Segacs's World I Know

Posts Tagged ‘ontario’

It’s Labour Day Weekend, and we all know what that means. That’s right, they’re everywhere: Ontario drivers have invaded our highways, side streets and alleyways. The “Je Me Souviens” uniformity has been broken up by a sea of “Yours to Discover”.

Some are bringing their kids to school and helping them get settled in the residence. Others are just visiting friends or relatives, or simply taking a weekend vacation. Whatever their reasons for being here, though, they have one thing in common: They don’t know how to drive in Quebec.

Even though their license plates are nearly the same colour as ours, they’re easy to spot: They’re the ones going 100kph in the fast lane; they even slow to 70 on the Met, thinking for some strange reason that the speed limits mean something here. They stop at crosswalks. They use their turn signals. They make 3-second stops at stop signs. They stubbornly insist on driving at their speed even when all the traffic around them is whizzing by and giving them a honk-and-finger tabarnac.

In short, they’re a major menace and they’re bound to cause numerous accidents. Watch out for them.

Mario Dumont is one thing. But I would’ve never predicted that La Presse would endorse the Tories in a Federal election.

La Presse is one of Montreal’s major newspapers and is widely considered the French federalist voice in Montreal (as opposed to Le Devoir, which leans separatist) and it had previously endorsed the Liberals almost automatically. But with the sponsorship scandal tarnishing the Liberal name, there’s a feeling now that the Tories may actually make some inroads. I’ve been saying it won’t happen for a long time, and if it does I may have to admit I was wrong and eat my words.

Then again, as they say, the only poll that matters is on election day. I’m still not convinced that this surge in polling numbers is going to translate into seats. And there’s no way the Liberals will be shut out of Quebec – whatever else happens, the Liberal stronghold seats in English Montreal are safe. As for percentages, since polls are not conducted riding-by-riding, there are as many ways to predict how the distribution will break as there are political opinions in Canada. I still believe that the surge in polling for the Conservatives in Quebec will translate into a lot of second-place showings in ridings where the Bloc wins, as opposed to seats. (The Election Prediction Project has the Tories ahead recently for the first time, but too many seats are too close to call to truly predict the outcome).

Nonetheless, with less than a week to go, Stephen Harper has overcome his toughest challenge: fear of a Tory government. With 55% of Canadians saying they believe a Conservative majority is a good idea, it seems that the Liberal attack campaign backfired on itself. And take a closer look at those numbers: the percentage of people who think a Tory majority would be a good idea is highest in Quebec – even higher than it is in Western Canada. (For the record, I’m not among those 55%, but then, regular readers already knew that).

Ontario, of course, remains the key battleground, and if it turns out that people are all talk and no action on election day, then we will be ushering in another Martin government. If Ontario goes blue, however, Stephen Harper should start preparing for his new job as Prime Minister.

I’m back after another brief business trip, this one to lovely Windsor, Ontario. Well, okay, maybe “lovely” is a bit of a stretch… but in fairness, I didn’t see that much of the city. Like most business trips, this was an airport-hotel-meeting-hotel-airport kind of circuit. The big Windsor sightseeing will have to wait till next time, I suppose.

The Windsor airport is really tiny. They never seem to have more than one flight there at a time; security and the gates are open only for about 20 minutes before each flight boards. However, it’s got a certain amount of charm. The staff are all suspiciously friendly, even the security personnel. There’s a food counter that makes real, edible food (which is more than I can say for Pearson airport in Toronto, Canada’s largest). There’s even high-speed wireless internet, albeit for a price. Since I was flying standby and had to spend several hours there, I was especially grateful for that last one.

Anyway, it’s good to be back. Regular blogging to resume, well, now. Those of you who missed me (all two of you) ought to be relieved.

While the SAQ was on strike last fall and winter, Quebecers flocked en masse across the Ontario border to stock up on liquor at the LCBO. Ontarians were fond of mocking us for this, and we in turn were jealous of their excellent selections, lower prices and seemingly better-run outlets.

Now, it looks like a role reversal might be on its way: the LCBO employees might strike:

About 5,400 unionized staff at the provincially owned LCBO, which runs 599 stores, voted overwhelmingly last week to reject a contract offer. If last-minute talks fail to break the deadlock, the strike will start on Thursday.

Well, the traffic might be going the other way soon. People of Ottawa, come discover our SAQs!

Update: Looks like the strike will be averted, as a last-minute tentative deal seems to be reached. I guess Ontarians won’t have to discover the joys of our SAQs after all.

Ontario may make it illegal to drop out of high school:

The Ontario government plans to introduce legislation that will require students to stay in school until they reach the age of 18, said the province’s minister of education Saturday.

If the rules aren’t followed, students would be forced back to their desks or sent to alternative learning programs by a court order, said Education Minister Gerard Kennedy. If that fails, a student could be ordered to spend time in jail, but that would be rare he adds.

The McGuinty government is spinning this as a “carrot, not stick” and an “exciting opportunity that strikes them as a real win for themselves”. Somehow I doubt most high school dropouts will see it that way.

Students need to want to stay in school because they believe in their future opportunities, not because it’s illegal not to. The Ontario government is taking an education system that clearly has problems, and trying to mask them with a new law that will do very little other than cause bureaucratic headaches.

In the meantime, Quebec – with our extraordinarily high high school dropout rate – is probably watching carefully. But with calls every so often to scrap the Cegep system, it’s hard to take the government’s commitment to postsecondary education seriously. Cegep, which is free and is open to “mature students” over 21 who never finished high school, provides a great second chance for dropouts to get back into the education system. It’s probably the best innovation that has ever come from a government. Scrapping it won’t solve our dropout problem, it will make the whole system worse.

The only way to reduce dropout rates is to provide students with clear incentives to stay in school. Both Quebec and Ontario are failing miserably on that score.

Muslim women’s groups are outraged at a Canadian court ruling allowing “Canadianized Sharia” in Ontario:

Then the province of Ontario quietly approved its use. Under the 1991 Arbitration Act, sharia-based marriage, divorce and family tribunals run by the Islamic Institute of Civil Justice are expected to begin later this year. The move has so horrified many Muslim women that they’re vowing to stop the tribunals before they start.

“We’ve had a flood of e-mails from people, asking `How can we help?’” says Alia Hogben, president of the Canadian Council of Muslim Women, whose 900 members come from a variety of Islamic sects.

They were outraged that Muslim women could be coerced into taking part in sharia tribunals or face family and community ostracism — or worse.

Why, they asked, should these women be treated differently from other Canadian women?

“When you come to Canada, you are a human being with full rights,” says Jonathan Schrieder, a Toronto civil litigation lawyer. Allowing sharia here — even a “Canadianized” version, as its proponents claim — “will subject Muslim women to a huge injustice.”

Indeed.

I don’t necessarily have a problem with religious arbitration being used voluntarily by members of a community, when it doesn’t contravene secular law. For example, Montreal – like many cities – has a Jewish beit din to decide matters of Jewish law, and members of the community can agree to subject themselves to its jurisdiction.

But what we’re talking about here isn’t voluntary arbitration: it’s an attempt to relegate Muslim women to second-class citizen status against their will. Even though the Ontario court ruling specifies that all parties must “voluntarily” submit themselves to the process, this is certain not to work because the very nature of Shari’a law makes the whole process open to unbelievable amount of abuse. No Canadian should stand for this.

Via LGF and Burnside, who are all over this one.

The Quebec Court of Appeal has ruled that barring gays from marriage is discriminatory, upholding a lower court ruling and effectively paving the way to gay marriage in Quebec:

The Quebec court case pitted some religious groups against Michael Hendricks and Rene Leboeuf, who want to marry after being together for 30 years.

The religious groups were appealing a September 2002 ruling by Justice Louise Lemelin of Quebec Superior Court that said restricting marriage to a union between a man and a woman was unjustified under the Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

This isn’t really too surprising, as public opinion in Quebec is overwhelmingly supportive of gay marriage. And it’s only a matter of time until the rest of the country follows suit.

It’s National Non-Smoking Week this week, and across Canada, longtime smokers are trying to kick the habit… including two of my coworkers. Can you say stressful?

Still, I say kudos to those who manage to quit, and good luck to those who are trying. I’ve never had an ounce of willpower in my life so I guess it’s a good thing I never started smoking… mind you, giving up chocolate hasn’t proven quite so simple.

In the meantime, ever reinventing the notions of stupidity, the Ontario Lung Association is trying to get all movies with smoking in them rated “R”:

The Lung Association in Ontario is lobbying for all films that show smoking to be given a restricted rating, preventing anyone under 18 from seeing those movies.

[ . . . ]

“This would be an incentive for [filmmakers] to remove the product entirely,” said Susan Berek of the Ontario Tobacco Free Network.

Alan Goluboff, head of the Directors Guild of Canada, scoffed at the idea. He warns such a law would kill Canadian filmmaking. “The whole concept is absolutely ridiculous… placing that kind of creative restriction on the whims of an artist is dangerous.”

Sure, and while we’re at it, why don’t we institute laws preventing anyone under 18 from ever going outside, because they might see someone smoking in the street.

There’s protective and there’s just plain ridiculous. Clearly, this falls into the latter category. Maybe the message to the Lung Association need to be to “just butt out” of the movie business.

This is a lousy year to graduate high school in Ontario.

The Ontario government, in its wisdom, is eliminating the Grade 13 “OAC” program this year. That means that there’s a whole year of students graduating from grade 13, and another whole year of them graduating from grade 12 . . . and they’re all applying to university at the same time.

With so many extra applicants, admissions cutoffs to Ontario universities are bound to be sky-high this year. So students who in a regular year would be borderline, this year are shit outta luck.

Then again, I suppose anyone rejected from university in Ontario could always go to Concordia . . .