Pubdate: Sat, 11 Oct 2008 Source: Intelligencer, The (CN ON) Copyright: 2008 Osprey Media Group Inc. Contact: http://www.intelligencer.ca/ Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/2332 Author: Brian Conway KRAMP NOW A TORY 'YES' MAN When Daryl Kramp became our Member of Parliament a couple of years ago, he said he wasn't interested in being a long-term politician. He was just going to Ottawa to solve some problems for the people of Prince Edward-Hastings. He proved himself a man of his word when he stood up against government mumbo-jumbo in the Picton post office problems. And when he and his family organized passport workshops to help us cope with the problems of travel after 9-11. He was a citizen representative in the best tradition of democracy so I voted for him in the next election. But then something terribly changed him. Last fall I received a questionnaire from him, asking for feedback on how the Conservative government was doing. So I sent him a letter explaining a serious problem which his government was not helping to solve: addiction. Drug addiction painfully touches one Canadian family in four. It plagues this riding; it has almost destroyed my family. Every addict is someone's child, sibling. spouse or friend. Addiction is a family problem. Experts agree that the tendency to addiction is genetic; like many illnesses, it is inherited. And only the emotional ties of family and friendship can motivate an addict to fight the illness. Federal Health Health Minister Tony Clement stated the Conservative government's policy: "The party is over. We will put drug dealers in jail and offer rehab programs to addicts who wanted to get clean." That statement shows no understanding of the problem. Here is why: 1) Anyone who has seen the despair, self-loathing and physical agony of an addict knows that addiction is not a party. 2) Police need good arrest statistics so they nab the easy to catch lawbreakers -- street dealers who are mostly young addicts desperate for money to feed their craving. Theft, petty crime and dealing: this is how they survive with their addiction. Major players walk and young addicts go to jail, where emptiness exposes them to more drugs. 3) Rehabilitation is not achieved through a short spell in detox, as the tabloids suggest. A recovering addict must make huge personal changes and solve the psychological problems which led to drug dependence. Rehabilitation requires at least one full year of treatment, with intensive follow-up. There are some extremely expensive private rehab clinics. But if you are not wealthy you must search for a program which takes OHIP. There are very few, and they have huge waiting lists. An addict who is inspired to get clean usually gives up because of the long wait to enter treatment. The public rehab programs Clement said he would offer just aren't there. So in my letter to Kramp, I asked him to talk to his government about setting up a separate ministry to deal with addiction or to find a health minister who understood addiction well enough through research or family experience to come up with policies to help heal this terrible illness. I thought that Kramp, with his stress on family and solving problems for people in his riding, would help. After all, he had asked for my feedback. Sadly, he did not even answer my letter. (I suppose his government likes approval, not suggestions.) Instead these things happened. Health Minister Clements publicly attacked the doctors of Canada for supporting harm reduction therapy, the only public program shown successful in making addicts want to change. Prime Minister Stephen Harper announced plans to get tough on crime by naming and imprisoning young offenders. (Who will there be to work and pay taxes if much of our population has a criminal record?) And Kramp sent me another flyer; this one showing two senior citizens holding hands. It named the Conservative, Liberal, NDP and Green party leaders and asked me to mail Kramp my response to this question: "Who do you think is on the right track on taxes?" In case my senior citizen mind was too feeble to understand what the different parties had done or intended to do, the mailing applauded seven things in the Conservative policy, and said nothing about the other parties. Last month, Kramp went on a government paid trip to the Middle East, although he has no foreign affairs duties. What happened to Kramp, the citizen MP who had no patience for government mumbo-jumbo and cared about the problems of Prince Edward-Hastings? So in this election I will not vote for Kramp because we need a citizen MP who works to solve the problems of Prince Edward Hastings, not a political yes-man who works for his Conservative party master. And I think Kramp might thank us if he is not re-elected. The last mailing he sent was a cheap photocopy; it did not reflect a person who was happy in his job. Maybe if we don't send this good man back for more mind-bending in Ottawa, he will regain the passion for truth and the social concern he showed when we first elected him. Brian Conway Cherry Valley - --- MAP posted-by: Richard Lake