Here's another placemarker for an issue I've wanted to write about for some time. I have not read any details of the Harper Governments plan to rein in federal environmental assessments, but in principle, I believe such an exercise is long overdue. It is a dirty little secret of the environmental movement that federal environmental assessments are a massive scam. They take far too long. They cost far too much. They do not focus on important issues. Everyone in the system knows this, but no one complains, because almost everyone benefits. Engineering companies get tens of millions of dollars to carry out...

30 March, 2012

Contrarian readers know I have no affection for the Harper Government. There are, however, occasional advantages to having hard-assed right-wingers in unfettered control. The willingness to do obviously sensible but unpopular things—like getting rid of the penny—is one of them. The penny should have been killed decades ago. Taxpayers lose money on every one we mint. Consumers and storekeepers lose 492 million hours every year handling the all but worthless chips. (Yes, I made that number up, but it can't be far off.) But...

30 March, 2012

In an interview with CBC Radio's Jim Brown, Ivan Fellegi, who served as Canada's Chief Statistician from 1985 to 2008, set forth five ill-effects of the Harper Government's surprise decision to make a crucial part of the 2011 census voluntary. The results will be biased because aboriginals, new immigrants, the poor, those with low educational attainment, and the very well off are less likely to respond. This will deprive Canada of important information about social trends such as income polarization. It will eliminate our best source of information about aboriginal Canadians, immigrants, and minority language groups. Municipalities and provinces will lose...

15 July, 2010