A Closer Look: Jody Paterson

I'm sharing my blog space today with a Victoria man who is justifiably frustrated with the system in B.C. for people with developmental disabilities, and wonders why Premier Christy Clark's promises to put "families first" doesn't seem to apply to his family:  By Ian McInnes Families First, a political concept that resonates well if you have 2.3 children, are a member of the middle class and live in urban BC  In fact, it is rather easy to put Families First as a member of these strata of our society; you have the financial strength, community support, and educational opportunities to do just that.  And if you vote Liberal you not only get government support but receive a pat on the back from your premier saying “keep up the good work” we’ve got your back.  But if you have a family unit that includes a member with a developmental disability, it is impossible to put family first.  The reality is the family member with the disability comes first a...

Great news from Turn off the Blue Light , the anti-criminalization campaign in Ireland launched by sex workers and supporters. Google has changed its mind on prohibiting the group from buying an AdWord, one of those little paid links you see at the top of some Google searches. I mean, it's a pretty small victory in the grand scheme of things, but what the heck. Take the wins wherever they come, especially when the issue is sex work. You just don't see many wins if that's your cause. The power of social media and electronic distribution lists were certainly obvious to me after I wrote a column on this subject (it'll be the June 24 blog post below this one) and then used Facebook and two sex-work-friendly researcher-based distribution lists to get the word out as far as possible. I've now got new "friends" in Bangladesh and Thailand as a result. Of course, none of this is to suggest that my Victoria column was the reason Google changed its mind, prompt an...

An inquiry into murdered sex workers, without any sex workers taking part in the proceedings - how well do you think that's going to work? This story from the Globe has a comment from the Attorney General's ministry that would be amusing if it weren't so tragic. In defence of the government's refusal to cover legal costs at the Pickton inquiry for groups representing the interests of aboriginals and women, the government lawyer suggests his team could assume the interests of aboriginals and women for the purposes of questioning witnesses. Yeah, that'll work. A bunch of largely white, largely male privileged people with law degrees, reimagining themselves as impoverished aboriginal women working the Downtown Eastside stroll. I get that it's painful for government to pay the legal bills of all the groups that Pickton inquiry chief Wally Oppal has said need to be heard at the inquiry. But it's completely unacceptable to deny legal support for virtually every...

Google decision snuffs out human-rights ad for sex workers Everybody’s got an opinion on the sex industry. But when you’re Google, what you think really matters. So when Google yanks the online ads of a small group of Dublin sex workers trying to talk about human rights for people in the industry, it’s a big statement. I’m going to have to rethink everything I thought I knew about Google. Ten escorts launched “Turn Off the Blue Light” earlier this year, responding to a major campaign in Ireland right now to outlaw the last legal vestiges of prostitution. The anti-prostitution campaign is called “Turn off the Red Light.” The escorts picked their name as an allusion to the blue lights on Ireland’s police cars, and the impact of criminalization. Ireland’s prostitution laws are essentially the same as Canada’s. The sale of sex is legal, but everything else to do with the industry is a crime. As in Canada, that has led to a thriving industry that operates almost completely in the shadow...

Here's an idea: Pull together a panel of average citizens and ask THEM to take a look at health care and what they think needs to be done. The Globe's Andre Picard summarizes here what the group of 28 Ontarians recommended as part of the Citizens' Reference Panel on Health Services. If you like your information full-on, read the full report here . It's 44 pages, but there's also a one-page summary.  Nothing world-shaking in the panel's findings, but that's the point. It doesn't take shiny new equipment, expensive new drugs and an influx of even more health-care professionals to fix much of what ails the "health" system - it just takes common sense and policy-makers brave enough to get beyond the individual interests of the big players. Note the recommendation to end the fee-for-service pay system for doctors. Yes, please - the incentives are all wrong in that system, resulting in high costs to taxpayers with no assurances that all that spend...

I can feel for governments on issues like health spending, which has no top limit to its growth. As long as there are people desperate to stay alive and clever entrepreneurs eager to capitalize on that, no amount of money will ever be “enough.” So yes, let’s have a heart for the plight of government in trying to manage that challenging issue. But that’s no excuse for why they’re not better at managing other costs that are far more predictable year over year. The crazy stuff going on right now for people with developmental disabilities in B.C. is a fitting example. Yes, there are cost pressures on that front, too: double-digit growth in autism diagnoses in Canada; expanded services on reduced budgets; more private-sector interests finding ways to turn a profit in the delivery of social services. But allowing for all of that, the big costs for a funding body like Community Living B.C. still ought to be relatively predictable over the long term. When it comes to a lifetime cond...

*Note: Here's further news coverage from October  after Rick Mowles was fired, and another follow from Nov. 4 detailing Mowles' $345,000 severance package While browsing the Community Living BC Web site for information about cuts to services, I found myself comparing compensation paid to CLBC executives since the Crown corporation was started in 2005-2006. Very, very interesting. CEO Rick Mowles has seen a 59 per cent increase in his annual compensation over the four fiscal years from 2005-06 to 2009-10, pushing him to almost $231,000. Doug Woollard, vice-president of operations and the man most often mentioned in stories about more service cuts at CLBC, has seen his compensation climb 57 per cent in that same period, to almost $176,000. Wow. Meanwhile, the money for contracted services for people with developmental disabilities - the raison d'etre of CLBC - fell $5 million in the 2009-10 fiscal year compared to the previous year. (Can't do comparisons back to 2...

Nice to have the Ontario Appeal Court calling prosecutors on their guff about the constitutional rights of sex workers in the landmark case that's before the courts right now. The judges cut through the blah-blah-blah and just got down to the bare facts - that Canadian laws around prostitution aren't just shutting sex workers out from constitutional protection, but are actively making the work much more dangerous than it needs to be. With two sex-work-related court cases progressing toward the Supreme Court of Canada right now, those of us who support the decriminalization of the adult, consensual sex industry are feeling stirrings of hope. However, I'm a little fearful that the federal government's response to a pro-decriminalization court ruling could be to declare sex work illegal, which will improve nothing and possibly make the situation even worse for workers.

If anyone's still wondering whether things are going well in the psychiatric facilities here in Victoria, this ought to set them straight. Terrific TC opinion piece from a psych-ward survivor, who writes in my favourite style: Straight-up.

Great column from the Vancouver Sun's Craig McInnes , who raises some very good points about where we put our priorities for spending. What's going to do us the most good in the long run - a fair tax system that ensures our children are educated and our civic needs are tended to for generations to come, or a flat-screen TV for the  living room?

Gotta love t he young page who seized a moment and pointed her protest sign toward the cameras in the House of Commons during the Throne Speech. She lost a job but is obviously creating quite a following. Whether she was an infiltrator from the start or truly was moved to action by her growing understanding of the Harper government's agenda - her assertion - Brigette DePape's protest was a bold thing to do. She'll feel the repercussions, good and bad, for a lifetime. How many of us would be brave enough to take such an action, no matter how passionately we might think we feel? Interesting letters in the Times Colonist this morning present the two polarities of viewpoints: A big hurrah from people who think like me, which is also to say they probably don't like Stephen Harper either; and a thumbs-down from those who think DePape's act shames Canadian legislative custom. (Sorry, I couldn't seem to find the letters on the TC Web site, but will keep working at th...

So we’ve got an inquiry into a B.C. mass murder headed up by a man tainted by his political connections, presiding over a process that shuts out almost everyone on the side of the victims. Yup, that sounds like a solid way to get at the truth about the Robert Pickton case. Only sex workers could draw straws this short. Then again, only sex workers would be left to go missing and murdered on our streets for so long in the first place. It’s baffling and heartbreaking, this misery we sustain in the name of “morality.” Should we be surprised, then, that the B.C. government has refused to cover legal costs for groups representing the interests of sex workers at the upcoming Robert Pickton inquiry? It’s a more blatant rejection than I’d have expected from a new premier, sure. But isolated howls of protest aside, the government likely knows it’s politically safe to stick it to groups acting in the interests of sex workers. More than a decade of dead and missing women in the...