"If you help 75 per cent of the people, it's an amazing feat, but there's 25 per cent that don't get helped, and in P.E.I. you know who they are — they're probably your neighbour, they're probably your friend, and that brings with it a tremendous toll of responsibility and burden," he said.
"There were days that, like many Islanders, I found it hard to get out of bed because I was tired and stressed… and going through many mental-health challenges. And then my family went through all of that, and it takes its toll."
I know nothing about this guy or his policies, but props for caring about that other 25%.
We're suffering for the sins of our parents. Many of us were too young to vote in the free trade elections, but they set the stage (at least partially) for the affordability crisis we're facing now.
At the time, protesters warned about jobs being sucked from Canada and the US to the lowest cost country. And they were. Shockingly, the people who lost out are angry because they can't get ahead.
“Branch plants closed and jobs went south, first to ‘right to work’ states, and then, after NAFTA was ratified in 1994, on to Mexico.”
...
“These were now redundant, as multinational corporations restructured their production footprint. It was a painful, painful process and a profoundly unjust one as there were no additional measures passed to soften the blow on displaced workers.”
...
Whereas Canada had previously operated its own national vaccine lab and a strong domestic pharmaceutical manufacturing capacity to produce generic alternatives to name brand medications, free trade agreements brought in long patents and foreign intellectual property rights.
“Canada pays among the highest prices for medications in the world and efforts to restrain those prices have been beaten down by the lobbying power of U.S. and European-based pharmaceutical companies ever since,” said Trew.
...
Stanford recalls that the popular fight against free trade in the 1980s was built on a coalition of progressive social forces who recognized that fighting free trade was a big tent cause.
“Not just because of free trade being a bad idea, but because of what free trade would mean for all of our other struggles, for equality and community and the environment and democracy,” said Stanford.
Ugh. It's gonna be another public/private partnership, featuring a consortium of:
Trudeau said the consortium Cadence — made up of CDPQ Infra, AtkinsRéalis, Keolis, SYSTRA, SNCF Voyageurs and Air Canada — was selected to build the line.
The Globe reports that AtkinsRéalis is really SNC Lavelin, which was part of the consortium that screwed up Ottawa's LRT (although there's lots of blame to be shared for that one) and renamed itself after numerous corruption investigations.
Canada tends to do badly with public/private partnerships and transit. Given who the players are, and how this is a YOLO from an outgoing PM, I don't see why this would be different.
It's unclear from the article, but it looks like that's the design phase:
Construction on the new line will not begin until the design phase is done, which could take four to five years. Funds are to be allocated at the end of that time period, so it's possible a future government could modify or cancel the project.
...
A government statement said "Canada's investment in the co-development phase of the project represents $3.9 billion over six years, starting in 2024-25," in addition to the $371.8 million announced in the budget.
Maybe it includes the first year of construction?
According to the article previous estimates were up to $80 billion. So yeah. 3.9b is not gonna cover it.
Canada is known to have some corners of its real estate market with financial opacity problems. Well, guess who built a business leveraging exactly that?
It's great that Fair Phone is doing this, but this shit should be required by law. Products built below the safety, environmental, or labour standards of a country should be subject to tariffs on entry.
Otherwise it's just us rich assholes exporting shitty working conditions.
That is a lot of text. But the bit that jumped out at me was:
But if you need a tool to communicate privately with your friends and family–even if your chats are boring, mundane, and totally legal–Signal is the best damn choice I can recommend.
And I trust them, because they bedazzled their essay with lots of furry art. Like an excessive amount. So they either know what they're talking about or it's a mid-effort psyop.
I know nothing about this guy or his policies, but props for caring about that other 25%.