Most Canadians welcome immigrants, but anti-immigration sentiments persist

Hostility towards immigrants has become a powerful component https://www.forbes.com/sites/stuartanderson/2020/08/26/fact-check-and-review-of-trump-immigration-policy/ of right-wing populism in several western countries https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-64024461. But for the time being, Canada has not succumbed https://www.nytimes.com/2017/06/27/world/canada/canadas-secret-to-resisting-the-wests-populist-wave.html to this wave.

In Canada, attitudes towards immigration have never been a particularly divisive or salient election issue. Maxime Bernier’s People’s Party of Canada is the only federal party whose platform includes radical reform of Canada’s immigration system https://www.peoplespartyofcanada.ca/immigration. Nonetheless, the party has twice failed https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/peoples-party-election-2021-1.6182680 to gain any seats in parliament.

Reinforcing the idea that multiculturalism lies at the centre of Canadian identity, a recent Focus Canada report https://acrobat.adobe.com/link/review?uri=urn:aaid:scds:US:92e101c4-428a-49e5-a34d-abfcc31fd012 finds that the public “has never been more supportive” of immigrants.

Our ongoing research into anti-immigration attitudes is primarily motivated by recent xenophobic attacks which expose a resurgence in anti-immigrant feelings. For instance, the 2021 London, Ont. hit-and-run, described by the prime minister as a “terrorist attack,” https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/trudeau-london-terroris-attack-1.6057480 which killed four members of a Muslim family, shocked many Canadians. A man facing terror-related murder charges https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/london/trial-of-man-charged-in-killing-of-muslim-family-in-london-ont-to-be-held-in-different-city-1.6531656 is scheduled to stand trial in September 2023.

Our mission is to share knowledge and inform decisions.

In 2020, Canadian police https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/n1/pub/85-002-x/2022001/article/00005-eng.htm reported 2,669 criminal acts motivated by hatred —the largest number recorded since 2009.

The Canadian government recently announced plans to welcome 500,000 new permanent residents a year by 2025. Research shows that despite rising hate crimes most Canadians are supportive of immigration. (Shutterstock)

Anti-immigrant sentiments exist, but no province stands out

We conducted a survey in September 2022 with Canadian polling firm Abacus Data https://abacusdata.ca/ on a sample of 1,000 respondents across Canada. We asked four questions: |Read more https://theconversation.com/most-canadians-welcome-immigrants-but-anti-immigration-sentiments-persist-196558|
#cdnpoli #immigration #racism #HateCrimes #xenophobia

Model shows extinction cascades caused by land use and climate change will wipe out more than 25% of world biodiversity

A new tool developed by European and Australian scientists enabling unparalleled modeling of interconnected species loss shows cascading extinctions are unavoidable, and that the Earth will lose some 10% of its animals and plants by 2050, rising to 27% by 2100.

The findings are published in the journal Science Advances.

Using one of Europe’s most-powerful supercomputers, European Commission scientist Dr. Giovanni Strona also of the University of Helsinki and Professor Corey Bradshaw of Flinders University used the tool to create synthetic Earths complete with virtual https://phys.org/tags/species/ and more than 15,000 food webs https://phys.org/tags/food+webs/ to predict the interconnected fate of species that will likely disappear from the ravages of climate and land-use changes.

The tool presents a grim prediction of the future of global diversity, confirming beyond doubt that the world is in the throes of its 6th mass https://phys.org/tags/extinction/ event.

The two scientists say past approaches to assessing extinction trajectories over the coming century have been stymied by not incorporating co-extinctions—that is, species that go extinct because other species on which they depend succumb to climate change and/or changes to the landscape. |Read more https://phys.org/news/2022-12-extinction-cascades-climate-world-biodiversity.html|
#world #environment #extinction #confirmed #species #cdnpoli

New labour militancy from the folks who brought us the weekend

The public doesn’t usually warm to the notion of labour militancy — until reminded that, without it, weekends would be a lot shorter, or maybe not exist at all.

The truth is labour militancy has benefited all of us. It was instrumental in attaining the weekend, the eight-hour workday, the end of child labour, public pensions and public health care, and countless other gains that have dramatically improved the lives of working people and the broader public.

It’s worth keeping this connection in mind as the union movement — sidelined and subdued for decades — is finding its sea-legs and starting to reassert itself.

Certainly, its stunning victory last month in its clash with the Ford government https://www.thestar.com/politics/political-opinion/2022/11/08/when-doug-ford-tried-to-prevent-a-strike-he-only-made-more-of-them-likely.html?rf has rekindled workers’ dreams of reclaiming some of the ground they’ve lost during the past four decades, when corporations have dominated and imposed their pro-market agenda.

Ontario Premier Doug Ford’s overreach — in picking on lowly paid education workers and using the soft-touch skills of an axe murderer in invoking the Constitution’s notwithstanding clause — helped CUPE win over the public, unite the labour movement and convince Ford he had no option but retreat.

Of course, there could be a backlash if labour strife escalates, especially if mainstream media commentators go on to depict workers as selfish and indifferent to the public’s suffering. |Read more https://rabble.ca/columnists/new-labour-militancy-from-the-folks-who-brought-us-the-weekend/|
#cdnpoli #labour #militancy #rights #unions

I’m stopping. I’ve had enough.

On the same day Ontario Health Minister Sylvia Jones said the province has “not seen a mass exodus of nurses https://www.cp24.com/news/ontario-health-minister-s-denial-of-nurses-mass-exodus-feels-painful-and-dismissive-for-some-1.6176052” leaving the profession – a remark some nurses say was “dismissive” and “painful” to hear, I stopped my active nursing license.

I say stopped, not resigned. It’s a more active description of my decision.

Like countless nurses, I’ve had enough.

Like my hospital colleagues I have listened and watched as nurses who are working in what can only be described as a war zone become ill or get COVID or burnout – or all three. It is highly likely their mental health may be permanently damaged.

Decades of government neglect to the health care system is now patently apparent. It’s safe to say nurses are now politicized, and they are angry.

It’s not unlike the government’s decades-long neglect to housing. |Read more https://rabble.ca/columnists/im-stopping-ive-had-enough/|
#onpoli #cdnpoli #nurses #covid #healthcare #neglect