G20 Girls: Sandy Lake a world away from G8 or G20 summits
Monday, June 21st, 2010
Jun 18 2010
Aboriginal girls face more gender discrimination than their non-aboriginal counterparts. With a lack of proper health care on many reserves, young women have less access to birth control, medical help during pregnancy and pediatric attention for their babies… one in four aboriginal adults lives in an overcrowded dwelling, and 5,486 of 88,485 houses on reserves do not have sewage… Nearly 70 per cent of on-reserve Indians will not finish high school.
Tags: housing, Indigenous, poverty, standard of living, women
Posted in Equality Debates | No Comments »
HST deal with Ontario First Nations nearly done
Wednesday, June 16th, 2010
Jun 16 2010
The HST will cause some daily items such as haircuts, gasoline and home heating fuel to increase in price, but 83 per cent of consumer items won’t be affected. However, provincial point-of-sale exemption is a treaty right, said Beardy… The province has been talking about an exemption for status Indians for a long time but the objections have been “coming on the part of the federal government” because of the complexity of the proposal, McGuinty said.
Tags: Indigenous, tax
Posted in Equality Debates | No Comments »
Big holes in Ontario retirement homes bill, advocates say
Monday, May 31st, 2010
May 31 2010
For decades, advocates have called for the regulation of privately run retirement homes after horror stories of resident neglect, abuse and lax standards of care. There are approximately 628 retirement homes across Ontario housing 43,000 residents… However, the bill allows for the industry to be virtually self-regulating — missing public oversight, critics say.
Tags: disabilities, Health, standard of living
Posted in Child & Family Debates | No Comments »
‘Class size is the biggest dead end in the world,’ writer tells provincial Liberal think-tank
Sunday, May 16th, 2010
May 16, 2010
Everything the world has learned about education shows that the quality of the teacher is the most important factor in a student’s success, Gladwell said. “Even if you were to cut every class in Ontario in half, you’d improve the performance of Ontario’s schoolchildren by about 5 percentile points,” Gladwell said. But changing teacher quality has a “massive impact” on student outcome, he said… Raising academic requirements isn’t the simple answer… The best thing we can do for teachers is to simply let them teach.
Tags: standard of living
Posted in Education Debates | No Comments »
Hospital CEO pay to be tied to performance
Tuesday, May 4th, 2010
May 3, 2010
Under the proposed bill, quality committees would also be set up that report to a hospital’s board of directors and it would also require hospitals to submit “quality improvement plans” to be publicly posted on websites. It will be the responsibility of the hospital board to ensure there is a yearly plan – with measurable results – publicly available… And a portion of compensation for CEOs and other executives will be tied to achieving those quality improvements.
Tags: Health
Posted in Health Debates | No Comments »
Cuts to nursing jobs hurting health care, union says
Tuesday, April 27th, 2010
April 26, 2010
Nearly 4 million hours of nursing care have disappeared across the province in the past 12 months and patients are paying the price, according to the Ontario Nurses’ Association… As Ontario hospitals struggle to balance their books — legislation prevents them from running a deficit — nursing positions are routinely cut to enhance the bottom line… But Health Minister Deb Matthews said the nurse’s math doesn’t add up… in the push to care for more people at home, nursing jobs have moved out to the community…
Tags: Health, standard of living
Posted in Health Debates | No Comments »
John Beaucage to advise on needs of aboriginal youth
Thursday, April 15th, 2010
Apr 14 2010
John Beaucage, former grand council chief of the Anishinabek Nation, will be the aboriginal advisor on child welfare, reporting to Children and Youth Services Minister Laurel Broten… Staggering youth suicide rates in remote northern communities and funding problems among First Nations children’s aid societies will be a focus for Beaucage. His one-year appointment coincides with an ongoing review of the Child and Family Services Act. The review hones in on the situation of aboriginal kids.
Tags: Indigenous, standard of living
Posted in Child & Family Debates | No Comments »
Help crown wards through college: report
Wednesday, April 14th, 2010
Apr 13 2010
As it stands now, crown wards age out of the system at age 18. “We really think there needs to be more support for a longer period of time,” Lewis said. Only 42 per cent of 19- and 20-year-olds in state care finish high school compared to the provincial average of 75 per cent, said the report.
Posted in Child & Family Debates | No Comments »
Early learning takes ‘leap forward’
Thursday, February 18th, 2010
February 18, 2010
The $1.5-billion extended day program pairs early-childhood educators with teachers in the classroom. The early-childhood educators will start before regular school hours and begin the program until the teacher arrives for the school day, Dombrowsky said.
Once the school day is over, children can continue with early-childhood education until 6 p.m.
Posted in Child & Family Debates | No Comments »
Ontario throws children’s aid $27M lifeline
Saturday, February 13th, 2010
February 13, 2010.
Of the $26.9 million, $2.5 million is earmarked for First Nations children’s aid societies in order for them to handle fiscal pressures other agencies do not face – such as high travel costs to get to at-risk kids in fly-in communities, and the exorbitant cost of living expenses in the North…
Some of the $26.9 million will go to the York Region Children’s Aid Society, which faced a $6.6 million projected deficit and cut 18 positions last year. The Simcoe County agency will also receive funding.
Posted in Child & Family Debates | 2 Comments »
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