As more western countries begin to adopt increasingly leftist ideologies and values, the time to push back against them is running out.
Brendan O’Neill, author of “A Heretic’s Manifesto” and the Chief Political Writer at Spiked joins Rupa on the show to discuss the ideas staining our culture today. They talk about the consequences of transgenderism, climate alarmism and more.
O’Neill argues that now is the time for brave dissidents to stand up and reject dangerous ideas that are leading to a society where the prevailing groupthink will no longer be questioned.
Just because elementary and secondary school officially ends next week in Ontario does not mean that all the problems associated with an infestation of woke ideology in the province’s school boards will magically disappear.
The issues will merely be held in abeyance until school returns in the fall – the violence, the obsession with queer activism and gender ideology and a curriculum steeped in critical race theory dressed in the guise of anti-black racism.
The province’s weak education minister Stephen Lecce has stood by and allowed the most ridiculous of issues to escalate without saying enough is enough.
For example, violence is out of control in Toronto District School Board (TDSB) schools, and, at boards like the Waterloo Region District School Board, a cabal of woke trustees and the radical education director Jeewan Chanicka have done their best to cancel and intimidate parents who come to the board pleading for less woke ideology and more academics.
It has led to open letters from frustrated teachers sick and tired of trying to manage the violence with little help from their administrators, who spend their time trying to indoctrinate staff.
These letters are a first.
Recently a Grade 7 teacher at a MIssissauga middle school wrote exclusively to me about how “disillusioned” he has become with the education system.
He says student behaviour has been getting “progressively worse” in the past five years.
“The more difficult students in the school you will see consistently wandering the halls during instructional time,” the 22-year teacher wrote.
He reported that wokism has completely infiltrated the teacher evaluation and training process.
In the past teachers would be evaluated on how they teach reading, writing and math. Classroom management skills would be discussed and they’d be asked how they deal with parents and student behaviour.
Now, says the teacher, the focus is on buzzwords like Critical Race Theory (CRT) and how teachers incorporate anti-black and anti-Indigenous racism into their classroom lessons.
In Peel, he says CRT stands for Culturally Responsive Teaching, which is really just a buzz word for Critical Race Theory.
Failing evaluations are possible if teachers don’t show that they deliver “culturally responsive lessons” and studies about “dismantling racism.”
“There is zero interest now from the administration and the board on teaching the 3 Rs or classroom management when we are evaluated,” he wrote. “It’s all about implementing woke, progressive policies and theories.”
He says staff meetings have become personal development sessions on progressive theories and wokism.
Staff sit though an hour or so session every month on anti-black this, anti-Indigenous that, and are lectured about “unconscious bias” and white privilege, he said.
“We leave our staff meetings feeling as though we are all racist teachers that, if we do not teach a ‘culturally responsive’ pedagogy, then we are horrible, racist, white supremacist educators,” he said.
In a move bordering on absurd, he says these PD sessions are now led by a special, full-time “modern learning resource teacher” whose job it is to travel from school to school to enlighten staff about the need to teach kids about CRT and to lecture them about “educator bias.”
Not surprisingly, he says the union is absolutely no help. While complaining to the media about school violence they still support and implement progressive, woke ideologies that just contribute to the problem, he contends.
The union also continues to protect inept teachers. Far too often, he’s observed teachers playing on their phones in the halls and during duties or even talking on their cellphones in class in front of students.
“We need to be setting an example, not acting like the students,” he says, noting that these habits tend to be seen with the younger educators.
He wonders why the Ford government does nothing to deal with this.
It remains to be seen whether their new Bill 98 The Better Schools and Outcomes Act will do anything to right the ship.
From what I’ve observed writing about these issues for the past year, unless the Ford government is prepared to monitor school boards and introduce penalties for those who don’t get back to basics, their legislation isn’t worth the paper it is printed on.
The Grade 7 teacher observes, quite rightly, that kids are not being prepared for the real world.
“When assignments can be handed in whenever they feel like it, when teachers have to ask permission to give kids a D or failing mark, when teachers are not permitted to put any negative comments on report cards, and when disciplining a student amounts to no disciplinary action actually being taken, then as an educator I fear for the future,” says the teacher.
“Students will not be able to handle the demands and stresses of the real world of deadlines and expectations. We are failing our students and teachers’ hands are tied.”
The Progressive Conservative Premier of Ontario Doug Ford cautions Torontonians to not vote for mayoral candidate Olivia Chow, warning them of inevitable tax increases and urban decay if she wins Toronto’s June 26th byelection.
In a Burlington, Ontario press conference, Ford was asked by reporters about former Toronto mayor John Tory’s endorsement of Ana Bailão for the mayoralty.
Not responding to the question directly, he urged Torontonians to have their voices heard by voting, but warned that the race’s left-wing frontrunner will pose challenges to business and affordibility in the city.
“I’ll tell you if you want my opinion, if Olivia Chow gets in it’ll be an unmitigated disaster,” said Premier Ford.
Ford told reporters that Chow would raise taxes on Toronto’s residents like never before seen, up to 30%, the Premier estimates.
“She makes David Miller look like a fiscal conservative,” said Ford, taking a jab at both Chow and the former mayor’s record.
“God forbid Olivia Chow gets elected, your taxes are going up at an unprecedented rate. Companies will leave, and I’ll tell you, I hear even the staff at City Hall is worried.”
Chow has been a Toronto-area politician for decades, serving as a school board trustee from 1985-1991, a Toronto city councillor from 1991-2005, and an NDP MP for Trinity-Spadina.
Doug Ford’s late brother Rob Ford served in Toronto City Hall with Chow from 2000-2005.
Chow’s platform has been criticized for being scant on details and having large spending promises that will require double-digit property tax increases.
Despite this, Chow has maintained a considerate lead ahead of the rest of the candidates, consistently polling in the low 30’s.
A recent Forum Research poll pegs Chow at 32% support among decided voters, 17% higher than the next best candidate who is polling at 15%.
Premier Ford recently announced that he has a Mark Saunders election sign on his lawn, and will be voting for the former Toronto police chief on June 26th.
Saunders has positioned himself as the anti-Chow candidate in recent weeks, but this shift in campaign strategy has not accompanied a bump in the polls.
Forum Research estimates that Saunders has around 1% more support than he did at the beginning of the campaign, up from 14% to 15%.
An unvaccinated Canadian who’s been denied a life saving organ transplant now has the option to receive the transplant in the US, but at a hefty price tag.
Sheila Annette Lewis has been fighting Alberta Health Services’ (AHS) decision to remove her from the top of the organ transplant list over her decision to refuse the Covid-19 vaccine since last year. Earlier this year, the Supreme Court of Canada decided not to hear her case.
Lewis says a hospital in Texas has agreed to perform the transplant surgery, but it will cost Lewis $600,000 USD. Lewis is hoping to fundraise the costs off GiveSendGo.
“The only thing we have is hope,” she told True North.
She must first pay $100,000 for testing before being placed on the donor list to ensure her body is healthy enough for a transplant. Lewis says the hospital requires the full amount before beginning testing.
It’s the same testing she underwent in Canada, but health officials stopped testing her two years ago when she declined the Covid vaccine.
If she’s approved, which Lewis is confident she will be, the surgery is estimated to cost an additional $500,000.
As of Thursday morning, the GiveSendGo fundraiser sits at around $35,000. It’s far short of the $100,000 goal, but more than $10,000 was raised in just one day.
Lewis was unsuccessful at both the Alberta Court of Queen’s Bench and the Alberta Court of Appeal in 2022, with both levels of court finding that the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms does not apply to the Covid-19 vaccine policies of AHS, the Alberta Hospital where she would receive her transplant, or her transplant doctors. Both courts also dismissed her claims under The Alberta Bill of Rights.
There is a court-ordered publication ban that covers the organ Lewis is seeking a transplant for, the names of the doctors, and the hospital’s name and location.
In a November ruling, the appeal court acknowledged it’s a “virtual certainty” Lewis will die without an organ transplant.
In March, Lewis provided her Alberta Transplant Program doctors with a privately funded medical report, known as the Kinexus Report, establishing her natural immunity to Covid-19.
She has now filed a new negligence claim against AHS and awaits a court date.
“I’m not going to go away,” she said in a recent interview with Rebel News. “I have to fight for my life.”
“I don’t want to die. I’m 58 years old and I have a reason to live. I have grandchildren and I have children.”
In November, the Alberta Health minister’s office said transplant programs are obligated to do all they can to ensure the best possible outcomes of a donated organ. Patients awaiting treatment are required to be vaccinated against infections like diphtheria, tetanus, polio, pneumococcal pneumonia, meningitis, influenza, Covid-19 and more, the office said.
The former Alberta Health minister, Jason Copping, lost his seat in the May 29th election.
Taxpayers were billed $61,000 for hotel rooms during a recent trip to New York City by Prime Minister Justin Trudeau to attend the celebrity-studded “Global Citizen NOW” anti-poverty summit.
In a six minute- video uploaded to social media, Former Toronto mayor John Tory has endorsed his one-time deputy Ana Bailão to become the next mayor of the city.
The Alberta government says it will hire outside arson investigators because it requires additional support due to the unusually early and aggressive wildfire season.
Tune into The Daily Brief with Rachel Emmanuel and Noah Jarvis!
“Please sir, I want some more.” This famous line comes from Charles Dickens’ classic novel, Oliver Twist. Set in mid-19th century England, Dickens vividly depicted the extreme poverty experienced by London’s many orphans. Readers naturally sympathize with the young orphan who just wants a little more food. As they should. These orphans needed a lot more, not just a little.
Unfortunately, Canadian teacher unions seem to think that they’re the 21st century incarnation of Oliver Twist. Hardly a month goes by without a union leader demanding more money. Of course, they try to make it look like they are advocating for students.
For example, the Saskatchewan Teachers’ Federation is loudly denouncing the Saskatchewan government’s recent announcement of an extra $40 million for public education. In the federation’s view, that number is “missing a zero.” Meanwhile, the British Columbia Teachers’ Federation panned their province’s latest budget because it lacked targeted funding to hire more teachers.
It’s a similar story in other provinces. No matter how much money provincial governments pour into public education, teacher unions, like Oliver Twist, always want more. However, unlike Oliver Twist, they have no idea how much more would be enough to satisfy them.
Clearly, teacher unions fail to realize there’s only so much money to go around. Every dollar used to hire more teachers or increase their salaries is money that must come from somewhere else—either by cutting other services or raising taxes on the public. It’s easy for an interest group to demand more money when they don’t have the responsibility of figuring out where that money will come from.
In addition, no province has actually cut education spending. While spending increases haven’t fully kept pace with the unusually high inflation rates over the last couple of years, school boards across the country still receive more money than they did before. Besides, if increases in education spending are supposed to be linked with inflation, then provinces spent far too much when they gave three per cent (or higher) salary increases to teachers in years when inflation was much lower.
The problem is that we have a bureaucratically dominated education system where there’s little to no accountability for outcomes. And salaries comprise the vast majority of education spending. Thus, salaries and benefits will invariably gobble up any spending increases.
Therefore, there’s no reason to assume that more money will lead to better results. No one seriously thinks, for example, that paying teachers five per cent more results in a five per cent improvement in academic achievement. Nor is it reasonable to assume that simply hiring more teachers will fix the problem, particularly since there’s no guarantee that these new teachers will be good at their jobs.
Obviously, it’s important to ensure that teachers are fairly compensated. However, Canadian teachers are paid quite well by international standards. In fact, Canadian teacher salaries are generally much higher than those of their American counterparts. It would be foolish indeed to pour more money into the education system without a clear plan to get better results.
So, instead of protecting the existing system, we should empower families. Provinces should decide how much money to spend on each student (with a higher allotment for students with special needs) and then let parents use that money to enroll their children in the schools of their choice—whether it’s a public school, charter school or independent school. Then hold these schools accountable with regular standardized tests.
No longer would school boards be able to pad their roster with consultants or blow money on professional development sessions of questionable value. By giving parents the ability to remove their children—and take their funding with them—school boards would have to become more responsive to parents and more careful with their spending.
More money is not the solution. Spending it more wisely is. The next time teacher unions say that they want some more, we need to give them a firm no. They get plenty already.
Michael Zwaagstra is a public high school teacher and a senior fellow at the Fraser Institute.
Documents show that taxpayers were billed $61,000 for hotel rooms during a recent trip to New York City by Prime Minister Justin Trudeau to attend the celebrity-studded “Global Citizen NOW” anti-poverty summit.
As reported by the National Post, the documents containing the figures were released in response to an order paper question from B.C. Conservative MP Dan Albas.
Fourteen rooms were booked at the luxury Intercontinental New York Barclay hotel for the night of April 25, 39 rooms were booked for the night of April 26 and 27, and 11 were booked for the night of April 28.
Each hotel room cost $562.72 CAD per night.
The government also rented an office for PMO and Privy Council Office staff to use in the hotel, for the cost of $1,137.29 CAD. However, the document notes that the latter is standard procedure during Prime Ministerial trips.
Trudeau flew from Ottawa to New York on an RCAF Challenger private jet on April 26. Eleven other passengers were on board the plane, including Trudeau’s executive assistant James Armbruster, his official photographer Adam Scotti, his official videographer Akshay Grover, former PMO adviser Jeremy Broadhurst and chief-of-staff Katie Telford.
The documents did not provide the cost of the flights.
Reacting to the news, Conservative ethics critic Michael Barrett questioned why Trudeau travelled to New York while Canadians are struggling at home.
“This comes at a time when, because of Trudeau’s inflationary deficits and ever increasing carbon taxes, many Canadians are cancelling their own travel plans, one in five are skipping meals, and millions are accessing food banks every month,” said Barrett.
The Prime Minister’s office directed the National Post to Global Affairs Canada, which noted that hotel rooms were used by delegation members who did not travel onboard the government private jet.
“The Canadian delegation for the Prime Minister’s visit to New York consisted of the Ambassador of Canada to the United States of America, the Ambassador for Women, Peace and Security, staff from the Prime Minister’s Office as well as officials from the Privy Council Office and Global Affairs Canada,” said Global Affairs.
“Not all delegation members traveled with the prime minister.”
The Global Citizen NOW summit, seen as a place of gathering to take “urgent action” to end extreme poverty, was also attended by several other political leaders and celebrities.
French President Emmanuel Macron, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen and Barbados Prime Minister Mia Mottley were also in attendance.
Musicians John Legend, Billie Eilish and actor Hugh Jackman also attended, as well as rock star Lenny Kravitz, Canadian model Sabrina Elba, and actors Jordan Fisher and Katie Holmes.
“Building a future that is fair, equal, and peaceful, with clean air and clean water for everyone, is at the heart of the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals and reflects the vision of the Global Citizen NOW summit,” said Trudeau in a statement before attending the event.
“In New York City, I look forward to advancing our shared progress and advocating for strong global commitments to support gender equality and the empowerment of women and girls everywhere.”
Global Citizen was founded in 2008. The group says its mission is to “to end extreme poverty worldwide, now.” “Our voices inspire action to defend the planet, defeat poverty, and demand equity.”
Trudeau was previously in hot water after it was revealed that taxpayers were billed $475,000 CAD for hotel rooms at the five-star Corinthia London for Queen Elizabeth II’s funeral. Trudeau stayed in a $6000 per night River Suite during that trip.
Former Toronto mayor John Tory has endorsed his one-time deputy Ana Bailão to become the next mayor of the city.
In a six minute- video uploaded to social media, Tory talked about a mayor’s crucial roles and responsibilities and why he thinks Bailão is capable of delivering.
“The candidate who can best work with other governments, work with city council to make material advancements in housing, employment, services and taxes is Ana Bailão,” Tory said in french.
“She [Bailão] is the leader who can deliver on the promise of Toronto, on the promise that is Toronto.”
Tory lauded Bailão’s history as an immigrant who became successful, referring to her as a “fighter,” a “negotiator,” and a “leader.”
“Ana earned my respect and my trust because of who she is and what she can do.”
Tory served as Toronto’s mayor for two full terms beginning in 2014, but his third term was cut short after a story broke in the Toronto Star revealing an affair he was had with a city employee, compelling him to resign.
Tory’s endorsement of Bailão’s campaign comes as no surprise as she was appointed as one of Tory’s deputy mayors, and served in the role from 2017-2022.
Bailão has received a lot of support from Toronto’s political class, being with nine Liberal MPs endorsing her as have seven city councillors, and former Toronto mayors Art Eggleton and Barbara Hall.
At a press conference earlier in the day, Premier Doug Ford said he and Tory have an “excellent relationship,” but has chosen to endorse Mark Saunders for the mayoralty instead.
Saunders attacked Tory for endorsing Bailão, tweeting that Tory gave up on Toronto again and that Chow is the winner of a “Tory backroom deal.”
While Bailão has received many high-profile political endorsements, it has not translated into a winning campaign, according to public opinion polling throughout the election.
A recent Forum Research poll pegged Bailão at 13%, tied for third place and nearly 20 points behind the race’s frontrunner Olivia Chow.
Conservative leader Pierre Poilievre addressed a town hall meeting in Timmins, Ontario last week that drew dozens of citizens concerned about rising crime and drug use in their city.
“For her to be scared to go to a movie or to school or be out in the neighbourhood is unacceptable. The people of Timmins have the right to be safe in their own community,” Poilievre said in response to 18-year-old Phoenix Blaine, who expressed fear of wandering her neighbourhood and wonders if she’d be safer elsewhere.
“That’s why our common sense Conservative plan seeks to bring home safety by putting the most violent repeat offenders behind bars for reasonable sentences.”
A town hall meeting in Timmins, Ontario last week drew dozens of residents who expressed dismay about the rising crime and drug problems in their city and it caught the attention of Conservative leader Pierre Poilievre.
According to Poilievre, Blaine’s testimony moved him to demand further action on the issue of northern and rural crime.
Poilievre blamed the Trudeau government’s lax bail laws for allowing violent repeat offenders to be released back into the community.
He said the Conservatives would reverse the “catch-and-release” policies and impose longer sentences for those who commit multiple crimes.
Poilievre also said he would address the root cause of the crime wave, which he identified as drug use.
He said addicts need treatment and rehabilitation, not safe consumption sites or decriminalization. According to Poilievre, a Conservative government would fund more facilities where addicts can get help to overcome their addiction and rebuild their lives.
“We would also get at the root cause of this, which is drugs. We believe that addicts need treatment, rehab and detox to get them off drugs, that is the only way to end their cycle of theft,” said Poilievre said.
“A lot of people are stealing so they can pay for fentanyl and other powerful drugs. The only way to put an end to that is to get them off the drugs.”
The Liberal government has introduced a bill to reform the bail system, but Bill C-48 has not yet passed second reading. The bill would make it harder for people who have been charged with a violent offence involving a weapon to get bail if they have a similar conviction in the past five years.
But according to Poilievre, the law doesn’t go far enough.
“The problem is that reverse onus already exists for many offenders, and it hasn’t stopped them from being released,” said Poilievre.
“They should be held behind bars until their trial is done and their sentence is complete.”
Political analysts continue to do an autopsy on Monday’s four byelections to see if there are any mysteries in the outcomes.
Nothing in the House of Commons will change, of course. The Liberals retained their two seats, as did the Conservatives.
The status quo offers few mysteries, so the analysts have had to sift through the entrails.
Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre can take some comfort from the fact that Maxime Bernier couldn’t manage more than 17% in Portage-Lisgar — four points below what the People’s Party of Canada (PPC) leader received there in 2021.
If Poilievre’s leadership has so far been aimed at bringing back Conservative voters who went to the People’s Party in 2021, Portage-Lisgar offers some evidence that he is succeeding.
The Conservatives might not have knocked Bernier out, but they have at least knocked him for a minor loop.
Poilievre can at least stop dramatically worrying about wooing the People’s Party crowd to secure his path to electoral success.
Portage-Lisgar is about the only riding that would give Bernier some decent numbers, coming second in 2021, but significantly losing this time around.
Bernier had said the People’s Party is “the only national political party thinking about important issues” like relitigating the legal status of abortion, stopping what he calls “toxic transgender ideology,” and ending the country’s overreaction to climate change.
“Our opponent and the establishment try to say, ‘Oh no, those issues are settled.’ Well, they’re not,” he said.
Leslie and Bernier traded barbs throughout the campaign. Bernier has called his opponent a “fake” conservative. Leslie, in turn, has called Bernier “an opportunist from Quebec who will say or do anything he thinks people want to hear.”
Still, there is a spot of bother on the horizon for Tory candidate Branden Leslie over a video of him that the Liberals dug up Sunday that has him stating he would have voted against the legislation that banned conversion therapy.
Without the PPC hovering over Pierre Poilievre’s right flank, the party could campaign closer to the centre in the next general election.
After all, Conservatives don’t stand to make easy inroads into desperately needed suburban Toronto ridings without at least some moderation of what is right now a very hard-right and populist.
Monday night’s result in Winnipeg South Centre was not even close. Two years ago, the late Liberal minister Jim Carr won the riding by nearly 18 points. On Monday, Carr’s son Ben won the riding by almost 32 points — matching the spread that Jim Carr had in 2015 when the Liberals won a majority government.
In the southwestern Ontario riding of Oxford, the outcome was grimier and closer. Arpan Khanna won over a field that included Deb Tait, the daughter of retiring MP David MacKenzie.
But other party members in the riding were highly concerned, claiming they were poorly treated by party headquarters. Two Conservative Electoral District Association executive members in Oxford, in fact, quit their posts after Khanna’s candidacy got the nod.
MacKenzie, in fact, was so incensed he endorsed the Liberal candidate.
The results in these four ridings results don’t reflect anything about what could happen in a federal election that might still be two years away. But if the tide of public opinion was moving decisively against the government, one could expect to see the Liberals losing ground or the Conservatives gaining it.
Beyond Portage-Lisgar, however, the margins for the Conservative Party last night appeared to be getting worse, not better.
The byelections, in fact, might speak to some latent support for the Liberals that isn’t showing up in polls.
Abacus gave the Conservatives a seven-point lead nationally last week, but these results might also be traced back to that lack of comfort with the alternatives.
