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WHITBY FREE PRESS. WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 13, 1989, PAGE 7 PAGE SEVEN AND JUSTICE FOR NONE The GST may be the federal government's albatross but they most decidely don't hold the monopoly on economic failure. Bureaucracy stifles all levels of government, and perhaps appropriately, any tax revolt that results from the GST will hit all levels of government. Government is most inefficient when more than one level is involved. Unfortunately for us taxpayers, no mechanism exists to resolve the disagreements and we end up paying for them. (Meech Lake will make it even worse.) Wilson says he tried to get the provinces to agree to a shared sales tax and having failed, he had to invent his own. The result is wasteful duplication and confusion. A few particular areas of shared responsibility stand out for their bureaucratic inefficiency. Justice is one of the worst. Our justice system no longer commands the respect and trust of the people - it has failed them far too often. Bureaucratic inefficiency can be measured in the length of time spent waiting - to talk to somebody on the phone, to get an answer to a simple question or to get a tax refund. Nowhere are the waits longer than in our courts. A year to get a case to court is the norm and newspapers daily carry stories of cases than began five, six, seven, eight years ago. We have so many different courts - provincial, federal, supreme, appeal, divisional, family, small claims, surrogate, etc. that you need a lawyer just to find your way around. It is hard to imagine that a system so inaccessible to the public is capable of serving the best interests of the public. We carried a story a few weeks back that several new judges and crown attorneys had been appointed and this would help to clear the backlog. I doubt it. Instead, judges will spend more time on the cases before them and the queue will continue to grow. So says the law - Parkinson's law. The solution is as simple as deciding to solve it. Faced with a crisis, the federal government did just that with the immigration courts. It simply decided that refugee cases had to be resolved in days rather than the years it was taking. We need the same decisiveness for our own citizens - all criminal cases should come to trial within, say, a month. Not only is it fairer to the accused, but events are still fresh in witnesses minds. Court appearances would be drastically reduced. We would need fewer judges, not more ...and fewer court rooms, too. So why doesn't it happen? Wherever there are lawyers, there is bureaucracy - they create it, nurture it and live off it. And then they get appointed to judgeships. Perhaps significantly, Canada has twenty times as many lawyers as Japan. Perhaps that's one reason that Japan is on the top of the economic heap. Equally bureaucratic is our penal system. Can you believe that in an age when satellites can watch the movements of cars and trucks from outer space, when we can shoot an ant on the moon with a laser, or send a probe to Saturn and Neptune and have it send us pictures as detailed as any fin- gerprint - do you really believe that it is impossible to keep a criminal like Frederick Merrill from escaping? Do you believe it when correctional officials say there is nothing they can do to keep drugs out of the prisons? Or prevent the spread of Aids? Who the hell's in charge? Thecrooks or the guards? Our correctional system is still'in the dark ages - build higher walls, put up more barbed wire, hire more guards, etc. Pilot studies on electronic surveillance systems, such as ankle bracelet transmitters, have been conducted for years yet the inertia to implement them is astounding. Thousands of accused who are held simply to make sure they show up for their trial could be at home and earning a living and parollees could be monitored 24 brs a day. The savings would be tremendous. If correctional services can't put it together, perhaps it should be contracted to someone who cani. Canada bas one of the highest rates of incarceration in tbe world yet the level of crime is not exceptional. We give crooks very little incentive to go straight. A good lawyer can keep you out of the slamimer for years and maybe forever. And the chances are that we pay tbe lawyer. Police claim tbeir hands are tied. Politicians pass complicated laws and then say they don't know what they passed until the courts have interpreted it. Courts let crooks go free on technicalities. Rapists are sent to half-way bouses witbout anyone checking to see what they've done. Expert witnesses testify that black is white (and legal aid pays for it). There is confusion, discontientment, and lack of coordination. All are signs of bureaucratic anarchy. It stems partly from the shaxted responsibility of the federal and provincial governmentis and their inability to agree on anything. The rest is simply inertia. As we mark the fiftieth anniversary of the beginning of the Second World War, we should remember what that crisis did for governments around the world. Problems suddenly found solutions. Would it be too muich to ask that the GST start another war - against government mismanagement? s 'I IL ~--~ ~k i_ - . z '; I ~ SEWAGE TREATMENT PLANT UNDER CONSTRUCTION, 1914 Whitby's first sewage treatment plant was built in the fall of 1914 on the north side of Victoria Street, east of St. John's Anglican Church, which can be seen in the background of this picture. The plant was enlarged in 1948. Whitby Acàives photo 10 YEARS AGO from the Wednesday, September 12, 1979 edition of the WHITBY FREE PRESS • The future of bus service to the Whitby Psychiatric Hospital is uncertain as negotiations proceed for GO Transit to take over the Charterway routes. • Ontario Minister of Transportation and Communications James Snow opened the CPR overpass on the Whitby-Ajax town line last week. • Concerns are expressed that school busing in Whitby will stop when the town start its own bus service. • The Town of Whitby is promoting its new Port Whitby Marina with a brochure. 25 YEARS AGO from the Thursday, September 10, 1964 edition of the WHITBY WEEKLY NEWS • Widening of Dundas Street East to four lanes is postponed to 1965. • Councillor Harry Inkpen is chairran of the Whitby Centennial Celebrations Committee. • The 17th annual show of the Whitby Garden Club will feature displays by local industries. • Twenty-five students from the University of Toronto School of Architecture will use Whitby as the subject of a town planning project. 75 YEARS AGO from the Thurs&iy, September 10, 1914 edition of the WHITBY < AZETTE AND CHRONICLE • The Town Council has purchased 15 acres of land for a sewage disposal plant in Port Whitby. • A by-law regulating the sale of milk in Whitby was passed by the Town Council. • The Womens' War Relief Association will supply wool for knitting socks and colic belts to all Whitby ladies who will make them. • The Whitby Public Library is getting a supply of English newspapers for its patrons. 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