When we talk about housing affordability the focus is usually on home ownership and high housing costs. Less discussed is the affordability crisis faced by the third of Canadian households (4.7 million families) who rent their homes. This paper looks at the extent of the problem by determining the hourly…
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As public opinion polls confirm, the wheels seem to have come off the Ford Fiesta. After months of fallout from cuts to education, hundreds of educators across Ontario receiving redundancy notices, and a round of collective bargaining-related gauntlet-throwing, provincial MPPs retreated to their ridings for an extended summer break that…
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The Ontario government is cutting two-thirds of the funding for the Ontario Seniors’ Transit Tax Credit program. Whereas previously $9.7 million was allocated for the program, now there is $3.5 million. The spokesperson for the Ontario Ministry of Transportation says, “no negative impacts to seniors are anticipated.” That sounds odd….
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It’s been a chaotic year for public education in Ontario. And for all of us who benefit from a high quality and publicly-accountable system, the stakes are high—particularly for our youngest and most vulnerable. Given what we know about the tremendous societal and economic benefits of investment in public education,…
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Wikimedia Commons photo The future of Ontario Place is up for grabs. Will Toronto’s waterfront park be a reinvigorated public space beside the natural wonder of Lake Ontario? Or a glitzy commercial zone, where enjoying the view means shelling out big bucks? Last month, the Ontario government clearly backed the…
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The urgency of the global climate crisis could not be more obvious than in India right now, where a 50ºC heatwave is causing “heavy casualties” both directly through heat-related deaths and indirectly through water and food shortages. Canadians have been spared that kind of heat so far, but it’s little…
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By 2020 all secondary school students in Ontario will need four e-learning credits to graduate. E-learning can be delivered a number of ways, but the Ministry of Education is mandating supplementary courses that take the place of face-to-face offerings, delivered entirely online. To date, we do not know who…
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This week on CBC’s Metro Morning, Ontario Treasury Board President Peter Bethlanfalvy defended cuts in transfers to the City of Toronto by saying that the Ontario government had to “do something immediately” because of the province’s debt. His government had inherited a “staggering amount of debt,” he said. Hours later,…
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May 17th, the International Day Against Homophobia, Transphobia and Biphobia draws attention to the realities of violence and discrimination experienced by LGBTQ2+ people in Canada and around the world. It is an opportunity to advocate and organize for LGBTQ2+ inclusion—to emphasize our continued failure to do justice to LGBTQ2+ communities,…
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It’s entirely possible that the Doug Ford government is about to bring in legislation to cap wages in the Ontario public sector. Treasury Board Chair Peter Bethlenfalvy first raised the idea back in April, when he called on public employees to accept wage settlements that were “modest, reasonable, and, most…
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