The FAO’s report is out. Its topline finding is that Ontario is set to spend $11.7 million to run 9 Service Ontario branches in Staples Canada stores over the next three years – that’s about $1.5 million more than the estimate the government provided the public last year.

You can find the full report here, if you'd like to read it for yourself.

Doesn't Doug want to raise the speed limit on 400-series highways? A higher speed limit might have drastically worsened the outcome of this crash...

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.ca/post/36550208

The highways are literal ice, either thawing, freezing or going to become ice later tonight and people all over facebook, messenger, whatsapp, whatever are all messaging each other and me and my family asking what the highways are like today and if they can safely go out. People are dying on the highways this week all over the north. Stay at home.

The safest thing to do is just don't go on the highway when it is raining in December in northern Ontario!!!

According to a 2022 report by the Ontario Drug Policy Research Network, one in 13 opioid toxicity deaths happened among people working in the construction industry.

She said they often work big stretches of long shifts, deal with the loneliness of remote work, suffer from painful injuries and the pressures of a "work hard, pay hard mentality," including easy access to drugs on the job.

Over three-quarters of opiate toxicity deaths in trade workers happened to individuals who had a prior pain diagnosis, she said, but only one in six had a prescription for an opioid replacement medication.

Baker, who is now 36 years old, said unions are very supportive of workers and do their best to help people who need it, but it doesn't change the root problem: men are overworking themselves in gruelling conditions.

He said he's worked 120 days straight, all 12-hour shifts, something that is common among his peers. "We're breaking our bodies down," he said.

No paywall link: https://archive.ph/zUIcj

Next year, Ontarians are set to spend roughly one out of every five days in an election. The federal writs are due by the fall, and Ontario premier Doug Ford is expected to call an early election to get ahead of a police investigation into the Greenbelt scandal and to campaign against the federal Liberals, instead of the Conservatives, who are expected to soon replace them.

There are certain affinities between Ford and Trudeau, however – or perhaps unintended flattery by way of imitation. Both favour sending pre-election bribe cheques to voters. In October, the Ontario government announced it would send cash to residents in the new year, with $200 “rebates” going out “to support families facing high interest rates and the federal carbon tax.” In November, Trudeau announced he’d do the same – $250 cheques, in this case – alongside a GST holiday on a number of consumer goods from Dec. 14 to Feb 15. But while the GST break is on, the cheques are being held up in the House of Commons.

The federal government will not subject Ontario’s Highway 413 to an environmental review, clearing the way for construction on the project to begin as soon as 2025.

Environmental Defence, an advocacy group, tried to urge the review forward in October after Premier Doug Ford’s Progressive Conservatives introduced a bill that weakened Ontario’s environmental oversight of Highway 413. The charity made a formal request to federal Environment Minister Steven Guilbeault, who was mandated by law to respond by mid-January.

The latest request for that federal oversight was, to some, a last hope for stopping the project before shovels hit the ground.

But on the Friday before Christmas — with the governing Liberals in turmoil following the resignation of former finance minister and deputy prime minister Chrystia Freeland and a controversial cabinet shuffle — the federal government quietly posted a notice online, saying there will be no review.

“Ontarians are being let down by the federal government’s decision to not put back in place a federal impact assessment for Highway 413,” Gray said. “It is now impossible for federal decision-makers to understand how to best mitigate cumulative impacts on the environment, and to understand species at risk and conditions downstream.”

There are 29 federally-listed endangered species along the highway route. Among these are aquatic species in need of protection, such as the silver shiner and the redside dace, Gray noted.

Evidence strongly indicates the redside dace minnow may no longer exist in the wild in Canada, if the highway is built, Gray said.

“The federal government has a responsibility under the Species at Risk Act to ensure the survival and recovery of federally protected aquatic species,” Gray said. “Allowing this highway to move forward would destroy the remaining habitat of these endangered species.”

The group says environmental assessments, when conducted properly, prevent the government from falsely claiming that a project is safe.

Unfortunately, Ford had already jumped into the fray with both feet firmly in his mouth.

Ontario’s premier got Trump’s attention with a threat to cut electricity exports from Ontario to New York, Michigan and Wisconsin. A Ford spokesperson emphasized this could affect up to 1.5 million households.

While that sounds significant, let's put Ontario’s exports in context: the gargantuan eastern U.S. grid has 700 GW of generating capacity, while Ontario’s exports to that grid represent less than 0.3 per cent of that total. If Ontario stopped exports, the province would lose up to $700 million annually in revenue and further idle its generating capacity, or worse, waste off-peak electricity it can’t do anything with, while the U.S. has large resources to rebalance.

Ford’s tit-for-tat threat opened a door we don’t want opened. The idea of using energy as a cudgel is unbelievably terrible for Ontario when we look at how energy is supplied to the province. Ontario has far more to lose if the U.S. slashes energy supplies to Canada than the other way around.

Third time this year, overnight when it was empty just like before

Imagine being so mad at a building

After The Canadian Press published news of the unannounced expansion plans last year, two former conservation officers spoke out about the pens based on their experience investigating them in the years after the Harris government tightened the rules.

Rick Maw and Wayne Lintack said the dog sport is cruel to the captive prey and well-meaning regulations are impossible to enforce.

The two said the industry has long been rife with problems, including the illegal catching and warehousing of coyotes that are then fenced in as prey for the dogs. They also uncovered a coyote trafficking ring.

On April 2, 2006, conservation officers fanned out across southern and central Ontario for a series of raids. They seized nearly two dozen live coyotes and laid hundreds of charges. The criminal case eventually fell apart because it took too long to get to trial, but the province shut down a train-and-trial area where coyotes had been found packed in a barn.

Mississauga Mayor Carolyn Parrish recently generated headlines when she stepped down from her local police services board, calling the city’s escalating police budget “out of control.”

Desmond Cole visits her office to discuss her resignation and the alternatives to policing.

https://archive.is/MQeVa

Cycle Toronto has launched a Charter challenge against the Ford government’s new law that could remove three Toronto bike lanes.

The charity, along with two cyclists, Eva Stanger-Ross and Narada Kiondo, is seeking an injunction from Ontario’s Superior Court of Justice to prevent the removal of bike lanes on Bloor Street, Yonge Street and University Avenue.

The advocates have argued tearing the bike lanes out goes against the Charter’s guarantee to life, liberty and security of the person.

If the lanes are removed, “many thousands of Toronto cyclists will be forced to cycle in lanes shared with motor vehicle traffic” resulting in “heightened risk of injury and death,” Cycle Toronto argued in a statement of claim.

Gig delivery workers will be at particular risk because the nature of their work requires them to use the roads whether or not there are bike lanes, the cycling charity noted.