Redeye

It is clear that the Covid-19 pandemic has drastically reduced transit ridership, and that rebuilding rider confidence will be challenging. Councillor Jean Swanson has a motion before Vancouver City Council specifically focused on preserving bus ridership, which makes up over 60% of transit trips in Metro Vancouver. Redeye collective member and City Beat commentator Ian Mass joins us to talk about...

A year into the pandemic, it’s clear that any recovery plan has to include public investment in child care. The Canadian child care sector was fragmented and under-funded before the pandemic and it’s just gotten worse. A new study by David Macdonald and Martha Friendly of the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives surveyed child care providers in 37 Canadian cities and found staggering difference...

The ride-hailing giant Uber recently announced its answer to complaints about lack of benefits and labour protections for its workers when it unveiled its Flexible Work+ plan last. Uber is asking provincial governments to amend labour legislation to allow gig workers to accumulate benefit funds that they could spend on things like health insurance and pension plans. We speak with Brice Sopher, an...

The upcoming provincial and federal budgets are being called the most important in a generation with the opportunity of addressing long standing systemic inequality and injustices. Alex Hemingway is an economist and public finance policy analyst at the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives BC Office. He joins us to talk about what British Columbians are hoping to see in these budgets.

On April 1. BC Supreme Court granted an injunction to logging company Teal-Jones Group to remove Fairy Creek/Ada’itsx forest defenders. This clears the path for the destruction of one of the last intact old-growth areas on Vancouver Island, on the territory of the Pacheedaht First Nations. We speak with two people from the Sierra Club, senior forest and climate campaigner Jens Wieting and forest r...

According to a recent study, more than one and a half million child laborers were working in cocoa growing areas of Côte d’Ivoire and Ghana in 2019. In a landmark human rights case, eight young men from Mali are bringing a class action suit against big chocolate companies. They managed to escape after being trafficked as children and forced to harvest cocoa in Cote D’Ivoire. We speak with lawyer a...

According to a recent study, outbreaks of infectious diseases are more likely in areas that have been stripped of their forest cover or land that is used for monoculture plantations. The study, published in Frontiers in Veterinary Science, suggests epidemics are likely to increase as biodiversity declines. We speak with Claire Lajaunie, researcher with the National Institute of Health and Medical...

Vancouver City Council is at risk of slipping into divisive politics which will hinder a solution for South False Creek residents who fear eviction from their homes. Plus the push to host the 2030 Olympics, plans for the post Covid economic recovery and policy overload for City staff. We talk with our City Beat reporter, Ian Mass.

Music streaming services like Spotify are great for people who love to listen to music but have robbed musicians of much of their income. Musicians say the paltry payout rates are unfair and make it hard to make a living through their work. The Union of Musicians and Allied Workers (UMAW) launched a campaign called Justice at Spotify last fall, and they organized worldwide protests outside Spotify...

If you were asked to name the countries that have produced vaccines against Covid-19, you probably wouldn’t think of Cuba. Yet Cuba is currently the only Latin American country developing Covid-19 vaccine candidates. The Soberana 1 and 2 vaccines have shown strong immune response against the virus during clinical studies. Conner Gorry is Senior Editor of MEDICC Review and has been reporting on the...

In March, Vancouver City Council unanimously passed a motion to implement the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, UNDRIP, in Vancouver. To find out what this means for the three host nations, Musqueam, Squamish, and Tsleil-waututh, urban Indigenous people and the City of Vancouver, we speak with Alexander Dirksen, co-vice chair of the City’s Urban Indigenous Peoples’ Advisory Commi...

Statistics show that the lower your income, the less likely you are to have employer-paid sick days. Given that the jobs where women workers predominate don’t pay well, it’s clear that the introduction of paid sick leave would increase gender equality across the board. This March, the BC Employment Standards Coalition is calling on the provincial government to include the right to paid sick days i...

Nearly 6,000 workers at an Amazon warehouse in Bessemer, Alabama are sending in their ballots in a certification drive that will make history if it succeeds. Ballots must reach the National Labor Relations Board regional office in Alabama by March 29 to be counted. Jonathan Rosenblum is the author of Beyond $15: Immigrant Workers, Faith Activists, and the Revival of the Labor Movement. He also wor...

Activists across Canada say that it’s long past time that the federal government addressed environmental racism in this country. Nova Scotia MP Lenore Zann has brought forward a private member’s bill to develop a strategy to combat this form of structural racism. Bill C-230 is going to second reading in the House of Commons on Tuesday March 23. Dr. Ingrid Waldron is associate professor in the Scho...

Phase 3 of the vaccine rollout in British Columbia is expected to start in April and includes everyone over 60. But neither the province nor the feds have prioritized disabled individuals and their essential caregivers in its vaccine distribution plan. In contrast to other countries which clearly indicate that people with certain types of disabilities are high priority, Canada has yet to give this...

Vancouver has been developing a neighbourhood to house 20,000 people in South Vancouver for the last 30 years. Unfortunately, despite promising the best in amenities, the City faces rising costs with little money to pay for what was promised. Ian Mass brings us his City Beat report on this and other city issues.

Most of us can’t go to Tofino yet this year, with public health restrictions on non-essential travel. But if you’ve been longing to connect with the spirit of wild West Coast experiences, you can connect through film this weekend, March 12-14. The first-ever Tofino Adventure Film Festival is hosted by the folks at Clayoquot Action. We spoke today with festival curator, Keegan McColl.

While President Biden has made positive moves on the domestic front, activists are sounding the alarm about the direction of his foreign policy with the naming of Senator Robert Menendez to chair the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. Menendez has repeatedly attacked the United Nations and the International Court of Justice and supported unconditional military aid to right-wing governments. We sp...

The federal government’s new Bill 22 repeals some of the offences that currently carry mandatory minimums, but it leaves quite a number still in place. Meghan McDermott says that any imposition of sentencing requirements on judges leads to problems with systemic racism within the justice system. Meghan McDermott is with the BC Civil Liberties Association.

Migrant rights advocates estimate that 1.6M people in Canada don't have permanent resident status and at least 500,000 people are undocumented. Both groups could have problems getting the vaccine. Last week, the Migrant Rights Network sent a letter signed by more than 250 organizations calling on the prime ministers and provincial and territorial leaders to make sure that vaccines are available fo...

Six months after mass worldwide protests in support of racial justice, support continues to grow for a divestment from policing and prisons. Choosing Real Safety was collaboratively developed and authored by the Abolition Coalition and its allies. Over 250 organizations and over 3,000 individuals have signed on to support the declaration. We speak with Kit Rothschild, Violence Prevention Coordinat...

A letter signed by Naomi Klein, David Suzuki and Noam Chomsky, as well as a hundred other academics, activists and artists was delivered to Foreign Affairs Minister Marc Garneau’s office on Feb 25. It called on the federal government to stop propping up a repressive and corrupt dictatorship in Haiti, pointing out that for the past two years, Haitians have demonstrated their overwhelming opposition...

The Canadian Union of Postal Workers says we should re-imagine Canada Post and use its existing network to connect Canadians as part of a green and just recovery after the Covid-19 pandemic. We talk with Kate Holowatiuk about the vision they have developed - Delivering Community Power.

A new study has found that air pollution from fossil fuels was responsible for more than 8.7 million deaths globally in 2018. This death toll exceeds the combined total of people who die globally each year from smoking tobacco plus those who die of malaria. The study was published in the journal Environmental Research earlier this month. We talk with Eloise Marais, Associate Professor in Physical...

Vancouver City Council approved rezoning applications for two new housing projects spearheaded by local Indigenous societies, despite neighbourhood opposition. Council also looked at how they could support reconciliation, bring in paid sick leave and protect West End residents from homophobic street preachers. All this, and more, in today’s City Beat with Ian Mass.