BC’s NDP: Easy Win, Harder Road Ahead

Updated with full results after postal votes counted. The New Democratic Party (NDP) strolled to a solid victory in the October 24 provincial election. After a delay of three weeks to count the 660,000 postal ballots, the NDP has won 57 seats up, taking two additional seats from the Liberals in each of the Okanagan […]

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Courts Agree to Kill MEC

On Friday, October 2, a BC Supreme Court judge killed hopes of saving Mountain Equipment Co-op (MEC). Usually courts rule in favour of the owners of property against other claims – such as granting an injunction to Coastal GasLink that led to the RCMP’s invasion of Wet’suwet’en lands. But in the MEC case the owners, the […]

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BC’s NDP Goes for a Majority

To no one’s surprise the BC New Democrats (NDP) have called a provincial election, which they are highly likely to win. The opposition parties are having little or no impact and, not surprisingly, are criticizing the decision. COVID-19 COVID has dominated people’s thoughts for most of 2020. Up to recently, the NDP was considered to […]

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BC Schools: COVID Canaries

Written by a BC teacher. After weeks of hearing about the nightmare of states in the US reopening their economies amid the COVID-19 pandemic, we knew it was coming. The reopening of the Canadian economy! Granted, the pandemic has not been as devastating in Canada as in the US, but that doesn’t say much. The […]

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Remote teaching + Remote learning = Proximate frustration

The path to remote teaching starts with cautious curiosity, goes through enraging frustration and ends with a tired, tenacious and uninspired slog. The Cautious Curiosity COVID-19 has shutdown physical K-12 classrooms across Canada. In BC spring break ended on March 30, not with a return to school but with teachers logging onto their computers to […]

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Death Trap at the Lynn Valley Care Centre

The Lynn Valley Care Centre in North Vancouver was the site of the first death in Canada attributed to COVID-19. As of April 6, there have been at least 15 deaths at the facility, along with 46 residents and 24 healthcare workers infected. The infection was brought into the care home by a staff member […]

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Elk valley open-pi coal mine

Energy companies put Profits Before Safety

Teck Resources (2019 revenue of $11.9 billion, 2019 “adjusted profit” of $1.6 billion) is in the news this morning for a typically capitalist display of  corona virus corporate responsibility British Columbia’s Elk Valley. Teck is upgrading facilities for its mining operations in the valley which, among other things, involves a work camp of up to […]

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microscope image of covid-19 virus

COVID-19: Government Failure to Prepare Makes Me Angry

What a difference a few weeks and a major disease outbreak makes! Not that long ago, if I remember correctly, there was no money for pretty much anything but tax cuts and supports for business. Now, suddenly, there seems to be cash aplenty, to be sure, mainly for the rich, but with a substantial amount […]

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Unite Here Local 40 workers on picketlines

Zero hours at the Hotel Corona

I work “full time” for a hotel. A cog in Vancouver’s tremendous tourism industry. Since I started work here, the fact that my contract stipulates “full time” availability with zero guaranteed hours has laid cold and squirming in the back of my mind, a worm undermining the small sense of security that comes with regular […]

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When Workers Fight They Win

1,200 hotel workers in UNITE HERE Local 40 won dignity and job security in a battle against global corporations that rule the most luxurious hotels in downtown Vancouver. The two-month strike, the longest in the city’s hotel industry, demonstrated the power of unions when they have determination to win and a fighting strategy. The workers, […]

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