The world according to cdlu -

Police Week

With Police Week under way today and tomorrow, I thought it would be a good opportunity for my column to leave the usual track of pushing for rational transit solutions in a land where such concepts sound wonderful but are truely completely foreign to all of us, and focus on the people who enforce our laws for a few moments. While policing addresses crime head on, it doesn't make any effort to address the root causes of crime in the structure of our society, but that's a different column. So here's this one.

Police Week a chance to show our appreciation and get involved

Today marks the start of Ontario's annual Police Week. What better time to stop and really appreciate the contribution that our police department makes to the peace and well-being of our community?
Our media outlets are usually looking for problems -- scandals, disasters, or epidemics -- to catch our attention. As the saying goes, "If it bleeds, it leads." National news coverage sometimes sounds like a soap opera, reporting murders and crimes until we become inured to them and no longer even notice, except to wish they would announce good news more often.
Even so, we rarely take the time to notice when something is working properly. The fridge, the hot water tank, the car -- all are taken for granted until they break. In the same way, for most of us, the Guelph Police only come to mind when we realize we have been speeding, or have just made an illegal left turn.
The rest of the time, though, they are performing their real tasks.
Policing is among the most thankless tasks in any community, yet year after year, crime rates are substantially lower in Guelph than in other comparable cities in Ontario in every category except traffic violations.
There, we rate as the second highest, arguably a sign of the zeal of our men and women in uniform who monitor and patrol our roads.
"This year's theme is Policing Possibilities: Inspiration for the Future. This theme focuses on heightening community awareness and promoting collaboration between young people to keep our communities safe, through crime prevention, preparedness and social development," The Guelph Police Service said in a statement.
Policing services are not all performed by the active members of the force.
There are also groups of volunteers that strengthen links with the greater community.
One of these groups is the Community Volunteer Patrol (www.guelphcvp.ca). The volunteer patrol was started by residents of Guelph's west end in the mid-1990s. It grew quickly and serves the entire city, feeding information back to the police service's dispatcher as warranted, and helping to keep Guelph's crime rate down. Many similar volunteer services exist in other Ontario communities such as Kingston, Belleville, and Halton region.
Some forces, such as the OPP, have a more hard-core group of volunteers in their auxiliary units. All of these groups share one thing in common: they are all ways for the community to volunteer with the police services and contribute to our collective well-being.
The Guelph volunteer patrol is an eyes-and-ears extension of the Guelph Police Service. Usually at night, its members patrol parks, schoolyards, churches, and other neighbourhoods, institutions and businesses that request their presence.
They report directly to the police dispatcher while on duty and record everything that happens. You may also have seen them in their red shirts helping out at events such as Canada Day.
Guelph is a city rightly proud of its strong volunteerism, as seen during the recent National Volunteer Week.
If you want to get involved and help out with policing in Guelph, but the volunteer patrol is not your cup of tea, there are other opportunities to volunteer, with organizations such as Guelph Neighbourhood Watch or Block Parents.
If you want to learn more about these local opportunities, about the police service in general, or just want to show your appreciation to our Police service, Police Week is your big chance.
Today and tomorrow, you are invited to an open house at the Guelph Police Station any time between 8 a.m. and 8 p.m. to meet the people of our police service, and the volunteer community groups attached to the police that help to make Guelph a better place.
Guelph works because people like you take an interest and show their appreciation. Successful policing requires community involvement.

guelph 733 words - permanent link - comments: 0. Posted at 20:50 on May 11, 2009

On May 12, vote safely: Don't give BC an STV

Electoral reformers in Canada have proven time and time again that they want absolutely anything, as long as it isn't what we have. Their latest principle compromise is the referendum in BC next week, where the province will vote, for the second time, on an obscure and barely used electoral system called the Single Transferable Vote (STV). At its core is the best possible electoral system: a preferential ballot, but the proposal in BC then takes a good idea and bastardises it so totally that, were it to pass, BC could kiss representation goodbye.

The problem is simple. BC intends to turn simple, single-member ridings into massive conglomerations of unrelated communities with multiple representatives forced to compete with local politicians to keep themselves relevant. These mega-ridings will be made up of as many as seven current ridings, with seven representatives. The premise is that with multiple representatives per riding, small parties have a chance of winning where they would currently be shut out on the vote split. While there's little evidence to support this, there is a misconception that the off-chance of a fringe party winning a seat if the mega-riding is sufficiently diverse makes the electoral system "proportional." It isn't.

Were this to be in Ontario, the equivalent where I live would be to have the ridings of Guelph, Wellington Halton-Hills, Flamborough-Dundas-Ancaster, Kitchener-Conestoga, Kitchener-Centre, Kitchener-Waterloo, and Cambridge merged into one mega-riding.

It's pretty easy to see where the problems would be. In the recent federal election, Guelph had ten candidates. Between these seven ridings there would have been more than forty.

Imagine, for a moment, an all-candidates debate with forty candidates.

If you live in Georgetown, a city that is significant within the current riding of Wellington-Halton Hills, do you expect ever, in an entire 36 day campaign, to hear from any of the forty candidates in your riding when they each have every door in Kitchener-Waterloo, Cambridge, and if they get to it, Guelph to knock on?

Having gone door-to-door in the last election in Guelph, I know how difficult it is to hit every door in the city. We had an 82-day campaign, thanks to the cancellation of our by-election, and one riding. Every candidate in an STV election would normally have a 36 day campaign and seven ridings to cover, giving a maximum of five days per current riding to campaign.

It isn't rational. And if you expect your MPs to give your community any reasonable representation, you're in for a surprise under STV. Just like a campaign is likely to concentrate on vote-rich communities within a mega-riding, representation by seven people of the same riding will concentrate where the most political points can be gained. As every representative has to cover seven times as much territory -- and they all overlap, unlike today where each representative has a clearly defined limit -- small pockets of the mega-riding will be massively overrepresented, and the rest will be hard-pressed to get any attention whatsoever.

Moreover, by having overlapping ridings, as I have been told happens in Ireland one of a tiny number of countries in the world to use this system, representatives will compete with each-other to do more on the local level, and step on the toes of municipally elected politicians.

Once again, a province in Canada is voting on electoral reform that is change for the sake of change, with its proponents having failed to think through the ramifications of its adoption. Single-winner, single-riding STV, known as Instant Run-Off Voting, would be an ideal sort of system. Mashing up the province with mega-ridings, and pretending that it adds proportionality, negates any benefits of the reform and hurts the democratic representation the province deserves.

For me as someone outside of BC who thinks electoral reform should be careful and considered, not slipshod and emotional, this referendum is very important. The result of this referendum in BC has national implications. The passage of STV, were it to happen, could ultimately result in a national STV campaign. Pro-STV activists, who know the destructive effects of this system but have a stated agenda of pure proportional representation, want this to happen quickly, before BC has another election under the new system.

When BC votes next Tuesday, I urge them to consider their vote, and its ramifications carefully. Just because it is different does not make it better.

Think it through. Don't give BC an STV.

politics reform 746 words - permanent link - comments: 5. Posted at 13:22 on May 06, 2009

City Council decision on the Hanlon upgrades

It was a long night in Council's new chambers last night. The session lasted a full six hours, which I suspect gave most people the impression by the end that thy had always met in that room, even though it was the first meeting there since new City Hall opened. On the agenda was the construction of a new organic waste processing facility, upgrades to the Hanlon, approval of budgeting for money under a $135.5 million Infrastructure Stimulus Fund, and other topics that were ultimately deferred.

On the organic waste plant, also known as the 'wet plant,' several impassioned local residents rose to demand a full environmental assessment be done of the $26 million facility's construction. The small rural neighbourhood nearby the facility on the outskirts of town reported that the last, rather unsuccessful, such plant resulted in the deaths of four of the local residents from aneurisms as air and water quality were allegedly tainted by the facility.

Ultimately the new plant was approved by council without an EA and that project will be going forward over the next few years. I found it interesting in the lengthly discussion on this item that the City currently sends 8 trucks per week of organic waste to a Niagara Falls, New York incinerator to be burned. It perplexes me that so much of our waste leaves by truck when waste is by no means a high priority commodity, and the so-called "Waste Resource Innovation Centre", or our trash collection facility, is right next to the city-owned Guelph Junction Railway, albeit separated by a narrow river. Eight truckloads of trash is around two freight car loads of trash. Part of the plans for the new wet facility also include importing wet waste from nearby municipalities to process, which will also be done by truck. Were we to build a small rail spur into the Waste Resource Innovation Centre, we could both import and export our trash by rail at minimal environmental and economical impact rather than moving all the trash by truck, a vehicle designed for priority.

On the agenda, there was also another curious item: Guelph's distribution of money from the Infrastructure Stimulus Fund. It breaks down like this:

Organics Waste Processing Facility - $26.5 million
Guelph Transit Terminal, Bridge Rehabilitation and Related Road works - $16.4 million
Eastview Community Park and Pollinator Initiative - $7 million
Civic Square Skating Rink/Water feature - $2 million
Municipal Facility Rehabilitation, Energy Conservation Upgrades and Accessibility Improvements - $10.3 million
Major and Minor Road Reconstruction - $17.1 million
Norfolk: Norwich to Quebec Road Reconstruction - $5.4 million
Sidewalk Rehabilitation - $3 million
Parks Rehabilitation - $3.8 million
Road Reconstruction Projects - $24.9 million
Road Pavement Deficit - $5 million
City Bridge and Structure Upgrades - $2.1 million
New Sidewalk and Bicycle Lane Construction - $2.5 million
Intersection Improvements - $6.2 million
Storm Water Infrastructure - $2.3 million
Railway Crossings - $1 million.

Road investment (6, 7, 10, 11, 12, 14) $60.7 million
Walking/cycling investment (8, 13): $5.5 million
Transit/rail investment (2, 16): $17.4 million

That is $17.4 million for transit and rail projects, and $60.7 million for roads -- and that's counting rail/road crossing upgrades for rail. The $16.4 million for a Guelph Transit Terminal raises another whole host of issues, not least of which is that there is no evidence yet that Via Rail has actually agreed to have its station parking lot ripped out and turned into a bus/train interchange terminal. Even if it is, because Council elected not to save the Lafarge property as a park-and-ride, the project will devastate downtown parking no matter how many $30-$50,000/stall parking lots we build.

Anyway, in the context of all that happening, Council's other major decision last night was weather or not to support the Ministry of Transport of Ontario's recommendation to upgrade the Hanlon between Maltby Rd and Wellington.

Here is the text of my comments to Council on the topic:

Madam mayor, members of council,
What is our global vision for transportation?
While the Hanlon was being built in the early 1970s, the prevailing attitude was that any problem could be solved with another hunk of pavement. In 1974, while the Hanlon was under construction, a survey conducted by the City of Guelph asked industries, essentially: can you move away from trains and switch to trucks so that we can abandon most of the profitable Guelph Junction Railway? Surely our attitude has improved since that time.
The Hanlon was built to allow Guelph residents to bypass the downtown. Before the last section was even finished, Guelph had a save-the-downtown committee. This lesson is one we are continuing to fail to learn. The Hanlon already allows motorists to bypass Guelph's commercial centre, but its main purpose is to connect the different parts of Guelph to each other. Chopping out College and Claire, and making Kortright's Guelph-side access a residential service road, turns the Hanlon from an intra-Guelph highway to a Guelph bypass.
As importantly, we don't even know what the MTO has in store for the other half of the Hanlon, but we do know the highway is eventually intended to connect to Highway 6 south of Morriston, new Highway 7 north of Guelph, and we can safely assume it will connect to the GTA West project which still pretends to be something other than a highway project. These upgrades are not a project by, about, or for Guelph, but about finding a way around Guelph.
While the proposal before you went through extensive public consultation, the question asked was always: how should we upgrade the Hanlon. It was never: should we upgrade the Hanlon. It was never: where do we want to be in 20 years? We have no global vision for transportation.
If we go ahead and upgrade the Hanlon, we will see increased traffic volumes with better flow, pat ourselves on the back, and congratulate ourselves for planning for the future. If we do not, we will see increased congestion, and we will regret not doing the work. Why? Because that is the shallow view of the world we take, where highways are the answer but nobody knows the question.
There are four major highway projects currently ongoing in the vicinity of Guelph, of which the resolution before you covers only one quarter of one. If we divert the hundreds of millions of dollars of our money these highway projects will cost to mass transit, and give people a useful way to get around, we may start making headway.
Most of us probably drove to this meeting tonight. I, frankly, would rather not have. But parking downtown is free. Taking the bus, round trip, is $5, and takes approximately five times as long as driving, plus waiting. In all likelihood, the last bus will have left before I leave this meeting tonight. Counting generously, one out of every twenty trips in this city is done on a bus, and we are proud of the "five percent modal share" busses enjoy. We call it our goal, and we sleep well at night knowing that only ninety percent of people use their cars exclusively.
This evening's resolution includes a request to study further transit opportunities, but it does not go far enough. These have been studied over and over; what we need is actual investment in improved mass transportation opportunities for both passenger and freight, as part of a global vision for transportation that sets out how, not whether, we will move toward mass transit over the next decades.
While passenger trains have been largely relegated to the status of quaint tourist attraction, railway tracks parallel the Hanlon and Highway 6 from Guelph to Hamilton, where they continue parallel to the QEW all the way to the US border. Abandoned railway lines parallel Highway 6 north of Guelph all the way to Owen Sound. There is no reason for us not to invest in moving our people and goods on these economical, environmental railway lines, rather than once again upgrading our highways. These are just some of the options we can evaluate, but applying more band-aids to our highways should not be among them.
The auto industry does not have the money to fight transit projects at the moment. This is the time, as US President Barack Obama has figured out, to invest in mass transit, rather than highways. The Hanlon's time to upgrade has come and gone. Now is not the time to build bigger better overpasses at taxpayer expense, it is the time to come up with alternatives so that all of us can come to council meetings by public transit if we choose, with a reasonable expectation of being able to get home after, for less than the cost of driving.
Madam mayor and members of council, while the Hanlon was built forty years ago, the decision of whether to think like forty years ago or think about forty years from now rests in your hands for this small corner of the world. Do not approve this highway project until we have planned what we are really doing with transportation, not only to get us to the year 2031, but for the indefinite future, as time will not stop when our highways and our city reach their planned capacity.
I appeal to you to show the leadership that is needed in these times to formulate and implement our part of a true global vision for transportation.
Thank you.

Following my presentation, Councillor Piper asked me to expand on the construction cost difference between road and rail. I pointed out that Highway 7 will cost in the order of $30 million per kilometre to build, while rebuilding an abandoned railway line costs approximately $1M/km in each of parts and labour.

After hearing delegations for more than two hours, some in favour, more opposed, all with one problem or another with the plan, it was approved in a disappointing 12-1 vote, paving the way for one more albatross around the City of Guelph's neck and leaving me and many others scratching our heads about the vision our leadership claims to have.

guelph presentations transit 1697 words - permanent link - comments: 1. Posted at 09:20 on April 28, 2009

Celebrating our heritage

Today's column ties Guelph's rail history to Guelph's rail future through Guelph's rail present. The message in it applies to communities all over, though. Waterloo residents can drop in Waterloo Central where Guelph Junction Express is mentioned, Orangeville and Brampton residents can look toward the Credit Valley Explorer, and the further away you go, the more of these tourist railways you find viably running on railway lines that could be hosting real passenger service.

Rail transport is not just a thing of the past

On Election Day, last Oct. 14, a teenager playing with fire destroyed the restored historic railway station in the Quebec town where I grew up. A few short years ago, Strathroy's station, too, was torched. The River Run Centre was built on the site of the original Guelph Canadian Pacific station, which was the Priory. Our Great Western station, once near the former Lafarge property, has been gone for generations. The Grand Trunk station remains in service as the city's Via Rail station, soon to be joined by GO transit and the city's bus system. This is the sole survivor of at least seven train stations built in Guelph since 1827.
It used to be that the Guelph Junction Railway was part of the Canadian Pacific network as a passenger and freight line, connecting Goderich to Hamilton through Guelph. The line was abandoned from Guelph to Goderich some years ago, and passenger trains have not run on the balance with any regularity for over four decades.
Now that has changed. Last year, a local business person started the Guelph Junction Express, a tourist railway running between downtown Guelph and Guelph Junction, which is just west of Campbellville, on weekends.
Guelph residents have an opportunity to see this passenger train as it goes by the site of the old CPR station at the River Run Centre. The symbolism cannot be overstated.
The Guelph Historical Railway Association, which has been an active participant in the Guelph Junction Express project and has provided volunteer labour for many aspects of its preparation and operation, is putting on a special trip on April 25, running the Guelph Junction Express passenger train over most of Guelph's railway tracks. It will cover all of the tracks from Guelph Junction to north of Woodlawn Road, and into the industrial tracks that cross the Hanlon Expressway between Speedvale Avenue and Woodlawn Road, off of Edinburgh Road. This is an opportunity to experience Guelph's existing, and still active, rail network.
The tracks on which the Guelph Junction Express operates represent a huge opportunity for Guelph, if we have the courage to rise to the challenge. While studies looking at transportation in the region see tracks that run from Guelph to nowhere, and studies in the region south of us see tracks that run from Hamilton to nowhere, we must see that these tracks do not go nowhere, but connect Guelph to Hamilton.
Imagine a direct train from here to Hamilton. When Guelph had 20,000 people, passenger trains regularly ran that route. Now, with over 120,000 people, we have settled for a tourist train, celebrating rail transit as an exotic form of transportation that only our grandparents used.
While we treat passenger trains as a tourist attraction rather than as a practical way to get around, a ride on the Guelph Junction Express will challenge that assumption. Short-, medium- and long-distance travel are all possible by rail. All we lack is the imagination and courage to invest and restore our service to the level it was a century ago when taking the train got you some place other than Front Street.
Could we run a light-rail transit system south from Guelph's downtown to Hamilton's? Could we run one from downtown Guelph to our northwest industrial park? The Guelph Historical Railway Association excursion train will operate on one of the two potential routes for that service, which exist today as freight lines.
Integrating a Guelph light-rail system with a Waterloo Region light-rail system can be accomplished along two existing, serviceable routes, one that goes from Guelph to Cambridge (that appears as a desired route on Guelph's walking-trail master plan, in spite of being an active railway line) and the other, which goes from Guelph to Kitchener. But even if we do not connect to Waterloo, we can provide meaningful service within Guelph city limits, connecting some of Guelph's residential areas to its industrial ones by rail.
While our train stations continue to be burned or torn down, whether through malice or planning, the opportunities along the railway lines that pass those stations remain untapped and unexplored. Take a moment out of your weekend, take the Guelph Historical Railway Association's excursion, and imagine the possibilities as you ride a passenger train around Guelph.
Now is the time, with more and more of us looking for work, to invest in improving the underused rail infrastructure that we already have, an approach that could truly make us stronger for when times improve.

columns guelph transit 834 words - permanent link - comments: 0. Posted at 09:49 on March 30, 2009

Disrespect won't win you any points

I attended the Guelph Civic League's Hanlon Creek Business Park community discussion this evening and have a little to say on the matter. There were six panelists, though five of them didn't really need to be there. Peter Cartwright, the City's General Manager: Economic Development and Tourism, fielded nearly all of the ninety minutes of questions from the floor.

The Hanlon Creek Business Park is something I do not fully grok. I understand the need for employment lands as long as we subscribe to the theory of sustainable growth. While I believe "sustainable growth" is a total oxymoron -- something can either be sustained, or it can be grown, but to sustain growth requires infinite resources, itself an oxymoron -- growth is coming to this area and some accommodation needs to be made for it.

Not to belittle the environmental concerns, my objections to the plan are less environmental than they are pragmatic. I think it is crazy to be tearing down one of our few remaining virgin growth forests and paving it over, but I also think that if we are going to develop the land, it needs to be done in a way that minimises environmental impact on a wider scale, well beyond the 500 acre plot. It is imperative, therefore, that any such development be designed to maximise employment per acre, and be set up around public transit for commuters, and around rail for freight.

At the moment, the development is at the outskirts of town, where busses would be seriously stretching their legs to reach. The entire development is centrally located three to five miles between three different railway lines, two of which connect back to downtown Guelph and could be used for LRT as well as freight, and all of which connect to Canadian National and Canadian Pacific's national networks. No plans are even being contemplated to make any of those lines reach this industrial park, meaning all the heavy industry planned for the south end of the park will have to move by truck, further increasing the environmental impact to that part of town, to our road system, and our environment in general.

The points made by some panelists and those speaking from the floor were generally valid and important: namely that paving over wetlands isn't generally good environmental policy. But I have serious issues with the people who attend these events to disrupt them and argue their point in an unhelpful manner.

In their efforts to make their point, activists applauded questions and ignored answers, some swearing at the panelists and heckling. One questioner even went so far as to accuse Cartwright of conflict of interest for doing his job. Matt Soltys of Land is More Important than Sprawl sat on the panel and insisted that his views are not radical. Indeed, the ideas are not, but the disrespect shown by supporters in the room for those with whom they did not agree is radical, uncalled for, and completely counterproductive.

More information is needed for the community on the Hanlon Creek Business Park, that is evident. The City has promised that a website with up to date information on the project is forthcoming. But if the opponents of the project would rather shout down the planners than listen to them, what, really, is the point?

Showing such blatant disrespect won't win you any points. If anything, it will only serve to alienate people who would otherwise agree.

guelph 580 words - permanent link - comments: 1. Posted at 22:18 on March 26, 2009

TTC Chairman William C. McBrien accurately predicted the state of our transit system -- in 1954

This gem was handed to me by a fellow member of the Guelph Historical Railway Association last night. It is the text of a speech by TTC Chairman William C. McBrien at the opening ceremony of the Toronto Subway on March 30th, 1954 at the Davisville station. As I reflect on Guelph's mind-numbingly stupid decision to reject the former LaFarge lands as a transit station in favour of continued inadequate transit policy, the words of this man ahead of his time ring loud and true.

Also worth noting over at GO K-W: Ipsos-Reid poll on GO service to Guelph says 98% of Guelph residents want GO trains. They can't come soon enough.

Here's the text of William C. McBrien's speech:

Honourable Sirs and Distinguished Guests, on behalf of the Toronto Transit Commission I welcome you here today and wish to thank each of you for coming and helping us make this, the official opening of Canada's First Subway, a success.
We would not be human if we did not admit that we are a very proud organisation today. This tremendous task is completed.
The dream of 1944 becomes a reality of 1954. This project was designed and built in the ten most chaotic years in the history of our country - war, shortage of steel and building supplies, shortage of skilled and unskilled labour and a general increase in labour and materials of nearly 100 per cent.
True, it cost more than our original estimate of ten years ago, but if started today, at present prices, it would cost at least 15 million dollars more or 30 percent above the actual cost.
We are more than satisfied with the design, construction, finish, and equipment, and today we publicly express our sincere thanks to the engineers, architects, contractors, suppliers, and workmen for a grand job.
In admitting that we are a proud organisation today we must also admit that we are also a humble one. For we know that the completion of this subway is not the final solution of Toronto's traffic problems. It is only the start of combatting this monster. Many other lines will have to be built in the future.
But the right-of-way and construction of all future rapid transit lines will have to be financed out of general taxation. If public transportation is to be the medium of relieving traffic congestion in our cities, and we believe it is, its success will depend upon getting more people to use it rather than on increasing fares to make it pay. We must not price ourselves out of our own field. We know that moving the masses, in the future, will be a tremendous task.
But if planners will give us the same consideration as the automobile in providing rights-of-way for new rapid transit lines; if government bodies, federal, provincial, and civic, will start making capital expenditures for the benefit of public transportation, we will accept the challenge.
Our major problem in Toronto is traffic congestion. If our small downtown business area supplies one third of our taxation we cannot allow it to be strangled to death by traffic congestion.
Surely we now realise that our patient medicine prescription of street widenings is not the cure. For it has only lured unmanageable numbers of automobiles into our downtown streets that were already overcrowded. We suggest:
1. Eliminate parking on all major streets in the downtown area.
2. Parking meters belong to the horse and buggy days and have no place in a large modern city.
3. Develop fringe parking lots to be serviced t o this subway and the downtown area by bus transportation.
4. Downtown business will have to establish a system of staggered hours for their employees. All of these improvements can be put into effect with little or no capital cost.
5. The proposed mile of Queen Street subway should be started at once, eliminating 80% of the street car operation in the downtown area, and freeing many streets for one-way traffic.
Do not sell public transportation short. We are not a dying industry, but one that can and will meet the competition of the automobile. For we know that the egotism is gone from driving a motor car and that, today, tens of thousands of automobile owners do not want to bring their cars into the downtown area.
We also know that what the great majority of our people want is good public transportation with more speed, greater comfort, and improved service at a reasonable fare. Our ambition is to give such service.
In conclusion, I wish to say that the Toronto Transit Commission does not want or expect any praise or glory for the completion of this gigantic task. It was our job and we did it. Our reward is in the fact that we, ourselves, know - it was a job well done. Thank you.

transit 827 words - permanent link - comments: 2. Posted at 09:14 on March 10, 2009

It's full-time work when you're looking for work

Not being much of a romantic, my column in today's Valentines-day Mercury is about everyone's favourite topic in this economy: the job hunt. Without further comment, here it is.

As 2008 drew to a close, so too did the livelihoods of hundreds of thousands of people across North America.
After almost nine years of professional Linux and web work, my U.S.-based contracts dried up and, being self-employed, I was not eligible for employment insurance -- or a government bailout.
My wife, a doctoral student at the University of Guelph, is not in a position to make up the missing income, so I have been seeking Linux system administration or web-related work, and have some observations about the whole process of "finding a job."
Until now, I have never once found either a job or a contract through the conventional CV/interview process. In fact, no employer has even asked to see my curriculum vitae, with one notable exception: the employer at a summer job in high school asked for my CV -- after signing my contract.
With my major American clients gone, I prepared a detailed CV and fired it off to some 20 employers who had posted notices seeking my skills in Guelph and Waterloo Region. Along with each application, I included a detailed, personal cover letter.
Over the following several weeks, as I continued sending applications, I received only one response. In spite of these numerous applications, mostly to positions I am well qualified for, I had received no other replies.
Then, in late January, I attended the TechVibes job fair in Waterloo where, aside from running into people I know from Guelph who I would never have imagined were unemployed, I found a small number of tech companies looking for employees.
This time I distributed 10 copies of my CV, two of which went to recruiters. When I got home, I sent followup letters, along with a soft copy of my CV.
Within a week of the job fair, I received three responses, two of them to schedule interviews. The third was from a recruiter wanting to pass on a soft copy of my CV to a client. The lesson was clear: personal contact is very important.
One of the interviews I attended was with a company that had received my original application to that company's posting more than six weeks earlier, but giving them a CV at the job fair is what caught their attention.
When I attended my first job fair-related interview, I was surprised to learn that the interviewer, who said he knew me by reputation and was clearly interested in my file, had received only the CV I had given them at the job fair and had not seen the followup letter I had sent directly to the company's posted recruitment address the following day.
Perplexed, I began to wonder if email addresses like 'jobs@company' and 'careers@company' were just aliases for the nearest trash bin.
I have come to realize that the major task is not so much to find work as it is to learn how to find work -- to learn how the system actually works and not to rely on how it is supposed to work.
While I am fortunate to be in a field where demand is great and to have some savings to fall back on, my search has inspired a lot more questions than answers about the job-hunting process.
If a company needs an employee to do a specific task, why is it so difficult for a relevant application to get noticed? What needs to be done to ensure that an employer reads an application? (I have been told that the scented ones go straight to the trash, so there goes that idea!) How are people with less specialized skills than I have coping with the lack of response from employers?
In Canada in January, 0.6 per cent of our total workforce lost their jobs. That is a huge number of people joining me in the job line. I am not starving, but for those who have kids, a lot of debt, or simply no reserves, what are the options?
How can they afford a costly learning process that may only serve to help them understand how to get interviewed? Is there a secondary process that still stands in the way of actually being hired once the interview process is complete?
The first lesson people in my position seem to have to learn is that finding a job is a job in its own right, and that there is no logical training procedure to follow. Like any other job, success comes through experience, determination, and the courage to think outside the box.

columns 792 words - permanent link - comments: 2. Posted at 18:30 on February 14, 2009

GO PIC #2 results

GOKW.org has posted the boards from the Kitchener service PIC #2 that took place yesterday. I'm out of town and can not attend any of the three PICs, but from talking to some who attended and reading the boards I have a few quick comments. First: GO is accepting the city's recommendation to go with a downtown station only in Guelph, which isn't surprising as GO will have no desire to fight with the city. But the plans call for a parking lot at Neeve St to be provided by Guelph (which the papers have already picked up on). With the city government arleady taking flack for wanting to build two hugely expensive parking lots downtown, at at least $15M a piece, committing to a third such lot that will in no way be adequate for future needs near downtown is not something I consider completely rational.

GO's own projections see nearly 2000 people a day commuting out of Guelph by 2031, a third of them in the westbound direction. Three 500-stall lots in the downtown core might accomodate that, but downtown business will have a net loss of parking on an investment of at least $45M in multi-level lots if those traffic projections are right. But I must remind all that their projections tend to be conservative. Barrie was projected to have 150 passengers per day, but within two months their 430-stall lot was inadequate to handle the demand. And the world won't stop turning in 2031 when those projections are set for. We have no allowance for parking in 2046 or 2075 or 2109, when more heavily developped areas will have to be bulldozed to make way for service that is nearly back to the levels we had in 1917.

Having the city of Guelph commit to funding GO's parking is a far from ideal solution, reflects continued poor advance planning, and is something that we will all live to regret. We have opportunities now that will not exist in 5, 10, 20, 100 years to make getting in and out of Guelph easy for those who need to and, from this PIC, Guelph is opting to take on that responsibility by committing to providing a lot at Neeve St that may be adequate for a couple of years, and releasing GO from the responsibility of providing parking for the Guelph market.

GO'so PIC itself is almost entirely positive, aside from this huge thorn Guelph has inserted into its own side for no apparent reason, laying out plans for expanded bi-directional service to Kitchener, with track upgrades, longer sidings, and eventually double tracking of the Guelph subdivision through the entire service area.

Bi-directional service is integral to the success of transit in and around Guelph. Guelph and Kitchener are the big commuter markets to eachother, and the expansion of transit service between the cities should be a much higher priority than the construction of a $400M divided highway between them (which is getting under way this year). The fact that GO is considering bi-directional service is a positive sign that it will evolve into a more comprehensive commuter service, not focused on getting everyone to Toronto Union Station, but just on getting people where they need to go.

Earlier signs that this service would not immediately go all the way to Kitchener seem to not be there any more. Service as far west as possible is important and this PIC reflects that reality. The comment period is short, with a deadline of February 27th, though this EA process has not set up its own website as some others have. Refer to the PDF linked to at the start of this entry for how to comment.

transit 621 words - permanent link - comments: 0. Posted at 08:01 on February 13, 2009

Lafarge-Howitt deal an improvement, but still hampers transit future

Howitt Park Neighbourhood Residents Association, the city, and the developer of the Lafarge lands have come to an agreement on use for the lands that sees the retail space nearly halved and the addition of high density residential. This is an improvement from my point of view, because it allows the potential for my future dream of having the land used for walk-to-work out-of-town commuters as GO service progresses toward Guelph.

As I face the prospect of commuting to Kitchener myself, a new development in my life, the idea of having a station there that allows me to take the train westward to work is ever-more important to me.

The city has asked for only the downtown station to be used, but necessity will eventually require the Lafarge site to host a parking area for a station, even though the city government has acknowledged that westward commuting is as important as eastward commuting and a downtown-only station does nothing to help that. Having 340 residential units on the property should reduce the number of spaces needed. With trains, transit, and residential, the number of cars needed by such commuters should also be reduced.

It isn't an ideal situation, but it is a vast improvement over a nothing-but-commercial development as had been proposed. Armel's continued objection to the project and continuation of the OMB process is a plus, allowing GO Transit's environmental assessment to get out ahead of the development on the property and assert whether or not GO intends to use a portion of the land for a station, something I have long believed is essential to the future intercity transit system that Guelph is currently making no realistic plans for.

With the worst recession in three generations upon us, the province is in a hurry to shovel money at ready-to-go transit and infrastructure projects. With that in mind, GO's next Environmental Assessment Public Information Centre for Guelph service is coming up:

Kitchener:
Thursday, Feb 5, 2009
18:00-21:00
St. Andrew's Presbyterian Church
54 Queen St N

Guelph:
Thursday, Feb 12, 2009
18:00-21:00
Evergreen Seniors Centre, Room 4
683 Woolwich St N

Georgetown:
Tuesday, Feb 17, 2009
18:00-21:00
Halton Hills Cultural Centre
9 Church St

Interestingly, the Kitchener meeting directly conflicts with the next GTA West Community Advisory Group meeting (which is open to the public). It will be Thursday, Feb 5, 2009 at:

Four Points by Sheraton
2501 Argentia Rd
Mississauga

Anyone interested in the future of transportation in southwestern Ontario should go to this meeting. Visitors can observe the proceedings and do have time at the start and end (if I recall correctly) to comment. GTA West is, in my estimation, a project to build a highway between Guelph and Brampton connecting new highway 7 to the 407, but is disguised as a holistic analysis of transportation problems in the region. If there is enough community interest in solving our transportation problems with something other than steamrollers and asphalt, then it may actually become that holistic analysis that really is needed.

guelph transit 511 words - permanent link - comments: 1. Posted at 11:07 on February 01, 2009

Auto bailout lacks vision, imagination

My column in today's Mercury addresses the strange circumstances we now find ourselves in with regards to spending about $360 per Ontarian on one of the most heavily subsidised industries in the world. To put it mildly, I am not impressed.

In one of the newscasts covering the US' debate on the auto industry bailout, a US congressman in debate asked if we should have bailed out the horse and carriage industry when the car was invented. It is mildly alliterative, but it makes the point.

There are plenty of successful auto manufacturers left in the world, many of them manufacturing their vehicles in North America while making cars that consumers actually want, instead of asking consumers to want the cars they are making*. Moreover, if we are going to bail out American auto manufacturers, what bang are we going to get for our buck? If we invest the roughly $17 billion in the US and $4 billion in Canada to keep them afloat, what will we accomplish? Will we remain world leaders in the construction of SUVs, or could we perhaps exercise just a little imagination and use these billions of taxpayer dollars that, in Canada alone, add up to around $10,000 per affected auto industry employee to become world leaders in something that needs a little leadership?

Through part of the fall, I saw one wind turbine head up Guelph's Highway 6 just about every weekday afternoon. They were offloaded in Hamilton harbour and sent north by truck. Why? Because they had to be imported from Europe; they are not manufactured in Canada.

During the Second World War, North America's industrial might was very quickly changed from the manufacture of consumer goods and vehicles to the manufacture of war machinery including trucks, tanks, aircraft, ships, weaponry, and ammunition. Is our failure of imagination so total that, in an age when technology allows us to contemplate a manned mission to another planet, we can not re-task our manufacturing sector to prepare us for a more sustainable future?

The whole process of bailouts has been broken from the outset. The US' $700 billion bailout package is largely being used to buy up bad credit from creditors so that they can once again lend money. Had the same money been used to pay off the huge consumer and mortgage debt in the US, consumer confidence would have returned in spades, the credit markets would have been re-invigorated, and millions of people would not have had their homes foreclosed. If we are going to spend taxpayer dollars to that phenomenal extent, we should at least be helping people live rather than only ensuring that bankers' profit margins are not hurt too badly.

The big concern for me is that the failure of imagination is so comprehensive that the current governing generation is taking a huge debt-load, and doubling it for my generation -- those of us born well after the war in Vietnam -- to pay off. Recent policy in Canada has been to "give back surplus tax dollars to Canadians" in the form of huge tax cuts, but only during boom times. All it serves to do is bankrupt the country so that proper, forward-thinking investment is impossible.

Canada has a long history of building itself up only to sell itself short. It is a cycle we need to break. From being world leaders in the aviation industry until the cancellation of the Avro Arrow, a crime for which I will never forgive Diefenbaker, to turning from the most prosperous country in the G8 to essentially bankrupt under another Conservative government, Canada has a long history of getting to the top of its game, and then backpedalling with apology to those that we had outshone. The bailout Canada and the province of Ontario are offering to the auto industry here, measured as a simple function of how much the US is offering in their bail out multiplied by the percentage of the industry that is in Canada, is yet another example of how we are failing where we should be leading.

The ideas are out there. A report in the Mercury a few days ago related a new study proposing a high speed rail network for the greater Toronto area, stretching from Waterloo to Orillia to Peterborough to Niagara Falls. According to the study, the network could cost as little as $4 billion -- the amount we are giving to the auto industry.

With the prospects for my generation being as dim as they are with what we are inheriting, I feel I have to call attention to the existence of the future to those currently in power, as nobody at the top seems capable of seeing beyond the tips of their own noses.

This lack of vision and foresight extends to Guelph, which at a recent council meeting voted unanimously to ask GO Transit to set up a single station in the downtown core, not setting aside any other land for use as a future station, and committing downtown to building vastly more and more expensive parking -- no doubt at the expense of further increased transit fares. To council's credit, only three members voted in favour of a motion calling on GO never to consider any additional stations in Guelph. While the "Stone Rd extension" right of way connecting one of the main east-west strips at the south end of the city with highway 24 has been set aside for generations, preparing our transit infrastructure even a few years in advance is beyond the capability of our politicians at any level. Why are we so chronically incapable of planning ahead? Is it too much to ask that we plan as far ahead for our transportation infrastructure as we do for our water usage? We do have abstract plans, but without action, it's essentially meaningless.

With that, here's today's column.

Bail-out places a second mortgage on my generation

My generation is in for the surprise of its life.
We have never endured a recession. Sure there was one in the early 1990s, but when your parents tell you at nine years old that they are on their last $20, your reaction is "that's more than I have!" So as we head into this period of economic uncertainty, what do we have to consider?
I am a firm believer in the role of government. For the economy, government's responsibility is to eliminate debt and build a reserve when times are good. When times are bad, taxes can then be lowered and we can rely on those reserves and short-term debt to invest in our national infrastructure, stimulating the economy.
Government's role is to reduce the peaks and troughs of the economic cycle. The bigger the boom, the bigger the bust, and by taxing the boom, we can mitigate the impact of the bust.
U.S. president Franklin D. Roosevelt's New Deal and president Dwight D. Eisenhower's Interstate system demonstrated this. Both took the economy out of recession through massive investment in the future. We almost had it figured out on this side of the border this time, too.
For 10 years we paid down the debt of the previous two recessions. We were making headway, but a new government came in and opted to cut taxes when the economy could actually afford the level of taxation we had.
Both Paul Martin and Stephen Harper brag about the amount they cut taxes: Martin by $120 billion, and Harper by another $200 billion. Between them, we could have almost completely paid off our debt and could have had the money to invest in public infrastructure during this recession without mortgaging my generation.
We pay in excess of $30 billion a year from the federal pot just for interest on the debt we have.
Without any debt that would be $30 billion more per year that the federal government would have to work with before going into deficit.
Our deficit is projected to be $30 billion in 2009, all of which will be borrowed to pay interest on what we have already borrowed.
The trouble is, we called our financial situation a "surplus." There is no such thing as a surplus as long as there is a debt.
Surplus is a bad word: it implies the government is taxing more than it needs.
That way of thinking considers only the here and now, it does not account for the spending done yesterday that we could not afford. Ultimately, it means we are measuring our government's financial health in terms of cash flow, not in consideration of the long term.
You and I would not reduce our income if we still have a mortgage to pay off and a retirement to plan for. Why should we do so collectively?
Government is not some mysterious institution that robs from us. It is our way, as a society, to manage ourselves and share communal costs and responsibilities.
If we, as a society, are spending more than we can afford, it is our collective responsibility to pay off the excess just as it would be for us to do personally. When governments at any level have a debt-target that is not zero per cent of GDP, we have a problem, just as much as if we abuse our credit card, or refinance our homes simply because we can, with the deliberate intention of carrying a debt that we could have paid off.
After having quickly squandered our reserves when times were good, the governments of both Canada and the United States are now preparing to give the American auto industry thousands of dollars per manufactured vehicle to keep their inefficient business models afloat. Meanwhile, their foreign competitors continue to clean up the market with better, more efficient vehicles, built for less money that cost less to maintain.
This bailout is wholly uninspired and does nothing to invest in our infrastructure or our future.
The $23 billion being spent by the governments on the two sides of the border could be put into our national infrastructure in a way that is truly meaningful while stimulating our economy.
Canada's $4 billion figure, just to bail out one industry in one province, along with all the other money governments around the world are giving to save dated business models, could instead have been invested in rethinking our approach to infrastructure.
Why are we not refocusing the industrial might of the auto sector on redefining how our cities are built, how we move around, and how we power it all?
Why are we not taking this opportunity to invest in becoming world leaders in sustainable technologies?
The auto industry has the potential to do it. We would be better served investing our billions of dollars to convert these failed manufacturers to the construction of technologies largely made elsewhere today including buses, passenger trains, wind turbines, solar panels and the like.
Purchasing the results would improve Canada's infrastructure. This would turn our automakers into world leaders in those fields, saving hundreds of thousands of jobs, and truly preparing us for the future. All it takes is vision.
Cars are not going anywhere, but they do not need to go everywhere.
Instead of paving over my generation with poorly considered short-term fiscal policies from unnecessarily emptied federal coffers, this recession could be our chance to invest wisely in our rapidly changing world.
At least then my surprised generation could contemplate a better future.

As an aside, Guelph spends a huge portion of its annual budget building and maintaining our 538 km of public roads. Mayor Farbridge's recent State of the City address confirmed this. 538 km represents approximately 4.5 metres or 14' 8" of road for each of Guelph's approximately 120,000 residents. It is 6.1 km of road per square km of city. All of those km are funded by the taxpayer and exclude the provincial highways in city limits, bridges, boulevards, traffic signals, and the other expenses we pay for to allow our cars to run. The level of subsidy for the automobile includes all these factors. By contrast, the City of Guelph turns an actual, real profit that is returned to city coffers on its railway operations. The subsidy for cars and trucks on our roads is so ingrained in our governing attitude that, in spite of the Guelph Junction Railway's profit, Guelph has, in the past, tried to convince its rail customers to switch to trucks. I suppose, given that, it is not that much of a surprise that we would seek to bail out the least profitable or visionary auto makers in the world.

* - Although I am unable to find a car I want to buy from any manufacturer to replace my venerable 1993 Oldsmobile Cutlass Cruiser 8-seat wagon as it approaches forced retirement. No car on the market today can seat more than five people aside from a fuel-thirsty Mercedes C350 7-seat wagon, which is a tad outside of my price range. Vehicles built on car frames rather than truck frames with a large capacity rather than the wasted space of a sedan, and bench seats up front allowing three occupants per row (something I use more than you'd think), simply do not exist any more from any manufacturer, with half-hearted attempts to correct a decade of SUV/Minivan obsession by building slightly smaller SUVs nicknamed "crossovers." Sorry folks, they're still SUVs.

columns environment money politics 2236 words - permanent link - comments: 3. Posted at 09:56 on December 30, 2008

Harper truly gives up on Quebec

Among the Senate appointments today, a former PQ MNA who served under Jacques Parizeau during the 1995 referendum. Clearly Harper's use for Quebec is at an end.

Other interesting bits from EEE-Senate-obsessed Harper: Mike Duffy, CTV reporter extraordinaire. I suppose Peter Kent needed some conservative media colleagues to join him at the Conservative caucus table.

politics 61 words - permanent link - comments: 1. Posted at 14:20 on December 22, 2008

GO train service not to reach Kitchener?

GO has released its 2020 plan, and according to the 65MB document, Guelph is to get rush hour train service, but Kitchener, Cambridge, Brantford, Niagara region, and Peterborough are only being considered for possible future expansion. Such a move makes the need for a site like Lafarge for parking and route origination much more urgent for Guelph's service, as it would be the nearest GO train access for the entire Waterloo region market. At the junction of 6, 7, and 24, Cambridge, Kitchener, and Waterloo commuters would need a place to park in Guelph to park and ride. Refer to page 20 of the linked PDF for the GO 2020 rail service map.

The whole document is rather interesting. Page 24 of the PDF outlines operating ratios for comparable commuter services across North America. In the text, the document states "GO Transit will maintain a sustainable cost-recovery ratio of 75%." According to the chart on the same page, GO's current ratio is in the area of 90%, well ahead of second-place MTA Metro-North, New York City's system, which operates at about 62%. Page 34 outlines the plans for each of the lines on the GO system. Among the interesting tidbits, this chart shows GO considering the electrification of the Guelph line, and outlines the expected service for Guelph.

See GO's press release on the topic.

guelph transit 232 words - permanent link - comments: 0. Posted at 14:02 on December 12, 2008

Welcome to the People's Republic of Canada

Today's decision by the Governor General sets the most dangerous precedent in recent history. To allow a Prime Minister to shut down Parliament to cancel a confidence vote sets us among the banana republics of this world, where the "will of the people" is nothing more than the catch-phrase of a totalitarian regime. Welcome to the New Canada.

politics 65 words - permanent link - comments: 5. Posted at 17:01 on December 04, 2008

Frank Valeriote off to a good start in the House of Commons

While all hell breaks lose in Ottawa as the Prime Minister acts too clever by half, and rumour spreads (by tories) that he is planning on sending Canada toward its constitutional minimum of one Parliamentary sitting day per year, new Guelph MP Frank Valeriote has been settling in to the House of Commons. Here are Hansard transcripts from his first interventions in the two weeks since being sworn in. Valeriote, the rookie Liberal MP for Guelph, is the Associate Critic for Industry (Automotive).

Question period, November 20th:

Mr. Francis Valeriote (Guelph, Lib.):
Mr. Speaker, the auto sector has greatly suffered from the government's poor management of the economy and chronic neglect.
Guelph's economy is dependent upon the good jobs that come from a prosperous automotive and auto parts industry. Under the Conservatives, tens of thousands of good jobs have been lost, a situation that could have been avoided if they had a plan.
While the minister is on the road without a plan, auto workers are on the streets without a job. When will we see some real action?
Mr. Mike Lake (Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Industry, CPC):
Mr. Speaker, Canadians know that the global auto industry is facing unprecedented circumstances and the North American integrated automotive industry is no different.
The situation is changing daily. The minister is down in the U.S. right now talking to stakeholders. He has met with stakeholders here in Canada over the past couple of weeks.
The solution here needs to be a carefully considered one with a long-term view to the interests of Canadian consumers, Canadian workers, Canadian businesses and Canadian taxpayers. Any decision taken will be carefully considered in that regard.

Question period, November 26th:

Mr. Francis Valeriote (Guelph, Lib.):
Mr. Speaker, what our auto industry needs is a coordinated, concurrent effort with the United States. Anything less than that will result in the protection of U.S. jobs at the expense of Canadian jobs. Anything less than that is only going to worsen the new Conservative deficit.
Will the Conservative Minister of Industry tell us exactly with whom in the Bush administration and in the new Obama economic team he has met to ensure that Canadian jobs are protected and not siphoned across the border?
Hon. Tony Clement (Minister of Industry, CPC):
Mr. Speaker, I would remind members of the House that the president-elect, the premier of Ontario and the Prime Minister of this country are all saying the same thing. We need long-term sustainability. We do not need back of the envelope plans. We need a business plan and a business model that will work for the future. Barack Obama is saying that. Dalton McGuinty is saying that. The Prime Minister is saying that, and we are proud of our Prime Minister.
Mr. Francis Valeriote (Guelph, Lib.):
Mr. Speaker, the Conference Board of Canada stated that Canada will lose up to 15,000 more auto assembly jobs, which means 100,000 lost jobs in total by the end of 2009, 100,000 Canadian jobs. The U.S. Congress on its own will not protect Canadian jobs. That is the responsibility of the Conservatives, but all we hear from that minister is empty rhetoric.
How much longer will workers and their families have to wait before that ineffective Conservative minister finally acts to protect the auto jobs in this country?
Hon. Tony Clement (Minister of Industry, CPC):
Mr. Speaker, we on this side of the House are serious about our auto sector and indeed the entire economy. We are not part of the ready-fire-aim gang over there. We are methodically working on the best economic strategy for this country. We are working with our stakeholders. We are working with the auto sector. Members on that side of the House have no plans, no promises, except a car tax and a carbon tax which people in Canada could not afford to pay. That is not good enough anymore.

And later on the 26th, during the debate on the throne speech:

Mr. Francis Valeriote (Guelph, Lib.):
Mr. Speaker, I will be sharing my time with the member for Mississauga--Streetsville.
I am pleased to have the opportunity to rise in the House today to highlight some of my thoughts on the government's agenda outlined in the Speech from the Throne entitled, "Protecting Canada's Future".
It is indeed a distinct honour and privilege to have a seat in Canada's Parliament. I am profoundly grateful for the confidence that has been placed in me by the citizens of Guelph, a city in which one could not be more proud to live. It is a tremendous opportunity and privilege to serve one's own community in public office.
I want to take a moment to extend my appreciation to those individuals who devoted their time, resources and energy during my extensive 82 day election campaign. I am humbled by their contribution and inspired by their conviction.
My family has always been a source of love, guidance and support for me, and I am grateful for, and often feel undeserving of, their continued support. In particular, I want to thank my wife, Catherine, and our children, Olivia and Dominic, for their steadfast love and support as my young family continues along this journey into public life and public service.
In meeting my new colleagues from all parties, I am mindful that while we are divided geographically and politically, we are bound by a desire to serve the citizens of our constituencies and contribute to a better quality of life for those we are entrusted to represent. It is an ambitious goal, one that is essential for all of us to achieve in co-operation together.
I respect that Canadians want a Parliament that will work together to overcome the challenges that are on our doorstep. I have been successfully serving Guelph for 27 years as a lawyer, assisting people through the best and worst times of their lives. I have also had an opportunity to serve my community through many community boards and foundations. The people I have met and the organizations I have worked with along the way in Guelph have always had the foresight and commitment to face challenges, accept responsibility and plan a strategy to move towards a brighter future.
The people of Guelph and I are concerned about, even disapproving of, the Conservatives' lack of vision. In response to calls for economic prudence, we saw the Prime Minister irresponsibly eliminate the $3 billion contingency fund. In less than three years the Conservative government has become the highest spending government in Canadian history, after squandering the $13 billion surplus left to them by the previous Liberal government.
The Conservative minority government increased federal spending by more than $40 billion a year and, despite all respected economists' opinions to the contrary, cut its own vital source of revenue. In doing so, the Conservatives failed to stimulate meaningful economic growth and failed to be prepared for the slowdown they saw coming.
This economic crisis is an opportunity to embrace and invest in bold ideas and strategies that are going to translate into the jobs of tomorrow. I invite the Conservative government to take a look at Guelph for inspiration.
Maclean's magazine consistently rates the University of Guelph as Canada's foremost research university. The university is dedicated to maintaining this reputation through its intensive research-based programs, such as making plastic from non-food agricultural products, plastic that becomes car parts or packaging. Imagine farmers around Guelph feeding cities and feeding raw materials to industry in Guelph and elsewhere. Imagine the benefit for the economy and for the environment.
Innovation is exciting and full of economic opportunity. We need to make more meaningful investments and create strategic partners with those engaged in innovation and research in order to contribute to the kind of growth that will have our economy thriving. Governments need to play a more meaningful role in sponsoring university research and helping turn that research into jobs in Guelph and throughout Canada. There is little doubt that investments in university research yield significant social and economic returns. For example, Canadian economist Fernand Martin estimates that the cumulative dynamic impact of universities' contributions to the economy through research and development was at least $60 billion in 2007. We need to invest in talent, knowledge and innovation to continue to fully participate in today's competitive global and greening economy.
When I think about the next generation, a clean sustainable environment stands side by side with a prosperous economy. We have a responsibility to be mindful of our environment.
Again, I turn to Guelph for a stunning example of environmental sustainability. Last year, Guelph became a North American leader on energy management with its commitment to a 25-year community energy plan. Through the plan's challenging but realistic targets, Guelph could use less energy in 25 years than it does today, even with expected population growth of 53,000 people, and cut its annual greenhouse gas emissions by nine tonnes per person. This will put Guelph among the top energy performers in the world, reduce our environmental footprint and make my riding one of the most competitive and attractive communities in which to invest.
Liberals have been saying it for years, and I repeat the message at the risk it falls on deaf ears: Sound environmental policy delivers economic prosperity.
We cannot talk about the economy of tomorrow without paying heed to Canada's struggling auto sector. Communities right across this great country were built on the back of a thriving automotive industry. Today, with the industry in crisis, we see communities rightfully distressed about the loss of the good jobs provided through automotive assembly and parts manufacturing plants and the hundreds of thousands of spinoff jobs, from office cleaners to accountants and restaurateurs, to mention a few. It will negatively affect even the charitable contributions made in our communities.
Government has a role to partner with the industry to enable this sector to survive its credit limitations and emerge an industry that is committed to transition to greener and more efficient technologies.
Guelph is an auto town. Canada is an auto country. I call on the government to send a clear message to the industry and Canadians that the Government of Canada stands shoulder to shoulder with our auto industry to protect Canadian jobs.
The people of Guelph are disappointed that the funding promised to Canada's cities and communities has been delayed. Sound infrastructure is the link between healthy cities, productivity and competitiveness. I implore the government to move forward with vital and more meaningful infrastructure investments to create jobs and address the infrastructure deficit.
It is simply unacceptable for Canada to have an infrastructure deficit that exceeds $123 billion at a time when we are depending on our cities and communities for business growth and development and jobs. Guelph needs more meaningful help to repair its infrastructure, invest in public transit and for affordable housing.
My friends across the floor have asked us for ideas. I invite my Conservative colleagues to meet with me in Guelph and talk to those in the child care and early learning profession. The experience of 35 other industrialized countries, more committed than the Conservative government to early learning and child care, tells us that early learning is designed to take an entire generation out of poverty and into prosperity, better prepare them for the knowledge based economy, help children be better adjusted and less likely to be involved in crime and allows their parents to return to work or pursue their education. The Conservatives' $100 a month has left Guelph's early childhood education and child care in crisis.
Our children deserve more. I would have thought that my Conservative peers would care more about our children.
I respect the choice that Canadians made on October 14. I look forward to working in opposition to hold the government to account for the commitments it has made.
We need a bold vision that will lead us to a larger, greener economy that will restore Canada's place in the global economy.
We live in a complex, demanding, diverse nation. We govern not only for today, but for tomorrow and beyond.
Mr. Bruce Stanton (Simcoe North, CPC):
Mr. Speaker, I congratulate the member opposite for his comments and intervention this afternoon.
I want to go back to his earlier remarks with regard to the surplus and so-called lack of capacity. I wonder if the member might comment on the fact that Canada, of all the G-7 countries, has the greatest fiscal position and the greatest capacity to deal with this, partly because the government over the past two and a half years has reduced debt by some $38 billion.
The $13 billion surplus that keeps being heralded here by the other side has been reduced to put in the pockets of Canadians and help put Canada's fiscal position in a better light. I wonder if the member would not agree that this has improved Canada's position to address the very situation that confronts us.
Mr. Francis Valeriote:
Mr. Speaker, the member is right. I do not agree that it puts us in a better position.
If he has seen the reports from the OECD, he will know that Canada is headed for a deeper recession than we predicted and a far deeper recession than was denied by the Conservative government.
Had the Conservatives not squandered that surplus, had they paid attention to where we were headed and had they acknowledged what was clearly in their vision, which was a deficit and a recession, they would not have reduced the GST and we would have been in a better position right now to respond to the needs of all Canadians and respond specifically to those industries that need our help right now.
Mr. Wayne Marston (Hamilton East--Stoney Creek, NDP):
Mr. Speaker, I am little confused when I hear the member opposite talking about fiscal capacity when it was his leader who spoke to the Canadian Club and demanded that the government lower corporate taxes even further than it was planning on in the last budget.
Which side are you on?
The Deputy Speaker:
I would just remind the hon. member for Hamilton East--Stoney Creek to address comments through the chair and not directly to the opposite member.
Mr. Francis Valeriote:
Mr. Speaker, I am not at all against lowering corporate taxes to spark industry but lowering taxes alone is not enough. Lowering taxes for an ailing industry, all the ailing industries that are suffering right now, would be like refusing to throw a life jacket to someone who is drowning but telling them that if they get to shore they will be treated to a good meal.
I agree with lowering taxes but it is not enough. More must be done and more could have been done had the Conservative government prepared better for this deficit and for what is looming on the horizon.
Mr. Rodger Cuzner (Cape Breton--Canso, Lib.):
Mr. Speaker, I congratulate my colleague on his maiden speech. I want to assure the people back in Guelph that the member has made an impact not only in a very tough situation in his own riding but an impact already not just in our caucus and as a member of our auto caucus, but in the House as well. He has brought some important issues to the House so early in his career.
We stand in this place and we talk about issues and we debate legislation and bold ideas but it is important that, as members of Parliament, we have an understanding of how these issues impact on the real lives of those back home.
As the member's community continues to wrestle with those challenges within the auto industry, how is the inactivity on the part of the government impacting on those back in his riding of Guelph?
Mr. Francis Valeriote:
Mr. Speaker, today and yesterday I have been in communication with those who are being severely impacted. Linamar Corporation has already lost 800 jobs. It has had to freeze wages and benefits. I have received letters from dealerships in Guelph that have indicated that the wheels have stopped rolling.
We are getting absolutely no response from the Conservative government. It is not coming at all to the table with a meaningful effort.

guelph politics 2731 words - permanent link - comments: 0. Posted at 11:25 on November 30, 2008