Poilievre says he needs to study replacement workers bill before taking position

Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre said Monday he doesn’t yet have a position on the Liberal government’s proposed legislation to ban the use of replacement workers during strikes and lockouts in most federally regulated workplaces.

The bill, known as Bill C-58 in the House of Commons, was introduced last week and will apply to most federally regulated industries such as banking, airports and telecommunications, and ports. It will not apply to the federal public service or workplaces that are regulated by a province or territory.

“We’re going to study the legislation,” Poilievre told reporters at a press conference in Vancouver. “I never take a position before I have had a chance to actually look at what’s written down on paper.”

“I don’t blame the workers who are voting for strikes right now,” Poilievre said.

“Conservatives are 100 per cent on side with workers, union and non-union, who are fighting for pay hikes,” he said.

He laid the blame for rising costs at the feet of Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and his government spending.

“If Pierre Poilievre truly supports the rights of working people there is only one way to vote,” she said.

But Payne also pointed to Poilievre’s record when it comes to workers, adding “we are not holding our breath.”

Poilievre has voted multiple times in favour of back-to-work legislation over his nearly 20 years as an MP, including when the former Conservative government was in office. |Read more https://halifax.citynews.ca/2023/11/13/poilievre-says-he-needs-to-study-replacement-workers-bill-before-taking-position/| halifax.citynews.ca/2023/11/13…

#cdnpoli #workers #BillC58 #non-union #unions #Poilievre

Smith Just Exploded Alberta Health Care. What Comes Next?

This isn’t just about Smith’s pre-premiership comments in which she, among other things, pitched the idea of contracting out the operation of hospitals to private bidders and suggested patients might pay out of pocket to see a doctor (ideas she subsequently disowned as premier).

This is about someone who has a record of attacking medical expertise where, as a radio talk-show host, she criticized pandemic restrictions and promoted quack treatments such as ivermectin and hydroxychloroquine.

Ivermectin is an antiparasitic drug. After its discovery in 1975, its first uses were in veterinary medicine to prevent and treat heartworm and acariasis.

Hydroxychloroquine, sold under the brand name Plaquenil among others, is a medication used to prevent and treat malaria in areas where malaria remains sensitive to chloroquine. Other uses include treatment of rheumatoid arthritis, lupus, and porphyria cutanea tarda.

The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has not approved the use of either hydroxychloroquine (HCQ) or ivermectin for treating or preventing https://scdhec.gov/covid19/dangers-using-hydroxychloroquine-ivermectin-preventing-or-treating-covid-19 COVID-19 in humans.

During the 2022 United Conservative Party leadership race, Smith fired up support from her anti-mandate, socially conservative base by promising to wreak vengeance against Alberta Health Services for COVID restrictions. She also promised to amend the Alberta Human Rights Act to give official protection to the unvaccinated. On her first day as premier, Smith declared that the wilfully unvaccinated faced the most discrimination she had seen in her 50-year lifetime.

She dutifully fired the AHS board, got rid of Alberta’s chief medical officer, Dr. Deena Hinshaw, and began the process of undermining what she had called a “lawless” AHS.

This week, we saw just how AHS will be declawed. And how Smith will take more direct political control over health care in the province.

Nobody is saying the current system is perfect, and Albertans rightfully complain about long wait times in the emergency rooms, long wait times for surgery and long wait times to get a family doctor.

But critics say Smith’s upheaval of the system is only going to make things worse.

Steve’s note
It looks to me as if Resolution 3 get passed, quack-doctors can write articles and do interviews telling the public about the great successes they’ve had treating covid with hydroxychloroquine and ivermectin. By the look of resolution 16, they’ll have the right to prescribe it to you for covid. |Read more https://thetyee.ca/Analysis/2023/11/14/Smith-Exploded-Alberta-Health-Care/| thetyee.ca/Analysis/2023/11/14…

#abpoli #resolutions #covid #ivermectin #hydroxychloroquine #healthcare #AHS #politics