Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utcsrgv.UUCP Path: utzoo!utcsrgv!dave From: dave@utcsrgv.UUCP (Dave Sherman) Newsgroups: can.politics Subject: Re: Ontario government funding for Catholic schools Message-ID: <4543@utcsrgv.UUCP> Date: Thu, 14-Jun-84 04:01:47 EDT Article-I.D.: utcsrgv.4543 Posted: Thu Jun 14 04:01:47 1984 Date-Received: Thu, 14-Jun-84 04:05:46 EDT References: <4538@utcsrgv.UUCP> <698@hcr.UUCP> Reply-To: dave@utcsrgv.UUCP (& Sherman) Organization: The Law Society of Upper Canada, Toronto Lines: 58 [The line immediately below was generated for me by rn!] In article <698@hcr.UUCP> tony@hcr.UUCP (Tony Lill) writes: ~| In any case, this meant that only PART of our ~| property taxes have gone to the separate school board, the rest have gone ~| to the public schools. This is what annoyed me the most, that the public ~| system was getting a free ride at my expense. That's not fair, and I would never make the argument that my taxes should not go to the public system. Otherwise, people without children would be able to argue that they shouldn't pay property taxes at all. ~| > The Jewish community ~| > has sought in the past to have this inequity changed so that, at ~| > the least, we could direct our property taxes to our own children's ~| > schools. The justification for allowing Catholic parents to have ~| > this privilege was "it's always been this way" ... "historical reasons", ~| > etc. etc. ~| ~| This is part of the BNA act, and was one of the concessions that allowed ~| Canada to be in the first place. (Actually, I seem to recall that as ~| being one of the reasons brought up NOT to give us full funding :-) ~| Now that we have gotten a fair shake, it is much more likely ~| that Jewish and other religious schools will be able to get better ~| treatment, since there is now a precedent for full funding of a separate ~| school system. (Besides, you wont be competing with our claims anymore) That's a valid point. In fact, Rabbi Witty (director of the Toronto Board of Jewish Education) is quoted today as saying exactly that. ~| ~| > This afternoon Premier Davis announced in the legislature that ~| > Catholic schools will now receive funds from the general public purse. ~| > Well, what about Jewish schools? Or those of other religions? ~| > Those of us who send our children to certain schools for religious ~| > reasons should have the same right to public funds as the Catholics ~| > who send their children to certain schools for religious reasons. ~| ~| I quite agree that you should, where numbers make this feasible. ~| (How silly, obviously if you already have schools, you have the numbers) Yes. There are 15 schools in the Board of Jewish Education in Toronto, and several others which aren't affiliated with it. ~| Now would be the right time to push for this, now that they have made ~| concessions, an since an election is near (this is the second nice thing ~| Davis has done in the past couple of weeks, there must be an election coming) ~| Perhaps the tone of my article was a little strident. When I called the Premier's office, I didn't say I objected to the Catholic funding. I said I objected to Catholic funding without Jewish funding. ~| The moral of the story: Don't begrudge us our victory, for it opens the ~| way for your own. ~| Time will tell, I suppose. Dave Sherman -- {allegra,cornell,decvax,ihnp4,linus,utzoo}!utcsrgv!dave