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p 4 the tribune thursday march 5 1998 st the tribune thursday march 5 1998 vol 110 no 18 the tribune is a member of the ontario press council t opinions send your letters to the editor to the address below editorial spanking okay is it right for parents to physically discipline their children its one of those questions that will never be unanimously agreed upon and one further that is gaining more and more attention a childrens rights group is fighting a part of the criminal code which allows parents to use reasonable physical force when disciplining their children the group says physical pun ishment is unconstitutional other critics say hitting a child when he or she is behaving unacceptably only teaches children that violence is the best way to solve conflicts up until the mid1980s most parents didnt hesitate to swat a child on the bottom with the hand the only acceptable part of the anatomy if he or she were misbehaving it was not thought then to be archaic or abusive it was expected by both kids and their parents that if children stepped over the line they would get a spanking and perhaps its for that reason that parents today- many products of childhood spankings chose to turn that mind set around abandoning the practice altogether today most people who see children out in public yelling screaming kicking and bossing their parents around silently wish the parent would give the child a welldeserved smack in many homes children seem to run the roost showing no respect to parents acting downright rude and yes spoiled as long as spanking is used reasonably theres nothing wrong with loving parents taking control of bad behaviour with a smack on the bottom abusive parenting is a whole different matter and should be punishable under the criminal code parents and kids know the difference thompson not the only truant senator dear editor canadians have been angry over senator andrew thomp sons absence from work from january to october of last year this senator attended parlia ment for only two days out of 99 senate sittings the senate has acted to pun ish mr thompson first by stripping him of certain perks such as paid travel and having a secretary and second by taking away his salary the trouble however is that mr thompson has not been the only senator absent from work last year 27 senators missed 40 per cent or more of designated sittings for example senator john buchanan a brian mulroney appointee showed up only half the time last year we ask readers what would happen if we were absent half letters the time from our place of work unlike senators who are appointed by the prime minister and whose jobs are guaranteed for life we would be fired we at watchdog newsletter have a list of the 27 truant sen ators and their senate mailing addresses we are asking interested people to write to us for the list and to write to some of the sena tors to ask them to attend all sen ate sittings to receive our list of truant sena tors please contact us by email at dmurrellunbca or fax us at 506- 4548245 david murrell watchdog newsletter fredericton nb replacing health card impossible dear editor thank you for your timely editorial entitled cards cut fraud in the tribunes march 3 issue t agree that the health care system is being abused due to health card fraud and applaud the efforts of our cur rent government to put a bet ter system in place however have you tried to get a lost health card replaced my daughters wallet escaped from her purse in a public place and we have dis covered firet hand how well the new system is working informing her bank and bell telephone of the loss was done with two telephone calls replacing her drivers license was accomplished with a quick trip to aurora replacing her health card has been a nightmare you cannot replace an exist ing cardby telephone or mail although most doctors offices post a listing of health card clinics at the local hospi tal getting an appointment within six months is impossi ble you must attend at a min istry office in person during business hours there are very few of these offices around you must go to barrie or toronto once you have arrived at the office extreme ly long jineups await you and many people give up in frus tration the reason given for per sonally attending an office is to obtain photoidentification for your card the telephone announcement however indi cates that the government has not yet decided if photo iden- tification will be required down the road the decision apparently is still up in the air until the decision is made i suggest that lost cards could be replaced by mail once suitable identification has been produced we are able to do this for a birth cer tificate so why not for a health card i believe that a birth certifi cate would be the document of choice if someone wanted to steal ah identity for a pass port or credit card approval we arc novy being told to carry our health cards with us in case of a medical emer gency until replacing a lost card becomes easier i recommend that you do not do so replac ing it is just too difficult elaine stewart gormley why so many shaw cable blackouts open letter to shaw cable system what is wrong lately with the cable system why are there so many blackouts in stouf- fville one day last week it was thursday feb 1 9 1 think the blackout lasted from 230 am until 2 pirn not to mention numerous other days in the last month or so the next day was feb 25 from 530 to 8 pm why dont you put in the local paper when something goes wrong even when you phone the cables customer service they would not give you an answer my experience i think there are too many shaw repair vans roaming the streets of stouffville is there a possibility to give your subscribers some refund please take this letter into consideration j deters stouffville stouffville tribune newspaper patricia pappas publisher andrew mair editorinchief tracy kibble editor debra weller director of advertising mike rogersori retail 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tribune todays seniors- contents cannot be reprinted with i out written permission from the 1 publisher permit 1247 the pub- i luker reserven the right to refuse or classify an advertisement credit for advertisement limited i- to space the error occupied -vi- w atwlji f ltf ww tviw 1 letters policy the tribune welcomes your letters to the editor please keep letters to no more than 300 words note that letters may be edited for space libel spelling grammar while we endeavor to print as many letters as possible we regret that not all let- tens may be printed t rr r r- 1 ta