To the editor:
Re: "Class division scheme spreading across globe," July 22.
The reasoning that the CEO of B.C. Ferries deserves his stupendous enumeration, else some corporation will lure him away with more pay, makes sense in ways I don't like. Has the value of public service been so discounted in the professions? Why not pay him at the rate of junk land dealer, if his professional competencies and loyalty are to be gauged by his earnings? Is this a healthy standard for Canadian values?
For example did ministerial assistants Bassi and Virk accept bribes in the B.C. Rail sale that were of less value to bureaucrats than they might have expected as businessmen? How did Erik Bornman who paid the bribes determine their dollar value? Mr. Bornman, best friend of Premier Christy Clark's ex-husband, now wants the Law Society of Upper Canada to admit him to the Ontario Bar. So the correlation between business and political stipends and blandishments does matter.
I remember when Premier Glen Clark was accused of accepting the bribe of a sundeck so his neighbour could obtain a casino license, and I thought at the time that surely a casino license is worth two sundecks. Mr. Clark now helps Jimmy Pattison run things.
Down here on the ground, however, we need to know just how business differs from public service in the rates for bribes. For example, the residents at Steeves Manor public housing want to know who to bribe and how much, to get B.C. Housing's years-long renovation of their building finally finished.
Roger Henning,
Vancouver
