BY LEE BERTHIAUME, POSTMEDIA NEWS Calgary Herald OTTAWA — The federal government has refused to give Parliament’s budgetary watchdog copies of the bids that ultimately won nearly $33 billion worth of work for shipyards in Halifax and Vancouver under the government’s national shipbuilding strategy. Parliamentary Budget Officer Kevin Page had requested the bids
Pollution Limits Renewed With UN Push for Climate Aid
By Alex Morales & Ewa Krukowska Bloomberg The international effort to curb global warming inched forward with an agreement that extends pollution limits under the Kyoto Protocol and calls for work on a mechanism that would pay aid for climate-related disasters. The deal endorsed by ministers from more than 190 nations in Doha yesterday restrains
Ten worst ‘ecocides’
From floating plastic islands and orbiting space junk to mountaintop removal and deep-sea mining, the worldwide destruction of ecosystems is worse now than at any other time. The UK environmental lawyer Polly Higgins is advocating a new law at the UN that would recognise ‘ecocide’ as the fifth ‘crime against peace’. Here is a selection of 10 examples
British campaigner urges UN to accept ‘ecocide’ as international crime
Proposal to declare mass destruction of ecosystems a crime on a par with genocide launched by lawyer Juliette Jowit Guardian.co.uk A campaign to declare the mass destruction of ecosystems an international crime against peace – alongside genocide and crimes against humanity – is being launched in the UK. The proposal
Clinton’s Environmental Failure
Bill McKibben The Daily Beast Hillary isn’t winning many friends among environmentalists with her support of the Keystone Pipeline–and it will be the purest test of whether Obama’s second term will be greener than his first. It seems just a tad early to be thinking about the 2016 election—unless, apparently, you’re Hillary
UNGA Second Committee Approves Resolution to Declare 2014-2024 Decade of Sustainable Energy for All
iisd 5 December 2012: The UN General Assembly’s (UNGA) Second Committee (Economic and Financial) approved draft resolution A/C.2/67/L.52 on “Promotion of new and renewable sources of energy” on 5 December 2012, in New York, US. The draft declares the decade 2014-2024 to be the “United Nations Decade of Sustainable Energy for All” to promote
Ask McKibben Anything: Preparing For The Worst?
Andrew Sullivan The Daily Beast The rest of Bill’s videos are here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here and here.
Unions gain access to documents related to Chinese miners in BC
By The Canadian Press VANCOUVER — A Federal Court judge has granted two unions access to documents filed with the federal government to obtain temporary foreign worker permits for a mine in northern British Columbia. HD Mining’s proposed Murray River underground coal mine near Tumbler Ridge has been under scrutiny over plans to use
Nexen Cave-in: Chairman Harper’s Economic Desperation
Selling bitumen fast, while it’s still hot, is the prime minister’s myopic motivation. By Andrew Nikiforuk TheTyee.ca “I don’t think Canadians want us to sell out important Canadian values — our belief in democracy, freedom, human rights. They don’t want us to sell that out to the almighty dollar.” — Stephen Harper talking
Global warming and global civics
by Gideon Rachman ft.com The climate change talks in Doha have come to a predictably acrimonious conclusion. As well as the baffling technical, economic and scientific challenges involved, the diplomatic deadlock throws up a fascinating question of political philosophy – do the citizens of one country have responsibilities to people in other parts of the
