Letters, Oct. 15

Support for combined approach

Re: Balanced drug blitz pays off (Oct. 14)

Your news and reporting on the positive results of co-ordinated outreach coupled with enforcement combining social, medical and police services is important progress towards a safer and healthier Winnipeg.

As is often stated and conclusively researched, the poverty, mental health, addictions and desperation of too many of our brothers and sisters on the streets is a very complex dilemma. Let’s really get behind and support these new initiatives with vigour and sustained support through this combined co-operation with front-line engagement coalition partners.

Fewer silos of separate/disassociated interests working in isolation and more collaborative interactions, as shared in your reporting, is a direction that can hopefully change people’s lives in our city and beyond.

I applaud those leaders in our community who can see the forest for the trees and are moving to a big-picture view of the seriousness of social and health threats in our communities that are further negatively impacted by unscrupulous criminal elements.

As we approach the voting booth in our civic elections this month, let’s advocate with candidates for more support and sustainability for smart policies that can really have a positive payoff.

Roland Stankevicius

Winnipeg

No place like home

Re: Separatists don’t put us on the brink of collapse (Opinion, Oct. 14)

As a kid growing up in Montreal during the ’50s and ’60s, I remember well the issues of the day.

Soon after I graduated from high school, our family sold and liquidated several businesses and we moved to Vancouver. Money is portable and many businesses, individuals and families moved out of the province. Montreal had been very vibrant.

Since those days, I’ve lived, worked and, at times, studied in six provinces and nine large- and medium-sized cities in Canada. I declined a very good IT management position in Montreal in the 1980s because I disliked the attitudes in Quebec and would not live there for any reason.

For a number of years, I worked in both Edmonton and Calgary. To me, Alberta seemed to behave a lot like Texas. After working in Ottawa and Toronto, I looked for a place which would be my final move. I settled on Winnipeg.

I was very lucky, and it turned out to be a good choice, with less discontent than two other provinces in my life.

Holly Bertram

Winnipeg

Being prepared

Re: Hydro’s unpredictable fortunes (Editorial, Oct. 13)

The Free Press is right to highlight Manitoba Hydro’s growing vulnerability to unpredictable water levels.

Manitoba should expand wind, solar, geothermal and energy storage while exploring emerging technologies such as green hydrogen, advanced energy storage and next-generation geothermal systems. Our hydro reservoirs are a tremendous asset, but they should be part of a broader strategy.

We cannot control rainfall, but we can control how prepared we are when it doesn’t come.

Martin Zeilig

Winnipeg

Parlez-vous?

Premier Wab Kinew was recently criticized by a member of the Franco-Manitoban community for repeatedly answering in French to questions posed in English by the acting Conservative leader in the legislature.

While I agree that this was used as a tactic to embarrass the Opposition member, I want to commend the premier for using French more often than any premier in my memory.

While proud of his Indigenous roots, Kinew is open to the other founding language of this province and Canada. He is also a successful graduate of the French immersion system. Hats off to a trilingual premier.

Rachel DeGagne

Winnipeg

MPI fraud nothing new

Re: ‘Fraud, plain and simple’: MPI (Oct. 9)

Ride-share drivers’ alleged untruthfulness is not a new phenomenon in the casualty insurance business. When I worked in casualty insurance about 64 years ago, there were three “risk categories” in automobile insurance; namely, “driving for pleasure,” “driving to work (i.e., commuting),” and “driving for work.”’

“Driving for pleasure” incurred the lowest insurance premiums because it exposed the driver, the vehicle, and John Q Public to the lowest probability of “at fault” mishaps. Obviously, most applicants for automobile insurance sought the lowest premium — regardless of their actual intended use of the insured vehicle. This was where the insurance agent’s tactful (and sometimes oblique) interviewing techniques became crucial. Yes, my agency wanted the client’s business, and yes, my agency was aware that other agencies might be less thorough — simply to get the prospective client’s business, regardless of that client’s possible untruthfulness. But, back in that primeval era, we had few ways of verifying our suspicions.

Fast forward to modernity, and verification is, indeed, becoming more readily available. Modern cars are quickly morphing into four-wheeled computers that can be a cornucopia of information about their users’ usage and driving habits. With proper use (and with legislation giving prospective insurers the right to access that cornucopia), undeserved access to the cheaper “driving for pleasure” insurance premiums should end.

Edward Keith Bricknell

Toronto

A missing piece

Re: Manitoba e-scooter legislation changes set to impose speed limit, age restrictions, sidewalk ban (Oct. 13)

I read the article on e-scooter legislation changes from start to finish. What I think is missing is a mandatory, short familiarization course on road safety for riders who do not have a driver’s license. Purchasers and riders should be required to attend an online or in-person orientation before setting out on the e-scooter.

If government is going to legislate, they need to consider this.

Elizabeth Dorey

Winnipeg

Alberta’s test run

On Monday, Oct. 19, Western Canada will experience something new — an Alberta referendum. Looking at their issues, my feeling is that if Alberta separates it will face tremendous constitutional consequences, from a political and economic perspective. There will be rising uncertainty, business flight, slow investment and total economic chaos in Alberta.

The United Conservative Party, led by Premier Danielle Smith, is presently walking a tightrope over the Rockies without a balancing pole. By allowing this plebiscite to take place, Smith is stalling, anticipating that the referendum question will be defeated, and everything will return to status quo. She is asking voters to choose between remaining a province of Canada or starting the legal framework to consider separation.

It’s a test that Canada will endure and experience, probably, a few more times.

Peter John Manastyrsky

Niverville

He’s unbelievable

The nightmare continues. Trump has announced, with all his usual bluster, an “energy ceasefire” between Russia and Ukraine.

He blames Ukraine for the price of diesel fuel, saying nothing about his war in Iran being the only reason diesel prices have skyrocketed. He also continues to be openly played as the complete buffoon he is by Putin.

It’s hard to believe he can be so ignorant, blind and stupid and run one of the biggest countries in the world

Ken McLean

Starbuck