People everywhere should be watching what’s happening on Haudenosaunee (Six Nations) territory at 1492 Land Back Lane in Caledonia, Ontario. The basic facts of this latest confrontation are plain enough. In 2015 Foxgate Developments paid $4 million for 10 hectares of land bordering the town of Caledonia. The development company…
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Ontario Premier Doug Ford has made many statements expressing how deeply concerned he is about the impact of COVID-19 on the health of Ontarians and our health system in general. In April, when the Canadian Armed Forces reported on conditions in certain long term care (LTC) facilities, Ford said, “The…
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Parents, children and the child care sector are facing an extraordinary crisis brought on by the COVID-19 pandemic. So you might reasonably hope that the Ontario government would use a scheduled five-year review of the Child Care and Early Years Act to directly address these challenges: beef up health, safety…
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An August 26 news release from Ontario’s Ministry of Education reads, “Today’s federal announcement provides $381 million to Ontario, on top of the nearly $900 million provided by the province to support provincial back-to-school plans.” This statement is disingenuously inaccurate. A more accurate headline would be, federal government to transfer…
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When it comes to anti-Black racism in Canadian policing, we don’t have an information gap, we have a police accountability gap. I’m reminded of this as I review some of the findings of two significant reports released jointly in August by the Ontario Human Rights Commission, with news channels in…
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Photo courtesy of HWDSB Kids Need Help A History Of Us On Monday June 22nd, after hosting a sit-in on the street for almost seven hours, we celebrated and danced as we listened in on the school board meeting, where trustees ultimately voted to terminate the Police Liaison Program for…
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A new mathematics curriculum guide is set to drop this September in Ontario, the first update since 2005. Not only will students be heading back to the basics, they’ll also be introduced to a new “strand” of learning: financial literacy. The reason I’m so excited about this development is that…
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Twenty-five years ago today, on June 8, 1995, the people of Ontario elected one Michael Deane Harris as premier. Harris’s program, the “Common Sense Revolution,” changed Ontario overnight. He slashed program spending. He slashed social assistance. He slashed taxes. Thousands lost their jobs. Others became homeless. Many died. It’s all…
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Workers on the front lines of our economy stock our grocery shelves, pack boxes in warehouses, and deliver our food. As COVID-19 rages on, they are facing dangerous working conditions with inadequate personal protective equipment, low wages, and a high stress load. Frontline workers did not sign up to be…
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The COVID-19 pandemic has highlighted the vital importance of collective responses via governments at all levels. The Canadian context of federalism, with a division of powers between federal and provincial/territorial governments, also highlights key differences in approaches to the pandemic. At its best, federalism is an advantageous arrangement, with the…
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