Kathleen Wynne’s new Ontario cabinet is being announced today, and my local MP, Liz Sandals, has apparently been tapped to become the new education minister. But that’s not the observation that leapt out at me from today’s Toronto Star article about the cabinet shuffle. Authors Robert Benzie and Rob Ferguson
Continue readingTag: Laurel Broten
Pample the Moose: Define "junior", oh great Toronto Star!
Kathleen Wynne’s new Ontario cabinet is being announced today, and my local MP, Liz Sandals, has apparently been tapped to become the new education minister. But that’s not the observation that leapt out at me from today’s Toronto Star article about the cabinet shuffle. Authors Robert Benzie and Rob Ferguson note that former Education Minister Laurel Broten has been “demoted” to Intergovernmental Affairs, calling it a “a ministry so junior McGuinty ran it himself for years.”
[ETA: Interesting to note that the updated version of the article calls Intergovernmental Affairs: “barely a stand-alone department because the premier usually handles all its major files personally.”]
To me, this drives home just how ill-served we are by many of our journalists these days. Just because a portfolio is held by the premier does not make it junior or unimportant. Indeed, given how Canada’s system of federalism works (or doesn’t), the role of intergovernmental affairs minister can be quite important indeed. Federally, that role was once held by Stéphane Dion, in the aftermath of the 1995 referendum. Many Canadian Prime Ministers also acted as their own foreign affairs minister. And what does it say that Wynne is planning on running the Ministry of Agriculture herself? Just last Wednesday, the Star ran an article arguing that this decision was a way of signalling the importance of this ministry!
Just to be clear, I do think that the decision to move Laurel Broten out of education is probably a demotion. But to conflate that with implying that the Intergovernmental Affairs ministry is insignificant betrays a woeful lack of perception of how Canada’s system of government operates.
Continue readingPample the Moose: Define "junior", oh great Toronto Star!
Kathleen Wynne’s new Ontario cabinet is being announced today, and my local MP, Liz Sandals, has apparently been tapped to become the new education minister. But that’s not the observation that leapt out at me from today’s Toronto Star article about the cabinet shuffle. Authors Robert Benzie and Rob Ferguson
Continue readingPolitics and its Discontents: Finger-Pointing 2.0
Well, there can be little doubt that both The Toronto District School Board and the Ontario Ministry of Education have fully embraced the digital age. Finger-pointing abounds on both sides. In the ongoing saga that I think could best be described as a clash between Jimmy Hazel’s union muscle (and
Continue readingPolitics and its Discontents: Jimmy Hazel and His Crew Prevail
As I have mentioned in this blog before, one of the many reasons I respect The Toronto Star is that it doesn’t let its adherence to The Atkinson Principles blind it to good stories, even when those stories may lead to some uncomfortable questions about the abuses that unions are
Continue readingThe Equivocator: The 2012 “You Go Girl!” Awards. Presented by: The Equivocator
Context: I don’t like to think of this blog as existing in a vacuum. You may not be aware of it but I am also an avid user of the twitter and the facebook (my twitter feed is there on the right side of my blog btw.) On twitter (you can
Continue readingPolitics and its Discontents: Beyond Cynical By Any Standard
Using the legislative power that Bill 115 provides, Ontario Education Minister Laurel Broten has announced she will impose contracts on Ontario teachers but then rescind Bill 115 because it has become a “lightning rod.” In doing so, she hopes teachers will forgive and forget and resume coaching sports teams and
Continue readingCalgary Grit: After 16 Years of McGuinty, What’s Next for OLP?
Sixteen years ago, Dalton McGuinty won the Ontario Liberal leadership race at 4:30 am, after 5 rounds of voting. Always one to defy expectations, McGuinty worked his way up from 4th place over the course of 9 hours in what was truly one of the wildest leadership conventions in Canadian
Continue readingThe Equivocator: Toronto Pride with the Queer Liberals
“There is no place for the state in the bedrooms of the nation.” – Pierre Trudeau While at university I made appoint of watching the Toronto Pride Parade a a member of the crowd. This year, thanks to my friends in the Queer Liberals, I was able to participate in
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