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In a shift on Canadian campuses driven by Trump policies, Indian students now outnumber Chinese
Saturday, March 2nd, 2019
Last year 172,000 students with Indian citizenship held a study permit for Canada, vaulting past the 142,000 from China… drawn partly by the low value of the loonie relative to the U.S. dollar. But more importantly they come for the simpler path to work permits and immigration credentials… It’s a lucrative popularity for Canadian universities. At the University of Toronto, for instance, domestic arts and science students paid $6,780 in tuition fees for the current school year, while international students paid $49,800 – a seven-fold difference.
Tags: budget, economy, immigration, multiculturalism
Posted in Education Debates | No Comments »
End solitary confinement, says Ontario human rights commissioner in wake of Adam Capay case
Wednesday, February 27th, 2019
Solitary confinement continues to be overused in Ontario correctional facilities and should be phased out entirely, says one of the central figures responsible for drawing attention to the plight of Adam Capay, the 26-year-old Indigenous man who spent more than four years in isolation… [The (OHRC) Commissioner found]… details emerging from the Capay case “extremely troubling” and urging the government to end the practice of isolating prisoners for 22 or more hours a day.
Tags: corrections, crime prevention, ideology, Indigenous, jurisdiction, mental Health, rights, standard of living
Posted in Child & Family Policy Context | No Comments »
Doug Ford surprises – by not gutting police oversight
Thursday, February 21st, 2019
confidence in the police, according to the Ford government, was undermined by a stillborn law that never got to impose steep fines on officers who refused to co-operate with the SIU, and never made it slightly easier to fire them for misconduct or incompetence. And so, the Ford government has now tabled the Comprehensive Ontario Police Services Act – yes, the COPS Act. The government is pitching it as a radical overhaul of Liberal police oversight, to make it more fair to police. Spoiler alert: It’s mostly not.
Tags: crime prevention, ideology, rights
Posted in Governance Debates | No Comments »
Let us now give thanks for Michael Wilson’s GST
Wednesday, February 13th, 2019
The GST was designed to be revenue-neutral; its goal was not increasing government revenue but instead raising it in a smarter, more progressive and more economically efficient way… Value-added taxes tax spending and encourage saving. Traditional sales taxes are regressive, falling hardest on low-income people, but credits for low-income Canadians make the GST progressive. The revenue is fairly stable. The system of input credits makes tax evasion far less likely than under a sales tax.
Tags: economy, ideology, tax
Posted in Governance History | No Comments »
The deterioration of data is robbing marginalized communities of their voice
Friday, February 8th, 2019
Even as policing agencies across the country tout the value of street checks as a tool for preventing and solving crime, data on their efficacy have typically not been studied nor reviewed by independently operated and funded oversight agencies… Canada’s data deficiencies are not merely problems of public policy: They reflect an unacceptable level of neglect that’s become an obstacle to our ability to advocate for ourselves.
Tags: crime prevention, ideology, Indigenous, multiculturalism, rights
Posted in Equality Policy Context | No Comments »
How Canada’s racial data gaps can be hazardous to your health
Thursday, February 7th, 2019
Little of this potentially life-saving information is available in Canada, which leads to a dearth of knowledge about who is most at risk. From health care to education to the justice system and the work force, Canada has long been reluctant to collect or publish data based on race and ethnicity… the United Nations has repeatedly rebuked Canada for its lack of data on the ethnic composition of its population. And an increasing number of people − from academics to community organizations – are pushing to close the gap.
Tags: crime prevention, Health, ideology, multiculturalism, participation, rights
Posted in Equality Policy Context | No Comments »
Full-day kindergarten keeps women in the work force. Let’s not mess with it
Thursday, February 7th, 2019
… since its full deployment, study after study has demonstrated the benefits for children and families. According to the University of Manitoba’s 2014 research, FDK “is especially beneficial for children of low socioeconomic status or educationally disadvantaged backgrounds.” For a government that purports to put Ontarians back to work to even consider changes to full-day kindergarten invites pause…
Tags: budget, child care, economy, ideology, participation, women
Posted in Debates | No Comments »
America’s rich are facing a reckoning. It’s about time
Tuesday, February 5th, 2019
A new Politico/Morning Consult poll released this week, as well as a recent Fox News poll, showed overwhelming support for more taxes on the wealthy. Even among Republicans, a majority are in favour of making the rich pay a greater share… They want to replace the neo-liberalism of the post-1980s with an economic paradigm which redistributes downward instead of up. It’s a tall order. Making the coddled class pay a larger share is necessary start.
Tags: economy, ideology, participation, standard of living, tax
Posted in Equality Debates | No Comments »
Tilting at windmills won’t solve our health-care woes
Monday, February 4th, 2019
Almost all health services are contracted out to private providers – doctors (most of whom are corporations), hospitals (which are not-for-profit corporations), pharmacies, pharmaceutical companies, device manufacturers (for-profit corporations), home care and long-term care facilities (a mix of non-profit and for-profit corporations) and so on…. we have the least-universal universal health-insurance system in the world. More than 30 per cent of care is paid for privately.
Tags: budget, economy, featured, Health, ideology, mental Health, pharmaceutical, privatization
Posted in Health Debates | No Comments »
Mental health is health care’s orphan
Saturday, February 2nd, 2019
The recent Health Accord between Canada and the provinces will invest $5-billion in mental-health services over 10 years, but spending will still be short of the annualized $3.1-billion investment that is required to reach the Mental Health Commission target of 9 per cent of health spending.
Tags: budget, disabilities, ideology, mental Health, standard of living
Posted in Health Debates | No Comments »
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