Last week, Bell Media announced it was ceasing multiple television newscasts and implementing other programming cuts following mass layoffs and the sale of 45 of its regional radio stations. Canadian Taxpayers Federation Alberta director Kris Sims joined True North’s Andrew Lawton to discuss the future of the Canadian legacy media.
Legacy media panicking as government’s local journalism fund nears expiry date
One of the Liberal government’s key funds for ailing legacy media companies is set to expire at the end of March and news organizations are panicking over a lack of clarity on whether the fund will be renewed by Ottawa.
The Local Journalism Initiative was introduced by Prime Minister Justin Trudeau in 2019 to offer up $50 million in funding over five years.
Funds for eligible media companies are supposed to be used to hire journalists to report on local stories.
According to News Media Canada, a group that has lobbied the federal government to step in to save the legacy media, there have been over 400 journalists hired under the program.
All of them could be out of work if the fund doesn’t get renewed, the organization is warning.
“Frankly, there are no other current federal funding initiatives that can replace it. It is a world-class program that other countries are looking at,” News Media Canada CEO Paul Deegan told CBC News.
Despite appeals from the legacy media to extend the fund, the Liberal government has not yet announced what the initiative’s future might be.
“If I were to be asking for anything, it would be clear, more timely information that allows publishers to make informed decisions on what we know is going to happen,” said legacy media advocate and Press Forward chair, Jeanette Ageson.
Despite receiving taxpayer funding, some legacy media companies have halted local journalism.
In 2022, Saltwire Network, one of Atlantic Canada’s major legacy media companies, stopped home deliveries of physical newspapers to certain rural communities in northern Nova Scotia.
Saltwire Network has received funds from the Local Journalism Initiative.
In a March 2021 article, Saltwire Network’s senior managing editor, Steve Bartlett, acknowledged the significance of federally-financed local journalism initiative in covering remote regions, suggesting the company was committed to addressing “news deserts” in remote parts of Eastern Canada.
Canadian youth represented most in labour force participation decline
The decline in Canada’s labour force participation rate is particularly acute among the country’s youth, according to data from Statistics Canada.
Labour participants are those who are employed, or who are available and actively seeking a job when they are not.
The labour force participation rate for that cohort of Canadians dropped to 62.7% last month, falling three full percentage points from last April.
According to the survey, women within that demographic fell even lower to 62.5%, the lowest rate since 2000.
During the worst months of the pandemic, the rate didn’t dip below 67%.
Youth non-participants, those aged 15 to 24 who are not in the job market or employed, have increased by about 200,000 over the past year, bringing the total to 1.9 million.
Of that figure, 6.8% said that they wanted to work but have not searched for a job, up from 5.8% who held that position last January.
Ontario saw the highest increase in labour participation, going up 0.3% in January, bringing it back up from a 0.5% drop in December. The province’s employment rate currently holds at 60.8%.
However, it remains down 1.4 percentage points on a year-over-year basis.
Newfoundland and Labrador saw an increase of 3.2%, following six months of a stagnant participation rate.
There has been little change in Manitoba, Saskatchewan and Quebec, over the past several months.
The majority of respondents in the survey cited attending school as the reason for not searching for work.
That response is consistent with a study published in January by RBC economists Rachel Battaglia and Carrie Freestone, which found the majority of the unemployed cohort to either be students or recent graduates
“The share of younger Canadians with postsecondary education has continued to rise, and hiring demand has softened sharply in industries like professional services and finance jobs where there’s a higher number of recent postsecondary graduates struggling to find a job,” reads the study.
For those who are looking, the landscape is tougher now than it was a couple years ago, with the youth unemployment rate at 10.8%, up from 9.3% in 2022.
However, the study asserts that there is nothing new about this trend for young people.
“Of course, it is not unusual for younger workers to bear the brunt of a labour market slowdown. Unemployment rates have historically risen faster for younger cohorts during recessionary periods – and this cycle doesn’t appear to be an exception. Not only are employees with the shortest tenures and the least experience typically the first to be let go,” reads the study.
Pointe-Claire mayor felt “singled out” by Poilievre press conference on housing delays
The mayor of Pointe-Claire, Quebec said he felt singled out by Pierre Poilievre after the Conservative leader held a press conference in the parking lot of the Fairview Pointe-Claire shopping centre to address the country’s housing crisis on Thursday.
“(Prime Minister Justin) Trudeau has caused this problem by funding local bureaucracies that block homebuilding,” said Poilievre, who also criticized the City of Montreal over numerous delays to housing projects.
The conference took place underneath the aerial tracks of a future express train line, with the focal point being to denounce the amount of bureaucracy and delays which have stalled thousands of Montreal housing projects.
“Here we are next to a federally funded future transit station, and the local owner wants to develop apartments and housing in this parking lot, but local bureaucracy is blocking that construction that would allow seniors and students to live next to a massive transit station that would take them to McGill University or to the airport,” said Poilievre on Thursday.
During a press conference last week at the Federal Port in Montreal, Poilievre also accused Mayor Valérie Plante and Quebec City Mayor Bruno Marchand of being incompetent in their handling of housing.
Pointe-Claire Mayor Tim Thomas responded to Poilievre by saying that too many housing units had already been constructed without enough thought, saying he was elected to “slow down development.”
“This is sensible, responsible urban planning in a community where developers have been given too many red carpets, and not enough red tape,” said Thomas. “I was elected to slow down development.”
Thomas said that the city of Pointe-Claire added more houses than any other neighbourhood in the West Island municipality.
He also said that he would like to see the Fairview Forest preserved, as it is the last natural space in the city that remains unprotected.
A citizen’s group has been protesting in front of the Fairview Forest since 2020, aiming to have the space officially protected.
“I think there are a lot of ways to develop without sacrificing green space,” Geneviève Lussier, a spokesperson for Save Fairview Forest, told the Montreal Gazette. “It’s a miracle that the forest is still there and that it stayed wild as long as it has been. With the influx of population in that area, we need to maintain that green space as is.”
Lussier expressed her frustrations with Poilievre coming to Pointe-Claire to denounce delays in housing development.
“I think we’re better off with a decentralized method of decision-making,” she said. “I don’t think the federal government has the best knowledge about each specific municipality. There are reasons that municipalities have those powers.”
Poilievre said that his government would incentivize municipalities via the gas tax transfer, which comes up for renewal in March.
His plan is to offer bonuses to cities that construct beyond a predetermined goal and penalize those who fail to meet it.
Additionally, he said that all new transit projects would be obligated to include a housing component.
OP-ED: Adam Smith’s “saline solution” for Canada’s health care system
Canada’s health care system is on life support, but many of its patients are languishing on wait lists, getting slowly sicker and in many cases simply dying untreated. Sick patients are frequently subjected to poor care – if they get care at all – while frontline health care workers are subjected to overwork.
The average waiting time from referral to treatment was 27.7 weeks in 2023. In some parts of Canada, such as Nova Scotia, where the average wait time was 56.7 weeks or over one full year, it takes significantly less time to create a human than to treat one.
Not to mention the other 631,527 Canadians who were waiting for surgery last year. As the World Population Review notes, Canada has the world’s tenth-largest economy, yet we come eighth-to-last among “developed” nations in hospital bed availability, with only 2.5 per 1,000 inhabitants.
As shown in a poll by Angus Reid, three in five Canadians consider our health care system poor, with one-third agreeing that increased privatization would improve health care delivery.
And that brings us to Adam Smith, the famed 18th century Scottish economist and moral philosopher. By shaking Smith’s “invisible hand,” the Canadian health care system could finally tap into the power of market forces to drive efficiency.
The antediluvians who still believe health care and competition are incompatible should consider boarding the Smith ship, and fast, because Canada’s current health care system is about to go under. To call our health care universal is to satirize it.
Smith’s 1776 magnum opus, An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations, has undoubtedly passed the test of time. But can it still last long enough to get a kidney transplant in the Canadian health care system? Let us find out.
In The Essential Adam Smith, Prof. James Otteson of the University of Notre-Dame describes the three major themes of Adam Smith’s political economy.
The first is the “Economizer” argument, suggesting individuals will seek out the most economical use of their resources to achieve their objective. Since health care is “free,” many patients rarely think twice about the costs of visiting the doctor, even if it’s over an issue Tylenol could fix. In doing so, patients effectively divert the precious time our scarce practitioners could spend on more immediate cases.
The second of the three big Smithian claims illuminated by Otteson is the “Local Knowledge” argument. Only we ourselves know best what opportunities and resources are available to us; therefore, the individual is in the best position to decide how they wish to allocate and expend their resources – not another person or organization, and least of all the government.
This should hold true for all matters, including health care. Publicly funded monopoly systems like Canada’s, however, do not permit such decision-making because critical economic connections have been broken and costs are not transparent.
This, in turn, dampens innovation in medical treatments, processes and medications. Every year, thousands of Canadians travel to access the newer and much faster treatments readily available in the U.S. – expending their own hard-earned savings to do so.
Smith’s third key economic idea, the “Invisible Hand,” is his most widely admired, cited, and misunderstood, takeaway. “Every individual…neither intends to promote the public interest, nor knows how much he is promoting it,” Smith outlines in The Theory of Moral Sentiments.
“He intends only his own security; and by directing that industry in such a manner as its produce may be of the greatest value, he intends only his own gain, and he is in this, as in many other cases, led by an invisible hand to promote an end which was no part of his intention.”
Smith’s overarching point was that in pursuing their individual self-interest rather than virtue-signalling about some unachievable utopian goals, people actually do promote the public interest: starting companies, creating jobs, coming up with life-improving inventions, treating the sick. And, if allowed to do so, allocating their own resources towards looking after their own health.
The free market’s dynamics encourage the production of the goods and services that are in demand. A zero-competition monopoly is intrinsically handicapped at achieving better standards, because it has few if any incentives to seek better outcomes.
Canada’s monopoly health care system eliminates the most powerful incentive of all: the spending power of consumers. Government-sourced funding that is generally budget-based surrenders the usual power of the purse to incentivize performance, quality, and operating efficiency. Robbed of this essential economic instrument, Canadian patients become supplicants, the system free to ignore them – as it habitually does.
Clearly, not all of Smith’s free market ideals could be implemented immediately. A mass overnight privatization of all hospitals would almost certainly be infeasible and impractical. But the more competition that could be introduced to Canada’s health care system, the more the quantity of health care provided could be increased and the more its quality improved.
Who knows, an unleashed Canadian health care sector might finally be able to find the cure to cancer. And not just that, but to actually treat Canadians with cancer in a timely manner. That would be the actual touchdown pass, caught and carried by none other than Smith’s Invisible Hand.
The original, full-length version of this article was recently published in C2C Journal.
Alicia Kardos is a student in economics and political science at the University of Toronto.
LAWTON: Does anti-racism training make people more racist?
According to a new report, studies indicate that DEI training tends to reinforce existing biases rather than eliminate them, and its effectiveness in fostering inclusivity remains uncertain. Prof. David Millard Haskell of the Aristotle Foundation joined True North’s Andrew Lawton to discuss the potential pitfalls and alternative approaches to fostering diversity, equity, and inclusion in organizations.
LAWTON: B.C. admits safe supply is broken, seeks to expand anyway
A new report by British Columbia’s top doctor, Bonnie Henry, reveals that safer supply programs are being regularly defrauded and are causing harm to communities, despite advocating for their expansion by the provincial government. National Post columnist Adam Zivo joined True North’s Andrew Lawton to discuss the complexities and challenges surrounding safer supply programs.
The Alberta Roundup | Smith mocks Guilbeault’s bid to ban roads
This week on the Alberta Roundup with Rachel Emmanuel, Rachel breaks down Alberta Premier Danielle Smith’s response to the federal government’s announcement that they won’t fund new road construction. Rachel also has an exclusive video for her viewers of Smith announcing that she will end use of electronic tabulators in Alberta election.
Later on the show, Rachel has an update on the Alberta NDP leadership race and Smith’s response to some candidates promising to axe the carbon tax.
And finally, there’s a new class action lawsuit brewing over forced businesses closures during Covid-19.
Tune into the Alberta Roundup now!
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Meet the Canadian lawyer blacklisted by mainstream media
She cross-examined Prime Minister Justin Trudeau at the Public Order Emergency Commission.
She represented former premier Brian Peckford in a lawsuit challenging the government’s restrictions on mobility rights for over 5 million unvaccinated Canadians.
She filed a lawsuit on behalf of Lethbridge mom-of-three Carrie Sakamoto, who was severely injured by the COVID vaccine.
And just last week, she launched a proposed class action lawsuit against the Alberta government over pandemic business restrictions.
Despite her high-profile legal work, lawyer Eva Chipiuk has never been interviewed about these cases by the legacy media.
“We hear these ministers talking about Canadian content. That’s why it’s so important for them to be providing subsidies to the CBC and mainstream media, because they have to uphold Canadian content. And here I am, like, it’s all Canadian content, everything I’m doing,” Chipiuk, 44, tells True North.
“This is information that Canadians should understand – what actions are before the courts in Canada… these are nationally significant issues, and not a word.”
Born to a mother who fled communist Poland and a Ukrainian father working as a farmer in Alberta, Chipiuk recalls her family convincing her to become a doctor.
But in her youth, Chipiuk had to accompany her mother to traffic court to act as her translator. She was disillusioned by the experience, remembering it as “dismissive” and “unpleasant.” It was ultimately a catalyst in her applying for law school.
“I was like, ‘I don’t want to go through that again, I want to be able to understand why somebody can charge me,’” she says. “I just wanted to understand it better. I never had big hopes of being some big criminal lawyer or anything like that. I just felt it’s important for people to know the justice system and the legal system.”
Chipiuk is a lawyer-turned-yoga teacher-turned-lawyer again. About five years into her legal career where she focused on property rights, Chipiuk, then in her early thirties, was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer. She knew she needed a break. She started practicing yoga and left her job to teach the discipline abroad.
“Four years of traveling the world. Literally. But I came back and my same old office took me back. I went to the same desk and some of the same files four years later. That’s law for you. It’s so slow,” Chipiuk recounts.
“And then after that, my yoga studio closed here in Edmonton… so I had the bright idea of opening up my own yoga studio and I said, well, if I’m going to open up the yoga studio, we need a healthy food cafe as well. So I just did it all.”
She opened a hot yoga studio, Studio X Bikram Yoga, and a Green Moustache Co. health food franchise in 2018.
Enter 2020, the COVID era.
With the government’s on-and-off lockdowns shutting down her studio, Chipiuk had to walk away from business ownership in January 2021.
“They kept shutting it down for months at a time without notice. I still had to pay my full crazy leasing bills and stuff. So I made a really tough decision just to walk away. It was like two children I had to just walk away from.”
She took a job with the City of Edmonton expropriating land for the highway and light rail transit system.
“I started working at home at my kitchen table. And even though I was to remain at my kitchen table, they wanted to enforce vaccine mandates. And I’m like, ‘this is kind of silly,’” she says. “I was seeing what was going on. And I was surprised that more lawyers weren’t doing anything.”
Chipiuk saw that employer vaccine mandates were imminent, so she quit her job with the city in October 2021 and joined the Justice Centre for Constitutional Freedoms.
“I was really keen to get involved in this legal battle, because I knew, it’s gonna be big, and it’s coming.”
It was with the Justice Centre that Chipiuk worked on the Peckford file, defending the mobility rights of unvaccinated Canadians who were barred from travelling by air or rail between 2021-2022.
“Not too many people generally challenge the government and that’s kind of what I was doing in my earlier career, is protecting or helping represent individuals or groups with their property rights. And then this all has been, with COVID, about personal rights. And so it was kind of a natural transition.”
Lawyer Keith Wilson, Chipiuk’s friend for over a decade, worked with her representing Tamara Lich and the Freedom Convoy organizers in Ottawa in early 2022, where they dealt with a class action lawsuit, injunctions, bank freezes, donation issues, and criminal charges.
“Eva and I were on the ground. And different lawyers came and went. The other lawyers found it too intense; asked to be relieved. But Eva never flinched,” Wilson tells True North.
“It’s absolutely clear that the media has made a conscious effort not to cover any of the cases that Eva has been involved in.”
Freedom Convoy organizer Tamara Lich notes the legacy media is “always promoting minorities: women this, women that. And there is a woman – there is a professional, intelligent woman – who cross-examined the prime minister, and no one’s talking about it.”
“Legacy media just seem to have one narrative that they side with. And that’s it,” Lich tells True North.
Wilson notes Chipiuk’s representation of Carrie Sakamoto, a 47-year-old Alberta mom who was hospitalized for over two weeks and had to undergo physical rehabilitation after being injured by the Pfizer vaccine.
“They don’t want to cover that,” he says of the legacy media. “They don’t want people to know about that. It goes against the narrative. And then it has the second layer that it goes against the government, it’s not in the federal Liberal government’s interest to have a story like that out. So they suppress that.”
Part of the reason the vaccine-injured woman wanted to sue the government was to raise awareness about her story amongst a mainstream audience, but no legacy media picked it up.
Legacy media journalists “have failed the Canadian people,” Chipiuk says.
“The financial hit that you take, when you stand up and do these types of cases, is a figure that you would never believe. It’s so huge. And you lose clients over it,” Wilson says, adding that both he and Chipiuk have been subject to politically motivated law society complaints, lawsuits, and hours upon hours of work without pay.
Chipiuk also runs an initiative called Empowered Canadians that aims to educate citizens about the political and legal system in Canada so they can become more involved in civic life.
I ask Chipiuk, who describes herself as politically closest to being a libertarian, if she was considering a run for office.
“Yeah, I’ve thought about it,” she says coyly.
“Municipal? Provincial? Federal?” I prod.
“I guess we’ll have to wait and see, won’t we?”
LAWTON: Feds wasted millions on ArriveCan app
Earlier this week, an Auditor General report revealed millions of dollars had been wasted in the contracting, development, and implementation of the ArriveCan app, citing a ‘glaring disregard’ for basic management practices. Macdonald-Laurier Institute domestic policy director Aaron Wudrick joined True North’s Andrew Lawton to discuss the implications of such mismanagement and the need for greater accountability in government spending.
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