Go Canada Go
2011-04-28
2011-04-27
2011-04-23
2011-04-22
Gordon O'Connor on the South March Highlands
"it isn't special ... there's nothing special about it"
2011-04-20
Minority Governments for Dummies (and Tory PMs)
- the voters elect the House of Commons to govern
- the leader of the current government (the government before the election) has the right to meet the House and attempt to gain its confidence, however usually the party with the most seats gets the first opportunity to be Prime Minister and lead the government
- responsible government requires that the Prime Minister maintains the confidence of the House of Commons to govern
- a minority government cannot survive if it attempts to govern as if it had a majority
- a Prime Minister cannot bully the House of Commons into supporting him by threatening an election if he doesn't get his way
- there is always a Prime Minister in waiting willing to attempt to gain and maintain the confidence of the House if the Prime Minister cannot or is not not willing to
- a government is legitimate, and only legitimate, if it has the confidence of the House of Commons
- minority governments can work if a Prime Minister recognizes it is the House of Commons that was elected to govern, not him by divine right
- minority governments can implement, and have implemented, important measures including Old Age Pensions, Medicare and the Canada Pension Plan
2011-04-17
2011-04-14
South March Highlands and Carp Hills - NCC Role in Protecting Natural Environment Lands: Beyond The Greenbelt
This post is also being sent via email to National Capital Commission CEO Marie Lemay
( Marie.Lemay@ncc-ccn.ca )
The National Capital Commission has recently published maps identifying natural environment lands within the National Capital Region as part of it's concept plans for the Greenbelt Master Plan Review.
Interestingly, none of the lands identified are within the urban boundary of the City of Ottawa. It is, as if by definition, the NCC has decided that lands within the urban boundary have no environmental value.
Of course, in the case of the South March Highlands we know that is not true. There are lands within the urban boundary and within SMH that are even zoned Environmental Protection, and others that should be, and were, but were rezoned for reasons that had nothing to do with their environmental value.
There are undoubtedly other lands of environmental value within the Ottawa urban boundary as well. It is unfortunate that the NCC has decided they are unworthy of recognition.
One of the things I noticed right away from the NCC map was the identification of one large natural environment area comprising the South March Highlands and the Carp Hills. I just recently had the opportunity to hike some of the Carp Hills land (some of which the City of Ottawa apparently owns) and was quite impressed with it's natural environment value. In examining the City Zoning Map it became obvious that a significant amount of the land identified by the NCC as natural environment is not zoned Environmental Protection (not that that guarantees it will be protected). I expect this applies to other natural environment lands identified on the NCC map.
So now that the NCC has identified these lands as natural environment lands what are they going to do about it. They will do a great disservice to the community if all they accomplish is creating a false belief within the public that these lands are actually protected from development.
Now that they have raised the public's expectations the NCC must fulfil their responsibilities and meet those expectations and take the necessary measures, whether by means of purchase/expropriation or some form of ironclad federal protection that neither landowners, developers nor the OMB can overturn, to protect these lands from development. The public expects and deserves no less.
2011-04-13
2011-04-12
The Debate: Canadian Values Win
The most interesting thing I noticed about the debate was where all the leaders, or at least all of the federalist leaders, agreed.
These were on what I would consider to be the most basic of Canadian values, but values that many of us suspect are not dear to the heart of Stephen Harper, yet he provided vigorous defences of them - public health care and multiculturalism.
It speaks well to their broad support among Canadians that not even Stephen Harper would publicly oppose them knowing it would be political suicide.
The other issues I particularly noticed were the ones that were only raised by Jack Layton, electoral reform, particularly proportional representation and aboriginal issues.
Jack also gets some points for language, being the only leader to use the term ""hashtag" in the debate and "commentariat" during the post debate scrum.
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