COMMONS

The Oka Crisis was the biggest military confrontation on Canadian soil in more than a century. On its face, it was about a golf course expansion. But for the Mohawks who took up arms, it was the culmination of a centuries-long fight for recognition of their sovereignty and their land.   Featured in this episode: Thaioronióhte Dan David, Loreen Pindera, Geoffrey York ( Globe and Mail) &...

Real estate mania is at an all time high in this country. And in no place is this more true than in Vancouver. But nobody can even agree on what went wrong.  Have snooty property owners, overreaching bureaucrats, and gutless politicians allowed the housing supply to dwindle to nothing?  Or has a network of transnational criminals turned Vancouver into a narco-capital built on dirty money...

Vancouver is obsessed with real estate. But what most people don't realize, is that it's been this way from the beginning.  Three stories of the swindlers, segregationists and profiteers that made Terminal City what it is.   Featured in this episode: Jesse Donaldson, Jordan Stanger-Ross, Michael Abe, Stephen Learey   To learn more: Land of Destiny: A History of Vancouver Real Estate...

Africville was one of Canada's oldest Black settlements, a proud community of more than 400 people. And then the City of Halifax decided to utterly obliterate it.  There was one man who simply refused to leave. Eddie Carvery may not have been the best man for the job. But for half a century, he has never stopped fighting for his home.    Featured in this episode: Eddie Carvery, Jon...

The Bridle Path is one of the most exclusive neighbourhoods in Canada, home to the ultra-wealthy and the famous. But behind their locked gates, some of Canada's elite try to scheme their way into even greater wealth on the property market — not always legally.  And their ambitions have a way of becoming problems for the rest of us.  Featured in this episode: Kozeta Izeti, Norma Wal...

Stories about Canada's real estate obsession.  The first episode drops on April 28, 2021. Support COMMONS: http://commonspodcast.com See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Almost a year after the worst mass shooting in modern Canadian history, Nova Scotians are still in the dark about what exactly happened. A gunman, dressed in an RCMP uniform, driving an RCMP cruiser killed 22 people. In the months since, the Mounties have been short on answers. And it's left people wondering whether they have something to hide.   Featured in this episode: Stephen Maher, Paul...

For three decades, much of Northern Ontario has been engaged in an unprecedented experiment in policing. It's called the Nishnawbe-Aski Police Service. And the idea is simple: the old, colonial cops shouldn't be policing Indigenous territory. Instead, Indigenous people should police themselves. Featured in this episode: Kyle Edwards, Christian Leuprecht To learn more: “Inside the impossible...

When John and Susan Pruyn came to Toronto, they were hoping to protest against the G20 and then spend some time with their daughter. Instead, they would be caught up in a whirlwind of police misconduct with few precedents in Canadian history. Featured in this episode: Jesse Rosenfeld, John Pruyn, Susan Pruyn, Sarah Pruyn. Jesse Rosenfeld is a Toronto born journalist who has covered the Middle East...

In the first of a two-part series on the G20, two mysterious strangers start volunteering with activist networks in southern Ontario. It's all part of one of the biggest undercover police operations in Canadian history.   To learn more: “Unmasked: Searching for lessons in Toronto's 2010 G20 debacle” by Andrea Bennett in Maisonneuve “How police infiltrated groups planning G20...

Myles Gray was an unarmed man who died after seven Vancouver police officers beat him mercilessly. Half a decade after he died, not only does his family not have justice, they don't even know the names of the people who killed him.   Featured in this episode: Bethany Lindsay ( CBC Vancouver ), Harsha Walia (B.C. Civil Liberties Association), Ronald MacDonald (Independent Investigations Office...

A Toronto police officer shoots and kills two Black men and is accused of beating another, all within a five-year span. He's never found guilty of committing a crime. And he continues to rise through the ranks.    Featured in this episode: Bruce Livesey, Howard Morton, André Marin, Leora Shemesh    To learn more: “Above The Law” by Bruce Livesey in BuzzF...

Even as a teenager, Neil Stonechild was an inspiration to his friends. And then one day, he was found frozen to death outside of Saskatoon. He was last seen alive in the back of a police cruiser. Thirty years later, we know some of what happened to him. But we still don't have justice.  Featured in this episode: Jeffrey Crowe, Donald Worme, Susanne Reber   To learn more: Report of the Co...

A teenage boy and his friends start robbing banks in Toronto. A future Prime Minister is deported from Montreal. A Black Panther in Baltimore goes to prison for four decades. And the RCMP is split apart by the biggest scandal in the force's history.  At the heart of it all is one man. He calls himself the General.   Featured in this episode: Ricky Atkinson, David Austin, Robin Philpot, L...

Support us: canadaland.com/join The RCMP is one of the most famous police forces in the world — the red serge and stetson hat are practically synonymous with Canada. But that image obscures the profound power the Mounties have held throughout Canadian history. And the dark legacy of ethnic cleansing and genocide at their core. Featured in this episode: Jean Teillet, Sean Carleton, Steve Hewi...

Canada is a big, interesting, and complicated place and COMMONS is committed to bringing you thoughtfully crafted and illuminating stories that will challenge everything you think you know about this country. This past year, we have brought you stories from all across the country. We told your stories about some of Canada's most powerful families. We launched an emergency season to cover the COVID...

Julian Fantino may be the most famous cop in Canadian history. He was the chief of four different police forces. And for decades, he was one of the most influential voices in law enforcement. But during his rise, people critical of the police had a way of finding themselves in the crosshairs. They were smeared, surveilled, intimidated and arrested. The police are a singularly powerful institution...

Stories about the power that police wield in Canada, and about the lengths they're willing to go to hold on to it. First episode drops Wednesday, October 14.   Support COMMONS: http://commonspodcast.com See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Support us at commonspodcast.com   In the final episode in our series about the COVID-19 pandemic and the crisis in long-term care, we’re going to tell you a different kind of story. A story of hope. About how the people we treat as disposable, can have lives of joy and dignity. And about one place where they were given exactly that.   COMMONS: Pandemic is currently focusing on how COVID-19 is aff...

Support us at commonspodcast.com Four months after the first outbreak in a Canadian nursing home, over 7000 long-term residents have died of COVID-19. But if you look at the news or social media or our political debates, it seems like we’ve already moved on. Maybe that’s because it feels like this kind of tragedy was inevitable during a pandemic. It wasn’t. And we know that because in some places...

Support us at commonspodcast.com   Jonathan Marchand is one of the thousands of young disabled people living in long-term care. But Marchand doesn’t want to fix the system. He doesn’t think it can be reformed. Marchand is an abolitionist. For a century and a half, Canada has hidden away disabled people in institutions where they were neglected and abused. Is long-term care just the latest incarnat...

Support us at commonspodcast.com   After a stroke left him locked in his own body, Rabbi Ronnie Cahana has found ways to lead an incredibly full life. Then the pandemic came. It swept through Quebec, leaving a trail of devastation. Today, Rabbi Cahana is one of the thousands of Quebeckers left stranded in the middle of one of the worst disasters in modern Canadian history.   COMMONS: Pandemic is c...

Support us at commonspodcast.com Innis Ingram’s mother is his hero. But today, she’s living in one of the worst hit long-term care homes in Ontario. She has a terminal illness. Dozens and dozens of people around her have died, including her friend and roommate. And she’s had minimal human contact for three months. But even though he can’t be there with her, Innis is determined to get her the care...

Support us at  commonspodcast.com We take a break from our PANDEMIC season with an extended interview with Damian Abraham, a guest from our episode about Canada's wrestling dynasty, The Harts. Damian explains the art of juggling the real and the fake, wrestling's dying language and how Canadians helped build World Wrestling Entertainment. Damian Abraham is the host of Turned Out A Punk Podcast, th...

Support us at commonspodcast.com Long-term care workers are in the vanguard in the war against COVID-19. They’re not the kinds of workers who get movies or TV shows made about them. In fact, their stories are rarely told. But not only are they battling heroically against this pandemic. They’re fighting for recognition and respect within a system built to marginalize them.  COMMONS: Pandemic is cur...