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Wednesday March 30, 2021

April 6, 2021 by Graeme MacKay

Editorial Cartoon by Graeme MacKay, The Hamilton Spectator – Wednesday March 30, 2021

We need a blueprint for the next pandemic

It’s a damning indictment. On Thursday, Canada’s auditor general released a report that finds Canada’s public health and border control authorities did a poor job at the outset of the COVID-19 pandemic.

March 4, 2021

Systems didn’t work as planned. Updates and monitoring were not carried out in spite of ample warnings being given, particularly to the Public Health Agency of Canada (PHAC). There were recommended changes that were ignored, literally for decades. The country’s vaunted pandemic early-warning system didn’t work properly. There were shortcomings in how the Canada Border Services Agency (CBSA) and PHAC responded, so border restrictions were not applied consistently, which hindered attempts to stop the virus from spreading.

Auditor general Karen Hogan pulled no punches as she assessed weaknesses in the government’s early responses to COVID in the first six months of the pandemic.

January 7, 2021I

None of this should come as a surprise to anyone who has been paying attention. Canada’s federal public health bureaucracy was slow and inept to begin with, and didn’t find its feet until the pandemic was already well underway. To be fair, that was the case in many other countries around the world. Almost without exception, the ones that were better prepared fared better in terms.

Does the fact that Canada was in good company make a difference? Arguably, yes. Scientists have been warning the world about the next pandemic since the last pandemic. And collectively, the world paid lip service to the warnings, for the most part.

August 15, 2008

For those who like to see heads roll and blame assigned, who should we be pointing at? Presumably, public health and border service leadership at the time. The buck always stops at the government, so the Trudeau Liberals get some of the blame, too.

January 31, 2014

There is an election coming soon, and those who want to send a message can vote for a different party if that helps. But keep in mind that the most likely alternative, the Conservatives, were in power for much of the time the warnings were being sounded, and they did little or nothing, like the Liberal government before them.

The auditor general’s mission is not a witch hunt. Her criticism and observation are of critical importance, not so we can assign blame, but so we can make sure we do this a lot better the next time a pandemic comes knocking, as we know it will.

And there is another aspect of accountability and blame to consider. Governments don’t tend to do things in the face of overwhelming public opposition. Had there been tremendous pushback when the Mulroney government privatized Canada’s largest domestic vaccine manufacturing lab, or when cuts to research and development by the Harper government led to other pharmaceutical companies packing up and moving to friendlier climates, those things would not have happened. Those things were not big priorities to the average Canadian at the time, otherwise they would not have happened.

Now, with hindsight, we know how much better off Canada would have been had those things not happened. And now, if we want different outcomes, we can demand different things. We must have a domestic vaccine industry. We must have unfettered access to all sorts of PPE. We must have proactive policy and bureaucratic measures in place so all the things that went wrong this time don’t go wrong the next time.

It will not be cheap or easy. It will not work with a small government that wants the market to drive everything. Preparing for future pandemics demands government, industry and business buy-in and collaboration. We can have that if we want it, or we can take our chances. (Hamilton Spectator Editorial)

Octopus sketching is such a joy!

Saturday December 5, 2020

December 12, 2020 by Graeme MacKay

Editorial Cartoon by Graeme MacKay, The Hamilton Spectator – Saturday December 5, 2020

Justin Trudeau won’t escape his election promise to lift water-boil advisories in First Nation communities

October 21, 2016

Five years after their election promise to lift the water-boil advisories in every First Nation community by March 2021, the federal Liberals have officially admitted they won’t meet that goal.

It was an embarrassing concession reluctantly made this week after much media prodding. And Prime Minister Justin Trudeau deserves the barrage of criticism coming his way from Indigenous leaders who are disheartened and disappointed by the news.

It is unacceptable that any resident of any First Nations community must wait a day longer for what almost all Canadians routinely take for granted: being able to fill a glass with safe, clean water when they turn on a tap in their home.

Trudeau has previously taken heat for breaking campaign promises to overhaul the electoral system and balance the budget, He should take his licks for failing to keep this pledge, too.

February 20, 2020

But for all that, thank goodness he made it. The federal Liberals have, in fact, made significant progress in ensuring Indigenous communities have a safe supply of water, one of life’s essentials not only for drinking but bathing and cooking.

When they came to power in 2015, there were no fewer than 105 long-term water-boil advisories in effect across Canada. Their efforts resulted in 97 of those advisories being lifted. The Liberals remain committed to getting the job done, too, and appropriately announced $1.5 billion in this week’s mini-budget to make that happen.

Yet, as they made advances in some First Nations communities, new problems and new advisories appeared in others. That’s why today, 59 long-term water-boil advisories remain in effect. That’s why there will be at least another dozen water-boil advisories in effect going into next year, the year everything was supposed to be fixed.

July 23, 2019

Indigenous Services Minister Marc Miller said this week the pandemic is partly responsible for these delays, which seems a reasonable explanation — to a point. But Miller also said the Liberals didn’t initially understand the “state of decay” in infrastructure in many First Nations communities.

So is what we’re left with a case where non-Indigenous politicians see a half-full glass on the safe-water front while Indigenous people see one that’s half-empty? Perhaps it’s both.

First Nations communities have every right to be angry that another promise to them has been broken. The Neskantaga First Nation in Northwestern Ontario, for instance, has been living with a drinking-water advisory for 25 years and was evacuated in late October after an oil sheen was discovered on its reservoir. Today, more than 250 band members are living in hotels in Thunder Bay 400 kilometres away

June 3, 2015

Can anyone seriously imagine a non-Indigenous community, for instance in southern Ontario, going more than a few days with a contaminated municipal water supply? Anyone who remembers the Walkerton, Ont., water crisis of 2000 will know how quickly authorities responded to a deadly E. coli outbreak in the town’s water supply, and how that led to more stringent water standards across the entire province.

Despite all this, the current federal government can still be credited for doing far more than its predecessors — Liberal as well as Conservative — and going a long way to ending an intolerable situation that should have been remedied decades ago.

No, the Liberals won’t meet the deadline of their campaign promise. But they should eventually keep the rest of the pledge to make safe First Nations water systems. That promise, even if critics say it has been broken, spurred necessary action and held the Liberals accountable in a way previous governments were not. It was a promise worth making as well as keeping. (Hamilton Spectator Editorial)

Saturday October 31, 2020

November 1, 2020 by Graeme MacKay

Editorial Cartoon by Graeme MacKay, The Hamilton Spectator – Saturday October 31, 2020

Biden’s Call for ‘National Mask Mandate’ Gains Traction in Public Health Circles

October 10, 2020

As the nation heads into what public health experts are calling a “dark winter” of coronavirus illness and death, public health experts are coalescing around Joseph R. Biden Jr.’s call for a “national mask mandate,” even as they concede such an effort would require much more than the stroke of a presidential pen.

Over the past week, a string of prominent public health experts — notably Dr. Anthony S. Fauci, the government’s top infectious disease specialist, and Dr. Scott Gottlieb, a former commissioner of the Food and Drug Administration under President Trump — have said it is time to seriously consider a national mandate to curb the spread of the virus.

Overseas this week, President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia became the latest foreign leader to impose a national mandate for citizens to wear masks. Mr. Trump is opposed to a mandate, and Mr. Biden has conceded that a presidential order for all Americans to wear masks would almost certainly face — and most likely fall to — a legal challenge.

March 6, 2020

Mr. Biden, the Democratic presidential nominee, echoed the “dark winter” language during the most recent presidential debate, and he is already using his bully pulpit to promote and reinforce a culture of mask wearing. If elected, he will almost certainly do more.

Mr. Biden has already said that, as president, he would mandate masks on all federal property, an executive order that could have wide reach. He could use his authority under federal transit law to require masks on public transportation. He could also prod governors who are resisting mask mandates to at least require masks in public buildings in their states.

But that is delicate terrain in the United States, where Mr. Trump has turned the act of wearing or not wearing a mask into a political statement. Public health and legal experts say it would be far better for Mr. Biden — or Mr. Trump, for that matter — to use his powers of persuasion to convince Americans that covering one’s face to curb the spread of the virus is a patriotic or civic-minded action.

“Instead of making it about the president’s coercive authority under law it should be about whether the president can support a norm that supports public health, which is in people’s self interest,” said Harold Hongju Koh, a law professor at Yale University and an expert in national security and human rights.

Mr. Trump, however, has shown little interest in supporting such norms. At a rally on Wednesday in Arizona, he mocked California’s mask mandate, saying, “You have to eat through the mask.” (New York Times)

Saturday July 29, 2017

July 28, 2017 by Graeme MacKay

Editorial Cartoon by Graeme MacKay, The Hamilton Spectator – Saturday July 29, 2017

Waterfront Trust owes City of Hamilton $325,000 in taxes

The Hamilton Waterfront Trust owes the city hundreds of thousands of dollars in back taxes.

The arms-length agency — whose mandate is helping Hamiltonians connect with their waterfront — has unpaid arrears of $325,000 from 2016 and 2017, city tax director Maria Di Santo confirmed Tuesday.

The money owed stems from two properties — $280,000 for 57 Discovery Dr., the home of waterfront restaurant Sarcoa; and $45,000 for 17-47 Discovery Dr., which includes Williams Fresh Café.

According to the city’s property inquiry tool, 2017 taxes for 57 Discovery Dr. are $176,790; and $20,670 for 17-147 Discovery Dr.

In May 2017, the trust owed an additional $164,665 in taxes and interest on 57 Discovery Dr. from 2015. That was paid by July, according to a tax certificate.

HWT executive director Werner Plessl declined comment and referred all questions to board member and Ward 2 Coun. Jason Farr.

Farr said the board directed a tax payment be made of about $175,000 about six weeks ago.

“This wouldn’t even be an issue if certain people paid their rent,” he said Tuesday.

He said the board is trying to manage its priorities, which include legal fees, maintaining their services and paying taxes.

“We are not ignoring any of them,” he said. “As a responsible councillor and board member, I feel we are living up to our fiduciary responsibility.”

The trust has racked up “many, many thousands of dollars” in “unaccounted for” legal fees, Farr said.

HWT has been locked in a $15-million legal battle that waterfront eatery Sarcoa launched against the trust and the city in late 2015 for preventing it from throwing patio parties with amplified music.

The trust began its life with a $6.3-million endowment to settle a lawsuit by the City of Hamilton that contended it hadn’t been properly compensated by the former Hamilton Harbour Commission for its share of port profits dating back decades.

But the seed money has run out and the trust’s revenues now come from capital project funding from other levels of government and sales from the various businesses that the trust operates around the western end of the harbour front.

In the past, the trust has struggled to stay out of the red. (Source: Hamilton Spectator)

Tuesday November 13, 2012

November 13, 2012 by Graeme MacKay

By Graeme MacKay, The Hamilton Spectator, Tuesday November 13, 2012

Some Light Reading

Canadians are slowly losing trust in Parliament and political parties, and share some of the toughest views in the American hemisphere about their national leader, according to a new 26-country survey.

The survey by The Environics Institute, part of an investigation into political attitudes in 26 countries in the Americas, found that Canadians have been shedding some of their optimistic and positive views on politics and government

The survey found only 16 per cent of Canadians place “a lot of trust” in their Prime Minister, putting Stephen Harper near the bottom among all leaders in the Americas.

“In an international context, Harper has a lower level of trust than almost every other national leader in the hemisphere,” Mr. Neuman said.

The levels of trust are also low for the Canadian Parliament (17 per cent), political parties (10 per cent) and mass media (6 per cent). The findings come after Canada lived under a series of minority governments from 2004 to 2011, fuelling a sense of growing partisan bickering in Ottawa. (Source: Globe & Mail)

Meanwhile, less than two years after lovelorn fans were first forced to accept that young pop superstars Justin Bieber and Selena Gomez were a romantic couple, their followers are reeling at news the pair are no more.

After weeks of rumours the couple was on the outs, E! News reported Friday that the teen pop stars broke up in recent days. The Associated Press confirmed the split on Saturday, citing an anonymous source not officially authorized to speak about the couple’s relationship status.(Source: CTV News)