The thing that seems weird about the contract fiasco is that the public servants had nothing to gain. I don’t think anyone is alleging that they received benefits from this, just that they did their job badly. At some point, it’d be better to fess up and take the L rather than digging themselves deeper.

I’m glad the judge made a ruling that seems consistent with reports the public has heard.

It’s harder than that.

As long as our population is growing, we need to ensure the appropriate amount of new affordable housing is built. Government stopped doing that in the 1990s, so we have 30 years of backlog to catch up on.

Current infill housing can be more expensive than the housing it replaces, pushing it beyond the means of many Canadians. Density isn’t enough.

Tax write-offs created in the 1970s make real estate investments more attractive than actual investments in actual companies that create actual jobs. That encourages people to treat homes as an investment, which pushes more money into the real estate market. Coincidentally, Canadian productivity has been dropping relative to our peer countries for decades. 🤷

Government has outsourced housing to the private sector, so we’re now beholden to private investors to choose to build housing. Interest rates are higher now, so private investors will slow down the building of new housing.

It’s good to see inflation on groceries coming down.

But, like Tiff Macklem says: all governments need to get off their asses to lower the cost of housing. High interest rates have pushed the cost of real estate down a tinsy tiny bit, but it’ll take actual reform to make housing affordable.

I’m seeing Lemmy posts on Google results as well.

I did not know. How do you know?

Back benchers have been taking different positions since the fighting began. They’ve been pretty public about it. eg

https://www.theglobeandmail.com/politics/article-liberal-mps-at-odds-over-genocide-case-against-israel-as-ottawa/

Edit: wording

I dislike this kind of story. It feels like gotcha journalism.

Oliphant will probably receive some kind of rebuke because he didn’t tow the party line. That will encourage politicians to keep quiet and stick to talking points, for fear that they’ll be outed for having an opinion. Even when talking in private.

That polarizes politics further, and gives party leaders even more power, because they get to decide on the messaging and the punishment for detractors.

There may be public value in showing that there are internal divisions within the Liberal party, but we knew that already.

Having said that, recorded conversations and airing internal grievances is appropriate in situations where there is wrongdoing, or it shows something we don’t already know.

just like they said “heating oil will cost more bro trust me bro just get a heat pump bro ditch the oil bro”.

Both of these initiatives are great, but they require discipline, which the Liberals sorely lack.

A less paywalled version: https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2024/feb/12/french-security-experts-identify-moscow-based-disinformation-network

According to the article, Singh is only saying the NDP will leave the supply and confidence pact. That doesn’t mean they’ll vote against the government on a confidence motion.

That’s good for the NDP, come next election. They get to say they humanized the Liberals policies, but they withdraw support when the Libs didn’t hold their end of the bargain.

The Liberals are plummeting in the polls, so Singh is probably hoping to pick up some disillusioned Liberal votes next election.

Commentators have been saying that interest rates are pushing up housing costs, which contributes to inflation. I suspect this is Tiff’s way of reminding listeners that housing costs aren’t the his problem.

I think Canadian governments have been doing that since forever, but it’s getting harder and harder to use cops/intelligence agencies for that bullshit so they’re having to outsource it.

Welund’s services are offered in a format designed to thwart access to information requests. Instead of sending intelligence reports to government officials by email, they publish them on their own secure site, where government officials are able to sign in and access them. Because the documents are never in the possession of the government, they can’t be compelled to disclose them.

Suitor is also a Realtor with over 200,000 followers on Instagram, where he shares business advice as a “self made” entrepreneur and real estate investor.

Last August, Suitor hosted a “Business Results Training Seminar” in Burlington, Ont., promising attendees would learn to grow their business up to 150 per cent over 12 months, according to his social media posts.

😂

That’s close to $4k a year. That’s a pretty sizeable difference.

It suggested the true cost to oil companies in New Brunswick of clean fuel rules in 2024 would be two-tenths of a cent for gasoline and one-tenth of a cent for diesel.   

By that estimate, oil companies are overcharging consumers by at least 25x.

WHY WOULD TRUDEAU DO THIS TO US?

The average rent for a two-bedroom purpose-built apartment, which the CMHC uses as its representative sample, grew eight per cent to $1,359 in 2023. That growth figure was up from the 5.6 per cent average rent increase recorded in 2022 and above the 1990-2022 average of 2.8 per cent.

I’m guessing that is the average people are paying on their rent for their current contract. I wonder what the cost is for people entering a new rental agreement.

Exactly. The features are not equivalent.

During Zhang’s hearing, the CBSA argued the OCAO had infiltrated Chinese communities in Canada to suppress opponents, among them Taiwanese, ethnic Uyghurs, Falun Gong practitioners and Canadian citizens of Chinese descent.

Yes. Lemmy is deep in “good enough” territory. It mostly works for most people, much of the time. But if you stray outside of the main use cases, you’re gonna be disappointed.