Today Will Be My First Time at UTSC Since McGuinty Tried to Have Me Arrested for Protesting; This Time I Will Be Delivering a Guest Lecture
This time it’s to give a guest lecture to an Environmental Science class on the Environmental Assessment process. I am going to explore the flaws with environmental planning in Ontario, the process and the negative impact this has on democracy, the environment and project planning. These are essentially the beliefs I was fighting for when I organized a protest to meet Dalton McGuinty on his first visit to Scarborough since coming out swinging against residents when he announced a law to take our rights away.
We were fighting to participate in a fair and open process when we lost the rights to participate at all. The Green Energy Act also removed the requirement for an environmental assessment for renewable energy projects; in addition to denying local municipalities the right to issue building permits for projects or develop local planning controls of renewable energy projects, the roads, transmission lines and other infrastructure pieces they impact.
What you will notice is opposition has strengthened since the Premier tried to legislate our rights away, and in Scarborough we’re stronger now than before he tried to have me arrested for planning a protest against his undemocratic, donor written attack on democracy. голова болит секс
There are consequences to denying citizen participation, ending environmental protection, outlawing local planning and gutting oversight. These are topics I have discussed publicly and privately since February and I am honoured to have the opportunity to deliver a guest lecture to an upper year Environmental Science class on these themes, especially on a campus where these views had me threatened with arrest less than two months ago.
The fact that I’ve been invited to deliver a lecture on this demonstrates there is a willingness within the academic community to understand the process failures that exist.
I’ve spoken to high school students about active citizenship, the need to participate in decision making and stand up for the things you believe in. Recently I’ve participated in thesis work by two Masters students exploring the cause of opposition to Toronto Hydro’s proposal, and another who was exploring the impacts of the Green Energy Act on planning, assessments and participation. It is clear this is an issue that isn’t going away, and one that I am proud to be continuing to push along.
Tags: Dalton McGuinty, Environmental Assessment, Guest Lecture, Save the Toronto Bluffs, Toronto Hydro, Toronto Hydro Energy Services, UTSC
October 6th, 2009 at 10:21 am
Way to go, John!! This issue is NOT going away. The angry people and newly formed groups are coming forward in droves now.
October 6th, 2009 at 5:21 pm
John:
Will be most interested to hear about the the welcome you receive and how the students listen tou your point of view. Generally speaking, I would suspect that students will be in complete favour of “Green Energy”, but do they favour “Green Energy” at any cost as seems to be the current Provincial Government’s position?
October 19th, 2009 at 9:17 pm
Tell McGuinty and his Liberal MPP lapdogs…this is a democracy and not a liberal dictatorship. What do you expect from idiot lawyers……promoting big corporate profit agendas ..at the expense of taxpayers….their health, the environment…Ontario laws etc etc etc