Archive
Yet another case of our government delaying the release of important data
May 12, 2009
Less than a week after BC’s Freedom of Information and Privacy Association (FIPA) report raised serious questions about secrecy in government (see Keith’s comments here), The Tyee reporter Andrew MacLeod has uncovered another case of important statistics not being released on time. The culprit this time is the Housing and Social Development Ministry, which typically… View Article
Bike to Work Week and our transportation culture
May 11, 2009
Pouring rain marked the start of Vancouver’s Bike to Work Week (May 11 – 17) this year, but those who braved the weather conditions are being rewarded with a beautiful sunshine for the ride home. Bike to Work Week is an annual event organized by the Vancouver Area Cycling Coalition, which aims to raise the… View Article
Where’s Our Danny Boy (2)? Mayor of embattled town weighs in on needed forest reforms
May 11, 2009
Few British Columbia communities have been hit as hard by the forest industry crisis as Mackenzie. Some 1,500 jobs, by mayor Stephanie Killam’s estimate, have been lost in the community as sawmills, planer mills and pulp and paper mills closed. With hundreds of good paying mill jobs gone, jobs in related service industries have disappeared… View Article
Planet Before Politics
May 11, 2009
I signed the following open letter published in the Globe on the weekend. I cannot take any credit for organizing or writing the letter (hat tip to Ian Bruce of the David Suzuki Foundation). On the other hand, I can say that I have co-published with David Suzuki! It’s time to put the planet before… View Article
Towards an effective and fair carbon reduction strategy
May 8, 2009
This oped appeared in the Vancouver Sun’s online edition: Towards an effective and fair carbon reduction strategy By George Heyman and Dr. Colin Campbell, May 7, 2009 The latest science on global warming shows we must rapidly slash carbon emissions, or face catastrophic impacts on our civilization by the end of the century. We are… View Article
Report finds government stonewalling on FOI requests
May 8, 2009
BC’s Freedom of Information and Privacy Association (FIPA) released a report yesterday showing secrecy in government is even a bigger problem that we thought. A February report from BC’s Information and Privacy Commissioner’s described what he called, “an unacceptable pattern of government-wide failure to respond to access requests in as timely a fashion as it… View Article
Mischief making by oil and gas industry
May 8, 2009
Ben Parfitt and I submitted the following letter to the Vancouver Sun yesterday. Hopefully it will run in the next couple days. Here it is: Letter to the editor Re. “Maintaining momentum in oil and gas,” May 7. The oil and gas industry should stop its political mischief-making, and obfuscating the numbers about the industry’s… View Article
BC government should heed its own report on childcare
May 7, 2009
Do you remember the 2008 Throne Speech in which the provincial government launched a feasibility study on providing full day kindergarten for 5 year-olds and extending full day preschool options to younger children as well? Here’s a refresher: A new Early Childhood Learning Agency will be established. It will assess the feasibility and costs of… View Article
What are we going to do with the oil and gas industry?
May 7, 2009
That is the question no one seems willing to entertain in this election campaign. In today’s Vancouver Sun, David Collyer of the Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers makes the case for expanding the industry based on some dubious facts. First there is this gem: The industry has invested almost $30 billion dollars in British Columbia… View Article
Why young children’s education and care are not priorities in this election
May 7, 2009
It seems clear that policy-makers in this province (and country, for that matter) are not prepared to invest in a quality early education and childcare system, despite the proven benefits for children. The reasons have got to be political, as the economic case for investing in early childhood education and care has already been made… View Article
Poverty reduction and the party platforms
May 7, 2009
The CCPA is a member of the BC Poverty Reduction Committee, the network that has been pressing all the BC political parties to commit to a comprehensive poverty reduction plan. Over 280 organizations have now signed an Open Letter to all the political parties calling on them to commit to a poverty reduciton plan with… View Article
There is more to good economic policy than protecting the interests of employers
May 6, 2009
Next week’s election will take place in the midst of an economic crisis which hit our province seemingly out of the blue last fall and hit us hard, causing 69,000 job losses between November and March (the April numbers will be released on Friday, May 8, and are expected to be just as grim as… View Article
The Case for STV
May 6, 2009
One final article from our BC Commentary special: The Case for the BC Single Transferable Vote (BC-STV) by David Huntley and Michael Wortis BC-STV has many advantages over the current First-Past-the-Post system (FPTP) used for electing our MLAs. BC-STV will achieve a reasonably proportional representation of parties, with the number of MLAs of each party… View Article
The Case Against STV
May 5, 2009
More from our BC Commentary special on STV: The Case Against STV By David Schreck Will STV “make your vote count”? Actually, BC-STV can make your vote worth less and make your MLA less accountable. Our existing first-past-the-post (FPTP) system is not perfect, but it is better than BC-STV. Inequality is inherent in BC-STV. The… View Article
A Framework for Enhancing Home Support in BC
May 4, 2009
Home support is an important element of the broader home and community care system, which unfortunately tends to get overlooked in many health care discussions. Home support serves an important dual purpose: it improves the quality of life of vulnerable citizens by allowing them to continue living independently in their own homes and it enables… View Article
STV: A better democracy and more progressive politics
May 1, 2009
Dennis Pilon from UVic published this excellent article on STV in the CCPA Monitor, so I am republishing it below: MAY 12 DECISION DAY FOR B.C. VOTERS: Change to STV system would be helpful to progressives By Dennis Pilon May 12, 2009 will be the “make-or-break” day for voting system reform in British Columbia, and… View Article
Seniors’ care concerns should be taken seriously in this election
May 1, 2009
Access to residential care beds for seniors was dubbed “an election hotspot” by CTV early last week, and for good reasons. The party that forms government after May’s election will have to deal with the pressures that the aging population would put on the already strained system of seniors’ care in BC. Fundamentally, providing an… View Article
Government report on welfare leavers at odds with narrative
May 1, 2009
Kudos to the Tyee’s Andrew MacLeod for extracting a long delayed report on welfare leavers from the provincial government. The report can be downloaded here. Andrew’s Tyee article about the report can be found here. The report uses tax data of BC welfare leavers between 2000 and 2005 to see how people have done. Comparing… View Article
The Premier speaks out on labour issues
Apr 30, 2009
On April 27th I posted about the BC Federation of Labour’s report on the impacts of changes to BC’s workers compensation system under the current government. Today Tom Sandborn writing for the Tyee posted a story quoting Premier Campbell’s response to health and safety issues. The story also dealt with the NDP and labour issues,… View Article
BC’s child care crisis IS an election issue
Apr 30, 2009
The provincial election is off and running, and once again families and communities know that childcare should be a high priority for every candidate in every riding. After eight years of failed policies, ad hoc decisions, and inadequate funding, B.C. childcare is in a crisis. Just ask any young family about their struggle to find… View Article