• Black Nova Scotia
  • Economy
  • Education
  • Environment
  • Health
    • COVID
  • Investigation
  • Journalism
  • Labour
  • Policing
  • Politics
    • City Hall
    • Elections
    • Province House
  • Profiles
  • Transit
  • Women
  • Morning File
  • Commentary
  • PRICED OUT
  • @Tim_Bousquet
  • Log In

Halifax Examiner

An independent, adversarial news site in Halifax, NS

  • Home
  • About
    • Terms and Conditions
    • Commenting policy
  • Archives
  • Contact us
  • Subscribe
    • Gift Subscriptions
  • Donate
  • Swag
  • Receipts
  • Manage your account: update card / change level / cancel

Worse than Russia: Access to information in Nova Scotia places 66th in world rankings

One expert says the FOIPOP Act needs improvements, but that isn't all: "We need an attitude change within the public sector, in which people would see themselves as servants of the people, working for the people, and being open and transparent with the people."

September 24, 2021 By Joan Baxter Leave a Comment

This, the second of a two-part series about the state of the public’s “right to know” in Nova Scotia, looks at what options are available to those dissatisfied with a Freedom of Information (FOIPOP) result, and how the province’s access to information ranks internationally — spoiler alert: rather poorly — and what should be done […]

Filed Under: Featured Tagged With: access to information, Access to Information and Privacy (ATIP), Arilea Sill, Brad Johns, Centre for Law and Democracy, FOIPOP, Freedom of Information, Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy, Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Act, French River watershed, Information Access and Privacy (IAP), Information and Privacy Commissioner, Michelle Boudreau, Municipality of the County of Colchester, Nova Scotia Environment and Climate Change, Office of the Information and Privacy Commissioner (OIPC), public interest, redactions, Right to Information, Right to Know, Right to Know Week, Supreme Court of Canada, Tim Halman, Tim Houston, Toby Mendel, Tracy Barron, Yarmouth ferry

Iain Rankin says he’s listened and learned. Now it’s time to lead

On Tuesday, Rankin will get his first chance as premier to make his first lasting impression on Nova Scotians. What will he say? What should he say?

February 21, 2021 By Stephen Kimber

After Nova Scotia Lieutenant-Governor Arthur LeBlanc performs his ceremonial and socially distanced laying on of hands at the Halifax Convention Centre on Tuesday morning — instantly transforming Iain Rankin, the twice-elected MLA for Timberlea-Prospect, into Iain Rankin, the suddenly unelected premier of all he surveys — our 29th premier will get a first chance to...

This content is for subscribers only.
Log In Subscribe

Filed Under: Commentary, Featured, Province House, Subscribers only Tagged With: Premier Iain Rankin, Stephen McNeil, Yarmouth ferry

When is a management fee a profit margin, and does calling it either make it any less a boondoggle?

Lawyers for Bay Ferries and the provincial government were in court last week arguing we should not be allowed to know how much the province is paying Bay Ferries not to operate a ferry between Yarmouth and Maine. Only in Nova Scotia, you say.

November 15, 2020 By Stephen Kimber

On Thursday, lawyers for the McNeil government and Bay Ferries Limited appeared before Nova Scotia Supreme Court Justice Richard Coughlan to dissect the deliberative differences between a “management fee” and a “profit margin,” and to make clear that, in either case, neither is any of our business. The subject before the bar is a secret...

This content is for subscribers only.
Log In Subscribe

Filed Under: Commentary, Featured, Province House, Subscribers only Tagged With: Bay Ferries CEO Mark MacDonald, Stephen MvNeil, Yarmouth ferry

Lloyd’s Ferry Fairy Tales, Spring 2020 edition

Instead of waiting for the inevitable end to a ferry season that will never begin, why doesn't the government simply stop pretending, cancel its subsidy to Bay Ferries and redistribute those millions to local tourist operators who really need help? And then begin contemplating a different, more sustainable, less uncertain future for rural Nova Scotia.

May 17, 2020 By Stephen Kimber

My. Oh my. Really? You don’t say. Lloyd? Again? Still. Do tell. No, wait, please don’t… Last Thursday, for the first time since the provincial government declared us all in a state of suspended animation in March, our politicians came back out to play with reporters — at a politically safe distance, of course. After...

This content is for subscribers only.
Log In Subscribe

Filed Under: Commentary, Featured, Province House, Subscribers only Tagged With: COVID-19, Lloyd Hines, Yarmouth ferry

Is ‘Idle Some More’ back for another season?

It's the end of February, so it must be time for Bay Ferries to announce the start of this year's summer sailing season between Yarmouth and Bar Harbor. And for the rest of us to ask if it will really happen this year.

February 23, 2020 By Stephen Kimber

Shall we begin a new round of our favourite game show, “Idle Some More: 2020 Edition.” On Friday, Bay Ferries pinned the tail on June 26 as the official start-up date for this year’s summer ferry service between Yarmouth, NS, and Bar Harbor, ME. Well… not definitively pinned. That’s just its “planned” start-up date. If...

This content is for subscribers only.
Log In Subscribe

Filed Under: Commentary, Featured, Province House, Subscribers only Tagged With: Bay Ferries, Yarmouth ferry

‘Tis the season to say something positive

I had been hoping to say something positive about Stephen McNeil’s government — it is, after all, the season — but as soon as I could consider it, his government inevitably did one more something that was so bone-headed, so egregious, so cringe-worthy, I couldn’t help but revert to my natural nattering-nabob-of-negativism self. And yet...

December 15, 2019 By Stephen Kimber

I had been hoping to say something positive about Stephen McNeil’s government — it is, after all, the season of speaking positively — but as soon as I began to put electronic keyboard to computer-screen praise, his government inevitably did one more something that was so bone-headed, so egregious, so cringe-worthy, I couldn’t help but...

This content is for subscribers only.
Log In Subscribe

Filed Under: Commentary, Featured, Province House, Subscribers only Tagged With: Auditor General Michael Pickup, Emergency Health Services, P3 hospital, Premier Stephen McNeil, Yarmouth ferry

A non-existent service is Nova Scotia’s top attraction

Morning File, Wednesday, December 4, 2019

December 4, 2019 By Philip Moscovitch 9 Comments

News 1. Cassidy Bernard’s ex-boyfriend arrested for her murder Yesterday, RCMP announced second-degree murder charges against 20-year-old Austin Isadore. He is accused of killing Bernard last year. Isadore was her ex-boyfriend and is the father of Bernard’s twin daughters. An unbylined CBC story says: Janey Michael, who is president of the We’koqma’q Native Women’s Association, said she’s […]

Filed Under: Featured Tagged With: Andrew Rankin, Austin Isadore, bicycle tourism, Cassidy Bernard, Cat ferry service, Chris Surette, Christopher Garnier appeal, cycling tourism, development, Elizabeth McSheffrey, Erynn Ahern, fishermen's strike, helen Craig, Homer Stevens, Janey Michael, Jim Haggerty, Judy Saunders, land-use regulations, Mark Scott, Mayann Francis, Nova Scotia Human Rights Commission, Patsy MacKay, Robert Devet, Roger Burrill, Sea King Drive development, Sharon Davis-Murdoch, Silver Donald Cameron, The Education of Everett Richardson: The story of the Nova Scotia fishermen's strike 1970-71, unionism, William Craig, Yarmouth ferry, zoning laws

Northern Pulp owes the province $85 million

Morning File, Monday, November 18, 2019

November 18, 2019 By Tim Bousquet 5 Comments

Philip Moscovitch told me yesterday that I buried the lede when I announced a couple of weeks ago that I’ve been hired by the CBC to write and host a podcast series about the wrongful conviction of Glen Assoun. So here it is right in the lead (let the lede v lead wars begin): I’ve […]

Filed Under: Featured Tagged With: Africville, Alakai, Bay Ferries, Becky Pritchard, Captain Skip Strong, Eddie Carvery, Elizabeth Chiu, Emma Smith, Glen Assoun podcast, North Atlantic landslides, Northern Pulp loans, Paul Merrill, Yarmouth ferry

The curtain falls on this year’s ferry follies… but there’s always next year

Transportation Minister Lloyd Hines had to sort-of admit his ferry universe hadn’t unfolded exactly as planned, or… well, at all. “We're really disappointed on behalf of the operators that we haven't been able to mount a season…” On behalf of the operators?! The operators are making out like bandits. What about the rest of us?

October 13, 2019 By Stephen Kimber

So it’s finally, Thanksgiving-ly, over. For now. We hope. But don’t hold your breath. And do hold on to your wallet. Tightly. “There will not be any commercial crossings in 2019,” Mark MacDonald, the CEO of Bay Ferries, emailed a CBC reporter Friday in response to his question about whether the Yarmouth-Bar Harbor ferry would...

This content is for subscribers only.
Log In Subscribe

Filed Under: Commentary, Featured, Province House, Subscribers only Tagged With: Transportation Minister Lloyd Hines, Yarmouth ferry

If we build it, will they come?

The stadium that refuses to die has returned. Last week, HRM released most of its private sector proposer's pitch for public sector funding to make its dream of a CFL team reality. But it's worth asking ourselves: what else could/should we spend that $180 million over the next 30 years on?

September 29, 2019 By Stephen Kimber

“Premier Stephen McNeil reiterated Thursday that no money from general revenue will go toward a stadium.” Uh-oh. Not “uh-oh” that our premier told the Chronicle Herald he didn’t intend to pluck any money out of our general revenue and dump it into the latest $110-million stadium-in-the-sky scheme, but “uh-oh” that he qualified his no with...

This content is for subscribers only.
Log In Subscribe

Filed Under: City Hall, Commentary, Featured, Province House, Subscribers only Tagged With: CFL stadium proposal, Convention centre, Stephen McNeil, Yarmouth ferry

  • 1
  • 2
  • 3
  • …
  • 6
  • Next Page »

PRICED OUT

A collage of various housing options in HRM, including co-ops, apartment buildings, shelters, and tents
PRICED OUT is the Examiner’s investigative reporting project focused on the housing crisis.

You can learn about the project, including how we’re asking readers to direct our reporting, our published articles, and what we’re working on, on the PRICED OUT homepage.

2020 mass murders

Nine images illustrating the locations, maps, and memorials of the mass shootings

All of the Halifax Examiner’s reporting on the mass murders of April 18/19, 2020, and recent articles on the Mass Casualty Commission and newly-released documents.

Updated regularly.

Uncover: Dead Wrong

In 1995, Brenda Way was brutally murdered behind a Dartmouth apartment building. In 1999, Glen Assoun was found guilty of the murder. He served 17 years in prison, but steadfastly maintained his innocence. In 2019, Glen Assoun was fully exonerated.

Halifax Examiner founder and investigative journalist Tim Bousquet has followed the story of Glen Assoun's wrongful conviction for over five years. Now, Bousquet tells that story as host of Season 7 of the CBC podcast series Uncover: Dead Wrong.

Click here to go to listen to the podcast, or search for CBC Uncover on Apple podcasts, Spotify, or any other podcast aggregator.

The Tideline, with Tara Thorne

Two young white women, one with dark hair and one blonde, smile at the camera on a sunny spring day.

Episode 79 of The Tideline, with Tara Thorne, is published.

Grace McNutt and Linnea Swinimer are the Minute Women, two Haligonians who host a podcast of the same name about Canadian history as seen through a lens of Heritage Minutes (minutewomenpodcast.ca). In a lively celebration of the show’s second birthday, they stop by to reveal how curling brought them together in podcast — and now BFF — form, their favourite Minutes, that time they thought Jean Chretien was dead, and the impact their show has had. Plus music from brand-new ECMA winners Hillsburn and Zamani.

Listen to the episode here.

Check out some of the past episodes here.

Subscribe to the podcast to get episodes automatically downloaded to your device — there’s a great instructional article here. Email Suzanne for help.

You can reach Tara here.

Sign up for email notification

Sign up to receive email notification when we publish new Morning Files and Weekend Files. Note: signing up for this email is NOT the same as subscribing to the Halifax Examiner. To subscribe, click here.

Recent posts

  • Halifax chief administrative officer Jacques Dubé resigns May 18, 2022
  • Pastel QAnon: How extremist groups recruit women May 18, 2022
  • Union leader pleads for better wages for paramedics May 18, 2022
  • Halifax council round-up: Reprieve for Rankin, development study next to Blue Mountain-Birch Cove Lakes, and more May 18, 2022
  • Halifax council hikes taxi fares 16% May 17, 2022

Commenting policy

All comments on the Halifax Examiner are subject to our commenting policy. You can view our commenting policy here.

Copyright © 2022