Ambulance chasing in the public interest?

At what point does lawyerly risk-taking in the public interest become crass ambulance chasing? Before we consider today’s case — personal injury law firms hovering over last week’s late-night crash landing of Air Canada Flight 624 — let’s layer in some context. In 2013, the Halifax law firm McInnes Cooper won an $887-million class action […]

The rise and fall of Andrew Younger

I’ve known Andrew Younger since the summer of 1998. I was director of the King’s School of Journalism. He was on the waiting list for our one-year Bachelor of Journalism class. He wasn’t near the top of the list, but he was persistent. He maintained what seemed like daily contact, just letting us know how […]

Health care unions, the government and the mess that will be

Really? Last year, the McNeil government passed the Health Authorities Act, ostensibly (and laudably) to streamline the province’s health care system, but also (and shabbily) to game that system. The legislation reduced the number of health districts from 10 to two, and the number of collective bargaining units from 50 to four. But the government’s […]

What’s terror? Who’s a terrorist? And other aftermath questions…

It can’t happen here. It won’t happen here. It — almost — did. But what is “it”? And how do we protect ourselves against whatever it is? On Friday night, I was at Scotiabank Centre enjoying the Mooseheads-Shawinigan Cataractes Quebec Major Junior Hockey league game. During a commercial lull — the game was televised nationally as part […]

Health care unions: arbitrator’s report unlikely to be the end of the story

By this time next week, government-appointed mediator-arbitrator Jim Dorsey is expected to hand down his final report into which health care worker should be represented by which health care union. His choices seem limited. The Health Authorities Act — which the McNeil government introduced last fall as part of its promise to merge nine district […]

The ‘selfless friendship’ of the Cuban Five solidarity movement

In the sweet afterglow of last month’s historic rapprochement between the United States and Cuba, much has been made of the pivotal roles played by Pope Francis, the Canadian government, New York Times editorialists, various American politicians and their aides, even “sperm diplomacy.” All that is true, of course, but there are other narratives in […]

2014: The year the conversation changed

I followed last week’s news stories about Dalhousie dental school with a mixture of oh-no shock and not-again recognition. The week began with revelations about a misnamed, misogynous Facebook group: “The Class of DDS 2015 Gentlemen.” Thirteen male graduating dental students had shared anti-women screeds, voted on which female classmate they’d most like to “hate […]

The Cuban Five free at last. The week that was.

On December 17, 2014, the United States and Cuba reached an historic deal. The United States agreed to return Gerardo Hernandez, Ramon Labañino and Antonio Guerrero — the remaining three members of the Cuban Five — to their families and homeland in exchange for a previously unknown Cuban national who has spent much of the […]

Bourque, Zahef-Bibeau, personal consequences and public accountability

There is little doubt re-watching video of Justin Bourque chillingly describe the targeted killing of their husbands, sons, fathers — “It’s sad,” Bourque explains blandly. “They might have had a wife and kids, but every soldier has a wife and kids, right?… It’s all about whose side you chose, and they chose the wrong one” […]

The boy who took the photo, the girl who was bullied to death and the sentence that can never satisfy

It is easy to understand the anger, the frustration. The boy, who is now a man, who took the picture of the girl who will now never become a woman (but who still can’t be named — and that is part of the frustration), will not go to jail. Instead, Judge Gregory Lenehan Thursday sentenced […]