Manitoba can improve its education system by abandoning faddish ideas and embracing common sense solutions.
Year: 2013
Secondary Suites could be an answer for Renters in Post-Flood Calgary
In post-flood Calgary, both displaced residents and new renters are trying to get into Calgary’s renting market, resulting in a lower vacancy rate. Calgary’s restrictive bylaws further restrict the amount of affordable housing available. If bylaws were modernized, secondary suites could provide a viable option in this tight housing market.
More Government Pocket Picking
Following closely on the heels of a media report of the dangerous driving behaviour of many motorists in school zones, the Minister Responsible for MPI, Andrew Swan, rushed out today with an announcement that MPI premiums are to pay...
Similarities Abound – BC and Manitoba Hydro
The rate practices, requirements and options of BC Hydro were recently leaked to the media by the Canadian Office and Professional Employees Union (COPE), which represents the unionized staff of the utility. Apparently, senior BC public servants and BC...
Featured News
‘Side Issues’ Result in Much Higher Costs to Our Health and Social Systems
As we enter the year 2022, most Canadians will have lived their entire lives under the shibboleth that says we have the best health-care system in the world. Our beloved medicare is universal in scope, free of charge and offers equal access to all. What country could...
Touted Climate Emergency for Calgary is Deceitful and Undemocratic
Calgary has sworn in its first female mayor. A week earlier, less than 24 hours after winning the mayoral race, she gave her first post-election talk-radio interview to Ryan Jespersen, mostly involving a series of softball questions. He asked her the obligatory woke...
Time to End the Tax-and-Incarcerate Approach to Tobacco
The federal government is considering mandatory minimum sentences for the sale of contraband tobacco in an attempt to crack down on black market activity. However, federal taxes are driving Canadians to the black market in the first place. Rather than ramping up policing efforts and costs, the government should reduce taxes to reduce demand for black market tobacco.
Hydro Must Serve Citizens, Not Government
I find Lane to be credible and not conflicted. He has had a distinguished career serving the people of Manitoba at the Workers Compensation Board, Manitoba Public Insurance, the University of Winnipeg, St. Amant Centre, and, lately, the Public Utilities Board. Lane criticized Hydro and the government for the high degree of risk Hydro’s ratepayers will incur with the implementation of the utility’s capital expenditure plans, some $33 billion to be spent over the next 20 years.
The Wonders of Accounting
It is widely understood, at least within certain knowledgeable circles, that the actions of Publius politicians, lawyers and accountants brought about the credit crisis and the worst recession in the developed world since the 1930s. Politicians strive to be elected...
Precautionary Principle Push Back
News from the UK dealing with over reach in advice to pregnant women.
The Wireless Industry Code
The CRTC released the Wireless Industry Code on Monday. The Code itself has 8 pages of rules and 2 pages of definitions and is accompanied by a 1-pager entitled “Your Rights as a Consumer” which has a handy checklist that anyone can use to see if their supplier is...
Cuts to Aboriginal political organizations will re-focus priorities
Announced cuts to Aboriginal political organizations should not be seen as negative, but are an opportunity to re-focus on results-based priorities
Public Responsibilities Ignored
Publius attended a Frontier Centre Winnipeg luncheon address by Graham Lane, a former Chair of Manitoba's Public Utilities Board. In an address of about three quarters of an hour, Mr. Lane shared serious concerns about the provincial government's determination to have...
Toward a Self Employed Nation?
The United States labor market has been undergoing a substantial shift toward small-scale entrepreneurship. The number of proprietors – owners of businesses who are not wage and salary employees, has skyrocketed, especially in the last decade. Proprietors are self employed business owners who use Internal Revenue Service Schedule C to file their federal income tax. Wage and salary workers are all employees of any establishment (private or government), from executives to non-supervisory workers.
Government Is Too Expensive
Is it really sustainable for your paycheque to go up by 2 per cent a year, but your hydro bill to go up by 4 per cent, your school taxes by 6 per cent, your property taxes by 3.5 per cent and the provincial sales tax to go up to 8 per cent? Obviously it isn’t sustainable, but that’s what’s going on; government is simply becoming way too expensive for many people.