Redeye

Starting January 31, the province of BC decriminalized the personal possession of certain types and amounts of drugs. But the policy does not cover some commonly used controlled substances and the amounts permitted are too small to have an impact, according to advocates and drug users. Pivot Legal and VANDU have collaborated on a Know Your Rights card to help people figure out if they are protected by the policy. I speak with Caitlin Shane, staff lawyer at Pivot Legal Society.

Colonialism and systemic racism are embedded in Vancouver’s bylaws. A motion before Vancouver Council wants to take a deep dive into these bylaws using an equity lens. Council will also consider a climate justice charter written by people with lived experiences of systemic inequities. Ian Mass joins us with this week’s episode of City Beat.

Despite the climate crisis, 80% of new vehicles sold in Canada in the last two years were SUVs and pickup trucks, up from 55% a decade ago. A research team at SFU says the Canadian obsession with SUVs is seriously disrupting our climate goals. We speak with Zoe Long from the Sustainable Transportation Action Research Team.

In a small Indian village, Ranjit wakes up to find that his 13-year-old daughter has not returned home from a family wedding. A few hours later, she’s found stumbling home. She had been dragged into the woods and raped by three men, all known to the family. Ranjit and his wife go to the police, and the men are arrested. The new documentary, To Kill a Tiger, follows Ranjit’s uphill battle to find justice for his child.

The 45-year old Vancouver Folk Music Festival is a much-loved event for music fans and an important showcase for musicians. So it came as a shock when the festival’s board announced two weeks ago that the 2023 festival had been cancelled and they wanted members to vote to dissolve the society. Following a groundswell of support, the board postponed the AGM and held an open meeting to discuss the festival’s future. Ian Mass was at the meeting and brings us a report.

We are probably all familiar with the letter-writing campaigns of Amnesty International. Now Amnesty Canada has a new podcast: Rights Back at You. The podcast aims to unravel the Canada you think you know and challenge the systems that hold back human rights. The podcast launched February 1 with an episode on facial recognition and policing protest. We talk with the host of Rights Back at You, Daniella Barreto.

There has been a rapid increase in Canadian university tuition fees, creating a barrier for low-income students and widening the gap between privileged students and those who struggle to pay for their studies. Grace Barakat is a sessional lecturer at the University of Toronto. She talks with us about how changes in the cost of tuition are having an impact on Canadian students and their futures.

Canada’s drug prices are the fourth highest in the developed world. New guidelines aimed at lowering prescription drug prices have been in process for more than 2 years, and have met with intense pressure by the industry lobby group, Innovative Medicines Canada. Dr. Joel Lexchin examines the lies and half-truths put out by IMC. Lexchin is Professor Emeritus of Health Policy and Management at York University.

Ian Mass joins us with City Beat to talk about Indigenous-led supportive housing, a business-friendly mayor, fires in Downtown Eastside hotels, the demise of Vancouver’s Renter Office and increasing the supply of renewable energy.

A new report by Women Transforming Cities looks at ways to speed up implementation of TRC calls to action within municipalities. As almost 80% of Indigenous people in BC live, work, and study in urban and off-reserve areas, municipalities play a big role in fostering Indigenous relations. Yet, researchers found that almost half of municipalities identified a lack of knowledge and understanding about the calls to action and saw it as a substantial challenge to implement them. Clara Prager is one of the authors of the report.

British Columbia is awash in housing announcements and plans. A rental protection fund designed to thwart real estate investment trusts, one stop shopping for provincial housing permits, a refreshed 10-year housing supply plan, a promised BC Builds plan and a brand new housing ministry. Economist Alex Hemingway joins us to help us figure out if all these plans will change the game on housing in BC.

When Pedro Castillo was elected president of Peru in April 2021, he embodied the hopes of millions of rural, Black and Indigenous peoples. Following more than 18 months of opposition from Congress and the Peruvian elite, Castillo was impeached and jailed after he attempted to rule by emergency poweres. Protests against the arrest have been met with lethal force by the police and the army. As many as 50 people have been killed and over 600 wounded. Meanwhile the Canadian government has sided with the United States in supporting the new president, Dina Boluarte. We speak with Yves Engler of the Canadian Foreign Policy Institute.

Vancouver parks board threatens to turbocharge commercialization of parks and city council plans for urgent measures to uplift Chinatown and increased support for renters. Ian Mass has these stories and more in this week’s City Beat.

On the final day of the UN Biodiversity Conference in Montreal in December, 196 countries reached a new global agreement to stem the stunning loss of biodiversity worldwide. The Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework promises key commitments to halt extinction while recognizing Indigenous People’s rights and title. Charlotte Dawe is Conservation and Policy Campaigner with the Wilderness Committee. She was in Montreal and joins us to share her perspective on what was achieved and what still needs to be done.

Millions of Canadians do not have dental coverage, with 1 in 5 children and over half of seniors without access to regular dental care. A forthcoming book by Nova Scotia dentist Brandon Doucet highlights how Canada’s current dental care system is inconsistent with the primary purpose of the Canada Health Act. Doucet is founder of Coalition for Dentalcare. He joins us to talk about the urgent need for full universal dental care.

City Beat reporter Ian Mass joins us with his regular City Beat report to talk about the year ahead in politics for Vancouver City Council and Metro Vancouver, from police and public safety to affordable housing and budget shortfalls.

By 9:43am on January 3, many of the 100 highest-paid CEOs in Canada had made as much money as the average Canadian worker makes in a year, close to $59,000. New data from 2021 shows that top CEOs broke every compensation record on the books that year. We speak with David Macdonald, author of Breakfast of Champions, a new report on CEO pay.

Late last year, the Gitxaala First Nation filed a judicial review in BC Supreme Court. The First Nation is challenging BC’s Mineral Tenure Act. The act currently allows anyone to get mineral rights just about anywhere in the province. Redeye’s James Mainguy spoke recently with Chief Matthew Hill, hereditary Chief of the Gitxaala First Nation, along with Ruben Tillman, one of the legal team representing the First Nation in BC Supreme Court.

Michael Bueckert is one of three delegates who just returned from a 2-week trip to the occupied Palestinian Territories and Palestinian communities within Israel. The three are all members of different Canadian organizations working to support Palestinian human rights in Israel and the Occupied Territories. Michael Bueckert is Vice-President of Canadians for Justice and Peace in the Middle East and author of a report on the trip.

The BC government under Premier David Eby has signaled new directions on protecting BC lands. They have committed to protect 30 per cent of the province’s land by 2030. This includes a mandate to work with Indigenous communities to create Indigenous Protected and Conserved Areas. We talk about the new commitment with Torrance Coste, National Campaign Director for the Wilderness Committee.