• Get on Board for Aboriginal Rights! Come Join the Blanket Train! (Updated 19 May 2001)

• Update on Global Land Rights Campaign (22 March 2001)

• February 2001 Jubilee Update (8/16 Feb 01)

• Assembly of First Nations endorses Land Rights campaign (01 Feb 01)

• Conference "Dakar 2000: From Resistance to Alternatives" (26 Jan 01)

• Church Coalition Praises Martin for Debt Moratorium (19 Dec 00)

• Britain announces Debt Cancellation (15 Dec 00)

• Canada seeks to jumpstart failed talks on Climate Change (15 Dec 00)

• Updates and Animation Ideas (25 Oct 00)

• Churches turn up the heat on Ministers to address global warming (10 Oct 00)

• Launch of CEJI Involvement in the Campaign to Reform the Export Development Corporation (3 Oct 00)

• Jubilee Initiative Applauds as Martin Steps Forward on Debt (27 Sept 00)

• Launch of Year III Aboriginal Land Rights Campaign (21 Sept 00)

• CEJI Meets with Finance Minister (04 Sept. 00)

• Death of Ecuadorian Jubilee Activist (04 Sept. 00)

• 13 Children Die Every Minute as Leaders Dither on Debt Relief: Church Group Responds to G7 Statement on Debt from Okinawa Summit (21 July 00)

• One Year after G-7 Promises, Third World Remains Mired in Debt (07 July 00)

• Meetings with Jubilee South (05 July 2000)

• CEJI Wins the 2000 International Co-operation Award for Influencing Public Policy (05 June 2000)

• Kenyan Protestors Freed (01 June)

• Jubileo 2000 Haití Demands Inclusion in Plans for Debt Cancellation (01 June)

• A Jubilee Postcard from Saskatchewan: The Jubilee Pledge and MP Lobbying (01 June)

• Debt Campaigners Call on Japanese Prime Minister to Move Forward on Debt (05 My 2000)

• Sixty-three Jubilee Protestors Arrested in Kenya, Nairobi (19 April 2000)

• Julius Nyerere on the Failure of Structural Adjustment (19 April 2000)

• Kirsten Mercer and Desmond Tutu (19 April 2000)

• Report on the "Emerging Scandal" of the implementation of the Cologne Debt Initiative (18 April)

• Announcing "Jubilation!" A Public Event to Celebrate Jubilee Hopes and Challenges (17 April)

• April Priority Campaign: Redirecting Military Spending (1 April)

• Leaders from 14 Churches Respond to the 2000 Federal Budget (29 March)

• Lending Governments Freeze Mozambique's Loans - But say No to Cancellation (20 March)

• Urgent Action: Mozambique (13 March)

• We are a Jubilee People! Taking the Jubilee Pledge (13 March)

• A Campaign of Persistence: Update on the Debt (13 March)

• A Jubilee Budget_ (13 March)

• Debt Cancellation Welcomed but Budget Falls Short of Jubilee Vision (Feb. 28)

• March Priority Campaign: Eliminating Women's Poverty and Ending Violence Against Women (Feb. 28)

• February Priority Campaign: Close the Gap between Rich and Poor (Feb. 1)

• Jubilee Budget Kit including Guidelines for Meeting with MPs (February 2000) (separate section)

• Church Leaders Call for a Jubilee Budget (Jan. 20)

• Winnipeg's Jubilee Fund for Community Development (Jan. 14)

• January Priority Campaign: Global Fair Share (Jan. 1)

On June 21, the Aboriginal Rights Coalition (ARC), the Canadian Ecumenical Jubilee Initiative (CEJI), and community activists from across Canada will come together at the Supreme Court of Canada to symbolically reverse the process of dispossessing Aboriginal peoples from the land. In a twist on the "blanket exercise" that dramatizes the forced separation of Aboriginal peoples from their home, we will roll out blankets from across Canada, symbolizing our commitment to restoring right relations with Aboriginal peoples, and joining in the Jubilee call for a truly independent commission to implement Aboriginal land, treaty, and inherent rights.

As we have worked on the ARC/CEJI "Land Rights, Right Relations" petition this year, we have been learning the history of Aboriginal peoples’ displacement from the land upon and with which they lived before the arrival of the Europeans. One way we have done this is the Blanket Exercise. Developed by ARC in consultation with the Assembly of First Nations, the exercise dramatizes the forced separation of Aboriginal peoples from their home by various means such as war, disease, the reservation system, and the policy of assimilation. It is an emotional experience for participants, who stand on a group of blankets representing North America, and watch as people are removed and the blankets are gradually folded up to mere remnants of what they once were. It cannot recreate the process of dispossession, but it can render powerful emotions and visceral understandings of what that historical process has meant. Now, in a twist on the blanket exercise, we join together in Ottawa on June 21, National Aboriginal Day, to roll out blankets gathered from across Canada, symbolizing restoration of the land and our commitment to restoring right relations with Aboriginal peoples.

Many community-based educators know how hard it has been to encourage an open discussion of aboriginal rights; yet these very difficulties have often made for good discussions and a new perspective on the relationship between aboriginal peoples and dominant society. Regional workshops of all kinds have been held and have been very successful, but actual petition signatures have been slow in coming. We’re still quite far from our original goal of 50,000 signatures, which helps to explain why the petition deadline has been extended to September 2001. It was felt that a final, public petition push was needed before the summer break, in order to remind ourselves and the Canadian public (including the churches) that land rights are an urgent issue that must be dealt with fairly.

In the spirit of earlier aboriginal trains and caravans that brought this same message to communities across Canada, it was decided by both the Aboriginal Rights Coalition and the Canadian Ecumenical Jubilee Initiative that a Blanket Train to Ottawa would help highlight the petition in our communities. Trains will be converging from the West, the East, the North, and Southern Ontario, and we will come carrying the blankets that symbolize the land we once shared, stopping along the way to pick up bundles of blankets from individuals and communities on or within travelling distance of the train route. 

People can join us for the journey if they wish. There are also other ways of becoming involved including:

• Contributing blankets and signed petitions

• Holding an event at the train station (see our publicity tools and the list of local events contacts). 

• Planning a worship service

At 1:00 PM on June 21 we will gather the blankets – 500, we hope – on the lawns of the Supreme Court of Canada in Ottawa. We will roll out the blankets, reversing the Blanket Exercise and symbolically restoring the land. We hope that you will join us – come by train, bus, carpool, or bicycle!

No doubt many other ideas will evolve in the next month, and we ask you to share your ideas with the national planners! If you and your community or faith group would like to get involved directly, contact Julie Graham at Ten Days for Global Justice:   or 1-877-403-8933

For more complete information:

• Go here to see the detailed invitation to participate

• Explore some Publicity Tools and see a sample worship service

• See the detailed train schedule and local event contacts

1. Visit of Alberto Achito

The first is a CBC news report on the visit of Alberto Achito of Colombia's Embera Katio people, whose lives have been disrupted by the EDC-sponsored Urra dam on the Sinu river. The story can be found here.

2. Developments in the House of Commons

The second comes from Burnaby MP Svend Robinson, who reports to us that he has taken action on the large number of letters he has received on this issue from CEJI supporters. Robinson has initiated a motion in the house calling for EDC regulation, and he has also written to Pierre Pettigrew, Minister of International Trade, on the issue. The text of his letter to CEJI, his motion, and his letter to Minister Pettigrew appear below.

Svend Robinson's Letter to CEJI

Dear Friends,

I write in support of your Global Land Rights Action Letter campaign. I applaud your excellent work in encouraging our government to take seriously its responsibility to ensure that Canadian corporations and the Export Development Corporation invest resposibly abroad. I have been contacted by a number of Canadians, from my constituency and elsewhere. I share their concerns, and yours. In support of the campaign, I have introduced in the House of Commons a motion calling for the government to enact effective regulation in this area.

Sincerely, Svend Robinson, MP Burnaby-Douglas

Parliamentary Motion: SJR/sm CEP 232

M-267 - February 15, 2001 - Mr. Robinson (Burnaby--Douglas) - On or after Thursday, March 1, 2001 - That this House call on the government to effectively regulate Canadian corporations and the Export Development Corporation in their activities here and abroad so that they: (a) comply with internationally recognized human rights agreements; (b) comply with agreements made with indigenous peoples; (c) uphold internationally recognized environmental standards; and (d) undertake genuine consultation and achieve agreement with the affected communities in order for a project to go ahead.

Letter from Svend Robinson to Pierre Pettigrew

March 8, 2001
Honourable Pierre Pettigrew
Minister of International Trade 

Dear Pierre,

I have recently been contacted by a number of Canadians in support of the Global Land Rights Action Letter campaign.

I support the concerns of the Letter, and agree that our government has a responsibility to ensure that Canadian corporations and the Export Development Corporation are involved in responsible investment.

I look forward to your reply to these important concerns.

Sincerely, Svend Robinson, MP Burnaby-Douglas

Warm greetings! This is just a short item to bring you up to date with what has been happening in the world of the Canadian Ecumenical Jubilee Initiative.

Follow the links in this section for full-featured articles with more details...

1. Zambia: Year-End Economic Review

A report from the Jesuit Centre for Theological Reflection in Lusaka, Zambia on Zambia's social and economic status within the context of current debt relief initiatives, such as HIPC and the recently announced Canadian moratorium. It is a sobering account of a nation's ill-health, and makes clear the need for action at the multilateral level.

It seems the World Bank knows that HIPC doesn't work. In this report from the Overseas Development Institute in London, Isac Diwan, Manager of Economic Policy for Poverty Reduction at the World Bank Institute is quoted as saying that "the HIPC initiative is more helpful to multilateral organisations than it is to poor countries." Mr. Diwan noted that the HIPC Initiative is a watershed because it helps clear up the books (of the multilaterals)...brings back selectivity in lending...and supports economic policies driven by performance and needs."

3. Mozambique Wins Long Battles Over Cashew Nuts and Sugar

Researcher Joseph Hanlon describes the Mozambique's recent victory over the IMF's economic restructuring plans -- specifically, the closing down of cashew nut processing and deregulation of the sugar industry. The IMF pressed both these measures on Mozambique in the mid-nineties, arguing that free trade and globalisation would bring more long-term benefit, outweighing the cost and disruption of massive unemployment. Mozambique, on the other hand, sought protection of the industries in order to create and protect tens of thousands of industrial jobs -- cashew and sugar are the country's two largest industries.

This education and action campaign for the establishment of an independent commission to implement aboriginal, treaty, and inherent rights got a boost on January 29 with endorsement from the Assembly of First Nations (see item immediately following).

National Chief Matthew Coon Come signed the petition, as did BC Vice-Chief Herb George, Alberta Vice-Chief Wilson Bearhead, Saskatchewan Vice-Chief Perry Bellegarde, Manitoba Vice-Chief Dennis White Bird, Northwest Territories Vice-Chief Bill Erasmus, Quebec Vice-Chief Ghislain Picard, and St'at'imc Nation (BC) Chief and Lillooet Tribal Council President Gary John.

Now is the time for us to act in solidarity with our Aboriginal brothers and sisters and move this petition through our churches and communities! Most parishes and congregations will have received the petition and backgrounder with the Jubilee poster distributed this fall. More are available from the Jubilee office, and they can also be downloaded here from the CEJI webpage.

Please think about what you can do in your community. We can provide you with educational and worship resources to support the petition (the CEJI Year 3 Leadership Guide) and all the materials you might require for a community signing (the "Jube Tube"). Both are available at cost, plus postage. You might have other ideas, such as that of the Ecumenical Good Friday Walk committee in Toronto. This year’s walk will focus on Right Relations with Aboriginal Peoples.

Please consider attending a workshop in your area, which will equip you to further animate the petition. So far, we have held exciting workshops in Sudbury and Victoria. (Pictures of the Sudbury event are available here on the CEJI website, as is a full list of upcoming workshops here.

Participation in this campaign has increased since the failed Hague meetings on Climate Change in November. Most recently, Environment David Anderson met with the members of the Ottawa Jubilee Coalition at their January workshop on climate change. These workshops continue to be held across the country; check the CEJI website here for one in your area.

As well, local TEN DAYS for Global Justice groups are planning information pickets at ESSO stations across the country on February 17. Check the list below to see if there is a picket happening in your area.

Vancouver, Saturday February 17 - Wrestling With A Dinosaur: Global Warming Day of Action. Information pickets at Vancouver Esso Stations. Places and times to be determined at the February 10 Teach-in/Planning Session. For more information call 250-541-1937 or 250-936-9057.

Victoria, Saturday February 17 - Wrestling With A Dinosaur: Global Warming Day of Action. Information picket at the Esso Station at the corner of Hillside and Shelbourne. 11:30 AM - 1:30 PM. Bring your family, friends and pet dinosaur. For more information contact 250-370-0121 or 250-592-6735.

Parksville: Saturday, Feb. 17 - Information Picket on climate change at ESSO station. For more information call 250-752-7588.

Winnipeg: April 22, Earth Day Information Picket at ESSO Distribution Station in Bird's Hill. More information will be posted later.

Toronto: Saturday, Feb. 17, 2:30 pm - 11:00 pm at St. James-Bond United Church 1066 Avenue Road, Toronto (From the Eglinton-Young subway, take the 32 Eglinton West bus to Avenue Rd. OR from Eglinton West subway, take the 32 Eglinton East bus to Avenue Rd.; then walk 2 blocks north - the church is on the west side.) Ecological Footprint Youth Workshop. For grades 7 and up, and youth leaders. Spend the afternoon learning about your ecological footprint, then have some dinner, play some games, and finish off the evening with a dance. Sponsored by TEN DAYS for Global Justice. Cost is $10. To register please call: Brian Nicholson 416-485-0732. For further information call: Susan Howard 416-483-0695.

Brantford: Saturday, Feb. 17, 11:30 a.m. to 1:00 Don't be a Dinosaur! Information Picket at Colburn St. Esso station. Raging Grannies will be there! Contact Mike Misener at 519-753-7834 or Katheryne Eddy at 519-756-8642.

Montreal: Saturday, Feb. 17, 2 p.m. to 3 p.m - Dinosaur Day information picket at ESSO station at 700 Atwater Ave. corner St. Antoine (across from Lionel Groux Metro) featuring Raging Grannies . For more information contact: Joan Hadrill (514) 695-2675 or Barbara Seifred (514) 481-6435. 

The Dakar conference brought together leaders of NGOs and social movements from all over Africa to analyze the debt crisis and the impacts of IMF/World Bank Structural Adjustment Programmes on African populations. Conference participants also considered strategies for resistance to the neoliberal model and highlighted alternative approaches.

The conference was an important turning point in the global Jubilee movement, as well. The last two days of the conference featured a meeting organized by Jubilee South which brought together organizers of the Jubilee movement for debt cancellation from Northern and Southern countries. Strong themes that emerged from Global South debt networks in that meeting, included: 

• That the third world debt is illegitimate and must be totally canceled without conditions; 

• Structural Adjustment Programmes of the IMF and World Bank, under whatever name, including the new PRSPs (Poverty Reduction Strategy Programmes), must be rejected; 

• That no conditionalities should be placed on the debt cancellation process by Northern governments or creditors; 

• And that we must more consciously take stock of the ecological impacts of the debt.

New strategies for achieving "life without debt" were also proposed and discussed. Jubilee South groups are planning to build social movements in their countries to get their governments to refuse to pay their illegitimate debts. This strategy of building for repudiation of the debt comes in light of the failure of the G-7, the IMF, and the World Bank to accede to demands for total cancellation. The limited debt relief that the G-7 governments have offered thus far is wholly inadequate.

More details, read the declaration and manifesto from the conference.

Toronto, 19 December 2000: Finance Minister Paul Martin is to be commended for announcing today that Canada will extend a debt payment moratorium on bilateral debt owed to Canada by Heavily Indebted Poor Countries (HIPCs).

The Canadian Ecumenical Jubilee Initiative, the church-based group which gathered 640,000 signatures on a petition for debt cancellation, says that the moratorium is one more step towards justice for impoverished nations. "We welcome this response to the lobbying of thousands of activists across Canada," says John Dillon of the Jubilee Initiative.

The Jubilee Initiative applauds Martin for adopting a moratorium on collecting payments rather than holding payments in a trust fund as Britain recently announced it would do. Canada’s actions will immediately free up foreign exchange for spending on social and economic development in impoverished countries.

However, Dillon stresses that since Canada is owed less than one half of one percent of impoverished country debt, "the effect will be a drop in the bucket. The amount of debt relief offered under the Enhanced HIPC Initiative is inadequate." The Jubilee Initiative urges Martin, who has encouraged other G7 finance minister to implement the bilateral moratorium, to work for an extension of his action by multilateral creditor institutions, which hold most of the low income countries' debts. The Initiative also calls on all creditors to rectify a fundamental problem of all current plans for debt relief: the imposition of onerous Structural Adjustment Programs (SAPs). "SAPs still demand too heavy a ransom for the reward of debt relief, and are an unacceptable intrusion into the affairs of sovereign nations," Dillon says.

The global campaign for debt cancellation is not over. The Jubilee Initiative reiterates its call for the complete and unconditional cancellation of bilateral and multilateral debts of the world’s poorest countries; ending the imposition of Structural Adjustment Programs; and the assessment and cancellation of the illegitimate debts of developing countries.

For more information, contact:

The Canadian Ecumenical Jubilee Initiative: Kairos-CEJI, 416-462-1613; Kirsten Mercer, 416-924-9199, extension 246

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At a Jubilee 2000 rally in London on Saturday December 2, Gordon Brown, Britain's Chancellor of the Exchequer, pledged to either stop collecting or hold in trust all debt payments to the UK from 41 of the world's poorest countries.

What does this mean_ It applies to those countries which have not already reached decision point—when they first receive some relief on debt payments—in the Heavily Indebted Poor Countries initiative. For those countries which do not have poverty reduction strategies in place, any payments made to Britain after December 1^st 2000 on existing debt will be kept in a trust fund and returned to the country when it can be shown that the money will be used for poverty reduction.

How does it relate to Paul Martin's recent proposal in Prague for a debt moratorium_ Brown is stopping some collection of bilateral debt immediately. (He is also continuing to collect from some poor countries, but will return the funds to them when they have satisfied Martin's proposal is still just that: a proposal after all. We would like Martin and Canada to go ahead and stop collecting. We would like all parties to implement the bilateral moratorium.

We also want the moratorium extended to cover multilateral debt. Zambia serves as an illustration of why this is necessary. Current IMF debt relief plans project that Zambia will pay $153 million in debt repayment in 2001 and similar amounts for some years after, but $212 million in 2007.

What about SAPs and conditionality_ Brown's plan still relies on SAPs and other conditionalities. In Prague, Martin was critical of excessive conditionality, and we are encouraging him to turn that criticism into policy by rejecting the implementation of SAPs.

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As you have probably read in the news lately, recent meetings in The Hague to reach an agreement on the rules for implementing the Kyoto Protocol failed. (In the Kyoto Protocol, industrialised nations agreed to help control human-induced climate change by reducing their emissions from 1990 levels by the period 2010-2012.) CEJI is currently coordinating a "Renewal of the Earth" campaign pressuring Canada to ratify the Kyoto Protocol, and therefore takes great interest in the meetings at The Hague.

Though many countries have signed the Kyoto Protocol, they have not yet ratified it. Ratification requires passing appropriate legislation in a country’s parliament. Most industrialised nations have been waiting until they see what the implementation rules will be before proceeding to ratification. Hence, the importance of the COP6 agenda. Under the Kyoto Protocol, there are ‘flexibility mechanisms’ by which countries can attempt to meet part of their reduction targets through purchasing credits from other countries. To the concern of the churches, as well as many developing nations and environmental groups, the majority of attention leading up to and at COP6 was not focused on strategies for reducing emissions within industrialised countries but on negotiating these flexibility mechanisms for gaining credits from elsewhere.

The Climate Conference in The Hague failed to reach an agreement. Australia, Canada, Japan and the United States had pressed for flexibility to meet an unlimited amount of their emission reduction targets through paying for projects in other countries. Canada and the U.S. also wanted to be able to get credit for the carbon dioxide absorbed by the forests and deduct this credit from their reduction target. These positions were strongly rejected by most developing countries, the European Union, Indigenous Peoples’ organisations and environmental groups as undermining the environmental integrity of the Kyoto Protocol.

(Thanks to United Church Staff person David Hallman for the above analysis. It is excerpted from a larger report which will be posted on the CEJI website and is available from Kairos-CEJI by email.)

This past week, Canada's Environment Minister attempted to restart the talks by convening a series of meetings on Climate Change in Ottawa. CEJI's Steering Committee send a letter of encouragement to Minister Anderson (go here to read the full text). Unfortunately, it seems that the meetings have produced little forward movement on emissions reductions. According to the CBC on December 8, the European Union had lessened its opposition to the use of carbon sinks. For the reasons cited above, this cannot be seen as a victory for the Earth.

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As you know, one of the key actions this year is the CEJI "Land Rights, Right Relations" petition campaign for the establishment of an independent Aboriginal land rights commission in Canada. Our goal for this petition is 100,000 signatures. To date, without any systematic animation, we have gathered about 400 signatures.

To get this campaign rolling, however, staff at the Anglican Church have come up with a plan for public signing events. Essentially a public event in a mailing tube, it has become affectionately and informally known as the "Jube Tube." I hope that, once hearing about this idea, you will also decide that it is something you can circulate in your networks.

What is it_ A mailing tube containing a large poster-sized version of the "Land Rights, Right Relations" petition, 25 regular sized versions of the petition, one CEJI Year 3 poster, a copy of the recent Church Leaders' Call to Reflection on land rights, and materials to help animators put together a public display and shape their public signing event.

How does it work_ You send tubes to key contacts within your network -- for the Anglicans, those are diocesan contacts; for CEJI, local Jubilee committees and Jubilee communities. They are asked to commit to an event (it could be as simple as a table in the mall on Saturday or as complicated as a full day retreat) wher they will seek to obtain at least 250 signatures. At the end of the event, they mail the completed petitions (with as many signatures as the group was able to realize) back to CEJI. As a symbol of their commitment to this campaign for justice, they will keep the large poster-sized version of the petition signed by members of their community.

How can you participate_ By getting these materials in circulation. We have calculated that the tubes, including all materials, will cost about $10.00 plus tax and postage (postage rates run from about $3.00 to $5.00). If you would like to participate, there are a couple of options available to you:

1. You can tell us how many tubes you would like, and we will prepare them for you at cost. You can then ship them. Or,

2. We can provide you with the master copies of all materials at no charge (except the Year 3 poster, which costs 50c) and you can assemble your own mailings (you will also have to get the tubes!)

Please contact me by return e-mail or phone (462-1613) if you would like to participate, and which option you prefer.

Last year, we brought the divergent themes of Jubilee Year 2 together in a budget submission to the Standing Committee on Finance. Activists from across the country backed up this submission with letters and visits to their MPs. Church leaders added their voice in a New Year's letter to the Prime Minister.

As a result of this and other lobbying, over the past 12 months we have seen new commitments to: full bilateral debt cancellation to all HIPCs, increases in ODA spending on social development, and increased spending on early childhood development programs.

Now we would like to keep pressing forward on those and other issues, especially the issues encompassed under Jubilee Year 3: Rights Relations with Aboriginal Peoples and Right Relations with the Earth.

In order to do that, we have prepared a list of "Jubilee Questions for Federal Candidates" which people in your networks can use in doorstep conversations with candidates and in all-candidates meetings. Please find that document attached; please post as appropriate and circulate among your networks. (You may also download a rich-txt version here.).

A factsheet highlighting CEJI achievements in the areas of grass roots mobilization, education, and advocacy is available for distribution. If you would like a copy, please let me know. 

Warm regards,

^ ^

Ottawa, 28 February 2000: For Immediate Release

While Finance Minister Paul Martin's promise to cancel the debts owed to Canada by highly indebted poor countries is a step forward, those countries will continue to have to jump through many hoops before they see the benefits of debt cancellation, says the Canadian Ecumenical Jubilee Initiative.

Canadians involved in the Jubilee Initiative across the country had called on Mr. Martin to write a Jubilee Budget for the year 2000, one which would see definitive debt cancellation for the world's poorest countries, increases in Official Development Assistance, and the elimination of child poverty in Canada.

John Dillon of the Jubilee Initiative says that Canada's plan to cancel the debts of 19 countries is seriously flawed in its reliance on Structural Adjustment Programs, which put countries in a "vicious spiral of debt, restructuring, weakened economies, and even greater debt." It also ignores poor countries such as Haiti, and continues to fund the International Monetary Fund's Highly Indebted Poor Countries (HIPC) Initiative for debt relief, a lengthy process which is also premised on Structural Adjustment. "It's time for Canada to stop deferring debt cancellation and prolonging poor peoples' misery," said Dillon.

Despite nominal increases to Official Development Assistance in this budget, Canada's foreign aid spending will fall further away from the internationally committed target of 0.7% of gross national product. Current spending projections portend a drop from O.27% of GNP in 1999 to 0.25% this coming year.

Finally, says the Jubilee Initiative, Mr. Martin has failed to deliver the "children's budget" so long anticipated by poor families. His package of tax cuts will benefit middle and upper income bracket families far more than the poor. "There were a few first steps measures," said Harry Kits of the Jubilee Initiative and Citizens for Public Justice, "but not the substantial commitment to programs and services that we hoped for."

For more information, contact: