A new report says Canada is not keeping up with many of its global neighbours when it comes to the amount of vacation time provided to its workers.

The report by the Canadian Labour Congress compares vacation rates among member countries of the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development, as well as among the provinces.

The report finds that Canadian workers get less paid vacation time than almost all the other developed countries. It also calls for the federal and provincial governments to move to a new national legal minimum of 10 paid statutory holidays and three weeks paid vacation after one year of service.

“Considering that all school-age children are on vacation for two months in the summer, the legal vacation regime in Canada cannot be said to be family-friendly,” said the report from the pro-union group.

According to the comparison of statutory annual leave minimums among member countries, Canada is near the bottom of the list. It is behind Australia, Austria, Belgium, France and Denmark, to name just a few of the countries that offer more paid time off to their workers — in some cases more than double the Canadian average.

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This cap is completely unjustified. We are the only place in Canada that has such a ridiculous cap. This cap needs to be removed.

The announcement of this increase is joke as well. We are limiting ourselves by only allowing half of the already planned wind projects to get started. Renewable energy is the future, and it’s too bad that these dinosaurs up in Edmonton don’t see that.
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The Stelmach government foresees nearly doubling the amount of wind-power generation allowed in Alberta, even as the province remains the only jurisdiction in Canada to cap the production of wind energy.

“There is every possibility that (the cap) could move to, in the interim, someplace around 1,500 megawatts,” said Energy Minister Mel Knight. “As we move along and Alberta’s system becomes more robust, and we’re able to integrate more wind, I can see it moving beyond that.”

The wind power industry is demanding the province go further than raising the amount of production permitted and remove the cap outright.

Alberta’s Electric System Operator introduced last year a limit of 900 megawatts of wind-energy generation, saying it was uncertain about whether wind conditions and patterns could be properly forecast — something needed to produce a reliable stream of power.

The decision enraged wind-energy producers, which have thousands of megawatts in the queue. The rules made Alberta the only jurisdiction in Canada to impose such a cap.

“Replacing it with a higher cap is not a preferred option,” said Robert Hornung, president of the Canadian Wind Energy Association. “A cap sends a signal that a door is closed, and for investors in the industry, that sends a negative signal.”

Knight said increasing the cap to 1,500 megawatts could make room for between six and 10 new wind farms.

That could be big news for southern Alberta wind-energy producers, with more than a dozen new projects in the queue.

But Hornung said maintaining a cap system will leave industry in the same position it faces today.

A recent report from the electric system operator indicates conditions could soon be ripe to remove the cap on wind-power generation, he said.

There are well over 3,000 megawatts of wind-energy projects being “actively pursued” in Alberta, Hornung said, most of them in southern Alberta from Medicine Hat in the east to the B.C. border in the west.
Canada.com

Read more on this:

Blowing in the Wind - Vue Weekly
Scrap cap on wind power, says Mason - Alberta NDP

The BBC has launched a massive online service allowing people to download some 400 hours of recent programming.

The service, launched Friday, will give viewers a choice from 70 per cent of the British broadcaster’s output, including popular programs such as EastEnders and Doctor Who. Programs from the previous week will be made available.

“Our vision is for BBC iPlayer to become a universal service available not just over the internet, but also on cable and other TV platforms, and eventually on mobiles and smart hand-held devices,” said the BBC’s Ashley Highfield, director of future media and technology.

Highfield said the BBC’s new service is a response to the popularity of video-sharing sites such as YouTube as well as competition from other U.K. networks such as Channel 4.

He says the audience is tiring of fixed TV schedules and viewers want the option of watching programs whenever they want to.

The service is free and is only available to people living in Britain with computers running the Microsoft XP operating system. It takes about 30 minutes to download an hour-long show.

Programs will be automatically deleted after viewing or after 30 days. Copyright protection software prevents the copying of shows.

CBC

For those of you in Great Britian who can take advantage of this service, check it out here.

The U.S. manufacturer of Aquafina bottled water will soon revise the product’s label to clearly show the drink is made with treated tap water.

CBC

I posted last year about the United Church thinking of banning bottled water, as water is a human right, and should not be privatized into a commodity. This is not the only controversy surrounding bottled water. The environmental impact of the waste produced by the bottled water industry is huge. Water bottles clog the landfills every year.

Now I will admit that I have bought bottled water before and probably will in the future due to the convenience factor. But I still think it’s important to be aware of what you are actually buying.

A byelection date has now been set for two Quebec ridings. Prime Minister Stephen Harper announced Saturday that voters in the Outremont and Saint-Hyacinthe ridings will go to the polls Sept. 17.

The battle for Outremont is already off to a heated start as candidates have been anxiously poised to start the byelection race. Political parties have been pushing their star candidates in the spotlight in anticipation of the announcement.

Outremont is being watched closely because of its roots as a Liberal stronghold. If the seat should go to another party, political pundits warn it would cast doubts on Stephane Dion’s effectiveness as leader of the opposition.

“This time around, both the Conservative party and the NDP have strong candidates, so it’s really a multi-party contest in Outremont,” said David Mitchell, political historian and vice-president of the University of Ottawa.

“It could be very devastating for the leadership of Stephane Dion if the Liberals don’t easily win the Outremont byelection.”

On July 20, the Liberals announced their candidate in Outremont as Jocelyn Coulon, a long-time political commentator and professor. He will duke it out with NDP candidate Thomas Mulcair, a former Quebec environment minister, Conservative candidate former ambassador Gilles Duguay, and Bloc Québécois candidate psychoanalyst Jean-Paul Gilson.

“Byelections are difficult to predict,” said Mitchell. “They’re kind of mini-referenda on how the government is doing. Governments, historically, in Canada don’t do well in a byelection.”

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