Sometimes we need to be reminded of the basics. During the COVID-19 pandemic, public health officials have repeated clear messages about handwashing, physical distancing and mask-wearing. These are relatively simple preventative measures to limit the virus’s spread.  Responding to climate change isn’t so simple, yet it’s every...

In today’s landmark ruling in the Cambie Surgery Centre case, Justice Steeves dealt a strong blow to the efforts of Dr. Brian Day and others to undermine Canada’s publicly-funded health care system. The decade-long legal attack launched by one of the largest for-profit surgical centres in Canada sought to invalidate key...

By Marc Hudson for The Conversation Thirty years ago, in a small Swedish city called Sundsvall, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) released its first major report. Even then, the major dilemmas facing those who sought rapid action were clear. An account by Jeremy Leggett, who had thrown in a well-paid job ...

Almost every product and material we refer to as “plastic” is made from fossil fuels. Most of it hasn’t been around for long — a little over 70 years for the most common products. North American grocery stores didn’t start offering plastic bags until the late 1970s.   Over that short time, plastics have become ubiquitous. A...

[Editor’s Note:  This is a very long article which supplies answers that such activists as young  Greta Thunberg have been criticized for not providing – even though she has repeatedly said, “Listen to the scientists!” – and she has also provided many of the answers suggested here....

Recent ongoing media revelations of abusive, discriminatory  and deadly police practices across Canada, coupled with reports of numerous racist killings and hyper-militarized police actions from south of the border, have led some to demand “defund the police!”  Others have begun using the acronym “acab” – meaning, “all cops...

Diversity is strength. That’s true in nature and human affairs. But recent painful events have shown society has yet to grasp this. The appalling deaths of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, Toronto’s Regis Korchinski-Paquet, Chantel Moore from Tla-o-qui-aht First Nation and many others — all at the hands of those tasked to serve...

Editor's Note:  Rossland has a rich history of community involvement.  That tradition continues today, as groups of citizens agitate for and against various developments in the community.  The most recent example is a petition, signed by over ten percent of Rossland voters, alleging various things about the City’s involvement...

After the 2008 stock and housing market crash plunged the U.S. and world into economic upheaval, governments came to the rescue, with trillions of dollars in corporate bailouts. Executives at the insurance firm AIG were so happy with their US$152-billion package (more than U.S. and European countries spent in total on...

My role as Natural Resources critic for the NDP covers forestry, mining and energy—and the big issue these days in that trio is energy.  The pandemic has intensified calls for a national energy strategy that will direct federal investments to help us recover from the economic impacts of the crisis and put us on a good footing...