Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre rises during Question Period on Parliament Hill in November, 2025.Adrian Wyld/The Canadian Press
Better than nothing
Re “Democracy is not a dinner party” (Dec. 30) Living in Toronto, our television media is more focused on Queen’s Park, where there is considerable coverage of the opposition parties.
While they might not be as quick-witted or as articulate as Pierre Poilievre, they all seem solely focused on criticizing the Ford government. I never see them offering any alternatives.
While Mr. Poilievre opposes the federal government, he, at least occasionally, offers solutions such as eliminating carbon pricing and higher capital gains taxes. Critics should exercise some restraint and stop the Poilievre-bashing.
By definition, the job of the opposition is to oppose.
Brian Cruise Toronto
Balanced approach
Re “He’s paying” (Letters, Jan. 3): A letter-writer highlights how Ontario Hydro’s dismantling followed from betting too heavily on large, centralized projects. That lesson is especially relevant today as Ontario embarks on another major nuclear-led build.
The choice, however, should not be large projects or distributed energy: It should be whether Ontario intentionally uses both. A residential rooftop solar and storage program can complement the big build by shaving peaks, deferring distribution upgrades and improving system resilience, all at far lower risk and cost per incremental kilowatt.
This program would not replace nuclear baseload, but it would reduce the need to oversize wires and transformers and for peaking resources, while allowing households to participate directly in system reliability.
A balanced system would blend centralized generation with millions of small, flexible assets, so that taxpayers and ratepayers are not always the backstop.
Martin Benum Brighton, Ont.
Back to it
Re “Unions hit out at Doug Ford’s ‘ridiculous’ back-to-work order as Ontario civil servants return to office” (Jan. 6): One of Doug Ford’s rationales is that downtown landlords and “small businesses” are suffering.
I thought the free market was supposed to be sacrosanct for conservatives? The free market has determined there is an excess of downtown office space, as it has also determined that people have shifted their daytime purchase patterns closer to home, or that people don’t need the stuff they were buying downtown.
This seems to have nothing to do with small businesses either, as most businesses downtown are large corporate entities. Mr. Ford, then, has revealed his real priorities: protecting rich landowners and corporate interests.
J. Andres Hannah-Suarez Toronto
What about doctors, nurses and teachers? When do they have time for yoga and hour-long lunch breaks? Wellness and self-care is important, but I see a selfish pattern here.
As a former health care worker, babysitters in the early hours of the morning, after school, even on Christmas Day – calling to let my girls know it was time to get the turkey in the oven, even though it was upside down when I arrived home – was part of life.
We made it work. It was hard, yes. But we were caring for the sick and I would never look back with any regret.
Good luck to everyone as they return to the office. Look for the positive.
Mary Smith Guelph, Ont.
Bigger picture
Re “Paris museum faces calls to return North American Indigenous artifacts” (Jan. 3): I was involved in the recent Vatican returns. Repatriation is more properly understood as but one form of restitution and one outcome along a spectrum of other Indigenous engagement outcomes for museums.
Other outcomes include dedicated training opportunities for Indigenous museology interns, Indigenous artist-in-residence programs and the normalization of Indigenous traditional caregiving practices as part of routine Indigenous collections care. Many Indigenous persons do not passively accept museums and their disciplines as unquestioned social goods.
Museums should be deemed useful only to the extent they facilitate cultural continuity, rather than the mere preservation of often fragmentary remains far removed in place and time from their original Indigenous contexts. Many Indigenous persons are more concerned with the circumstances under which these belongings came to leave Indigenous hands in the first place.
Hence the interrelated calls today for land back, children back and accounted for and Indigenous ancestor belongings back.
John Moses Former director of repatriation and Indigenous relations, Canadian Museum of History; Delaware and Upper Mohawk bands, Six Nations of the Grand River Territory
Problem-solving
Re “Ontario has a math emergency” (Opinion, Jan. 3): I have a degree in mathematics and taught high-school math for more than 30 years.
Mathematics is now taught for understanding, not for the rote “getting the answer” methods of 60 years ago. Do you recall learning how to get an answer using long division? Did you ever understand why the long division algorithm worked, or did you just memorize it?
Perhaps the problem with Ontario’s Education Quality and Accountability Office test results is not that teachers are not teaching properly, but that the tests are not testing what is being taught. In the last Programme for International Student Assessment in 2022, Ontario students, like all students in Canada, did very well.
Our Canadian students ranked among the top 10 countries in the world for understanding of mathematics. That’s something to be proud of.
Richard Hoover Delta, B.C.
I believe that blaming declining Education Quality and Accountability Office scores on instructional methods alone, while ignoring the resounding impact of multiyear funding cuts to public education in Ontario, is not only reductionist, it also endangers our already fragile education system and the students who struggle within it.
Yes, students benefit from explicit instruction, but those benefits erode quickly in the face of ballooning class sizes and dwindling supports, particularly for students with disabilities. If we want to “support teachers to teach,” we should focus on advocating for increased funding to public education.
That is what would allow teachers to implement the most effective instruction across subjects and help students flourish.
Daria Mancino Student, Ontario Institute for Studies in Education, master of teaching program, University of Toronto
Hey, was that…
Re “Becoming a stand-up comedian meant succeeding at failure” (Arts & Books, Jan. 3): This brought back memories of when a friend and I decided to give comedy a shot in the late 1970s. Naming ourselves the Wise Guise, because of various costumes and other disguises used in our act, we spent a year writing sketches and skits that we hoped would tickle funny bones.
Mark Breslin, co-founder of Yuk Yuk’s comedy club, liked our “cute” name and booked the Wise Guise for an appearance on open-mic night. Our show went over okay, and afterward he booked us to perform again the next week.
Suddenly, a bushy-haired figure burst into the room. “What do you two do for a living?” he asked.
“Advertising copywriters,” I replied.
“That explains your strong, creative material,” he said. It wasn’t until later that I learned the young man was Howie Mandel.
David Hunter Toronto
Public good
Re “The enduring power of a good book” (Editorial, Jan. 3): The best thing my dad did for me was take me to the Louise Riley branch of the Calgary Public Library. I have been a bookworm ever since.
I read every day. I read newspapers and magazines, as well as books. For me, nothing surpasses the power of the printed word.
I am currently reading The Duel: Diefenbaker, Pearson and the Making of Modern Canada (2023) by John Ibbitson. It is great and I am learning things I did not know about these two prime ministers.
Public libraries are one of the most democratic institutions we have.
Craig Harris Edmonton
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