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Last year, a dubious record was set when a magnitude 4.6 earthquake was triggered near Fort St. John during a natural gas industry fracking operation. The tremor was just the latest to be linked to the controversial brute force gas extraction technique, and almost certainly was noted at BC Hydro’s…
Canada’s preparedness for oil spill crisis sadly lacking For Canadians wondering about our preparedness for a major oil spill, an item in The Montreal Gazette (June 6) was not reassuring. It stated that Canada was sending “half of its stock of oil containment boom – some 3,000 meters (1.8 miles)…
The recent unilateral decision by the federal government to spend up to $16 billion on the purchase and maintenance of new fighter jets is both wasteful and dangerous. It’s wasteful because our military doesn’t need such extravagant and costly equipment. The arguments for such military aircraft became obsolete with the end…
Toxic heavy metals, including arsenic, barium, cadmium, lithium and lead, are flowing unchecked into the Peace River following a series of unusual landslides that may be linked to natural gas industry fracking operations. The landslides began nearly two years ago and show no sign of stopping. So far, they have…
I know this budget is supposed to be good news for health, but I want to argue here that the exact opposite is true. We’ve had a lot of budgets like this in B.C., so this one is in keeping with its right wing predecessors. During the 1980s, for example,…
Florida Center for Instructional Technology” style=”border-radius:0px;–objectFit:cover;–imagePosX:50%;–imagePosY:50%” decoding=”async” srcset=”https://www.policyalternatives.ca/wp-content/uploads/2025/04/draw_bridge-web-300×176.jpg 300w, https://www.policyalternatives.ca/wp-content/uploads/2025/04/draw_bridge-web-1024×600.jpg 1024w, https://www.policyalternatives.ca/wp-content/uploads/2025/04/draw_bridge-web-768×450.jpg 768w, https://www.policyalternatives.ca/wp-content/uploads/2025/04/draw_bridge-web-1536×900.jpg 1536w, https://www.policyalternatives.ca/wp-content/uploads/2025/04/draw_bridge-web-2048×1200.jpg 2048w” sizes=”(max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px” />There was a fair amount of good news about Freedom of Information rules and a little bit of bad news last month. But the bad news was serious and you really have to wonder why the government would bother with it when the rest of the news was good. First…
https://vimeo.com/8623368 Mountain pine beetle attacks have decimated BC’s pine forests, seriously damaging their ability to store carbon and protect against global warming. An effective response to the beetle attacks will involve much more than just clearcutting dead trees.
Campaign for fair, sustainable economy is gaining ground Anyone who believes exponential growth can go on forever in a finite world is either a maniac or an economist. So said economist Kenneth Boulding back in the 1970s. Concept, process or movement — décrosissance, to give its European popularity its due —…
Province of BC/ Flickr” style=”border-radius:0px;–objectFit:cover;–imagePosX:50%;–imagePosY:50%” decoding=”async” srcset=”https://www.policyalternatives.ca/wp-content/uploads/2025/04/food-secure-BC_policynote_may2016_1280x600-300×141.jpg 300w, https://www.policyalternatives.ca/wp-content/uploads/2025/04/food-secure-BC_policynote_may2016_1280x600-1024×480.jpg 1024w, https://www.policyalternatives.ca/wp-content/uploads/2025/04/food-secure-BC_policynote_may2016_1280x600-768×360.jpg 768w, https://www.policyalternatives.ca/wp-content/uploads/2025/04/food-secure-BC_policynote_may2016_1280x600.jpg 1280w” sizes=”(max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px” />If California’s farmers ever run out of the water needed to irrigate their crops, we’ll be in for a rude awakening. With 70 per cent of British Columbia’s imported fruits and vegetables coming from the sunny US state, any climatic disaster there would almost certainly result in dramatic run-ups in food…
Download 542.78 KB20 pages This report drills down on one key but complex policy file that is essential to the province meeting its commitment to reduce poverty and to improve income security for both children and adults: social assistance. The poverty gap for single individuals who qualify for Ontario Works or its…
(Vancouver) A report released today finds that the wage needed to cover the costs of raising a family in Metro Vancouver is $20.64 per hour. This is the 2016 Metro Vancouver living wage, the hourly wage that two working parents with two young children must earn to meet their basic…