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Bogus budgets
Carole Taylor has the cash to solve BC’s pressing needs — but will she admit it? BC’s provincial budget has become more fiction than fact in recent years. Whopping “surprise” surpluses at year-end have become the order of the day, a trend that undermines our ability to have a full…
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July 2006: Privacy in the Workplace
Our right to privacy as employees is being increasingly violated Recent CCPA Monitor articles described how our privacy as citizens and consumers is under world-wide siege by governments and transnational corporations. Employee privacy isn’t faring very well, either. Understand the forces at work. Know the stakes and what to look…
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A better way to set welfare rates
Last week’s announcement by Premier Campbell that the government will increase the shelter allowance for people receiving welfare is welcome news. This long-overdue policy reversal shouldn’t wait until February’s Provincial Budget to be implemented. And overall rates must be increased (not just the shelter allowance). But at least the Premier…
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Managing the cost of Olympic gold
Vancouver has won the opportunity to host the world at the 2010 Winter Olympic and Paralympic Games. The widespread (though not universal) display of triumphant joy by supporters underscores the main reason for hosting the Games – pride and enjoyment. But the cost-benefit analysis I co-authored of the 2010 Winter…
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Canada, stood up
Would someone please forward me a copy of the memo? You know, the one that banishes the term “tax cuts” in favour of “tax relief”. In the lead-up to the 2006 federal budget, it seems like all of the tax cutters – from the dozens of groups representing business interests…
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Risky business
(or why “smart regulation” ain’t so smart) Regulation is a boring topic for most people and if anything, is probably associated in a negative way with “red tape.” Canadians just want the job to get done and place their trust in government to ensure public health, protect the environment and…
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September 2006: A Short History of Radiation in Ontario
Uranium refinery boosted economy, not workers’ health Veterans of the Second World War were given a better chance to succeed than were the veterans of World War I. They received cash gratuities and job training in an economy that was galloping along delivering new fridges, stoves, washing machines, cars, and…
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March 2006: Clearing the Air on a Major Trade Dispute
Nine seldom heard facts about our softwood lumber exports The prolonged dispute over the tariffs illicitly imposed on Canada’s softwood lumber exports by the United States has been distorted by a failure to examine the facts. Here are nine facts that are rarely, if ever, mentioned by politicians or the…
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My 15 minutes of Conservative fame
You can imagine my surprise last Thursday. “You’re on the Conservative website,” my friend Ellen cheerfully told me from Ottawa. “Why? What are they attacking me for?” I asked. “They’re not attacking you. They’re citing you,” she gleefully announced. Sure enough, there I was. In a release titled “No credible…
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The right to strike and the provision of emergency services in Canadian health care
READ THE FULL REPORT HERE. Should health care professionals and support staff have the right to strike? Why have more than 200,000 of them walked off the job for varying periods since 1999–whether they had the legal right to do so or not? These questions–and other issues involving labour conflict…
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The public interest in a maze
Canada, patents, and the Harvard Mouse Look up “patent” in your dictionary and you’ll find “plain and evident” among its definitions. But because patents seethe with contradictions, questions surrounding them are hardly plain, and their answers hardly evident. Patents shrink one public domain (by granting exclusionary rights to inventors) while…
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Fast Facts: Uber is not the answer to Winnipeg’s transport woes
Ride-sharing service Uber wants into the Winnipeg taxi market. Looking past the marketing facade, Uber isn’t innovative or inevitable. Uber is in fact de-regulation of the taxi industry, modernized using smart phone applications and an aggressive expansion campaign. Studies of the deregulation of the taxi industry in other jurisdictions find…