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Morning commuters on the Jacques-Cartier Bridge were welcomed with the first of many public pressures aimed at Prime Minister Stephen Harper by Quebec unions. 

According to the Montreal Gazette, a coalition of Quebec unions unfurled a 24 feet tall banner saying no to Harper’s upcoming changes to employment insurance announced last year. 

The unions feel these changes will be disastrous for the Quebec economy and wage-earners. They criticize the government for not properly studying the effects of the changes they proposed.

The coalition, known as La Coalition québécoise contre la réforme de l’assurance-emploi, say they represent 1.2 million Quebecers.

They plan to ramp up more pressure in the coming days. Notably, high profile Quebecers will speak out against the bill at a public event on April 4.

STORY WRITTEN BY: GREGORY WILSON

The Grand Chief of the Innu people said that his tribe will continue hunting caribou regardless of the recent ban.

According to CBC News, the Newfoundland and Labrador government prohibited animal hunting from George River for the next five years.

The Newfoundland and Labrador government feel that the ban will prevent the caribou heard from dying off altogether.

The Grand Chief replied by stating that his tribe always make careful decisions on how much caribou will be killed each year.

He also stated that they make a great effort to make sure that the supply of caribou meat is equally distributed within the tribe.

In Greece, layoffs have been ruled out with unemployment at a European record of 27 per cent, as stated in a report by the Guardian.

The country was heading for a full-on collision with its international creditors on Sunday.

Representatives of the creditors: the EU, the International Monetary Fund and the European Central Bank discussed the situation in Greece.

Finance minister Yannis Stournaras said the public sector has shrunk by seventy-five thousand people in the last year and a half.

But still, he told a newspaper there would be no layoffs.

Stournaras has now come across hostility from within the government.

Athens agreed to cut one hundred and fifty thousand jobs from its public sector by 2015. 

That’s part of a wide-ranging package of improvements for the country.

But the conservative-led administration has faced growing pressure from its leftwing junior partners.

Leader of the Democratic Left Fotis Kouvellis said that with 1.4 million Greeks now unemployed, the thought of losing even more work could threaten the already fragile social peace.

Economists are calling the situation a “great depression” as Greece is projected to see unemployment pass thirty per cent by the end of the year.

Flickr Photo by: ines saraiva

STORY WRITTEN BY: KURT WEISS

British Columbia Premier Christy Clark has issued an apology after a document was leaked explaining how the liberal party planned to win ethnic votes in the upcoming election.

According to the CBC, members of Vancouver’s Chinese and South Asian communities are calling the B.C liberal party dishonest after learning of the party’s plan to get votes from ethnic groups with their Multicultural Strategy. 

Though Clark apologized for how the document was worded, Bill Chu of the Canadian Reconciliation Society called the apology unacceptable and stated that the Multicultural Strategy was full of disrespect. 

While Clark says she does not know who drafted the document that was leaked by the NDP, the Vancouver Province newspaper claims it has proof that one of Clark’s chiefs of staff gave advice when the document was being written. 

British Columbia’s next provincial election is scheduled for May 14.