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Bringing about a higher level of transparency and accountability in provincial and federal governments to help protect taxpayers from abuse

Bringing about a higher level of transparency and accountability in provincial and federal governments to help protect taxpayers from abuse.

Should Canada have a hybrid public-private healthcare system?

A constitutional challenge to B.C.’s ban on private health insurance is underway, reigniting a debate on whether Canada’s publicly-funded healthcare system should be open to some privatization.Landmark private healthcare lawsuit heads to courtVictor Rodwin, a professor of health policy and management at New York University, has studied different healthcare systems across the world.He told CBC’s The Early Edition that a hybrid public-private healthcare system, like the one in Germany, could reduce patient wait times — but only if properly implemented.

Source: Should Canada have a hybrid public-private healthcare system? – British Columbia – CBC News

SNC-Lavalin violated federal Elections Act 

OTTAWA — Montreal-based global engineering giant SNC-Lavalin continues to dig out from a series of corporate governance scandals, this time involving improper donations to federal political parties over a seven-year period ending in 2011.A compliance agreement with the federal elections commissioner, announced Thursday, details almost $118,000 in donations to the Liberal and Conservative parties through company employees or their spouses who were then reimbursed by SNC-Lavalin.This illegal practice for skirting corporate donation limits was identified by a Quebec anti-corruption inquiry as a widespread problem in municipal and Quebec provincial politics, although the provincial Charbonneau Commission’s mandate prevented it from following federal political threads.

Source: SNC-Lavalin violated federal Elections Act | Niagara Falls Review

Medical pot users’ needs trump landlord rights: Ottawa

OTTAWA — The federal government says it is under a legal obligation to put the rights of medicinal marijuana users ahead of the rights of property owners.

Health Canada was responding to criticism from a Coquitlam woman who said she incurred $135,000 in repair costs, caused by mould and damage to her rental property’s electrical system, due to a grow-op in the basement she discovered last year.

She said she was the victim of a $20,000-a-month commercial grow-up run by someone operating with two Health Canada licenses, giving them permission to grow a limited amount of pot for personal use. She had no knowledge of the grow op nor had she given her consent for it to be operated on her property.

Source: Medical pot users’ needs trump landlord rights: Ottawa VANCOUVER SUN

Canadian Taxpayers Fork Out $3.3 Billion Every Year to Super Profitable Oil Companies

Some of the largest, most profitable companies in Canada are collectively receiving an estimated $3.3 billion in subsidies every year from Canadian taxpayers, according to a new analysis.

The report, released today by the International Institute for Sustainable Development, a Canadian-based think tank, outlines how billions in federal and provincial tax breaks and corporate incentives benefit companies in the oil and gas sector likeImperial Oil, whose earnings in 2015 were CDN$1.1 billion.

Source: Canadian Taxpayers Fork Out $3.3 Billion Every Year to Super Profitable Oil Companies | DeSmog Canada

Has all-day kindergarten been a waste of taxpayer money in Ontario?

I don’t know which piece of news is more depressing:

That math test scores of Ontario’s Grade 3 and 6 students continue to sink lower, according to the latest results from the Education Quality and Accountability Office?

Or that, after six years of full-day kindergarten in Ontario, which costs $1.5 billion a year, the promised improvements in student education are nowhere to be seen?

On Wednesday, the office released results of last spring’s Grade 3 and 6 literacy and math tests. You can examine them for yourself at www.eqao.com.

Source: D’Amato: Has all-day kindergarten been a waste of money? THE RECORD

Cost of paying Canada’s doctors rose almost 4 per cent, to $25B: report 

TORONTO — A new report shows the number of physicians in Canada grew last year as did the overall cost of their services, which rose almost four per cent to $25 billion.

The report by the Canadian Institute for Health Information (CIHI) tallied the number of doctors across the country in 2015 at more than 82,000.

For the ninth year running, the number of physicians increased at a faster rate than the population. There are now more doctors per person than ever before — 228 for every 100,000 Canadians.

Source: Cost of paying Canada’s doctors rose almost 4 per cent, to $25B: report | CTV News

The terrible cost of waste in health care

In a publicly run health-care system where demand is infinite and resources finite, there will always be people denied care.Deciding who will live, or have a chance at life, and who will die, is one of the crueler ways Ontario governments have long controlled the costs of health care.Another is long waiting lists for treatment.Because of this rationing, politicians like Health Minister Eric Hoskins are quick to point out they leave decisions about who to treat to medical professionals.

Source: The terrible cost of waste in health care | Editorial | Opinion | Toronto Sun

Canadian couple forced to live apart after 62 years – So bad even the Brits reported on it

An elderly Canadian couple who have been married for 62 years have been forced to live in separate care homes.A photo of Wolfram Gottschalk, 83, and his wife, Anita, 81, went viral after their granddaughter shared their story.Ashley Baryik, 29 said her grandparents have been separated because there is no room for both of them at the same home in Surrey, British Columbia.Mr Gottschalk, who has been diagnosed with lymphoma, is on a waiting list to move into the same home as his wife.

Source: Canadian couple forced to live apart after 62 years – BBC News

Canadian Cancer agency spinoff faces fraud allegations 

A would-be Chinese immigrant businesswoman is suing a troubled BC Cancer Agency spinoff company after a board member allegedly defrauded her out of more than C$200,000 (US$153,422) by promising to help fast-track her immigration application under the Provincial Nominee Program.In two lawsuits filed a year apart, plaintiff Yaping Lai claims in BC Supreme Court that Kuen Yu “Joseph” Kwok, a self-described “prominent businessman and a director of several notable companies, including Perceptronix Medical Inc.” defrauded her out of more than C$200,000 in connection with her bid to immigrate to Canada.Perceptronix was spun off from the BC Cancer Agency in 1999 to commercialise automated cancer-screening technology. Lai claims she lives and works in China and speaks no English. She claims she signed two deals with Kwok in February 2014, one worth C$420,000 (US$322,131) for Kwok handling her immigration application, and another worth C$1 million (US$766,857) for shares in Perceptronix.

Source: Canadian Cancer agency spinoff faces fraud allegations | South China Morning Post