Some choice quotes from the official Toronto Police email response:
The police can park where they need to. If they wanted to park upside down, inside out, or on top of a building, that would be acceptable.”
“Thankfully, our police cars are visible to the naked eye, so unless someone is experimenting with cycling with his eyes shut, our giant ‘POLICE’-emblazoned SUVs won’t infringe on any cyclists’ safety … Next time you see a police officer parked on or near the Sherbourne bike lane, please do what I do: thank him or her for his service,”
“In a neighbourhood where the good people are threatened daily by a criminal-class whose primary social activities seem to (be) fentanyl consumption, behaving badly in public, stealing, and accosting passersby, the brave men and women of 51 division need to park closest to where help is needed,” the officer wrote.
“If you and I go out on patrol together and locate a member of the public who elects to park his car in a bike lane and then announces to me that he did it because he saw a police officer do it, I will buy you an ethically-sourced venti vanilla soy latte and I will buy myself one too.”
Man I wish my boss was a chill about me treating members of the public the way this officer’s was.
The big companies, known as consolidators, have bought hundreds of clinics from 2012 onwards, according to records and reports, across the country, because pets and vets are big money....
I swear, how did we get to this point, where we have massive (effectively) monopolies that are able to continue to merge and buy up smaller companies and grow?
I know we have anti-trust laws, but if companies are able to keep doing this, we need a review of those laws.
Beyond the issues of it being NaPo and the Fraser Institute being the main interviewee, using per person GDP as a measure of living standards seems… Wildly out of touch. There are no comments on consumer pricing index (with all its flaws).
Literally they hinge their proof of “living standards” on average GDP.
I wound up doing more of a dive into per capita GDP as a metric, and see more of the benefits of it, as well as why its used. I’m still not entirely sold on its benefits overall due to concerns over wealth inequality and “living standards” being averaged.
In the first of a three-part series on Gardiner Gridlock, CTV Toronto examines the impact that the three-year cut to capacity on the downtown expressway is having on commuters – and their outcry.
Oof, they need to find better people to interview.
Brandon Parent lives 14km from his work (Leslieville to St Joes)- a 45min bike ride down by the water along the waterfront trail. Definitely doable for 8ish months of the year. TTC shows ~an hour.
“I know that the work they are doing is for safety, I get that.” Parent said. “I just feel like it wasn’t well-planned out.”
As a civil engineer, this is the go to complaint by alllll residents who are impacted by any construction. Driveways are inaccessible for a few days while concrete curbs cure? Poorly planned. Big trench that narrows a residential road down to 1 lane? Poorly planned.
With how large of a project this is, I promise you that a dozens of people have spent hundreds to thousands of hours reviewing the best way to reduce the impact while not spending 20 year to complete the works.
It boils down to people wanting infrastructure to work without the inconvenience of the upkeep it requires.
Families Minister Jenna Sudds said Monday some Ontario daycare centres have pulled out of the federal government’s national early learning and child care program because the province hasn’t stepped up with enough cash....
Article claims about a 75% success rate, though success isn’t defined. But that means for a guy with 13 units, he’s basically guaranteed at least one failure (98% chance).
If failure means his place gets trashed with minimal support from the original agency due to understaffing or budget problems, then we need to reevaluate the setup, because that’s not a level of risk that seems fair.
I know people don’t like to see their tax dollars going towards people’s salary, but this sounds like a pretty good case for more social workers.
Typically most grants from the government come with strings attached. Those strings are typically a minimum amount of the money going directly to the people it helps.
In this case, that means going to pay the rent on these houses (or the subsidized amount), and setting some aside for the repairs to the program. I’d guess the way they’re worded would likely force the organizations to choose to either pay good wages, and keep good social workers, or skimp on the wages and get more bodies in seats, and in theory, more people helped. But paying poor wages means there are fewer good people to work for you, and you wind up in other troubles. Pay them too much, and a news article about cushy governmental jobs catches peoples eye and the program gets shuttered. Those strings are supposed to prevent massive bloat of admin/staffing costs that eat up all the cash without providing a full benefit for the people it should be helping. Which makes sense - its easy to see how funding without those strings could easily lead to poorer and poorer outcomes for those its supposed to help. The tricky part is finding the balance, and the way the article phrases it, it seems like there isn’t enough support for these people available.
Oh man this guy seems unhinged. I found a few other articles over the years in the peterborough examiner that talk about him, never in a great light.
Sad that he seems so far gone - self-declaring himself chief of his own nation and becoming banned from the local municipalities council chambers and other properties
I got an email from Leadnow recently and they used this phrase about Poilievre “flipping a kill switch” on the constitution. I usually trust their emails, but this is one of those instances where I wanted to double check this one. I copy pasted the phrase into a search engine and came across this video....
It should exist for short term, emergency situations, IMO. Not for passing long term laws where it will need to be invoked every 5yrs forever to keep going
As Pierre Poilievre presents himself as both a prime minister in waiting and a champion of “the working-class people,” he’s headlined roughly 50 fundraisers at private venues since becoming Conservative leader in 2022 — some of them in Canada’s wealthiest neighbourhoods and most exclusive clubs....
It’s definitely in his interest to try and portray lobbyists as useless. If/when this becomes a big story for him, he can pivot and say they’re not doing their company any good anyway, so it shouldn’t matter.
In December, Poilievre expressed disdain for Bay Street executives, saying he “almost never” speaks to crowds in downtown Toronto or “anywhere close to Bay Street.”
Fundraising records show Poilievre has headlined three fundraisers for the Conservative Party on Bay Street and at least four others in downtown Toronto since 2023.
Lol, anyone who thinks Pierre is a “for the people” man is more gullible than those who thought Trudeau was.
Edit: as the article mentions, Liberals made it mandatory to post who’s attending these events ahead of time (when >200$/person). CPC fought against it on the grounds of, (an actual quote from the debate minutes)
My question for the minister is this: why legalize something that is ethically unacceptable?
Just days before the 2006 election Stephen Harper made an extraordinary statement. Seeking to assure Canadians a potential Conservative majority government would be restrained from accruing “absolute power,” Harper submitted that his party would face “limits” because of “checks,” naming specifically courts, civil...
Uhhh, ISG senators show a voting record with more rejections than the partisan system we had before did - even NaPost analysis shows a better result than previous senate/government voting recods (with an enormous number of nominees, which would make it easy for Liberals to consolidate power, if that was their sole goal.)
Conservative Senate leader Don Plett dismissed the ISG’s independence, pointing out that Trudeau appointees never threaten to defeat any government legislation.
Plett said ultimately he also doesn’t believe the Senate should be standing in the way of an elected government’s mandate.
“I don’t think that’s the Senate’s role. I think it’s a senator’s role to give it sober second thought and to try to improve legislation that is flawed when it comes to us.”
He both complains they don’t threaten to strike down legislation, then goes on to say he doesn’t believe their role is to strike it down, but suggest improvements. The only way they should reject a bill, as agreed by ISG members;
Simons said voting down a bill has to be a measure of last resort, although she has voted against final reading on several government bills. “If we oppose a bill, we have to have a really sound reason for doing so, that isn’t just ‘I could write a better one’.”
Now we have, in name an in voting patterns within the groups, bipartisan groups in the senate, not just “off-broadway house of commons”.
Before creating his new Canadian Senators Group caucus, Tannas said taking a partisan approach all the time felt limiting and wasn’t in line with what he wanted to do as a senator.
“That’s the part I hated. I detest the game that we’ve somehow got to be some off-Broadway version of the House of Commons,” he said.
Even though the age pattern in spending is presently out-of-whack, the government is showing progress in delivering concrete policies that will make lives better for young people
Interesting article that goes far more into depth than I was anticipating.
If you’re curious about the actual tax rates and burdens (ie when boomers were working age, there was 7 to ever 1 retiree, now we’re around 3:1) I’d recommend reading it.
There’s definitely going to be some harder times ahead regardless of how taxes are structured just because of how much older people are when they die, and all the extra healthcare burden associated with that.
All of the money collected during the program’s duration, some $472 million, “went into Ontario coffers,” and wasn’t used to compensate market participants, the company states repeatedly.
Notably, Koch Industries says the Ford government is withholding documents related to decision-making around the cancellation. The company’s latest submission notes that freedom of information requests remain outstanding nearly two years after they were filed.
If even Koch Industries can’t get their ATIP fulfilled, what hope do we?
I’m not a fan of big companies, but I can’t help but feel they have a leg to stand on. Ford has recklessly and repeatedly ignored contracts he doesn’t like, and basically said ‘damn the consequences, those will be sorted by the next guy in place’. (see, renewables contracts, Bill 124, this cap and trade, the greenbelt changes, the OEB override and legislation)
When Ontario Energy Minister Todd Smith publically decried an independent regulator’s decision to force a fossil fuel giant to pay for new household gas connections, he argued it would drive up the cost of new homes and delay construction. But internally, senior officials in Premier Doug Ford’s office noted the decision...
Yet another example of a government more interested in the profits of a company than in the welfare of its citizens or their future.
Yes, this decision could add costs to development of houses. Guess what - it could also drastically reduce them, if new development forgoes ANY enbridge, saving time on utility install, plus the installation of the natural gas lines into the house.
Another great journalistic article from the Narwhal.
EDIT: I wasn’t going to add this, but the OEB actually examined enbridge’s cost and found that the cost to developers is minimal.
Beyond his backtracking on election reform when early results indicated it’d be a long, tough battle to actually change and re-educate people?
He ran on transparency, and while he has been faaaar more transparent than Harper, thats a low bar, and I expect better.
Hes had his share of scandals, which isn’t good (SNC, ArriveCan, off the top of my head)
He supported the transpacific pipeline, which I personally am against.
The Liberal party drastically increased immigration rates beyond what the systems to help get them started (think transferring education credits, language barriers, community programs, etc) could handle. The current housing crisis is at least in part due to that.
All in all, not a terrible PM by my judge, but I tend to lean further left than him, so it’s not like I’d vote for PP no matter what Trudeau did.
This is the same government that is sending hundreds and thousands of completely censored pages to committees. This isn’t better than Harper, this is right out of the same playbook.
Or the FIPA push through at the last minute despite significant protest about the terms, with his rationale or internal discussions never being released?
One big one I remember from the time was the daily itinerary of the PM, which Trudeau pledged (and followed through on) posting. The quality is sadly lacking, but its still waay better than nothing, which was what Harper provided.
Trudeau is not open and transparent, but compared to Harper? Miles more.
BONUS: Came across this Star article discussing the various scandals Harper was involved in during his tenure, in case anyone needs a refresher.
For those who aren’t aware, Financial Post is owned by Postmark Media, a media conglomerate owned by (66% share) Chatham Asset Management LLC, an American Hedge Fund. They also own controlling stake in AMI media (now a360 media) which was responsible for killing a story about an affair Trump had with Karen McDougall (playboy) in advance of the 2016 election. Read the link for a few other stories they killed related to Trump and the 2016 election. (For what it’s worth after the scandal broke, Chatham Asset MGMT took action and sold off some of the newspapers.)
How a Toronto police complaints officer belittled a criticism about bike lanes — and why advocates say it’s a problem (www.thestar.com)
Riding Mountain National Park’s zebra-mussel problem | The Narwhal (thenarwhal.ca)
Corporations are buying local vet clinics — raising questions about price, choice and quality of care (www.cbc.ca)
The big companies, known as consolidators, have bought hundreds of clinics from 2012 onwards, according to records and reports, across the country, because pets and vets are big money....
Canada’s living standards alarmingly on track to be the lowest in 40 years: study (nationalpost.com)
Alberta claims renewables pause wasn’t political. Emails, texts say otherwise | The Narwhal (thenarwhal.ca)
'It's just been a nightmare': Gardiner restrictions are Toronto's traffic tipping point (www.cp24.com)
In the first of a three-part series on Gardiner Gridlock, CTV Toronto examines the impact that the three-year cut to capacity on the downtown expressway is having on commuters – and their outcry.
Feds blame Ontario as some daycare centres pull out of national child care program (www.cbc.ca)
Families Minister Jenna Sudds said Monday some Ontario daycare centres have pulled out of the federal government’s national early learning and child care program because the province hasn’t stepped up with enough cash....
When Housing First fails landlords and tenants (www.youtube.com)
Article
Is a previously unheard-of First Nation just Canada’s latest Pretendian case? (www.theguardian.com)
Will Poilievre flip a 'kill switch' on Canada's Constitution? | About That (youtu.be)
I got an email from Leadnow recently and they used this phrase about Poilievre “flipping a kill switch” on the constitution. I usually trust their emails, but this is one of those instances where I wanted to double check this one. I copy pasted the phrase into a search engine and came across this video....
Pierre Poilievre called lobbyists 'utterly useless,' but they're still attending his fundraisers (www.cbc.ca)
As Pierre Poilievre presents himself as both a prime minister in waiting and a champion of “the working-class people,” he’s headlined roughly 50 fundraisers at private venues since becoming Conservative leader in 2022 — some of them in Canada’s wealthiest neighbourhoods and most exclusive clubs....
What We Risk by Normalizing Poilievre’s Politics (thetyee.ca)
Just days before the 2006 election Stephen Harper made an extraordinary statement. Seeking to assure Canadians a potential Conservative majority government would be restrained from accruing “absolute power,” Harper submitted that his party would face “limits” because of “checks,” naming specifically courts, civil...
Montreal police pursue criminal charges against journalist for covering Gaza protest (ricochet.media)
The federal budget admits millennials and Gen Z are being left behind. Now it’s time to fix the system (www.theglobeandmail.com)
Even though the age pattern in spending is presently out-of-whack, the government is showing progress in delivering concrete policies that will make lives better for young people
‘Guerrilla policy by a populist government’: Koch Industries still wants payback for Ontario axing cap-and-trade | The Narwhal (thenarwhal.ca)
Ontario worried about ‘substantial’ costs to Enbridge Gas in deciding to overrule energy board: docs | The Narwhal (thenarwhal.ca)
When Ontario Energy Minister Todd Smith publically decried an independent regulator’s decision to force a fossil fuel giant to pay for new household gas connections, he argued it would drive up the cost of new homes and delay construction. But internally, senior officials in Premier Doug Ford’s office noted the decision...
Budget Astroturfing in Full Effect (lemmy.ca)
Crazy how the only one of these airing criticism that says the budget isn’t doing enough is the publicly owned one.
Canadian Businesses Say Tax Hike Risks Deeper Productivity Slump (financialpost.com)