Conservative leader Pierre Poilievre speaks at a news conference in Calgary in November.Jeff McIntosh/The Canadian Press
Ring, ring
Re “House Leader says there are other frustrated Conservative MPs” (Dec. 13): Is Michael Ma an opportunist, someone who saw a shift in the winds and went with it, or is he genuinely hopeful he can have more impact in government than outside it? I have no insight into his thinking.
But I do believe it’s another alarm bell ringing over Pierre Poilievre’s leadership. If the Conservatives reaffirm him in January, I wouldn’t be surprised to see one or more moderate Tories either announcing they won’t run again, or following Mr. Ma across the floor.
There would be no election in the offing, so plenty of time for a leadership convention.
Steve Mertl Vancouver
The Conservatives and Liberals have been relatively deadlocked in recent polls. The leaders, however, have been separated by 20-odd points in Mark Carney’s favour.
It’s conceivable that with a different leader, the Conservatives could have won the last election. Yet they continue to support Pierre Poilievre.
Doesn’t that make voters wonder if this party is really capable of governing?
David Chalmers Toronto
But when?
Re “What ails us” (Letters, Dec. 10): Letter-writers are taking shots at each other.
Anti-pipeline groups are incensed that, in the midst of serious climate anomalies, pro-pipeline groups embrace getting more petroleum to market. With the imminent consequences of climate change, plus a trade war and upheaval in Indigenous land claims, should now not be the moment to impose negotiations and start speaking in plain language?
On the other hand, it should be essential that anti-pipeline groups demonstrate how Canada will replace oil finances while planning a fair transition, shifting from gas vehicles and building electric vehicle infrastructure, as well as overhauling health care, funding housing, solving the drug crisis, fighting a trade war, fulfilling our military buildup, negotiating with First Nations and paying down our historically high public debt. This is just a short list.
Conflicts cannot be resolved until they’re defined; parties start by understanding each other. May our Prime Minister facilitate this conversation, soon.
Jim Fryeskul Vancouver
Pipelines, very much in the news, are not new.
For more than a decade, Canadians discussed and debated the merits of the Trans Mountain pipeline and Northern Gateway proposal, and how new markets for bitumen stack up against the hazards of oil spills.
But the crux of the matter should not be exports and coastlines, or even oil and water. It should be time, since proponents emphasize rapid resource exploitation and opponents highlight long-term sustainability.
To help resolve the matter, we might poll our grandchildren’s grandchildren: What are their priorities?
James Schaefer Peterborough, Ont.
Luxury taxes
Re “Ottawa weighing tax reforms to attract foreign capital for Canadian real estate developments” (Dec. 9): While the federal government – and hopefully provincial governments, too – is at it, I believe it would be wise to revisit Canada’s ban on foreign buyers and other punitive policies that have inadvertently impacted the sales of luxury, recreational and investment properties, starving the Canadian economy of untold tax and other revenue.
Given today’s circumstances, reserving homes deemed to be “affordable” for purchase by Canadians and other qualified buyers should be sufficient protectionism. An outright ban on foreign buyers, plus taxes that penalize Canadians for owning property in other provinces, should be seen as folly.
Canada’s once overheated real estate market has cooled. There should be government incentives to bring this vital sector back to life, for everyone’s benefit.
Randall Mang Sidney, B.C.
Try again
Re “Will Quebec’s child care model work in New York?” (Dec. 9): Recent data show for-profit centres – funded equivalently to non-profits, or funded by tax credits to parents – more often failing quality measures than non-profits. Other Quebec studies, and research in multiple countries using different methods, show the same.
Thus it’s a mystery to me why governments continue to believe it is a good idea to spend public funds to subsidize private profit. Scholar Deb Brennan, who studied Australia’s ABC Learning Centres fiasco, points out that private sector solutions attract governments as they seek to save money.
Quite the reverse: For-profit child care solutions have repeatedly been the pricey ones in dollar terms, while delivering low value-for-money outcomes by subsidizing child care likely to be poorer quality.
Martha Friendly Childcare Resource and Research Unit, Toronto
Keep in mind
Re “Plans to lower training requirements for psychologists in Ontario worry clinicians” (Dec. 9): I was thankful to see your coverage of the significant controversy in psychology in Ontario today. Our profession is gravely concerned because the vast majority of us believe these changes will put Ontarians at risk, particularly in the form of misdiagnosis.
One recent survey from the Psychology Advocacy Network, polling 1,275 psychology professionals and graduate students, showed 95 per cent of respondents believed these changes were contrary to the public interest. The college released preliminary results from its own consultation survey and reported 89 per cent of more than 7,000 professionals and members of the public did not believe in these proposals.
The data are in, and they are unambiguous: The profession and the public are deeply concerned. The college should re-evaluate its position.
James Watson-Gaze Clinical psychologist, Toronto
Food for thought
Re “A Campbell’s soup fiasco is a reminder that eating healthy will cost you” (Dec. 10): I believe future generations will look at this period in history with sheer bewilderment and shock that we would allow corporations so much power to control the food we eat, and to convince us unhealthy food is the norm.
To expect those same corporations, making billions of dollars off an unhealthy food system they created, to change their ways would be utterly naive.
I believe only a non-profit public option for groceries will begin a transformation that is so desperately needed. And that is a prospect that terrifies corporations: real competition.
Christopher White Hamilton
Making food more affordable seems elusive. Finding a way, however, requires a monumental pivot of our thinking away from the “free market.”
To start, profit margins on food production beyond the farm, distribution, marketing and sales should be reined in. Small, independent food producers and co-operatives should be established and given incentives and support.
It is the mega-food industry producing unhealthy foods with the attendant profit. Ultra-processed should be removed from the shelves, possibly banned.
Prices on prime produce, meat, vegetables and fish should be controlled much like the supply management of dairy. I can hear the shouts of “socialism!”
Putting that label aside, allowing the free market to flourish unabated will likely continue to keep food prices, particularly healthy foods, unaffordable.
Robert Milan Victoria
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