish their squid quotas. Sea Arrow has access to 3,000 tonnes of squid. D’eon has 2,500 tonnes. As it stands, the companies have met three of four conditions set out by DFO to allow the foreigners in. The companies are said to be waiting on a small cod quota to cover their bycatch or incidental catch of codfish that’s sure to be taken with the squid. Gus Etchegary, an outspoken critic of DFO management of East Coast fish stocks, says the companies are ultimately after the cod quota, because squid is worth little on world markets. “It’s the same thing happening over and over,” Etchegary says. “I’m sick of hearing about it. They’re after squid for a low market price, but they’re going to try and get as much opportunity they can to get groundfish, which sells for a higher price.” Sophie Galarneau, spokesman for the federal Department of Fisheries and Oceans in Ottawa, tells The Independent before being permitted to bring in foreign boats, the companies had to ensure there were no Canadian vessels interested in catching the squid quota. As well, she says the companies had to agree to land 25 per cent of their catch in Canada and carry an at-sea observer aboard the foreign vessels. Galarneau says the Canadian companies have yet to secure cod quotas. “It’s inevitable when you’re out there with otter trawls that you’re going to catch groundfish,” she says. Canada’s squid quota this year has been set at 29,467 tonnes, the same level set in 2005. Galarneau couldn’t say how much of this year’s squid quota has been caught to date. Sea Arrow and D’eon also applied in 2004 to have foreign vessels catch their squid quotas. Galarneau says D’eon successfully brought in a Korean ship, which caught 12 tonnes of squid over 60 days. The foreign vessel brought in by Sea Arrow that year caught 100 tonnes of squid over July and August. The squid fishery is not a stable fishery in that squid don’t show up in huge numbers every year. Earle McCurdy,
Save More per km
noblesse oblige, is a model for his life,” read the article. “Over time, he’s made his share of enemies — most notably, when Clearwater took over Fishery Products International from the province of Nova Scotia (minor boo boo there) — but it surprises him to hear he has a reputation as a tough guy.” The next line was the sweetest of all, “Seeing him murmuring to a dog cradled in his arms, he doesn’t look so tough.” That’s the Risley we all know and love …
4 • INDEPENDENTNEWS
SEPTEMBER 3, 2006
‘Out of whack’
New electoral districts designed with old data
By Ivan Morgan The Independent
the province continues the practice of fixed election dates, the 2016 election will be based on boundaries developed 14 years earlier. f you live in the greater St. John’s area, your “This is quite a serious oversight,” says next vote may not count for as much as the Conacher. “The legislature should be making it a vote of a rural Newfoundlander or Labra- priority to adjust the system so that not only are dorian. And unless things change, urban votes more recent (Statistics Canada) figures taken into will have even less impact over account, but that also adjustthe next 10 years. ments be made in a shorter time The Electoral Districts period so you don’t have a Boundaries Commission is curlong-term skewing of the seat rently conducting public heardistribution.” ings on the redefinition of the Commissioners are directed province’s 48 district boundto divide the island portion of aries. The Electoral Districts the province into 44 districts Boundaries Act directed the and Labrador into four. They commission use data from the must set the boundaries based 2001 census, now five years out on data obtained from the 2001 of date, to define the boundcensus. The commission conaries. The act also states these ducts hearings around the boundaries will remain in effect province to allow members of for a decade. the general public have input Duff Conacher, co-ordinator into the process. Officials will “It doesn’t matter of DemocracyWatch Canada, then forward their recommenwhich bills itself as Canada’s dations to the minister, who at what point in time leading democratic reform and will set the boundaries. you do it, the way government accountability “There should be no problem advocacy group, says that’s not for the legislature to quickly our demographics good enough. make an amendment (to the are changing, it’s “There is no valid reason for act) to shorten the time period being so out of date and also for to something more reasonable always going to be delaying further changes anothlike three to five years, and to an issue, and I guess er 10 years,” Conacher tells The base the current redistribution Independent. on more recent census,” says we’ll never have a Kelvin Parsons, former minConacher. truly valid system ister of Justice under Liberal Failure to do so, says Roger Grimes, and current that has equal numbers Conacher, seriously damages opposition Justice critic, says the public’s interest in having a within each district.” the electoral boundaries are balanced and fair district distribehind the time because the bution system. election of 2003 was called in Kelvin Parsons says the Kelvin Parsons the middle of the commission’s province is “out of whack” for inquires. The commission did the 2007 election. not restart until 2004. He also says the system is not perfect. Tobias Macdonald, legal counsel for the “It doesn’t matter at what point in time you do boundaries commission, says those involved it, the way our demographics are changing, it’s have no power to address the issues surrounding always going to be an issue, and I guess we’ll population shifts since 2001, and no power to never have a truly valid system that has equal suggest redrawing district boundaries sooner numbers within each district,” says Parsons. than 10 years from the finalizing of the current Parsons points out that geography is also a facboundaries. Such changes could only come with tor in deciding electoral boundaries, with some an amendment to the act. rural districts having fewer voters than average. As the situation stands, district boundaries will He cites Torngat Mountains as an example. not reflect population decreases in some rural Parsons also wonders — if census figures condistricts since 2001. Nor will it take into account tinue show our province’s population is shrinking the growth in population on the northeast Avalon. — whether the province even needs 48 districts. This disparity is set to grow. Next year’s elecJustice Minister Tom Marshall could not be tion will be based on data six years out of date. If contacted for comment.
I
Paul Daly/The Independent
Wait time report incomplete: medical association By Mandy Cook The Independent
T
he association representing the province’s doctors says a recent report on improved wait times for certain medical procedures does not reflect the whole picture. Robert Ritter, executive director of the Newfoundland and Labrador Medical Association, says the clock starts ticking once a patient sees a specialist and stops when they undergo surgery. The report, released Aug. 22 by the province, does not include the time a patient may spend waiting to get in to see a specialist after a referral. Securing an appointment with a general practitioner in the first place can also be difficult, due to a provincial shortage of family doctors. “Some people might put off going to see the doctor, which can be problematic because they end up at the emergency room,” says Ritter. “We also know many GPs spend an awful lot of time trying to track down specialists for their patients … A great deal of the whole wait time problem relates to the availability of the right kind of professional expertise.” Noel Brown, a GP in St. John’s for the past 39 years, says wait times for many diagnostic procedures and specialists are actually going up. “It was better here 20 years ago than it is now, believe it or not,” he says. “Even routine procedures like bone density (tests) will take six to eight months. The situation for some of these things is just unreal. You would think you could get a bone scan done fairly urgently on somebody with bone pain that you suspect might have metastatic cancer or something like that, but you just can’t.” The report outlines an overall improvement in certain procedures, such as joint replacements and cardiac surgery, in accordance with national benchmarks. Ritter says the medical association
is pleased the provincial government is making headway in shortening some wait times, but says its stretched some departments thin in its attempt to do so. “In order to accomplish what they did, they really did over-extend themselves,” says Ritter. “There are two vacancies (in radiation oncology) they’ve been trying to staff for some time now and haven’t been able to get anybody. So you really have four oncologists doing the work of six. “They cannot sustain that level of effort indefinitely which means we feel the prospect of maintaining the standard is adrift.” A spokeswoman for the Department of Health says the province bases its findings on the national benchmark established by the federal government last year. “We are just following national standards like every other province in the country,” she says. Ritter says additional data indicating the wait times between booking an appointment with a GP through to an actual surgical procedure could be easily built into any kind of reporting system. “It wouldn’t be that hard to be tracking the information that we’re asking for or that we’re saying is important,” he says. “You don’t have to be a rocket scientist to be able to capture that kind of information.” But it is the specific types of procedures outlined in the report that Ritter is most concerned with. For example, a hip replacement is an acute pain issue and can be resolved once the joint replacement is complete. Ritter says there is “a very long wait” for those who experience chronic pain, including people suffering from arthritis who must see a specialist numerous times in order to be properly diagnosed. “You have a situation where if the condition progresses over a year or two year period without some kind of intervention, some of it can be irreversible,” says Ritter.
You’re busy, your phone shouldn’t be. You focus on what you do best, let us do what we do best. We’ll answer your calls, take the sales leads, and pass them on to you. And we’ll do it all at a surprisingly affordable cost. Call our award winning answering services and find out how we can help your business grow.
1- 8 88 - 693 -2255 • 709-722-3730 • www.telelinkcallcentre.com
SEPTEMBER 3, 2006
INDEPENDENTNEWS • 5
A secretariat for all seasons From Smallwood to Tobin to Williams: how we got from ‘Great New Industry’ to ‘Rural Secretariat’
Y
our little tyke comes up to you, eyes full of innocent wonder, and asks: “Daddy, what’s a secretariat?” Too quickly you may respond: “She’s a bad person who tells lies because Daddy never laid a finger on … Oh.” Quickly you attempt to mend your faux pas: “A famous racehorse? Something the United Nations is maggoty with? Oh. Ah ha. My clever little man!” “A secretariat is something which, way back in poor Mr. Smallwood’s time, used to be called a Great New Industry. It costs politicians nothing, it means nothing but it has been a favourite trick of Newfoundland politicians for more than 60 years. Now, run along and bug your mother.” It’s a little more complicated than that, of course, but not much. It falls into the category of BS baffles brains. The unspeakable Tobin was a master practitioner who said things like, “We intend to reopen the file and move it forward.” This had a slight appearance of actually meaning something. It meant nothing but another worm squirm. Tobin,
RAY GUY
A poke in the eye tutored in Ottawa, spewed them out night and day … “this point in time,” “at the end of the day,” “down the road.” Keep those lips flapping and they’ll never catch on. Always a “task force” or a “new strategy” or a “rationalization” or a “royal commission” to dazzle the dimwits. No later than Friday I heard a brand new one (to me) when the Honourable Mr. Hickey spoke of something called a “Senior Working Officials Group.” Spread a bit of jam on that and the voters up the St. Barbe coast are likely to leave the radio open-line shows alone for at least 48 hours. How did we get from “Great New Industry” to “Rural Secretariat” in a mere 60 years? We really can’t call poor Mr. Smallwood the father of it. Joey merely took a political trick as old as Buckley’s Goat and ran with it. And ran and ran.
Except for getting the same type of sleazebag politician reelected, it gets us neither here nor there: “The cow kicked Nelly in the belly in the barn; didn’t do her any good, didn’t do her any harm.” As the old coots among us will remember, Smallwood got more than 20 years out of the Great New Industries version. THE QUAINT SPECTACLE It was simple enough. Joey and a small gang of his favourites would skip off to foreign parts with the large announcement that they would return with a Great New Industry. They’d come back with some large wooden crates and a German or two and declare it to be a rubber plant or an eyeglass factory or an orange juice bottling works. This quaint spectacle would dazzle the great unwashed at least until the election was over. Then, before too many noticed the Great New Industry had more holes than Swiss cheese, there would be another great announcement of another G.N.I. In the latter days, the word got out and world-class carpetbaggers like John Shaheen and John C. Doyle
saved Joey and pals those trips abroad. They kindly came here and relieved us of what tax breaks, resources and loose cash might be weighing us down. Between then and now not much has changed. Whenever we have something to give away there is always someone to graciously relieve us. And politicians to convince us they’ve brought us a day’s march nearer home. Same tricks, different names. In the present day, the fishery is down to the last tom cod, the lights are blinking out all along the coast, those who can have lashed the mattress to the roof of the car to brave the dangers of the untamed west. Although at a pinnacle of his popularity, a few murmurs against Danny Dealhead have arisen. Has the Mighty Mite ignored a dicey present for some oily future? A murmur is all it takes to make Danno’s beady little eyes shoot death rays. And, lo, he did gather together about him in a great hall all who were sniveling, all who were disquieted, all who were fishless and did say unto them: You, you, you and you. You are hereby and henceforth to be a Great New Rural Secretariat.
Case closed, says Danny. Baymen can frig with fish; Townies to me and a gassy tomorrow. It is the extreme pomposity of that title, Rural Secretariat, which all but gives the game away. It might make a cat laugh. Even the stunnedest Bayman must snicker. Tom Rideout is, we must suppose, hailed in Iceland as a part of the Rural Secretariat to make sure yet again that their codfish really do resemble our codfish. Dan Williams has traveled on with the Townie Secretariat to Norway to immerse themselves in oil. I can see Secretariats become our new Great New Industries. Surely, those Secretariats will pup all over the place. Clones to begin with and then a breeding program. Hickey’s “Senior Working Officials Group” sounds mighty like a Secretariat in embryo. Let me put in an early non-denominational word in. Let none of our Honourable Gentlemen, no matter race, creed, politics, colour or class, suffer. For an Orange and Grapefruit Secretariat with a fact-finding trip to Florida in March … ladies and gentlemen, the Honourable Eddie Joyce!
SHIPPING NEWS Keeping on eye on the comings and going of the ships in St. John’s harbour. Information provided by the Coast Guard Traffic Centre. MONDAY
Vessels Arrived: Rebecca, America, from Twillingate; ASL Sanderling, Canada, from Halifax; Maersk Dispatcher, Canada, from Orphan Basin; Maersk Chancellor, Canada, from White Rose. Vessels Departed: Oceanex Avalon, Canada, to Montreal. TUESDAY
Vessels Arrived: Olivia, Norway, from Faroes; Maersk Detector, Canada, from Orphan Basin. Vessels Departed: ASL Sanderling, Canada to Corner Brook; Maersk Nascopie, Canada, to Hibernia; Olivia, Norway, to sea; Maersk Placentia, Canada, to Hibernia. WEDNESDAY
Vessels Arrived: Diamond Star, Canada, to Quebec; Atlantic Hawk, Canada, from White Rose; Sauniere, Canada, from Grand Entrée. Vessels Departed: Maersk Chancellor, Canada, to Terra Nova; Maersk Dispatcher, Canada, to Orphan Basin; Diamond Star, Canada, to Holyrood. THURSDAY
Vessels Arrived: Jean Charcot, Britain, from sea; Maersk Nascopie, Canada, from Hibernia; Maersk Placentia, Canada, from Hibernia; Cabot, Canada, from Montreal. FRIDAY
NAPE president Carol Furlong
Paul Daly/The Independent
‘This is about people’s lives’ Experienced highway plow operators may not be back By Ivan Morgan The Independent
N
APE president Carol Furlong says some of the people most experienced at winter highway maintenance are not coming back to work for the province. “Many of our skilled workers are being laid off for the summer months, particularly the highway equipment operators,” she says. “Because they get laid off, they have a choice: either take a reduction in salary by moving to a lower paying job — unskilled, or take the summer off. If they take the summer off, they have no income “So they are going away to work. Now they are telling us ‘No, we are not coming back. Why would we come back when we don’t know from year to year if we are going to have a job and furthermore, we are making really good money when we get away?”
“You can’t expect someone to drop his job in Alberta to come home on the chance that he might be called up. He’s not going to do it. And nor should he.” Carol Furlong Furlong tells The Independent the province is losing the workers it needs to keep highways safe in winter. She says this could be a safety issue. “At a time when people are scared to be travelling the roads, because of sleet and ice, you want to make sure you have people there who know what they are doing.” Furlong says some of them will not be in place for the first snowfall, espe-
cially if it comes early. “We went to government last winter and said, ‘you have to recall your people now because if you don’t do it now, you’re not going to have them back in time.’ We don’t know when the snow is going to fall. Our weather is very unpredictable and you have to have your people in place. This is about safety — this is about people’s lives.” She says there is little incentive for many of these skilled workers to return to the province. “You can’t expect someone to drop his job in Alberta to come home on the chance that he might be called up. He’s not going to do it. And nor should he,” says Furlong. She says the irony of some government initiatives can be frustrating. “The government is having town hall meetings to try and find out how to keep skilled workers in the province, while they are laying off their own skilled workers.”
Vessels Arrived: Burin Sea, Canada, from Conception Bay; Resa Angler, Norway, from Orphan Basin; Cicero, Canada, from Halifax. Vessels Departed: Cabot, Canada, to Montreal; Resa Angler, Canada, to Orphan Basin; Burin Sea, Canada, to Terra Nova; Sauniere, Canada, to Grande Entrée; Cicero, Canada, to Montreal.
A LITTLE OF YOUR TIME IS ALL WE ASK. CONQUERING THE UNIVERSE IS OPTIONAL. Think it requires heroic efforts to be a Big Brother or Big Sister? Think again. It simply means sharing a few moments with a child. Play catch. Build a doghouse. Or help take on mutant invaders from the planet Krang. That’s all it takes to transform a mere mortal like yourself into a super hero who can make a world of difference in a child’s life. For more information...
Big Brothers Big Sisters of Eastern Newfoundland 1-877-513KIDS (5437) www.helpingkids.ca
6 • INDEPENDENTNEWS
SEPTEMBER 3, 2006
A fishing story A
ttention Newfoundlanders out for a fight — this column’s for you. You may have read a news piece this week about a Portuguese trawler cited for illegal fishing. The Independent had the story nailed down but it broke in another media before we could get it to print. Normally the story would have been dropped altogether at that point, but the article’s author missed a critical point. Wait for it … The Joana Princesa was caught with its pants down on Aug. 25 in the act of raping the Grand Banks of Newfoundland. Rape is a harsh, harsh word that’s only used these days in American courts, but it’s a lot stronger than Canada’s word for the crime, sexual assault, and a much more fitting description for what foreigners do every day — decade in, decade out — to our precious fishing grounds. Two Canadian inspectors aboard a zodiac snuck up on the trawler just as it was pulling in its net. The inspectors asked to be allowed on board, but the foreign crew ignored them. (No. 1 slap in the face for the fighting
RYAN CLEARY
Fighting Newfoundlander Newfoundlanders keeping count.) One of the two determined inspectors then maneuvered the zodiac alongside the Princesa (not exactly a name befitting a rapist), while the second officer dared a high seas boarding. The Portuguese wouldn’t lower a boarding ladder. (No. 2 slap in the face — the Canadian inspector could have been killed.) Both inspectors eventually got on board to find the Portuguese had been fishing with a liner inside their net. The foreign crew tried to get rid of the evidence, but they weren’t quick enough for our high seas lawmen. A liner was once described to me as an onion bag — water and stunted plankton are about all that can get through. Whatever fish the foreign crew was chasing that day didn’t stand a chance. The Canadian inspectors then waited on board the foreign trawler for a day and a half until an European
Union patrol vessel could steam to their coordinates and verify the citation. In fact, the EU officers found the illegal liner was even smaller than the Canadians had reported — fish the size of pens and pencils were about all that could swim through its mesh (oh, for the days of palm-sized catches). CITATION STUCK In the end, the citation stuck. The Canadian inspectors were picked up by their mother ship and the EU patrol boat went on its way. Before I get to what happened to the Portuguese rapist/trawler, I should mention a little about the vessel’s history. The Princesa (there’s that sweet name again) was cited in December 2004 for illegally catching more than five tonnes of American plaice, a species under moratoria. In that particular incident, Canadian inspectors boarded the Joana Princesa and discovered the unprocessed plaice on the ship’s deck. The inspectors found even more fish when the net was pulled in (like you would). In 2003, the same vessel was issued three citations, including one for exceeding the five per cent bycatch
limit for American plaice. It was also charged in 2001 for using small-mesh gear. In other words, the Portuguese trawler is a serial rapist. So what became of the Princesa once the citation was issued and the authorities went on their way? Wait for it … Contacted in Brussels, Fisheries Minister Loyola Hearn patted the Canadian government on the back for doing such a good job, which they are, of keeping check on the foreign fleets. “We have a constant presence and have done a very good job in monitoring,” Hearn was quoted as saying. NAFO REFORMATION He’s a firm believer NAFO can be reformed. Forget the fact that Newfoundland politicians have been trying to do that for a generation, starting with Smallwood in ’71. Hearn’s a believer. He’s trying to put teeth into an organization that’s been toothless since the day it was born. He will fail like the ministers before him. Countries such as Norway have begun taking a heavier hand against Spanish and Portuguese vessels,
known there as “trawler pirates.” Dozens of fishing vessels have been arrested, but even that doesn’t seem to be working. In July, the captain and owner of a Spanish trawler arrested for illegal fishing in Norwegian waters announced they had no intention of paying fines levied against them by local police — who don’t seem to be able to do much about it. What’s clear is that countries adjacent to fish resources must have the power to enforce quotas and arrest ships. Diplomacy is a joke — Loyola is a fool if he believes otherwise. So what happened to the Joana Princesa once the authorities went on their way? What was the repeat rapist allowed to do as soon as it was released on the Grand Banks of Newfoundland after being caught redhanded? The answer is a perfect example of why custodial management is our only prayers and the Conservative government must be forced to live up to its commitments, come hell or high water. The Princesa resumed fishing. ryan.cleary@theindependent.ca
YOUR VOICE Button A or button B? Dear editor, In the blizzard of rhetoric that surrounds the fisheries some things have become more clear and some things less clear. What is clearer is that Ottawa does not care about the fisheries and it cares even less about the people of Newfoundland. What is less clear is why Ottawa does not care about the fisheries. This resource is potentially the most valuable in all of Canada, worth more than all the timber and oil and nickel. This is food, the most vital resource there is. The rest of the world appreciates the value of this resource, as they are all here carting it away. It is clear that Norway knows the value of fish, as they have taken the necessary steps to restore their fishery. Timber has to be replanted. Oil is going to run out. Corn, wheat, rape and other crops have to be replanted every year and fertilized and tilled and harvested at greater and greater expense. All that has to be done with the fish is to be careful not to kill it off. If this were any other natural resource, Ottawa would not allow all the nations that are out taking fish, with and without quotas, to come to Canada and take them away. I can imagine Spain being allowed to come to Canada and harvest timber, and while they were at it steal a couple of million board feet now and then. I don’t think anyone would be quite so sanguine about Portugal pumping oil on the continent and swiping a couple of thousand barrels
while they were at it. The mantra I hear from DFO is “we need more science.” A tenth grade remedial biology student knows there are three sure-fire ways to eliminate a species from the planet: one, hunt it to extinction; two, take away its habitat; and three, take away its food source. All three of those things are being done at the same time to the fish stock. The solutions are easy to cite, politically difficult to effect. But I think they are achievable and well worth the effort. Take over custodial management of the 200-hundred mile limit and the continental shelf, including the nose and tail of the Grand Banks. Stop all dragging. Stop caplin fishing. Stop all foreign fishing. If the nations of the world want fish, they can buy it or trade it. They should not be allowed to come and take it away. Since the moratorium, Ottawa, DFO, and successive ministers of Fisheries have done little to change the causes of the collapse of the fish stocks. There is a saying that goes: If you push button A and you do not like the response you get, stop pushing button A. It seems to me that the people of Newfoundland are jumping up and down on button A and nothing is changing. It is a daunting thought, but it could be that button B is Pink, White and Green. Dick Ellsworth, Elliston
Missing the bus Dear editor, I was talking to someone at Metrobus in St. John’s the other day about the fact that Route 3 is late quite often this summer. I forgot to mention that this is not a new occurrence. I have been using Route 3 since 1997 and if I recall correctly I have had trouble with the route being late for a number of summers since then. It is even more difficult to get Route 3 to be on time on Fridays, especially in the summer. As far back as 1997 during the summer season there is always some harbour construction or other work on Water Street, or some kind of festival that ends up holding up traffic and ensuring buses will be late. Surely, we are all aware of the fact that there will be
traffic problems and so on. I mean the radio and TV stations always give notice that there are going to be traffic problems in the downtown area because of construction and so on. Regarding the harbour construction this year, we were all well aware for weeks before the summer that there would be traffic delays because of the construction. Why didn’t Metrobus decide to reroute the buses then? In future, I am hoping that Metrobus will keep abreast of the traffic reports and reroute certain buses ahead of time when we have all been warned in advance that construction on certain routes will interfere with traffic flow. Sheila Hunters, St. John’s
AN INDEPENDENT VOICE FOR NEWFOUNDLAND & LABRADOR
P.O. Box 5891, Stn.C, St. John’s, Newfoundland & Labrador, A1C 5X4 Ph: 709-726-4639 • Fax: 709-726-8499 www.theindependent.ca • editorial@theindependent.ca The Independent is published by Independent News Ltd. in St. John’s. It is an independent newspaper covering the news, issues and current affairs that affect the people of Newfoundland & Labrador.
PUBLISHER Brian Dobbin EDITOR IN CHIEF Ryan Cleary MANAGING EDITOR Stephanie Porter PICTURE EDITOR Paul Daly PRODUCTION MANAGER John Andrews
sales@theindependent.ca • production@theindependent.ca • circulation@theindependent.ca All material in The Independent is copyrighted and the property of The Independent or the writers and photographers who produced the material. Any use or reproduction of this material without permission is prohibited under the Canadian Copyright Act. • © 2006 The Independent • Canada Post Agreement # 40871083
The Independent welcomes letters to the editor. Letters must be 300 words in length or less and include full name, mailing address and daytime contact numbers. Letters may be edited for length, content and legal considerations. Send your letters in care of The Independent, P.O. Box 5891, Station C, St. John’s, NL, A1C 5X4 or e-mail us at editorial@theindependent.ca
‘Sadly misinformed’ A
ndy Wells, the infamously outspoken mayor of St. John’s, made a statement last week during the city council meeting about Heavenly Creatures, the five-year-old St. John’s animal charity of which I am president and co-founder. He said the SPCA has to do the “dirty work” of euthanizing unwanted animals. The mayor said humane services is “constantly bombarded with euthanasia requests” from Heavenly Creatures. We’ve asked for proof and an apology — we’ve yet to receive either. What Mayor Wells said about Heavenly Creatures was slanderous. We should sue, but we don’t have the money or the energy to fight City Hall. We are too busy and broke fighting the kind of ignorance that brings a skinny, cowering puppy in through our doors at midnight. Truth is, we save the city money by taking care of animals that would otherwise end up at humane services. We are constantly bombarded by calls from concerned owners who can no longer keep their pet, and would rather bring their pet to us than deal with the city. These people don’t want their pet to have a matter of days to a couple of weeks to find a new home before being “put to sleep.” We reduce the city’s “dirty work” — not add to it. The mayor also said he wanted to inform the public that Heavenly Creatures has no credibility. He asked where our shelter is located. “Where are its employees? Its money? Its volunteers?” Since the mayor has refused to meet with us, or even talk to us on the phone, we can only hope he reads The Independent. Heavenly Creatures has a no-kill policy, which means that every animal we take in is guaranteed a home unless they become unadoptable through sickness or aggression. No-kill shelters are becoming more and more common. Out of nearly 1,000 animals that
JESSICA RENDELL
Guest column Since the mayor has refused to meet with us, or even talk to us on the phone, we can only hope he reads The Independent. have come into our care, we’ve euthanized 12. We took them (with heavy hearts) — not to Humane Services or the SPCA — but to veterinarians. We have the receipts to prove it. Our shelter is a network of foster homes where animals typically spend less than two months until adopted. Volunteers are the heart and soul of the organization. They open their homes to starving dogs, old cats, frightened kittens (even iguanas) and treat them like their own until they find permanent placement. What better shelter could you ask for? Heavenly Creatures has rigorous screening procedures and lawyerapproved, fostering and adoption applications and contracts. From our office at 127 Queens Rd. (up the street from City Hall — Mayor Wells doesn’t have far to go if he ever decides to seek the truth) we field an average of 30 calls/e-mails daily. Everything from people seeking to give up their pet to lost animal calls — even calls about injured birds. We work with other rescue groups, and we’re on the go at all hours, putting maximum energy into minimizing the suffering of the helpless. Our money comes from the sweat of our brows and the kindness of hundreds
of supporters. We charge adoption fees, hold fundraisers such as flea markets and walk-a-thons and concerned, generous people and businesses mail or drop off donations. We are currently ensuring that 40 foster animals have food, shelter — and love. When I was a little girl, I read and reread a story the local SPCA ran in their newsletter about Mayor Wells finding a stray dog trapped under a wharf — threatened by the incoming tide. Wells went to the trouble to hire a scuba diving company to save that dog. I was full of admiration. This is why I believe that in the case of Heavenly Creatures, Wells has been sadly misinformed. Would he only take the time to meet with us I think he would find that we have a lot in common. Heavenly Creatures understands that sometimes euthanasia is the most humane thing for a sick animal, and sometimes a necessary evil for a homeless animal if there is no alternative. The tragedy is that because of the overpopulation problem there is an enormous amount of homeless animals; the rescue organizations in our province combined couldn’t house them all. However, we feel strongly that mass euthanization is not the long-term answer — spaying and neutering programs, and educations programs are. Newfoundland and Labrador is one of the few remaining places in North America that doesn’t have some kind of spay and neutering assistance. In St. John’s, you can bring your animal to the city to be euthanized for free, but can’t get help with getting it fixed. That’s one of the reasons why the local branch of the SPCA and the City of St. John’s humane services division were forced to euthanize over 2,000 animals last year. Most of those animals — a number equivalent to the human population of Glovertown — were healthy. That’s just not good enough. Jessica Rendell is Heavenly Creatures.
president
of
SEPTEMBER 3, 2006
INDEPENDENTNEWS • 7
Police have explaining to do T
here are people out there you should never trifle with. I fear Dale Worthman and Kimberly Lockyer found this out — tragically, too late — in the last hours of their lives. My apologies to the friends and relations of Dale Worthman and Kim Lockyer if this column offends them. I am trying to make a point. I live in St. Philip’s, and I was living there in 1993, and I remember 13 years ago when they disappeared in ominous circumstances. I remember it well. I had four young children, with friends in the same neighbourhood where these people lived. The circumstances at the time clearly pointed to the two having been murdered. That was very upsetting. St. Philip’s was, as it is today, a small bedroom satellite of St. John’s — a place where people raise their kids. A lot of people had questions at the time, wondering what happened to Worthman and Lockyear. There was a lot of speculation and rumour. It was scary. As time passed, many of us came to the same conclusion. Now we know we were right, and I
IVAN MORGAN
Rant & Reason have questions — and I suspect a lot of others have them too. And I want them answered. The police are very spare with their information, and they use a lot of legalese and euphemism to describe the situation as it currently stands. The coroner says they were both shot to death. Does he mean executed? A pond was searched, but no one will say what they were looking for. In light of the fact we have the bodies, why won’t they say they were searching for the murder weapon? Are we are all supposed to stay on the sidelines, mind our business and let the professionals do their job? Not good enough. Why weren’t the bodies found earlier? They were buried in a bog up a side road in the community. Did it not occur
YOUR VOICE Environment minister must prove he’s not just another ‘forestry puppet’ Dear editor, On July 31, Clyde Jackman released to the public a management plan outlining the steps to be taken to protect wildlife species listed as vulnerable under provincial endangered species legislation. At the time the minister said, “Management plans outline a course of actions primarily aimed at ensuring that a vulnerable species does not become threatened or endangered.” Included in this species list was the five-year management plan for boreal felt lichen. Unfortunately, despite the minister’s good intentions all indications are that the boreal felt lichen management plan has failed its first test. One of the most signifi- Clyde Jackman cant recommendations in the management plan was that before logging or other developments could take place in potential boreal felt lichen habitat, field surveys would have to be conducted to determine the status of the species. And if the lichen was present then landscape management protection rather than the unilateral 20-meter buffer used by forestry during this past decade would supersede. Further, if the boreal felt lichen were found in tree stands where a proposed development could affect its survival this would trigger an evaluation of the stand. As a contributing member to the development of the boreal felt lichen management plan I was led to believe the plan would allow our wildlife division to have significant input into future logging operations, specifically as it pertained to lichen conservation. Sadly but not surprising, our senior forestry bureaucrats have shown us once again just how insignificant the
Department of Conservation and Environment is and has been during the past three decades when it comes to protecting wildlife habitat from clear-cut logging. The irrelevance of the department is demonstrated by forestry’s decision to ignore the boreal felt lichen management plan and construct a 3.5 km access road into the final stand of commercial old growth forest left on the Avalon located near Ocean Pond. The area is a known boreal felt lichen habitat and a full assessment of the species is required under the provincial Endangered Species Act before any development takes place. Since I have already documented over 300 boreal felt lichen on 180 trees in the area and made application to have the area designated a wildlife reserve all the necessary criteria is there for the minister to trigger intervention by endangered species and biodiversity wildlife division. In addition this road will cost taxpayers around $100,000 to build and could end up being a waste of public funds if the area should prove to be worthy of protection or if the boreal felt lichen population is significant enough to restrict the amount of available timber. I call on Minister Jackman to halt construction of the Halls Gullies/Neil’s Pond/Round Pond West access road and show us for once that unlike his predecessors he is not just another forestry puppet. Eugene Conway, Newfoundland Lichen Education and Research Group, Conception Harbour
to anyone 13 years ago to check the side roads in the very community where they disappeared for recently disturbed soil or vegetation? Did no one think to look in areas where it was relatively easy to dig? As a wise acquaintance observed recently, “Do you know how hard it is to dig a hole in Newfoundland?” That narrows the options. Assuming, as most of us in my community did, that these two did not run away to points unknown, would it not have been reasonable to then try and put oneself in the minds of the evil person or people who did this? Someone committing an intentional and pitiless double murder would necessarily want to quickly dispose of the “evidence” and then get away as fast as possible. So they went up a local side road, dug a hole where it was easy to dig a hole, dispensed with the two unfortunates, and took off. Do they live in the community today? What upsets me the most is it seems to have worked. Has crime paid for the murderer of these two? Did our police force do a competent job searching for
them at the time? No doubt this question pisses them off, but Brenda Young was murdered that same summer, and police insisted at the time, and for years afterwards, they knew what they were doing in that case. They didn’t. My point here is not to take cheap shots at or anger the RNC. My point is to try and make the RNC brass realize the people who pay the salaries of the RNC — the taxpayers — need to be more confident in them. We need to be better informed. I think the RNC needs to look at its image and its communications strategy. Continuing to issue terse statements isn’t enough. Today’s force is, I hope, a different force from the one in 1993. But it is still a culture that is spare with information and takes the attitude that we should all shut up and let them do their jobs, which was their attitude with the Randy Druken and Greg Parsons cases. Am I saying the RNC lacks competence? I hope not. But they need to be sensitive to the fact that we need to know more.
Two people were “shot to death” in our community, and then buried right in our community, and the crime is still not solved. This is not good. Can we get an explanation why they weren’t found earlier? Can we get some indication why they were found now? If not, can we get an indication of why we can’t be told? Does anyone besides me wonder about the competency of the original search? Can we get an explanation of exactly what was done to look for them 13 years ago? What were the criteria for searching then? Was the area where they were eventually found searched back then? I hope the investigators on this case are as frustrated as I am — it will keep them sharp on the trail of this terrible deed. With the discovery of their remains, we now have two mysteries surrounding the Worthman and Lockyer case: who are the people who did this terrible thing, and was enough done to catch them? Ivan Morgan can be reached at ivan.morgan@theindependent.ca
STABBING IN THE EAST END
Police park outside 7 Coaker Pl., St. John’s , where an alleged stabbing has lead to the death of a 27-year-old male. Few details are available, other than police say they suspect “foul play.” The residence is listed under Nuhi Mustafa in the phone book. Paul Daly/The Independent
‘Fancy words’ for killing salmon Dear editor, I read with interest Paul Smith’s article on hook and release (The art of hook and release, Aug. 20 edition). I am constantly amazed how people like Smith offer opinions as to why hook and release deters poaching when in fact they are completely wrong. Can he tell me from what scientific study he got this information? My 25 years of research of the scientific evidence tells me that this does not exist. They always use the words “my experience” and this is a problem. Their experience proves nothing. Anglers on a river do not deter poachers in any way and this is one myth that needs to be put to bed once and for all. For Smith to state that mortality rate
from hook and release is low is doing the salmon a grave injustice. Hook and release kills salmon. For Smith to go on and on at great length about how he releases the salmon gently is nothing but fancy words and does not ensure the salmon’s survival. Scientific studies done and accepted world wide prove that hook and release has a profound negative effect on salmon behavior and does lead to salmon mortality. Whenever a salmon is played and handled it weakens to the point the fish is easy target for predatory birds, eels, mergansers etc. This is scientifically proven — not “my experience.” I have spent 25 years researching and studying this issue and I would need a
dozen issues of your paper to cite the scientific material that proves that hook and release kills salmon. Even, DFO admits to a 12-25 per cent mortality rate for hook and release of salmon. If DFO admits to this much, you can bet your rubber boots that the number is much higher. To finish, let me state that several countries have now banned the practice of hook and release. Why? Because their expert scientific advice advises them that hook and release kills salmon. But here in Canada, it is not the scientific evidence that dictates the rules but the wealthy people with the big bucks. Rick Bouzan, St. John’s
nest with its speckled eggs. Or to stand quietly in a small stream such as Aspen Brook as it talked to you with its golden waters passing over small pebbles on a sunny day and then feel that tug on your line. Any child who misses these joys has not lived. Another game was follow-theleader. Our buddy, Bill Barrett, Johnny Chaulk’s grandson, could leap over higher posts than anyone else and so he always won the day and when playing cowboys his first cousin, Roy Reid, because he had Roy Rogers’ Christian name, a most tenuous relationship at best, would refuse to lie down and die when he was legitimate-
ly shot. Then there were the surreptitious “smokes” made from dried alder leaves, crumpled up and wrapped in brown paper. God, how we had to pretend they were just fine as we gasped our way through one. It was in those same woods too that we made our bows and arrows from the alder saplings and fired them point blank at each other. Of course, unlike George Bush’s war, we never killed or even injured anyone for our lopsided arrows were like our lop-sided kites — they were off balance and never operated properly. Oh yes, I was talking about Glen
Ford or Rocky Lane or the Lone Ranger and Tonto or Batman or Johnny Mac Brown or Smiley Burnett or Lash La Rue or Whip Wilson or John Wayne or Gene Autry or Walter Brennan or Ma and Pa Kettle and their 99 kids. So who gives a damn? We baby boomers do. For all this and much more was our childhood and we enjoyed each and every activity and every character that passed through it. Rest in peace, Mr. Ford. Job well done, old sport.
Simple tale of childhood Dear editor, Glen Ford is dead. Many of our youth will ask who the hell is Glenn Ford? The more cynical will quip, who gives a damn? He was a movie star born in Quebec in 1916 and moved to Hollywood and acted and starred in about 100 films. Who gives a damn? We do, all the baby boomers out there who spent untold hours sitting in Father Meaney’s Theater, Jim and Madeline Basha’s Vogue Theater in the town of Windsor, or in Charlie Edward’s Popular Theater in Grand Falls. It was not because there was little for young people to do in those days
of the 1950s and early ’60s, because we trouted, made home-made snow skis and kites, and toboggans and hunted for bird nests and picked and sold blueberries. I can still recall shaking up the Brookfield glass quart milk bottle just before knocking on the door of a potential customer to bring the sunken berries to the top of the bottle again. All was fair in selling blueberries from the Burnt Woods, especially at 35 cents a quart. As for bird nests, there was no grander sight in human experience than to look deep down into a robin’s nest and see three or four robin-egg blue ovals there, or into a sparrow’s
Aubrey Smith, Grand Falls-Windsor
SEPTEMBER 3, 2006
8 • INDEPENDENTNEWS
IN CAMERA
A small protest as former Taoiseach, Charles Haughey, arrives to give evidence at the Moriarty Tribunal in Dublin Castle.
Joe Dunne/Photocall Ireland Ireland
Fine Gael TD Michael Lowry confronted by journalists on his way out of the Dail in 1995. Paul Daly/Photocall Ireland
Businessman Ben Dunne of Dunnes Stores shakes hands with Fianna Fail Leader Charles Haughey in 1986.
Eamonn Farrell/Photocall Ireland
Fianna Fail TD and former Justice minister Ray Burke.
Eamonn Farrell/Photocall Ireland
‘Only two politicians went to prison …’ From page 1 family business. In the nasty court battle that followed, one member of the Dunne family sued to discover where a large sum of company money had gone during her brother’s time as chairman. “In the litigation that followed, an affidavit was produced which showed payments which he (Dunne) had made to the former Taoiseach, and that’s what broke the whole thing open,” says Connolly. That Taoiseach at the time was Charles Haughey. Haughey, who died last June, was a giant in Irish politics. Coming from a humble working class background, his career spanned decades. He was one of the most powerful politicians in the history of Irish politics. Known as the great survivor, Haughey weathered many scandals through his career, including being put on trial for gunrunning to Northern
Ireland in the early 1980s (acquitted), and the revelation in 1982 that a murder suspect was found at the home of his attorney general. But allegations he accepted huge cash payments from wealthy business people over a period of 30 years — the accusation that he was essentially “kept” by the wealthiest people in Irish business throughout his career, spawned investigations still going today. One such tribunal — the Moriarity Tribunal — was struck to investigate corruption allegations against Haughey and one of his ministers, Michael Lowry. Haughey claimed under oath he knew nothing of payments made to him by Dunne. Later Dunne admitted, also under oath, having paid him, and he released the cancelled cheques to the tribunal. This was a devastating blow to the respected elder statesman. Haughey
was guilty of lying under oath and obstructing the tribunal. He was charged in connection with this incident, but, as Connolly says, “by a curious accident one of the members of government … said in an interview in the late 1990s that she thought Mr. Haughey should go to jail for what he did. As a result of that it was decided that he couldn’t get a fair trial and the case against him was dismissed.” Connolly says even though this woman was known as a political enemy of Haughey, and had at one time left the government because of him, it is “hard to know” what her motivations were. She did apologize, but the damage was done. “She was not a stupid woman,” says Connolly. Ahern, the current prime minister, is also implicated. He was called by the Moriarity tribunal and told them that, while serving as treasurer of their political party, Fianna Fáil, he regularly signed blank cheques for Haughey, who
was Taoiseach at the time. Ahern was aware Haughey used the money to pay for his expensive lifestyle, which included exclusive restaurants, cars, silk Charvest shirts from Paris, as well as his mistress’ expenses. The money came from a Fianna Fáil political fund called The Leadership Fund. Ahern survived the allegations and was re-elected Taoiseach in 2002. He claims although these practices are “irregular,” it was the way things were done in Fianna Fáil at the time. In 1998, it was decided Haughey did not owe significant tax on the money he’d taken. The man who made that decision — a member of the appeals tribunal of the Irish revenue commissioner — is the brother-in-law of Ahern, the man who signed Haughey’s blank cheques. Says Connolly: “Ahern’s predecessor, as leader of the party, has received up to £8 million, and possibly more, in
“...by a curious accident one of the members of government … said in an interview in the late 1990s that she thought Mr. Haughey should go to jail for what he did. As a result of that it was decided that he couldn’t get a fair trial and the case against him was dismissed.” Frank Connolly
SEPTEMBER 3, 2006
INDEPENDENTNEWS • 9
Former Fianna Fail leader and Taoiseach Charles Haughey (left) with future leader Bertie Ahern at a Fianna Fail Ard Fheis.
Leon Farrell/Photocall Ireland
Taoiseach Charles Haughey, stands at a window in Leinster House. Leon Farrell/Photocall Ireland
Former Taoiseach and leader of Fianna Fail, Charles Haughey\ leaves the Circuit Criminal Court in Dublin after his appearance to answer charges of obstructing the McCracken Tribunal into payments to politicians, was adjourned for two weeks. The McCracken Tribunal established that Haughey, while holding the position of Taoiseach, accepted large sums of money from business man Ben Dunne, to support his extravagant lifestyle. Eamonn Farrell/Photocall Ireland
Charles Haughey
Newspapers across the country carry the news of former Taoiseach Charles Haugheys death, June 14 2006. Graham Hughes/Photocall Ireland
Taoiseach and Fianna Fail leader Bertie Ahern speaking at the funeral of Former Taoiseach Charles Haugheys in St Fintans Graveyard in Sutton County Dublin. Eamonn Farrell/Photocall Ireland
payments from the wealthiest business people in Irish society. “He claimed — and indeed these businessmen gave evidence to the effect — that where they remembered making the payments, there were no political favours given in return. And that is what the tribunal has been investigating. “These are people who, for instance, own or who are the largest property developers in the state, and who have managed to acquire over a period of 20 or more years very lucrative government leases — even though they would deny and Mr. Haughey would deny he has any influence in making sure that they got those leases.” Connolly says these are the kind of statements the Irish public has been asked to believe from their former and current leaders in politics and business. Ahern is also under investigation by other tribunals struck to look into corruption. Connolly wrote the original story
about Ahern’s colleague Ray Burke and payments he received from a property developer in return for rezoning promises in Dublin, which created the Planning and Payments Tribunal (also ongoing). Connolly says he personally warned Ahern about evidence he had of Burke receiving bribes. Ahern stated he would not have Burke in his cabinet. Two weeks later, he made him his minister for foreign affairs. Four months after that, as the details of the allegations were circulated more widely, Burke resigned as minister and member of parliament. A tribunal was set up to look into the allegations, which eventually led to dozens of politicians being exposed for taking corrupt payments from property developers and builders. This same tribunal is currently trying to establish the facts on allegations Ahern received illicit payments of £80,000 between 1989 and 1992. That
investigation has been delayed for almost five years because of high court appeals by people who are involved, to stop the tribunal from investigating their affairs. Connolly says the tribunal is currently bogged down and Ahern, having survived the 2002 vote, is looking towards next year’s elections and hoping that the tribunal won’t get into that examination before the ballots are cast. While it may seem incredible to Canadians that a prime minister would even consider re-election under such circumstances, Connolly says while these allegations might be fatal to a political career in some countries, such is not the case in Ireland. In fact, it is the tribunals, having cost the Irish taxpayers hundreds of millions of Irish pounds, that are causing people to grumble. “The public have now watched eight or nine years of tribunal investigations into corruption and they are not con-
Eamonn Farrell/Photocall Ireland
“The public have now watched eight or nine years of tribunal investigations into corruption and they are not convinced that it is good value for their money.” Frank Connolly vinced that it is good value for their money,” says Connolly. “Lawyers have become very wealthy as a result of the process, but only two politicians went to prison, and nobody in high places has suffered any particular punishment as a result of these investigations.” Most, but not all, of the people found
to have taken payments have been forced from politics. In a statement issued after Haughey’s death, Ahern said this of his former boss: “In recent times, these achievements have become clouded by the revelations that are the subject of inquiry by the Moriarty Tribunal. History will have to weigh up both the credit and the debit side more dispassionately than may be possible today but, I have no doubt its ultimate judgement on Mr. Haughey will be a positive one.” Connolly is not so sure. As these tribunals and journalists do their work, he wonders if Ahern’s own political days are numbered Some say, were it not for business magnate Ben Dunne’s over-indulgence in cocaine, none of this would have ever been revealed. Connolly disagrees. He laughs as he utters the credo that keeps every journalist focussed: “Ah, they are all found out in the end, aren’t they?”
SEPTEMBER 3, 2006
10 • INDEPENDENTNEWS
If he loses, will he quit?
T
oronto MP Michael Ignatieff won’t commit to running in the next election if he loses his bid to become leader of the federal Liberal party. “Depends who’s leader,” Ignatieff says. However, Ignatieff, 59, considered by many to be the frontrunner in the race, denied having indicated that there are some leadership hopefuls for whom he would not run. “No. It really is that I have to look at what I am looking at,” he says. However, he says, nobody should “doubt my devotion” to the party, adding he’s been a committed Liberal since he was 17. “There are all kinds of ways you can stay committed and involved and active in the Liberal Party of Canada, believe me, without being an MP,” says Ignatieff, who was elected for the first time in Etobicoke-Lakeshore riding in the Jan. 23 vote. “Being an MP, without being an MP, I’ve been a Liberal all my life,” he says. “When I go into
rooms people are glad I’m in the room because they’ve read stuff I wrote which contributed to their sense of what it is to be a Liberal and what Liberal philosophy is. There are all kinds of ways I can serve the party.” He wouldn’t speculate whether, of his nine rivals, he could live with some as a possible winner and not others. “No, I won’t go there. It really is a hypothetical. “ Ignatieff argues he wouldn’t be “doing this occasionally difficult job” without serious commitment. “It’s been brutal,” he says. “EtobicokeLakeshore was very, very tough.” When asked: “But you won’t commit to run for Etobicoke-Lakeshore again?” Ignatieff replies: “I’d like to serve my constituents well, but you’re asking me an anticipatory hypothetical about the situation that prevails on the 3rd or 4th of December.” Besides, he’s “quite confident” he will win. “I believe I will win,” he says. — Torstar wire service
LIFE STORY
‘The sound of voices drifting in’ Ontario-born Norman Duncan introduced the world to Newfoundland through fiction
NORMAN DUNCAN 1871-1916 By Keith Collier For The Independent
N
orman Duncan was a traveller. He had a love of adventure and of strong, physical people living in remote places. No wonder he fell in love with Newfoundland. Duncan was born in Brantford, Ont. in July 1871. His family’s constant relocations throughout his childhood gave way to Duncan’s own restlessness as an adult. After several unsuccessful years at the University of Toronto, Duncan was on the move, travelling and changing residences frequently. Duncan’s only real success at university was a friendship with Mackenzie King, the future prime minister of Canada. The friendship would last the rest of Duncan’s life, and King always supported Duncan and his writing. Duncan had been writing since high school, but it wasn’t until his move to New York in 1897 he began to earn a reputation as a writer. He wrote for the Evening Post and The Atlantic Monthly, and his first book, The Soul of the Street, was published in 1900. In the early 1900s, American readers were hungry for stories of adventure and exploration. Newfoundland and Labrador was seen as an with his book The Way of the Sea, a collection undeveloped, unexplored northern frontier, and of 10 Newfoundland stories that many regard as a prime location for the stories and articles mag- his best writing. In his study of Newfoundland literature, The azines of the time were looking for. With his combination of literary ambitions Rock Observed, historian Patrick O’Flaherty and wanderlust, it wasn’t long before Duncan writes: “Duncan was the first writer of fiction to headed north. He left New York in the summer make ordinary Newfoundlanders the leading of 1900, originally destined for St. Anthony characters in his stories, and to see in their rouwith the intention of interviewing Dr. Wilfred tine, everyday activities a fit subject for literature.” Grenfell for McClure’s magazine. For the first time, readers across North AmerHe never made it. Although Duncan shared Newfoundlanders’ love of travica and in England were el, he did not share their love of exposed to life in Newfoundtravel by sea. He avoided ships land through fiction. Duncan’s “What matter — in if he could, covering as much work formed the important the end? For truth, of the distance from New York beginnings of a canon of Newto Newfoundland by train as literature. old age holds nothing foundland Many Newfoundland writpossible. Eventually, he arrived ers who came afterwards used at Lewisporte. for any man save the same people and places in There, Duncan boarded the a seat in a corner their writing, and these writers Clyde, one of Newfoundland’s owe him a debt. The ground famous coastal boats, for and the sound of Exploits Island, where he was covered by Percy Janes, Harold Horwood, Wayne to catch another boat for St. voices drifting in.” Johnston and many other of Anthony. the province’s most notable During the stormy trip, Norman Duncan, writers was broken by Norman Duncan suffered greatly from seasickness, and when he The Strength of Men Duncan. Duncan would later travel found he had missed his conto, and write about, Europe, necting boat, he decided a short stay at Exploits Island would be a wel- the Middle East, North Africa, and Australia. By 1916 he was at the height of his popularity. come break from travelling. This brief stopover lasted months. Duncan But a lifetime of heavy drinking and chain ended up spending the summer with the smoking had caught up with him, and he died Manuel family on Exploits Island. There, he on Oct. 18, 1916, at the age of 45. met the fishermen and women who would Although Duncan’s sudden death left several soon feature so prominently in his writing. works forever unfinished, his mark on NewDuncan was captivated by the harsh beauty of foundland literature had been made. the land, the warm people, and the rugged way His early death was lamented by friends like of life. Mackenzie King, but perhaps Duncan was satDuncan spent the following two summers at isfied with his accomplishments. Exploits Island — and it was three years before “What matter — in the end?” he wrote in The he finally met Grenfell and spent a summer Strength of Men. “For truth, old age holds nothtravelling the Labrador coast with him. ing for any man save a seat in a corner and the But Duncan’s writing didn’t suffer from the sound of voices drifting in.” delay. Between 1901 and 1903, he published 25 A century later, Duncan’s voice can still be articles and stories about Newfoundland, along heard.
Jamaica seeks Canada’s legal aid
W
hen Stephen Shelton walks into a Jamaican courtroom, it’s like taking a trip back into the 17th century. In the country’s civil courts, there are no computer-savvy court reporters, generating instant transcripts. It’s the judge who takes notes — in longhand. “To get a transcript for an appeal takes forever,” says Shelton, a trial lawyer in Kingston, Jamaica. According to those familiar with the Jamaican legal process, antiquated recordkeeping is just one area where reform is long overdue. Part of that process began last week, when Canadian legal experts joined forces with the island’s government to overhauling the justice system. The review is part of a broader attempt by the Jamaican government to “modernize” its institutions, says Peter Parchment, senior director of strategic planning and policy research for the country’s justice ministry. The government hopes to restore public confidence in the justice system by reducing the length of time required to resolve a case and by making the system more accountable, he says. While Canada has made some strides, the man heading up the Canadian contingent says those heading to Jamaica don’t claim to have all the answers. “There’s no denying it. Canada has its own problems in the justice system,” says Andrejs Berzins, the former chief Crown attorney in Ottawa. “Part of our review will be to look at how principles of restorative justice can be promoted and incorporated within the system in Jamaica.” In recent years, there’s been substantial investment in Jamaica and companies are looking for ways to have commercial disputes resolved more quickly, said Shelton. “You would be amazed, it can take seven, eight or even 10 years to resolve a case,” says John Leiba, president of the Jamaican Bar Association. — Torstar wire service
SEPTEMBER 3, 2006
INDEPENDENTNEWS • 11
VOICE FROM AWAY
REUTERS/Rick Rycroft/Pool
Into the clean Australian Rob Dunstan describes himself as a Newfoundlander perpetually stuck in an Australian’s body. He plans to move to the province in November. Below, he talks about why By Rob Dunstan For The Independent
T
he first time I ever saw Newfoundland on TV, it was an image of a small fishing village with a rocky shoreline in front. Squat, green trees threatened to take the rear of the village — by force, it seemed. This was some serious greenery. I assume the icebergs would provide naval support. Possibly the thick clouds were the airborne division. I am speaking figuratively of course; the community was not made out to be a town besieged by giant tree-folk and iceberg demons. At least, not to the untrained eye. It was, however, depicted as a tiny, tightknit community. The older people talked with a thick pseudo-Irish accent, there were antlers above every doorway and a rosy-cheeked chef proclaimed excitedly that you weren’t a real Newfoundlander unless you had tried seal flipper burgers. Luckily I already knew where and what Newfoundland was, via the wonders of the Internet. As of Jan. 1, 2006 the population for the Canadian province was 514,409 (according to the Newfoundland and Labrador Statistics Agency). Small Irish-esque fishing village indeed. For me — living in Sydney, Australia — Newfoundland certainly seemed different.
Although St. John’s might not be the tight-knit Irish town shown on so many travel shows, it was still fundamentally different. People there smiled. People were proud to be from Newfoundland. And that’s something that can’t be said about my own country without instigating a riot. I decided almost instantly I wanted part of that pride. Australian pride basically consists of drinking some beer and watching a bunch of grown men in short shorts chasing after a ball. The gleam in the eye of those I saw on television that night was something I wanted for myself. I wanted something to be proud of. I still live in Australia. Not through lack of trying, however. I have worked in a bookstore, I have worked in a discount variety store (aptly named The Reject Shop), and I have even repaired boat motors for a short stint trying to get together the money. I’m now working in the warehouse of a dental company. My girlfriend, Shawna, is from Newfoundland. I still haven’t been myself, but we lived together in Malta for a couple of months and the thing she said she noticed the most difference in was people’s attitudes. I don’t mean to make Malta look bad — well, I do, a bit — but you couldn’t cross the road, even at a crossing, without nearly being run down by an already dinged-up car. The people were generally rude (the foreigners
were pretty nice), and the air tasted, by and large, like dirt. And she just kept saying how unlike Newfoundland that was. How even if you went out onto the freeway and sucked on a car’s muffler, the air would still be cleaner. Again, my intention is not to put down any other country. My point is that Newfoundland is a haven from the impending feeling of rudeness, and from pollution. It is one of the oldest places, but still one of the cleanest. And already, St. John’s is home to me. Where I am now is just a place to live temporarily, and wait. It may be a classic case of the grass being greener, but St. John’s is about as far from the little town of Norah Head, Australia that I can get. So the grass there is the greenest, and where I go from there will be decided once I am close enough to look over the neighbors’ fence. For the gleam in the eye, for the pride of that island… I would gladly travel the world for. Newfoundland, where the grass is always the greenest, even covered in white snow. In November, all going well, I’m flying to Newfoundland. And then I’ll be home, in the clean, and the polite. Do you know a Newfoundlander or Labradorian living away? Please e-mail editorial@theindependent.ca
Parched B.C. town may tap donor
A
drop in the bucket could solve Tofino’s water woes. A wealthy resort owner says he’ll pay $50,000 to have four trucks deliver water to the Vancouver Island tourist community that’s been parched by a summer-long drought. Deliveries will start if the Vancouver Island Health Authority approves the plan and it’s confirmed that Ucluelet — the nearby town that’s to supply the water — has enough to
meet the demand. Businesses would be allowed to remain open. Last week, the local council had warned they’d have to close as of today because Tofino’s reservoir was running dry. The cost of the trucked water is a small fraction of the revenue resort and other business operators say they’re losing during a peak time for tourism. The area’s posh beachfront inns had can-
celled reservations for this Labour Day weekend in anticipation of a council order to turn off their taps and close their doors. Chris Le Fevre — who owns three high-end resorts — came to the rescue with $50,000. The four trucks are to carry water from Ucluelet — 30 km away — around the clock. They would dump about 910,000 litres a day into a Tofino reservoir. — Torstar wire service
stories from here I’M DYING TO LIVE ALS SLA maladie LOU GEHRIG’s disease
The Spotlight on Education program at the St. John’s Boys and Girls Club offers a supportive after-school environment, where trained educators help children with reading, computer awareness and homework. It’s made possible with support from Petro-Canada.
.
GIVE TO RESEARCH
1-800-267-4257
Part of your community.
www.petro-canada.ca
12 • INDEPENDENTNEWS
SEPTEMBER 3, 2006
INDEPENDENTLIFE
SUNDAY THROUGH SATURDAY, SEPTEMBER 3-9, 2006 — PAGE 13
Whether touring the world with his rock band sHeavy, or painting anything he can get hold of, Dan Moore says it comes down to one thing — keeping his mind busy
Anything goes
By Mandy Cook The Independent
A
lthough Dan Moore can’t remember his grandfather, he has vivid memories of studying the man’s painting techniques as a young boy. “They say that’s where I got it,” says Moore, relaxing on his couch, blonde hair tied at the back of his neck. “He did landscapes. Hunting pictures. Salmon fishing. I remember staring at them and wondering how he did it. When you look at a painted picture you can actually see the paint is dabbed a certain way. A picture of a painting, you can’t tell the brushstrokes.” A large square landscape enjoys the focal point of Moore’s living room, but the subject matter and — this is a comfortable guess — the technique could not be more removed from his grandfather’s preference for portraying traditional Newfoundland outdoor pursuits. At the same time, Moore’s Asianinspired piece echoes the same appreciation for nature and setting. The picture is dominated by an orange harvest moon, overlaid by an oversized banzai tree. Across the reedlined river bank floats a beautiful crane, complete with turquoise head and wispy, golden feathers for a crown. Hazy clouds — Moore’s favourite part — steal in quietly from the border of the frame. Interestingly, the softened edges of the clouds were achieved with an airbrush pen, and the other components rendered with acrylic and lacquer paint. Moore says he’s basically selftaught, and his painting instincts come as naturally as writing songs for his other creative outlet: playing guitar in the St. John’s-based band sHeavy. The rockers are gearing up for a weekend tour through Moncton, Halifax and Maine, recording their sixth album and filming a new DVD — all on the heels of a European tour where they enjoy a fierce following of their “70s groovy rock.” Moore appreciates the fan loyalty. “A father and son drove for hours to see us play,” he says. “They saw us before in ’98 in Holland at this big outdoor festival. We were playing in See “I could doodle,” page 14
Dan Moore
Paul Daly/The Independent
The beat goes on
From Stompin’ Tom to a Broadway musical to the symphony, percussionist Romano DiNillo makes a varied career in Toronto By Stephanie Porter The Independent
R
omano DiNillo arrives at 10:30 p.m., full of energy and a little scattered. He’s just finished the final studio session for the latest CD for the Dogberries, a St. John’s-based jazz group, and he exudes that half-woundup, half-exhausted energy familiar to anyone who’s been working intensely for just a shade too long. “I think we were supposed to be done by five,” he says. “But I think it’s going
to sound great.” DiNillo, a drummer and percussionist, is a native of St. John’s. He’s been living and working in Toronto for more than seven years, but delights in every opportunity to come home — especially for a work project. “It’s the only reason I could come home this summer,” he says, smiling. After years of freelancing, he says he finally hit his stride this year, involved in several different projects in different disciplines, just the way he likes it. “From January until right now, it
feels like it’s been all one day,” he says. “It’s been really good, but I don’t know exactly what’s happened.” When he stops to list what has actually happened, it’s impressive: playing with the Toronto Symphony Orchestra and the orchestra in KitchenerWaterloo, accompanying dance classes, writing and performing for theatre, film, and potential television pilots. He’s musical director for The Ballad of Stompin’ Tom, which premiered at the Blythe Festival in southwestern Ontario this summer. He’s collaborated
with fellow Newfoundlander Jonathan Monro on two musical projects. He’s also been learning to play guitar and has started singing again. Now, he’s got a couple of days to enjoy his home province before heading back to Ontario to prepare for a gig as a substitute drummer in the orchestra for Wicked (a Broadway musical about the witches of Oz) when it returns to Toronto this fall. DiNillo says he knew he wanted to be a drummer at age six, when his mother took him to see his uncle play
Relax. Summer’s not over yet.
Book your holiday today.
1 866 686 8100
humbervalley.com
with the Carleton Showband. That, and his 15-year-old brother was in “a kickass band” at the time — and used to let the younger DiNillo hang around. He never changed his mind. He says everyone on his mother’s side of the family — from the Port-auPort peninsula — are extremely talented musicians. Everyone can sing, dance, and play multiple instruments. “I used to feel silly because all I did was drum,” says DiNillo. But that sort See “A switch,” page 15
SEPTEMBER 3, 2006
14 • INDEPENDENTLIFE
GALLERYPROFILE
DON LANE Photographer
D
on Lane sits, relaxed, behind the counter of his store/gallery space in the Fairmont Hotel Newfoundland, sipping a coffee and reading the day’s paper. He’s enjoying the quiet start to the day — business generally picks up later in the morning, as the inevitable tourists come through, the tourists who account for the majority of his business. Lane’s gallery is compact, walls filled from floor to ceiling with framed photographs in a variety of sizes, with more on easels or leaning on any available surface. The large windows provide plenty of light and — combined with the pleasant ambient sound from the hotel — a welcoming work environment. Lane has been in the same space in the hotel since it opened in 1982. Before that, he had a gallery for three years in the old Hotel Newfoundland. And before that, he spent two years
right across the road, at the corner of Gower Street and Military Road. It adds up to 30 years in business, all in the same neighbourhood. Over the decades, Lane has built a profitable business and solid reputation for high-end photographs of Newfoundland and Labrador scenes — icebergs, lighthouses, dramatic coastlines, quaint villages, colourful window boxes and empty boats. But he didn’t start his business for tourists. The St. John’s native says he’s always dabbled in photography, but really cut his teeth while at Memorial, where he worked for The Muse, the campus student paper, and CameraMUN. He went on to train in California, then “came home, got married, and started the business.” He opened a studio, hoping to make a living doing portrait and commercial work. “I took some snapshots of landscapes — Torbay, Twillingate — because I loved to travel in Newfoundland, and enjoyed camping back then,” he says. “I put those on the wall of my little gallery, and that’s what people liked.
“People would come in for whatever reason, and that’s what they’d buy, a picture of the harbour, not even that good, right next to this lovely portrait — but that’s what they’d buy. “I’m not stupid, I saw what was happening, so then in 1976-77 I started travelling and taking more shots of the province. They offered a room for a little gallery in the old hotel, and it just blossomed from there. It wasn’t my intent, the intent was to keep working with families and buildings and stuff for commercial use. “But this is what I love.” Lane still does commercial work, and some portraits. But the pictures on his gallery walls are his bread and butter. Some of the photographs are from as far back as 1976. While Lane doesn’t number his prints, he does keep track of sales. Each picture has a card or series of cards with the names of the people who buy the pictures — and where they’ve been sent, and he has an “informal limit” on the number of prints he’ll make. He says there are no more than 300 of any one photo — and most have left the province. Lane attributes his success, in part, to
sticking in the same location — people always know where to find him. But he also gives a lot of the credit to Newfoundland. “People who come here absolutely love it. They’re buying land — I don’t think a week goes by when someone doesn’t come in here and ask where they can buy land on the water,” he says. And if tourists don’t catch sight of an iceberg (“it’s been the Newfoundland icon since about 1995,” he says) — or even if they do — they seem to desperately want to take home a picture of one. His icebergs pictures are his most popular, by far. He also enjoys getting to viewpoints most don’t have access to, whether it be St. John’s cityscape taken from the roof of the hotel, or the majestic cliffs of Cape Race from a helicopter. Up until last year, Lane did most of his shooting on film, but prints all his work digitally. He’s embraced the new technology — with his computer set up, he can scan old negatives and tweak the colours back to their original vibrancy. His studio/workshop is downstairs in
the hotel, in a former (read: failed) nightclub few have ever seen. Although he values his St. John’s clientele, Lane says “it’s great to have the world as your customer.” He pulls out a sales card for one of his popular photos, a St. John’s cityscape, looking down from Military Road, over rows of colourful houses, and out the Narrows — with an iceberg perfectly visible. “Japan, gift to Japan, Aberdeen, Quebec, England, Ontario, Ontario — I’ll just read the really interesting ones now,” he says, after listing off virtually every province, several times. “Hong Kong, Michigan, Indianapolis, California, Boston, Florida, another Japan, France, San Diego … Bermuda, Australia, Madrid, Wisconsin, Texas, Ireland …” The list goes on. Some were purchased by companies or government as gifts, many more by tourists passing through. And then there is “the biggest single group of customers,” the Newfoundlanders who are living away, wanting a vivid reminder of home. — Stephanie Porter
‘I could doodle on a napkin and it would keep me contented’ From page 13 Scotland this one time and a bunch of people came from Italy!” The painter/guitarist says neither his music nor art informs the other, but he makes no distinction between the two — it’s just being creative, and it keeps his mind busy. He has no idea where his artistic instincts originate, just that he likes to use his imagination and “anything goes. “I could doodle on a napkin and it would keep me contented,” he says. Another large acrylic “… I’m more of a work featured in Moore’s home is the screeching folk artist than an face of a multi-coloured baboon. Fangs bared at actual artist some peripheral upset, the primate is striking in because my stuff vibrant blues and reds. is all over the Moore was inspired by a stay at a friend’s house place” where there were thousands of National Geographic magazines to peruse. The shadings and contours are immaculately interpreted, with a leaning towards the cartoonish. The visual impact is arresting. Only a few more pieces adorn the walls of the home Moore shares with his girlfriend, Sheila. He says he can’t hold onto the stuff — friends of friends keep purchasing his work — and he’s held only one show in a coffee shop downtown. A band mate once put one of Moore’s pieces on eBay to see if it would sell, and a man bought it to hang in his New York blues bar. Moore will also adorn pretty much anything he’s asked to — automobiles, futon mattresses, guitar cases. “A friend of mine once said I’m more of a folk artist than an actual artist because my stuff is all over the place,” he says. “Next I want to get a shed and backyard so I can start welding sculptures out of car parts.” mandy.cook@theindependent.ca
SEPTEMBER 3, 2006
INDEPENDENTLIFE • 15
A home for indie musicians Vision for the Independent Artists Co-operative house was utopian — and doomed. It’s time, says Noreen Golfman, to come up with a plan that works
S
ummer in these parts just wouldn’t feel normal if we didn’t have some riveting municipal drama to complement more highbrow fare of Shakespeare by the Sea or the Magnetic North Theatre Festival. This year, with free admission, we could watch the recurring spectacle of the Peace Accord-Bannerman Park melodrama, as well as an even livelier production of Rebels Without a Home. On one side of the stage, we have perennial pixy Liz Pickard, a resolutely independent sprit with an uncanny set of pipes and a near manic creativity. Liz has long been a household name in St John’s and probably around most of the island. She’s all guts and noisy ability, a little bit of sugar and a lot of spice, fearless, formidable, and well in the face of any who dare muzzle her chops. Liz and her alternative music group, the Independent Artists Co-operative (IAC), struck an unusually sweet deal with the city in 2002. They could occupy a city-owned house for $1 with the contractual understanding they would fix up the largely neglected property at Symes Bridge Road, way out in the west end, far from the strings of chamber orchestras or the pop vibes of dinner theatre. Earlier in the summer, when the IAC asked to have the property formally turned over to them, council set itself up solidly on the other side of the stage. Spurred by an irritated neighbour or two and frustrated with the IAC’s inability to live up to its own promise to fix up the joint and upgrade the property, council was in no mood to hand over the lease. And so what began in mid-summer as a minor, distracting skirmish, grew into a much noisier showdown, with the IAC grabbing the headlines and effectively painting a picture of themselves as the undeserving victims of a mean spirited, rebellion-averse St. John’s city council. Not that this is a really difficult portrait to paint. Indeed, it probably wasn’t the most elegant of political gestures to move, as Art Puddister did in early August, to sell the property, effectively evicting the IAC occupants without so much as a warning or a whisper. And after all, this is a council whose idea of civic beautification is to spread used bedsheets and lurid pink blankets over garbage bags. But I digress. Enraged by such unceremonious bullying, Liz bullied right back, compelling arts-friendly councilors like Shannie Duff to appeal for calm and a more graceful way out of the mess. Inevitably, the IAC was given extended life support until the end of October, time enough to regroup and rethink its future, if not actually reconfigure the Symes Bridge Road space to acceptable standards.
NOREEN GOLFMAN Standing room only To be fair, it was a highly unconventional move on the part of the city to lease the house for a dollar in the first place. Why, it was downright ingenious, really. It’s too bad, however, that Liz and her band of friends and musicians couldn’t have marshaled the resources to fix the place up. Sure, it takes major money to make major repairs, but this community also thrives on in-kind benefits and favours, and one would have hoped a feisty, driven bunch like the IAC would have come up with some schemes, even some partnerships, to inspire more confidence. They didn’t. The house deteriorated. A neighbour complained about beer and blaring music. The original contract had not been fully satisfied, and the city had a duty, albeit one handled crudely, to resist merely handing the place over. That leaves this nagging problem of providing appropriate space for emerging musicians and artists. This city, no more than any other, has no civic obligation to provide space for such groups, but it sure would be a progressive, inspired thing to do if it could. A city that sees the wisdom of building a skateboard park to keep testosterone-intensive youth off the streets can also appreciate the appeal of an interior space dedicated to younger, needier musical talent. Shannie Duff and a few others on council get this, and are seeking ways of speaking to some of the broader complaints voiced by the IAC. But how to do it? One of the lessons of the Symes Bridge Road debacle is that some mechanism of responsibility has to be put in place. Is it fair to ask young rock musicians who are struggling to earn a living, cut a record, and shop their name around to be thinking about painting the pickets white? The initial arrangement was utopian, and therefore doomed. Perhaps the proceeds from the sale of Symes Bridge Road should go to hiring someone to manage an appropriate space in downtown St. John’s: a loft above street shops? The city gets to brag about its vision, the musicians get a place to hang out, and someone gets a new job overseeing a place where wild and wonderful synergies can thrive. In other words, can we start all over, but this time with some common as well as musical sense? Noreen Golfman is a professor of literature and women’s studies at Memorial. Her column returns Sept. 16.
KING O’ FUN
Andy Jones' one-man show, King O' Fun, was filmed before a live audience at Halifax's Sir James Dunn Theatre. The “gut-wrenchingly funny” theatrical performance receives its TV premiere on Bravo! Sept. 13, 2006 at 8:30 p.m. in Newfoundland and Labrador.
Romano DiNillo
Paul Daly/The Independent
‘A switch has been turned on’ From page 13 of adaptability and flexibility is apparent in his already diverse career. DiNillo studied under Don Wherry at Memorial University, where he received his bachelor’s degree in music. From there, he went on to earn a master’s at McGill. Almost immediately after graduating, he moved to Toronto. “Toronto, I guess I went there because that’s where Don was from,” DiNillo says. “He had a lot of contacts there, and it seemed familiar to me because he talked about it so much … I knew a few people and it seemed like a safe environment to start from scratch.” It wasn’t long before he was involved in his first major theatre production, (boxhead), under the direction of Chris Abraham. Everyone involved, including DiNillo (for
sound/music), were nominated for Doras, Toronto’s big theatre awards. DiNillo made ends meet by playing percussion for dance classes. “It’s a great way to make cash, because you’re just … you need to have an ability to improvise, not take things personally, be able to experiment. I didn’t play piano before I started doing dance classes … but they asked me to one day. “So you just say, OK, and give it a shot, and the first couple of years were pretty hard on the ears I’m sure …” Along the way, he says he’s learned not to make excuses for himself. “You always try to surround yourself with the best people possible and trust them and their vision,” he says. “Your job is to do your job and come up with as many ideas as possible — and let them sift through, or offer suggestions or use them or not. “I like different projects. I like stick-
ing on some tails and playing with the orchestra and then hitting things to find out what sound I need for film or theatre, or sound design, writing stuff … “I just don’t have the attention span of people who dedicate their lives to orchestral playing, or dedicate their lives to sound design … if something specific were to really take off, that would put me in a different direction. “But for now, let’s just see where I can get with all these ball in the air and hope they all don’t drop.” And while DiNillo recognizes the last six months have been full, creatively stimulating, and busy, he’s also familiar enough with the music business to know there can be months without gigs. “The past year or so, it’s like a switch has been turned on. It’s good. I don’t feel cocky or anything, just try to keep going.”
16 • INDEPENDENTLIFE
SEPTEMBER 3, 2006
On the brink It’s all about boxes, writes Clare-Marie Gosse, as she packs up and readies to move provinces
O
ver the course of two particular Seinfeld episodes, Jerry, to his delight, strikes up a sudden friendship with super-cool major league baseball star Keith Hernandez. The two enjoy a successful evening of male bonding and leave with a promise to catch a movie together on the weekend. All seems to be going well until Keith pops the question. He asks Jerry to help him move. At first Jerry reluctantly says yes, but he cracks when Keith explains he has a lot of heavy, valuable furniture that has to go up three flights of stairs, into a townhouse without an elevator. “I’m sorry, I can’t do this,” Jerry cries. “I can’t do it. I can’t. It, it’s too soon. I don’t know you. I can’t help you move. I’m sorry I can’t. I just can’t!” As Jerry says, to help someone do something as significant as move their life is “a big step in a relationship.” Appropriately, his stand-up comedy segment for that episode is about boxes. How when you’re moving, your whole world becomes about where you can lay your hands on them — to the point you become obsessed. “You could be at a funeral. Everyone’s mourning, crying, and you’re looking at the casket. That’s a nice box. Does anyone know where that guy got that box? It’s got some nice handles on it. “And that’s what death is really. It’s the last big move of your life. The hearse is like the van. The pall bearers are your close friends, the only ones you could ask to help you with a big move like that, and the casket is that great, perfect box you’ve been waiting for your whole life. The only problem is, once you find it, you’re in it.” Well if death is the last big move, I’d say I’m about to enter phase four. Not that I’ve only moved house four times in my life. I wish. It’s just my latest move happens to be a big one, and I currently have an on-the-edge-of-a-precipice sort of feeling about it all. (Hopefully my paragliding equipment will take me up over a bright horizon, rather than drop me in the dust.) So right now, after packing up a stack of boxes, watching them depart without me and
CLARE-MARIE GOSSE Brazen finding myself armed with a mop and spray gun, facing an empty rental house covered in dust and grime that needs to be vanquished, I am left with a queasy feeling. My life has been compartmentalized into cardboard boxes with labels such as: kitchen utilities, linens, fragile! and Clare’s stuff. Except I am currently rather stuff-less. All my relatively useless junk is in those phase three — soon to be phase four — boxes. Phase one: I was born in Chertsey, London — and funnily enough, placed in a box (plastic, hospital crib thing. It was very uncomfortable). I lived mostly in the same house over the course of my entire childhood and had an average upbringing until … Phase two: At the age of 18 I pack up one box, a suitcase, grab some bedding and leave home to shack up in halls of residence at university. As each student year goes by I move into a different room, a different flat, a different house. By the time I’m 21 I’m graduating, have acquired a potentially serious “significant other” (from Newfoundland) as well as at least three more boxes of stuff, an extra suitcase and a whole bed of my own … Phase three: I embark on a period of travelling, punctuated by intermittent visits to Newfoundland. I go to Thailand, Spain, Vancouver, back to England (where I marry afore-mentioned significant other), Halifax (where I acquire a dog) and St. John’s. During phase three I’m a bartender, an actress, a waitress, a receptionist, a comic-book heroine, a purchaser for the British Army and a writer. By this time I have accumulated about a million boxes of stuff and several items of furniture … Phase four: To be continued… Well, phase four actually begins in Toronto, the city I — and my significant other — will be in by the time this edition of The Independent
rolls off the press. It’s a move we’ve decided to make for a few reasons. We want to earn more money, and at this fledgling point of our professional careers, with student loans still hanging heavy, it makes financial sense. (Yes, yes, housing prices are more expensive etc., etc., I hear you cry, but the salary differences actually will make up for that.) We also want to experience living in the heart of a big city while we’re still young and childless, because phase four will gradually begin to demand the ultimate question: where do we want to eventually settle? As nomadic as I’ve been in the past, maybe nowhere; as much as I loath packing and moving, maybe Toronto; or maybe England. Perhaps the Caribbean, Ireland, or maybe Newfoundland and Labrador will be my phase five future. I first visited Newfoundland almost a decade ago and after several more trips back and forth and a few summers spent on the island I moved to St. John’s permanently two years ago. In all the places I’ve lived, I don’t think I’ve ever discovered anywhere with such a solid sense of self — despite its contentious Confederation history. I’m writing this on Aug. 28. Out of curiosity I search through my files and dig out the first column I ever wrote for The Independent. It’s called Lynching the leprechaun and it’s about how our personal insecurities both help and hinder us in our quest for a sense of self. To my surprise, the publication date of that issue is Aug. 28 — exactly one year ago. I’ve come full circle and learned more about the province than I could ever imagine possible. Because of all I’ve discovered, the people I’ve met, and what I see every day in the arts, economy and life here, I know Newfoundland and Labrador is about to enter a phase of bright horizons. This place will always represent home to me, as much as England ever has, and because of this it’s impossible to pen a farewell column. So I’ll see you ’round in phase four. Clare-Marie Gosse can be reached at claremariegosse@hotmail.com
POET’S CORNER Shifting demographics By David L. Benson Here, old men in greatcoats and buttondown hats lean on benches and yarn. Little left to do at this stage. Who remembers the Coves? Clift-Baird’s, Becks and Ayre’s, when they were coves and the har bour waters passed beneath Long Bridge. Who remembers the fish mongers? Their wooden barrows? Thrusting cod, big as dogs under the high noses of passers-by on Water Street, when the smell of fish in the Sun was no alien to the young. Who remembers Ungava and Imogene? (One and two for the heaviest load) Thetis and Algerine? (Bloody flippers carried up the road) Who remembers when the Longshoremen ruled the waterfront and the LSPU was strong? (“Like peas set in concrete”) Wages were high, unemployment was low, because Solidarity was a creed. Here, the old men sit, thankful to have been born in a time that allows them to die without a struggle. For here, it’s minimum wage, firing on the spot, no unions and no recourse. And here there is no industry; even the building is owned Upalong. No one makes anything here (besides not enough money) and no one notices fluorescent lights have scrambled their brains. The busses swing in, disgorge hurried Buyers, the lookers and touchers, Swallow the harried plastic bag clutchers and swing away to the drizzly suburbs. But here, it never rains. Getting wet, means sitting too near the fountain. Being wet, means something else. Here, the old men gather like crows near the entrance — no benches outside. And they cannot smoke their pipes in the Mall. From And we were sailors … published by Killick Press, 2002
INDEPENDENTSTYLE
SUNDAY THROUGH SATURDAY, SEPTEMBER 3-9, 2006 — PAGE 17
DRINK
Cute name, budget wine By Nicholas Gardner For The Independent
W
ineries have spent time and effort trying to convert, or at least lure, consumers to their product. But as wineries start popping up all over the world, the distinction between the names becomes more difficult. Most small wineries, except for some boutique wineries, are simply repositories for grapes from nearby vineyards and they simply make the best wine possible with the product they have, rather than growing and marketing their own grapes. Increasingly, we see clever if not rude names used in order to gain consumer attention. This week I searched out a couple of them to see if they were good — or just marketing hype. I tried Wild Frog Cabernet Sauvignon/Merlot from France and Big Fat Llama from Chile, also a Cabernet Sauvignon/Merlot, to compare and contrast. They both had garnet tones to them — deep red wines, but that is where the similarities ended. Wild Frog ($11.81) had almost no nose — not even an inkling of the flavour to come. Because of that, the wine itself was water-like, with imperceptible tones of plums and red currants; no hint that there was anything other than watered down grape juice in the bottle. The sip lasted seconds, with no perceptible change from beginning, middle or end. It was a distinct disappointment. Big Fat Llama ($10.25) was better, containing more plum and jammy notes in the nose, but light in flavour. Even allowing the wine to sit and aerate for a while was not enough to pump up the flavour. However, it is a suitable wine for sipping and enjoying, with its tart dry finish and notes of ground black pepper and green peppers. It was at this stage that I started to have fun — I wanted to test the wines’ food threshold. Classically, Cabernets and Merlots are paired with robust flavours with some fat content. So I put them to the test pitting them against a barrage of flavours: citrus, mild cheese, soft cheese, fresh cheese, yogurt, smoked BBQ sauce, herbs, tomato salsa, ham, processed cheese and bread. Surprisingly, none of the “classical pairings” worked for them. In fact, when fat was introduced it only became palatable. Sharp flavours masked the metallic taste, but acids made it worse. Accenting hidden flavours like fruit or vegetables only darkened and depressed the flavour. The verdict: The Wild Frog Cabernet merlot blend would do well with a simple piece of chicken with fresh thyme, baked, not barbequed, resulting in a complimentary balance of acid and light fruit. The Big Fat Llama was best with processed cheese spread on sweet whole grain bread – the transformation was instant. Soft muted flavours of plums and dry fruit benefited from the creamy and salty textures. My overall impression is for a budget price, the Llama was a clear winner with yards more flavour. The Wild Frog is a wine for those who don’t like wine, as there was no such flavour present. As a result, I’ll take a llama over a frog any day of the week. nicholas.gardner@gmail.com Paul Daly photo/The Independent
Mental mise en place As Nicholas Gardner says, the key to a streamlined, efficient dinner lies in the details
T
he French have a way of communicating perfectly what is needed in the kitchen and know how to turn a phrase. My favourite is “mise en place” (meez-on-plahce). Translated, it means “everything in its place.” This is the culinary phrase for one’s food, utensils, materials and everything else required to get the job done. It could be the little spoon needed for sauces, or the garnishes and
NICHOLAS GARDNER Off the eating path plates required for that special time of the day called “service.” Service is the time when the restaurant has finished its prep work and
opens its doors to the customers. If the food (also known as product) is not prepared to the correct amounts or one becomes confused as to what to do next, one can get “in the weeds” which is the direct translation of dans la merde — enough said. I have always felt that cooking professionally is 90 per cent mental and 10 per cent physical. Don’t get me wrong, working in a kitchen is physically
demanding and at times gruelling work, but for the most part, the mental mise en place is what gets the work done. Mental mise en place is getting your head in order. In short, it is preparing your mind for anything that can come along. For me, mise en place lends its way through my life. It is the little things that make all the difference. For young people heading out into
the world for the first time and experiencing the joys of cooking for themselves, they will appreciate how a little planning goes a long way to creating a healthy and exciting meal at any time. By planning the whole experience from cooking to cleaning, you feel a lot better and the job becomes more enjoyable. See “Buy in bulk,” page 14
SEPTEMBER 3, 2006
18 • INDEPENDENTSTYLE
Shabby chic Some hints on how to decorate your apartment on a student budget — from those who have been there By Mandy Cook The Independent
N
ew killer outfit? Check. Spread the word about your Saturday night bash? Check. Fabulous apartment decked out with sumptuous leather couch, teak tables and flat screen TV? Er … not so much. After tuition is paid off and the remaining cash in your bank account forked over for expensive textbooks, there ain’t much left to beautify your rental pad. It is at this point your thriftiness and/or ingenuity must fill the gap between financial shortcomings and yearning need for a tricked-out living, studying, and the socializing space that is your home.
Paul Daly/The Independent
CLAIMING CASTOFFS Some students comb the neighbourhood, claiming castoffs people have relegated to the curb. Some scour their parents’ basement for no longer used pieces. Most students rely on second-hand furniture stores to furnish their abodes — but are careful to feather their nests with a few favourite items to maximize the feng shui flow. Will Hiscock, a 24-year-old in his final year of a history degree knows a few things about decorating on the cheap. But it is a lucky $150 find in Fermeuse of an ochre-coloured antique wooden table that he says is the hearth of the home. “I love it,” he enthuses. “I use it to eat, to study and write, to paint. It’s so sturdy and the colour looks like somebody finished their shed and threw the last of it on the table.” Aside from a matching pair of fake wood paneled dressers purchased at a thrift shop, everything else found in his downtown St. John’s apartment cost “next to nothing.” He is a fan of scavenging up-for-grabs pieces and has outfitted the house he shares with his fiancé with an over-stuffed couch donated by friends who had to move in a hurry (ran out of rent), a dining room table-cum-coffee table (sans the original legs and jacked up slightly off the floor) and even a $15 china
rack bought at the Waterford Hospital fundraiser to house his graphic novel collection. Political science student Kim Byrne, 22, says she worked out a fail-proof system during her years of decorating on a budget. “Books! Books on a bookshelf always make you look smart,” she laughs. “Other than that, lots of plants because they’re green and alive and cheap, big simple pieces like giant candles that will last, and a good bed cover.” SPARSELY FURNISHED The two-bedroom apartment she shares with her roommate boasts 12foot-ceilings, tons of light from many windows, and is sparsely furnished with a couch, a vintage flower print swivel chair (one of Byrne’s faves) from a friend of a friend, many hanging plants and a few abstract prints over the sitting area. It’s a giant space, but Byrne has filled it in with several Asian touches such as the always popular bamboo blinds and paper lantern light covers which cost “literally two bucks.” She added her own artwork of a burning setting sun tangled in a black, gnarled tree, and some inexpensive rugs on the floor. Byrne thinks getting creative with both her shortage of funds and aesthetic needs is the most interesting way to decorate. “When you actually have money you have more lame and stagnant things,” she says. “You can find some pretty unique stuff at garage sales and Value Village. I even got my bed there for $50 and it was brand new!” Used furniture stores frequented by students — like Fred’s on Cashin Avenue — are being cleaned out of “beds, dressers, kitchen tables, dressers, lamps, you name it.” But there is one piece in particular that seems to show up — in evidence at both Hiscock and Byrne’s homes — wherever students hang their hats: a picture of everyone’s favourite revolutionary, Che Guevara. many.cook@theindependent.ca
TASTE
Old-time recipe for fresh spinach OLD-SCHOOL SPINACH SALAD Adapted from Anna & Michael Olson Cook at Home: Recipes For Every Day and Every Occasion. The Olsons are chefs from the Niagara, Ont. area. • 4 slices bacon, diced • 1/4 cup extra-virgin olive oil • 1 cup sliced button mushrooms • 1 clove garlic, minced • 1/4 tsp mustard powder • 2 tbsp red wine vinegar • 1/2 tsp kosher salt • Freshly ground pepper to taste • 6 cups lightly packed spinach leaves, washed, dried, torn • 1/2 cup thinly sliced red onion • 2 hard-cooked eggs, coarsely chopped
By Susan Sampson Torstar wire service In these parts, the end of summer brings the second spinach crop of the season. Load up on iron and everything good dark leafy greens provide in this classic spinach salad. In large skillet on medium heat, cook bacon until crisp, three to five minutes. With slotted spoon, transfer to drain on plate lined with paper towel.
Return skillet to medium heat. Add two tablespoons oil and heat until shimmery. Add mushrooms. Cook, stirring, two minutes, until softened. Stir in garlic and mustard powder. Stir in vinegar, salt and pepper. Cook, stirring, one minute. Stir in remaining oil. Remove from heat. Put spinach in large bowl. Pour warm oil mixture over top. Toss gently. Divide among four plates. Top with onion, eggs and bacon. Serve immediately. Makes 4 side servings.
Ever been to BC? Classics 1100 (Introduction to Greek Civilization) and Classics 1200 (Introduction to Roman Civilization). The perfect way to become aware of the social, religious, artistic, mythological and political influences of ancient Greece and Rome. Spaces are still available in these courses and many other introductory courses at Memorial. For more information, call 737-8260, visit www.mun.ca/regoff, or e-mail reghelp@mun.ca.
www.mun.ca
SEPTEMBER 3, 2006
INDEPENDENTSTYLE • 19
Buy in bulk From page 17 Designate a workspace for cutting and preparing food and keep that space clear of all clutter. This includes getting the toaster off the counter and having enough space to work. Clean as you go. This also stops a big pile of dishes collecting in the sink at the end. Not having to work around this ends frustration when straining pasta or simply filling a kettle with water. Before you go grocery shopping, make a list. As simple as it sounds, a list
helps organize your eating habits. It also stops you from impulse shopping, which ultimately leads to more shopping and bigger bills. Buy in bulk. I can’t stand running out of something. It aggravates me. So I buy double the amount of staples (milk, favourite sauces, etc.) so I don’t run out. One is for use and the other is for backup. I buy chicken breasts in packages of 10 or so and repackage and freeze them for single meals. Pairs work best. I just grab a sandwich bag of two chicken
breasts and I can feed two people. From this I gauge how fast I go through meat products and when I have to buy more. This method also works well with pork tenderloins (one per two people) and most other meats. When you repackage your meats for single meal prep, why not do one more step and flavour the meats? While not as good as fresh, it still allows some flavour to penetrate the meat while they freeze. A small steak sliced when raw and covered with garlic, a chopped onion, soy sauce and some ginger is the
beginning of a stir fry before you have even started to cook. Wash and dry your fruit and vegetables as soon as you get home from the grocery store. One less step when cooking a meal is always a good idea. Cook more than you need for one meal. Winning in the kitchen is all about how much you can produce as quickly as possible. I tend to cook more than required, even for two people. This means some lucky person gets leftovers to take to school or to be the envy of others at the
office. Cooking just a little more than you planned will also cut down on take out eating, a killer when on a student budget. Succeeding in any kitchen, be it a professional one where you serve the public or your own home, comes down to 90 per cent mental mise en place. A little preparation goes a long way. Nicholas is a freelance writer and erstwhile chef now living in St. John’s. nicholas.gardner@gmail.com
DETAILS
Wireless hotspot By Anshuman Iddamsetty For The Independent
L
aptops are staples of modern education, conjuring up images of last-minute essays and hours spent Googling your own name, but the advent of wireless Internet access has changed the learning landscape once again. Students can now take research and writing outside — trading dull library walls for the exotic, and occasionally rowdy. Commonly known as Wi-Fi, the technology allows anyone with a laptop to wirelessly connect to the Internet courtesy of a local access point, or “hotspot.”
Don Cherry’s is one of several businesses to offer wireless services for laptop users in St. John’s. Paul Daly/The Independent
WORKING WIRELESS For students tired of being tethered to university campuses, this allows them to surf the Internet in a variety of places more suited to their personal work habits, whether that involves double mocha frappacinos and adult-contemporary, or spicy chicken wings and Jock Jams ’98. Located on Water Street, St. John’s, Hava Java is an example of the ideal student-friendly alternative to the library. A cultural haven for the St. John’s arts scene, the
Stolen hours on the water
An afternoon of fishing yields more than fresh fish and an old lobster pot
M
y father and I don’t do much together anymore. I spent my childhood as his PAM shadow. Whatever he did, I mimicked. PARDY GHENT Since returning to outport Newfoundland and running the local store, one is in the shop (usualSeven-day talk ly him), while the other (usually me) isn’t. My father is strict. I have tried to talk him into goofing off with me, but the answer is always hand over hand over hand, until that fish was in. no. Just because it’s your own business, he My parents had a hit at the same time. We had scolds, doesn’t mean you can do whatever you struck the fish. I was in a rush to get my line want. back down before we drifted away from this Which is why I was shocked this week when fish-filled spot. We were, after all, there to catch he stuck a closed sign in the shop window and our quota. Before I realized it, I had the bloody beckoned for me to join him and my mother on cod unhooked and in the cooler. For the first the floating dock. For the first time in years, I time, I had de-hooked a big fish. My father would jig cod with my father. winked at me. I don’t know who was more It was a cloudy windless afternoon on Fortune proud. Bay. We motored out on the same waters I fished A few more strikes — cod now eight and 10 with my father as a child. As my mother ran their pounds filled our cooler. My line attracted mackbusiness in Conception Bay South, my father erel — three at a time, twice — and, to my mothfished out here, with me in tow. ers delight, a few herring. We stayed until the The landmarks looked familiar as we left the strikes stopped. harbour, yet many of the cove We didn’t catch our 15, but we names were not. I recognized had 11 nice-sized cod and a few Yellow Cove Friar and Foxes other goodies to fill pans and The redfish I was Hole, but most I could not recall. freezer bags. The redfish I was hoping to bake that My near-grey father patiently hoping to bake that night was in pointed them out again. I tried to the belly of a bald eagle — but night was in the commit them to memory. we saw the majestic creature up belly of a bald eagle How many more times would close, so it was worth the sacri— but we saw the we be out here together? I turned fice. and watched for the bald eagles I The handmade lobster pot was majestic creature knew would soon arrive so my my trophy for the day. Even if it up close, so it was father wouldn’t see my face. didn’t hold the goodies I was sinThe eagles appeared as if on fully hoping it would, it was still worth the sacrifice. cue — majestic white heads a good story to tell. The cooler poking out from the green and held still-flopping fat codfish brown of the treed hillsides. We caught a redfish and I ran my menu demands past my mother. and set it on the water so they would venture Cod-au-gratin, chowder and pan-fried this week close. One circled, and once we drifted far please. My mother couldn’t think that far ahead. enough away, down it shot, snatching the blood- She was planning her evening feed of herring. I coloured fish from the calm waters. Back it would pass on that. soared to its cliff-side perch with its offering. I sat near my father as we motored in. I could I knew what to do with a jigger, my father had see a crowd waiting for us near the locked-up shown me years ago. Let the weight hit bottom. shop. I snuck a glance at Dad, he didn’t notice. Haul up “just enough,” then up and down, up He focused on docking his boat. I carried one and down. side of the heavy fish-filled cooler and he carried I had a strike almost instantly, and it was the other up to his yard. He would fillet it. I left HUGE. My father had to help, I couldn’t get it him with his dirty job and went to the shop to do up. I grabbed my camera. This was the mother of my own. all codfish! I smiled as I unlocked the door to let those My father’s laughter caused me to lower the waiting in. They needed beer and bologna, lotto camera. What? I had hooked a sunken lobster tickets and smokes. No one seemed pissed the pot. I took a guilty look around. No other boats only store for two communities had unexpectedwere in sight … maybe, just maybe? Damn. The ly closed. pot was empty. Not today, my father joked. He I removed the handmade sign my father had expertly coiled the cut line, full of baby muscles stuck on the door. “Closed. Sorry,” was all it eager to find a home of their own, and placed the said. My father and I had spent a few unexpectpot in the stern to return to its fisherman owner. ed stolen hours on the ocean together. I was It was slow going at first. The cod we caught many things, but sorry wasn’t one of them. were small. Perhaps two or three pounds. We changed spots, and I felt a fierce tug on my Pam Pardy Ghent lives in Harbour Mille, feathered line. A big cod. I excitedly hauled, Burin Peninsula. Her column returns Sept. 16
café offers free wireless Internet access to all of its customers in a setting perfect for typing essays between sips of delicate chai. Also downtown is the more recent Chatters Café on Duckworth Street. Chatters provides dedicated Wi-Fi access to its customers, as well as Internetready computers for those who haven’t made the laptop leap. This isn’t unique to just downtown businesses. “We see students come in all the time… (Wi-Fi) is something I’ve wanted put in since last year,” says Rhonda Decker, owner of Second Cup Coffee in the Avalon Mall. She plans to add wireless access for her customers in the coming weeks. Don Cherry’s, the popular sports bar and family restaurant chain, recently included the service in its St. John’s location. Though most wouldn’t immediately associate a pint of Keiths and up-to-the-minute sports coverage with schoolwork, a booth can turn into an informal group study area — or the perfect place to comfortably fact-check over a plate of Irish Nachos. (The service is not yet available at their Mount Pearl location.)
Fast food giant McDonald’s offers a Wi-Fi hotspot at select locations, where a password is given with every meal purchased. While the thought of grease on a keyboard might turn off some, the service is a boon for students who find themselves between deadlines and Happy Meals. LEAKY SIGNALS While these locations feature official connections, it’s easy to find unofficial ones, courtesy of unprotected hotspots leaking their signal nearby. Connecting to these unreliable hotspots won’t guarantee a stable online experience — abrupt disconnects and reduced speeds are a reality — so if you stumble onto a wireless network at your favourite spot, be prepared to bookmark all those websites fast. Despite the growing number of establishments offering Wi-Fi access in St. John’s, the list is still modest in comparison to other cities across Canada. But that’s starting to change. “I’d love to have wireless Internet (at Jungle Jim’s),” says a member of the restaurant’s wait staff. “It’d be great — check e-mail, get some work done, and have a beer.”
SEPTEMBER 3, 2006
20 • INDEPENDENTSTYLE
Perfume in school could be scent packing
I
ts latest budget mess may smell, but at least Toronto school board staff and students won’t, thanks to a motion this week to consider making schools a “fragrance-free environment.” After a heated dollars and cents battle, Toronto District School Board trustees moved from its $84 million shortfall debate last week to another kind of scents. The board voted to form a “fragrance-free environment workgroup” to look into the possibility of prohibiting perfume. Trustee Josh Matlow persuaded his colleagues to follow the example of schools in Halifax and Calgary and investigate the possibility of a “scent-free” school system. Trustees voted to launch a public awareness campaign to persuade staff and students to tone down the spray and that if a colleague or classmate complains about a fragrance you’re wearing, “immediate action be taken to respond to the complaint and to make that workspace free of the offending chemical-based scent.” There was no mention of banning hot air. — Torstar wire service
A view of the Little White Wedding Chapel in Las Vegas, Nevada.
Steve Marcus/Reuters
Vegas ends after-hours weddings No more 24-hour licence service; poor record for pre-dawn nuptials By Judy Gerstel Torstar wire service
G
ambling hours are set to be restricted in Las Vegas this week, but it’s not the casinos that will close down between midnight and 8 a.m. It’s the marriage bureau. County officials are eliminating the 24-hour marriage licence service that was in effect on Fridays, Saturdays and holidays. This may not be such a bad thing. The odds have not been good for afterhours marriages. Among the pre-dawn nuptials that later broke down were those of Demi Moore and Bruce Willis, Nicky Hilton
and, well, somebody. Also Britney Spears and a childhood friend. Their pre-breakfast marriage didn’t last past dinner a few days later. And it’s a pretty good bet that at least one of Mickey Rooney’s eight marriages in Vegas took place between midnight and morning. But not everyone who weds after the showgirls go to bed is intoxicated by more than love. “No one who has liquor on his breath will be married at The Little White Wedding Chapel,” says Rose Sharpe, manager of the gown and tuxedo room at the famous hitching post where Michael Jordan and his bride arrived at 2:30 a.m. on a Saturday.
“But when his friend (Dennis Rodman) came to get married to Carmen Electra, well, he was not with it that night,” recalls Sharpe. “We said, ‘Do you want to go have coffee and come back in a few hours. ... He never came back and they went someplace else to get married.” Their conjugal bliss ended after nine days, presumably when the coffee kicked in. Not being able to obtain a marriage licence after midnight on the way to the chapel will be a hardship for more than spontaneous, inebriated celebrities. It’s going to make it tough for ordinary poor folks, too, says Sharpe. “We have the world famous drivethrough tunnel where people come and
University grads earn more. Census data from 2001 shows that, on average, university graduates earn more than those who do not attend university. So if you are working and putting off further studies, don’t forget about the long-term. You may want to take a course this fall to keep you sharp or get you one step closer to that all-important degree. For more information, call 737-8260, visit www.mun.ca/regoff, or e-mail reghelp@mun.ca.
www.mun.ca
get married during the night because it’s what they can afford,” explains Sharpe. The fee for getting married in your own car at the drive-through chapel is $40. “Now, without a licence, they can’t come to the drive-through in the middle of the night any more,” she says. “And sometimes, when they’re combining two families — I’ve heard this so many times — they’ll say, ‘Let’s take the children, we’ll put them in the car and we’ll make a little thing of it.’ And they drive in, five hours from California, and get the licence and come here at 3 a.m., and the kids are all excited, and then they have breakfast and they’re on their way home already, because they can’t afford a hotel.” Last year, about 5,000 marriage licences were issued in Las Vegas during the early morning hours. More than 60,000 couples applied for the $55 licences in the self-proclaimed matrimonial capital of the world. The Little White Wedding Chapel, however, will continue to offer its services 24/7. “We have our courtesy limos and we’ll be picking people up at the airport and make sure they try to get to the courthouse before midnight and then bring them here to get married,” says Sharpe. Reduced hours at the marriage licence bureau will reportedly save about $200,000. “In a town like this,” snorts Sharpe, “that’s lush money.”
Glamour in the aisles
N
o wonder some flight attendants can be mean as snakes. Cost cutting has resulted in shoddy uniforms as hard to stomach as airline food. “In a cheaply made uniform, you feel more like a bus driver than airline crew,” says pilot Pino Ruggiero. That won’t be the case with the uniforms for Porter Airlines, the plucky start-up soon to begin flying out of Toronto City Centre Airport. Porter’s sleek navy dresses, three button suits, pencil skirts and white cotton shirts have been designed by Kimberley Newport-Mimran. “I wanted a look that related back to the days when airline travel was glamourous,” says NewportMimran, amid blown-up images of Coco Chanel and Jackie Kennedy emerging from airplanes in suits, pearls and high heels. Fashion editors were cooing over the outerwear: a shimmery navy trench and a lean black down coat. The pillbox hats models were sporting at the uniform unveiling have not been finalized. But Newport-Mimran has recommended Cole-Haan oxfords for the men, and for the women, black flats with grosgrain trim from Joe Fresh Style. Porter Airlines purser Stacey McDonald says that she’s impressed. “I’ve had friends say they want to come over (to Porter) just because of the uniforms.” And Ruggiero, sporting his madein-Italy pilot suit, says, “the look, feel and quality is far superior to any uniform I’ve ever worn … It feels more like a high end suit that you would buy for yourself.” — Torstar wire service
INDEPENDENTBUSINESS
SUNDAY THROUGH SATURDAY, SEPTEMBER 3-9, 2006 — PAGE 21
Brian Murphy of the St. John’s Senior Soccer Association.
Paul Daly/The Independent
‘It’s amazing stuff’ ‘World class’ soccer pitch already attracting big-ticket games and millions in sponsorship By Mandy Cook The Independent
T
he recent overhaul of the King George V soccer pitch is already attracting worldclass soccer tournaments — and injecting several million dollars into the local economy, says Brian Murphy of the St. John’s Senior Soccer Association. The facility recently hosted two matches between the Chinese and Canadian national womens’ teams. Murphy, project manager for the new field, estimates the games generated $250,000 for the capital city. Next year, the pitch will welcome the national under-14 boys’ and girls’ tournaments, and in 2008, the senior mens’ and ladies’ national tournaments will take place there. Murphy estimates the events will be worth about $2.5 million to the St. John’s area.
“There’s about 500 kids that’s going to be here from across Canada (for the under-14 tournament) and with that age group, you get 500 parents basically,” says Murphy. “So there’s going to be roughly 1,000 people here next summer for seven days.” To top it off, Kevan Pipe, CEO of the Canadian Soccer Association, committed to a mens Olympic qualifying match next summer upon witnessing the opening ceremony at the field on Aug. 17. The local association will be informed which countries to expect in late October or early November. The association is currently working to establish an ongoing invitational under-14 international tournament to take place each August. Teams are already confirmed from Ireland, the U.S. and France. The tournament will be scheduled to coincide with summer events such as the Regatta and the George Street Festival, so athletes can take part in the city’s summer entertainment.
Murphy says the new King George V field has been touted as the best soccer facility in Canada by Pipe. The design, by local architecture firm Sheppard Case, includes an international-size artificial turf — such as that used in the Toronto Rogers Centre — a stone entrance gate, new change rooms and public washrooms, and bleachers to accommodate a crowd of 6,300 people. With the exception of the field itself, all design and materials were done locally. Murphy says corporate sponsors, such as Adidas Canada, Molson and Aliant jumped on board to the tune of $1.3 million. The provincial government is contributing $100,000. The City of St. John’s contributed $1.3 million of its own, “right off the mark,” says Mayor Andy Wells. Wells says the money is an investment in “world class” infrastructure, both for the use of the local community, and to attract national events to boost
tourism and economic development. “The field is a riot,” he says. “It’s amazing stuff. The drainage system will extend the playing season from 90 days now on average for outdoor facilities to about 270.” In addition to visiting teams, hosting tournaments and bringing in internationally renowned coaches, the field will see plenty of local players. Memorial University signed a five-year contract to use King George V as their home field and is currently bidding on hosting the 2009 University national tournament. Everyone from the under-10 league to the masters level will be playing on the field, says Murphy. Soccer is the most popular participant sport in Canada. Nearly 10,000 people in Newfoundland and Labrador play soccer, with a total of 800,000 players across the country. mandy.cook@theindependent.ca
Keeping Marine Atlantic afloat
T
he Latin saying “don’t cut off your nose to spite your face” was first recorded around the year 1200. An interpretation of the proverb at the time stated “vengeful rage has led to many pointless and foolish acts, but none so stupid as those in which we try to get back at someone else by punishing ourselves.” Nowhere does this proverb have a more modern day application than when one considers the never-ending saga that is collective bargaining at Marine Atlantic. Ah yes — another summer, yet another strike scare at Marine Atlantic. As we approach the tail end of the 2006 tourism season, Newfoundland is in a bit of a tizzy again over the looming possibility of another labour stoppage aboard the Gulf ferry service, which would temporarily disrupt, if
RAY DILLON
Board of Trade not shut down, the floating section of trans-Canada highway that connects our island to the rest of the continent. But, then again, we’ve come to expect these threats of labour disruptions almost on an annual basis. And they typically surface around this time of year, when tourists and vacationing residents use the ferries the most, and when the unions know the mere hint of potential delay is enough to deter travelers from booking a trip on the ferry. After all, about 56 per cent of Marine Atlantic’s passengers and passenger vehicle traffic travels between the months of June and August.
Recall a few years ago that, after a lengthy hearing process, the Canada Industrial Relations Board (CIRB) determined Marine Atlantic’s services were essential to the health and safety of the people of this province. The following year, the CIRB further ruled there could be “no reduction in the level of Marine Atlantic’s regular ferry service between Newfoundland and Nova Scotia at any time of the year.” That was a positive outcome for Marine Atlantic Inc. and the many who rely on this crucial link to deliver goods to stores, exports to market, and people from province to province. The problem is the past CIRB ruling doesn’t mean that an “essential service” designation became enacted in federal labour legislation, nor does it directly apply to future disputes with other unions.
Earlier this summer, Marine Atlantic and the Canadian Merchant Service Guild agreed to enter binding arbitration to work out contract issues, after a strike vote by members of that union. Now, it’s the International Longshoremen’s Association and the United Steelworkers, two more of the seven or so unions that represent ferry workers — roughly 460 ticket agents and dock workers in this case. The two unions indicated their Marine Atlantic members had recently voted 95 per cent in favour of strike action against the crown corporation. For the time being, though, any such action must be suspended for a three-week period, as ordered by a government-appointed conciliator. There is still time to avert a strike should negotiations restart and prove fruitful.
However, the more important point here is that Newfoundland and Labrador has to deal with this kind of threat in the first place. This is a crucial link and an economic lifeline for our province, and we shouldn’t have to face these disruptions on a regular basis. Our growing tourism industry feels the impacts of reduced passenger traffic as a result of delays and the lasting deterrent effect this has on visitors. In fact, this could have wider-reaching impacts on tourist travel throughout the Atlantic region. The ferry service is an important part of intra-provincial and interprovincial supply networks, especially for businesses that rely on just-intime delivery of goods. On average, See “Economic lifeline,” page 22
A stunning collection of photography from the portfolio of The Independent’s own Paul Daly. Available this fall. To preorder your copy, contact
Boulder Publications at 895-6483
22 • INDEPENDENTBUSINESS
SEPTEMBER 3, 2006
Go west Air Labrador finds new markets in Quebec By Ivan Morgan The Independent
A
ir Labrador recently added western Quebec to its territory — just the latest in a series of expansions into that province that began in 2001, says Air Labrador vice president and general manager Ward Pike. Pike says Air Labrador is the perfect company to enter the Quebec market, servicing some of the smaller, more remote communities and airports. Having served coastal Labrador since 1951, employees (“the Air Labrador family,” as Pike repeatedly refers to them) have a deep understanding of the communities they serve. And, he adds, the company has learned to survive in the tough Newfoundland business culture of “perpetual depression. “We’re used to having to survive on a bag of hard tack, if necessary,” he says. Pike says Air Labrador’s decision to expand is not based completely on “bottom line” competition. “A straight profiteer would look at our business model and laugh,” says Pike, but it’s a model he says works for the airline. Decades of experience in northern Newfoundland and coastal Labrador has prepared Air Labrador in other ways as well, continues Pike. In a region where many people struggle to make ends meet, little extras are noticed. Air Labrador planes often fly
scholarship students from the remote communities they service to schools in the south for free. The company has been known to divert planes to collect sick people. Acts like these integrate the company into the community, says Pike, and are essential for the success of any business in the north. “We know that without our communities we are nothing,” he says. “It helps us to help others.” Fluent in business French, Pike tells The Independent understanding Quebec is essential to being successful in business there. Half of Air Labrador’s employees, including many who work in the Goose Bay area, are from Blanc Sablon and the Quebec north shore. “When more than half your company is francophone first, it is very easy to move into (Quebec),” he says. Pike says he hasn’t encountered any problems from Quebec’s complicated political situation — a provincial Liberal government and a federal separatist party holding most of the province’s seats. In fact, he says, the government of Quebec lobbied Air Labrador to take some of the most recent contracts. The company has received federal contracts as well. Pike characterizes the business environment in Quebec as one of fair play and competition, adding he personally carries no political affiliation: “I am neither a Péquiste nor a Liberal.”
Air Labrador vice president and general manager Ward Pike.
He does stress the importance of contacts. Air Labrador is 100 per cent owned by Labrador Métis (Pike and his father, Air Labrador president Roger Pike, are members of the Labrador Métis Nation), and Pike says he has excellent relations with the aboriginal airlines operating in Quebec, Air Creebec and Air Inuit. His says his relationship with Air Canada is also healthy. “They say there is room for one and a half airlines in Quebec,” he says. “We’re content to be the other half.” Pike says his airline “re-invented the wheel” in 2001, when it re-entered the eastern Quebec marketplace with a full
Paul Daly/The Independent
slate of services: freight, mail delivery, charter service, and regularly scheduled passenger services to parts of coastal Quebec. Since then, the company has been expanding, basing growth on past success. In 2002, Air Labrador signed a contract with the government of Quebec for transportation of non-emergency medical patients for eastern Quebec and the Quebec North Shore. In the spring of the following year, the company offered regular twin otter service to points on the North Shore for the first time. And then, in spring 2004, Air Labrador launched its Dash-8 service
BRITISH COMPANY BUYS NEWFOUND
from Wabush to Sept Isle, Quebec City and Montreal. This year, “thousands of flight hours later,” Air Labrador is making the jump into western Quebec, with services to towns like Rouyn-Noranda and Vald’Or. Pike says there’s more growth to come for Air Labrador. They are planning to purchase new Dash-8 turboprop planes. Pike says they are very happy with their chosen aircraft, the Dash-8, and turboprops are efficient, burning 28 per cent of the fuel of a comparably sized jet. Air Labrador employs 290 people. ivan.morgan@theindependent.ca
Economic lifeline needs saving From page 21
London-based Nettec, a business services company, has conditionally agreed to purchase St. John’s-based Newfound Group, a developer and operator of highend holiday resorts, in a $199.5-million deal. Newfound Group, under CEO Brian Dobbin, runs Humber Valley Resort, near Corner Brook, and is developing resorts in Nevis, St. Kitts, and Ireland. Nettec’s shareholders will vote on the deal Sept. 25. Paul Daly/The Independent
the service is responsible for transporting half of all the goods entering the province, including an estimated 90 per cent of perishable food items. Businesses, and the people they employ, simply cannot afford transporting delays. And while the myriad of collective bargaining sessions serves to cut away at Marine Atlantic’s “schnoz,” our province is moving forward without them. A well-run airport authority in the capital city supporting a competitive airline industry has soared in terms of passenger growth, while Marine Atlantic continues to anchor itself with never-ending labour disputes. And Oceanex is no doubt grateful for the continued labour troubles at Marine Atlantic, if the size of the ships delivering goods and the frequency of their visits to St. John’s harbour is any indication. It’s high time our federal government — which is responsible for delivery of the service through the crown corporation, Marine Atlantic Inc. — looked seriously at ways to solve these ongoing concerns caused by labour disruptions and ensure the ferry service operates efficiently and reliably. It has certainly been talked about enough. Early last year, for example, a report by an advisory committee on the future of Marine Atlantic Inc., appointed by the thenfederal transportation minister, stated in no uncertain terms the federal government itself needs to take action on this matter. Recommendation No. 1 of that report was “That an amendment be included in the 1986 MAI Acquisition and Authorization Act, or other legislative instrument, to recognize the essential nature of MAI’s services.” If that were to happen, it could just be the rhinoplasty that will be required to keep Marine Atlantic afloat and relevant as a means of transportation for the long term in this province. Ray Dillon is president of the St. John’s Board of Trade.
What’s new in the automotive industry
SEPTEMBER 3-9, 2006
FEATURED VEHICLE
Refinement The all new Subaru B9 TRIBECA a sport utility vehicle with high levels of refinement, flexible seating for up to seven, and available features like a navigation system, xm Satellite radio and a rear-seat DVD entertainment system. The vehicle also comes standard with Subaru’s Symmetrical AllWheel Drive and boxer engine, which gives performance and safety on the road. Available at Capital Subaru in St. John’s, 33-37 Elizabeth Ave.
Paul Daly/The Independent
The overpowered pond M
y little town is dotted with ponds, some form a series of steps in the hills while others are level and bisected by roads. I pass by no less than six bodies of water on my daily commute to St. John’s. Sometimes the mist hovers on the water and the houses are reflected like castles in the sky. The good residents make the most of their liquid lots and launch all make and manner of canoe, kayak, and rowboat for sport. But one pond in particular boasts wharf weaponry beyond imagination, a
MARK WOOD
WOODY’S WHEELS
cache of recreational hulls that wouldn’t be out of place in British Columbia or even Miami. I stumbled upon the arsenal while visiting one of my friends over the summer. We strolled through his backyard down to the dock where he launches his personal watercraft — a tidy little jet boat suitable for towing a tube full of kids around the pond and even water skiing. I admired the possibilities; if you could tear yourself away from the tranquility there was always the option of some high-speed water-sports.
“Take a look at this,” said my friend as we peeked over the hedge. There on the adjoining property was a single-engine floatplane. “When that thing fires up the whole house shakes,” he added. I believe it — you can hear those things miles away when they’re flying at altitude. I noticed the plane a couple of times last summer circling overhead, backing off on the throttle and drifting low over my hacienda. You don’t realize how big they are for a small plane until you see one up close, and mufflers don’t seem to be an option on these machines. I must admit though, they sound excellent. Owning a plane is a huge responsibility. I would-
n’t even be able to sleep with one of those machines down by the wharf, flying my garbage out to Robin Hood Bay and getting into dogfights all the time with other unsuspecting planes. Perhaps the odd jaunt to Mexico to watch a sunset or dropping off my old T-shirts to needy countries. Maybe that’s why I don’t own a plane. Under the guise of an investigative pond-hopper, I attended a late-night soiree at the behest of a likeminded individual, specifically “mad as a hatter” for whom the usual set of rules need not apply. Not See “Mechanical ecosystem,” page 25
24 • INDEPENDENTFUN
SEPTEMBER 3, 2006
WEEKLY DIVERSIONS ACROSS 1 Painter Emily 5 Corn on the ___ 8 Meech, for one 12 Hard to find 16 Malarial fever 17 Israeli P.M., once 18 Geishas’ belts 19 Digital audio player 20 Loch ___ 21 Pollen and ragweed, e.g. 23 “Anyone out there?” program 24 Alta. town with UFO Landing Pad 26 Abacus unit 27 Among 29 Italian or Austrian 31 Leader of Upper Canada Rebellion (1837): William ___ Mackenzie 32 Brave 35 South in France 36 Follow too closely 40 Mother’s sister 41 Bad cheque letters 42 Minister’s residence 43 ___ an egg 44 British Broadcasting Corp. 45 Debatable 47 Swindle 48 India tourist stop 49 Antennas 51 German thanks 52 Aberdeen natives
53 Roman poet 54 Compassion 55 Sharp 56 Where the Nile is dammed 58 Small moneybag 59 Highest-scoring defenceman in NHL history 62 Vocalist Arden 63 Wicca 64 Fall short 65 WWW address 66 Brew 67 River transport 68 Whimsical 69 Covers 70 Alta. town with giant oil derrick 72 Humble dwelling 73 Wide street 75 Opinion page 76 Despotic 78 Canadian Paul Mason’s invention: Beverage ___ 81 Waist band 82 Drill directive 85 Norway’s patron saint 86 Shaggy little dog (2 wds.) 89 Pelvic bones 91 Sainte ___ de Beaupré, Que. 92 Hop-drying kiln 93 Faculty head 94 North in Normandie 95 Old bits of cloth
96 Keats’ feats 97 Archie Belaney’s alias: Grey ___ 98 Summers in Ste. Adèle DOWN 1 Is able to 2 Gets older 3 Wheat disease 4 Esteem 5 Ofra Harnoy’s instrument 6 Vinaigrette ingredient 7 Jesuit missionary, composer of Huron Carol 8 Our highest mountain 9 Still snoozing 10 Cousins 11 Writer of opinion pieces 12 Coming up 13 Imitated 14 Goes bad 15 Emend text 17 Actor Chaykin (“Whale Music”) 22 “___ my lips!” 25 Bird once native to Funk Island: Great ___ 28 Underground rodent 30 Hissed “hey!” 31 Cavalry weapon 32 Sunscreen ingredient 33 Garage service 34 Like a king in waiting 36 With too much dialogue
37 Large Ontario park 38 Butter ___ 39 Young hawk 41 “O Canada! Terre de ___ aïeux” 42 Chew vigorously 45 Chief 46 Medieval 47 Month of wind and rain 48 Maple tree genus 50 Terrible tsar 51 Side of a die with two pips 52 Alone (Fr.) 54 Engine 55 Japanese carp 56 Close to closed 57 Bargain event 58 Longed 59 Hudson or James 60 Pakistani language 61 Alternative indicator 63 City with Canadian Innovation Centre (CIC) 64 Greek cheese 67 Breton or Tormentine 68 Singer Nelly (Loose) 69 He invented a music synthesizer (“The Sackbut”, 1945) 71 They may be heard howling in 37D 72 Tree frog 73 Author Chekhov 74 C’est la ___ (sigh). 76 Exams 77 Pertaining to the nose
78 Piglet’s pop 79 Forearm bone 80 Citrus feature
81 Headquarters 83 Machine for gamblers 84 Where to find
Galway Bay 87 Deceived 88 Sunday seat
90 Public plugs Solutions page 27
WEEKLY STARS ARIES (MAR. 21 TO APR. 19) As tensions ease on the home front, you can once more focus on changes in the workplace. Early difficulties are soon worked out. Stability returns as adjustments are made. TAURUS (APR. 20 TO MAY 20) A new romance tests the unattached Bovine’s patience to the limit. But Venus still rules the Taurean heart, so expect to find yourself trying hard to make this relationship work. GEMINI (MAY 21 TO JUNE 20) It’s a good time to consider homerelated purchases. But shop around carefully for the best price — whether it’s a new house for the family or a new hose for the garden. CANCER (JUNE 21 TO JULY 22)
A contentious family member seems intent on creating problems. Best advice: Avoid stepping in until you know more about the origins of this domestic disagreement. LEO (JULY 23 TO AUG. 22) A recent job-related move proves to be far more successful than you could have imagined. Look for continued beneficial fallout. Even your critics have something nice to say. VIRGO (AUG. 23 TO SEPT. 22) Ease up and stop driving yourself to finish that project on a deadline that is no longer realistic. Your superiors will be open to requests for an extension. Ask for it. LIBRA (SEPT. 23 TO OCT. 22) You should soon be hearing some positive feedback on that recent
business move. An old family problem recurs, but this time you’ll know how to handle it better. SCORPIO (OCT. 23 TO NOV. 21) Some surprising statements shed light on the problem that caused that once-warm relationship to cool off. Use this newly won knowledge to help turn things around. SAGITTARIUS (NOV. 22 TO DEC. 21) Your spiritual side is especially strong at this time. Let yourself be guided by it into deeper contemplation of aspects about yourself you’d like to understand better. CAPRICORN (DEC. 22 TO JAN. 19) Your merrier aspect continues to dominate and to attract folks who rarely see this side of you. Some serious new romancing could
develop out of all this cheeriness. AQUARIUS (JAN. 20 TO FEB. 18) You’re always concerned about the well-being of others. It’s time you put some of that concern into your own health situation, especially where it involves nutrition. PISCES (FEB. 19 TO MAR. 20) Just when you thought your life had finally stabilized, along comes another change that needs to be addressed. Someone you trust can help you deal with it successfully. YOU BORN THIS WEEK You have a sixth sense when it comes to finding people who need help long before they think of asking for it. And you’re right there to provide it. (c) 2006 King Features Syndicate, Inc.
Fill in the grid so that each row of nine squares, each column of nine and each section of nine (three squares by three) contains the numbers 1 through 9 in any order. There is only one solution to each puzzle. Solutions, tips and computer program available at www.sudoko.com SOLUTION ON PAGE 27
SEPTEMBER 3, 2006
INDEPENDENTSHIFT • 25
Roundabout in a rental I
have a friend who equates wed- much against the idea, and he would dings with cat litter. Don’t strain have driven to England if he could trying to figure out the have. Now the ads everyconnection — it’s all about a where make it seem like rentcar rental. Whenever he has ing a car for the weekend is to go to a wedding, this cheaper than a box of ice urbanite has to rent a car to cream. I love the hooks they travel to the far-flung destiuse — “unlimited mileage!” nation. And when someone — which frankly is a good only gets his hands on a car one, because I used to use up once or twice a year, you bethalf my allotted daily mileage ter believe he’s going to just trying to get out of the airLORRAINE make the most of it. port. SOMMERFELD For my friend, that means If I have to rent a car somecat litter. You can cram lots where, I always try to get one of things in a backpack while the same make as I drive back you ride your bike. Being the home. That way I know where strong manly man that he is, the headlights and windshield he can tote multiple grocery wipers will be, which you bags to his apartment. But cat litter don’t think about until you need them, weighs more than watermelons, and for and by then you’re wedged under the this you need a car. butt of some transport truck someWhen I was a kid, renting a car was where. A Very Big Deal. My father was very Despite all the best-laid plans, some
POWER SHIFT
things are just destined to go badly. In 1977, my family took that trip to England. By airplane. Upon arrival at the hotel, we went to a car rental agency. They handed my father the keys to the car as my mother translated the Queen’s English to my Dad’s English for him. Then the girl looked up, and saw my two sisters and me. When she realized we were all together, she handed my father a shoehorn and a can of axle grease. The cars are considerably smaller in England. Some of them only have three wheels. On purpose. We’d driven a large orange station wagon in one country, and were touring another one in a small white thimble with tires the size of Oreos. If my father were alive today, the experts would probably say he had anger management issues. Back then, they just called him an SOB. He didn’t
enjoy travel. He hated airplanes, he hated strange food, and he hated wearing his leisure suit. After experiencing all of these things at the same time, he got behind the wheel of a car built for Weebles, with the steering wheel on the right side and prepared to barrel down the road on the wrong side. Did I mention it had a standard transmission? As my sisters and I strained to take in some of the quaint British sights (“Welcome to Scotland! It’s Raining Here Too!”), the one-man band in the front seat snarled his way from one coast to another. We’d beg to pause at places with names like Henley-onFish-and-Chips, but once my Dad got that thing in gear, there was no stopping. If you’ve never experienced a traffic circle, write it on your list of things to do before you die. Come to think of it, it could be the last thing you cross off. When I first heard about them, like
many I was nonchalant. How dangerous can something colloquially called a roundabout be? It sounded fun — quaint, old world, casual, as if it should be called “ye roundabout,” almost. It is none of those things. It is a NASCAR track for regular people. If regular people can be found whipping their vehicles violently around a paved circle, reading a confusing array of picture signs that were written by drunken ducks with dirty feet. My father was having a hard enough time on straight little roads. When he got trapped in a traffic circle, I remember my young life passing before my eyes. I was 13-years-old and I had just discovered the Bay City Rollers. And I was going to die because my father had finally decided the shortest distance between two points was a straight line, not a damned roundabout. www.lorraineonline.com
Automobiles living longer By Tony van Alphen Torstar wire service
T
he trend of more old vehicles on Canadian roads isn’t showing any sign of conking out. The number of 10-year or older autos in operation has climbed more than 510,000 in the past five years to 6.8 million in 2005, according to vehicle registration data from DesRosiers Automotive Consultants and R.L. Polk Canada Inc. DesRosiers president Dennis DesRosiers says his firm forecasts the number of old cars and trucks will hit 7 million before the end of the decade. DesRosiers says over the years, auto manufacturers have been building vehicles better so they last longer. For example, galvanized steel started replacing carbon steel in the late 1980s and reduced body corrosion dramatically. The quality of those vehicles far exceeds the dilapidated clunkers sputtering down the street a generation ago, he says. Other statistics indicate a consumer shift from cars to more durable trucks during the past decade contributed to the continuing increase in older vehicles. Trucks are also easier to repair after collisions than cars, he says. At the same time, DesRosiers says governments aren’t doing much to put the brakes on the trend and force older vehicles off the road through requirements for better fuel economy and lower emissions. He rejects arguments motorists are keeping their vehicles longer because they can’t afford new models, because statistics indicate real prices have dropped in recent years. The registration data shows that, over the past decade, the number of 10-year-old operating vehicles in Canada has climbed almost 2.6 million to 6.8 million. DesRosiers says the federal government could force older vehicles off the road and improve fuel economy and the environment by implementing maximum mileage limits or higher taxes on them. “A large portion of the country’s out-of-tune engines would be removed from service, the new vehicle market would receive a boost and the used vehicle market would still have enough headroom to operate with a degree of health,” DesRosiers says.“Loopholes could be written for people wishing to collect high mileage classic cars, but the vast majority of daily commuters would be forced into making ecologically sound transportation decisions.” The data shows luxury brands such as Lexus, Mercedes-Benz, Infiniti, Acura, BMW, Volvo and Cadillac had the highest survival rates of 11- to 20-year-old vehicles. However, Saturn, Toyota and Honda vehicles also had high rates.
Bob Slack wants to build a NASCAR legacy in Ontario starting with the NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series. Above: Mark Martin takes the checkered flag to win under caution the GM FlexFuel 250 Craftsman Truck Series race at the Daytona International Speedway in Daytona Beach, Florida February 17, 2006. Martin drove his number 6 Scotts Ford in the race, which leads up to running of the 48th Daytona 500 NASCAR race on February 19. REUTERS/Pierre DuCharme
It’s not just racing — it’s entertainment
E
arlier this summer, when Ontario’s most famous oval racetrack, Cayuga Speedway, changed hands, the announcement was followed almost immediately by a press release and drawings showing a larger and vastly improved facility on the 121 hectare property south of Hamilton. A new day would dawn soon after Labour Day, the release said. Out would go the old 5/8-mile speedway and the 40-year-old grandstands and control tower and in would come a new 3/4mile (maybe bigger) racing surface surrounded by gleaming seating areas complete with corporate hospitality suites and other luxury boxes. But just a minute, says Bob Slack, the man who made Cayuga what it was in its glory years. The message back to the new owners from Bob Slack, whose son Randy was one of this province’s finest late-model stock car racers and whose grandson Roger is the driving force behind racing operations at the Lowe’s Motor Speedway in Charlotte, N.C., is that Cayuga, the facility, is just fine. What’s needed is some TLC and some proper promotion — two things Slack says have been missing in recent years. “You know,” he says (and he has this
deep baritone speaking voice; when he talks, you listen), the new guys (Hamilton-area businessmen Dean Rose, Jerry Santucci and two others) have done a terrific job getting the place ready for the CASCAR race this weekend. “They’ve spruced it up and they have a really good guy (director of operations Bruce Mellenbacher) in charge. But instead of planning to spend a whole lot of money to just about start over again (by essentially building a new plant), what they should do is build on what they’ve already got there. EYE ON THE BALL “They can make a real success of that race track and make themselves some money, if they keep their eye on the ball that’s right in front of them instead of on some distant horizon.” For instance, instead of lusting after a Nextel Cup date, Slack thinks Cayuga is ripe in the short term to land a NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series race. And that opportunity is staring them pretty much right in the face. “Toyota’s throwing some cash around these days,” he says. “They have a big manufacturing plant in Cambridge and they’re building another one in
Mechanical ecosystem From page 23 in an evil way, but the nicest, wildest guy you’d ever want to meet. I had to eat barbecue and drink beer to get to the core of this twisted saga, Hunter S. Thompson style. It’s a tough job but somebody’s got to do it, take one for the team. (Sometimes 12.) With a party raging all around us the owner of the home showed me his boat, a sleek cigarette-style craft with a massive 150 horsepower V-6 outboard engine reluctantly bolted to the stern. You could hear the Miami Vice soundtrack and helicopters chasing you running rum back from St. Pierre.
A stunning blonde hostess, five-foot11 in flip-flops, plied us with more beer. “I bought the craft in Lake Ontario,” he said, “buddy put her to the mats right off the dock and nearly lost our passenger in the back, beautiful bit of salesmanship.” IT’S ALL FUN UNTIL ... And this is what he water-skis with. He drives 60 kilometres per hour to the pond and scoots around 90 km per hour on the water. But if he loses it on the corner he’ll skim across the pond and clear a new path up in the woods. We’re all having fun till someone loses a tree. The boy’s clearly insane. What if his
neighbour with the floatplane comes in for a landing? Well, here’s a nautical pecking order on the overpowered pond — larger faster craft have the right of way. Kind of like our own bird feeder, the juncos are fine until the blue jays arrive. My wife calls them “the cops.” They’re loud, the same colour blue and everybody leaves when they show up. Then they clear out when the crows pitch. Sport imitates wildlife in the fragile mechanical ecosystem of the overpowered pond. Mark Wood of Portugal Cove-St. Philip’s very rarely attends social events.
Woodstock. They’re big in truck racing right now and they’re about to get into (Nextel) Cup racing. “I’d say there’s a golden opportunity there for a truck race at Cayuga with Toyota backing. Cayuga’s right in their backyard. And if they did that next year, and it’s a success, there’s a pretty good chance they could then land a Busch (Grand National) race there the following year. “And if they also went after some ARCA and ACT late-model shows, they could do real well for themselves.” Slack says the “if you build it, they will come” mantra doesn’t work with NASCAR. “Years ago, I sat across the table from Bill France Jr. I wanted a Winston race (a previous Cup sponsor), so I shoved a blank cheque across the table and told him to fill in any amount he wanted. “He shoved it right back to me. I found out that day that when NASCAR wants you, they’ll be there, not before. That’s why I’d go after the trucks first and work up from there. “And you don’t need a track bigger than a 5/8-mile for those shows, either. “What’s the difference between a 5/8 and a 3/4-mile anyway?” Slack, who took over Cayuga in 1967
and promoted racing there until 1994, says the new owners also have to remember that they’re in the entertainment business. “I didn’t just promote racing,” he says. “I’d have racing, sure, but I’d also have thrill shows or motorcycle daredevils or whatever to keep the people interested and entertained.” Slack remembers having all five members of the Allison family on hand for one promotion (“there was Bobby, Donnie, Davey and Clifford and a cousin who’s name I can’t remember”). And then there was the time that Dale Earnhardt arrived by helicopter and just about everybody went nuts. “They (NASCAR) were racing at Michigan. I had him (Earnhardt) coming in for a Saturday race. He flew his plane into the airport at Mount Hope. We had him picked up there in a helicopter and flown over to Cayuga and the helicopter landed right on the front chute. He got out and the grandstands went crazy. “He spun a guy out to win the race. Then he signed autographs for everyone who wanted one. We had his wife and son (Kerry) up in the tower. We had a real good time.” nmcdonald@thestar.ca
26 • INDEPENDENTSPORTS
SEPTEMBER 3, 2006
Ticats get ‘football smarts’ Hire Alouettes’ Desjardins as GM; ‘I am a bit of an idiot,’ owner says By Rick Matsumoto Torstar wire service
H
amilton Tiger-Cats owner Bob Young insists it’s not a put-on when he refers to himself as an idiot who surrounds himself with smart people to protect him from himself. “The reality, as Ticat fans are learning to their dismay, is that I wasn’t kidding,” he says. “I am a bit of an idiot. It takes me a while to learn new things.” What the billionaire software maker has learned since he purchased the bankrupt team late in the 2003 CFL season is that you can’t start a business with a group of novices at key positions. He began his first full year as owner (2004) with a rookie president, Dave Sauve; a rookie general manager, Ron Lancaster; a rookie head coach, Greg Marshall, and a rookie owner, himself.
“That’s arguably three too many rookies,” he says. Today, the rookies, save for himself, are either gone or moved on to other positions within the organization. And the rebuilding of the key positions on the football side of the operation is in full swing. The Ticats took the occasion of their annual golf tournament at Century Pines Golf Club in Flamborough yesterday to announce the appointment of Marcel Desjardins as general manager. He has been the assistant GM of the Montreal Alouettes for the past five years. Rob Katz, the club’s chief operating officer who has been acting general manager, will return to looking after the business operation. Young says he started to get the message early last season that putting
together a leadership group composed of inexperienced people was a mistake. The euphoria of a successful freshman year — when the Ticats finished with a 9-8-1 record and Marshall won coachof-the-year honours — evaporated faster than the annual Stanley Cup hopes of Maple Leaf fans as the team began the 2005 season with six consecutive losses. Young relieved Lancaster of the GM’s position and installed Katz, then listed as the team’s senior business adviser, on an interim basis. Lancaster was bumped upstairs with the title of senior consultant, football operations. A month later Sauve, a former Ticat lineman, announced he was quitting to concentrate on running his coffee shop chain. The Ticats finished the year with a 513 record and when they opened this
season with four consecutive losses, Marshall was dumped. Lancaster was coaxed back onto the sidelines to replace Marshall on an interim basis. As the Ticats continued to slide — they failed to score a touchdown in three straight home losses — the team this week fired offensive co-ordinator Joe Paopao and offensive line coach Kani Kauahi. “As an organization we are getting much smarter,” says Young. “And we took a quantum leap in the football smarts in our organization with the hiring today of Marcel.” The 40-year-old Desjardins, a native of Burlington, has worked under the Als’ Jim Popp, considered one of the league’s best GMs. “It’s hard to argue that if (Popp) isn’t the best GM in this league he’s one of
Elvis Stojko acknowledges the standing ovation while performing at the closing of the Canadian Figure Skating Championships in Edmonton, Alta. in 2004.
the top two,” Young says. “To get the guy Jim’s been tutoring for the last five years is a great coup for us.” Desjardins doesn’t feel the Ticats are as bad talent-wise as people make out. “I did catch the last half of their most recent game and the effort certainly wasn’t there,” he says. “Everybody seemed to be going in their own direction. You have to believe in the guy next to you. You have to get everyone working together. That’s the first thing that has to be done here.” Desjardins’ first major task will be to hire a head coach and that likely won’t happen until after the season. One name that has already come up is former Alouettes head coach Charlie Taaffe (1999-2000), who compiled a 2412 regular-season record before taking a college football job in the U.S. He has expressed interest in the Ticat job.
Andy Clark/Reuters
Stojko hangs ’em up Skater embarks on career as a singer — with no regrets By Randy Starkman Torstar wire serivce
E
lvis has left the building — he even described it in those very words himself for the first time. Three-time world champion Elvis Stojko is done with figure skating. A fierce competitor who forged an amazing career against great odds before retiring as a competitor after the 2002 Olympics, Stojko has decided he’s had it with professional skating shows. He has performed on ice for the last time — and he’s not leaving because he’s just launched a singing career. There’ll be no gala figure skating TV special to celebrate the two-time Olympic silver medallist. And you can definitely forget about those sappy, money-grabbing farewell tours. “No farewell tour. Not for this boy,” says Stojko. “To go through the whole rigmarole of a tour and all that, I just didn’t want to deal with that. It’s just been really difficult, so I didn’t want to drag it out. Short and sweet and to the point. If I’m going to retire, I’m retired.
I’m not going to mess around.” The 34-year-old from Richmond Hill is adamant he’ll remain retired as a skater, unlike so many athletes who experience a change of heart after a year or two away from the sport they loved. The thing is Stojko’s heart really hasn’t been in it the past two years. It was no longer his passion: it had become a job. After taking two months off at one point, he found it very hard to motivate himself again. “It was kind of funny because when you have no more words to say or words to write, then what? And that’s kind of like with skating, I had no more words to say for skating,” he said. “I was finished. It was like my book was done. The novel was finished. Why write a second movie when the first one went so well? Why ruin it? “With music, I feel like I have a new book, not just a chapter but a whole new book to talk about things and live and I can express it through words.” Stojko’s duet with Canadian Idol finalist Ashley Leitao on Braided’s
debut album is currently getting airplay, while his own album is being readied for a pre-Christmas release. But he said his new venture didn’t influence his decision. “I think either way, if I had a music career or not, I would still retire at this point,” says Stojko. “I wanted to make that clear, too. I’m not giving up one for another. I don’t think it would be smart to do that. I think I should go as long as I can with one and see how I feel and be honest with that. It just happens to be that there’s a nice transition now.” Stojko’s announcement stunned figure skating fans who have traditionally expected their favourites to stick around for a decade and often even longer as pros once they’ve finished competing. Rather than cash in on his last skate, Stojko chose to perform it at a low-key event, the Mariposa Gala two weeks ago at the Barrie Molson Centre, a fundraiser for his old club, where he skated under coach Doug Leigh for 14 years. There had been a difficult break with Leigh towards the end of his
career, but Stojko came to his “second home” to wrap things up. No one knew that this was Stojko’s final skate beforehand except his close friend and kung-fu coach Glenn Doyle and Doyle’s wife, Roselle Soussana, who choreographed his routine. He skated his last routine to Queen’s The Show Must Go On. “I always wanted to skate to that song,” he says. “I think it was appropriate. No matter where I go and what I do, the show must go on.” When he caught his breath afterwards, Stojko took the mike and announced to the crowd they had just seen his last skate. The first people Stojko thanked, strangely enough, were his legion of critics, the ones who said he’d never make it because among other things he didn’t look at all like a figure skater and lacked the necessary artistry. “I thanked everyone who talked behind my back and always criticized me, and I thanked them because they made me strong. They fuelled the monster. So I thanked them first. I told the
“I think either way, if I had a music career or not, I would still retire at this point.” Elvis Stojko people, ‘This will be an unusual group of people to thank, but they are a part of who I am as well.’” After thanking Leigh, Doyle, his skating idol Brian Orser, and his parents among others, Stojko couldn’t resist uttering the line he’d resisted his entire career up until then. “I actually did say that at the end, because I never said it ever in my career. At the very, very end, I said, ‘And the old cliché, as many people would say — and this is my first time saying it — Elvis will be leaving the building.’”
SEPTEMBER 3, 2006
INDEPENDENTSPORTS • 27 Solutions for crossword on page 24
Paul Smith/The Independent
Tea on the tundra
Solutions for sudoku on page 24
From page 28 mainland shore lunch. It wasn’t a Lloyd Colbourne-style boil up, but neither was it Pepsi and ham sandwiches. First I have to tell you a little about Mike and Terry — not at all typical mainlanders. Mike is originally from Calgary, but fell in love with the north at a tender age. He is now “homesteaded” on a river bank about three hours’ drive outside Yellowknife, where he is somewhat of a celebrity for his escapades with big Northern Pike on a fly rod. His cabin is built of logs he cut along the river’s bank and floated to his property. He is a character, to say the least. Terry grew up in Kamloops, B.C., a quintessential fly-fishing region. Terry embraced his roots and has been a professional fly-fishing guide for 20 years. He has appeared on FlyFishing B.C. and has fished with Lefty Kregh. The fly fishing aficionados among us will know what that means. Both Mike and Terry can cook up a mean shore lunch. For a week in the unspoiled northern wilderness, we feasted on the likes of grilled Arctic char, honey-cajun lake trout, deepfried grayling, and fish kabobs. On an early morning fly-out to Sulky River, there were five of us on a quest for the elusive Arctic grayling. The Sulky is a river system that flows into Great Bear and is renowned for world class grayling fishing. Mike and Terry were guiding Rod and myself, along with Dave Linkiewicz from Arizona. Rod and I became great friends with Dave and plan to stay in touch. He is a kindred fishing adventuring spirit. By 1 p.m. we had built up a powerful appetite by hooking no less than 50 hard-fighting grayling each. It was time for shore lunch or a boil up, whatever. Rod, Dave, and I collected dry wood and built two campfires — one for Terry and one for Mike. On the menu was Terry’s deep-fried grayling with wedges, and Mike’s specialty, fish kabobs. Terry rolled grayling fillets in breadcrumbs, and added some secret spice. Then he threw them in a frying pan filled with hot oil. The pre-boiled potato wedges met the same fate. Meanwhile, Mike was cubing a combination of lake trout, veggies and grayling. When the fire had burned to a bed of hot glowing coils, Mike positioned his skewers of lightly Cajun-seasoned fish and veggies on the fire. I have to admit, this was one of the best outdoor cook-ups I’ve ever experienced. I won’t even attempt to describe the smell in the air. Suffice to say we kept a keen lookout for hungry grizzlies. But there was something missing — tea. Newfoundlanders can’t do without a cup of tea, either in the woods or on the tundra. Rod and I rummaged up an old ketchup can and boiled some crystal clear Arctic water. We’re still not sure what the can was previously used for, but sometimes you just have to live on the edge. All hands washed down Terry’s and Mike’s culinary delights with strong black tea. Maybe we’ve added a permanent addition to the Great Bear Lake shore lunch. Paul Smith is a freelance writer living in Spaniard’s Bay, enjoying all the outdoors Newfoundland and Labrador has to offer. flyfishtherock@hotmail.com
“
“
”
You have to see it to believe it.
”
The accommodations are magnificent.
“
”
Canada’s best kept secret.
1.866.686.8100 humbervalley.com
INDEPENDENTSPORTS
SUNDAY THROUGH SATURDAY, SEPTEMBER 3-9, 2006 — PAGE 28
By Bob White For The Independent
T
arga Newfoundland offers Fay Matthews a rare opportunity to tell husband Geoff Fowlow where to go, how to get there, and what to do when he arrives. And she’s become quite good at it. Of course, as navigator, it’s her job. The husband and wife team are regular participants in the annual car race — and both see the humour in the situation. “The whole week can be considered a wife’s dream,” laughs Fowlow. “But, it’s true, I have to listen to her. And she’s a great navigator.” For her part, Matthews takes the job seriously — but not too seriously. “I’m responsible for making sure he gets to where we’re supposed to go and at the right time,” she says. “It can be quite intense at times, but … we don’t want to take the fun out of it.” Having participated in every Targa Newfoundland to date, the couple enjoys the annual experience. And again this year — their fifth — they’re excited to get behind the wheel and hit the road for the event, Sept. 9-16. “It’s something that we share and it gives us a wonderful memory,” says Matthews. “I’m sure there are people who think we are cracked, but we have fun with it.” Targa Newfoundland is a 2,200 km long automotive adventure, held over seven days in September throughout eastern and central Newfoundland. The event allows the owners of historic, classic and modern sporting motor vehicles to drive them the way they were designed to be driven.
Targa team Husband and wife team ready for fifth year in Targa Newfoundland
PASSION FOR CARS Fowlow has had a passion for cars from the time he was two years old. The first vehicle he bought was a 1955 Porsche Speedster, when he was 16 years old. From that point on, he’s been a collector of classic cars. He drives a 1957 Jaguar XK140 in Targa. He owns several rare vehicles, including a 1905 Apier, originally owned by the governor of India. He got the car “unfinished,” and he’s spent 20-odd years researching, fabricating, and rebuilding the antique. He hopes to have it roadworthy in the near future. “I’ve always been fascinated with cars and to get the opportunity to drive them (like this) … That’s what Targa offers.” He shares that passion with his wife, who was no stranger to cars growing up. “I wasn’t one to be the helpless female when it came to cars and if there were problems,” she says. “And when I met Geoff, well, it was a case of ‘if you can’t beat them, join them.’” When Targa was first introduced in the province, Fowlow knew it would be worth trying the race. In fact, he knew it would be fun to experience — and it is, each year. “After that first year, it was even better than I hoped it might be. We have no illusions of winning, but it is a challenge to finish the race and of course we don’t want to finish in the end of the pack, but around the middle of the pack like we did last year. “If we can do that, we’ll be pleased.” Even though both grew up in this province, Fowlow admits it’s easy to get lost every now and then. Fowlow, a doctor, has operated a practice in Arnold’s Cove for more than 30 years, and Matthews is Chief Operating Officer of the Trinity, Conception, Placentia Eastern Health Board.
Fay Matthews and husband Geoff Fowlow in Harbour Mille during last year’s Targa race.
‘HOLIDAY FOR THE MIND’ “The week of Targa is like a holiday for the mind,” Fowlow says. Fowlow and Matthews cherish Targa for many reasons, from the process of getting the car ready to race to the camaraderie of like-minded drivers. They appreciate the tips they get from professional drivers, and the work of the many volunteers.
“Our roads are fantastic for this type of driving,” Fowlow says. “Basically, there are not a lot of other places in the world where an event like this can take place. And to see and hear these cars, the old ones and the newer ones, being driven like they were meant to be, is a wonderful thing.” Matthews says Targa has also given
them new appreciation for the spectacular beauty of Newfoundland. “I guess we can sometimes take it for granted, but because there are so many people in Targa who come from outside this province, we get to see it through their eyes,” she says. “They all think this place is fantastic. And for us, there are places we probably
Randy Dawe photo
wouldn’t have had the opportunity to visit if not for Targa.” The excitement in their voices is audible, as they make the final preparations for this year’s run. Both husband and wife are committed to participating as long as they can. whitebobby@yahoo.ca
The Great Bear Lake shore lunch Paul Smith heads to the Northwest Territories for a week of fishing — and fine outdoor eating
I
first heard the term “shore lunch” on the now defunct Canadian Sportsfishing TV series. Henry and Italo would always end the show by heading off for a shore lunch. It invariably disappointed me when the credits would roll and viewers would be left in suspense — never really sure if they ate fish or not. Lloyd Colbourne, on the other hand, exalted the shore lunch and enshrined it as a vital part of the Newfoundland outdoor experience. But he never called it a shore lunch. Lloyd would proclaim in his signature jovial tone, “Bryce old
PAUL SMITH
The Rock
outdoors
man, I think it’s time for a boil up.” I’ve always considered shore lunch to be a mainlandish perversion of a boil up. Maybe I’m wrong, but while Henry and Italo were singing the praises of today’s tackle, Lloyd was showing us how freshly caught fish are meant to be enjoyed. Lloyd and Bryce devoted sometimes
10 minutes of their half hour show to the boil up. Bryce would prepare the fire as Lloyd cleaned trout and sliced the fat pork. Smoke blurred the camera’s vision while tea steeped in a copper kettle and pork rendered in a cast iron pan. Then Lloyd would lay freshly caught brook trout in the pan and make his commentary on the appetizing smell hanging in the air. It’s a challenge for words to describe the aromatic mixture of wood smoke, fat pork, trout, strong tea, and home-made bread, but Lloyd made a spirited effort. Mix in the tobacco smoke from Lloyd’s pipe and, well, it must have
been overwhelming. How could words measure up? You just had to be there. As a teenager glued to the TV I appreciated and identified with his enthusiasm. The man loved the outdoors and it showed. Canadian Sportsfishing aired nationally 1986-1999 and set the stage for the legion of fishing shows that dominate weekend cable. Some are tacky and ultra-commercial, while others are informative, entertaining and well produced. Henry Waszczuck and Italo Labignan produced and starred in Canadian Sportsfishing and are pioneers in angling television.
But they could have learned something from Lloyd Colbourne. Lloyd produced a local Newfoundland outdoor TV series that ran back in the 1970s and ’80s. I think he was ahead of his time as a conservationist and steward of the outdoor experience. My fishing buddy, Rod Hale, and I just returned from a fishing trip to Plummer’s Lodge on Great Bear Lake in Canada’s North West Territories. Our enthusiastic guides, Mike and Terry, blew away my preconception of the See “Tea,” page 27