Vancouver's civil strike: Update

But, here we are. Postal workers, garbage collectors, park rangers and so on.

Now, all of these people deserve some reasonable kick at the cat. That is, within the range of their abilities and opportunities, they aught to be able to afgord some of the many extraordinary comforts of the current age.

The politicians and their managers can. Vancouver City Hall, for example is overrun with people we've never heard of who have been earning in a excess of $100,000 a year for many years.

I'll be perfectly honest. I believe there is a place for unions in this world. I don't particularly like them, but I believe in the fairness of democratic unity, whereby workers form a membership to provide representation in matters of employment. The problem I have is that many jobs are basically essential services for society, the absence of which leads to serious problems. It is jobs like this, the police force, the fire department, hospitals, which cannot stop what they do in order to demand higher wages, as it can literally kill the population.

The Celebration of Light will go ahead Wednesday but with civic workers on strike, there may not be anyone left to clean up the mess.

 
The annual English Bay fireworks competition not only brings droves of people to Vancouver, it also generates about 40 tonnes of garbage along the beach each night.

 
"You're not going to see any of our guys cleaning it up," said Mike Jackson, the president of CUPE 1004. "I don't see how the beaches will get clean by the crack of dawn."

So, instead of focusing on how evil the unions are, shouldn't we be asking if its acceptable that an event like this produces that much waste?