A court order has banned pro‑Palestinian protests on the McGill campus for ten days.
A regular reader sent me some clarification: demonstrations:
But they aren’t banned outright.
I would have thought those normal demands at all times?
An ambitious plan to restore the Place des Nations to usable condition has ground to a halt as the firms meant to work on it are demanding more money.
I coincidentally came across this poster yesterday for a Bad Religion show at Place des Nations on May 22, 1999 billed as its “Official Reopening”. (source Montreal Concert Poster Archive).
I wonder how that happened, MarcG. The site has been nothing but abandoned concrete risers for years. When I explored it, about 15 years ago, it was clearly on the verge of becoming hazardous.
I found 2 other shows at Place des Nations that summer, The Offspring and Everlast, The Roots, and Macy Grey, and summer 2000 No Doubt played there with Lit and the Black Eyed Peas, and Grimskunk headlined a 2-day punk fest. It really seemed like the place to play in the 70s: Jeff Beck, Supertramp, Zappa, Peter Tosh, April Wine, Beau Dommage, BTO, Nazareth. According to this Gazette article, the Jazz Fest had a show there in 2004 featuring Vic Vogel.
Whoever put that poster archive together has my deepest admiration. Goodness, the early 90’s were something else – a lot of nostalgia for my (somewhat) misspent youth.
@saintlaurent: His name is JF Hayeur and he’s video documented tons of shows as well, available on his Punk Empire YT channel.
@saintlaurent he really deserves it. I commented on a post referencing a show I attended as a six year old and he replied with a scan of a Gazette ad promoting that concert.
This isn’t the first time it’s been in the news, but the STM has to halt the project to retrofit metro stations with elevators from lack of funds.
Elevators were inaugurated Wednesday at Atwater station, and work being done at Édouard‑Montpetit and to the yellow line at Berri-UQAM will be completed, but that will be that, for a long time.
The Canadiens have squeaked into the playoffs with a defeat of the Hurricanes in the last match of the regular season.
Film director Emmanuel Gendron-Tardif, who stabbed his mother to death two years ago, was declared not criminally responsible Wednesday because of mental illness, and may soon be allowed accompanied trips outside the Pinel Institute.
La Presse even found that Gendron-Tardif has been able to post to Facebook despite his incarceration in an involuntary mental facility.
The Tribunal administratif du logement, which allowed an unheard‑of 5.9% increase in rents this year, is promising to review how it calculates the hike to moderate next year’s increase. Thanks so much, Mme Duranceau.
This new method still doesn`t adress that rent increases contribute to the IPC, thus contribute to the rent increase. This circular type of calculation is only going to lead to ever increasing inflation and increasing increases. Someone needs to stop that train.
Ah yes, but even if the rent increase is only inflation, it will still contribute to inflation. Meanwhile, the landlord also needs to pay for their food that has increased by inflation. Inflation is always circular… ask Argentina
Well, you raise an interesting point. Rent is based not on a landlord’s profit margins, but their costs.
I guess what it boils down to is simple enough – do you think the point of rent control is to keep rents affordable, or to balance whatever profit the Ministry thinks the market can support against the government’s popularity at election time?
François Croteau, who used to be mayor of Rosemont–La Petite-Patrie, asks in a Le Devoir column who our commercial streets belong to and should only the merchants have a say in its direction? He points out that the pedestrianization of St‑Hubert last summer was welcomed by residents, but voted down for this year by a small majority of the merchants’ association – and is this the way to go?
Sounds a lot like the discussion we’ve had about this.
Interesting to see Croteau take a more Projet position than the the Projet mayor of Rosemont…
Quebec is putting the brakes on a lot of crucial health infrastructure projects – a kind of decision Quebec is prone to make on public installations until things actually crumble (e.g. metro and highway structures, school and hospital buildings).
La Presse has a companion piece about the bad state of the Douglas Hospital where mentally ill people are crammed into tiny rooms with strangers, illustrating the province’s general neglect of people with mental illnesses.
I’m struggling to understand the government’s logic with this push towards austerity. Is it just the CAQ knowing they won’t win the next election and deciding their approach will be fuck toute, let’s burn it all down? Or do they somehow think people will appreciate having crucial healthcare and infrastructure and educational funding slashed to the bone?
With the arrival of Sante-Quebec, there have been serious staffing cuts to the radiology departments of our downtown sites, impacting access to the various tests (ultrasound, MRI, angio/intervention radiology). An odd area to target as the delays were a concern for in and out patients before these decisions. Our esteemed institution’s media people have kept this news off the radar but for those working in the system, it’s one more slap in the face to health care common sense. Of course, many wonder about the elephant in the Sante Quebec room, Biron medical imaging/radiology, and if some of the diagnostic/treatment exams will be out-sourced to these clinics by the top-guns running Sante-Quebec.
This is neo-libieralism at it’s finest. Starve the public services, claim they’re not efficent and the population will be better with privitization. Hand it over to the private sector where the population will end up footing the ‘profit tax’ to the private sector (there’s always a profit tax)
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Sharing this story because I’ve now heard it happen to three different people. A seriously ill patient is scheduled for surgery at a private clinic, with everything covered by RAMQ — so far, so normal. But on the day of the procedure, once the patient is already prepped and in the blue gown, the clinic suddenly decides they can’t go through with it. Surgery is canceled, postponed, to be rebooked at a hospital instead.
Three people. Three separate stories. Same exact scenario.
Makes you wonder how much these clinics are billing — and profiting — even when the surgeries don’t actually happen.
All of this – cuts, delayed capital projects, etc. – was designed to get the province back on track to a balanced budget to avoid a credit downgrade. S&P just reduced our credit rating, which means that our debt-repayment/borrowing costs will increase, it will take longer to return to a balanced budget, and there will be more pressure to cut public expenditures, which will mean (even more) cuts to services (health care) to citizens in the very short term and (even more) contentious labour negotiations as existing agreements expire. Add on the insane trade policy roller-coaster from the US and we’ve got ourselves a real crisis.
Cheaping out on maintenance and proper construction is a choice and a mindset.
And yes, big bold projects do open themselves up to corruption (hello MUHC Glen site) but the more a society builds those projects, the more internal expertise it gets in developing anti-corruption habits.
As someone who has 4 MRIs and 2 ultrasounds a year ( fun fun genetic mutation, but hey at least I am getting properly screened for free [for now]! ) I can attest that the services/delays at the Glen and that MGH have increased a lot in the last year or so. It used to be that I went in for my full body MRI on a Sunday morning at 8am and was out by 9, 9:15 … now I am lucky if I get called before 11am. Where the used to be at least 3 techs to get me set up, now there is only one frazzled person worried I’d scream at her because it was so long…
I was chatting in Spanish with the tech last weekend because she thought I was Spanish and I told her “Lady! you’re not paid enough for me to yell at you”
Just be comforted that the elimination of the two other techs were to pay for salary raises for Genevieve Biron and the top gun management at sante QC. Efficiency! Lol
A 16-year-old boy was stabbed to death Tuesday evening outside Plamondon metro in Côte‑des‑Neiges. His attacker has not been found.
The federal French-language debate was scheduled for Wednesday evening, but the Canadiens’ last‑ditch effort to get into the playoffs was to be at the same time. So they moved the debate time forward, pundits calling this “the most Canadian thing ever.”
Radio-Canada explains how the team is hanging by a thread. CityNews also spells out the rather complicated points scenario.
The lawyers will obviously go over the contract, which we can’t read, but in general unless you have an inflation clause or a cost plus clause or a generous force majeur clause, you don’t get to not fulfill your fixed price contract or demand more money just because your costs rose. If you promise to do a thing for $100 and you think it’ll cost you $85 and you can get $15 in profit, but then costs go up and now it’s $95 or $105, well too bad, you take a loss. The park here should either force the contractor to finish the contract (specific performance) or sue for damages (liquidated if they exist). If the contractor goes bankrupt, well tough, bid better next time. And certainly no government should ever use them again. Enough socializing the losses or low bidding and then asking for more money later.
Also it’s really funny that one of the contractors said they don’t consider there to be a legal case as of yet, so they won’t comment. It’s usually the opposite. I guess they’ll never comment.