Search results for “site/human rights”

  • The wrong question in the wrong forum

    It didn’t take very much time at the joint federal-provincial environmental hearing into Site C, which started this week in Fort St. John, to realize that it is not the best forum to address the central issue underlying BC Hydro’s proposal to develop the $8 to $9 billion hydro project.…

  • Wood wasted at BC logging sites would fill a cross-country truck convoy — twice

    Costs include thousands of potential jobs, sharply higher CO2 emissions: report CLICK HERE TO VIEW THE FULL REPORT (Vancouver) A new report on BC’s forest industry finds that startling numbers of usable logs are being left to rot or burn at logging sites, at a potential cost of thousands of…

  • The roots of our housing crisis: Austerity, debt and extreme speculation

    We’re now 10 years on from the biggest financial crisis since the Great Depression. Or, as our national mythology puts it, 10 years since Canada breathed a deep sigh of relief as the crisis mostly grazed our economy and financial system. Since 2008, we’ve had 10 years of congratulatory back-patting…

  • UN singles out BC Government on women’s rights

    BC is not meeting its obligations to women under international human rights law. That was the clear message of the United Nations Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women in comments issued last week in New York City-just in time for International Women’s Day (March 8). The UN Committee…

  • Canada at a Crime Crossroads

    National Conversation on “crime” and prevention urgently needed At a time when the economic, political, and social costs of increasing our reliance on incarceration are widely known, the federal, provincial, and territorial governments are in the process of creating 10,600 new prison spaces with an infrastructure cost of $3.6 billion…

  • FastFacts: Rights of Migrant Farm Workers Recognized

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    Housing crisis worse: Former UN special rapporteur Miloon Kothari revisits Vancouver

    As the United Nations’ Special Rapporteur on the Right to Adequate Housing from 2000 to 2008, Miloon Kothari observed the failure of market-based approaches to addressing housing crises. His 2007 report on Canada called for “a national strategy [for the] large scale building of social housing, and much better tenant…

  • Corporate rights under serious scrutiny in Europe. Canada fast asleep.

    On Feb. 3rd, I made a presentation  in Vancouver to the House of Commons Standing Committee on International Trade on the proposed Canada/E.U. trade deal (C.E.T.A.). I was there on behalf of CUPE B.C. The Committee, chaired by Alberta Conservative M.P. Rob Merrifield, was in B.C. to review both C.E.T.A.…

  • Labour Matters

    Work Life: Workplace Safety a motherhood issue? Not yet.

    In Manitoba, messages about the importance of workplace health and safety are hard to miss. The SAFE Work campaigns run year-round by the Workers Compensation Board are trying to foster a culture of workplace health and safety in which it becomes socially unacceptable to put workers in harm’s way. After…

  • Tradable Water Rights – Coming to a province near you

    In January of this year, the BC government joined Alberta, Saskatchewan and Manitoba to become the fourth province to announce that it is considering creating tradable water rights as a way of curbing use and improving the efficiency of allocation. The announcement came as a vague reference to “water markets”…

  • Fast Facts: Meeting the housing needs of Aboriginal people moving to Winnipeg

    Winnipeg is home to Canada’s largest Aboriginal population. Aboriginal people, however, are among the most likely to experience homelessness and are also over-represented in housing that is unaffordable, overcrowded or in poor condition. Finding housing has become a wall preventing many Aboriginal people from successfully making Winnipeg home. Moving to…

  • Nova Scotia Alternative Budget

    Budgets more than numbers

    The Nova Scotia Department of Finance recently launched an interactive “Back to Balance” website, giving community members an opportunity to try their hands at government budgeting. The site is technically sophisticated and informative. Users can move sliders to adjust the levels of various taxes and expenditures, and pop-up bubbles provide…