Grievances Against Canada Laid Out-Canada’s Discriminatory Woes

Grievances Against Canada Laid Out-Canada’s Discriminatory Woes

Tony Peters and The Black Robe

https://youtu.be/9NE17qGhmGA

Canada, home to a diverse melting pot of cultures and races from all over the world. We pride ourselves in tolerance and accepting. Do we really though? We accept immigrants and refugees sure, and yes, we do accept them with welcome arms, but what about those who have lived in Canada their whole lives? I assure you it is not a culture of acceptance for those who have lived here most or all of their lives. We are cast aside and pressured into silence by a government with eyes set on destroying our cultures and traditions, and replacing them with the cultures of those newly arriving in Canada. This needs serious thought and changes need to be made, as this is actually a very serious matter.

One way that this is affecting Canadians is the push by certain companies to only hire immigrants. Tim Hortons has been pointed out for this very thing. They bring in immigrants, Filipino employees in particular, rather than hiring white Canadians, this is supposed to be so that it is easier for the employees to communicate among each other. The problem is then, that they should be speaking English or French at work, depending on the area, as these are our official languages, which would solve the communication problem, as they are supposed to be “fluent” in English or French to be allowed entry, but sadly this is not the norm. Also please note, when going to Tim Hortons you rarely ever get what you actually ordered. McDonald’s has been accused of the very same thing. I know of a few local businesses, a bank, hotel, and coffee shops, that do exactly this, hiring mainly Filipino employees. Then one could take a look at the trucking industry, which has begun to hire Arab, or East Indian employees to drive trucks, rather than people who have been in the country their whole lives, as it is cheaper for them. The problem is, they often do not go through the proper training and have caused accidents/fatalities as a result, look at the Humboldt Broncos bus crash for example. It is sad when the number of employed immigrants is on the rise, and yet Alberta has seen so many citizens who are born here losing jobs at a high rate, leading to suicides. Yet nothing is being done about this problem, it is simply ignored by our government. http://www.vancouversun.com/life/Hortons+McDonald+face+criticism+over+foreign+worker+program/9768838/story.html https://globalnews.ca/news/5083904/humboldt-broncos-bus-crash-truck-driver-sentencing/ https://globalnews.ca/news/5369168/immigration-employment-canada/

Another problem comes in the form of reserving job positions based upon both race and gender. The same can also be said for colleges and universities. In certain situations, hiring based upon race, religion, or gender is justified and necessary, but these cases must be proven as the requirement. In all other cases hiring based upon this is not legal. These hiring decisions are usually an image factor, they hire women or natives, or an immigrant, for appearance of being diverse and inclusive. These positions should be reserved for the most qualified applicant. Jobs should always be given on merit, who deserves the position the most, if it happens to be a woman, great, if it is a native great, but it should always be the most qualified person. The same should be said about schools. Schools are reserving spots for women specifically, which women need a chance, but so do men. Why should men not get into a school if they are more qualified, just because a woman has the spot reserved based upon her gender? They do the same for our Native population, or other races. I can understand what they are trying to accomplish in doing this, as it has been a struggle for our Indigenous population to gain education, and be motivated to finish. The problem comes in the form of then other more qualified people may be missed. School entries, should be based upon who deserves the spot most. Otherwise a student lacks motivation. Many Indigenous in schools would be a deserving and qualified applicant, and if so then they should get the spot. Same could be said with paying them federal tax dollars to go to school, as when I was in school, we had a few students who only showed up for the minimum classes so that they could grab their money, motivation was not there, and they were not allowed to be removed from the class. Yet there was a 2-year waiting period for me to enter the course. It is a controversial issue with no clear solution, because we do need Indigenous people to be in school and succeed in life. There needs to be better ways of motivating and encouraging our wonderful Indigenous population. We need them, and we need them to succeed. https://www.heritage.org/education/report/race-preference-college-admissions https://www.thestar.com/news/canada/2018/11/23/algonquin-college-engineering-a-future-that-includes-more-women.html https://employment-law.freeadvice.com/employment-law/job_discrimination/employer_distinguish.htm

Another big issue in Canada is in the relation of Quebec, or French speakers. In Quebec employees must be speaking French in all forms of communication, whether vocal, written, email, etc. Signage must be French as well. This is a real problem. English is an official language in Canada, and should not be playing second fiddle to the French language. Everyone should be given a fair shake, and both languages should be allowed to be used, not suppressed by a forced law putting French at the forefront. Businesses in Ottawa are doing the same however, this time favouring customers and clients who are French over English-speaking patrons. https://canadiangovernmentexecutive.ca/the-fallout-of-favouritism/ https://www.tripadvisor.ca/ShowUserReviews-g155004-d3343622-r695213826-Rockcliffe_Boathouse-Ottawa_Ontario.html https://www.educaloi.qc.ca/en/capsules/language-workplace-quebec

In Canada, we hear about people being anti-Islam and Islamophobia all the time. This is an issue in Canada for sure. People do hate Muslim people in many cases, umbrellaing them under one lump group. Not all Muslims are terrorists and not all follow Sharia Law. Those who do follow Sharia Law, are the problem, as they are discriminatory against women and anyone non-Muslim. Preaching that women are to be used and free to rape, really drives rightful anger from people around the world. They also attack other religions and try to suppress them. They move into other countries around the world, and then they remove cultures from the country they move to and complain about other religious traditions and holidays, yet they expect people to make accommodations for them. We have the religions of Jewish and Christian institution being suppressed, restricted, and censored. Canadians openly attack and insult these religions and others, and nothing gets said or done. Attack Islam though, and you are asking for attacks, risk losing your job, and are going to be labelled a bigot, just like Don Cherry. This is not right. All religions deserve respect, and should be treated the same. These religions should not be censored and minimalized, just to bolster one religion. https://www.cdn-hr-reporter.ca/hr_topics/religious-discrimination https://www.huffingtonpost.ca/joshua-ostroff/anti-semitism-resurgence_b_15810432.html?utm_hp_ref=ca-religious-discrimination https://nationalpost.com/news/canada/don-cherry-fired https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/christian-leaders-say-faith-under-attack-in-canada-by-governments-regulators-1.3008916 https://understandingislam.today/is-islam-taking-over-the-world/ https://concit.org/on-hijabs-rape-and-shariah-law/

Another form of discrimination in Canada, is the inequalities between people groups. As mentioned previously we have covered the religious side of this, as well as the French side. Although the Indigenous people have some favouritism for them, they also have a lot of things going against them. They struggle to get by and live in poverty, the same as the Inuit population. A lot of this is policies put in place through our federal government that enables the leaders and elders to have control over everything. As a result, some of these leaders and elders have become corrupt. They siphon funds to line their own pockets, while their reserve members suffer and don’t receive the money that they need to live comfortably. Even the paid education that they are supposed to receive goes to the elder’s and tribal leader’s families rather than being given to the regular reserve members. This is not just me saying this either, this knowledge and fact, comes straight from people who currently live and struggle on reserves. On top of that these communities are left with dirty water that they can’t even bathe in without boiling first. The reason behind this is that the government came in and set up water treatment facilities, but did not stay to train anyone how to operate them. They relied on the tribal leaders and elders to use the money given for training to spend the money for it’s intended purpose, but instead many of these leaders used the money for gambling or buying their families things. Our Indigenous and Inuit communities deserve a new a fair deal, just like the west. The need to have control stripped from corrupt tribal hierarchy, and have the power and money go straight to the population. A change in treaties is needed desperately to help these groups control their own futures. Again, the same thing that the west is asking from the federal government. Those who say that these communities are not on board with independence have spoken only to the tribal leaders, not the regular reserve member. Really the demands of the west and demands being made for these communities are in line with each other perfectly. Corruption of their hierarchy is not the only problem however, often the government takes a hands-off approach, throwing money at places that may need more of a hands-on approach. Part of their fear is a repeat of the Residential School Scandal, a fair worry, considering how awful the residential schools were for everyone placed there, whether Indigenous, Metis, Irish, Scottish, etc. A situation that should never be repeated, but that does not mean that the government should not be monitoring more closely the activities of leaders. This would not be a discriminatory act by the government, it would be a show of genuine concern for those living on reserves, a group of people that make up a large part of our population. https://www.vice.com/en_ca/article/ava4kk/canadas-first-nations-reserves-have-a-faulty-system-of-government https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2011/dec/11/canada-third-world-first-nation-attawapiskat

There is much more that could be said about these matters, more discrimination that could be discussed. This federal government is clearly not the only group to blame. Blame would come over the generations of Prime Ministers, right from the day of Confederation. We focus on removing one area of discrimination, but cause a dozen more in the process. Discrimination of white people, seems to be an accepted form, something people just don’t talk about, but white people have rights as well, white lives matter as much as all other lives. Every group of people is equal. Every group deserves respect and should be treated the same. Special treatment, or walking on eggshells around certain people groups, needs to stop. People need to focus on true equality, not equality at the cost of other groups. Show respect for everyone, treat them all the same. Race, religion, culture, gender, beliefs, none of it matters at the end of the day, we are all human, and need to learn to live together and stop trying to drive wedges that result in fighting and wars. Respect is key to equality.

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Unemployment Rates Historical Comparison East VS. West

Unemployment Rates Historical Comparison East VS. West

https://youtu.be/ASYn_YlgYM4

Last week we looked at poverty and the middle-class, and how they relate to Canadians. Now we are going to take a look at a subject that ties in these previous articles. Unemployment directly affects poverty and homelessness. In Canada, our governments could be doing much more to help this problem, federal, provincial, and municipal. Before getting into solutions, taking a look at the facts and stats around unemployment in Canada is necessary. 

Tradingeconimcs.com has some really great information in regards to this subject. They describe the unemployment rates as the “number of people actively looking for a job as a percentage of the labour force.” In other words, this means that it is measuring the amount of people who are able to work, who are of age, and yet are unemployed, in Canada this includes 15 year-olds. Most recently October 2019, showed Canadian unemployment rates at 5.5% which has been fairly consistent since July bouncing between 5.5% and 5.7%. Canada did see a loss of 1, 800 full time positions, but then replaced those with 14,300 part time jobs. Which is a trend happening around the world, replacing full time jobs with part time jobs. This means that more people have jobs, leading to lower unemployment rates, but leading to lower paying jobs, meaning more poverty, or struggling families. Since 1966 Canada has averaged an unemployment rate of 7.62%. In December 1982 this was at its highest rate of 13.10%, which was due to policies and economic decisions made in the United States. The lowest rate recorded falls in at 2.90% in June of 1966. Which means our current rates are below average, but it does vary across the country and across job sectors. Canada saw drops in the manufacturing, warehousing, construction, and transportation areas, but a significant increase in administrative, finance, insurance, real estate, rental, leasing, and agricultural employment. We also saw differences based upon age, ages 15-24 saw no changes, but 24-55 year-old workers dropped in employment, while those aged 55 and over increased in employment. Not quite the shift I expected, but considering the manual labour job loss, it should not come as a real surprise. 

If we look at Stats Canada, we can see how these rates are dependant upon the province and territory one lives in. As of the summer the stats were as follows, nationally 5.7% was the average. The provincial breakdown: BC 4.3%, Alberta, 6.7 %, Saskatchewan 5.2%, Manitoba 5%, Ontario, 5.2%, Quebec 5%, New Brunswick 7.2%, PEI 9%, Nova Scotia 6.5%, Newfoundland and Labrador 12.4%. These numbers vary depending on how diversified each province is in their economy. Maritime provinces tend to rely on many seasonal jobs, and so they end up with higher rates depending on the season, otherwise many will leave for other provinces to work in the off-season. In the territories we see Yukon with 2.7%, NWT with 7.3%, and Nunavut with 14.1%. Yukon has more Ocean access and the ability to help in BC with forestry/fishery jobs, whereas NWT and Nunavut do not have these options, and are far more spread out in population bases, increasing the unemployment numbers. A good way around this issue, is for provinces and territories to diversify their economies, so when one commodity crashes, they have others to fall back on. Compared to other developed countries, Canada ranks middle of the pack in unemployment rate success. Switzerland leads the pack with 2.2% unemployment, and South Africa comes in at the bottom with 29.1%, which also reflects poverty rates in these countries. 

If we then take a closer look at the situation with the territories, conferenceboard.ca has great reasoning behind their issue. They claim to have 2 factors behind the higher than national average unemployment rates. One is that southern workers travel up north to take the higher-paying jobs that take more skill, but they do not stay to live there. The same problem the west sees with workers from the Maritimes. The second comes in the form of “economic expansion”, this has pushed more people from the north to search for jobs, but not all will be able to locate a job, resulting in more unemployment. Yukon, thankfully has avoided these issues, maintaining one of the lowest unemployment rates in Canada. 

They do also provide information on how unemployment rates can vary depending on immigration status. In 2018, those born in Canada had a 5.2% unemployment rate, newly landed immigrants were at 6.1%, immigrants landed less than 5 years were at 9.4%, immigrants landed within 5-10 years were at 6.4%, and Immigrants who have lived here for more than 10 years were sitting at 5.3%. I do have an issue with these stats though. First of all, immigrants who come to Canada need to be able to support themselves and not rely on tax pay dollars to keep them afloat, these numbers simply raise our countries unemployment stats. Secondly, if they cannot maintain a job in Canada, then they should not be allowed to remain in Canada. We have a lot of homelessness and poverty in Canada, so returning people who are not working back home help us to support those who truly need the help and are Canadians. This would apply for anyone who does not have a citizenship. 

During Stephen Harper’s time as Prime Minister the country did fairly well economically, with the exception of the 2008-09 recession, in which Canada was hit less hard than the United States. Our unemployment rate hit 8.3% but since we seemed better prepared, Canada was able to not be struck as hard as the United States, who were bleeding jobs up to a total of 2.6 million jobs, according to CNN Money. Too many lost jobs in both countries, but Canada’s preparation helped the country to rebound quicker and to help other countries try to rebound. However long term the US has been able to recover to lower unemployment rates, having the US rates drop to as low as 4.9%. Canada was able to recover in a short amount of time after this, mainly due to the quick thinking of Stephen Harper, who was able to get a trade deal with China, which shortened the recovery period, although some might say China is a terrible partner to support. Then when moved forward to 2016, when Justin Trudeau was in his second year as Prime Minister, rates dropped again, which has a lot to do with failed promises, harmful bills, and failed projects. One such failure would be the $4.5 billion purchase of the Kinder Morgan pipeline, which then got sidelined by the Vancouver area blocked it from going through and had it upheld by the Supreme Court of Canada (Huffington Post) Another threat would come in the form of Bill C-69, which makes a lot more red-tape in place for any future pipelines; it has been deemed the “Pipeline Killer”, according to Global News. The purchase and failure to proceed as planned with the pipeline to the BC coast, and a bill making it difficult to complete oil projects, made it very tough for the West and cost many jobs and a lot of money. Atlantic jobs were affected by this as well. Another factor in this was a struggle to recover after the oil price crashed in 2014, which has taken years to try to rebound from, a struggle that still shows today, hindered further by Federal environmental laws. To further read into this, check out conferenceboard.ca. 

Unemployment rates due to economic crashes, like in Alberta, can cause a spike in poverty and homelessness rates, which we have seen in the west. I won’t get too far into this topic though, as I have a whole previous article dedicated to that, (https://authortonypeters.blogspot.com/2019/11/keep-foreign-aid-money-in-canada.html and https://authortonypeters.blogspot.com/2019/11/trudeau-considering-supplying-vancouver.html). I will say that in 2017 Stats Canada placed 3.4 million or 9.5% of Canadians below the poverty line, which is not very clear, but they say the line is $25,000/year for single adults, but $40,000 for families, which seems low to me. Wages tend to play a big role in this, especially since so many people are having to work 2 jobs to make a living. The part time job trend has made this more pronounced. The wage of an average Canadian is $25.55, but this can be a hard stat to set with Salaries, self-employment, farming, and contract work. 

When looking to set up a policy around employment, a lot of factors must be considered, as there will always be some unemployment, largely in part to people moving to find jobs, shifting between workplaces, or a change in career. Canadians tend to have the highest rates of moving between cities and provinces to move to a labour mobility, according to conferenceboard.ca. The goal that should be kept in mind for policy setting, is to motivate all eligible workers in Canada to be able to find a job, no matter where in the country they are located. When families and locations have longer periods of unemployment it destroys and tears apart families and communities, so these periods need to be acted upon quickly. This has been the situation in the west and Prime Minister Trudeau has not followed through on promises to help the west fix this problem. The west supplied thousands of jobs for eastern workers in their oil boom, but when government policy destroyed this market the easterners flooded back east, an option that westerners are left without. CBC estimated these workers as being 20%, or 1700 people up to 10,000 at one point.  Yet the east has then criticized and hindered their progress to try to recover and diversify. Another factor that could be looked at is technology. When new tech hits the market it often cuts out jobs, leading to a spike in unemployment, but as people receive training for the new tech, the rates drop, as people get jobs working with the new technology. This creates short-term unemployment spikes, followed by longer term employment spikes. There are times, however, when new tech actually destroys a sector and takes it over, resulting in devastating job loss rates, that will struggle to recoup, so when implementing new technology, caution must be exercised to avoid unemployment because of technological automation. 

When an area has low unemployment rates, employers will struggle to find employees and wages are going to be higher, making it harder for employers to get by. High wages can also boom the housing market, making it harder to buy a home due to the inflation. Can areas really control this though? On one hand they could, but should they? A boom does have to end at some point, often times with a crash, rather than the preferred gradual decline. Which is devastating; but being able to provide jobs for a long period of time is important, meaning that preventing the boom is counter-productive. The best way to deal with the situation, is to diversify, find ways of bringing in other economic opportunities while the boom is on, that way when a crash does happen, the area has other sectors to depend on. Not everything is within a community or countries control however, a lot of this results from global and neighbouring countries globalization. American decisions affect our country greatly, and more recently, the decisions of the globe’s environmentally brain-washed movement. 

History tells of mistakes made in this regard, but also tells of successes. Provides educational opportunities in what not to do, as well as what to do. Listening to these lessons, can guide Canada through economic struggle, to help make Canada prosperous again. This does require governments that will listen. Our government cares not what happens in the west, which has made recovery, which the west is working at on their own, more challenging. All levels of government should assist areas that are struggling, not ignoring one half of the country and helping one province that has had it’s struggles. The whole country needs to be economically stable to lower unemployment rates and the rates of poverty. If we continue to have governments that ignore this, Canada will be led into further disaster. Work together to come up with a solution for the country as a whole. United we stand. Unify the West. 

Written in collaboration with Spencer Mathews

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