Bringing about a higher level of transparency and accountability in provincial and federal governments to help protect taxpayers from abuse
VANCOUVER — Solitary confinement is a cruel and inhumane punishment with “truly horrific” consequences including severe psychological harm and suicide, a lawyer said Monday in arguing the law allowing the practice in Canada must be struck down.
Joe Arvay, representing the British Columbia Civil Liberties Association and the John Howard Society of Canada, delivered closing arguments in B.C. Supreme Court in a legal challenge of the use of indefinite isolation in prisons.
Read more at CFJC Today
“Hey, are you ready to make 10,000 to 15,000 dollars a month?” cried the pitchman bubbling with enthusiasm, “… a fast and easy way to make millions from home.”
I flicked off my radio. I thought: You’ve got to be kidding. I was in the depths of gathering research on financial abuse of seniors, and I had become sensitive to the smell of scam. To top it off, this commercial was on a classical radio program geared to an audience of seniors.
Read more at The Hamilton Spectator
Among the most insistent critics of the recent proposals by Finance Minister Bill Morneau to tighten up the use of private companies to avoid taxes have been Canada’s doctors.
Canadians generally do not begrudge doctors their above-average incomes. They spend many years training for their jobs, and then sometimes literally hold our lives in their hands. Still, valid questions remain about how much they make and how much tax they pay. Despite some claims, are doctors really in the middle class?
Read more at Maclean’s
A Toronto man is raising concerns about the privacy of patients after he discovered what he believes are the names, birth dates and health card numbers of 60 people on the back of a prescription printed for his wife by her family doctor.
Last month, Eddie Soltani’s wife had an appointment with Dr. Michael Lai in downtown Toronto.
Her husband picked her up and they were about to fill the prescription when Soltani says he discovered a list on the other side containing what he believes is personal information of Lai’s patients.
Read more at CBC News
One thing you learn on the climate change beat is that the best journalism is done overseas.
In Canada, too many in the media, not knowing the issues, are empty vessels waiting to be filled by Trudeau government propaganda, which they uncritically regurgitate to their audiences.
By contrast, in the UK, one of many examples of serious reporting is a new radio documentary by the BBC’s environment correspondent, Matt McGrath.
Called “Carbon Counting,” McGrath reveals how many nations that signed the Paris accord are inaccurately reporting and/or hiding their greenhouse gas emissions from the United Nations.
Reporting is done once every two years, but the accord doesn’t require independent verification of the numbers.
Read more at Toronto Sun
Will the Canadian government continue to support Barrick Gold’s exploitation of mineral resources in Tanzania no matter what abuses the company commits?
Would the Trudeau government stop backing the Toronto-based firm if it bilked the impoverished nation out of $10 billion? Or, what if one thousand people were raped and seriously injured by Barrick security? Would Ottawa withdraw its support if one hundred Tanzanians were killed at its mines?
Read more at Huffington Post
OTTAWA — The personal information of Canadians will be on the negotiating table when North American free trade talks begin this month.
The United States has served notice it wants an end to measures that restrict cross-border data flows, or require the use or installation of local computing facilities.
It is among the many American goals for the coming NAFTA renegotiation spelled out by the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative.
Privacy advocates say that means trouble for Canada’s ability to shield sensitive information such as health or financial data from the prying eyes of foreign agencies by storing it in computer servers on Canadian soil.
Read more at the National Post
Criminal charges of extortion and obstruction of justice against Keith Hobbs, the mayor of Thunder Bay, Ont., are further proof that municipal politics in Canada need to be more transparent, and have more oversight, says a public policy expert in Ottawa.
The scenario unfolding in Thunder Bay is not an isolated incident, said Robert Shepherd, an associate professor in the school of public policy administration at Carleton University.
Read more at cbc.ca
Federal officials are working to eliminate any fraud or mistakes from the government’s largest seniors benefits program through a massive review of payments and testing a new way to catch problems before they get into the system.
Government officials are in the midst of a large-scale, national review of existing old age security recipients with investigators contacting seniors to go over details like marital status, unreported departures from Canada or unreported deaths.
Read more at cbc.ca
LAVAL, Que. – Thirteen people pleaded guilty Tuesday in a fraud scheme involving the awarding of municipal contracts in the Montreal-area city of Laval.
Twelve of the 13 received sentences to be served in the community.
Read more at 660news.com