NOW and NEXT

Today on NOW and NEXT: Anthony Rota represents the community of North Bay in the House of Commons. He's been forced to resign as Speaker of the House because he not only invited, he honoured a Second World War Ukrainian veteran who served in a Nazi SS Division. But he story barely gets any local coverage. Why? Because there's barely any local media to do that job. We sit down with Erin Trafford, C...

Today on NOW and NEXT: We're back in the saddle after some time off to celebrate my wife's retirement! We managed to extend our summer with some great weather, great food and great friends in Europe - all the while the Greenbelt lit a poltical fire around the Ford government, the federal Liberals appear to be in free fall in the polls, and our House of Commons unanimously applauded a Ukrainian Sec...

Today on NOW and NEXT: The Meta response to Bill C-18 makes it clear that government has no place in regulating journalism. Bill C-18 has been a collasol failure and will do nothing to stablize the economics for news producers in this country. The only way we're going to create a space that allows journalism to thrive is to recreate the media and journalism business model. We need to have a seriou...

Today on NOW and NEXT: Today on NOW and NEXT I had one of those weird "work" dreams last night. I was in a newsroom I didn't recognized and told we had no one to cover shifts. After a few anxious moments and efforts to solve the problem, I realized - it's NOT my problem. In fact, I DON'T EVEN WORK HERE! And I walked out. That's when I woke up:) I was clearly triggered by the Meta story! (I am a Re...

Today on NOW and NEXT: The reasons we aren't buying up EV in this country are because the auto companies aren't producing the vehicles most of us want, there's next to NO charging infrastructure in place, and dollar for dollar - they're too expensive in a world that becomes less affordable every day. Ask yourself, would you buy a gas fueled SUV if there were no gas stations between your home and y...

Today on NOW and NEXT: New research from Abacus Data suggests the Ford government would sweep to power with a larger majority government if an election were held today. David Coletto is the CEO at Abacus. He says there's no appetite for change in Ontario but points out more than half of those survey think the premier does more to support his friends and supporters than he does to support the well...

Today on NOW and NEXT: I'm hooked on the World Cup tournament. The Canadian women are poised to move onto the next round and I'll probably be up for the 5am ET start on Monday! https://www.cbc.ca/sports/soccer/worldcup/soccer-womes-world-cup-canada-group-stakes-1.6919678 Trudeau's cabinet shakeup includes a lot of new faces and experiences to the table. But what does it mean for the progress of th...

Today on NOW and NEXT: Gerard Kennedy is a former member of the federal and Ontario parliaments and served ten years as the Executive Director of Toronto's Daily Bread Food Bank in the 80s and 90s. He says Canada, we Canadians face a national character test as we emerge from the pandemic. More Canadians live in poverty. More Canadians are going hungry. And Kennedy says, "Hunger is a quiet noise."...

Today on NOW and NEXT: Toronto Mayor Olivia Chow and Hamilton Mayor Andrea Horwath should be leading the national charge on homelessness and housing. Two NDP mayors in two southern Ontario cities facing crises prompted by the wilful ignornace of Liberals in Ottawa. Chow and Horwath should be leveraging their relationship with Jagmeet Singh and the hammer he and the federal NDP hold over the Trudea...

Today on NOW and NEXT: Three years ago this morning, I was broadcasting the Newstalk 1010 morning show LIVE from Cow Bay, Nova Scotia when Marigold Brynn arrived to make me a grandfather of TWO! Happy Birthday Marigold. Minnesotans are facing lousy air quality thanks to the smoke from fires in BC and eastern Canada. And David Schultz, professor of political science and constitutional law at Hamlin...

Today on NOW and NEXT: In the wake of Mississauga Mayor Bonnie Crombie accusing Nate Erskine-Smith of ageism, (https://www.thestar.com/opinion/contributors/2023/07/17/bonnie-crombie-let-me-be-perfectly-clear-im-a-63-year-old-woman-and-i-am-in-it-for-the-long-haul.html) we connect with Lisa Taylor, President of Challenge Factory and our go-to voice on the future of work. Lisa says Crombie's accusat...

Today on NOW and NEXT: Former TTC Chair, Toronto City Councillor and current SVP at EY in Toronto Josh Colle joins the show to talk about the need for quick fixes and quick wins for Mayor Olivia Chow. In the short term, the mayor needs to be seen to be making the city "better" for average Torontonians. At the same time, she has to forege her image as the city's champion. Start by telling Queen's P...

Today on NOW and NEXT: Veteran journalist/columnist, host of The Daily Edition on Sirius XM radio and co-founder of The Line, Matt Gurney joins the show to give us a start-ups perspective on the mess that is Bill C-18, the Online News Act. That's the mess of regulation passed by Canada's federal government requiring Google and Meta to pay for news links posted on their platforms. Matt says the leg...

Today on NOW and NEXT: Olivia Chow is officially Toronto’s 66th mayor. Now what? Where to begin? The biggest challenge for the new mayor is political capital. Does she have what it will take to unite city council behind her agenda. Does she have what it will take to convince the province to strike a new deal with Toronto to ensure the city’s long term financial stability. And does she have what it...

Today on NOW and NEXT Did Australia's legislation aimed at saving that country's media and journalism from a slow painful demise really work? Did the "pay for links" law really force Google and Facebook to bend the knee? NEWS FLASH!! No. No it didn't. Yet, Canada's legacy media, (including the CBC), and the federal government see Bill C-18 as the only path to survival for the journalism ecosystem...

Today on NOW and NEXT: We're joined by veteran award winning broadcast journalists Barb DiGiulio and Kym Geddes to talk about the news of the day: Ontario developer asks court to prevent, delay interview with auditor general in Greenbelt audit. https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/silvio-de-gasperis-auditor-general-greenbelt-1.6902145 Marco Mendicino, Canada’s Public Safety Minister continues to...

Today on NOW and NEXT: The Weather Network reports: Canada’s Far North just saw its hottest temperature ever recorded theweathernetwork.com/en/video/fVCijuox?playlist=oLRZ3mum Shootings may be down in Toronto, year over year, but they're happening in neighbourhoods we typically think of as safe areas of town. https://data.torontopolice.on.ca/pages/shootings The latest crossfire murder of 44 year o...

Today on NOW and NEXT: We don't normally post on Fridays but, as of today, we ARE! It will be our FRIDAY THREAD. (The first one is here: https://www.threads.net/t/CuZR2Ong9_l/?igshid=NTc4MTIwNjQ2YQ%3D%3D) It's a short video to wrap the week and we'll post them in my Threads feed and on the Story Studio Network YouTube channel (https://www.youtube.com/@storystudionetwork/featured) The audio will la...

Today on NOW and NEXT: We continue to hit record high average temps globally this week. The warm Antarctic winter is a major contributor. https://www.theglobeandmail.com/world/article-the-earths-average-temperature-remained-at-a-record-high-wednesday/ The Economist has a fascinating in-depth story on the tech advancements in warfare. It doesn't make it any less bloody. There's been more Russian ca...

Today on NOW and NEXT: News and views with Dave Trafford. July 3rd was the hottest day on the planet since satellite records have been kept in 1979. https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-66104822 The TTC is the least reliable transit service in the GTA says the Toronto Region Board of Trade. https://www.theglobeandmail.com/canada/toronto/article-toronto-had-least-reliable-transit-service-in...

Today on NOW and NEXT: We're trying something in response to all of the caterwauling over Bill C-18 and chorus of concerns over how we'll ever find Canadian news. Do the way I've done it. Go to the source and pay for it when required. No Google search was done in the production of this episode! Today's stories came from: Environment Canada CBC.ca The Globe and Mail (paid subscription) The BBC The...

Today on NOW and NEXT: We highlight an episode from The Next Normal where we myth bust some of the assumptions and outdated ideas around career and skill development. What do we need to foster in our workforce now that we’ve gone through this experience? What have we discovered about education and training? Have retirement expectations shifted? Are there new skills gaps to address? Today’s host, C...

Today on NOW and NEXT: Pam Carter is the President of the Mariposa Folk Foundation. She joins us to talk about the health and well being of one of the longest running music festivals in Canada. This year's festival in Orillia marks 62 years since it's inaugural weekend in August 1961. The lineup feature a guy named Ian Tyson and a young woman named Syliva Fricker:) The festival kicks off with The...

Today on NOW and NEXT: Bob Reid, Principal at Broadway Strategy and Communications, John Wright, SVP at Maru Public Opinion and Sabrina Nanji, Founder and and Publisher of The Queen's Park Observer join the podcast to review the by-election results that landed Olivia Chow in the Mayor's chair. Can she hold a fractured council together to move her agenda forward? How will she stickhandle her relati...

Today on NOW and NEXT: Lisa Taylor, President at Challenge Factory joins us to talk about the current state and the future of work in Canada's media sector. Lisa says the telecom owned media companies face two major challenges, particularly in the case of news and journalism. First, is to retain and regain the trust of diminsishing audiences. Second, it to retain and regain the trust of its workfo...