Archive for the ‘Governance Debates’ Category
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Mayors form alliance to push for housing cash
At the summit, the big-city mayors will be requesting that most of the available $20 billion in federal money for “social” infrastructure be dedicated to public and affordable housing… Premier Kathleen Wynne’s government has not yet committed to a substantial investment, beyond the $42.9 million announced in April for energy retrofits for social-housing towers. But Toronto is facing a $2.6-billion backlog in social housing repairs… [which] has led to the closure of hundreds of units… and put thousands more at risk of being shuttered.
Tags: budget, homelessness, housing, jurisdiction, standard of living, tax
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Big tax evaders must be brought to justice
Perhaps CRA would have more resources available to go after the big fish if it didn’t spend quite so much time and effort harassing hard-working, moderate-income Canadians who may have missed a deadline or a decimal point… bringing money-launderers and tax evaders to justice carries little political cost and would go a long way toward making the tax system fairer for everyone.
Tags: budget, economy, featured, globalization, ideology, participation, standard of living, tax
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To fix Ontario politics, Wynne must follow the money
If Ms. Wynne is determined to end the perception that Ontario politicians are selling access, banning politicians from showing their faces at fundraisers won’t do the trick. Instead, she should further lower the maximum personal donation to $100, and also outlaw the bundling of small donations by third parties… the notion that money talks too loudly in Ontario politics will disappear if big donations are outlawed. Nothing else will work as well.
Tags: ideology, jurisdiction, participation
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Anti-tax crusaders provide only half the picture
The Fraser Institute’s annual report on taxes never considers what Canadians get in return for their money… the portion of income going to taxes has increased by only 7 per cent since 1961 – a half-century over which we got the Canada Pension Plan and medicare, among other aspects of the social safety net that many see as central to our national identity… middle-income Canadians enjoy public services, from education to health insurance to pensions, worth about $41,000 annually per family…
Tags: budget, economy, featured, ideology, standard of living, tax
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The evidence is in — evidence-based policy can have disastrous results
Data are always imperfect, and a data-driven interpretation of our society woefully incomplete… Good theory and judgement is more important than good data. Evidence does not answer moral and metaphysical policy questions… civil servants are infatuated with evidence-based policy… Insisting on evidence-based policy-making transfers power to those able to assemble and analyze data, effectively excluding the public from decision-making.
Tags: ideology, participation
Posted in Governance Debates | 2 Comments »
Poll finds support for PM Trudeau’s preferred electoral system—if it means winner elected with majority support
A new public opinion poll indicates the ranked-ballot electoral system Prime Minister Justin Trudeau favours to replace Canada’s so-called first-past-the-post system of electing federal governments has the approval of only a third of Canadians—until they are told that under the system “the winning party is always elected with the support of the majority.” … Support for proportional representation remained above 50 per cent before and after respondents were told that that system often results in coalition governments.
Tags: featured, ideology, jurisdiction, participation
Posted in Governance Debates | 1 Comment »
Revenue tools could have blunted growth in Ontario’s debt
Interest payments already represent the government’s third-largest expense, with debt servicing consuming more than what the province spends on post-secondary education. And the bigger the debt, the higher those payments, leaving less money for services that Ontarians want and need… Ontario’s mistake wasn’t to undertake this vital work; it was doing it by massively increasing the flood of red ink. A better way would have been to launch a series of bold new “revenue tools” designed to reduce the province’s need to borrow.
Tags: budget, economy, featured, ideology, jurisdiction, standard of living, tax
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Trudeau’s challenge: Turning promises into policy
… symbolic politics, at which our Prime Minister is proving a master, will work for only so long before voters want to see promises turn into policies and programs… if we try to do everything, we end up dissipating our energies and wasting our resources. I would not claim that the Trudeau government has the wrong priorities, but I know that it has too many.
Tags: ideology, participation, standard of living
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Brexit and Canada: Two crucial lessons for Liberals
There are now two threads connecting populist, anti-internationalist, xenophobic movements worldwide. The first is income inequality and poverty among the rural working class, which in England voted as a block for Brexit. The second is the fear of Islamism, manifested in suspicion of immigrants and refugees, which fueled the Leave campaign. Fixing inequality, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s Liberals say, is their job one.
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New access law is needed for a digital age
The all-party committee, quite rightly, found that “purely factual or background information” should not be a matter of cabinet confidentiality at all. Furthermore, when a request has been rejected on grounds of cabinet secrecy, the office of the information commissioner should have the power to investigate that refusal… Other welcome recommendations include… Amending the act to establish “a comprehensive legal duty to document” what government does, backed up by punishments for non-compliance.
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