Coopers clarifies policyMarch 23, 2006Dear Avid Shopper,I was dismayed to read your letter to the Editor of The Royal Gazette <$>newspaper dated March 13, 2006 and published March 27, 2006. I am indeed sorry that you had such an unhappy experience shopping at A.S. Cooper’s Harbourside store, but I am pleased to be made aware of it and wish to set the record straight.

A.S. Cooper’s does not and has never had the policy of allowing only two garments per customer when going into a changing room neither do we have anyone assigned to sit outside the dressing rooms and police this policy. Our human resources manager has ascertained that this “policy” was a result of a miscommunication between manager and staff and assures me that this won’t happen in the future.

On behalf of A.S. Cooper & Sons, Ltd., I apologise for your inconvenience and hope you will be shopping avidly with us again soon. Please feel free to call me if you wish.

PETER N. COOPER

Managing Director436 abused childrenMarch 2006Dear Sir,<$>I’ll start by saying that I am not a childcare expert (although I have completed some study in this area). I’m not a teacher, healthcare professional or even a parent. I do, however, know a bit about child abuse.

I know, for example, that, regardless of any assumptions, it affects children from every racial, social and economic background. And adults, for that matter. Rich kids, poor kids, black kids, white kids, and often, very young kids. So before you think that it has nothing to do with you, think again. Here are 436 reasons it has everything to do with you.

Bermuda’s latest child abuse numbers have just been released. There were reported cases of abuse against 436 pre-school and primary aged children in 2005. 142 of them fell into the pre-school bracket. This is likely to be just the tip of the iceberg though. Children are often silent victims, scared to speak up. Their abuser typically is in a trusted position — parent, family member, ‘friend.’ Especially in sexual abuse cases, the child is manipulated to keep secrets and convinced that it will be their fault if the perpetrator gets into trouble. Even in some of the most horrific cases of abuse, children have been overwhelmingly loyal — especially when the abuser is a parent. If we know of 436 cases of abuse, we can be sure the real number is much higher. You probably pass abused children in the street every single day.

When the figures were discussed in parliament, we were reassured that numbers will be monitored in case any ‘alarming’ trends emerge. Like 436 young children being abused is not alarming enough? I’m not going to claim this is just a government issue though. It is a society issue that we all bear some responsibility for. We can all play a part in trying to reverse the trend, or we can bury our heads in the sand and forget we ever heard the number 436. What’s it going to be?

There are some facilities that help abused children and their families in Bermuda. They are overstretched. There is an annual awareness campaign, but nothing that runs throughout the year. I don’t know if there is a 24-hour helpline, but I’d like to know. If I don’t know, chances are most kids don’t know either. Not being involved in this area professionally, I don’t know what resources would be most beneficial or make most difference — although I suspect most teachers and health workers could tell me. I do know that a concerted effort could make a lot of difference.

But what can I do about it? What can you do?

Here are a few challenges:

Corporations: <$>Bermuda has some of the world’s richest companies. I know it is easy to keep sponsorship to supporting nice things like the arts, but how about sponsoring an abuse hotline, a specialist counsellor, an awareness campaign? You’re probably making a bundle being in Bermuda — so a million here or there put back into the community wouldn’t hurt you.

Government: <$>How about matching sponsorship donations from business to make a campaign really rock? Take it from the cricket fund if you have to. Sure, they may be disappointed, but they’ll get over it a whole lot quicker than those 436 kids.

World Cup cricketers: <$>You are heading to an event viewed on TV by millions around the world — surely you can find someone who’ll pay to put their logo on your uniforms so that you can hand over a bit of that funding? That would make you not just sporting heroes but real heroes to boot.

Individuals:<$> Aside from donations of money (always good), do you have skills that could be used in a campaign? Are you a skilled graphic artist/copywriter/radio or TV producer? I’m glad to give my skills as an ad writer, anyone want to join me?

Media: If we come up with the ads, will you run them for free? And I mean all year round, not just as an annual event. Will you give us some editorial?

Phone companies: How about making available a free 1-800 number for an abuse hotline?

Surely with involvement from all of the above, we could between government, business, media and individuals manage a hotline and an extra support worker at the very least. A year-round ad campaign should be feasible. If you think you can help in some way, drop me a message through the Forum on this site. Or do you have something more important to do today than prevent the rape of another pre-schooler?

REALITY

Smith’s ParishTenants have too many rightsMarch 1, 2006Dear Sir,<$>I read with great dismay the latest “idea” from Colonel Burch regarding empty rental units. As a rule I support his initiatives because some one has to do something! But I’m afraid this one is totally over the top.

I want to put him on notice that, however much it might work elsewhere in the Island, it won’t work at my house! I am just now in the process of collecting the last of an $8,000 rental arrears that’s been in the collector’s office since the last century.

If he thinks that I’m going to go through that again, he’s sadly mistaken. Not to mention paying the collector’s 33 percent commission while rehabbing the house cost me more than I care to mention. Between the ruination of five rooms of carpet, the stench from all manner of pets and lost rent, I am very careful whom I let into my house. If you want to live in my house, you’re gonna’ have to have some money!

At the moment, I rent it by the week and it’s empty. You come, you pay, enjoy yourself and leave! So when it’s empty between rentals, it’s empty. That fact is no one’s business. I know what he’s hoping to achieve — and that’s commendable, but this whole sad state of affairs is only symptomatic of a larger issue.

In fact it embraces the entire scenario of all that ails human society. Greed! No one has yet to acknowledge that poor people are poor because they like it! By and large they work as hard as most of us; or in some cases harder. But there they are, stuck in the rut of abject poverty with no way of escape. And we go up from there. We then have the just plane old poor; lower middle class; middle class and upper middle class and on to the very top.

I’ve noticed this western tendency to decry any political system that is not based on democracy. Well for my money, if democracy was all that great, poverty wouldn’t exist!

So what to do? We need to back off from this knee-jerk reaction to the (less than satisfactory) way tenants were treated before the act was changed. The real reason landlords refuse to rent their units is because the tenants have so many “rights”, that once they get in you can’t get them out!

There’s another aspect to the equation, and that there is a subconscious resentment to the fact that they (the tenant) don’t own the house. They’ll never admit it, but the evidence is there. You don’t pay, you go! By all means go through the process to achieve this, but lets not fall prey to all these sob stories about how many children they have. Hasn’t anyone noticed, that motherhood is totally voluntary? Good grief!

We have to send the message. Landlords properties must be respected. Obviously we must tread the fine line between meeting a genuine need and getting on the case of those who just want to milk the system. Those defaulting on the rent are the ones (in some cases) who have every conceivable gadget of modern society. Not to mention the total waste of money spent on tobacco and alcohol.

Better they put that money aside for the down payment on a piece of land. Well of course, now there’s virtually none left. Sad! So I think the Colonel had better re-think this one. It’ll make him a lot of bad friends; yours truly included.

C.K. SIMONS

Sandys Parish