Each year, 16,000 Ontarians die from tobacco use and roughly 3,000 die from exposure to second-hand smoke. Peter Goodhand, Chief Executive Officer, Ontario Division, Canadian Cancer Society, Toronto
New tests find poisons in children's blood, urine
Minister accepts challenge to have blood and urine tested for contaminationOn Thursday, the group released results showing that the bodies of seven children tested are contaminated by a cocktail of toxic chemicals ranging from PCBs to flame retardants. The study found an average of 23 known or suspected toxins -- including carcinogens, hormone disrupters and neurotoxins -- in the bodies of the children tested. The researchers tested 13 individuals from five families, six adults and seven children. The families live in Vancouver, Toronto, Sarnia, Montreal and Quispamsis, N.B. "Our children are being poisoned every day by toxic chemicals that surround them at home, school and play,'' said Rick Smith, executive director of Environmental Defence.
Our dirty little secret
Capital's sole air monitor in Sandy Hill not enough to keep up with our car-driven toxic soup
Milking It: Moms find industrial chemicals in their breast milk an outrage -- and a call to action
The Walrus Magazine | Everyday Poisons
Are fire retardants actually a toxic hazard? by Paul WebsterToxins in N.S. counties prompt health warning
Toxic exposure
Martin Mittelstaedt's Toxic Shock series (May 27-June 1 Globe and Mail) on chemical safety strikes a long-neglected note. As he points out, the list of potentially harmful chemicals is so exhaustive there's really no one among us who has not been exposed to at least a few of them. Chances are, we've been exposed to a great many.
The chemical industry often plays down the risks by saying individual exposures are so minimal we should not be concerned. But they fail to take into account that low-dose exposures are often most harmful, and that exposures to chemicals simply do not occur in isolation. Thank you for staying on top of this critical public-health story.
Ontario goes smoke-free this June
The ban includes all indoor-smoking in public places such as restaurants, casinos, bars and bingo halls. But many are calling the government's move one filled with hypocrisy. "If politicians really cared about our health, they would ban the production of polluting vehicles with poor gas mileage. They could do so many things that would reflect a serious purpose, but banning tobacco — even from places where only smokers concentrate — is a little too farfetched," adds Nidhi Mehta, who is often seen taking a puff outside her Bay Street office in Downtown Toronto during break and lunch time.
Terrorists are supposedly creeping into the US from Canada. This is being proposed not only by wacko US congressmen but by our own homegrown self appointed experts.
Terror Land North: Canada Becomes America's New Next Threat
Alienation at home, criticism from abroad
WASHINGTON -- A U.S. congressman warned yesterday that Canada, and in particular the enclave of "South Toronto," was a breeding ground for Islamic terrorists and that the United States will be under threat as long as passports are not required of all Canadians crossing the border."South Toronto, like those parts of London that are host to the radical imams who influenced the 9/11 terrorists and the shoe bomber, has people who adhere to a militant understanding of Islam," said John Hostettler, chairman of the House of Representatives subcommittee on immigration and border security, noting that Toronto has a very large South Asian community.
Mr. Hostettler's views were backed by several witnesses to the committee, including David Harris, an Ottawa lawyer and senior fellow at the Canadian Coalition for Democracies who used to work for the Canadian Security Intelligence Service. He was the only Canadian asked to appear before the committee.
Mr. Harris described Canada as being "heavily infiltrated by terrorists" as well as "a recruiting, planning, financing and launch point for international terrorism."
'Cause our Chief Harpocrite can't do anything without asking Daddy first.
Canadian government, media use alleged terrorist plot to push right-wing agenda
Oh and the charges have upset MacDonalds. Those nice folks who are advertizing dates for their staff on bus ads in the city. Pimping I think is the term.
AFL Posts List of Employers Using 12-14 year olds on WebsiteEDMONTON, June 7 /CNW/ - Nine months into new rules allowing restaurants
to hire 12 and 13 year olds it is clear they are failing to protect young
workers says the Alberta Federation of Labour today. The AFL released the list
of employers who have submitted the paperwork allowing them to employ
adolescents. The AFL also announced its intent to post the entire list on its
website (www.afl.org) and update it regularly. The AFL received copies of the
forms through a FOIP request.
Between July 1, 2005 and March 31, 2006, the first nine months of the new
rules for hiring children, only 160 forms were submitted to the government.
This is a fraction of the number of applications the government received
before the new rules. According to government figures, 552 permits to hire
kids under 14 were granted in 2004, and 359 permits in the first four months
of 2005.
There is another side to the economic numbers, however. Canada's productivity is rising because the cost of labour is slowing.
Hourly compensation rose by 0.8 per cent in the first quarter, half the increase in the fourth quarter of 2005, keeping a lid on unit labour costs.
Whenever you hear the word productivity that simply means techology and cheap labour producing more profit. The watchword of capitalism. For workers it means you are getting screwed and paid less for it.
"Productive labour is therefore labour which reproduces for the labourer only the previously determined value of his labour-power, but as an activity creating value increases the value of capital; in other words, which confronts the labourer himself with the values it has created in the form of capital."
Fresh off the plane, I stood in a region engulfed by housing development and communities flush with new-found wealth. I wasn't in Sierra Leone or South Africa, where diamond mines have given rise to phrases such as "blood diamonds" and have caused massive social upheaval. On a work-related visit, I was in Canada's portal to the vast and serene north and, with my untrained eye, all seemed normal. We've all fallen prey to the marketing coup of the last century by believing that "a diamond is forever." But the communities that mine these diamonds are not.Since the discovery of Canadian diamonds in 1991, the Ekati and Diavik diamond mines have begun production in the Northwest Territories. The Snap Lake plant is gearing up for production next year and, as of this year, the Jericho project in Nunavut will also be in production. But according to Statistics Canada, these mines will be operational for only the next eight to 20 years.Once these mines shut down, miners can rarely transfer their skills beyond the industry. Diamonds are forever; prosperity isn't
MP: Help workers moveOf course this guy forgets that there are over 2500 tradesmen currently unemployed in Alberta looking for work. Unemployed trades?
Alberta Tory says government should help relocate unemployedUnemployed Atlantic Canadians should be encouraged by Ottawa to go where their opportunities are — namely job-rich Alberta — a parliamentary committee heard Thursday.
The suggestion, that the Conservative government could use taxpayers’ dollars to relocate jobless people from the Atlantic region, was made in Ottawa by Brian Jean — a Tory MP from northern Alberta — at a session of a federal committee studying employability in Canada.
