#Onpoli

[paddysnuffles]

For anyone unsure of what to write, here's what I wrote as an example. Feel free to use bits and pieces, but don't just copy and paste so they take what you have to say more seriously.

For more info on the issue, I recommend reading the first and second day overviews.

Dear Commissioner Kaplan,

My name is ______, and I am a resident of Airdrie, Canada. Having lived in towns even smaller than Airdrie, I am keenly aware of the importance of the service Canada Post provides to Canadians everywhere. I truly believe that public services such as Canada Post are why paying our fair share of taxes is important -- it's basically pooling our resources together to improve our communities at large for everyone. National postal services are incredibly important for a fair and equitable society.

That being said, I do not think that public services should come at the cost of civil servants' rights. Having a labour union that advocates for workers' interests is one of those rights. So much so that it's listed in Article 23.4 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, right alongside "just and favourable conditions of work and to protection against unemployment" (Article 23.1) and "the right to equal pay for equal work" (Article 23.2). Had Canada Post not violated the right to equal pay for equal work to the point that they had to pay millions in settlements, it would not have faced as much of a staggering loss. Actions have consequences and workers have rights.

As far as I understand from following this issue as a third party, the union has been willing to work with Canada Post to resolve its workers' concerns, but their concerns have not been taken seriously. If they had, I doubt the union would have had to go the nuclear option and go on strike, as strikes are typically the last option when nothing else has worked in having the workers' voices heard. No one wants to go on strike, you do it because that's the last option left.

Was the strike inconvenient to me? Yes. But that's the point of strikes: to showcase how important the work being done is and how not having it would affect people's lives. I was rather appalled at the government intervening in the postal workers' right to protest via a strike. Just because they are civil servants who do a critical job does not mean they lose the rights to organize and protest.

I ask that you keep these things in mind as you work to arbitrate the issue.

We the public are watching, and a great many of us stand in solidarity with the Canadian Union of Postal Workers.

Thank you for your time,

_____

i just got an email from the canada post union saying that the public (aka us) is currently allowed to send in emails to Commissioner William Kaplan in regards to the strike, but we have until FEBRUARY 14th, 2025 to do so. i highly, highly recommend going to the CUPW (Canadian Union of Postal Workers) website to learn more, and also sending an email of your own!

~~~~

[osmanthusoolong]

Contrary to the title and framing, this is about a landlord-on-landlord slap fight.

While the very real danger of these illegal rooming houses and their innumerable code violations are actually a lethal risk, here’s what the protesters interviewed had to say:

“Michelle Gauthier, who also attended the rally and is a landlord herself, says illegal rooming houses have been a growing issue in Brampton over the past two years.

She says about 30 per cent of the houses on her street have turned into rentals and illegal rooming houses.

"We really love that feeling of community, and we're afraid it's disappearing," Gauthier said.””

Hmmm

“Many residents at the protest expressed their support for the city's Residential Rental Licensing program.

The program, which began this January, is a pilot project that aims to crack down on rental units that violate health and safety rules.

Last week, Brampton Mayor Patrick Brown said the project has led to 4,700 home inspections and over 600 penalty notices.

Gauthier said 20 students were living in a neighbouring house for a year. She said they were frequently loud at night and were difficult to manage.

After the rental licensing program was introduced, she said the students were replaced with a family.”

I’m sure those students, who clearly didn’t have many options, are totally fine. Somewhere.

“Some landlords have criticized the pilot project, saying it costs them money, makes them do paperwork and, often, their tenants are to blame for the issues flagged by city inspectors.”

Much of the blame, unsurprisingly, seems to be falling on international students and foreigners in general, as opposed to the landlords.

@allthecanadianpolitics

[myalgias]

The Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms promises fundamental protections for the most vulnerable in our society. Court after court has found that section 7 of the Charter — the rights to life, liberty and security of the person — guarantees the right for those who are homeless to put up shelter overnight on public land when other shelter is unavailable.  Yet, several Ontario mayors are urging the province to pass laws that override this right by invoking the Charter’s notwithstanding clause.

[girlactionfigure]

[handwagoner2]

and advance voting from feb 20-22!

hiiiii so, to my ontario followers all three of you, you probably know this but the provincial election is on FEBRUARY 27TH!!! If you need to register to vote, or update your information, this site is here (it takes like 2 minutes, you need a piece of ID): https://vreg.registertovoteon.ca/en/home

PLEASE get out there and vote I do not have another four years of doug left in me

[quasi-normalcy]

Guy who likes it when Trump wrecks liberal shit realizing that Trump views his entire country as liberal shit

[sequencefairy]

The cognitive dissonance of listening to someone bitch about the lack of services in Ontario in one breath and spend the next one lauding our current premier.

I truly cannot understand how you do not see that this man has stripped our province for parts in order to pay off his friends and cronies. And he will continue doing it as long as ppl keep voting for him because he promises beer for a buck (that never happened btw) and canceled our license plate registration fees (this costs the province millions of dollars in lost revenue btw, all of which could have been used to help fund necessary repairs to schools, hire nurses, and the social welfare that many ppl in this province rely on).

That you have been on a waiting list for three years for a funded round of IVF is a direct result of the fact that Ford has completely obliterated Healthcare spending in this province in favour of building a highway to nowhere (so he can make sure his developer buddies get lotsa prime greenbelt real estate) and spending billions of dollars to demolish the lcbo ahead of schedule (the beer store is the actual shitty monopoly), among other things.

"Do better, Ontario!" you say, as if you and your votes for Doug Ford are not why we are in this fucking mess in the first place.

I cannot stand the voting public in this province. Why did none of you pay attention for one (1) hour of civics classes?

[wuts-good-gatsby]

[something-like-a-heart]

Even a blind squirrel might find a nut once in a while. That’s how I choose to look at Doug Ford’s stance on the tariffs. That said, now that the jaundiced jerkass has paused the tariffs for now, Ford’s also paused his retaliation against them. Makes sense, I suppose. There’s no sense pulling the trigger when the target’s been taken away, if only temporarily.

He’s been an unmitigated disaster for most people in Ontario since 2018, and there is no way I’m voting PC in the election this month—but I am willing to admit that this one time, he got it right. Let’s see if he follows through on that plan if the tariffs do come into effect while he’s still our Premier, though.

i feel like the people immediately getting on your ass about mentioning doug ford positively don't understand how politics works. sometimes awful people create/help to create good policies. if you can't talk positively about good policies, even if they're enacted by terrible people, then what the hell is the point. acknowledging that any politician is capable of various politics, those you agree with or not, is part of actually understanding how politics work. that's not to say we need to fall down at someone's feet upon doing anything positive, but it's just ridiculous to insist that we cannot praise good policies if they come from a shitty person.

Yeah, I think online spaces are so polarised that discussions on nuance just don’t take place anymore.

But you’re right, and posting about one person’s single good policy isn’t a ringing endorsement for everything they do.

[neveragainfools]

Some top tier signs from the Art Gallery of Ontario strike:

Anyway help these lovely people get a fair deal by emailing the CEO Stephan Jost (stephan.jost@ago.ca) and telling him that the gallery needs to negotiate with OPSEU and get the gallery to reopen!

[intothestacks]

For every dollar invested in London Public Library (Ontario), $6.68 is brought back into the community.

That’s a 452% return on investment.

[onpoli]

"The Canadian government promotes itself as really aware of the environment," environmental biologist Guido Berguido told W5 at a protest. "We cannot believe that a Canadian company would do this to our national resources." Owned by a subsidiary of Canada's First Quantum Minerals, the sprawling 13,000-hectare, open-pit mine is bordered by jungle about 120 kilometres west of the capital, Panama City, on the country's Atlantic coast. Pointing to its alleged impact on the environment and water supplies, a broad coalition of Panamanians – including students, environmentalists, labour groups and indigenous communities – have protested for weeks, with police resorting to tear gas and rubber bullets as the country has ground to a halt. "People already are feeling betrayed by all that is institutional in Panama," a photographer, who lost an eye as police fired at protesters, told W5. "It's not just the mining, many things are linked to corruption. People are tired of that."

[teratologique]

You can only vote in provincial elections in the riding in which you reside.

Local elections, i.e. municipal elections, allow you to vote anywhere you own or rent property, per the eligibility requirements (https://www.registertovoteon.ca/register-of-voters/eligibility-to-register-for-local-elections/municipal-elections). So you might be able to vote in different cities if you own/rent property there.

So when you see this, it's referring to local, not provincial, elections:

I was just looking online to vote early in the upcoming Ontario election, and the website said, "If you or your spouse own or rent property other than your home address in Ontario, you may be eligible to vote in more than one local election." Doesn't this mean property owners get multiple votes in different ridings, giving them more of a say over people who don't work property? How is this fair?

~~~~

[osmanthusoolong]

“Lia Hess, chair of the board of the Estonian Summer Camp Society, said in an emailed statement to CBC News that the monument was installed by Estonian war veterans who came to Canada as refugees in the 1940s and 1950s.

"The Estonian and Jewish communities share a common hatred and disgust of all totalitarian and oppressive regimes," Hess said in her statement.

"The Estonian summer camp does not now and has never honoured Nazi collaborators and our children have never been indoctrinated into worshipping Nazi leaders as alleged."

She added that the campers also commemorate Black Ribbon Day, which is formally recognized by the European Union and Canada as a day of remembrance for victims of Stalinism and Nazism.

"Flowers were placed in remembrance at the base of this plaque, like one who grieves at a grave. We are remembering those that died and the importance of defending our independent country, language, traditions and customs," Hess's statement says.”

So definitely not indoctrination of children into worshipping Nazi leaders, just placing flowers at their monuments and teaching them about how great they and their beliefs were. Totally a different thing.

“Eva Plach, an associate professor of history at Wilfrid Laurier University, said that when the Swords Monument was erected decades ago, Estonia was still a part of the Soviet Union and its people were fighting for independence.

"What always needs to be remembered in this region is that kind of active military resistance to the Soviet Union often meant collaboration with Nazi Germany," Plach said, explaining how Rebane and Riipalu could have once been celebrated within the Estonian community while also being a part of the Nazi military.”

I wonder if there’s a word for someone who allies themselves with Nazis and works alongside them to further their goals.

“”After the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR) was formally dissolved as a sovereign state, Estonia, the Baltic States and other countries "were trying to rewrite or understand better" their Second World War histories, Plach said.

"They were looking for nationalist heroes. They were looking for feel-good nationalist stories, where it was really difficult to find those stories and it was complicated, too."”

That actually doesn’t seem very complicated at all. It in fact seems pretty straightforward that you’re not gonna look like anything but Nazis if you venerate your Nazi heritage.

Canada is full of shit like this. SS memorials in public cemeteries, summer camps where little kids can learn about their proud history as Nazi collaborators.

@allthecanadianpolitics

[crunchyspicysalmon]

I am genuinely shocked and happy that Doug Ford is ripping up the Starlink deal. Let’s hope he does the same for Tesla.

Just a note: this could also be a very strategic move on his part to win the election at the end of the month - I will be doing my part to vote him out - but it’s still nice to see everyone come together in many ways during this trade war