Globe And Mail Decision To Hold Bombshell Ontario Liberals Story 'Offensive,' Says MPP

An Ontario MPP says it's “offensive” that The Globe and Mail decided to delay publishing an explosive story involving Kathleen Wynne’s Liberal government until after federal election day.

“The fact that there was a federal election on shouldn’t have dictated when it was release and when it wasn’t,” said Lisa Macleod in an interview.

Support for Harper’s environmental record increasing, poll shows

The number of Canadians who believe the Conservative government is doing a good job of protecting the environment is inching upward, according to a recent poll – despite the federal government finding itself repeatedly under fire on environmental issues, and Canada remaining on track to fall substantially short of its Copenhagen greenhouse gas emissions reduction targets.

The poll also comes two weeks after Prime Minister Stephen Harper said it would be “crazy” to limit oil and gas emissions, as his government first promised to do in 2006, at the current oil price. The poll also comes at a time when environmental concerns continue to underpin opposition to major pipeline projects across Canada, and after Canada criticized for inaction at a climate conference in Lima this month.

Unreported in Canada: the Globe and Mail’s fight to suppress freedom of the press

You can be forgiven, dear Contrarian reader, for not knowing that a hearing last week in the Ontario Divisional Court sought to determine how far wrongdoers can go to suppress the freedom of those they have wronged to speak about the wrongdoings. And for not knowing that the wrongdoer in the case is Canada’s national newspaper, The Globe and Mail, or that the person wronged was once its most celebrated columnist, Jan Wong.

You can be forgiven because, in an revelatory display of unanimity, the Canadian news industry has suppressed coverage of the court battle. The sole exception* is a bilious piece of character assassination by National Post columnist Chris Selley, the sort of journalist who makes a fine living comforting the comfortable and afflicting the afflicted.

Harper’s overhaul means getting back in control of the agenda

This government needs to recover its sense of purpose. The odds are it will. But in politics, the odds can quickly change.

Stephen Harper has little to show for the past six months. While the last half of 2012 was dedicated to pushing the tough measures of last year’s budget through Parliament, the winter and (endlessly delayed) spring of 2013 have been a policy vacuum, with a stay-the-course budget, a trade deal with Europe gone missing, and a slender legislative agenda.

Speculations on newspaper character and the Globe and Mail

I keep hearing people ask about the Globe and Mail. It's been going on since well before it put up a paywall this month. People get that. Newspapers are in a panic over funding in the Internet era (as they were before it, about TV, and probably radio, though this time's definitely worse). Their questions are more like: What's with the Globe? Who does it think it is? What's it trying to be?

They ask this with special trepidation since the Globe, unlike other papers, always had a quasi-public, quasi-official aura, a bit like the banks. Everyone knows they're private and for-profit but when you walk in, they still feel somehow . . . civic, with larger duties and responsibilities. Maybe it's because they're our source for common currency. In the Globe's case I don't know what lends it that aura -- perhaps it's the font.

Globe And Mail Paywall Upsets Readers Unwilling To Shell Out $20 A Month For News Site

The Globe and Mail's digital edition will disappear behind a paywall on Oct. 22, and many of the national daily newspaper’s online readers reacted with disappointment and hostility to what some see as an excessive subscription price.

Faced with years of declining ad revenue, newspapers around the world have been shifting to a subscriber-supported business model that sees online readers paying for access to the newspaper's website. The New York Times, Los Angeles Times, Wall Street Journal and The Times of London are among the papers that have made the switch.

You heard it here: Northern Gateway’s dead

The Northern Gateway pipeline that Enbridge proposes to build from Alberta’s bitumen oil to the Pacific coast of British Columbia is, for all intents and purposes, dead.

Yes, regulatory hearings before the National Energy Board will continue until the NEB approves the project. And yes, Enbridge will keep pushing for it. And yes, the Harper government, which is so publicly committed to the project, will continue to extol its virtues as part of the need to get Canadian resources to Asia.

But the project is dead. It has too many obstacles now, and there’ll be more in the future.

‘Free-trade deniers’ threatening Canada’s economic future: Fast

Canada’s economic future is being threatened by “free-trade deniers” whose vision for the country is “timid and inward-looking,” Canada’s International Trade Minister said in provocative remarks Wednesday.

“I wish I could tell you that everything looks rosy,” Ed Fast, federal Minister of International Trade, told a Toronto audience. “Unfortunately, there are still some activists that slavishly oppose our efforts to open up new markets for Canadian entrepreneurs ... these activists are Canada’s great free-trade deniers.”

Why is The Globe going to ask online readers to pay? Our editor-in-chief explains

On Thursday afternoon we announced The Globe will introduce an online subscription across our full website this fall. You may have questions about this. Here is what we can share so far.

We’re adopting a metered approach, which means our readers will be able to access a certain number of articles across our website each month before they’re asked to pay. Similar leading news organizations, such as The New York Times and The Financial Times, already do this. We will let you know how many articles will be free at a later date, but most readers will not run into the limit on the meter.

In addition, we announced last fall that we will offer an enhanced suite of exclusive business and investing journalism, tools and data as a separate product this year. We’re still on track to do this.

PMO letter on Helena Guergis is released

OTTAWA—The letter that Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s office fired off to the federal ethics commissioner that triggered Helena Guergis’ political woes was a straightforward referral of allegations that “she promised to advance private business interests,” the Star has learned.

Signed by Harper’s then-chief of staff Guy Giorno, the three-paragraph letter makes no mention of reports about partying with cocaine users or busty hookers, or any other outlandish behaviour.

Nor does it mention that at the heart of the potential conflict-of-interest allegation was Guergis’ spouse Rahim Jaffer, a former Conservative MP.

Moreover, the letter, dated April 9, 2010, makes no explicit request of ethics allegation commissioner Mary Dawson, but outlines allegations “made by Mr. Derrick Snowdy” — a private investigator.

“In particular, Mr. Snowdy alleges that Ms. Guergis attended meetings at which she promised to advance private business interests. Mr. Snowdy makes additional allegations about the MP’s conduct, allegations that may or may not be relevant to her responsibilities under the Conflict of Interest Act and/or the Conflict of Interest Code for Members of the House of Commons.”

Rick Salutin's Last Words

Whenever a columnist is suddenly fired from a well-established gig, and explanations why aren't particularly forthcoming or convincing from the people in charge, the curious mind naturally turns to what the columnist has recently written, and whether it might have set in motion the axe.

There's rarely any way to prove cause and effect, of course. In the case of the canning of Rick Salutin, long-time, left-leaning, award-winning columnist for The Globe and Mail, we're told officially that he didn't fit in with the paper's redesign plans.

The firing has sparked an organized protest led in part by regular Tyee columnist Murray Dobbin. And it leaves confused not only Salutin's loyal readers but anyone in journalism who has been encouraged to believe that attracting readers is a good thing.

Salutin's Sept. 17 column drew 587 comments. By comparison, stalwart Jeffrey Simpson's latest effort pulled in 143. No word yet that Simpson has been redesigned out of Canada's paper of record.

And yet, according to what Dobbin says Salutin told him, The Globe gave its popular columnist no reason for his dismissal.