Absolutely. It would be interesting to know what information was in this database. It doesn't make sense that it was just a list of people. Did it include known connections? Other medical information? Travel history? And why/how was it being used?
Giving the user clear feedback about where they are in a page and how to modify their location should not "increase cognitive noise". It should in fact offload cognitive load from the user onto the interface leaving more room, so to speak, for the user to use for themselves.
The number of immigrants admitted to Canada per year is very stable and only slowing rising. On average it has been between 200-300 thousand per year for at least the past 20 years. This is not the driving force of lack of housing, and is a driving force of a stronger economy with the introduction of skilled labour.
I can't see how immigration can be considered to have no impact on available housing. People have to live somewhere and if there were fewer immigrants, there would be more housing stock for non-immigrants — unless you believe that immigration causes houses.
It's perfectly possible for immigration to be a net positive for the economy and for it to have negative affects on the availability of housing.
There are approximately 14,072,080 occupied private dwellings in Canada. The rental of 31,000 of them on AirBNB is unlikely to be a significant factor in the housing shortage.
As the article states, 31,000 is 1.5 percent of rental accommodation. If we assume that half of the 300,000 immigrants rent, and that they tend to rent in couples, that's 75,000 rental properties consumed by immigration each year -- or about 3.5 percent. That's an additional 3.5 percent of rental housing stock each year, a much faster increase than the number of AirBNB rentals.
Regardless of whether you think immigration or AirBNB are major causes of a housing shortage, it's disingenuous to argue that immigration has less of an impact than AirBNB.
EDIT: It's also worth noting that construction is expected to slow over the next five years, whereas immigration is expected to grow.
A great deal of our forests are not "natural forests" anymore, and are mono-cultures that may be even more susceptible to issues of climate change (forest fire, pine beetle, ...). Managed (young) forests also hold less carbon than mature forests.
What I've been hearing is that one of the problems with Canada's "managed" forests is the reduction (in BC, at least) of deciduous trees which apparently can act as firebreaks [1]. BC (and the pacific northwest in general) has seen a steady increase in the length and damage caused by the fire season. It is April and we are already battling large fires in the province.
Providing money to attend this kind of program is awesome, but there are many people who, despite having expenses paid, still could not afford to take advantage of this kind of program. The more financially stable you are, the more likely you would be able to drop your life for x weeks to take advantage of this kind of program.
Its not that what she is doing is "helping rich people more", but it will still favour them.
Since this is parental leave we're discussing, would you make the same judgements when considering hiring a young man and only hire contractors that don't get the protection of labour laws?
