Climate crisis
Re All That Oil Won't Move Itself (Nov. 3): Once, there were also editorials claiming that giving women the vote would lead to ruin, and that abolishing slavery would enable others to profit from the trade.
It's time to start preparing your readers for the necessary transformation away from fossil fuels to avoid the most severe effects of catastrophic climate change (Dire Warning On Climate Change – Nov. 3). And that means starting with stopping Energy East and investing in renewables, not the expansion of the tar sands.
Liz Bernstein, Ottawa
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Business as usual doesn't work in a crisis. We must treat our addiction to fossil fuels – or sentence our children to a bleak future. To quote Gus Speth, a U.S. adviser on climate change: "I used to think that top environmental problems were biodiversity loss, ecosystem collapse and climate change. I thought that 30 years of science could address these problems. I was wrong. The top environmental problems are selfishness, greed and apathy, and to deal with these we need a cultural and spiritual transformation."
Eleanor May, David Thompson; Vancouver
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75 years, no parole
Re Bourque Given Canada's Toughest Sentence In 52 Years (Nov. 1): I am not a proponent of the death penalty because the justice system cannot be relied on to administer it fairly for a capital crime (think Donald Marshall, David Milgaard). But the prospect of keeping Justin Bourque – who murdered three RCMP officers – jailed for the rest of his life, at great cost to the state, sickens me.
Thomas Frisch, Ottawa
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Seventy-five years is not justice. It's revenge.
Neil Foster, Toronto
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Society has no obligation to let multiple murderers live in hope that they might once again walk the streets, their very presence a taunt to their victims' families.
Life in prison – actually life, actually in prison – is wholly appropriate for Justin Bourque and others like him.
Jay Nathwani, Toronto
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ABCs of sharing
Re Fundraising Clout Gives Rich Schools Wider Edge (Nov. 3): As a past chair in our local elementary school and a regular volunteer, I was privileged to participate with parents, teachers, residents and school council to raise thousands of dollars each year, providing wish list items for our children.
However, a number of schools not far away were raising very little. We decided that in October of each year, when parents and teachers gathered to put forward their "need and wish lists," a determined percentage would be allocated to a school that could use the help. Each year, a group of parents did some leg work to find a school needing assistance.
Not a perfect system and not without challenges, but it worked.
Dianne McComb, Mississauga
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NDP's reasoning
Re Information Is Power (editorial, Nov. 3): Yes, the NDP opposed the First Nations Transparency Act when it came before Parliament. You didn't say why.
We believe that the provisions in the bill that force First Nations to reveal remuneration to chiefs or councils from band-owned entities – revenue generated from business, not from government- contribution agreements – could possibly prejudice the business interests of First Nations.
That is not good policy, especially when economic development on-reserve that is directed and controlled by First Nations has the best chance of success.
Some may say asking for that remuneration to be made public is a small thing, but other businesses can keep that information confidential. And in today's competitive world, even small disadvantages can mean the difference between success and failure.
Jean Crowder, NDP Aboriginal Affairs critic
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It's a crime (novel)
As the chair of Crime Writers of Canada, and a mystery novelist myself, I was enjoying Camilla Gibb's article on decreasing income for writers (The More You Write, The Less You Make – Nov. 3). Then she had to ruin it with one sentence. Talking about big money prizes, she says: "It matters for literary writers in a world where bestseller lists are dominated by genre fiction."
Why is there this need in Canada for so-called literary writers to disparage genre writers?
Not only are very few of the CWC's members on the bestseller lists even in Canada, we are struggling with the same industry upheaval as any other writer, and at an added financial disadvantage because of the attitude expressed by Ms. Gibb which excludes (without ever saying so) genre writers from big money literary prizes, writer-in-residence gigs, or government grants.
With very few exceptions, international publishers won't take mystery novels set in Canada. But we write about Canada anyway. Because we want to. Some support from our fellow writers and recognition that we're all in this together would be nice.
Vicki Delany, chair, Crime Writers of Canada; Picton, Ont.
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Taxes and kids
Heartbreak Hotel (Focus, Nov. 1) is an excellent exposé of the difficulties facing the Manitoba government or other provincial governments in dealing with aboriginal children at risk.
Surely any improvement in the situation must include on-reserve agencies so problems can be addressed at source. The split jurisdiction, with the federal government being responsible for funding and oversight of on-reserve services, no doubt creates falling-through-the-cracks problems.
Maybe the time has come for the feds to transfer funding, and contract with the provinces for oversight of this vital service.
Bob Liddle, Calgary
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First, income splitting gets the nod – a $3-billion gift for the well-off (New Tax Cuts Include Income Splitting, $60-a-month Hike In Child Care Benefit – Oct. 31). Then we're confronted with the harrowing story of aboriginal children in Manitoba, warehoused in bare-bones hotel rooms by cash-strapped social agencies. This was Tina Fontaine's world and is a re-minder of grim reality for far too many of our aboriginal youth.
If you are prone to connecting the dots, the political logic is simple, if harsh. Aboriginal children do not vote, and upper middle-class families do. I get it. I don't have to like it.
Bill Hall, Toronto
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Where is it written that any single tax measure must benefit all taxpayers equally? Does the tax bracket system benefit everyone equally? No. Does the child tax credit benefit everyone equally? No. Do rental and GST rebates benefit everyone equally? No.
Go find something else to complain about instead of a measure that helps level the playing field in a small way for families with a single wage-earner – families which, incidentally, do not require the subsidized daycare many two-earner families need.
Such a sadly typical Canadian attitude: If it doesn't benefit me, it must be bad!
Merrill Perret, Port Sydney, Ont.