2013 Likely To Be One Of The Hottest Years Ever As Warming Trend Continues, WMO Says

WARSAW, Nov 13 (Reuters) - This year is the seventh warmest since records began in 1850 with a trend to weather extremes and the impact of storms such as Typhoon Haiyan in the Philippines aggravated by rising sea levels, the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) said on Wednesday.

A build-up of manmade greenhouse gases in the atmosphere meant a warmer future was now inevitable, WMO Secretary-General Michel Jarraud said in a statement on the sidelines of U.N. climate talks among almost 200 nations in Warsaw.

Conservative party deletes archive of speeches from internet

The Conservatives have removed a decade of speeches from their website and from the main internet library – including one in which David Cameron claimed that being able to search the web would democratise politics by making "more information available to more people".

The party has removed the archive from its public website, erasing records of speeches and press releases from 2000 until May 2010. The effect will be to remove any speeches and articles during the Tories' modernisation period, including its commitment to spend the same as a Labour government.

TPP Exposed: WikiLeaks Publishes Secret Trade Text to Rewrite Copyright Laws, Limit Internet Freedom

WikiLeaks has published the secret text to part of the biggest U.S. trade deal in history, the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP). For the past several years, the United States and 12 Pacific Rim nations have been negotiating behind closed doors on the sweeping agreement. A 95-page draft of a TPP chapter released by WikiLeaks on Wednesday details agreements relating to patents, copyright, trademarks and industrial design — showing their wide-reaching implications for Internet services, civil liberties, publishing rights and medicine accessibility. Critics say the deal could rewrite U.S. laws on intellectual property rights, product safety and environmental regulations, while backers say it will help create jobs and boost the economy. President Obama and U.S. Trade Representative Michael Froman reportedly wish to finalize the TPP by the end of the year and are pushing Congress to expedite legislation that grants the president something called "fast-track authority." However, this week some 151 House Democrats and 23 Republicans wrote letters to the administration saying they are unwilling to give the president free rein to "diplomatically legislate." We host a debate on the TPP between Bill Watson, a trade policy analyst at the Cato Institute, and Lori Wallach, director of Public Citizen’s Global Trade Watch.

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Source: democracynow.org
Author: --

Trans-Pacific Partnership Chapter Released By WikiLeaks

A trade agreement Canada intends to sign will have “far-reaching implications for individual rights and civil liberties,” WikiLeaks says.

The group known around the world for publishing state secrets has released a draft chapter of the Trans-Pacific Partnership, a trade deal being negotiated under what it calls an “unprecedented level of secrecy.” Critics say the agreement favours corporate interests over consumers.

The middle class could soon be up for sale in Ontario

A leaked Progressive Conservative document reveals a deep disconnect between ideologically driven wedge politics and the realpolitik of Ontario's struggling middle class.

The document lays out a provincial election plan for the party that is premised on an explicit attack on workers and a promise to bring in American-style low-wage policies.

In other words, the middle class could soon be up for sale in Ontario -- at bargain basement rates.

It's a path Ontario would be wise to avoid.

New warships to cost more than $100-billion, Ottawa estimates

The cradle-to-grave cost to Canadian taxpayers to acquire new warships will exceed $100-billion, the federal government says – tens of billions of dollars more than Ottawa has previously disclosed.

It is the first time the federal government has gone public with its best guess on the full life-cycle cost of up to 15 surface combat vessels.

The political demand for transparency has changed in Ottawa since a controversy over the true cost of a plan to buy F-35 fighter jets, and the Harper government feels pressure to open the books.

BC Hydro: SNC-Lavalin Named Preferred Contractor For John Hart Generating Station

VANCOUVER - BC Hydro says SNC-Lavalin has been selected as the preferred contractor to design and build the $1-billion John Hart Generating Station replacement project.

The provincial Crown corporation says SNC was advised of the selection last week and the two sides will now begin final discussions aimed at signing a contract by early 2014.

BC Hydro says the replacement facility on the Campbell River on Vancouver Island will improve power reliability and seismic safety and make it easier for the utility to protect fish habitat in an area that is world renowned for its salmon.

Construction is scheduled to begin shortly after a contract is signed, with the work scheduled to be completed by the end of 2018.

The project is expected to create an average of about 400 jobs a year over the five years of construction.

Located within the City of Campbell River, the John Hart Generating Station has been operating since 1947 and is one of the oldest generating facilities in BC Hydro's hydroelectric system.

Original Article
Source: huffingtonpost.ca
Author: CP

Kenney donors in apparent breach of limits on political contributions

OTTAWA — Toronto-area donors who last year made $1,000 contributions to Multiculturalism Minister Jason Kenney’s Calgary riding association had also given the same amounts to another Conservative MP’s association, in apparent breach of the legal limits on political contributions.

Six donors who contributed at a private fundraiser held for Kenney in Scarborough last fall had earlier made $1,000 donations to the Conservative riding association in Oak Ridges–Markham, the riding held by the prime minister’s parliamentary secretary, Paul Calandra. The Elections Act limits individual contributions to electoral district associations to $1,200 in a single calendar year.

Brampton Mayor Susan Fennell racks up $186,000 in expenses

Brampton Mayor Susan Fennell has expensed taxpayers over the past three years for items such as $2,160 on personalized barbecue aprons, $3,191 for a seat upgrade on a trip to India, $1,326 for Mandarin lessons and $1,500 for an orchestra performance.

The recently disclosed expenses from December 2010 to September 2013 total more than $186,000. Some residents are expressing outrage about the expenses after the figures were released last week, in response to a freedom of information request by the Brampton Guardian.

Christy Clark: B.C.'s LNG Plants Will Do World A Clean-Air Favour

VICTORIA - Premier Christy Clark is calling British Columbia's proposed liquefied natural-gas plants worldwide pollution-fighting machines despite concerns by climate scientists and environmental groups that they will belch millions of tonnes of harmful greenhouse gas emissions into the sky.

Clark said Tuesday B.C. will be doing the world a favour if it can sell natural gas in China and Japan because natural gas is cleaner than China's coal and safer than Japan's nuclear power.

She came close to rejecting outright B.C.'s 2007 Greenhouse Gas Reduction Targets law that calls on the province to cut its GHG emissions by one-third by 2020.