Fact-checking Premier Redford’s speech in Washington

Yesterday Alberta Premier Alison Redford was in Washington to lobby for the controversial Keystone XL tar sands pipeline. While in Washington, she gave a speech at the Brookings Institute. We decided to fact check some of her comments. Here’s the Premier's top 10 lies, mistruths and deceptions.

Statement 1:
“The truth is that Alberta is home to some of the most environmentally friendly, progressive legislation in the world.”

Reality:
Alberta has been widely criticized for their wide lack of environmental protection. Corporate Knights, ranked Alberta dead last in it’s recent provincial environmental stewardship report card.

The David Suzuki Foundation also ranked Alberta last when it comes to climate policy.

Finally having legislation is good but if you don’t enforce it, it doesn’t matter much (like with respect to toxic tailings ponds). Adding insult to injury, the guy the Alberta government just put in charge of environmental enforcement is Gerry Protti, founding President of the Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers (conflict of interest much?).

Canada is missing the boat on water security

Over twenty years ago, the world first acknowledged a looming water crisis. Today, water security is one of the fastest-growing economic, political, and social challenges, and a quickly unfolding
environmental crisis.

In the future, the demand for water is expected to increase in every sector — including energy, food production, industry, and mineral development, and by 2030, the world is expected to face a 40 per cent global shortfall between forecast demand and available supply.

Brian Mulroney endorses Justin Trudeau

The Conservatives in Ottawa are furious. Brian Mulroney is not supposed to be going around praising Justin Trudeau. After all, Trudeau is Stephen Harper's biggest political adversary.

In an interview on CTV's Power Play political affairs show Monday night,  Mulroney went out of his way to praise Justin Trudeau. And he did it so effusively, better than any Liberal so far.

Doug Ford goes fishing

Just what is Doug Ford up to anyway?

Last week, the mayor’s older brother and councilor for Etobicoke North made it known that he may be leaving City Hall to run for the PCs in the next provincial election. Then he proceeded to dare Premier Kathleen Wynne to call an election.

Right on cue, the Sun held forth with a strange front-page treatment: Doug in black T, neck craned looking like he was about to pummel the Preem. As if.

Ford renews push for Scarborough subway

It’s been one year since council rejected his unfunded underground transit plan, but for Rob Ford, the dream will not die.

 

At a press conference on Friday afternoon to address the federal budget unveiled in Ottawa the day before, Mayor Ford reaffirmed his support for extending the Sheppard Ave. subway and putting the Finch West LRT underground. 

 

He suggested the city could use some of the Conservative budget’s $47 billion in municipal infrastructure spending to pay for the projects.

Pushback against Porter begins

Councillors and at least one community group are vowing to fight plans to expand operations at Toronto’s island airport.

 

At a press conference Wednesday, Porter Airlines announced plans to purchase up to 30 CS100 jet planes, which would allow the company to add more than a dozen destinations to the list of 19 cities it serves. Locations the company is eyeing include Los Angeles, San Francisco, Vancouver, Miami, and Nassau, in the Bahamas.

Stephen Harper’s “omnibus” strategy to overhaul green laws was proposed by oil industry, says records

OTTAWA – Lobbyists from Canada’s oil and gas industry recommended the Harper government’s 2012 strategy to put multiple changes to a series of environmental protection laws into a single piece of legislation, says a newly-released internal federal document.

The briefing scenario, prepared for a senior Environment Canada official attending an industry awards gala, suggested that oil and gas companies didn’t want a series of separate legislative changes, but rather an “omnibus” approach.

BMO Outsourcing? Temporary Foreign Workers Used Only To Fill Short-Term Gaps, CEO Bill Downe Says

SASKATOON - Bank of Montreal CEO Bill Downe says the bank has used the controversial temporary foreign worker program to fill short-term gaps.

However, Downe, who was grilled about the issue of outsourcing Canadian jobs to foreign workers during the bank's annual meeting, said the bank is abiding by the rules set out under the federal program.

Great Lakes Garbage Patch Presents Major Threat To Region's Marine Life, Scientists Say

Take a dip in the Great Lakes these days, and you might get more than you bargained for. That's because, in addition to the water, fish and plant life you might normally expect, the region's waterways are increasingly clogged with plastic debris, according to researchers.

The phenomenon is nothing new. For years, scientists have looked on in alarm as garbage patches, constituted mainly of plastic particles resistant to natural decomposition and consolidated by underwater currents, have grown at alarming rates in the Atlantic and Pacific oceans, as well as off the remote coasts of Antarctica. The "Great Pacific Garbage Patch," the most famous example of water pollution run amok, is by some estimates twice the size of Texas.

Districts With Widest Gender Wage Gaps Have Congressmen Who Oppose Fair Pay Laws

Four out of five of the U.S. congressional districts with the widest wage gaps between men and women are represented by congressmen who oppose equal pay laws, according to a new report by the American Association of University Women.

The most recent data from the U.S. Census Bureau shows that women earned an average 77 cents for every dollar that men earned in 2011. But in Louisiana's 3rd District, represented by Congressman Charles Boustany (R), women who work full-time only brought home about 61 percent of men's annual salaries that year.