Fifty-one years ago, he was a young boy who came to a tragic end. Today he's a symbol for all that was wrong with this country's treatment of Indigenous people. So why is the story of Chanie Wenjack so full of imaginative fabrication? At age nine, Chanie, from Ogoki...
Peter Shawn Taylor
Next On the Carbon Hit List: Meat
Peter Shawn Taylor, December 30, 2016 If it wasn’t so tasty, would anyone bother with beef? Last year, the World Health Organization added processed beef and other red meats to its list of level-one carcinogens, alongside such deadly substances as tobacco smoke,...
The dangers of driver’s licence suspensions
Make the scofflaws pay. And if they won’t pay, punish ’em. There’s an understandable lack of public sympathy for deadbeats such as parents who skip out on family support payments or drivers who rack up huge parking ticket fines. And one of the...
Safety Seats on Planes Don’t Necessarily Make Kids Safer
As every mom or dad knows, infants travelling by car must be firmly strapped into a government-tested, properly installed (and often maddeningly complicated) car seat. Failure on this account can earn you a hefty fine and demerit points. Flying with your kids, on the other hand, is a whole other matter.
Featured News
There’s Nothing Fair About Canadian Health Care
For the past 14 years, Vancouver surgeon Dr. Brian Day has led the charge for health-care reform, pushing for the right of patients to pay for private care if their health and well-being are threatened as a result of waiting in a stagnant and overburdened public...
Transformers: More than Meets the Eye
The path to net zero, based on the much disputed belief that carbon dioxide is a pollution, is more steep and impractical than most people realize. Replacing fossil fuels with clean electricity will require much more power generation and a greatly upgraded grid to...
The Road to Ruin: Manitoba Public Insurance monopoly is hurting the poor
Manitoba’s Public Insurance’s arbitrary policy to destroy cheap used cars made before 1995 ostensibly to protect the environment will hurt the environment and make it more difficult for the unemployed poor to find jobs.
UNICEF’s Guilt Trip: Putting Canada at the bottom of the list for housing poor children is absurd
Putting Canada at the bottom of the list for housing poor children is absurd. As with all statistical arguments, understanding the UNICEF report requires a careful eye and a healthy dose of skepticism. The study focuses on relative differences; that is, the gap between children in the middle of the income distribution and the average below that line. Exclusively relying on relative indicators is a highly contentious, and generally misleading, way to examine poverty. The UNICEF report is no exception.
Driving out of Poverty and Unemployment
Over 170 U.S. charities have programs to match social assistance families with cheap but reliable cars–but this practice is rare in Canada.
The Road Out of Poverty
New Frontier Centre study recommends provinces drop restrictions on automobile ownership for Canadians on income assistance.
When Times are Tough, Private-sector Daycare Proves its Worth
Given equal access to government funding, nimble entrepreneurs are more likely to open new spaces quicker and more cheaply than non-profit operations saddled with volunteer boards of directors. If you want more daycare spaces, let entrepreneurs do their thing.
How to Fix Manitoba’s Daycare Problems
If Manitoba is committed to meeting its goal of 6,500 new daycare spaces by 2013, it should stop discriminating against for-profit daycare operators. Commercial child care should be an important part of any provincial daycare system.
Media Release – The Perfect Gift for Mother’s Day: Child Care Choice
Provincial child care policies vary widely across the Prairies. In particular, Saskatchewan and Manitoba actively discourage for-profit child care centres by denying them access to government subsidies and grants. Alberta treats both for-profit and non-profit centres equally. Because of these policies, Saskatchewan has just one commercial daycare in the entire province. Only five percent of the child care centres in Manitoba are for-profit. Alberta has a majority of for-profit centres. Saskatchewan also has the lowest level of child care coverage in the country. Manitoba and Alberta are both near the national average. Evidence suggests that Alberta has been better able to meet rising demand for new child care spaces than either Saskatchewan or Manitoba. Further evidence suggests that Alberta is more efficient in turning government funding into new daycare spaces. Alberta is able to create twice as many spots per $1,000 in government expenditure than Manitoba, and three-times as many spots as Saskatchewan.
How to Solve Saskatchewan’s Child Care Problems
If Saskatchewan Premier Brad Wall is committed to meeting his goal of 1,000 new daycare spaces, he should stop discriminating against for-profit daycare operators. Commercial child care centres should be an important part of any provincial daycare system.
Alberta Gets it Right on Daycare
If the goal is to open new licensed daycare spaces in a short period of time, the best solution is to enlist the capabilities of the for-profit child care sector. Because it treats both sectors equally, Alberta has been better at opening new spaces – at a lower cost to taxpayers – than Saskatchewan or Manitoba.