John Tory, Mark Saunders get cover from Queen’s Park on carding issue: James

2015/09/02 Leave a comment

Royson James on the Ontario government’s public consultations on carding:

There is little reason to believe that the provincial Liberal government consultations on carding will yield anything more satisfactory than the chaotic farce the Toronto Police Services Board has delivered, led by Mayor John Tory.

To expect meaningful reform from the current initiative, with a stop in Toronto at the reference library Tuesday night, is to be overcome with naiveté borne of willful blindness.

In fact, the evidence points to a provincial government in cahoots with Tory and the Toronto police brass; one whose intervention is designed to offer pap and a public relations show, while preserving the essence of police street checks.

Notwithstanding the lofty statements about the government’s intolerance of discrimination, the impact of any new rules passed will likely be: police will have the ability to stop anyone, anytime, for any reason, stated or unstated, to psychologically, if not expressly detain said person, record personal information from said subject, and record the same in a police database.

And we know who will be targeted most.

And we know — or have been told ad nauseum this past year — the real, psychological, and social costs borne by the black community, particularly young black men.

But carding is a useful tool — according to opening statements on the Ministry of Community Safety and Correctional Services website, announcing the review.

Done properly, the new police chief has said, carding is legal.

Done properly, we wouldn’t be here debating the matter, attempting to tame it, wrestling with the chief to find reasonable constraints on the practice, and advocating for reform.

Done properly, street checks in Toronto would follow the protocol drawn up in April 2014 by a Toronto police board that studied the matter and came up with as good a compromise as possible.

That was before John Tory and (now board chair) Andy Pringle and former chief Bill Blair turned the file into a horrible mess, a political hot potato and a public relations disaster.

Pringle, a member of the board in 2014 and Tory acolyte and Blair’s fishing buddy, convinced Tory that he should back Blair in his refusal to implement the board’s decision. Tory, while condemning carding, destroyed the 2014 policy designed to fix it, brought in new guidelines that created a firestorm of controversy, and was forced to go back to the very 2014 board policy he meddled with.

And this is where the province mysteriously entered the fray.

Why? Few can explain the motivation. How? In a manner that only fosters cynicism. Who would enter this messy situation, with the epicenter in Toronto, and decide to hold consultations in Ottawa and Thunder Bay but not Toronto? Who would set up private sessions with groups familiar with the issue and not include the Black Action Defence Committee (BADC)?

Source: John Tory, Mark Saunders get cover from Queen’s Park on carding issue: James | Toronto Star

Filed under Multiculturalism Tagged with , , ,

Montreal man under fire from Yazidi activists over rescue efforts

2015/09/02 Leave a comment

Further to the earlier article (Un Montréalais à la rescousse des esclaves sexuelles de l’EI), appears not quite true:

Montreal businessman Steve Maman has been dubbed the “Jewish Schindler” for his efforts to rescue women and girls from sexual slavery in Iraq.

But now Maman is defending himself against questions about his motives, methods and results being raised by politicians, activists and religious leaders from the very minority group he says he has been pouring his time and energy into saving.

In an open letter last week, the signatories questioned a claim they called “dubious” that Maman’s group, The Liberation of Christian and Yazidi Children of Iraq, had rescued 102 women and girls (a number that has since risen to 128) with just $80,000. They also questioned whether the money paid for the hostage release was going back into Islamic State coffers. They are calling for Maman to offer proof of his tactics and the identities of those who have been saved before they will approve his work.

“We ask the friends of the Yazidi people all over the world who passionately support our vulnerable community to stop donating to Mr. Maman until his work is verified,” reads the letter, dated Aug. 26. “If his project is legitimate, safe, and ethical, we will also support him.”

Maman claims he has the backing of the Iraqi and Kurdish governments and credits his success to powerful and influential contacts in Iraq who have assisted his team of front-line workers.

He refutes critics’ allegations and says he is preparing to publicly defend his claims: “I know what I have in my hands. I can take the hit for another month, two months or three months in the media and let people say I’m a fraud and all that. But three months from now we’re going to go out in public and show everything we’ve done.”

Maman’s defence against the criticisms have become more strident in the last few days. He says he initially chalked it up to a misunderstanding that occurs as information is translated from French to English to Arabic to Kurmanji, a collection of Kurdish dialects.

A few days later, he sent a cease-and-desist letter to one of the signatories, University of Chicago Yazidi specialist Matthew Barber, who is a member of Yazda, a group that raises awareness about the Yazidi plight. The letter warned the signatories to end their criticisms or face a $5-million defamation suit.

Source: Montreal man under fire from Yazidi activists over rescue efforts | Toronto Star

Filed under Multiculturalism Tagged with ,

Twitter Sets Measurable Hiring Goals for Women and Minorities | Re/code

2015/09/02 Leave a comment

Setting public goals and reporting on them provides incentives for managers:

A month ago, Twitter’s interim CEO Jack Dorsey told employees that diversity would soon be a company goal. Twitter was fresh off an embarrassing fraternity-themed party that only underscored Silicon Valley’s reputation as a place where women and minorities are often overlooked.

Today, Dorsey and Twitter followed through on that promise, and they’ve got the numbers to back it up.

Twitter reported its diversity metrics Friday, falling in line with the rest of Silicon Valley by reporting a predominantly white and male workforce. Two-thirds of Twitter’s global employee base is male, and men also claim 87 percent of the company’s tech jobs; ninety percent of its U.S. employees are either white or Asian.

Unlike most other tech companies, however, which often provide lip service on how they plan to improve those ratios, Twitter is setting measurable goals for each of these categories as a way to hold itself accountable. For example, it wants to grow its percentage of women in tech roles from 13 percent to 16 percent in the next year. It also wants to grow women in leadership roles from 22 percent to 25 percent.

They’re small increments, sure, but putting tangible numbers out there also puts pressure on the company to deliver. (You can guarantee that if it misses these marks, the media will point it out.) Janet Van Huysse, Twitter’s VP of diversity and inclusion, wrote in a post Friday that the company will start recruiting more heavily at historically black colleges and universities and Latino-serving institutions this fall. It is also working to ensure its job descriptions are written to “appeal to a broad range of applicants.”

Kudos to Twitter for putting a stake in the sand. Perhaps other companies will soon do the same. Now the pressure’s on to actually change things at Twitter.

Perhaps DND and the RCMP could take a similarly public position, starting by posting their employment equity reports on their website, and commit to a more active approach to addressing their poor results for women and visible minorities.

Source: Twitter Sets Measurable Hiring Goals for Women and Minorities | Re/code

Filed under Multiculturalism Tagged with , , , ,

Justin Trudeau vows to repeal ‘2-tiered’ citizenship law

2015/09/01 Leave a comment

Unclear whether he would repeal the complete Citizenship Act (the reporting suggested that) or just the revocation and a few other provisions:

Liberal Leader Justin Trudeau says if elected his government will repeal the Conservative government’s “two-tiered” citizenship law and that he would do more to help free imprisoned Egyptian-Canadian journalist Mohamed Fahmy.

“Liberals believe in a Canada that is united — strong not in spite of its differences, but precisely because of them,” Trudeau told an audience at the Jalsa Salana Islamic conference in Mississauga, Ont., on Saturday afternoon.

He added that under Conservative Leader Stephen Harper, Canadians are being encouraged to be fearful of one another and there has been a decline in refugees coming to Canada, and in citizenship applicants.

In an accompanying news release, Trudeau said his government would repeal the Conservative government’s controversial Strengthening Canadian Citizenship Act, saying it “devalues Canadian citizenship by creating two classes of citizenship.”

“Liberals will guarantee that all Canadians’ fundamental rights are respected as guided by the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms,” the statement said.

The act became law in June 2014. While several elements of the law remain controversial, a provision that came into effect in May of this year expands the grounds on which the federal government can strip dual nationals of their Canadian citizenship, even if they were born in Canada.

The provision gives the power to revoke citizenship, in some cases, to elected officials and not a federal court.

“There is a suggestion that some of us might be less Canadian than others, a suggestion of who ought to decide who stays or goes from Canada be an elected politician instead of our justice system. I think that’s wrong,” Trudeau said during his speech.

The changes are currently being challenged in court by a coalition of civil liberties groups.

In a statement, the Conservative candidate for Ajax [and current Minister of Citizenship and Immigration] described Trudeau’s remarks as “more evidence that he’s just not ready,” to be prime minister.

“Canadians know that only Conservatives can be trusted to take action against those who would do Canada harm and stand up for Canadian values,” Chris Alexander said.

Liberal position is consistent with their opposition to the revocation provisions during the C-24 Citizenship Act hearings (NDP also opposed).

In a sign that either the Conservatives continue to think they have a winner on this issue (earlier polling would suggest that) or whether they are worried that they don’t, the heavy hitters, Jason Kenney and Jenni Byrne were denouncing Trudeau’s position vigorously on Twitter.

Source: Justin Trudeau vows to repeal ‘2-tiered’ citizenship law – Politics – CBC News

Filed under C-24, Citizenship, Revocation Tagged with ,

Foreign caregivers ask Filipino Canadians to ‘vote wisely’

2015/09/01 Leave a comment

It will be interesting to see how these changes play out with Filipino Canadians and the weight of this in relation to broader political issues (there are only 4 ridings with more that 10 percent Filipino Canadians: Vancouver South, Vancouver Kingsway, Scarborough Centre, with only Winnipeg North where they are the largest groups at 28.6 percent):

Kristina Torres hopes her 620,000-strong Filipino Canadian community won’t forget their roots — and the compatriots they left behind — when they cast their votes in the October federal election.

The Toronto woman from the Philippines is joining a chorus of past and present foreign caregivers, who are overwhelmingly Filipino, to warn the community about Ottawa’s waning caregivers program, which has been the key immigration avenue to Canada for Filipinos over the past 15 years.

“The government has promised to reduce the backlog, but the changes they made are making things worse,” said Torres, 27, who was let go by her employer in October and has since been struggling. “They made the promise to improve the program and must keep their word.”

Until November, foreign caregivers were bound by the requirements of the old Live-in Caregivers Program, which allowed them to apply for permanent residency after two years of service.

In December, the Conservative government replaced the old program by removing the live-in condition, capping the yearly number of applicants and raising applicants’ English and education requirements.

However, months into the new program, caregivers said the processing time required for their permanent residency has lengthened, and many are now having trouble getting a positive Labour Market Impact Assessment (LMIA) — a certificate that justifies their attaining a job because of a labour shortage.

“There has been no improvement. Our members can’t get the LMIA. If they leave an abusive employer, they will be punished because they need the LMIA to work,” said Johnna Uchi, of Toronto’s Caregivers Action Centre, pleading for all political parties to commit themselves to changing the situation.

“Voters in the Filipino community, and all voters, must vote wisely. Don’t just think of what is happening now to the program, but think of what’s going to happen to the community in the long run.”

Source: Foreign caregivers ask Filipino Canadians to ‘vote wisely’ | Toronto Star

Filed under Multiculturalism Tagged with , ,

Critics see problems with Ontario carding review

2015/09/01 Leave a comment

In advance of Toronto’s consultation on Tuesday, a look at three concerns raised by critics about the province’s street checks review and responses from the ministry and police associations:

The definition of “street checks” is too broad

In an online form the ministry calls its “discussion document,” street checks are defined as a tool police use “to engage and record interactions with individuals whose activities and/or presence within their broader context (e.g., location, time, behaviour, etc.) seem out of the ordinary.”

But Knia Singh — who has launched a Charter challenge against police carding and says he has been stopped by police 30 times — says the ministry’s definition is does not capture the reality of street checks, which involve arbitrary detentions.

The majority of community members who are concerned about carding are not opposed to police having the ability to stop and question people for a legitimate investigative purpose.

“What we’ve always been fighting is the non-criminal investigation of people,” Singh said. “What they’re missing is the whole point of people just walking on the street, standing on the corner or minding their own business are getting stopped.”

“If they are going to use the word ‘street check,’ they have to define it correctly,” Singh said. “Then we can have a discussion.”

Jonathan Rose, spokesperson for Naqvi’s ministry, said it’s in the process of updating the content of its street-check document online “to reflect the feedback that we have heard from our public consultation and online channels,” though he did not specify what changes were being made.

“We intend to make these changes to the web page content in the coming days,” Rose said in an email.

It misses the root problem of racial discrimination

In a lengthy submission to the ministry, the Ontario Human Rights Commission states its central concern with the street checks review is that it does not go far enough to address the “systemic issue” underlying the over-representation of racialized people in street-check interactions.

Ruth Goba, the OHRC’s interim chief commissioner, says the ministry does not go far enough to define when it is appropriate to perform street checks.

The OHRC challenges the suggestion that police may perform street checks when individuals’ activities “seem out of the ordinary.” That is just simply too broad, Goba says — and unguided officer discretion to initiate street checks is “fertile ground for racial profiling,” the OHRC writes.

Also, the larger issue “of racial profiling is not explicitly mentioned,” Goba says, “and that is a significant gap given how the issue has manifested itself.”

Rose said Naqvi has made it clear the government “takes the protection of human rights very seriously and that we have zero tolerance for racism or marginalization.”

It is taken for granted that street checks solve crime

In its description of street checks, the province describes the practice as “a necessary and valuable tool for police” that helps solve and prevent crime.

Chris Williams, an outspoken carding opponent and member of the Toronto Police Accountability Coalition, says stating carding’s usefulness as fact is problematic. Numerous groups, including TPAC, the Law Union of Ontario and the OHRC have argued there is a dearth of objective evidence supporting the claim that street checks solve crime.

Police forces and associations across Ontario often cite the importance street checks can play in solving crime…

Source: Critics see problems with carding review | Toronto Star

Filed under Multiculturalism Tagged with , ,

Antiterrorism Laws Prompt British Library to Distance Itself From Taliban Project – The New York Times

2015/09/01 Leave a comment

How can governments understand the threats of the Taliban, ISIS and others without this kind of documentation and knowledge?

Over nearly a decade, a group of researchers who organized the Taliban Sources Project have painstakingly collected and translated into English more than a thousand newspapers, magazines, radio broadcasts, military and administrative documents, as well as handwritten poetry by Taliban fighters in Afghanistan.

The group’s aim is to digitize the primary material, shedding light on the Taliban’s organization and the insurgency in Afghanistan. The British Library has one of the world’s biggest digital collections, including manuscripts that date back centuries. The researchers took the project to the library in 2012, received advice from a prominent scholar and appointed members of the library to its advisory board. But a month ago, the library declined to take on the project, saying it had been legally advised not to publish the collection because it contains material that could be in breach of Britain’s antiterrorism laws.

The library said that it recognized the archive’s research value. But “it was judged that it contained some material which could contravene the Terrorism Act,” it said in a statement, “which would present restrictions on the library’s ability to provide access to the archive for researchers.”

The Terrorism Act “places specific responsibilities on anyone in Britain who might provide access to terrorist publications,” the statement added, “and the legal advice received jointly by the British Library and other similar institutions advises against making this type of material accessible.”

The Taliban Sources Project mostly focuses on material from 1994 to 2001 that “gives a unique window into the Taliban’s world views, their negotiations with foreign governments, how they viewed history,” said Felix Kuehn, an organizer of the project, adding that the material could help provide a more complete picture about the organization in the run-up to the 2001 American invasion of Afghanistan.

“Our knowledge of the Taliban in the 1990s is dominated by Western media coverage that was highly politicized, in part because information was not easily accessible,” Mr. Kuehn said.

The project’s 10-member team has translated more than two million words of material. The group had hoped that the British Library would “provide a big institutional home for the material for the long run,” Mr. Kuehn said, calling the decision disappointing. “We can put it up on the web, too, but it wouldn’t last forever.”

Source: Antiterrorism Laws Prompt British Library to Distance Itself From Taliban Project – The New York Times

Filed under Multiculturalism

Harperman case: Can public servants be political activists? – Politics – CBC News

2015/09/01 Leave a comment

I agree with Savoie and Sheppard on this:

Donald Savoie, the Canada Research Chair in public administration and governance at the University of Moncton, disagrees.

“In my view, regardless of what the Supreme Court might say, public servants should not become political actors, especially in the middle of campaigns,” he said. “They are not political actors. We have political actors; they are politicians.”

He said you can’t be politically active and non-partisan at the same time.  “If you start handing out flyers and you appear in videos, you become a part of that — you become partisan. You can’t be half-pregnant,” he said.

…. But [Robert] Shepherd says the responsibility to speak truth to power does not give public servants permission to engage in political activism.

“The expression or the vehicle for doing that is to use internal avenues, not to be activists outside of the established mechanisms within the public service,” he said.

A public servant concerned about government policy who exhausts all other avenues and chooses to go public, he says, must be willing to accept the consequences.

Source: Harperman case: Can public servants be political activists? – Politics – CBC News

Filed under Multiculturalism

Newer posts →