Premier King My interest in the recent PEI election, I will admit, was largely confined to the referendum on moving from a first-past-the-post electoral system to a mixed-member-proportional (MMP) system, which islanders ultimately chose not to do. The success of the Green Party on election night also piqued my interestRead More

You would have to be completely foolhardy to question the brain trust that has formed to support spending public money to build an airport in Inverness but foolhardy’s my middle name so — hold my beer. The group — consisting of former premiers, businesspeople, consultants and Mary Tulle — hasRead More

Editor’s Note: Given that the mayor of our municipality has spent much of his time in office — and thousands of public dollars — promoting a Port of Sydney container terminal, the Spectator feels all Nova Scotia port news is of interest to its readers. So when Halifax-based reporter RickRead More

Editor’s Note: This is the second in a series of articles about the conclusions of Canada’s Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls (MMIWG) inquiry. You can read the first one here.)   Why does the MMIWG inquiry declare a “Canadian genocide”? Why raise such a storm of controversy overRead More

Believe it or not, summer is officially here and tourists, as well as former residents of our fair city, will be coming to Cape Breton. The latter group, especially if they grew up in the North End of Sydney, will definitely drive or walk around their old neighborhood during theirRead More

Complex systems Former Nova Scotia health minister Maureen MacDonald took to Facebook this week to express frustration with some of the recent criticism she’s seen leveled at the province’s healthcare system. She took particular issue with a speech given at a healthcare rally in Halifax by Paula Minnikin, a formerRead More

Note: On Friday June 21 I received a revised version of the travel expenses and have updated the totals accordingly — I have also attached the revised travel sheet at the end of the article. In the five months after losing his bid to become leader of the provincial ProgressiveRead More

The CBRM has posted its audited financials from fiscal year 2007-2008 to fiscal year 2017-2018 on the municipal website. From 2010-2011 on, they include travel expenses for elected officials and senior CBRM staff members. I wanted to compare Mayor Cecil Clarke’s travel expenses to those of his predecessor, Mayor JohnRead More

It took me well over the advertised 30 days and cost me $510 but last Friday I finally received the travel and expense data I had requested from the CBRM on 11 April 2019. My exact request was travel and expense data for Mayor Cecil Clarke, his executive assistant MarkRead More

I was listening to an interview with businessman Andrew Yang, one of the many Democratic presidential candidates in the US, during which he listed the jobs he felt were most vulnerable to automation in the near future (it was part the case he was making for a basic annual income).Read More