Article: Students lay Down the Law
 

Students lay down the law
Teens push healthy eating, job safety
Proposals introduced in Legislature
Apr.*7, 2006. 05:15*AM
KERRY GILLESPIE
QUEEN'S PARK BUREAU, ONTARIO

Fifteen-year-old Nupur Dogra thinks it's time students across Ontario
say no to three cafeteria favourites: sugar, salt and fat.

Dogra, a student at Iroquois Ridge High School in Oakville, got a
chance to do something about it yesterday.

For the first time in Ontario, proposed legislation drafted by a
student ‹ this one requiring schools to educate students about healthy
food choices ‹ was introduced in the Legislature. Dogra was not alone.

Vanessa Flemming, 15, knows students who've been scared and hurt at
part-time jobs because they didn't know they had a right to refuse
unsafe work.

She and some classmates at Cardinal Carter Secondary School in Aurora
hope to change that with their bill requiring employers to tell student
workers about their basic labour rights.

Students at Georgetown District Secondary School think their bill,
requiring paper and aluminium recycling bins in every class, will make
a difference.

All three proposals were introduced by MPPs as private member's bills
yesterday thanks to CBC television reporter Mike Wise, who started the
Making the Grade project as a way to engage students in politics.

It seems to have worked.

"When they said `Cardinal Carter' in the Legislature, I couldn't
breathe. When I heard my name read out, I honestly thought I was
dreaming," Amanda Piron, 15, said.

Piron, and four other members of the "bill-making team," were bouncing
with excitement after a day of meeting the premier and watching their
student labour rights idea, which could become law, introduced in the
Legislature.

"Being in the same picture with the premier was just such an honour,"
said Lauren Babic, 15.

"It feels like meeting a celebrity, kind of," Flemming said.

On a more serious note, she added, "I have a much more positive outlook
on politicians as a whole because they've been so nice and so helpful."

The praise went both ways.

"The students aren't just making the grade; they're making history.
This is the first time ever in Ontario that students have drafted
legislation that we will debate and hopefully pass into law in this
House," said NDP MPP Andrea Horwath (Hamilton East), who introduced the
student labour rights bill.

Liberal Kathleen Wynne (Don Valley West) introduced the recycling bill
and Progressive Conservative MPP Frank Klees (Oak Ridges) introduced
the healthy food choices bill.

What Dogra really wanted was a bill to ban junk food and vending
machines in schools but was told that wouldn't fly.

She adapted and is hoping that more informed kids will choose healthier
foods in their cafeterias and the number of vending machines will
decline.

Her school, Iroquois Ridge, makes sure at least 60 per cent of
cafeteria fare is healthy, including options like stir-fry, milk and
sandwiches on 12-grain bread. But that doesn't stop many kids from
opting for french fries and chicken fingers, which are also on offer.

"Twenty years ago we weren't so big on packaged and processed foods.
Now it's okay in society to eat that. What's not okay is that we're
turning out to be unhealthy adults and that's putting a strain on our
health-care system," Dogra said.

Monique Gazan, Dogra's geography teacher, heard about the Making the
Grade project and encouraged her Grade 9 students to get involved.

Dogra is the only one who took it all the way and Gazan is hoping her
bill will make a difference.

"Yesterday, I had a girl say, `That's why we go down to the cafeteria,
to get the junk.' You have to know what that junk is doing to you,"
Gazan said.

Dogra, who can rattle off statistics about the cost of youth obesity,
clearly knows what it can do.

"I don't eat at the caf. My mom packs a lunch for me."

But it wasn't just a passion for healthy food that made her take the
class project all the way to Queen's Park.

"My big motivation was that the MPPs wanted to listen to our ideas,"
Dogra said. "My dad always says when opportunity comes knocking on the
door the pessimist complains about the noise and the optimist opens the
door."

After the bills were introduced, Premier Dalton McGuinty chatted with
the students and posed for pictures.

"I just wanted to drop by and say hello to you, thank you and let you
know I'm very proud of you," McGuinty said.

"You are breaking new ground."

As he was leaving, he said: "One more question. Should I eliminate
homework in Ontario?" Predictably, they responded yes, though this
really is a homework-doing crowd.

A private member's bill isn't a regular bill. It is introduced by an
individual MPP, of any party, rather than by a cabinet minister as a
government bill. That means it can't count on enough support to be
passed. These bills rarely become legislation, but they do bring
attention to ideas, which the government has been known to introduce
later in legislation of its own.

Wise thinks these bills will have a better chance than most. Either
way, the students have "sparked debate" and learned more about how laws
are created than most adults will ever know.

--
Diva
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Lack of actions leads to no desired changes