Search results for “site/human rights”

  • Hospital surgery corridor. Blurred figures of people with medical uniforms in hospital corridor

    Healthcare is a Human Right

    International Students Speak Out on Healthcare Inaccessibility in Manitoba Download 2.94 MB32 pages Five years after public health insurance was rescinded from international students in Manitoba, and in the aftermath of the most volatile years of the COVID-19 pandemic, this report brings together testimonials shared by international students across a…

  • Connect the dots: School boards, democracy, and human rights

    Democratic school boards could serve as a bulwark against far right attacks on education

    On a gray day last September, I attended a counter-protest at the Grand Parade in Halifax. I was there as part of “Education Saves Lives” – a response to the deceptively named “1 Million March4Kids”, a nationwide movement fueled by some parents’ opposition to what they call “gender ideology in…

  • Education Project

    In Alberta, “parental rights” and privatization go hand in hand

    Our Schools/Our Selves, Summer/Fall 2025

    In recent years, public education systems have become a battleground in a culture war fomented by the far right. The points of contention include manufactured panics over “wokeism” and accusations that schools are teaching “critical race theory” and “divisive concepts.” The current flashpoint, around the supposed indoctrination of students with…

  • Education Project

    Discrimination through deception: The parental rights movement’s school board strategy

    Our Schools/Our Selves, Summer/Fall 2025

    In spite of the role trustees play in communities across the country, school board elections in Canada have historically been rather perfunctory affairs, often beset by poor voter turn-out and little to non-existent media coverage. Yet, that has changed dramatically in the past few years, as what were once considered…

  • Education Project

    Difficult knowledge: Understanding “parental rights” and anti-SOGI mobilization among Sinophone Canadian parents in Metro Vancouver

    Our Schools/Our Selves, Summer/Fall 2025

    Over the past 15 years, there has been a rapid rise in anti-SOGI (Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity) mobilization, primarily led by self-identified “parental rights” protesters in Metro Vancouver and across Canada more broadly.

  • BC Hydro

    Losing sight at Site C

    Court documents and FOI materials show BC Hydro knew shale would move at troubled construction project, yet Hydro proceeded with river diversion BC Hydro approved the pouring of massive amounts of concrete to build a buttress at its problem-plagued Site C dam project months before a critical drainage tunnel was…

  • From discrimination against temporary foreign workers to sexual harassment, there’s no shortage of issues a human rights commission could tackle

    British Columbia is the only province in Canada that does not have a Human Rights Commission. That makes us the weakest province when it comes to fostering human rights awareness and preventing discrimination. Currently BC only has a Human Rights Tribunal, which mediates and adjudicates complaints about discrimination after it…

  • Source: iStock

    The Parental Rights Trojan Horse

    Previously published in the Winnipeg Free Press August 21, 2023 On Thursday, the PC party promised to update the Public Schools Act and expand parental rights if elected. Premier Stefanson’s press conference began by outlining the changing technological landscape, but did not end with a discussion of how to increase…

  • True reconciliation in BC requires implementing the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples

    In the span of a decade, we have moved from the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples being largely absent from political and public discourse in BC, to being fully endorsed by both the federal and provincial governments. In May 2017, implementation of the UN Declaration was called…

  • Report points to “gaping hole” in BC’s system of human rights protection

    Researchers call for an independent Human Rights Commission as BC fails to meet Canadian and international standards READ THE FULL REPORT HERE. Vancouver—Today is International Human Rights Day. But what does that mean here in BC, the only province in Canada without a human rights commission? A new report published…

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    Addressing the racism of the Temporary Foreign Worker Program

    There is renewed attention on Canada’s Temporary Foreign Worker Program (TFWP) in the wake of the recent damning report from the UN Special Rapporteur on Contemporary Forms of Slavery that calls the program “a breeding ground for contemporary forms of slavery.” Yet, the central critiques and recommendations made in the…

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    Greenlighting fracking while protecting treaty rights?

    Agreement with BC aside, 1000s of gas wells await Blueberry River First Nations When the Blueberry River First Nations took the provincial government to court in March 2015, arguing that cumulative industrial developments had robbed them of their ability to hunt and fish, oil and gas companies could see trouble…