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Staying home with the kids
Wednesday, March 24th, 2010
March 24, 2010
Having children is a choice. Having several children, if one has trouble making ends meet with just one child, is also a choice. Putting one’s children in daycare at an early age is another choice. But asking the rest of society to support choices that may not be in children’s best interest is difficult to justify.
Tags: child care
Posted in Child & Family Debates | No Comments »
Move carefully on provincial deficit
Wednesday, March 24th, 2010
Mar 24 2010
As the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives said in its pre-budget report this week, “Now is not the time to withdraw economic stimulus.” Indeed, some spending ought to be increased – to replace the withdrawn federal funding of daycare, advance the government’s goal of reducing child poverty, invest in the knowledge economy by expanding post-secondary education, and rebuild crumbling infrastructure.
Tags: budget
Posted in Governance Debates | No Comments »
America’s health, and our own
Tuesday, March 23rd, 2010
March 23, 2010
While nominally paying lip service to “one-tier” health care, we have permitted a welter of private solutions: Worker’s compensation health networks, private clinics in Montreal, Vancouver and Toronto, a private pharmacare system, and, of course, the reality that legions of Canadians — including Newfoundland Premier Danny Williams — simply head to the United States, where they pay cash at the door.
Posted in Health Debates | No Comments »
The daycare funding gap
Tuesday, March 23rd, 2010
Mar 23 2010
Just as Ontario complains that Ottawa is shirking its responsibilities, Toronto is coping with ongoing shortfalls in provincial transfers for child care. And yet, despite Toronto’s own financial challenges, early this month the city’s budget committee found more than $1 million to prevent a crisis in 370 daycares. The province would do well to follow that example.
Posted in Child & Family Debates | No Comments »
Young offenders get Ottawa’s spin [Sebastien’s Law]
Saturday, March 20th, 2010
Mar 20 2010
What Sébastien’s Law would do, though, is change the tone of our youth criminal justice system from rehabilitation and reintegration to punishment and public shaming…
If the government really wants to reduce youth crime, it needs to stop telling Canadians this can be done through the judicial system and start focusing on long-term social investments that deal with the underlying causes, ranging from poverty and broken homes to fetal alcohol syndrome and addictions.
Tags: crime prevention
Posted in Child & Family Debates | No Comments »
For students both on and off reserves
Wednesday, March 17th, 2010
Mar. 16, 2010
In its last budget, the federal government reannounced a two-year-old commitment to reform aboriginal student support. Shawn A-in-chut Atleo, national chief of the Assembly of First Nations, has called for 65,000 more aboriginal postsecondary graduates, in order to narrow the income gap. They should work together to make sure that pilot projects that explore these options get off the ground.
Tags: Indigenous
Posted in Equality Debates | No Comments »
Don’t cut costs on backs of sick
Tuesday, March 16th, 2010
Mar 16 2010
Rising costs are no reason to kill a program that allows sick Ontarians to buy healthy food they could not otherwise afford. If the government is simply looking to cut spending in a $6.5 billion social assistance budget, slashing this program would be counter-productive. The end result would be to shift costs to our health-care budget, by depriving people of the food they need to avoid getting sicker.
Tags: poverty
Posted in Health Debates | No Comments »
Stop delaying on pension reform
Friday, March 12th, 2010
Mar 12 2010
For a federal government that credits itself with a mastery of financial matters, it is difficult to fathom why the Conservatives keep running away from the perennial issue of pension reform…
With the federal government wavering, there is a growing clamour for pan-Canadian leadership that would forge a consensus at the highest levels: a national pension summit that would bring together the first ministers, the labour movement and industry experts to debate suggestions such as an expanded Canada Pension Plan.
Posted in Debates | No Comments »
Taking our pulse on health care
Wednesday, March 10th, 2010
March 10, 2010
Including private health-care delivery options would… ease the burden on the public system. And it would provide competition, which would encourage the public system to find those efficiencies Canadians would like to see, but don’t trust the government to discover.
Posted in Health Debates | No Comments »
Prudent strategy for tough times
Tuesday, March 9th, 2010
Mar 09 2010
A particularly disappointing note in an otherwise forward-looking plan for the province is the absence of a progressive agenda to help Ontario’s most vulnerable… This throne speech sketches out a prudent plan for an increasingly knowledge-based economy for the province. But in the transitional years ahead, we cannot afford to leave behind the Ontarians who need an extra hand – or it will only hold us all back.
Posted in Inclusion Debates | No Comments »
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