- It's almost a given that living in a great international city (Hong Kong, New York, Toronto, Sydney, Dubai, etc) will be very expensive. Almost, but not quite; Paris has managed to remain remarkably affordable. The secret - government investment in housing. Around 25% of the city's residents live in public housing. Of course, you also need to take action against people who fraudulently represent themselves as being entitled to subsidized housing, like a bunch of folks in Victoria seem to have done.
- An analysis by the US National Institute of Health of "Havana syndrome", the mysterious illness that affected American and Canadian diplomats in Havana and other capitals has found no evidence of anything physically wrong with the afflicted people. This lends a fair bit of support to the mass hysteria theory, though as a caveat it's worth noting that some neurological conditions (most famously chronic traumatic encephalopathy) are only detectable in an autopsy.
- Winnipeg Transit's community safety team are getting good reviews from bus drivers and passengers so far. The Winnipeg Police union, though, shows no sign of withdrawing the grievance they filed about the team in January; in fact, I suspect the success of the team in showing how problem passengers can be apprehended without shooting them is probably adding to their displeasure.
- The Kinew government has introduced a bill to prohibit the use of strikebreakers in legal strikes and lockouts, as well as to make it easier to join a union. Predictably, the Tories are doing their utmost to delay the bill's passage.
- The American Bullfrog is native to eastern North America but is an invasive species in the west, including in California. People keep importing them for food; a proposed ban on further importation is causing concern by some that it is culturally insensitive to those who eat them.
- BC is warning its residents to be prepared for a "prolonged wildfire season" this year.
- Europe is banning imports related to deforestation starting next year. This includes a ban on products such as palm oil that originates on land that was deforested after 2020. Malaysian and Indonesian officials are fulminating about what they call "regulatory imperialism". No doubt there's an element of injustice here given that once again it's developing countries having to pay the price for damage that until recently has mostly been done by rich countries, but the obvious counterargument is that deforestation isn't going to bring justice to those countries anyway - quite the opposite.
- The scientist who was fired from the National Microbiology Lab in 2021 has been located in China.
- A Winnipeg attorney has been suspended for "conduct unbecoming a lawyer" after she was convicted of impaired driving and assault with a weapon after ramming another vehicle in a road rage episode.
