Quote of the week:

"I see this as extremely injurious." - John Lafalce, a former congressman and advisor to the Canadian-American Business Council, on new regulations requiring all travellers, Canadian, American or other, to present a passport when entering the U.S. by 2007.

Anniversary protest

Next Thursday, April 14, marks the second anniversary of the Charest Liberals' election victory. For a wide range of groups, it's been anything but political bliss. Since the spring of 2003, unions, health workers, teachers, natives, housing advocates, suburbanites, environmentalists, students - any subgroup, really - have taken to the streets in one protest or another.

The Coalition J'ai jamais voté pour ça, an umbrella organization including an array of pissed off citizens' groups, will be showing their ire next Thursday with a large demo outside Charest's McGill-College office. Among them will be the Comité logement Centre-sud, who take issue with the province's stand on housing.

"Basically, the demonstration will be against PPPs [public-private partnerships, where the government hires private industry to carry out traditionally public tasks]," says Gaétan Roberge, a community organizer at the Comité. "When the government talks about housing, they don't mean social housing. They're talking about subsidizing developers to build affordable housing - and by ‘affordable,' they mean $900 a month for a 4 1/2. That's not affordable, and it isn't very social either."

The protest begins at 5:30 p.m. » Patrick Lejtenyi

Home birth rebirth

For the first time in a dozen years a little whippersnapper will be born here at a home with the official help of a midwife. Since April 1, the arcane insurance complications that had been blocking last year's legal renewal of home birthing have been resolved, thus removing the last obstacle to the practice that had seen up to 400 Quebec babies born at home a year before legislation banned the practice in 1993.

Since then, midwives have been relegated to assisting births in one of seven birthing centres across the province. Montreal's two birthing centres will remain available for expectant mothers, but they will now also have the choice of giving birth chez elles. The practice has a bagful of benefits, according to its supporters.

"Studies show that these births offer less interventions, forceps, vacuums, epidurals and less depression," says Bernadette Thibaudeau, president of Groupe Maman.

The midwives at both birthing centres are popping the proverbial bubbly. "We've been waiting for this for 10 years," says Christiane Leonard of the Lac-Saint-Louis CLSC's midwife clinic. So are those in Côte-des-Neiges. "It's time to celebrate," says Marleen Dehertog of Maison Naissance. » Kristian Gravenor

Discussing dead women

"Women in Latin America are often considered second-class citizens," says Gerardo Aiquel.

Aiquel, the man in charge of the Latin American human rights dossier at L'Entraide Missionaire, a locally based international solidarity organization, says a combination of macho culture and political apathy is killing hundreds of Latin American women every year, and their killers are doing it with impunity. One of the most notorious examples is in Ciudad Juarez, a city on the south side of the American-Mexican border. Over the past 10 years hundreds of women, usually poor, have been brutally murdered by unknown assailants. "We don't know if it's the police who are implicated, or those holding the real power," he says, referring to the town's untouchable narco-traffickers.

The situation will be discussed this weekend at a colloqium co-organized by Aiquel's group on violence against women in Latin America, held at UQÀM's J.-A.-deSève Pavilion Rm. Ds-R525 (320 Ste-Catherine E.) on Friday, April 8 and at the Science and Management Pavilion Rm. RM-120 (315 Ste-Catherine E.) on Saturday, April 9. Voluntary contribution $15. » Patrick Lejtenyi

Befriend the disabled

Next time you find yourself muttering about your sagging social life, remember that no matter how unpopular you've managed to make yourself, there's a person out there who would like to be your friend.

Indeed, 1,000 Quebecers are on a waiting list for a service that hooks them up with ordinary average Joes like yourself to go for walks, meet for coffees and do whatever people with friends do together. The companionship program is similar to Big Brothers except the clients aren't children of single parents, but rather "individuals with either intellectual disabilities, mental health problems, physical disabilities, socially isolated (usually that means elderly) or young people with social adaptation difficulties," says Marie-Laurence Paré, who handles media for the Regroupement québécois du parrainage civique (RQPC).

Their good deeds have been speaking for them over the last 20 years, in which time the gang has paired 6,500 disabled with new acquaintances. "It's a way of giving back," says Paré

Call 877-727-7246 or visit www.parrainmarraine.com. » Kristian Gravenor

REAR-VIEW MIRROR

13 YEARS AGO THIS WEEK
April 9–April 16, 1992

On the cover: German director Wim Wenders, who discusses his 1991 "ultimate" road movie Until the End of the World, which spans 15 cities on four continents, culminating in an Aboriginal funeral in Australia. "When [the Aboriginals] did the burial scene... they did it for real. They actually cried and mourned. It made us realize that, as a film crew, we are so used to cheating."

• "Various political gladhanders were out and about amongst 400 invitees" at the opening of Old Montreal's World Trade Centre, runs a caption under a photo of the complex's crowded atrium.

• Upcoming shows, from a La Brique ad: Honeymoon Suite (April 11, $8), Joan Jett and the Blackhearts (April 18, $9.50), Manic Street Preachers (April 25, $6), Yngwie Malmsteen (May 8, $8.75) and "original Kiss drummer" Peter Criss (May 9, $8.75 ADV $9.75 DR).

• From a classified ad: "Me Mom & Morgentaler want to know: are you a woman looking for adventure? We need an accordion player, or any reasonable facsimile."

Angel >> Acceptable wait times The Wait Time Alliance, a group of seven national medical organizations, released on Sunday a list of recommended wait times for hospital treatment. Among them are joint replacements (nine months), sight restoration (four months), cancer care (radiation treatment within 10 days) and diagnostic imaging like CT scans and MRIs (seven days). The provinces and feds have promised benchmarks by the end of the year; the Alliance says it is keeping the pressure on to make sure the governments carry out their pledge. And while no hard national stats are available on wait times, the need to deal with the issue is obviously critical.
Insect >> Publication bans The Internet has made publication bans - long the bane of mainstream media - almost irrelevant. Witness the recent leaking of testimony from the Gomery inquiry onto Captain's Quarters, a conservative Minnesota-based blog helmed by "Captain Ed" Morrissey. There was even some talk that Groupaction chief Jean Brault's testimony last week - which reportedly sent "shockwaves through political circles" - could have triggered a snap election (the Prime Minister quashed those rumours). But the public still doesn't know why. The courts must realize that publication bans, like clampdowns on file-sharing, are like trying to stop rain with a sieve.