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G7 leaders and guests pose on the second day of the annual G7 summit.Pool/Getty Images

Letters to the Editor should be exclusive to The Globe and Mail. Include your name, address and daytime phone number. Try to keep letters to fewer than 150 words. Letters may be edited for length and clarity. To submit a letter by e-mail, click here: letters@globeandmail.com


Eco shame to share

Re Brazil Open To Foreign Aid In Fighting Fires, Backtracking On Earlier Rejection (Aug. 28): The G7 offered U.S.$20-million as aid to Brazil to fight the forest fires in the Amazon.

Given that there are more than 2,500 active fires, simple math tells us that’s $8,000 per fire. One could hardly put out a garage fire with that kind of money.

When will G7/G20 nations realize their prosperity was achieved with environmentally damaging activities that now fan these fires in a habitat that is critical to the planet’s future well-being? Offering such a derisory sum speaks volumes about the leaders’ lack of understanding or willingness to acknowledge that if this ship sinks, we all sink with it.

Shame on them all.

Ian Robertson, Grimsby, Ont.


Re In A Turkish Forest, Resistance Grows To A Canadian Company’s Gold-Mining Project (Aug. 27): The level of deforestation, and the use of cyanide to extract gold from a Canadian company’s planned mine in Turkey elucidate how Canadian corporations contribute to climate change and watershed destruction.

As it stands, the Canadian Ombudsperson for Responsible Enterprise (CORE) is a dud with no real power to investigate alleged human rights and ecological violations by Canadian mining and garment companies at overseas operations. Rather than appease the extractive-sector lobby, Canada’s government must heed the more than decade-long calls from victims, defenders, civil society, the UN and its subcommittee on international human rights. To prevent further environmental degradation, an empowered CORE is urgently needed. Now.

Gabriela Jiménez, Latin America Partnerships Co-ordinator, KAIROS Canada

ABC’s of pot proximity

Re Ontario Pot Lottery Stokes Proximity Fears (Aug. 28): The co-owner of a Montessori school says she is “really angry that nobody’s considered the age group under 6” when setting buffer zones for locating cannabis stores. She’s right: I am horrified by the mental image of a four-year-old marching into the pot shop, plunking her 75 bucks on the counter and saying, “Gimme your best Sensi.”

But wait! It’s going to be okay. Where’s the kid going to get matches to light her joint? Whew! Had me worried there.

Pot shops are not the beer parlours of the late 1900s, populated with ne’er do wells and dissipated drunks. They look more like high-end electronic or perfume stores than anything else, and the customers are everyday people.

Let’s not go over the top on this.

Claudette Claereboudt, Regina

$450,000 in goodbyes

Re Wynne Aides Received Severance Boost After Elections (Aug. 28): This figure – $450,000 in enhanced severance packages for two aides – is an insult to taxpayers. For defeated Ontario premier Kathleen Wynne to preside over rewarding her advisers so generously is beyond understanding. The laissez-faire attitude on display reflects the huge distance between Ms. Wynne and the average Ontario worker, who was left with the fiscal debacle her government created. These retirement packages are a stark reminder of the insensitive spending of the former government.

Anne Robinson, Toronto

Worst option? Tolls

Re Who Pays For Roads (letters, Aug. 28): Rather than creating another road-use payment system, why not just increase the gas tax? Not only would there be zero additional overhead, it would also encourage good behaviour.

If you base a toll on distance travelled, all drivers pay at the same rate, which doesn’t reward good behaviour. Increasing the gas tax would not only pay for roads, but benefit the environment by encouraging drivers to buy fuel-efficient vehicles, and drive them in the most fuel-efficient way – obeying speed limits, avoiding aggressive driving.

A toll wouldn’t have these added benefits, plus it would increase administration costs. A toll is the worst possible option.

Steen Petersen, Nanaimo, B.C.

Humiliations?

Re Former Conservative Leader Disagrees With Scheer’s Assertion That Trudeau Caved To Trump On NAFTA (Aug. 27): Conservative Leader Andrew Scheer calls the new NAFTA pact a “historic humiliation” that he says exposes Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s weakness on the global stage.

Former Conservative leader Rona Ambrose’s remarks to the contrary expose Mr. Scheer’s weakness as the party’s leader, as well as his ignorance of international trade deals. I wouldn’t call her comments a historic humiliation but it must be embarrassing for Mr. Scheer to be contradicted by a prominent Conservative.

Agostino Di Millo, Toronto

Keep Senate in check

Re The Senate Must Get More Independence (Opinion, Aug. 24): Senators Raymonde Saint-Germain and Yuen Pau Woo argue that the Senate needs more independence.

Maybe, but first it needs equality of representation, which is lacking to an egregious degree.

So long as New Brunswick (three-quarters of a million people with 10 senators) has ten times more senators per capita than B.C. (five million people with six senators), the Senate doesn’t merit more independence.

So long as the House of Commons has greater control, the fact that MP seats are more equitably distributed provides a check on the regional imbalance of power in the Senate.

Edward Guy, Kelowna, B.C.

Pakistan’s position

Re Can China Be A Responsible Power In A New Era? (Aug. 23): Pakistan does not claim Kashmir as its own region. Our position is that Kashmir is a disputed region, and its final disposition will be made in accordance with the will of the people expressed through a free, impartial plebiscite conducted under the auspices of the UN.

The recent steps taken by India have the real potential to worsen the deteriorating human-rights situation in Indian-occupied Kashmir, as well as carrying serious implications for peace and security in South Asia.

India’s actions are also a clear breach of UN Security Council resolutions on the Jammu and Kashmir dispute, particularly about realization of the right of Kashmiris to self-determination.

Nadeem Haider Kiana, Press Officer, High Commission for Pakistan

Hmm …

Re McDavid’s Choice (Aug. 27): Cathal Kelly says Connor McDavid risks having a career where he has “put up Hall of Fame numbers and never accomplish[ed] anything important.” I love it! I will add the term “unimportant Hall of Fame career” to my list of Canadian oxymorons, which includes: “diverse individual,” “born-in-Canada settler,” and “Stanley Cup Champion Maple Leafs.”

Rudy Buller, Toronto


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