Tories’ election budget fails to hide cuts to research, innovation
Budget 2014 represents a subtle shift in the federal government’s strategy for the research and innovation file. With the next election on the near horizon, the Conservatives are now trying to hide their shortsighted cuts with lavish promises of billions in investments delayed over the next decade. Most of these commitments are slotted to […]
Canada needs a senior science and innovation minister
OTTAWA—When federal Finance Minister Jim Flaherty announced his 10th budget on Feb. 11, he once again demonstrated that science, technology, and innovation suffer from that Ottawa affliction known as CPA, continuous partial attention. Budgets with this government and others before it are usually careful to make some sort of statement about the need to […]
Firms failing to measure progress on innovation
The federal government has put years of policy development and billions of dollars into improving Canada’s lagging innovation record, but 40 per cent of domestic firms aren’t even measuring their progress on innovation, according to the Conference Board of Canada. Forty per cent of Canadian firms do not use metrics to chart their innovation […]
Science strategy, research funding top priorities for Rickford in 2014
Minister of State of Science and Technology Greg Rickford hit the road last week to promote new long-term funding for academic research announced in the latest federal budget, but critics say the Canada First Research Excellence Fund lacks detail and doesn’t take effect for another year. The federal government announced a new 10-year, $1.5-billion […]
Election reform bill needs cross country hearings
OTTAWA—Politicians can really be quite loveable. I had three politicos over to a third-year class I teach at Carleton University last week and we all had a love fest. Jim Armour of Summa Strategies and a director of communications to Stephen Harper in his opposition days was the Conservative speaker. For the New Democrats […]
Election reform bill needs cross country hearings
OTTAWA—Politicians can really be quite loveable. I had three politicos over to a third-year class I teach at Carleton University last week and we all had a love fest. Jim Armour of Summa Strategies and a director of communications to Stephen Harper in his opposition days was the Conservative speaker. For the New Democrats […]
Trudeau’s Senate move could resonate well beyond Hill bubble
Liberal Leader Justin Trudeau’s Senate gambit caught his Senators by surprise and the Conservative government off guard. Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s reaction was swift and mocking. He derided the ejection of 32 Senators from the federal Liberal party’s caucus as a meaningless, trivial change. “Unelected Liberal Senators will become unelected Senators who happen to […]
Giving doctors more money does not improve access to care
The amount paid to doctors in Canada increased by $7.5-billion in the last five years to reach a total of over $30-billion per year. Put another way, the growth rate of physician remuneration expenditures—what our health system pays to doctors for health services—was more than twice the rate at which the Canadian economy grew […]
Inequality hurting social inclusion in Canada
Recently, I tabled a study in the Senate from the Social Affairs Committee about social inclusion. We wanted to know how significant poverty, homelessness, a lack of affordable housing and income inequalities in Canada have affected our cohesion as a society. Inclusion and cohesion are vital to the national social fabric. They are vital […]
Prescription drug spending flat, but not for long
Canadians spent almost $23-billion on prescription drugs at retail pharmacies in 2012/13—or over $650 per capita, according to the findings from the Canadian Rx Atlas published by the UBC Centre for Health Services and Policy Research. That is a lot of money. However, after adjusting for general inflation, spending per capita actually fell over […]
