The investment dealer's story
By Aaron Wherry - Friday, July 9, 2010 - 0 Comments
To the tales of the TTC worker and the amputee and the civil liberties monitor and the reporter and the photographers, you can add the account of the investment dealer.
I spoke to one 38-year-old investment dealer who went down to have a look at what he thought was a designated protest zone at Queen’s Park. He moved too slowly when, for reasons that have yet to be properly explained, a line of riot police advanced to clear the area. Four police pushed him to the ground, cuffed him and put him in a police van. He says he spent the next 21 “dehumanizing” hours in custody, much of it in a cramped cell at Eastern Avenue. “People’s legal rights were shelved for the purpose of controlling the extent and size of the demonstrations that weekend,” he says, still shaken from the ordeal.
The Liberals seem to think Vic Toews should be the first to testify when the public safety committee commences hearings.
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Ad Hoc Parliamentary Reform of the Week
By Aaron Wherry - Tuesday, November 24, 2009 at 11:37 AM - 6 Comments
If the government won’t answer your requests in Question Period, leave.
Frustrated by Premier Dalton McGuinty’s refusal to hold public hearings on the controversial 13 per cent HST, the 25-member Progressive Conservative caucus stormed out of the Legislature’s daily question period today shortly after it began.
“You have lost touch,” Conservative Leader Tim Hudak told McGuinty before the stunt took place, accusing the Liberals of being afraid of a public backlash over the tax. ”If Premier McGuinty is going to show that level of contempt for taxpayers by forcing through the largest sales tax grab in the history of this province without any kind of public hearings . . . we see no point in proceeding with question period today.”
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These people are not actors
By Aaron Wherry - Monday, June 29, 2009 at 5:18 PM - 5 Comments
Steve Paikin convenes a half dozen newish MPs and MPPs to discuss life in politics. Theatre is the most over-used word therein.
Theatre involves actors publicly portraying characters that are, at least in theory, entirely divorced from their actual selves. Question Period involves politicians standing in public and speaking loudly. Often they may present exaggerated versions of themselves, but mostly, I would argue, they show no more than who they are. It flatters the individuals involved, diminishes the usefulness of the conflict, and excuses too much of the lesser behaviour to suggest such stuff has anything to do with Laurence Olivier.
