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babad's weekend

A different look at the news

  • Tolls: Smart or highway robbery?
  • Scenes of a new Toronto?
  • Ontario pledges action on solitary
  • Military to act on suicides
  • The B.C. farmland controversy
  • A Trump-O'Leary scene I'd love to see
  • What to watch and read this weekend
  • What to watch for in the coming days

The past week

Is Mayor John Tory’s plan to tax expressways a smart thing for Toronto, or, as my daughter joked, highway robbery?

After my colleague Jeff Gray broke the story Wednesday night, I wondered aloud at our news meeting over how many people would be aghast at the idea of paying $2 for the privilege of driving on the Don Valley Parkway or Gardiner Expressway. (For the latter, that’s like asking us to pay to pee in a scummy public bathroom.)

Certainly, some of The Globe and Mail’s online commenters were troubled. Not so my friend Marcus Gee, who calls the plan bold and smart. Benjamin Dachis of the C.D. Howe Institute also applauds the suggestion, as long as it’s done right.

Marcus argues that it’s risky to make people pay for what they now get for free, but that this city needs billions for dollars to spruce up transit, infrastructure, parks and public housing.

Marcus also suggests people might drive less, reducing congestion in a city plagued by &*#$ congestion. And, God knows, if you’ve had to wait to get on the @%*& subway, you wouldn’t mind a little money being spent.

Mr. Dachis has several points, among them that the city needs to get the price right.

Personally, I’m uneasy, but not hugely so. I appreciate the arguments in favour of the tolls, but I believe we pay taxes for the general good of society, and that includes transit and transportation.

I may not be the best judge, though, since I also think WiFi should be deemed crucial infrastructure in this day and age, and free for all.

And while we’re at it, Toronto officials should pay attention to a C.D. Howe report released this week, which warns that budgets in most of our big cities are “a mess.”

This report card by C.D. Howe’s Mr. Dachis, William Robson and Jennifer Tsao gave Toronto and Winnipeg an “F" for annual reports “that do not match their financial reports, approved weeks after their fiscal years had started.”

They weren’t talking about amounts spent, but rather what and how the public is told.

“In nearly all Canada’s larger cities, obscure financial reports – notably inconsistent presentations of key numbers in budgets and end-of-year financial reports – hamper legislators, ratepayers and voters seeking to hold their municipal governments to account,” said Ms. Tsao, Mr. Robson and Mr. Dachis.

“Simple questions like, ‘How much does your municipal government plan to spend this year?’ or ‘How much did it spend last year?’ are hard or impossible for a non-expert citizen or councilor to answer.”

The new Toronto?

Ontario studies solitary

Ontario’s Corrections Minister is pledging to act on the use of solitary confinement in provincial prisons.

Responding to the work of my colleague Patrick White, who has documented the issues surrounding such segregation and, in particular, the plight of Adam Capay, David Orazietti says he has asked Premier Kathleen Wynne for fresh spending and has sent 25 staff members across the province to investigate conditions.

Military to act

The Canadian military is also pledging to act on the mounting number of suicides among soldiers.

Lieutenant-General Christine Whitecross, the chief of military personnel, promised this week to take aggressive action, reports my colleague Renata D’Aliesio, who has spent months documenting the marked rise in deaths by suicide.

Outstanding

We’ve all heard the old joke about the farmer who’s outstanding in his field.

My friend Kathy Tomlinson has been reporting this week on builders and speculators who are outstanding in theirs.

She reports on how investors and speculators are buying prime agricultural land under outdated tax incentives, and what officials are doing about it.

A scene I'd love to see ...

Photo illustration

Your weekend

I really should start with Manchester by the Sea, but the little boy in me is screaming to tell you about Bad Santa 2.

Actually, both get pretty good movie reviews from my colleagues.

John Semley gives you the goods on Bad Santa 2, starring Billy Bob Thornton and Kathy Bates, and where things stand with Billy Bob’s Willie Stokes character a decade on.

For the grown-up in you, my friend Kate Taylor says Manchester by the Sea, starring Casey Affleck and Michelle Williams, is excellent: “Once deciphered, the film does not falter but moves only deeper into the emotional territory it charts.”

Back to kids. Or not, actually. Andrew Parker highly recommends Disney’s latest, Moana, arguing that the animated movie “is the rare empowerment fable that kids might actually feel emboldened by.”

Or you can spend the weekend bingeing on the born-again Gilmore Girls on Netflix. The Globe’s Erin Anderssen watched it with her son, and both are fans of the show. Here’s what they thought of the revival (and what she’s learned watching old shows with her modern kids).

As for documentaries, my colleague John Doyle had a sit-down with Jay Baruchel to talk about his Celtic Soul, a “deft fusion of fun and heartfelt personal discovery.”

On the fictional side of things, Durga Chew-Bose reviews Zadie Smith’s new novel Swing Time: “Reading parts aloud to myself only felt natural.”

And, of course, there’s the 104th Grey Cup, which features Calgary against Ottawa in Toronto, on Sunday night.


The week ahead

It’s a heavy few days for economic and financial reports. And, as always, God knows what Donald Trump will throw into the mix.

The Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development gets things started with its latest projections for global economies on Monday morning.

Then on Tuesday, Bank of Nova Scotia kicks off the latest round of big bank earnings results, which stretch through until Bank of Montreal finishes on Dec. 6.

Also coming are two key economic indicators for Canada: Third-quarter economic growth and jobs.

Statistics Canada reports Wednesday on how the economy fared in the third quarter, and analysts expect to see a rebound of about 3.5 per cent after the wildfire-related hit in the previous three months.

Friday brings the dueling Canadian and U.S. jobs reports, the latter being key for the markets.

Royal Bank of Canada, for one, expects the Canadian report to show the November jobless rate sticking at 7 per cent.

“We are forecasting a 20,000 decline in employment in November following 139,300 of gains over the past three months that looks overstated,” RBC said.

“That gain has been more skewed to part-time employment as full-time is up 52,000 over the past three months and still down 12,000 so far in 2016.”