Lawyers, laws and politics

Just after church this morning, at the party for children, I bumped into Larry. He said – “You get what you elect. If you elect an engineer, you will get building. If you elect a doctor you will get better health care. If you elect a Lawyer, you will get more laws. And sadly, more laws are not always the answer.” A case in point is Manitoba’s present justice minister, Gord Mackintosh. Whenever there is a problem, Gord is there with a new press release or a new law. In spite of all this, in six years while he has been Justice Minister, the incidence of car thefts in Manitoba has increased by leaps and bounds. Laws alone are not always the answer.

Let me expand. There is reasonable evidence that as many as half the people in jail in Canada may have fetal alcohol spectrum disorder (FASD). I’ll bet Gord Mackintosh does not even know what proportion of those who steal cars have FASD. We know that those with FASD have great difficulty learning right from wrong under normal circumstances, and they need a different approach. Interestingly, our new Lieutenant Governor, John Harvard, was making the point when he spoke last Friday, that perhaps what is needed for youth with FASD is a more structured living environment. If you are interested in pursuing this issue further, see the Liberal Minority report on healthy children at www.manitoba.liberals.ca or write to the Lieutenant Governor and his wife Lenore at ltgov@leg.gov.mb.ca. They understand that new, more effective approaches are needed.