"The wide-ranging Forum Poll for the National Post sought the opinions of a sample of Canadians of voting age... The voting intentions, if actual ballots, would translate into a minority government for the NDP." The Canadian public is on a distinct tilt to the left, says a new national public opinion poll. Criticism of the Conservatives' spring budget, Bill C-38, continues: it is "anti-labour" (repeals The Fair Wages and Hours of Labour Act; reforms Employment Insurance) and "guts the Fisheries Act"; a website protest against the bill is planned for June 4. [more inside]
posted by flex on May 28, 2012 - 55 comments

Canada is planning to withdraw from the Kyoto treaty. CBC, BBC, AFP. The Herald Sun claims that this is to allow shale sands oil extraction.
posted by jaduncan on Dec 12, 2011 - 121 comments

With the Ontario provincial election campaign still extremely close (warning: PDF link) in its last days, the Conservative party sends out a gay-baiting and trans-baiting direct-mail ad. [more inside]
posted by mightygodking on Oct 3, 2011 - 70 comments

Shit Harper Did Does exactly what it says on the can. Example: "Canadian PM Stephen Harper weakened regulations so that more pesticide residue could be left on your fruits and vegetables." "Harper decorated the government lobby in parliament with photos of just himself, instead of the traditional portraits of former Prime Ministers." And much more.
posted by Fizz on Apr 13, 2011 - 96 comments

Scientists working for the Canadian government aren't allowed to talk to journalists without permission from Ottawa. And the restriction isn't limited politically sensitive topics like climate change and the Alberta oil sands -- the co-author of a recent Nature article about flooding at the end of the last ice age was told to "wait for clearance from the minister's office" before talking to reporters about his work. The policy has only been in effect at Natural Resources in Canada since March, but Environment Canada has had the same rules since 2008. (Previously.)
posted by twirlip on Sep 13, 2010 - 44 comments

Canada's Tourism Minister, Diane Ablonczy, was stripped of responsibility for a Marquee Tourism Events Program budget of $100 million, after she gave $397,500 to Toronto's Pride Week festival, which attracts a million tourists to Toronto every June. The story was broken by backbench Conservative MP Brad Trost in the blog LifeSiteNews.com, who stated that most of the Conservative cauacus was shocked at the award, and that Ms. Ablonczy was stripped of the budget as punishment. Pride Toronto's response. The Tories run damage control.
posted by Quiplash on Jul 8, 2009 - 71 comments

Anti-Conservative site Vote For Environment, has had over a million hits in just 12 days. Previously.
posted by gman on Oct 6, 2008 - 33 comments

Culture en péril - In these Canadian election times and in response to the recent Culture cuts from Conservatives - three of the best Quebec talents in music, theater and humor join forces and hit back hard (lol) with a highly satirical imagining of the replacement program (captioned).
posted by zenzizi on Sep 20, 2008 - 18 comments

Newfoundland's Progressive Conservative Premier registered his Anything But Conservative campaign today with Elections Canada. The same agency also deemed that the online vote swap on Facebook is in fact legal. They're hiring.
posted by gman on Sep 17, 2008 - 62 comments

PM Stephen Harper’s Canada Day greeting Harper adopts a hawkish, true-blue Tory tone for this year's Canada Day greeting, with an uncharacteristic (for a Canadian) shout-out to God: From championships in hockey to humanitarian and military leadership roles in Afghanistan and Haiti, we can say again this year, Canada is a citizen of the world and we make our contribution a positive one. And why shouldn`t we? From the natural wealth of the land that God created, to the talents, energy and imagination of people drawn from all the nations of the earth, we are a country that has been truly blessed.
posted by KokuRyu on Jul 3, 2007 - 75 comments

Are Canadians changing parliament? It seems that the minority government Conservative Party has introduced legislation to set fixed four year election dates, the third week in October. Some people seem to think it can work, and others don't. Evidently I fit into a minority position as I can't see the benefit of having a year long election runnup.
posted by pezdacanuck on May 30, 2006 - 40 comments

Harper wins Tory minority government. Conservative Leader Stephen Harper will become Canada's next prime minister, as Canadians have elected a Tory minority government and ended a 12-year reign of Liberal rule.
posted by Robot Johnny on Jan 23, 2006 - 171 comments

An election will soon be taking place in Canada and the party led by Stephen Harper may form a minority government. Might as well know what these Conservatives stand for.
posted by johnnydark on Jun 1, 2004 - 44 comments