Canadians are ready for legal cannabis
As recreational use of cannabis is set to become legal on October 17, we conducted a national survey of 3,000 Canadian adults on behalf of The Cannabis Council of Canada in September to find out how the country was feeling about legalization. Here’s what we found:
Former Hill staffer Wernick wants MPs to sign pledge to bring about ‘a long-term culture change’ on the Hill
Paul Wernick, the former Liberal staffer who attempted suicide twice earlier this year, including once on the Hill, and went public with his story in order to publicize the darker side of working in federal politics, is now urging all MPs to sign a pledge to create “greater transparency and accountability regarding working conditions” on […]
Ottawa fires back at Ford over USMCA grousing
Put a sock in it, Doug. That’s the message from Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s government to Doug Ford in the wake of the premier’s grousing about Ontario being hurt by the new U.S.-Mexico-Canada free trade deal.
The Green Party and the NDP have joined a Liberal backbench MP’s call for an emergency debate to address what Canada can do to avoid catastrophic climate change. Last week, the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change released a frightening report outlining how the world is headed towards irreversible heating of the planet —and the […]
Read MoreThe federal Liberals are set to introduce a new bill tackling the issue of administrative segregation, more commonly known as solitary confinement. A bill was put on the notice paper on Oct. 11, which is how the government gives notice that it intends to table legislation in the House of Commons.
Read MoreConservative Leader Andrew Scheer is opening a new front in his party’s fight against the revamped NAFTA deal, saying he would have done better than Justin Trudeau. Scheer tweeted today that the U.S. is measuring its success in the newly revised North American Free Trade Agreement by what it gained. He says the Liberal government, […]
Read MoreWhatever disdain Stephen Harper had for liberals as Canadian prime minister shows no signs of abating now that he’s out of office. In an interview Thursday in Toronto, where Harper was promoting his new book “Right Here, Right Now: Politics and Leadership in the Age of Disruption,” he explained his thoughts on populism, economics, recent […]
Read MoreThe federal Conservatives say they would not stand in the way of the Quebec government if it moves to bar some provincial employees from wearing religious symbols at work. In an interview, Conservative MP Gérard Deltell said his party accepts the incoming Coalition Avenir Québec government’s right to introduce legislation on the matter, would not […]
Read MoreLast week’s UN report detailing the devastating and irreversible impacts of climate change, which the world is on track to see by 2030, underscores the urgent need for Canada to “ratchet up” its efforts and targets, say experts and critics, who also say the government should drop its pursuit of the Trans Mountain pipeline expansion.
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No federal party will turn back the clock on the legalization of marijuana
It is not a drill. When legal cannabis hits the shelves in Canada on Wednesday, it will be there to stay. Come next year’s federal election, no party will be committing to turn back the clock on Justin Trudeau’s signature policy; not even the Conservatives who spent the last campaign painting nightmare scenarios about the […]
Canadians are suckers. Just look at our oil exports
If you haven’t been reading the business pages, you might not know that Canadian ingenuity has developed a stunning new business model: producing expensive oil and giving it away cheap. The gap between Canadian and U.S. oil is nudging US$50 a barrel. Alberta gets around US$26 a barrel, while West Texas Intermediate is in the […]
It is time to polish our humanitarian brand in Canada
In an age of social media and intense global competition, “brand” has become more important than ever. While it was once the exclusive domain of consumer-focused companies, now individuals, organizations and nations alike have become acutely aware of the image they project and the benefits that come with successfully building brand equity.
Many discrepancies in plans for toll-free Champlain Bridge
During the last federal election, Liberal Leader Justin Trudeau announced that, if elected, he would not proceed with the plan to charge tolls on Montreal’s new Champlain Bridge — a $4.2-billion project, now nearing completion. On May 29, 2018, the Auditor General of Canada reported that the decision to eliminate tolls on the federally owned […]
NDP starts small, but dreams big, on legal marijuana
British Columbia is poised for a flowering of small-scale marijuana cultivation. Call it craft cannabis. B.C. is already famous for producing some of the world’s finest cannabis. But when marijuana is finally legalized later this week, the proud home of B.C. Bud won’t exactly be charging out of the starting gates. After many months of […]
How long a stain will Trump’s poisonous legacies leave?
We are now almost halfway through Donald Trump’s first and — God help us — only term in office. It is tempting to think already of how the damage he will have left as a legacy, will be repaired. One of the saddest costs is perhaps the end of American unity, amity, even partnership among […]
Whatever concessions Liberals made in NAFTA, there’s plenty more they can’t blame on Trump
When the revamped, Trumpified NAFTA was first announced, the general reaction here was relief. Disaster had been averted. The agreement had been saved. Maclean’s magazine featured Foreign Affairs Minister Chrystia Freeland on its cover by the headine, “You’re Welcome, Canada.” This was probably overstated. The worst-case scenario for the talks was never that Donald Trump […]
Justin Trudeau’s biggest threat is Liberal hubris
With a short year to go until Canadians pick their next crop of MPs, Justin Trudeau no doubt sat at his table this past weekend feeling thankful. Donald Trump is in the rear-view mirror. Jagmeet Singh is hemorrhaging MPs. Maxime Bernier’s vanity project is targeting the most rabid bits of Andrew Scheer’s base. Even Stephen […]
Michaelle Jean has lost the aura of someone worth defending
She was a breath of fresh air into a stale job. Incredibly bright and charismatic with an instant connection to average Canadians, Michaelle Jean checked every box on a list to shake up the staid image of a Canadian Governor General. Her vice-regal performance, despite a few hiccups, lived up to the hype – particularly […]
Welcome movement on progressive trade agenda in USMCA
The Trudeau government entered NAFTA negotiations last August with an ambitious progressive trade agenda. Foreign Affairs Minister Chrystia Freeland used her testimony to the House of Commons International Trade Committee to explain that this meant strengthening labour and environmental rights, reworking dispute settlement, and adding new chapters on gender and Indigenous rights. A coalition of […]
It isn’t the first time the fighting with the Americans has continued after the peace was signed. Two weeks after the Treaty of Ghent ended the War of 1812, the Americans were victorious in the Battle of New Orleans. In less dramatic fashion, the U.S. is continuing hostilities on the trade front with Canada nearly […]
Read MoreNationalism and populism are in the news this week. While Stephen Harper’s new book Right Here, Right Now is getting grabbed off shelves, for my money, a more obscure release, Tom Dixon’s The Hidden Tribes of America, is a far more rewarding read. Contrasting the authors’ views on polarization says a lot about their respective […]
Read MoreSo many things would be different if the world were just and good: your high school bully would end up in jail, dogs would evolve to outlive humans, and one of America’s most famous sexual predators would be destitute and alone, eating chilli out of a can in sweat-stained pyjamas.
Read MoreWe have so many causes in our world, so many voices, so many injustices and so many opportunities. But in the end, it all might come to nothing, for the one great challenge overriding all others continues to remain an outlier. The world has known of the coming climate apocalypse for decades and warnings have […]
Read MoreThat presumably settles that. Throughout his time as prime minister, theories abounded as to what philosophy of government, if any, could explain Stephen Harper’s apparently rudderless course. A few die-hards on the left persisted in describing his government as ideological or hard-right, even as it was borrowing billions, adding new regional development agencies and nationalizing […]
Read MoreIn his new book, Stephen Harper warns that standing up for the environment makes for bad politics, especially in a populist age when parties are looking for the votes of “ordinary” people. “Political parties, including mine, have won elections just by opposing a carbon tax,” the former prime minister writes in the newly released “Right […]
Read MoreWhether out of indifference or relief, most citizens appear to have taken the draft United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement (USMCA) in stride. Media outlets and public opinion firms have demonstrated little interest in polling Canadians on the issue. Early criticism, it seems, has been confined to lawyers, lobbyists, political scientists, union leaders and other naysayers concerned with […]
Read MoreCanada plans to diversify away from its trade dependence on the United States in the wake of recent local difficulties with President Donald Trump. In the summer cabinet shuffle, Jim Carr became the minister for the newly minted portfolio of “international trade diversification.” But those plans have hit a snag. Trump quite likes Canada being […]
Read MoreThe world can’t say it wasn’t warned – repeatedly. But unfortunately, the dire cautions being levelled by climate scientists these days don’t seem to be precipitating the global panic and outrage that they should. The latest report from the United Nations indicates the planet is warming at a far greater rate than previously thought. At […]
Read MoreAmazon’s recent decision to raise the minimum wage it pays its workers to $15 an hour was greeted with enthusiasm and praise, with no one more pleased than independent Sen. Bernie Sanders, who tweeted: “This is what the political revolution is all about.” Anyone who watched the clip of Amazon employees shouting for joy at […]
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Michael Bublé says he is retiring, talks emotional struggle after son diagnosed with liver cancer
Canadian singer Michael Bublé said he is retiring from music in an interview with the Daily Mail’s Weekend Magazine, in which he talked about the devastation he felt after his son, Noah, was diagnosed with liver cancer when he was three years old.
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