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Politically Incorrect

Lower the speed limits

by Arthur Weinreb

February 3, 2003

Speed limits on all roads and highways should be lowered and the maximum speed should be set at no higher than 20 kph. The only strange thing about this proposal is that it hasn’t been made before. A lower speed limit would result in many fewer accidents and it would only be in the rarest of circumstances that a collision would result in serious injury or death. In order to truly attain the lower limit, cars would have to be designed that could travel no faster than 30 kph. This would insure that there would be extra speed for passing and evasive maneuvers as well as preventing government coffers from completely drying up from the loss of revenue that speeding tickets bring in.

Limiting serious bodily injury resulting from automobile crashes would reduce the cost of our health care system that, as we are told, ad nauseam, is our number one priority. It is what defines us as Canadians. Anything that can be done to save the system would be, in the words of the future felon, Martha Stewart, a good thing. A lot of people would be upset at not being able to drive from Toronto to Montreal in less than 24 hours, but, who cares. When people’s wishes conflict with the health care system, the health care system takes precedence every time. We live in an era where even the former alleged leader of the "right wing" Canadian Alliance Party held up a sign saying "No two-tiered health care".

A long time ago, in a galaxy far far away, the number one priority of a government was to protect its citizens. As terrorist incidents rise, and a war between the United States and Iraq becomes imminent, protection of Canadians from anything that isn’t defined as a disease, does not even register on the radar screen. As a country, we have no defense policy. We have no foreign policy. The "soft" power wielded by former Foreign Affairs Minister Pink Lloyd Axworthy has given way to the "no" power of Equivalencer Bill Graham, the guy who can’t complete a sentence without making reference to the United Nations. A chemical or biological attack, either aimed directly at Canada or one that drifts northward from the United States is given no consideration. If it happens you can almost hear the big guy now. "All dem peoples in the hospitals and dey don’t have to pay user fees." That’s the important thing.

Health care in Canada has gone from being a national social program to a national obsession. The world is on the brink of what could be a nuclear, chemical or biological war and while real countries discuss and argue over what conditions will trigger the war, Canada is deep in discussions about how much the federal government will give to the provinces for health care and which level of government will decide on how its spent. Canada could buy a fair chunk of military hardware with the money that is spent debating the who, when, what and how much of health care.

Which brings us back to speed limits. To keep control over its placid citizenry, the government uses its funding of the health care system as a lever to control behaviour. The nanny state tells its charges what they can and cannot do using the guise that since they are paying for medical costs that may result from certain actions, they have the right to control those actions. Lowering speed limits is not as radical as using the precautionary principle that is now in vogue. A new product or conduct can be banned unless the proponent of that product or conduct can show that it will have no harmful effects. We already know that highway speed kills and maims.

Speed limits probably won’t be vastly reduced. But reductions are not that far fetched.