Experts on sustainable development say the majority governing Conservatives made significant strides on conservation and banning toxic substances during their five years of minority rule, but the Tories are now abandoning environmental efforts altogether, and some fear the most recent federal budget’s focus on development over the environment risks further damaging Canada’s international reputation.

“Canada has custody over one of the largest environments in the world. It’s resource rich, and that gives us a special responsibility—one which this government is not exercising,” Maurice Strong told The Hill Times last week. “It’s very discouraging, and we’re going to pay a very heavy price for the policies of this government.”

read more http://www.hilltimes.com/news/news/2012/05/07/tories-accused-of-being-%E2%80%98one-of-most-anti-environmental-governments-in--the/30647

Through the Beyond the Border agreement released in December 2011, the U.S. and Canada are implementing initiatives that are working towards establishing a North American security perimeter. This includes expanding trusted traveler programs, as well as enhancing integrated law enforcement and information sharing cooperation which has raised many privacy concerns that have yet to be properly addressed.

There are questions surrounding the Conservative government’s Bill C-38, the Budget Implementation Act that also contains changes related to the U.S.-Canada Beyond the Border action plan. This includes ratifying and making the Shiprider a legal and permanent program which will require amending the Criminal Code, along with the RCMP and Customs Act. The joint initiative officially known as the Integrated Cross-Border Maritime Law Enforcement Operations first began as a pilot project. It allows RCMP and U.S. Coast Guard officers to operate vessels together and pursue criminals in the waters of both countries. The Council of Canadians reported that the NDP is demanding that the Shiprider policing program be taken out of budget implementation bill. Brian Masse, the NDP border critic is pushing for separate legislation and pointed out that, “it’s totally irresponsible to have it as part of the Budget Implementation Act.” He added, “There’s significant policing issues that really warrant a standalone bill. If it was so important that they did all the fanfare for it, why doesn’t it warrant its own process?” The proposed changes could have serious sovereignty implications with regards to accountability, due process and civil rights and therefore, need to be fully scrutinized.
 

read full article http://beyourownleader.blogspot.ca/2012/05/us-and-canada-quietly-implementing.html

Demonstrations in Quebec's long-running tuition protest again turned violent Friday, as marchers hurled Molotov cocktails during a show of defiance against controversial new legislation designed to end the standoff.

Police said that an incendiary device was hurled in Montreal at a busy downtown intersection, and The Canadian Press reported that at least two Molotov cocktails were thrown.

"Criminal acts were committed," the police said in its Twitter feed. "(The protest) has been declared illegal. We asked people to disperse immediately."

Earlier, the protest had begun peacefully as demonstrators marched through Montreal, hours after members of the national assembly voted to implement an emergency law designed to quash student protests that have been raging for three months.

The law ends the current academic year at schools affected by the strikes, imposes fines for anyone who prevents an individual from entering a school and restricts the scope and length of protests. The law, which passed by a vote of 68 to 48, will expire after one year.

Read more: http://www.ctv.ca/CTVNews/TopStories/20120518/quebec-protests-new-legislation-120518/#ixzz1vRKodxaI

The student protests in Quebec are not just about tuition fees- the issue is much bigger!

In the last couple of years, various Canadian commentators have remarked on the new conservative narrative of Canada that Stephen Harper and the federal Conservatives have been creating. Much of this narrative centres around a new form of patriotism that emphasizes support for the military, the Canadian North, hockey and Tim Horton’s coffee. Now, with the Harper Conservatives having formed a majority government in the 2011 federal election, progressive Canadians like Murray Dobbin, Jim Stanford and Andrew Jackson are calling for a new progressive narrative that provides an alternative to the narrative offered by the Harper Conservatives and the more general political right.

Earth Day, Tar Sands, Free Trade & Degrowth – Connecting the Dots by Janet M Eaton

May 1st, 2012

In a short article entitled “Earth Day and Tar Sands”, published by Common Dreams April 19^th  http://www.commondreams.org/view/2012/04/19-8 ]  Dale Wiehoff, VP of Communications and IP for the IATP [Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy], makes the link between Earth Day, the tar sands, and free trade.

First he relates how Earth Day emerged in the wake of a growing number of environmental concerns back in the 60s, not the least of which was a major oil spill in the Santa Barbara Channel, all of which led, not only to Earth Day, but also to the Environmental Protection Agency in the US, significant new regulatory policies and a new generation that was defining environmentalism. In Canada we saw the parallel emergence of  Environment Canada and significant new legislative acts and policies.

Wiehoff goes on to  remind us that on this Earth Day 2012, as we look back over 40 years of corporate pillage and abuse, none of those earlier offshore disasters like Santa Barbara or the Exxon Valdez disaster come close to the environmental threats and costs of the tar sands.  Finally he reminds us of a rarely examined driver behind tar sands oil production – i.e  trade policy, starting with NAFTA and now the Canada-European Union Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement (CETA).

A Canadian spymaster’s business card was recovered last year in a trove of intelligence documents in Libya, providing a physical link between Canadian security agencies and Libyan dictator Moammar Gadhafi’s spy services.

William “Jack” Hooper, a globetrotting deputy director for the Canadian Security Intelligence Service, was apparently among the Western intelligence officials who had cultivated ties with Libya, raising new questions about possible Canadian involvement in the arrests and interrogations of Arab-Canadians in their homelands following the 2001 al-Qaeda attacks on the United States.

read full article http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/politics/canadian-spymasters-card-found-in-gadhafis-intelligence-complex/article2418533/

Megan MaCardle turned over her blog to Adam Ozimek to spread some misinformation about NAFTA and trade policy. Ozimek headlines the piece, "4 politically controversial issues where all economists agree." While I’m pretty comfortable with three of the four, the claim that all economists agree that, "the benefits of free trade and NAFTA far outweigh the costs" is highly misleading.

First, NAFTA was not about free trade. First and foremost if was about reducing barriers that made U.S, companies reluctant to invest in Mexico. This meant prohibiting Mexico from expropriating factories and outlawing any restrictions on the repatriation of profits to the United States.

read full article http://www.bilaterals.org/spip.php?article21331

There’s a debate raging over Canada’s intellectual property regime. If one side’s right, Canada stands to pay $2.8 billion more every year in drug costs while it undermines its generic-drug manufacturing sector. If the other side’s right, what’s at stake is the viability of Canada’s pharmaceutical research sector and a trade deal that, the federal government crows, could raise Canada’s GDP by $12 billion a year.

It’s possible both sides are right, at least to some degree. That might be the scariest scenario of all.

Canada and the European Union are negotiating a free trade deal. There are a few sticking points, including Canada’s supply-management system in agriculture. You wouldn’t think it would be possible to find a trade issue with more acrimony, spin and brain-numbing complexity than supply management. But wait! The issue of pharmaceutical intellectual property (IP) has all that and more!

According to a recent House of Commons committee report, European representatives have said changes to Canada’s IP protection are “a critical priority in the Canada-EU CETA negotiations.”

read full article http://www.bilaterals.org/spip.php?article21421