1 week Ago By Reader Letters
For more than a decade, community-based organizations, municipal elected officials and anti-poverty advocates have been raising alarm bells about a growing addiction s crisis in Saskatchewan. Calls to action were incorporated into various strategies to tackle homelessness and poverty in our province. The current government put a lot of work into doing nothing.
Seats reserved for officials from the ministries of Social Services and Justice often sat empty at local working groups that gathered to make change. When provincial delegates did attend, they bemoaned the scope of challenges or sat silently on their phones waiting for meetings to end. When the community did the work for the Saskatchewan Party government, senior officials did little to move on the recommendations.
And, unless the federal government took the lead on new projects, like the YWCA or Rapid Housing Initiative, the province was content sitting on their hands. It took the threat of tariffs for the province to take the opioid crisis seriously. Unfortunately, their response is heavily tilted towards more cops, not real change.
Hopefully, the provincial government and their steadfast supporters acknowledge that the present reality is, in part, due to their legacy of inaction and ignorance. Andrew Stevens, Regina Poilievre promises, record at odds Well, here we go again. It is critical to vote this time around, but how do we wade through all of the muck? Consider the record of Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre.
Every promise he has made this election campaign goes directly against his voting record as a Conservative MP. He promises lots of really nice things to make life better for middle-class Canadians. But with his relatively high net worth amassed on an MP’s salary, he does not get the middle class.
He is a career politician with a current Opposition leader salary of $299,900. We’d all love a pension like the one he will get when he retires. He has a plan to cut taxes, and pay for it by slashing the public service again.
What departments are on the chopping block this time? Since he plans to use all of the empty federal buildings to build affordable housing, it is apparent that his plan is to totally eliminate some federal services. How can you promise to preserve social programs such as CPP and OAS while making wholesale cuts? He has promised affordable housing for all Canadians. He should know, considering almost half of his personal wealth is in real estate holdings.
I’m quite positive, though, that none of his holdings would fall in the affordable range. I’ll get off my soapbox now. Do your best to sift through all of the information thrown at you, but, most importantly, vote.
Darlene Mackenzie, Regina RelatedMandryk: Saskatchewan premier's war on drugs requires more than cliched, old approachTank: Sask. finally focuses on fentanyl after hundreds of deaths Share your views The Leader-Post welcomes letters to the editor. • Letters should be limited to no more than 250 words.
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