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The Federal government has just announced as review of the Cannabis Act. I have no particular interest in cannabis myself BUT it is the Act and its Regulations that makes cannabis stores cover their windows and thus remove 'eyes from the street'. (and to the street!). I intend to send in my comments on that aspect, others may want to too - on that and other more substantive issues. SEE: https://www.canada.ca/en/health-can...s-legislative-review-of-the-cannabis-act.html

As an initial step in the legislative review, an online engagement process has been launched. All Canadians are invited to read Taking Stock of Progress: Cannabis Legalization and Regulation in Canada and to share their views via the online questionnaire or through written feedback until November 21, 2022.
 
^^ It strikes me as harkening back to the day when the LCBO required you to fill out an order slip from a list of brand names (no display sample bottles) and the actual liquor bottles were hidden behind the counter and dispensed by staff into a plain brown bag.
 
^^ It strikes me as harkening back to the day when the LCBO required you to fill out an order slip from a list of brand names (no display sample bottles) and the actual liquor bottles were hidden behind the counter and dispensed by staff into a plain brown bag.

I only vaguely remember the last of those, as a toddler or thereabouts, I remember mom taking me into one, and my thinking it was a Consumers Distributing where we got my toys! LOL
 
This is an appalling decision:


The Feds are going to allow foreign students to work unlimited hours during the school year, obviously in an effort to suppress wage growth.

No one is getting a good education while working more than 20 hours off-campus.

Complete garbage.

We fleece the kids/their families then have them work as cheap labour, to their disadvantage and to the disadvantage of low-income Canadians as well.
 
This is an appalling decision:


The Feds are going to allow foreign students to work unlimited hours during the school year, obviously in an effort to suppress wage growth.

No one is getting a good education while working more than 20 hours off-campus.

Complete garbage.

We fleece the kids/their families then have them work as cheap labour, to their disadvantage and to the disadvantage of low-income Canadians as well.

I had a friend who immigrated from Colombia as an international student worked with many other Indian students. This is a good thing.

What I noticed happening was that these foreign students were living in rooming houses for $500 a month because literally that is all they could afford. They lived in absolute squalor because they could not earn a decent living.

Also, I know more than a few companies who paid international students on the books 20 hours and then off the books for more. This was because the help was needed but they could not work more than 20 hours.

My Colombian friend almost quite her studies and moved back to Bogota because she could not afford to survive here. If not for me bailing her out because I cared about her, she would have been homeless.
 
I had a friend who immigrated from Colombia as an international student worked with many other Indian students. This is a good thing.

What I noticed happening was that these foreign students were living in rooming houses for $500 a month because literally that is all they could afford. They lived in absolute squalor because they could not earn a decent living.

Also, I know more than a few companies who paid international students on the books 20 hours and then off the books for more. This was because the help was needed but they could not work more than 20 hours.

My Colombian friend almost quite her studies and moved back to Bogota because she could not afford to survive here. If not for me bailing her out because I cared about her, she would have been homeless.
The solution is subsidized housing, for the poor and for those studying, rather than dragging down wages because Trudeau's friends want him to.
 
This is an appalling decision:


The Feds are going to allow foreign students to work unlimited hours during the school year, obviously in an effort to suppress wage growth.

No one is getting a good education while working more than 20 hours off-campus.

Complete garbage.

We fleece the kids/their families then have them work as cheap labour, to their disadvantage and to the disadvantage of low-income Canadians as well.
I think this is acknowledging that we are allowing people to immigrate here by taking some perfunctory education, working as much as is allowed (perhaps some under the table) and try to get their PR. Frankly, we should eliminate the pointless 'education', as it is frankly a waste. Quite a cottage industry for local colleges like Humber, Centennial, Sheridan, etc.
 
Frankly, we should eliminate the pointless 'education', as it is frankly a waste. Quite a cottage industry for local colleges like Humber, Centennial, Sheridan, etc.

I agree. I know a few people who went to school in Canada to get their PR and nothing more. Once everything was settled they helped bring their relatives over.
 
I think this is acknowledging that we are allowing people to immigrate here by taking some perfunctory education, working as much as is allowed (perhaps some under the table) and try to get their PR. Frankly, we should eliminate the pointless 'education', as it is frankly a waste. Quite a cottage industry for local colleges like Humber, Centennial, Sheridan, etc.

I want to agree with this, but I feel a need to make a few distinctions and caveats.

First, I think we want to distinguish between full universities granting spots to some of the world's best and brightest in both undergraduate and graduate programs, vs a more basic diploma from a Community College.
The former is useful to Canada, and hopefully, useful to the student as well; the latter is much more questionable on both fronts.

****

Second, we need to identify that a portion of this has been driven, particularly in Ontario, by inordinately low per student post-secondary education funding; which both Colleges and Universities are trying to offset through their recruitment of higher tuition foreign students.

So we want to be sure, insofar as we cut off some of that revenue stream that we are protecting key programs and the number of domestic student spots through direct government grants.

****

Third, I think we need to note that insofar as the education provided is good; and we as a nation agree on the desirability of population increase, I'm not intrinsically opposed to going this route, simply not this way.

We need to make sure students and employers and society writ-large are benefiting from what we're doing; and part of that means not recruiting people nominally into colleges so they can work as office cleaners, table bussers,
security guards, or fast food workers.

If we want more people, and want them trained in IT, swell, let's train them in IT, but make sure they are able to focus on school with work limited largely to summers, or perhaps a single weekend shift somewhere, by providing at-cost, on-campus housing, and by not over-charging for tuition.

****

Finally, I think we serious need to discuss whether absolute population growth is what we want; and if so, what form that should take (ie, luring immigrants to the north or smaller communities vs everyone in Toronto/Mtrl/Vancouver; getting people with the right skill sets, and making sure we have the requisite amount of private-sector housing to support that population growth without a stilted market. )

****

What's absolutely terrible here is that we're enacting a policy that makes the education farcically bad whether people stay in Canada or not, which makes the exorbitant tuitions we charge even more of a ripoff........
All the while driving up housing costs and driving down entry level labour costs to the detriment of most Canadians new and old alike.
 
Second, we need to identify that a portion of this has been driven, particularly in Ontario, by inordinately low per student post-secondary education funding; which both Colleges and Universities are trying to offset through their recruitment of higher tuition foreign students.

So we want to be sure, insofar as we cut off some of that revenue stream that we are protecting key programs and the number of domestic student spots through direct government grants.
Isn't it a kind of head tax?
 
Isn't it a kind of head tax?

You could choose to view it that way.

****

But I think this evolved more organically; as opposed to being thought up as one. Nonetheless, here we are.

I oppose 'charging' people for citizenship; though every country will set criteria for citizenship, and much of that will always depend on one's fiscal resources.

Mostly here, I oppose a system that has evolved in such a way that I don't believe either those participating in it, or the majority of the rest of us, benefit.

The winners are large employers of low-cost labour, which to me is a net loss for the workers/would-be citizens and for Canada.
 
That is certainly your prerogative. However if I am stuck on a 10 hour flight to Europe I would rather not sit with that on at all times.
The dangerous part is not when flying as the air systems on planes are very good, it's in airports and getting on and off- when the plane's systems are not on.
 
I know a number of people who have contracted COVID in the past week while travelling. Whenever I’m around crowds, I’m happy to avoid sharing germs … mine and theirs. Pre masking, I always got sick when travelling by air, so I will do what I can to avoid that.
 

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