An organization that represents over 140,000 university students across Ontario on Friday recommended an ambitious agenda of long-term changes that included raising the OSAP (Ontario Student Assistance Plan) maximum to $175 per week, formal instruction in teaching methods and practices to Phd students at a cost of $1 million and regulating tuition fee increases at the rate of inflation.
Fund policies to support the nurses who deliver patient care under increasingly unsafe circumstances. Improve staffing and reduce workloads for nurses and allied health workers. And postpone corporate tax cuts in order to fund health care and important public services.
These and other priorities are in response to government funding policies that are forcing hospitals to cut nursing jobs to balance their budgets, according to the nurses’ pre-budget submission released last Tuesday, February 2, to the Standing Committee on Finance and Economic Affairs.
A bit of drama was injected Tuesday into the race to succeed George Smitherman as MPP in Toronto Centre.
NDP candidate Cathy Crowe criticized Elections Ontario for only providing three polling stations in St. Jamestown, one of the most densely populated areas in Canada. More than 15,000 people live in 18 high-rise buildings in one of Toronto’s poorest neighbourhoods.
The cheers cascaded over the parking lot as Gary Barrett made the case for saving the Toronto Grace, one of the last remaining Salvation Army hospitals in the country.
“We are proud of the vital health services we provide,” Barrett, a 20 year employee and Toronto Grace CUPE union steward, told the crowd. “We are not going to let the Liberal government shut us down or cut our services.”
It was an overcast Saturday afternoon in Dundas Square where 7,000 pro-democracy supporters gathered to ridicule the Prime Minister’s decision to prorogue parliament until the beginning of March.
Everyone from newborns to seniors filled the Square to capacity, many holding ‘No to Proroguing, Yes to Democracy’ signs while others were proudly waving their Canadian flags.
One week after the earthquake in Haiti, the Humanitarian Coalition has raised $3.5 million dollars (towards their $5 million dollar objective) which has gone towards the distribution of water purification tablets, four water bladders containing 5,000 litres, 2,200 hygiene kits, 1,500 jerry cans, food and water for over 2,000 people at a local hospital and much more.
It was a cold January morning outside the Church of the Holy Trinity where 25 people huddled together Tuesday for the monthly homeless memorial vigil to remember one death in December.
His name was Tony. He was only 42 years old.
“We’d been working on trying to get him housing for the last year,” said Aylish who hangs out at the Sanctuary, a place of worship in downtown Toronto that provides a meaningful place in a healthy community atmosphere, and who’d known Tony for the last three years.
“But he never made it off the streets before he died.”
"We're here today so the people of Gaza know that they do not stand alone. And we will not stop until we see justice and peace," Sandra Ruch told the crowd that assembled Sunday across the street from the Israeli Consulate in Toronto.
On Sunday, 1,360 people from 43 countries around the world gathered in Cairo, where they'll travel to the Gaza strip and plan to march arm-in-arm Thursday with 50,000 supporters in the Gaza Freedom March.
"End the siege," shouted the crowd. "Justice and peace for Palestine."
CEP Local 2003 workers, known as the CF61, were locked out in June and terminated by Cadillac Fairview in July. Some of the workers had 20 or more years of service.
Since then, the CF61 have demanded to have their jobs back and asked Cadillac Fairview to negotiate a new collective agreement in good faith.
A rally held outside the Eaton Centre (Cadillac Fairview owns the Eaton Centre) on Saturday was supported by various groups and unions.