Criminal

OTTAWA (CUP) - “The content of criminal law is incredibly stacked against women,” says Queen’s Uni- versity law professor Kath- leen Lahey.

Lahey Dal- housie University law pro- fessor Christine Boyle gave an address on feminist per- spectives on criminal law re- form to mark the beginning of a three-day workshop at the University of Ottawa on women and criminal justice issues. The workshop was sponsored by The National Association of Women and the Law, a group “dedicated to improving the legal status of women in Canada”, and the U of O’s Women’s Law Caucus.

and

Boyle reminded her pre- dominantly female audience that the “criminal justice

system is not a thing of our (women’s) creation.” Con- sequently, she said, women should not be satisfied with merely tinkering or updating the system. X

She expressed wonder at a criminal justice sys- tem that often questions the credibility of women and children who recount experi- ences of sexual abuse.

She warned that “knowl- edge of reality is influenced by male perspectives,” in a society where a crime such as rape is not “gender neutral” and pre-menstrual syndrome (PMS) is sometimes treated as a personality disorder.

Despite the guarantee of equality enshrined recently in the constitution, Lahey said that “inequalities mark us as women.”

Law Stacks The Odds Against Women

Lahey reminded her au- dience about a past before the 1982 guarantee of equal- ity when “women were har- nessed to male-owned eco- nomic apparatus” and men “appropriated women’s pro- ductive capacities.”

She said that during the three-year period between the passage and adoption of the 1982 constitution, it was expected the courts would be flooded by women to con- test cases on the new equal- ity provision, and that male lawyers feared being over- whelmed by a group of “rad fems”, but this didn’t hap- pen to the extent feminists wished.

Lahey suggested there be a new set of crimes that people could be tried for: domestic terrorism, enslave-

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ment of women, and use of women as reproductive chat- tels.

She called for a repeal of abortion laws, lawful ac- cess to artificial insemination and legalization of prostitu-

tion. She lauded women lawyers as a voice for women

in the courtroom and said

she was not surprised that only women seem to need to use “defense of necessity” as a course of defense.

Lahey also said there are times when civil disobedi- ence is necessary in obtaining justice for women. .

Commonwealth countries urge end to differential fees

VANCOUVER (CUP) Wealthy commonwealth countries should abolish the high differential fees posing financial barriers to foreign students, the commonwealth secretary told delegates to the recent conference.

Differential it easier and commonwealth enter universities commonwealth countries like France, Japan, the Soviet Union and the U.S., rather than Canada, Britain or Aus- tralia, Secretary -Shridath Ramphal told delegates.

fees make cheaper for students to

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72 Vat.

_ = Thursday, November 19 1987,

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Diplomats and heads of

commonwealth states dis- cussed the issue at the com- monwealth held in Vancouver from October

13 to 18.

conference

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James Mitchell, keynote speaker and prime min- ister of Caribbean try St. Vincent and the Grenadines.called on Canada and other wealthy common- wealth countries to reduce the “exhorbitant fees” levied upon foreign students.

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Mitchell is also an alum- nus of the University of

British Columbia.

Rod Fowler, student rep- resenta- tive to the Simon Fraser Uni- versity (SFU) board of gov- ernors, is also opposed to dif- ferential fees.

“It doesn’t, to my way of thinking, cost any inore to educate visa students than to educate any other student,” said Rod Fowler, a student representative on the Simon Fraser University board of governors.

“Tf youre going to have a damn commonwealth, then you should damn wealth,” said Fowler.

share the the

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Say- well defends his policies re- garding foreign students and differential fees, placing the issue in an international con- text.

“T would love to be able to eliminate differential fees,” said Saywell, “But un- fortunately we are not in this position. If we

it unilaterally

can’t do for financial reasons - then someone else has to donate (the money).” Saywell said the federal government is the appropri- ate agency to pressure for an elimination of differential fees. He differential fees could be re- duced either by the Cana- dian International Develop- ment Agency funding schol- arship and grant prograins

helieves

for their visa students, or by increased transfer payments from the federal government.

Saywell said the move- ment of students through

eemmmiE S| gS the commonwealth is a ua- tional issue and the best use of Canada’s foreign aid dol- lars would be in the training and education of foreign stu- dents.

But the real value of a university degree is diffi- cult to estimate in the con- text of the Canadian econ- omy, let alone in the context of a foreign country such as Malaysia, says SFU foreign student Desmond Ho.

uy plan on going into business administration,” said Ho. “I have interests in finance and marketing. I guess with a de- “ eree in that, it will be eas- ier for me to find a job back home.

“But we are still in the middle of a recession back home, so getting a degree might not mean anything,” said Ho.

“T try not to think about that.” n

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