winnipegsun.com - Manitoba - Paid more, doing less

winnipegsun.com - Manitoba - Paid more, doing less: "Senior staff at Manitoba's Office of the Public Trustee have been hauling in some pretty fat salary increases over the past few years -- money that comes from fees they charge clients. "

winnipegsun.com - Editorial - CBC should get real

winnipegsun.com - Editorial - CBC should get real: "So what's all the fuss? Much of the dispute is rooted in whether the government-funded CBC should operate like a private business. Management wants to be able to use contract workers where feasible, largely to keep costs under control. Workers -- despite being assured that no one who holds a permanent job will end up a contractor -- want limitations placed on the use of short-term workers. "

winnipegsun.com - Editorial - Too good to be true

winnipegsun.com - Editorial - Too good to be true: "So it would seem that Ottawa will continue on as 'normal,' spending tax dollars with wild abandon. But the talk of big civil service cuts was a sweet dream, if only for a moment. "

National Post westren alienation

National Post

winnipegsun.com - Winnipeg - Trustee's death grip

winnipegsun.com - Winnipeg - Trustee's death grip: "They want to know all about your assets, including a house if you have one, a vehicle and even jewelry. They may want to sell it down the road, which you have no control over. It's called 'calling in the assets.' I know, I sat through one of these things.
They take the money, pay your bills, give you an allowance and charge you fees for their so-called work.
For example, they take a 3% cut of your income, charge 3% to disperse income and levy a 0.9% annual asset management fee. "

winnipegsun.com - Manitoba - Another horror story

winnipegsun.com - Manitoba - Another horror story: "John Sienkiewicz was floored when the Office of the Public Trustee took over his mother's life, including seizing her pension cheques and selling her house against her will.
And he couldn't believe his eyes when the Public Trustee informed him in writing that he should reduce the number of visits to his mother, Jean Sienkiewicz -- who was in hospital at the time -- to two or three times a week.
The story of Jean Sienkiewicz -- who died earlier this year at the age of 77 -- is another Public Trustee horror story and part of an investigative series by The Sun that has triggered a legislative review of the office by the Doer government.
Sienkiewicz was taken over by the Public Trustee in 2003 after the province's director of psychiatric services appointed them committee while Sienkiewicz was in hospital suffering from leg ulcers. "

National Post The cost of security mismanaged?

National Post: "Currently, 44 government departments in Canada and the United States, in the name of security, have added myriad regulations governing border crossings that hurt the economy.
The most telling example, according to the report, is in the auto industry. The coalition estimates that costs related to border delays, and auto makers' reporting and compliance requirements, have added $800 to the price of a North American-made car.
'Simply hardening the border, simply layering further layers of costly bureaucracy on the border, does not make you safer. What it does do is drive up cost,' said Perrin Beatty, president of Canadian Manufacturers & Exporters.
'It damages your economy, and you are misallocating your security resources.'"

Winnipeg Sun: NEWS - Canadian gov't is dumbest

Winnipeg Sun: NEWS - Canadian gov't is dumbest: "Canadians often feel we're in the shadow of the U.S., especially when it comes to stupidity, but now we're proving we're world class,' said Robert Spence, spokesman of the awards handed out during the Just for Laughs comedy festival. "

Audit fails to clear air for some councillors Osprey Media Group Inc. - Brantford Expositor

Osprey Media Group Inc. - Brantford Expositor: "Animosity boiled over among city councillors in a special meeting Wednesday when they were handed a one-page report from an accountant saying that there was no point investing the downtown grants program any further.

James Balfe, a Windsor chartered accountant, wrote in a brief six-paragraph letter that a forensic audit wouldn�t likely yield results �due to lack of evidence, so the city cannot justify proceeding to a full-scale investigation,� James Balfe, a Windsor chartered account, wrote in a brief six-paragraph letter.

He also recommended that the city hire a consulting accountant to direct staff as it processes the last claims of a program that has committed nearly $5 million in performance grants toward about 20 projects worth a total $20 million to renovate or construct new buildings in the core. "

Macleans.ca | Top Stories | World | Might really can be right

Macleans.ca | Top Stories | World | Might really can be right: "Might really can be right
A controversial 'responsibility to protect' doctrine is gaining ground at the UN
LUIZA CH. SAVAGE
It isn't often that Lloyd Axworthy, Canada's former foreign minister and lion of the political left, has an idea that could appeal to American neo-conservatives and evangelical Christians. But the Paul Martin government is now promoting an Axworthy-generated plan to prevent genocide and atrocities that is slowly gaining adherents -- and some of the Liberals' most powerful allies could prove to be pro-war American conservatives such as former House speaker Newt Gingrich -- if both sides can overcome the divisions and suspicions engendered by the Iraq conflict."

Winnipeg Sun: NEWS - Smoke ban challenged

Winnipeg Sun: NEWS - Smoke ban challenged: "Smoke ban challenged

Manitoba, Sask. courts to hear charter cases

By STEVE LAMBERT, Canadian Press




Courts in Manitoba and Saskatchewan will be asked this week to decide whether provincial smoking laws are a violation of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms. "

Osprey Media Group Inc. - Brantford Expositor

Osprey Media Group Inc. - Brantford Expositor: "Motorcyclist battling for right to ride on his property

By John Paul Zronik, expositor staff
Local News - Wednesday, July 13, 2005 @ 01:00

Peter Venczel�s legal battle with Brant County over the right to ride his motorcycle has cost him more than $10,000. "

Winnipeg Sun: NEWS - Resistance is futile

Winnipeg Sun: NEWS - Resistance is futile: "It's one of those sad situations where, as the law stands, you are at the mercy of the bureaucracy,' said Gary Burnside, a Swan River lawyer with experience fighting Public Trustee orders. 'If they say 'Yea' or 'Nay,' there's not much one can do -- it's a very frustrating and difficult situation.' "

Winnipeg Sun: NEWS - Mackintosh orders Public Trustee reviews

Heat in the Kitchen -good about time . PR will keep you posted

Winnipeg Sun: NEWS - Mackintosh orders Public Trustee reviews: "Mackintosh orders Public Trustee reviews



By FRANK LANDRY, LEGISLATURE REPORTER"

FCPP Publications :: Ruth Richardson, NZ Finance Minister 1990-93

Lets improve the debate - great food for thought

FCPP Publications :: Ruth Richardson, NZ Finance Minister 1990-93: "'All monopolies are destructive of consumer and public interest whether they are public or private . . .'"

FCPP Publications :: A Win for Healthcare Consumers

FCPP Publications :: A Win for Healthcare Consumers: "A Win for Healthcare Consumers
Court takes over from frightened politicians

In Brief:
Canada�s Supreme Court has affirmed the right of healthcare consumers to seek private alternatives when Medicare fails to perform.
The ruling brings Canada in line with all other developed countries who already allow private insurance and providers.
The direction in universal access systems is towards structural reforms that expand patient guarantees and choice.
It embodies the principle that governments should mandate services, not provide them direct"

National Post

What are our new values - and who establishes them ? PR
National Post: "Charles McVety, one of the most prominent and outspoken leaders of a religious coalition against same-sex marriage, compared the measure to support for drugs and prostitution, describing gay marriage as 'the slippery slope of the moral degradation of our society.'"

Winnipeg Sun: NEWS - Unwanted takeover

Winnipeg Sun: NEWS - Unwanted takeover: "Unwanted takeover"

Osprey Media Group Inc. - St. Catharines Standard

Lets have an honest debate- not propaganda by those that fear service competition- QJ
Osprey Media Group Inc. - St. Catharines Standard: "But Thorold resident Barrett Smith dismissed the poll, calling it �the most ridiculous thing � as phoney as a $9 bill.�

Smith voted twice, at two different locations, to prove the poll was invalid, and he voted �no� both times because he�s in favour of private investment.

�Private is not as bad as they paint it,� said Smith, and the current model for funding health care �isn�t working.

�People are dying waiting, and there has to be something better, whether it�s two-tier or 10-tier, I don�t care. But it�s got to be better than what we�ve got now.�

Smith mistrusts the strong union backing of the Ontario and Niagara health coalitions, and he also objects to public libraries being used as poll locations.

The Niagara vote is the first of many the Ontario Health Coalition plans to hold across the province, said Natalie Mehra of Toronto, a spokeswoman for the coalition.

In May, the Ontario government introduced a five-year infrastructure plan that uses the term �innovative alternative financing� to describe the private funding of public infrastructure, including up to 23 new hospitals, said Mehra. "

Winnipeg Sun: NEWS - This can't continue

Government abuse in its most arrogant and intrusive from - disgusting PR
Winnipeg Sun: NEWS - This can't continue: "Criminals have more rights than someone being taken over by the Public Trustee.
At least they're presumed innocent until proven guilty and they eventually have their day in court where all the facts come out in front of a judge.
Not so with the totalitarian, communist-state approach of the Office of the Public Trustee. They just take over and that's the end of it. "