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OTTAWA — I was out on the Ottawa River last week, and couldn’t help but think I was in a tourism video for Canada’s waterways.The sun cast an orangey-pink glow on the glistening water as our boat, with a wakeboarder in tow, sped past dozens of sailboats gliding in the light breeze.
I also had the occasion to appreciate our abundance of water when repairs to some infrastructure led certain parts of Ottawa to be placed under a water conservation advisory for a day or two.
With all the water stories in my own world, it was perhaps fitting for my email inbox to be flooded (pun intended) with polls about water.
According to Nanos Research, 61.6 per cent of Canadians believe water is our most important natural resource.
Another poll, this one done by Probe Research for the Frontier Centre, found Manitobans are pretty much split down the middle about the idea of bulk water exports. It found 46 per cent of Manitobans are in favour of bulk exports to the United States and 45 per cent are opposed.
It was an interesting finding, considering in the Nanos poll, western Canadians were the most likely of any to say Canada should ban bulk water exports. More than one in four westerners (27.4 per cent) want it outlawed, compared with 20.2 per cent of Canadians overall. In both Ontario and Quebec, less than one in five people think it should be outlawed.
The Nanos poll found, however, almost 30 per cent of Canadians said developing a national water strategy is their No. 1 choice for what Canada should do to protect this valuable resource.
The Conservatives promised a national water strategy two years ago but have apparently been distracted by inconvenient crises such as the recession, a medical isotopes shortage and a global flu pandemic.
Let’s hope we don’t have to watch a major waterway run dry before we see a national water strategy.
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ALMOST every Canadian has bellyached about our health care system at some point. But when outsiders attack it, beware.
Last winter when some U.S. doctors suggested actress Natasha Richardson may have died because our health care system isn’t good enough, everyone I know bristled in defence.
Now, Manitoba NDP MP Judy Wasylycia-Leis wants the Conservative government to fight back against paid advertisements currently running on U.S. television channels and the Internet, knocking Canada’s health care as low-quality and suggesting our system is unpopular here.
She wrote to Health Minister Leona Agglukaq last week, telling her Ottawa should either appear before legislative bodies in the U.S. or even take out its own ads to counter the ads.
“I urge you to act quickly before these negative, fundamentally anti-Canadian messages gain a stronger foothold in the American public consciousness and unduly influence decisions not only about health care but about tourism, investment and other considerations,” she wrote.
The U.S. ads are part of a campaign designed to create a backlash against President Barack Obama’s health care reforms.
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WINNIPEG MP Steven Fletcher proved last week even well-known people get excited when they meet other well-known people.
Fletcher — who has his own fame from his political job and the fact he is the first quadriplegic to be elected to Canada’s Parliament — was at an event at the National Arts Centre July 7 as part of the festivities for the Canadian visit of Japanese Emperor Akihito and Empress Michiko.
When the emperor finished with his official protocol line, he spotted Fletcher in his wheelchair and went over to him.
“He put his hand on my hand,” said Fletcher, who was still excited about the moment two days later. “He asked how I operated the wheelchair.”
He also asked how Fletcher became a quadriplegic.
“It may have been two minutes long,” Fletcher said of the encounter.
“I never met an emperor before.”
mia.rabson@freepress.mb.ca