Democratic Reform

Covid-19 has struck the world's major cities hard. New York City, Paris, London, Madrid and Milan have all been hit with particularly virulent outbreaks of the virus with devastating consequences for the quality of everyday life for the residents of these cities. In Canada, Montreal is the epicentre of the pandemic while the Greater Toronto Area has been hard hit as well with 62% of Ontario's confirmed cases. Out of necessity, these cities and cities...

Four of Canada’s privacy commissioners have launched a joint investigation into whether a U.S. company’s facial recognition technology, which scrapes facial images from the internet, violates privacy laws in Canada. The federal privacy commissioner and commissioners in Alberta, British Columbia and Quebec said Friday they are investigating Clearview AI about whether the company is collecting and using personal information without consent. “Media reports have stated that Clearview AI is using its technology to collect images...

Ontario Government introduces strict, new rules for campaign donations.       Provincial riding associations will receive public money for campaigns and MPPs and candidates will be banned from attending political fundraisers under campaign finance amendments announced by the Ontario government yesterday. The amendments are to the Election Finances Statute Law Amendment Act, which was reintroduced in the legislature on this fall. The bill has passed Second Reading in the legislature, and has been referred to the...

Ontario News Highlight for October 24: Stunning upset in Niagara as 19 yr. old social conservative takes PC nomination   Sam Oosterhoff, a A 19-year-old social conservative university student, stunned the Ontario Progressive Conservative leadership Saturday night, winning the nomination for a Nov. 17 byelection in the solidly conservative Niagara seat held by former PC leader Tim Hudak. Oosterhoff’s surprise victory over PC president Rick Dykstra is a huge set back for PC Leader Patrick Brown who has been trying...

Federal News Round-up The federal government has thrown down the gauntlet to provinces without some form of carbon pricing. On Monday, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau announced a federal carbon pricing deadline all provinces must comply with by 2018 — or the federal government will impose a price. The federal government's direct-pricing plan means polluters in provinces without a carbon pricing scheme will pay $10 per tonne starting in 2018, increasing to $50 per tonne by 2022. Saskatchewan Premier Brad...