The four suspects in the metro smoke bombing will remain in custody to give them a damn good scare while their bail hearing is delayed again. A CP piece talks about a radical student force that wants to “strive for societal overhaul” (why on earth would they want that, with our society so transparent and run so well by our beloved authority figures, says my inner cynic).
Of course one National Post writer would like to see them caned.
The city’s auditor-general, the embattled Jacques Bergeron – I love him, he’s such a gloomy gus – says there are still five boroughs doing business with dodgy enterprises even after guidelines were brought in to end the practice.
The new “beach” at the Old Port will open on June 16 and cost $6 for adults to enter.
Price seems to be on par with municipal pools…
At least at the pools you get to go into the water.
LOL
Stupid concept.
This is one of those projects that people will look back at and say: What were they thinking? Wasn’t it obvious that no one in their right mind would go to such a place?
It’s kind of a dumb idea but I think it will be fully utilized. Either by tourists or by the pretty people who are desperate to be seen in public in a bathing suit.
@Bill youd rather see a beach full of muffin-tops?
This is the dumbest idea ever.
I’m going to wait till I see what the numbers are from the summer before saying it’s stupid. People certainly make use of a similar thing in Paris, although the banks of the Seine are not quite as much of a hike from the city streets as the Clock Tower pier is.
If its licensed, I might consider going and enjoying some mojitos.
Perhaps it will not become a “destination”, but tourists alone will provide a decent base level of support. Plus it’s location will pull in many locals on nice days.
It’s not my cup of tea but i’m pretty sure it will be reasonably successful at least.
The mayor has given the nod for the hiring of more than 150 extra police, the funds apparently not being a problem suddenly.
This retarded strike is just costing us more and more…
Effing “students”…
Ignorance is costing us even more.
And then there’s the new university building projects…this time the UdeM and the Outremont railway yards. Why is there always money for these ventures and police but not enough to hire permanent profs and keep tuition down…
Yeah when you don’t attend classes you don’t learn and you become ignorant. Yes so that costs us I agree.
How do you want to attract R&D money without state of the art facilities and buildings. They need to build. Alot of money comes from private hands also; why do you think McGill buildings are all named after rich people…
@ Spock: “when you don’t attend classes you don’t learn”
This is pretty simplistic. People are always learning. The strike has taught many people a lot more than a lot of “attending classes” has.
It taught them how to break windows and cars and how to stay out all night either walking naked or simply how to be annoying…
Great… :(
Spock, I’ve warned you before against using “retarded” as a slur. Please don’t do that.
So let me add this up. More of us will be going to jail. In jail, we will now have to pay more for room and board while working in prison for a maximum of $69 every two weeks.
Temporary workers come from poorer countries and work for less than minimum wage, and Jim Flaherty says there’s no such thing as a bad job as he weighs forcing people to take jobs they don’t want – an idea kyped from the UK Conservatives.
The funny thing is that I simply don’t think Canada is truly so poor that this is necessary. But I’m afraid it’s come around to having to break the spirit of a new generation so’s make them into obedient peons, and it’s not taking as well as it might, so they have to grind harder and scare us more. (Flaherty: “we are going to have to encourage more persons with disabilities to work, more seniors to work…”)
The obvious solution is to stay out of jail, its not like we have debtors’ prison in canada. And TBH, ive worked in retail long enough to wonder why thieves who are successfully apprehended come back a week later to do more of the same. Whats worse is when your staff realizes how easy thieves get off, its not long after they begin ripping you off themselves.
So the government wants to keep em longer and teach them to earn their living, i cant say i disagree.
Actually, they don’t teach them to earn a living. The program that used to do a bit of training has been axed. They punish them, use them as slave labour them put them on the street with no more life skills than they went in with. What do you imagine happens then?
Line Beauchamp has quit, not just as education minister but as an MNA and a politician.
Michelle Courchesne has been named the new minister.
Here comes the new boss, same as the old boss.
Speaking of boss, I guess the mafia will be organising a new breakfast get-together soon.
I wish her success in whatever her next endeavour may be…
plus ça change… in this case, literally.
Line: “I’m ready for my golden parachute now.”
The economic crisis in Greece is affecting some folks who live in Montreal as they have to decide whether they can afford to maintain family properties there now that the country has imposed new property taxes as part of its austerity measures. (Same story in French.)
Greece used to be such a nice place… :(
A bit off topic: honestly, it’s little wonder that they can’t set their economy straight. Just before the crisis hit I was checking out short-term rentals in Athens – the prices were stratospheric. Everything was just SO expensive in Greece. That didn’t make any sense – a warm mediterranean country that used to be so affordable had become an “advanced” economy with prices far exceeding those of Germany and France. What exactly did they think was going to happen?
The best thing for them to do right now is get out of that stupid currency union. There will be some short-term pain, but in a couple of years the country become affordable again and will attract legions of tourists. There will be growth and they’ll get things figured out and eventually pay off their remaining debts. What’s happening right now is not a solution, it’s collapse.
The dumb currency union really messed up that little country… It was so much better under the Drachma.
I actually don’t know the rights and wrongs of the situation but the European Union does sometimes seem to be forcing countries of very different scale and economy to behave the same way, which can’t possibly always make sense.
Well if wallstreet didn’t learn its lesson and kept getting bailouts, why should the greeks be made to suffer more for the same kind of antics? The leftists in greece are quite right in that, the country which benefits the most from the currency union is germany, and pretty soon theyll be begging the greeks to take their money, regardless of austerity.
The Greek issue isn’t the same as the US with bailouts. There are other issues like a bloated civil service (like Quebec), pension fraud (like in Quebec), corruption (Quebec again) and a small percentage of the population paying taxes in comparison to the overall tax base (ditto for Quebec)…
Quebec = Canada’s Greece. Yes we are in Canada!!! :)
“Forgive us our trespasses” used to be translated as “Forgive us our debts, as we forgive others’ debts,” but this was changed to make bankers happy. Our morality is a cut-and-paste job because banker needs have changed over time.
Government stimulus money went to well-known construction firms that have faced accusations of collusion in Quebec; the new federal omnibus law could send 1000 more Quebecers a day to jail as measures like house arrest and harsher sentencing becomes the law.
Voting once every four to five years seems rather a feeble response sometimes, doesn’t it?
Am I the only one who doesn’t understand the 1000 a day figure? Are they suggesting an addition 365,000 prisoners a year?
John, sometimes you only stay in lockup overnight, maybe they are counting that?
And yet increasing student tuitions is an “unavoidable” reality. You only have to read the newspapers to know that there is a huge amount of money being wasted because of corruption and/or incompetence by the provincial government – and the mainstream media doesn’t tell even half the story.
Ian, I don’t see how they can. I’ve spent just enough time around a newspaper city room to know that journalists can only print the visible part of the iceberg. They almost always know a much bigger story that they can’t print because they don’t have firm proof, because the lawyers won’t let them – maybe because sometimes word comes down from above not to talk about it.
There’s been trouble at Rosemont CEGEP Monday morning as the CEGEP backed away from an injunction ordering classes to resume, students blocked access and got pepper-sprayed and there were injuries.
Meantime, ongoing talks between the minister and the student groups are getting nowhere, terrorism-related charges are being pressed against the smoke bomb four as security’s cranked up at the Palais de justice.
other students have a democratic right to attend class, some people really cant afford to piss away an entire session like this.
You can’t “back away” from an injunction. It’s a court order which, if not respected, must be enforced.
That’s as may be, but if an injunction can’t be enforced then it doesn’t work. There’s been some sensible commentary on how futile it is to issue injunctions in the case of the student strike – I don’t have any links this minute but if I find them I will post them here.
I would argue that the people who have won injunctions have not made any attempt to actually have them enforced.
This morning, why were police *actively preventing* people with injunctions from going into schools instead of removing protesters?
Actually they have. Administrators refusing to obey the injunctions will be charged / have already been charged with “Outrage au Tribunal” (up to 1 year in jail and a fine).
IIRC the injunction prevents the schools from canceling classes because of the strike, but the injunction doesn’t stop them from canceling classes due to security issues – student blocking doors.
Hulk Smash you if u no learn!!!
No but isn’t that the loveliest illustration of what the law-and-order crowd is advocating through injunctions and pompous gazette editorials? Attain the wisdom of higher eucation and shut up or we will pepper spray and baton you until you do.
“Students” denying the right to education for other REAL students. What a shame.
Because education isn’t a right; unless there’s a strike and three green squares wanna break it – their education is a right.
It’s understandable that striking students would picket schools subject to injunctions to such an extent that the principals have no choice but to shut ‘em down. I don’t quite get how teachers can actively participate in the strikes, which have led in most (all?) cases to the undermining of court orders. Not that professors shouldn’t be entitled to the expression of their opinion, but they’re employees of public institutions who are supposed to teach. A judge has specifically instructed them to teach. And yet they are able not only to ignore the court order, but to work to ensure that it isn’t enforced. I wouldn’t be surprised if Charest ordered a bunch of firings – not an endorsement, but it wouldn’t be totally unjustified.
@ Raoul: “some people really cant afford to piss away an entire session like this.”
I know what you mean. We are raised to be 100% selfish and self-serving, so the idea of sacrificing even one semester of school for the collective well-being of our society is completely out of the question. Same with driving less or sharing more: not possible. Too selfish.
Striking students don’t have any respect for others. Isn’t that self-evident?
It is.
Josh 21:47 on 2012/05/14 Permalink
Yes, why on earth, when clearly Canada is at the bottom of the global heap on all the key indicators: Health, wealth, happiness and so forth. What a disappointment this country is.
Ian 22:00 on 2012/05/14 Permalink
Josh, that’s a non-sequitur. Unless of course you’re trying to say that since Canada’s not as bad as some other places we shouldn’t complain, but that would be a straw man argument that I would never engage in. How about actually expressing your opinion instead of relying on half-intelligible talking points?
Spock. 22:04 on 2012/05/14 Permalink
They should throw away the keys!
Fred 22:10 on 2012/05/14 Permalink
+1 apparent sarcasm (re: “societal overhaul” may be going a bit far? then again, they are radicals).
mdblog 23:08 on 2012/05/14 Permalink
The funny thing is that even if they were given free reign to “overhaul society” they a) wouldn’t have a clue what to do, and b) society would end up looking pretty much exactly as it is. Plus ca change…
qatzelok 08:37 on 2012/05/15 Permalink
I have to agree with mdblog and Josh on this one. Canada – land of Tar Sands and Al Qaeda hunters – is doing fine. The last thing we need is for some pesky students to ruin our daily drive to the mall.
Kevin 08:39 on 2012/05/15 Permalink
We have a method for overhauling society. It’s called democracy.
Don’t like something, get enough people to agree with you, get elected, and change it.
Bill Binns 08:41 on 2012/05/15 Permalink
I hope one of the papers does a follow up piece in four or five years. It will be interesting to see how many of these hardcore, radical communists, socialists and anarchists are spending their days sitting in a cubicle in a shirt and tie so they can keep up with their mini-van payments.
Spock 08:46 on 2012/05/15 Permalink
Yeah elections. Lets be honest, what’s the difference between elected leaders? They lie, steal and cheat just to get to the top.
I love it when I see successful people; people who got to where they are because they worked for it (white or blue collar).
Politicians are not those people!
Hamza 09:05 on 2012/05/15 Permalink
The death toll from last week’s act of hyperterrorism has skyrocketed to zero.
Kevin 09:16 on 2012/05/15 Permalink
@Hamza
Amazingly that’s identical to the number of students who will no longer be able to afford to get a BA.
What’s your point?
Bill Binns 09:21 on 2012/05/15 Permalink
@Kevin – How dare you! Having to pull a few extra shifts a semester down at the Java U is an unbreachable barrier to higher education for an entire generation of young Quebecois. This is exactly the same thing as genocide.
Adam 09:33 on 2012/05/15 Permalink
“This is exactly the same thing as genocide.”
Definitely. One wonders why Jean Charest isn’t already in the dock at the Hague.
Kate 09:34 on 2012/05/15 Permalink
I am thinking of cancelling comments for stories on the students, just because nobody has anything new to say so it’s all deteriorated into grouchy sniping.
Kevin 09:46 on 2012/05/15 Permalink
@Bill Binns
No, seriously, education is now free for everyone who earns less than $65,000 a year.
The less you earn, the more money you will actually be paid to go to school.
So I repeat, what exactly is the point of the protests continuing?
ant6n 11:51 on 2012/05/15 Permalink
@Kevin
It’s not what you earn, it’s what you parents earn. The government will assume your parents support you, even when they don’t. And then they might give you some bursary/loan, but you have to work to actually pay your bills. And then when you start earning money, the government will start cutting the support.
@Bill Binns
“A couple of Shifts” is more like 3 weeks. By the end of the increases, people will need to spend almost 9 weeks of full time minimum wage to pay the tuition, not including fees (which is another couple weeks). The summer only has 12 weeks; and if students spend almost all of it working towards tuition, when are they supposed to make the money to pay rent/food/books etc?
How many weeks of full time minimum wage are needed to pay Quebec tuition? (1986-2018)
Spock 11:57 on 2012/05/15 Permalink
Maybe if they would cut down on the Starbucks intake, iPhones and iPads, alcohol injected parties they would have more money.
I went to Timmy’s, had a el cheapo pay as you go phone and limited partying when I was in school and then had money left over for things like tuitions and books. You know, the important stuff.
Kate 12:07 on 2012/05/15 Permalink
Kevin, to evoke an old song:
“something is happening here but you don’t know what it is, do you, Mr. Jones?”
Ephraim 12:53 on 2012/05/15 Permalink
Let’s be nice, give them easy bail… along with an injunction preventing them from using, being in, on or around public transport. No bus, no metro, no train, no being near the tracks, no being in the metro station, etc.
@ant6n… can you show that from 1968? Oh and you forgot to include bursaries… under the current proposal, if your family is under $40K a year the bursary puts money in your pocket. If you are under $65K a year, a year of university is cheaper than an iPad. And of course, those calculations don’t include the tax write-off… future income, etc.
Bill Binns 13:32 on 2012/05/15 Permalink
@ant6n – I was speaking about paying for the increase not the total cost of tuition. Min wage is something like ten bucks an hour in Quebec right? The increase is about $300 a year? About a week of part-time employment or about 2.5 shifts per semester.
ant6n 14:57 on 2012/05/15 Permalink
@Ephraim
Minimum wage has not been around for that long. Bursaries exist, but their effects etc. are hard to measure. In any case, I was trying to show exact numbers relating to the idea that students can work to pay for the studies (which bursaries or not, many students will have to do).
@Bill
If you look at the chart, you see that we’ve been hovering around 6 weeks to pay tuition for many years, now it’s moving towards 9 weeks a couple of years from now. There are only so many weeks in a year where students can work full time (12), and we are going beyond the breaking point where students can work to pay their studies. You can argue that students can just go into debt; but then you have to give up the claim that students could easily work more to pay for the tuition increases.
Ephraim 17:44 on 2012/05/15 Permalink
@ant6n
I was a student too. I worked two different jobs, plus my summer job to pay my bills/costs. That’s part of being a student, balancing everything to pay the bills. Frankly, the fact that someone can balance work and study to me signifies a much better employee, someone with their priorities in good order.
Had tuition kept pace with inflation, from 1968, how much would tuition be?
And yes, I admit that it was too cheap when I was a student, too.
erika 18:35 on 2012/05/15 Permalink
@ Ephraim, wanted to let you know that my single mother makes less than 40k a year and I did not get any bursary money. Also, my loan is about $500 short of tuition every semester.
Just thought you should get some information from someone ACTUALLY experiencing our loan and bursary system before you continued to throw around grandiose “facts” about it.
Ephraim 19:20 on 2012/05/15 Permalink
@erika – I was speaking of the proposal that is currently on the table that was rejected by the students. The bursary for families under $45K would go from $193 to $5113 by 2019. The loan amount would be the same. For families under $60K would go from $0 to $2263. The loan from $2900 to $5290 (which leaves the net effect the same for both if you consider the loan, the tax effects, etc.)
Now, if you ask me, and I was the students, I would be negotiating things like indexation of the amounts and cut-offs. For example the $60K is one thing today but another by 2019. The government wants to index by 2.1% the increase, then those ceilings should be indexed as well. The bursary and the loans should be indexed as well. But I’m not at the negotiating table.
And I should mention that I don’t agree with how this is done at all. I would handle it another way altogether. But that’s a moot point. The point is that one thing is being said and another is being done. The government proposals do seem to come up with quite a bit of money for those who most need it. Are we doing this to help those who need it the most or are we holding down tuition for those who can certainly afford it? It’s like subsidies… if you subsidize the price of rice are you helping only those who need it, or is Mr. & Mrs. Muchobucks going to buy the same rice and enjoy the subsidy. How do you help those most at need versus giving subsidized education to the children of Mr. & Mrs. Muchobucks.
ant6n 01:07 on 2012/05/16 Permalink
@Ephraim
“I was a student too. I worked two different jobs, plus my summer job to pay my bills/costs. That’s part of being a student, balancing everything to pay the bills. Frankly, the fact that someone can balance work and study to me signifies a much better employee, someone with their priorities in good order.”
Well, the hike will exactly prevent that. Most people who studied in the last 25 years were able to work to pay their studies and graduate without debt. I don’t understand how these people first want to take that opportunity away from tomorrow’s students, but then they also gloat about how much harder they had it, when in fact they didn’t.
“Had tuition kept pace with inflation, from 1968, how much would tuition be?”
Exactly what’s proposed for 2018. That’s the goal, to bring it up to the ’68 levels. What’s so special about ’68 that we have to toss out more than 30 years of affordable post-secondary education? Why pick an arbitrary number like “tuition in 1968 adjusted for cpi”, rather than one that looks at how much money students can generate via work, and how much they need to live, so that they can graduate without debt if they work hard?
“And yes, I admit that it was too cheap when I was a student, too.”
That’s nice. But are you going to give that money back now? No, you’re not. You don’t want to even pay one cent more in taxes to today’s people the same advantage you had. So that sentiment is a bit meaningless.
erika 08:04 on 2012/05/16 Permalink
@Ephraim, I’m sorry, I should have been more specific in my response. I was trying to suggest that, despite what the government says they’re doing, I didn’t get any bursary money. I’m having troubles imagining them actually following through with their proposal when it includes giving out thousands and thousands more dollars. Didn’t Kate recently post an article about Quebec not using money that was given to them (given for the loans and bursaries) properly?
Imagine that your boss told you that your company wasn’t doing well so they would have to cut your salary by 20%. You keep the job because you like the place, like your boss, and, honestly, you could get by having a little less money – a couple less Starbucks’ coffees right? A few weeks later your boss shows up in a limousine, having come from a $400 meal, both payed for with company money. In fact, you have several bosses, and they all do this. Seems a little hypocritical no? A little like you’re getting f*cked over because you’re an easy target right?
If the schools and, well, government, need the money FOR the schools then i’m all for tuition increase. However, if they’re just going to waste it away then why bother? How about a little transparency in their expenses?
Kevin 09:57 on 2012/05/16 Permalink
@ant6n
I’m aware it’s what your family earns. And part of the discussion about university should be why parents are not supporting their offspring to the extent they should. But the latest proposal included making changes to how the government calculates loan and bursary eligibility.
Seriously, I don’t understand, (and I’ve said this before) why people don’t even attempt to provide for their children when the government is offering individuals hundreds of dollars each year in matching donations to RESPs.
@Kate
Wow, so you wanted to stop comments to prevent your own grouchy sniping?
People are profoundly disappointed with the government on many issues and hiding behind a ‘free tuition’ debate.
You’ve got people who are so angry they can’t stop to think and read about what’s being offered to them, others who just want to egg them on for their own reasons.
This is a polarized debate, and people marching in the streets don’t seem to recognize the legitimacy of other points of view.
ant6n 11:55 on 2012/05/16 Permalink
@Kevin
Based on what I’ve seen as a student, I deeply distrust the student bursary/loan programs by the government. I’ve seen people who need but are inelligible, I’ve seen people who don’t need support make themselves eligible. And I know people who wanted to get some government help, and work for the rest — but as they worked they lost the bursaries, because the government decided they had a lot of money. The bursary programs may also include a lot of loans (people tend not to be very clear on loans vs bursaries), so all these programs may not solve the debt issue.
I personally believe that the best (least) standard for fair tuition is one that allows people to work while studying without going into debt. That is what we had the last 30 years. And if you look at the Quebec budget, you see that it is not very expensive to provide.