A recent Ontario court decision, striking down the mandatory conviction for impaired driving of a woman simply because she was Indigenous, highlights the urgent need to re-examine the wrong-headed Gladue sentencing principles, which apply exclusively to Indigenous...
There are plenty of good reasons to oppose immigration into Canada. Presumably a man of the Left, Environmentalist David Suzuki opposes immigration: “Canada is full! Although it’s the second largest country in the world,” he says, “our useful area has been reduced....
Maclean’s magazine once declared Winnipeg as “Canada’s most racist city.” Now it is Thunder Bay’s turn, a city in turmoil after a report slammed its overstretched police force (if not the entire city) for alleged “systemic racism” towards its Indigenous population....
As the final leg of the world-famous Bruce Trail – the country’s longest and oldest hiking trail – Ontario’s rugged Bruce Peninsula places a physical exclamation mark upon some of Canada’s most spectacular and well-loved scenery. Separating Lake Huron from Georgian...
The pandemic has taken the countries, the governments and the people by surprise. Most of them were not prepared to face this crisis. After all, initially, most Western countries refused to panic and wanted to manage the situation like other illnesses like the flu....
One of the eternal questions of public policy is: should governments get into bed with private businesses? Whether it is called a Public-Private Partnership, buying a controlling interest for taxpayers, investing in the technologies of tomorrow or just, avoiding a...
The housing crisis on Attawapiskat is one example of larger problems with indigenous housing which is a reliance on an unsustainable model and an unwillingness to admit housing is also a political issue on many First Nations.
Reports of people living in tents and shacks at Attawapiskat evoke comparisons with the Third World, with people living in the shantytowns of South Africa and the barrios of Mexico. The comparison is apt, because we now know a lot about how people in the Third World have elevated themselves out of extreme poverty.
Here is a prediction: in a week, or two, or three, or six, the CBC and the Globe and the National Post and NDP MP Charlie Angus and Liberal leader Bob Rae will forget about the tiny, suffering northern community of Attawapiskat. And so will the rest of us.
The road to Attawapiskat is not paved. When there is a “road,” it is made of ice and runs atop a frozen James Bay. For the 2,000 Cree aboriginals living in the fly-in Ontario community, winter means access to the rest of the world.
The federal government is being criticized for placing Attawapiskat First Nation, a small remote First Nation in Northern Ontario, under third party management. This means a third party appointed by the Ministry of Aboriginal Affairs will deliver programs and...
Some First Nation leaders are already challenging different aspects of the government's new financial disclosure law for First Nation leaders. The bill will require chiefs and councillors to declare their salaries and expenses. In our fourth annual Aboriginal...
A new national Aboriginal economic report confirming that First Nation bands with taxing authority and jurisdiction over their own lands and resources tend to do better is bad news for Manitoba as bands in that province tend to not have those things.
Much ado is being made about a recent illegal cigarettes seizure in southern Manitoba. The tobacco products were sold on a Dakota smoke shop. Although the cigarettes (manufactured on Mohawk territory in Quebec) were federally licensed, they were not stamped for sale...
In the wake of the overthrow of three autocrats, not enough credit has been given to the mighty consensus that triggered the uprising – the desire of a vast, underclass of people to work in a legal market economy. In the culturally diverse Middle East and north Africa, the one common thread is its informal economy. This is the key to future growth and indeed stability.