Education Minister just needs to check the files for past reports on tackling staff shortages: Letters

This article tells me the Ministry of Education is co leading a working group to tackle the shortage. Tell them to save some money and check their files. If they can't find the two reports I worked on (between 1996 and 2016) I am happy to give them my copies. I could also share the "reports" we, er, cooked up showing that with the introduction of the two year program we were indeed cutting new intakes in half, but it was OK because fun with numbers deep in the ministry created a massive oversupply.

Recommendations today are the same as they always have been — treat them nicely and pay them commensurate with their responsibility, with the exception of one new one: Immediately repeal Bill 124 and throw yourself on the mercy of the predominantly female dominated professions that you need to look after your children and sick relatives.

Education Minister Stephen Lecce continues to tell us that his department has hired 7,500 additional "teachers and education workers," but steadfastly refuses to tell us how many of each. Is it seven teachers and 5,693 education workers or 3,750 of each? These are not interchangeable positions, and the press releases suggest that he'd rather not tell us.

The COVID era has drained the supply teacher pool of young energetic graduates from teachers’ schools over the past decade who have been holding out for any chance to fulfil their dreams of assisting young people to be more than they can be. Now any young staff who have managed to remain sane during the COVID 19 debacle are burned out with insulting unconstitutional one per cent wage freezes and absolutely no relief from that drained supply pool.

The Minister of Education and the teachers’ colleges must address this horrific situation immediately. This article says “there is no crime today” at the site of a pet cemetery where pets’ remains are being excavated, but I staunchly disagree. People trusted the Oakville and Milton Humane Society to take of their pets in this cemetery for eternity, that is the very reason people choose pet cemeteries in the first place rather than burying them some place where their remains may one day be disturbed.

This humane society should be as ashamed of itself as I am disgusted for its decision to sell off this land for redevelopment. My heart and soul go out to the animals and their people who have been so horribly betrayed. May they rest in peace, wherever they wind up. Perhaps the people who are lying about a property being their principal residence should have their addresses cross checked with the CRA, by the CRA.

Bet they wouldn’t like to pay capital gains tax on their real principal residence. You can have only one. If Premier Doug Ford really wants to get re elected, there are a number of things he could do which would almost guarantee that he is. ', I’m not surprised that Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, currently floundering in the Republican Presidential nomination, is grandstanding as a hero helping Americans to import cheaper prescription drugs from Canada.

While his motivation is personal, it’s surprising that the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) would succumb to pressure — damn the consequences. American politicians and the FDA must care that Canada just cannot supply drugs to Florida, and other U.S. states, without increasing risks of drug shortages at home.

The U.S. market being 10 times bigger than Canada’s, this reckless FDA decision could harm Canadian patients and our health care system. Fortunately, This is the second article on the same topic from Martin Regg Cohn, and I thought I would like to point out my concerns, as a longtime New Democrat.

The Liberals are not considered a left wing party, but rather a centrist one. They only initiate social progress when they have a minority in the House and need NDP support. Therefore, if both parties were to unite, where would the social progress animate from, I wonder? All we have to do is look to the U.S.

to realize that the two party system just doesn't work. The parties are basically funded by the same elites, and just keep fighting each other, and social progress cannot be considered a priority. Decisions cannot be made on the environment, state run health care, and so on. We do not need that kind of federal government here in Canada.

I fear your article may result in many a native muskrat being mistaken for an invasive nutria. Both in the text and in the photo caption it was implied that the nutria is smaller than a beaver or a muskrat. On average beavers are significantly larger, yes, but an adult muskrat, weighing in at around two kilograms, is always quite obviously smaller than an adult nutria, which weighs from four to nine kilograms.

Beaver and muskrat may or may not display their orange front teeth, but nutria almost invariably do, having relatively huge incisors. An excellent identification feature, not mentioned in the article, are the whiskers, which are longer, denser, lighter coloured, and much more visible in nutria than in our native species.

Nutria can’t survive the kind of prolonged, deep cold spells that typify Ontario winters, but with climate change, all bets are off..