What’s a parade without a fire truck?
Or, more to the point, what’s a fire truck without a parade?
And sure, the parade in Heart’s Content was a short one — because the fire truck’s not even ordered yet.
But that didn’t stop provincial politicians from lining up to take part.
Here’s Thursday’s news release on what should be an absolute normal and unheralded government function: “Today, the Honourable Andrew Parsons, Minister of Municipal Affairs and Environment was joined by the Honourable Steve Crocker, Minister of Transportation and Works and MHA for Carbonear-Trinity-Bay de Verde, to announce funding for a new fire truck for the Town of Heart’s Content. The ministers were joined by Fred Cumby, Mayor of Heart’s Content, and representatives of the Heart’s Content Volunteer Fire Brigade.”
Hooray.
Why don’t we rewrite the release for you? “A government provided the kind of funding it is supposed to provide to live up to its commitment to properly protect lives and property. No ministers were required for the making of this announcement.”
There are a couple of things wrong with the annual “cabinet-ministers-handing-out-cash” tours, which governments in this province, both Liberal and Progressive Conservative, have done for years.
No names, no photos, no thank yous.
Municipalities should be able to avail of funding for necessary and essential services without having their mayors and fire chiefs essentially line up to kiss a cabinet minister’s ring.
There are a couple of things wrong with the annual “cabinet-ministers-handing-out-cash” tours, which governments in this province, both Liberal and Progressive Conservative, have done for years.
First of all, the government itself shouldn’t have anything to do with providing the equipment, at least at a political level.
Politicians might well set the overall budget amount for assistance to municipalities purchasing fire equipment, but the decision on where and how that money should be spent should be made by non-political civil servants weighing funding requests based solely on demonstrated need.
Otherwise, clearly, the government is callously playing politics with people’s lives.
If a politician had a hand in directing money to his or her district, a fire department with a greater need might not be able to do its job. That political interference could be fatal.
And that’s not the only way that politicians shouldn’t be involved. They’re not putting the money forwards.
Taxpayers pay for the equipment. Why are we paying for cabinet ministers to travel and campaign for their own re-election?
And why, especially, do politicians feel it is legitimate to ride on the coattails of volunteer firefighters, who are already taking great personal risk while saving different levels of government millions upon millions of dollars every year?
In some ways, politics in this province hasn’t progressed from the 1950s or earlier: the common folk are supposed to come cap-in-hand to their betters, who might deign to “gift” the masses with the masses’ own money: “Thank you ever so much, Guv’nor, for letting us keep ourselves safe from the fires.”
It’s offensive and insulting.
