FROLITICKS

Satirical commentary on Canadian and American current political issues

Oct 9

Is National Legalization of Cannabis on the Horizon in the U.S.?

by bcurry

This past week, President Joe Biden pardoned thousands of Americans convicted of simple possession of marijuana.  What’s more interesting, Biden announced that he has instructed Secretary of Health and Human Services Xavier Becerra and Attorney General Merrick Garland to begin reviewing how marijuana is classified under federal drug laws.  Marijuana, also referred to as pot or weed, is currently a Schedule 1 substance under federal drug sentencing guidelines, the same as heroin and LSD.

The President’s move could be a first step in moving toward the federal government’s legalization of marijuana use for recreational and other purposes.  The issue leads us back to the legalization of marijuana by the Canada’s federal government in October 2018.  At the time, the new law made Canada the second country in the world after Uruguay to legalize cannabis.  In addition, on the day cannabis became legal, the Canadian government announced that it would introduce new legislation allowing people charged in the past with “simple possession” to apply for a pardon with no fee or waiting period.  By 2018, recreational cannabis was also legal for adults in nine U.S. states and the District of Columbia, and 30 states had government-sanctioned medical cannabis programs.  Today,19 states have passed recreational cannabis laws.

In both countries, there have been far too many persons who have ended up in prison for the simple possession of pot.  According to one study, as many as 500,000 Canadians may possess a criminal record for cannabis possession.  Their convictions hamper their ability to travel (most notably to the U.S), apply for jobs and volunteer with charities.  By some reported estimates in the U.S., there are nearly 5,000 laws on the books which bar people with past convictions from most of the necessities of life like housing, loans, work, and access to government services.  In both countries, arrests for cannabis possession particularly affected marginalized groups, disproportionately impacting people of color and low-income communities. 

Measuring whether the legalization of pot increased its consumption in Canada is difficult to ascertain.  Prior to 2018, most recreational pot users would not have declared their illegal possession and use, except in cases of medical cannabis use.  However, a Statistics Canada study based on data from the National Cannabis Survey showed that the prevalence of cannabis use has been increasing since its legalization in October 2018.  In fact, cannabis use in the year before the survey increased among Canadians aged 15 and older, from 15% in 2017 to 21% in 2019, for both men (from 19% to 23%) and women (from 11% to 19%).  It is believed that increased social acceptance of cannabis, and the increased number of outlets and range of products available were among the factors thought to have led to increased consumption.  In addition, cannabis can now be added to foods and drinks.  There is also some speculation that the COVID pandemic may have contributed to increased cannabis consumption due to the associated social and economic upheavals it caused over the past two years.

With the legalization of cannabis, Canada also introduced numerous regulations concerning its sale, production and distribution.  The Cannabis Act created new criminal offences for the sale of cannabis to youth — with penalties of up to 14 years in prison.  It also prohibits “illicit” cannabis of unlicensed producers, sellers and distributors.  Much like tobacco and alcohol, government regulations for growing and selling cannabis include standards for labelling and packaging.  Every package must be plain, without additional imagery besides brand name and logo.  Packages must also include a standardized cannabis symbol, a health warning and tetrahydrocannabinol (THC) concentration levels.  The government also established the tax rate for cannabis, to be split by the federal and provincial governments.  Of course, the government wanted a cut of the lucrative legalized cannabis action.  So far, the regulated cannabis industry appears to be working well, ensuring the control, quality and safety of the product sold.

It may be useful for the U.S. to examine the impact of Canada’s legalization of cannabis as part of its planned review of marijuana’s classification under federal drug laws.  The federal government may also want to get into alignment with legalization actions already taken by 19 of its states.

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Oct 4

Why The Minimum Wage Is Not A ‘Living Wage’

by bcurry

Going back over four decades, I studied changes across Canada in labour standards legislation, especially as they apply to minimum wages.  The minimum wage is the lowest hourly pay an employer can legally pay an employee whether they work part-time or full-time.  In Canada, minimum wages are primarily the responsibility of each of the ten provinces and three territories.  However, there is a federal minimum wage, which came into force in December 2021, adjusted automatically on April 1 of every year based on the average annual increase of the Consumer Price Index (CPI).  The federal minimum wage applies to workers and interns in federally regulated private sectors, including banks, postal and courier services, and interprovincial air, rail, road, and marine transportation — or roughly 6% of private sector employees in Canada.  The federal rate is currently set at $15.55 per hour.  Provincial and territorial minimum wage rates currently vary from $13.00 per hour in Saskatchewan to $15.50 in Ontario. 

Years after minimum wages were in first introduced in British Columbia and Manitoba in 1918, other jurisdictions followed suit.  Minimum wages are calculated and adjusted differently among the provinces, territories and the federal government.  Rates can be determined and adjusted according to regulations, rates of inflation and social and economic conditions.  In 2013, 61 percent of employees earning minimum wage were between the ages of 15 and 24, especially those working in the services sector (e.g. restaurants and fastfood chains) and the retail sector.  In recent years, there are those who argue that the current minimum wage rates do not reflect what became referred to as a ‘living wage.’  Originally, the formula for minimum wages was thought to be aligned with the average industrial wage rate, usually representing about 60 percent of that rate in Canada.  However, over the years, the determination of annual minimum wage rates became more a political factor based on the policies of the governing parties in power.  As a result, increases in the rates began to vary more extensively among jurisdictions and depended on the particular government in power.  For this reason, minimum wage rates began to lag far behind the rate of inflation and average industrial wage rates.

In today’s economy, many will rightly argue that current minimum wage rates, especially in urban centers, are putting workers in a near poverty situation given the high cost of living in many cities.  Matters have been made worst by the current hyperinflation being experienced across Canada.  As a result, many low-wage workers are required to have more than one job just in order to make ends meet.  Labour advocates say recent minimum wage gains are long overdue.  However, they also now advocate that the long-championed goal of a $15 an hour pay floor across the country no longer goes far enough to address the affordability crisis.  “We’ve been calling for a $15 an hour minimum wage for so many years, but now it’s no longer enough,” said Bea Bruske, president of the national Canadian Labour Congress. “It really needs to be $20 an hour or more when we look at inflation and the cost of food and housing.” 

Business organizations on the other hand continue to use the same old arguments against having a living wage.  These include the argument that higher minimum wages would cause employers to reduce the number of employees and the number of hours worked, potentially leading the hiring of more part-time workers.  A 2014 report from the right-wing Vancouver-based think-tank Fraser Institute concluded that both economic theory and the evidence suggest that living wages, like minimum wages, create distortions in the labour market that have a negative impact on employment.  Left-wing organizations in Canada, including the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives and Living Wages for Families continue to campaign for living wages, arguing a higher standard of living will benefit the overall economy. 

Remember what Henry Ford said about higher than normal wages for his automotive assembly line workers in the early 1900’s.  He argued that not only would the high turnover rates for the dull and monotonous work — running at over 300 percent — be reduced, but his workers would eventually buy his Model Ts as many of workers could then afford to buy one for themselves.  In today’s consumer society, one can argue the same is true for many low-income workers if they were to have a living wage.

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Sep 28

Prohibited ‘Assault-Style’ Weapons Have No Place in Canadian Society

by bcurry

On December 6, 1989, a man entered a mechanical engineering classroom at Montreal’s École Polytechnique armed with a semi-automatic weapon.  After separating the women from the men, he opened fire on the women while screaming, “You are all feminists.”  Fourteen young women were murdered, and 13 other people were seriously wounded.  The shooter then turned the gun on himself.  After the events of that tragic December, the Coalition for Gun Control was formed in Canada.  Their efforts contributed to the 1995 adoption of Bill C-68, the federal firearm control legislation.  Its stipulations included mandatory registration of all firearms and licensing for firearm owners; a national registry for all weapons; background checks; and verification processes and controls on ammunition sales.

On April 18–19, 2020, a gunman committed multiple shootings in the province of Nova Scotia, killing 22 people and injuring three others before he was shot and killed by the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP).  Two assault-style weapons were used in shootings, although it appears that they were not legally acquired and the gunman was known to police.  Subsequently and effective immediately in May 2020, the federal government introduced legislation to ban a total of 1,500 assault-style firearms for use, sale, import or transport in Canada.  It includes a two-year amnesty period for current owners.  Eventually, there will also be a buyback program, but those details were still being worked out.

This September, in an obvious political move, the provincial government of Alberta announced steps to oppose federal firearms prohibition legislation and the potential seizure of thousands of assault-style weapons.  It intends to ask the RCMP not to take part in the confiscation of these weapons.  Alberta’s chief firearms officer proclaimed: “The planned confiscations represent a fatal approach to reducing violence in Canadian society and are unwarranted and unacceptable infringements on the property rights and personal freedoms of Albertans.”

A survey, conducted in May 2020 exclusively for Global News, found that 52 percent of Canadians polled, living in nine major centres, agree that all types of guns should be made illegal.  The polling was completed between March 24 and April 2, before the above noted mass shooting happened in Nova Scotia.  The poll by the Angus-Reid Institute showed about 80 percent of Canadians also support a ban on “assault weapons.”  Canada is not the only country to ban assault-style weapons.  In March 2019, New Zealand banned all military-style semi-automatic weapons and assault rifles after a deadly shooting killed more than 50 people. 

Interestingly, there is no constitutional right to bear arms as in the U.S.  Indeed, one can Make a case that it is a weak argument in Canada that the banning of such weapons is an infringement on someone’s rights and personal freedoms.  I would argue that, just as owning and driving a motor vehicle, owning a gun is a privilege requiring training in its use, registration and other prescribed requirements for licensed users as regulated by law.  Just as there are restrictions on the ownership and use of a motor vehicle and one’s driving license, so must there be restrictions on acquiring certain types of guns as a matter of public safety.  No one should be surprised that after the Nova Scotia shootings some sort of inevitable government gun control action would occur, especially as the vast majority of Canadians appear to be in support of such initiatives.  During the 2019 federal election campaign Prime Minister Justin Trudeau noted that: “These weapons were designed for one purpose and one purpose only: to kill the largest number of people in the shortest amount of time”.

Although I do not own a gun, like many Canadians I believe strongly that the possession of either handguns or military-style semi-automatic weapons is not a fundamental right.  The fewer these weapons are around and accessible, the better off and safer we will all be.  One only has to look at the American tragic situation involving an increasing number of mass shootings using assault-style weapons every year, including those in schools, malls and workplaces.  Canada should do everything possible to avoid going down the same road!

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Sep 19

We Need to Adjust to Climate Change Now, Not Later

by bcurry

There are very few areas that aren’t affected by the consequences of climate change.  There are the number of extreme weather events that cause immediate damage and casualties, ranging from tornados and hurricanes to extreme heat and drought conditions.  Whether we can adjust to dealing with their consequences is a major question on many people’s minds, including mine.  Trying to slow up climate change appears to be a long-term goal.  This includes the introduction of new technologies to reduce the use of fossil fuels to heat and cool our homes, produce our electricity and transport people and goods.  Some refer to the increased interest in electric vehicles and renewable energy sources such as solar, wind and thermodynamics — all long-term in nature.  While this is all good and dandy, there appears to be a greater need for conservation and adjustment efforts on the part of all of us, especially in the short-term.

Increasingly, governments are being faced today with emerging issues resulting from the direct and indirect impacts on their citizens.  For example, it has been pointed out that Congress has helped cover Americans’ winter heating costs for decades.  But sweltering summers have made Americans’ energy bills soar, straining this key national safety net.  Under recent extreme heat events, Americans have died.  California has even recently introduced a new alert system designed to warn Californians of extreme heat forecasts.  In addition, these events place a great strain of the electricity infrastructure, forcing authorities to place embargos on the use of electricity, including that for air conditioning, during certain periods.  A significant proportion of the population, including the homeless, need to have access to cooling areas so as to avoid negative health impacts.  These health impacts in turn place a further burden on already strained health care facilities and emergency services.

The recent flooding of the Pearl River resulted in a temporary decrease in water production across the city of Jackson, the capital city of Mississippi.  According to state and local officials, the water system is failing.  Boil water alerts have become common place and can last for weeks.  Infrastructure from roads to water treatment is greatly in need of repair and many cases replacement.  During extreme heat events, roadways have even been known to buckle.  Bridges have been compromised and damaged due to flooding of local tributaries as a result of extreme rain events.  This in turn can cut communities off from emergency and support services, including access routes for supplies and people.  People are losing their homes.  Serious consideration must be given now to where homes are being constructed in known flood plains.

Of course, major droughts can lead to wildfires in many regions of the country, threatening towns, homes and agricultural lands.  Wildfires are unplanned and uncontrolled fires in natural areas, like forests and grasslands.  For example, the province of British Columbia (B.C.) has always experienced wildfires, but none as bad in recent years.  Evacuations of affected towns have become increasingly required.  One can’t forget the “out of control” wildfire that destroyed much of Lytton, B.C. during the summer of 2021.  Longer, hotter summers lead to more droughts and a longer wildfire season.  It is hoped that funding partnerships and community-led work, such as Firesmart, will reduce wildfire risks in B.C.  B.C. is also using climate information to set goals for resource management and to increase the resiliency of its forests.  Serious consideration must be given as to where homes are located in areas dominated by forests in particular, especially where access fire roads are few and far between.

In the area of conservation, there are a number of things that individuals and families can do.  For example, air conditioners (AC) and electric fans now account for about 10 % of electrical energy consumption all over the world.  Air conditioning can account for a whopping 60 to 70 percent of electrical power demand during peak hours.  Currently, there are companies that are in the process of developing new air conditioning technologies, thereby reducing the use of hydrofluorocarbons, or HFCs, which are greenhouse gases.  Hopefully, these ACs will become affordable and available in the near future.  Apparently, they could be two to three times more productive than the most common ACs on the current market.  In the meantime, people should now use their ACs in a restrained and sensible manner.

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Sep 16

Florida’s Gov. Ron DeSantis – Treating People Like Garbage

by bcurry

It’s an old phenomenon, municipalities with full landfills end up transporting their garbage — although always under contract — to other jurisdictions.  Such was the case years ago when Toronto decided to truck its garbage all the way to Michigan state.  After all, locally no one wanted a landfill in their backyard.  In very recent years, there have been examples of provinces or states doing the same thing, but this time with human beings.

In Canada, this happened when former Alberta premier Ralph Klein cut welfare rates in the 1990s and offered one-way bus tickets to welfare recipients to travel to sunny British Columbia (B.C.).  A similar incident occurred in 2016 in Saskatchewan when two young homeless First Nations men were each given one-way bus tickets by Social Services from North Battleford, Saskatchewan, to Vancouver and Victoria, B.C.  Needless-to-say, the B.C. provincial and municipal governments were not too happy about any other jurisdictions’ policies to simply dump people when their own support services were already under severe stress.

Now we have Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, a Republican, whose administration flew, on Florida taxpayers dime, two planes of Venezuelan migrants to Martha’s Vineyard, Massachusetts.  Apparently, they were not flown out of Florida but the flights actually originated in Texas.  Massachusetts of course is currently a Democratic-run state.  DeSantis said that Florida — not a sanctuary state — was sending migrants to Democrat-led states in response to their previous “virtue signaling” by declaring themselves sanctuary jurisdictions during former President Donald Trump’s years in office.  Around the same time, roughly 100 migrants aboard two buses sent by Texas Gov. Greg Abbott, a Republican, were dropped off in Washington, D.C. 

However, what about the impact on those migrants?  No one expected to land in Martha’s Vineyard, having reportedly been told they were going to Boston.  There is even some suggestion that, if the migrants were lured on to the plane under false pretences then it could have been illegal to do so.  Imagine, landing on a small offshore island with a population of about 20,000 people, an island accessible only by air and sea.  Obviously, the local authorities had few resources to care for these migrants.  As a result, Massachusetts authorities had to move the migrants voluntarily from Martha’s Vineyard to a military base in Cape Cod so they could find shelter and chart their next steps.  President Joe Biden responded, and rightly so, that the administration has a process in place to accommodate migrants at the border and Republicans shouldn’t interfere with such obvious “political stunts.”  The President further stated that “Republicans are playing politics with human beings, using them as props. What they’re doing is simply wrong.”

As in Canada, any influx of migrants is covered under federal laws and the federal jurisdiction should be responsible for enforcing those laws.  Canadian federal authorities are expected to coordinate settlement programs with the provinces, often funded by the federal government, that are designed to accommodate the arrival of and application by migrants or refugees as part of the process used to facilitate their landed status.  This process was used to deal with a significant number of migrants who entered Canada from the U.S. during the Trump administration, fearing their deportation in the U.S. back to their countries of origin at the time.

But what of the extreme confusion, disorientation and trepidation that such migrants must feel when they are suddenly transported to other jurisdictions without due process under the law or a clear awareness of the circumstances.  In the case of those Venezuelan migrants who had endured harsh and dangerous conditions to arrive in the U.S., one can only imagine how the Congressional Hispanic Caucus reacted.  Just as past inappropriate interjurisdictional policies were condemned in Canada, so must Americans condemn these inhumane policies which leave localities scrambling to secure resources in support of the normal needs of human beings.  I must say that I’m not surprised that Governors Ron DeSantis and Greg Abbott stooped so low as to implement such inhumane policies in order to gain some sort of political brownie points.  After all, we’re not dealing with garbage here!

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Sep 13

New Therapies Emerge To Deal With Climate Anxiety Symptoms

by bcurry

When I was a voluntary mentor to high school students as part of a community-based program, among the topics that young people wanted to discuss was that of climate change.  It was a topic for years that could not be avoided in light of existing discussion sites on the Internet and social media.  As we are seeing more and more severe weather events and their impact on people across the globe, but more importantly right here in North America, one cannot but help to wonder what the psychological impact is on youth.  Interestingly enough, there is now an emerging psychology field specializing in treating what has become referred to as ‘climate stress’ or ‘eco-anxiety’.

Recently, studies have indicated that eco-anxiety is particularly prevalent among college students.  For this reason, a number of college campuses have introduced group counselling sessions and individual therapy to allow students to talk through fears and frustrations of a world impacted by climate change.  However, it is recognized that many therapists and counsellors aren’t trained to provide students with this specific type of support, in part because of a lack of research about climate stress as a distinct phenomenon.  In addition, whether or not a therapist or counsellor believes in climate change, treating such anxiety must be done as in the case of any other anxieties.  Many leaders in mental health maintain that anxiety over climate change is no different, clinically, from anxiety caused by other societal threats, like terrorism or school shootings.  Interestingly, professional certification programs in climate psychology have recently begun to appear.  According to The New York Times, a group called the Climate Psychology Alliance now provides an online directory of climate-aware therapists.

While some will question the legitimacy of eco-anxiety, experts have come to recognize the range of feelings someone may have in response to climate change.  They point out that climate stress therapy is an effort to validate these emotions, help clients process their responses to climate change and provide coping strategies.  As for the causes of eco-anxiety, many individuals perceive that they are very real.  In January 2022, the publication Lancet in a 10-country survey of 10,000 people aged 16 to 25 reportedly found startling rates of pessimism. Forty-five percent of respondents said worry about climate negatively affected their daily life. Three-quarters said they believed “the future is frightening,” and 56 percent said “humanity is doomed.”

There is little doubt in my mind that young people, in particular, are increasingly expressing concerns about the potential impacts of climate change on their lives.  For this reason, they need to be informed and educated about the issue.  Many of its elements are complicated and not always very evident in their localities.  Understanding why they feel the way they feel is very important.  They need avenues in which to express their trepidations and fears.  Understandably, some will push to change familial and peer consumption and conservation patterns.  They may need our help, whether in schools or in communities.  Parents have to be aware of any symptoms that may be related to eco-anxiety.  Moreover, they must appreciate that this anxiety is real.  The more awareness by parents about community-based resources and accessible health-based information can prove to be invaluable. 

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Sep 9

Forecasts For Canada’s Population Growth By 2041 Reveal Interesting Trends

by bcurry

Today, Statistics Canada’s Centre for Demography released a new set of detailed demographic projections to 2041 on immigration and ethnocultural diversity for Canada and its regions.  The release notes that these new projections reflect the targets of the 2022–2024 Immigration Levels Plan released by Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada in February 2022, as well as the most recent demographic developments, including those related to the COVID-19 pandemic.  What’s really of interest is the projected composition of Canada’s population and where the majority of people will be living.

The projections note that by 2041 Canada’s population will reach 47.7 million, up from 14.4 million in 2016.  More importantly, about 25 million of the future population will be immigrants or the children of immigrants born in Canada, accounting for 52.4% of the total population.  This compares to 40.0% of the total Canadian population in 2016.  The Canadian population in 2041 is projected to include 9.9 million to 13.9 million people born in Asia or Africa, depending on the projection scenario.  In 2041, about 2 in 5 Canadians will be part of a racialized group.  The concept of “racialized” population is derived directly from the “visible minority group” variable and therefore refers to the persons belonging to a visible minority group.  In terms of location in 2041, the vast majority of the immigrant population would continue to live one of Canada’s 36 census metropolitan areas (CMA), with Toronto, Montréal, and Vancouver remaining the three primary areas of residence of immigrants.

Needless-to-say, all of these projections have massive implications for socioeconomic policies among the three levels of government: federal, provincial and municipal.  Canada today is recognized as multicultural society, increasingly having to apply a host of policies in the next two decades to deal with ethnocentricity, diversity, education, systemic racism, immigration, employment, etc., etc., to name a few.  Different regions and localities will incur diverse impacts, especially when it comes to resettlement and labour markets.  It can be expected that many of the racialized population will represent skilled labour and entrepreneurial capabilities.  One can expect that there will be a good deal of competition among localities and provinces to attract and accommodate skilled immigrants and entrepreneurs.  In addition, we anticipate that our aging population, those 65 and older, will continue to grow, which obviously will have a significant impact on health care resources.  A good proportion of the racialized population within the total population is expected to be younger than the population as a whole.  Future growth in the Canadian economy will greatly depend on this youth segment of the population, and governments will have to facilitate the addition of foreign labour to the labour market through efficient and effective settlement policies.

In general, both Canadian and American experts have long predicted future increased multicultural elements in both societies.  What the Statistics Canada report highlights is the fact that the projected trends, especially for the racialized population, will greatly increase and accelerate in the next couple of decades at a faster rate than previously forecast.  In order for both countries to benefit fully from these trends, governments must first recognize the projected population changes and their future impacts.  Like everything else, there will be those in society who will oppose such trends, which, unless many things change, appear to be inevitable.  The fact is that if we accept these projections, than we must begin now to develop and adjust many of our socioeconomic policies.  Not to do so would be somewhat catastrophic and regressive!

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Sep 5

Shouldn’t We Pay Health Care and Education Workers More Because of the Valuable Work They Do?

by bcurry

If there’s one thing to take from the pandemic is that workers in the health care sector and in our schools merit more pay than they currently have.  What could be more important than ensuring that our health and the education of our children meet today’s standards as modern industrialized countries?  Yet, the pandemic and an aging population have resulted in tens of thousands of teachers and health care workers to leave or retire from their profession.  The numbers don’t lie.  Take for example in the U.S., where recent statistics highlight that there is a massive teacher shortage, particularly severe in several states and many localities.  In Canada, the Canadian Nurses Association in a 2009 report predicted that Canada could see a shortage of 60,000 full-time nurses by 2022.  The estimate is based on a number of factors, including retirement projections, but of course doesn’t account for the serious impacts of the pandemic.

What is more disconcerting is the fact that within the teacher shortage, there are certain disciplines which are critical to developing a new labour force in the science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) fields.  Up until now, in both Canada and the U.S. immigrants continue to be a major source of STEM labour.  In Canada, adult immigrants accounted for 44% of all individuals aged 25 to 64 with a university degree in a STEM field in 2016, compared with 24% in the United States.  Can we continue to rely on immigrants to fill those job vacancies in high tech industries?  The teaching profession has grappled with a labour supply issue in STEM for years.  For example, according to a March 2022 report by the American Association of Colleges for Teacher Education, over the last decade, the number of teaching degrees and certificates conferred fell 27 percent in science and mathematics education.

On top of which, there are places that serve economically disadvantaged students where they are more likely to have vacant positions.  In lower income communities and in rural areas, school boards have a hard time attracting teachers to their schools.  We know certain types of teachers are also hard to attract, in particular STEM teachers and special education teachers.  As for special education teachers, the demand outpaces the supply.  Parents with autistic children or those with learning disabilities have complained, and rightly so, for a number of years about the lack of special education support in schools.  While something has to be done to encourage students enrolled in teachers’ colleges to become special education teachers, better pay and working conditions need to be promoted and implemented.

One of the things the pandemic has really shown the public is the value that nurses particularly bring to the health system.  As a result, I would hope that people recognize the importance that nurses play in making sure we all have access to care.  Interestingly, the media coverage during the pandemic did highlight the courageous acts by and commitment of nurses.  As a result, nursing colleges have seen a recent increase in applications within both countries.  However, burnout, wage competition with other sectors and early retirement has contributed to the current nursing shortage in the short-term.  When compared to health care workers in general, nurses continue to be underpaid given the extensive degree of training and responsibilities they have.

As a modern society, one needs to take a close look at where our priorities lie.  Everyone is touched by how well our health care and education systems work or don’t work.  Following the consequences of the pandemic for our children and aging population, we need to get our priorities straight.  This takes political and societal will and commitment to resolve these current specific worker shortage issues.  This is not something that technology alone can resolve.  These are people issues, requiring people solutions.  Unfortunately, up until now, most jurisdictions have been unable or unwilling to adequately address these immediate and long-term challenges.  I predict that within the next year, one will see this issue becoming increasingly a concern in both countries.

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Aug 31

Threats Against Politicians in Canada Becoming More Frequent and Inevitable

by bcurry

Verbal and physical threats against American politicians have been a constant factor in U.S. politics, with the most severe being the assassinations or attempts to assassinate politicians since that of John F. Kennedy.  In Canada, threats against political figures have grown in the last decade in particular.  During the 2019 federal electoral campaign, even Prime Minister Justin Trudeau was forced by his security detail in an “unprecedented” step to wear a bulletproof vest at a number of rallies.  It was also unprecedented to have a heavily armed uniformed Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) tactical team in plain sight around Trudeau, since normally they are in the background and out of site.  Just recently, Deputy Prime Minister Chrystia Freeland was verbally accosted by a man in a hotel lobby in Grande Prairie, Alberta.  The incident, although Ms. Freeland was not physically hurt, is now under investigation by the RCMP for potential criminal charges.  At the moment, there is an election in the province of Quebec where emotions run high over the provincial government’s handling of the pandemic.  Security around Quebec’s provincial party leaders appears to be high in the early days of the election campaign.  The potential of threats has forced Party Quebecois (PQ) leader Paul St-Pierre Plamondon to wear a bulletproof vest to keep him safe.  His party certainly recalls the deadly election-night shooting that marred the victory party of former PQ premier Pauline Marois in September 2012.  Quebec provincial police spokesman Nicolas Scholtus did not confirm whether security around the campaigning leaders was higher than in previous years, but he acknowledged that there was a rise in reports of harassment or threats directed at Quebec politicians during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Numerous Canadian politicians of all stripes condemned recent incidents of hateful threats against the PM and ministers in his cabinet, especially where female ministers and members of Parliament are targeted.  The general theme of condemnation is that such behaviour has no place in Canada.  They sincerely believe that people all run for office to promote dialogue on important public policy issues, and harassment like this cannot be tolerated.  However, simply issuing statements of condemnation most likely will not have an impact on the current political environment.  The RCMP and other enforcement agencies will have to continue to collect intelligence and conduct threat assessments for all events that political leaders attend. 

Michael Kempa, an associate professor of criminology at the University of Ottawa, pointed out that politicians everywhere have been facing increased threats due to what he calls “the new reality of polarization and violence that’s directed against public facing political leaders and other activists in our community.”  Professor Kempa attributes this in part to the spread of U.S. political culture, where threat levels have been high for years, and also to the COVID-19 pandemic.  Canadians can no longer rely on a tradition of promoting civility in political dialogue.  In an age of social media and digital conspirators, it has become difficult to lower the temperature of the political climate.  There are just too many disgruntled and angry individuals out there who are convinced that threats and violence are the only way in which to confront governments and politicians.  Unfortunately, the continuing outrage by Donald Trump followers after the F.B.I.’s seizure of classified documents at his Mar-a-Lago, Florida residence, has only contributed to further threats against government agencies, including the U.S. Justice Department and even the National Archives.  It doesn’t help that one of Mr. Trump’s closest allies, Senator Lindsey Graham, Republican of South Carolina, issued a similar warning that Mr. Trump quickly reposted on his social media platform.  Mr. Graham, in a Fox News appearance on August 28th, predicted that if the search of Mar-a-Lago led to a prosecution of the former president, there would be “riots in the streets”.

Canada has its own radical factions, as demonstrated by the occupation of its capital, Ottawa, by members of the truckers’ convoy for three weeks in January of this year.  There is little doubt that federal and provincial politicians will be a target for disgruntled individuals and groups.  One can only hope that there will be no resulting physical assaults on politicians and leaders.  I’m afraid that given the current polarization within Canadian society that such eventuality cannot be prevented, despite heightened security measures for political figures.

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Aug 26

What If An Employer Asks You To Pee In A Cup?

by bcurry

Recently, a study in the U.S. found that positive workplace drug tests hit a two-decade high, fuelled largely by the legalization of marijuana across a variety of states.  Cannabis, also known as marijuana (among countless other names), was banned in Canada from 1923 until medical cannabis became legal in 2001.  In 2018 Canada became the second country in the world after Uruguay to legalize marijuana for recreational adult use, and the first G7 country to do so.  Studies have shown that as more young people enter the labour market, their attitudes about using recreational marijuana are much more liberal and open than older generations.

This brings us to the issue of drug testing in the workplace.  In Canada, for some time now, the courts have objected to random drug testing.  Only in the period after a workplace accident where it is suspected that drugs or alcohol may have been involved, did Canadian employers get the green light to do limited employee testing as part of any investigation.  By comparison in the U.S., some federal regulations actually require employers in the aviation and other in safety-sensitive industries to conduct random testing, specifying the minimum percentage of employees who must be covered each year.  However, American laws on drug testing are complex and vary from state to state.  The Supreme Court of Canada’s “Irving” decision in 2013, which set out guidelines for when random, unannounced tests can be justified, said that random testing had been “overwhelmingly” rejected by arbitrators as “an unjustified affront to the dignity and privacy” of employees in safety-sensitive jobs, except when there was reasonable cause.”  On the other hand, some two decades ago, the U.S. Supreme Court first upheld the right to test for drugs in the workplace.

Testing for substance use is in itself a problem, especially when it comes to cannabis.  Most important variable is frequency of use.  Unlike alcohol use, for a first time cannabis user a trace of cannabis use could last for 3 days.  For a daily user, it could last 30 days or more.  In addition, the higher the Tetrahydrocannabinol (THC) level, which is the principal psychoactive constituent of cannabis, the longer it takes to metabolize in body.  Edibles take longer than smoking.  Weight and body fat also affect trace amounts due to THC binding to fat tissue.  More importantly, often capacity for detection and time to get results can depend on kind of tests given, such as urine, blood, saliva and hair tests.  Each testing method has a different ability to accurately determine the level of THC.  Normally, traces of cannabis use will disappear in about 30 days.  However, THC can be detectable for weeks, even months depending on one’s use, potency and frequency.

One of the privacy concerns with random testing is the matter of prescription medication and medical marijuana use which could disclose an underlying health issue that the employee may not want the employer to know about.  It could also disclose someone who is in addiction treatment.  Interestingly, there appears to a dearth of data from independent groups in the U.S. regarding impairment from prescription drugs in the workplace, partly because the issue has not drawn broad scrutiny.  However, Quest Diagnostics, an American clinical laboratory that operates in the U.S. and Canada and a prominent provider of workplace drug tests, said that the rate of employees testing positive for prescription opiates rose by more than 40 percent from 2005 to 2009, and by 18 percent in 2009 alone.  Increasingly, with an aging workforce, one can imagine that the use of prescription medication will increase, a concern for many industries in light of potential insurance liabilities.

As of now, Canadian case law severely restricts random drug testing of employees, even in safety-sensitive occupations.  For example, an Ontario court most recently struck down the Ottawa airport’s plan to conduct unannounced, random drug tests on its firefighters, citing a lack of evidence the group has a substance-abuse problem that would justify such a “highly intrusive” invasion of privacy.  The ability of an employer to require a random drug test appears to be much more difficult in Canada than in the U.S.  Some would say that there are pros and cons under certain situations, but much depends on previous case law in both jurisdictions.

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