Pubdate: Fri, 15 Sep 2006
Source: Kootenay Western Star (CN BC)
Copyright: 2006 Kootenay Western Star
Contact:  http://www.kootenaywesternstar.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/4235
Author: Thomas Toye

COLUMN BANG ON

Editor:

I am writing regarding Tom Fletcher's Sept. 8 B.C. Views column, 
headlined Bums prefer ocean views.

I have just returned from a two-week holiday visiting my family, most 
of whom emigrated to B.C. around 50 years ago.

I now have two aunts, three cousins and their extended families 
living in Maple Ridge and I always receive a warm welcome.

I congratulate you on your article, which I read on the Internet.

Here, in Scotland, we have the same problems with the so-called 
"homeless drug addicts."

We also have the same bleeding-heart politicians and social workers 
with their schemes, projects and solutions to the problems of crime, 
illegal squatting on private property and vandalism caused by these people.

Throwing public money at them, giving them sympathy, free needles and 
places to inject, etc., is futile.

I know - I'm a civil servant in the Department of Work and Pensions, 
and the word "work" is simply not in their vocabulary.

We have them here too: people who would rather commit suicide than do 
one day's honest hard work in their natural lives.

And why should they?

When our government and its agencies give them welfare, so-called 
community care grants and everything they need to lead a comfortable 
life and all at the taxpayers' expense?

We live in crazy times, and with increasingly crazy liberal 
governments not only tolerating these parasites in our midst but 
encouraging them, things will never change.

Your article was accurate, not only describing the junkie issue in 
Canada, but throughout the Western world.

Thomas Toye

Paisley, Scotland
- ---
MAP posted-by: Elaine