From firebrand student politician to city hall’s resident skeptic--and from anonymous rabble-rouser to very public rabble-rouser--Councillor Mike Nickel's story is a strange one. Now once again the Ward 11 councillor's ambitions seem to be in a position he has chased before: the mayor's seat. 

University of Calgary law professor Lorian Hardcastle joins us to talk about her controversial piece on Dr. Hinshaw and why she needs to exercise her powers to stop the death and destruction that COVID is wreaking. We also talk about what the government of Alberta needs to do get this disaster under control 

On November 12th, The Next 30 launched, professing to be a grassroots platform that will “engage in discussions with citizens about values that unite us and ideas and policies to build our shared future.” If this sounds vague and toothless, it’s because it is. This is a project led by a cadre of centrist professionals who, for all their professional success, understand their increasing irrelevance as political actors in this province. It’s easy to dismiss, and many have, but don’t count them out. The Next 30 bears the hallmarks of other projects that have proven to be harmful to the left.

Two months ago, Lethbridge citizens got together to figure out how respond to the UCP’s recent closure of the local supervised consumption site (SCS). The SCS had been the busiest consumption site in Canada (possibly North America) and provided comprehensive consumption services, as well as 16 other health care and outreach services. Locals stepped up to provide what had been taken away. But now the Lethbridge police and city administration are trying to shut that down.

Contact tracing is broken. 

Dr. Hinshaw told us on November 5th that contact tracers would now only be contacting people in “high priority settings.” Only the close contacts of health care workers, minors, and individuals who live or work within communal facilities (like long term care homes) would be notified that they had been exposed to COVID-19 and that they should self-quarantine. People sick with COVID in a non-priority setting were now expected to now do all of this on their own. 

Dave Cournoyer of Daveberta fame joins us to discuss Alberta's multiple overlapping crises. We talk COVID-19, Jason Kenney's $1.7 billion dollar whoopsie, conservative connected law firms making bank and how the smart money is on Joe Biden cancelling the Keystone XL pipeline. 

Originally published on the Shades of Colour Instagram account. Republished with permission. 

The UCP’s latest anti-worker legislation, the Orwellian-named Ensuring Safety and Cutting Red Tape Act (otherwise known as BIll 47), is another attempt by the UCP to roll Alberta back a couple decades when it comes to workers rights.

These changes reduce costs for employers on the backs of workers, transfer even more power to the boss and will see workers face an even crueler world if they get sick or injured on the job. When Albertans get up in the morning to go to work they expect to come home safe and healthy. For some workers that isn’t the reality. Here are the biggest changes to Occupational Health and Safety (OHS)  and the Workers Compensation Board (WCB) in this legislation that will affect you in your day to day work life.

Six months ago president-elect Joe Biden said "I've been against Keystone from the beginning. It is tarsands that we don't need — that in fact is very, very high pollutant." 

Joe Biden has been clear: he’s going to kill this project. He was always going to kill this project. Yet even when it was brutally obvious that Biden would be America’s next president, Premier Kenney kept betting the farm on Keystone XL.

Every year the poppy is at the centre of a cyclical, empty, culture war debate. Last year, it was Don Cherry. This year, it’s Whole Foods.