Andrew Younger… gone too late

Premier Stephen McNeil was right to fire Andrew Younger. He was wrong to wait until the situation had degenerated into a soap-opera, he-said-he-did embarrassment. On Wednesday, Younger, the province’s environment minister, abused his parliamentary privilege to avoid testifying at the trial of a woman accused of assaulting him on Oct. 22, 2013, the day the Liberals […]

$2 million for consultants, more cuts for welfare recipients

Community Services Minister Joanne Bernard says she knows the province’s welfare system is “broken… None of the systems and none of the policies and the way we serve people has changed in many decades.” That’s why her government announced last week it is forking out up to $2 million to consultants to “vision,” “design,” “transform” […]

Our long national Harper nightmare may be over, but…

The good news — as the late Gerald Ford so aptly put it in a different context after then U.S.-president Richard Nixon resigned in disgrace in 1974 — is that “our long national nightmare is over.” Or, to borrow a more triumphant, if cheekier chant from some social media commentators last week: “Dong Dong! The witch is […]

Time for principled Conservatives to say ‘no more’ to Stephen Harper’s politics of division

No matter the outcome of today’s federal election, it’s time for principled federal Conservatives to take back their party, or abandon it as a lost cause. I know, I know. Who am I, a left-of-centre progressive, to offer advice to those whose chosen party I’d almost certainly never vote for? In my defence, I grew […]

A statute of limitation on social media stupidity? Yes, please

Is it past time for a statute of limitations on social media stupidity? Or at least for a more nuanced understanding that what may have been expressed in the heat of a long-gone 140-character moment, or caught on a hidden camera investigation of… appliance repairmen(!) does not necessarily constitute a complete encyclopedia of any candidate’s […]

Stephen McNeil, the Miller contract and cavalier condescension

I like Bernie Miller, and I think Stephen McNeil is lucky to have the currently-on-leave managing partner at McInnes Cooper as one of his Liberal government’s key political advisors. Having said that, I also think, as a matter of public policy, we need to ask serious questions about McNeil’s deal with Bernard F. Miller Services […]

New developments demand ‘exceptions’: where’s the public benefit?

Residents attending a community meeting last Thursday did not — as Metro’s Stephanie Taylor put it — “mince words” about a 29-storey commercial and residential tower proposed for the corner of Quinpool Road and Robie St. “Sixteen of the 19 people who raised their voices did so to blast the proposal.” George Armoyan’s Willow Tree Tower […]

This government brought to you by…

The last minute of play in this period is brought to you by… What would happen, I often wonder, if the company that pays for that last minute of play in each period of Halifax Mooseheads home hockey games stopped sponsoring it? Would the 20-minute period be reduced to 19? Among life’s eternal, infernal mysteries, […]

How not to save a sinking ship

It’s hard not to feel a twinge of sympathy for the conundrum Stephen McNeil’s Liberals face as they scramble to figure out what to do next with the listing ship that is the Yarmouth-Portland ferry service. But it’s also hard not to believe the government’s decision last week to put off deciding who will run […]

Finance minister’s new approach sounds like more of the same public sector blaming

One would like to believe newly installed Finance Minister Randy Delorey meant it. Last week he told union leaders representing teachers, health care workers, paramedics and assorted clusters of government employees he wanted to meet to discuss a “new approach” to collective bargaining. There are more than 300 collective agreements slated for re-negotiation this year, […]

Stephen Kimber