Hard and dirty work

We need a new immigration program – a vertical one, an internal one.

We keep hearing about the provinces’ and country’s need for more immigrants. The population is aging, and younger people aren’t being replaced. At the same time, more jobs are opening.

Take a drive around: what do you see? Any city or town, any time of day, there are folks standing around or wandering about aimlessly for whatever reason.

I could understand if people were busy having a good time. At least they would be doing something. The crowds I see aren’t exactly having the time of their lives.

I can’t imagine our prison population is any too jovial, either.

And we have a lot of folks on disability - most for good reason - but some could likely be returned to the workforce for lighter duties. If I can haul my sorry arse to work daily, powered by a heart with four bypass grafts and a three-prong ICD and pacemaker; anybody can - short of being a danger or nuisance to all, of course.

Maybe it’s as complicated as lengthy motivational counselling, medical preparation and retraining. Maybe, in some cases, it’s as easy as a boot in the arse.

Overall, the virtues and physical benefits of employment have to be instilled in folks. Society’s attitudes towards some jobs – the service industry and agriculture come to mind – have to change to reflect their importance to the economy and social cohesion. This is starting with renewed interest and emphasis on the trades.

As folks immigrate into the workforce and functioning society, others who had been working with them in the dependant stage can also move on to essential duties.

Open employment positions are there; so are the people. We just don’t see them - or choose not to. There has to be a bridge somewhere to allow access between the two elements. In many cases, the folks are just not motivated, trained and delegated.

Let’s see some organization here, and a work ethic.

We don’t want to turn out like the United States, with its divided society reliant on cheap immigrant labour

How long?

On another subject, there looks like an election isn’t in the offing.

Prime Minister Stephen Harper has called an inquiry into the dealings between former Tory Prime Minister Brian Mulroney and German businessman Karlheinz Schreiber.

The national media is asking – rhetorically, of course – how much will be made of it, and for how long, and what it will mean to the Harper government?

Of course - how much and how long is entirely up to the national media.

When Harper speaks of looking at past prime ministers’ activities, who said anything about business dealings? There are much more pressing things to look at than what goes on among lawyers and clients, and even between business folk and the taxman. That’s up to the national media, too: look how it buried revelations of former Liberal Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau’s wartime behaviour. Look at how much national media attention Prime Minister Jean Chretien’s dealings with the trouble-plagued Khadr family got. Rest assured it got the attention of certain folks in the republic to the south.