In Canada pre-election campaign advertisement spending is unregulated.

I bring to your attention the well documented findings of
Corruption and democracy: Political finances - conflicts of interest - lobbying - justice (2008)

Author(s) :
Alexander Seger, Drago Kos, Alvis Vilks, Ömer Faruk Gençkaya, Manuel Villoria Mendieta, Alan Doig, Siim Kallas, Rogier Chorus, William Dinan, David Miller, Pim Albers, Nihal Jayawickrama
ISBN 978-92-871-6355-4



In Canada pre-election campaign advertisement spending is unregulated. The removal of public political financing will only lead to greater political favoritism and corruption of the public trust.

The effects of unregulated political financing is summarized on page 34. I also highly recommend reading the whole document.



At the same time, unregulated political finances carry considerable risks

- they exacerbate political inequality. The principle of "one person, one vote" is compromised by unequal influence bought through contributions. Financial contributions create an uneven playing field where big money (often coming from the corporate sector) has an undue advantage. Interested money may override equal voting rights and equal access to decision makers and elected office;

- political money may buy access to office and access to decision makers. Those in a position to contribute have a greater chance to be heard by political decision makers. And those able to finance political parties and electoral "pre-election" campaigns have bigger chance to secure places on election lists of established by political parties;

- elections may represent less a competition of political positions and ideas and more the ability of political parties and candidates to raise funds, leading to an arms or propaganda race disconnected from political debate;

- political parties and politicians risk being co-opted to represent and pursue particular interests rather than the common public interest. They are more accountable to those who pay than to their constituency. This risk is particularly great if parties rely on a small number of donors only. Parties relying on private funding may have a weaker connection to their voters and are less connected to party members. Party leaders may transform contributions into political capital to secure control over their party;

- unregulated political finances are not transparent. It is thus impossible for voters to determine whose interests politicians are representing, and to hold them accountable.

Public Party Financing and Democracy

It is time people read a few books on the subject before they mouth off. Stephen Harper is hoping people have forgotten how to read or cannot remember why Public Party Financing was introduced.

Lets start with this book

Corruption and democracy: Political finances - conflicts of interest - lobbying - justice (2008)
Author(s)

Alexander Seger, Drago Kos, Alvis Vilks, Ömer Faruk Gençkaya, Manuel Villoria Mendieta, Alan Doig, Siim Kallas, Rogier Chorus, William Dinan, David Miller, Pim Albers, Nihal Jayawickrama
ISBN 978-92-871-6355-4
Format : 16 x 24 cm
No. of pages : 220
Price : € 28 / US$ 42

This title is available in PDF.
ISBN : 978-92-871-6355-4PDF
Weight : 1364 Ko
Price : € 19 / US$ 29

Synopsis

Political corruption is an important challenge that democracies in Europe are confronted with. It contributes to the decline of citizens’ trust and confidence in democracy and weakens democratic principles and processes. Key areas of concern include:
- Political finances
- Conflicts of interest
- Lobbying
- Undue influence on the justice system.

This book contains contributions on each of these topics. They identity risks that corruption poses to the future of democracy in Europe, and they propose a wide range of measures for action which are not only aimed at preventing political corruption and enhancing transparency and accountability but also at rebuilding confidence in democracy.

http://books.google.com/books?id=yjmC0OvU0AIC&pg=PA65&lpg=PA65&dq=public+party+financing+democracy&source=bl&ots=nyTLZykQBQ&sig=jBM9Cbs-bn-7LlZNUtri8mKl7_c&hl=en&ei=QIAxTZOSKpD6sAPmxMmEBg&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=8&ved=0CE0Q6AEwBzgK#v=onepage&q=public%20party%20financing%20democracy&f=false

You can find this authoritative book on the Corruption and democracy: Political finances

http://book.coe.int/EN/ficheouvrage.php?PAGEID=36&lang=EN&produit_aliasid=2294

or borrow this book from a library
...
http://www.worldcat.org/title/corruption-and-democracy-political-finances-conflicts-of-interest-lobbying-justice/oclc/225866717&referer=brief_results

select find library

type in your city name

Need for a Monitored Independent Investigation into Toronto G20

An investigation into police tactics alone does not address the poor G20 planning, mismanagement of public funds, the security command issued orders, or directive under which those orders were issued. This monitored independent investigation is an opportunity to learn and improve so that public is served by all levels of government, police and security services.

The public's goal is to minimize government corruption and incompetence to ensure efficient usage of public resources/funds and that that government decisions making is competent and accountable. To achieve these public goals there is; the separation of power, independent selection of judiciaries and high ranking public servants, free and fair democratic elections and independent decentralized media. Incompetence is furthered by an inability to study mistakes of ourselves and others. It is through this learning process that competence is gained and errors are avoid. By definition public corruption is abuse of public office for private gain. The private gain may be a group's use of preferential access to government as means of improving their condition relative to other groups. It may be maintaining a government in power in order to enable continued preferential treatment. By its very nature corruption is secrete and requires deceit. As greater deceit is employed to hide incompetence, corruption grows unbounded unless checked.

Democracy requires an educated public with empowered votes voting in fair elections. Democracy is tool which enables empowered inclusion of those affected in collective decisions and actions. The educated public on which democracy depends requires decentralized independent media to prevent the influence of a group through preferential access to government or public. Only through both current and investigative reporting, independently reviewed can the public access the competence
and corruption of their public officials. The public does not have the resources to directly investigate government actions. Corruption is secretive, citizens are unlikely to have the knowledge they require to investigate, expose and combat corruption. Individual citizens who resist corruption face a public goods problem, no citizen has sufficient resources to investigate, expose and combat corruption. The public depends reviewed independent detail investigation of government actions required to investigate, expose and combat corruption. Successful examples of reviewed independent investigation of corruption, exposing and combating corruption include the Hong Kong Independent Commission Against Corruption combined with their independent Judiciary.

It is the public's low tolerance for corruption that ties democratic participation to controlling corruption. This is why "long exposure to democracy" predicts lower corruption. As the public's tolerance for corruption increases the tie between democratic participation and controlling corruption diminishes. Also required is a high amount of reliable information required to discern where corruption is present and empowered voting where their vote is effective for the public to exercise their intolerance for corruption an incompetence. This is why the public requires a monitored independent investigation into the G20. Governments not punished for corruption, are encouraged to increase their corruption “unjust exclusion or disempowerment” as means of retaining power. And the public has no choice, but to view any and all who stand in the way of reviewed independent investigations as supporters of corruption and also corrupt. In real terms as the tie between democratic participation and controlling corruption diminishes common people are increasingly likely to seek out increasing radical measures as burden of corruption grows.

- G20 planning. Why were the recommendations of Toronto ignored. Security at the CNE could have been obtained at a fraction of the cost? A military base which includes security could have been used with open land for demonstrations with very few targets for vandalism. Who was involved in the planning decision process and why was advice ignored to located the G20 at more easily secured location?

- G20 enormous mismanagement of public funds, A detail audit is required of the over 1.1 Billion spending.

- Confusion and high command order telling officers to stand down and not stop vandals even though they had more than sufficient manpower and equipment. Even with over 1.1 Billion in spending, individual citizens were required to take security into their own hands and take action to stop vandalism. http://www.torontosun.com/news/columnists/joe_warmington/2010/06/30/14564416.html Later police after first failed the public by their inaction during the vandalism, the police performed an unconstitutional mass arrest. Who ordered the mass arrests? Mass roundups and pre-emptive arrests have served a very unethical political purpose of deflect attention from the G20 policy decisions and legitimate concerns the peaceful public attempted to present. Who comprised the high command and from where did they receive their orders? It is unbelievable that individuals rising to this level of high command could have been so incompetent.

- Why did police deceive the public about the public works laws? Action must be taken when police do not honestly execute laws and regulations. This is police corruption.

These problems cross multiple levels of government, police and security services. Which have failed to protect and serve the Canadian public to various degrees.

This requires an independent investigation. Given that these problems cross multiple levels of government and police, I strongly suggest monitoring the independent investigation committee by international monitors who will publish at various point of the investigation, with a final full published report at the completion of the investigation. These monitors of the independent investigation committee provides a review necessary to insure complete and impartial investigation.


Therefore wise as serpents, and harmless as doves hating evil and loving good establish justice, faithful until death.

Canada falls behind from, lack of Telecommuniation Competition

VOIP via the Internet is the only phone we have. My family doesn't have a land line or a TV. Our computers are our phones, our TVs, our news papers and our library books.


My family relies exclusively on digital networks for phone service, news updates, entertainment and education. When we talk to friends and relatives over the phone our voice and video is digitized and sent over switched networks. Now even the oldest part of the telecommunication network the analog last mile has been effectively replaced by digital switch services, DSL, cable modem and wireless/cell. Analog television was discontinued this year in the United States and Canada is scheduled to end analog television in late 2011. Digital phone service can be delivered via PSTN and digital TV via ATSC. PSTN and digital TV require separately infrastructure. Where as all digital services can be delivered over the packet switch internet. As result it is cheaper for telecommunication companies to deliver phone, TV and Internet services over a single shared packet switched connection.

It is cheaper for consumers to purchase a broadband internet service and separately purchase VIOP and media services delivered over the packet switched broadband internet connection. High fidelity audio and video provided through PSTN are just another internet application with QoS guarantees. From a consumers perspective why buy broadband internet from a phone or cable company when they can be purchased for less from a local internet provider, who can purchase in bulk and deliver it via a local wireless/cell or building/block wired connection. The open competitive market place of local internet providers delivering local wireless/cell and building/block wired connections, realize a much more efficient market place with lower costs to consumers. The simple problem is billing benefits tremendously from economies of scale. In reality phone, cable and wireless companies are internet service billing companies which happened to also provide a local wireless/cell or building/block connection. Through the control of local wireless/cell or building/block provided broadband internet services phone, cable and wireless companies unfortunately vertically extended themselves into localized near monopolies. Allowing billing companies with very large economies of scale to extend themselves into localized near monopolies has resulted in limited local cellar data service competition. Lack of cellar competition has resulted in Canada having one of the highest cellar data access charges in the world. http://www.thomaspurves.com/2007/04/09/canada-worse-than-3rd-world-countries-when-it-comes-to-mobile-data-access/



There are a number of billing approaches which do not require internet service billing companies to be localized near monopolies exclusively providing local wireless/cell or building/block connection to broadband internet services.

The simplest is community internet service. An alternately is internet service billing companies charging customers for a sign on key. Which customers use to connect through anyone of number of local service providers the internet service billing company has an agreement with.

Community service works well when the majority are internet customers meet their of their internet needs from within the community area and the majority of the internet users are from the community. Community service can be used to provide store, school or city wide internet service.

The quality of wireless/cell or building/block internet services is insured through certification of local internet service providers. Certified internet service providers submit open bids to provide various types of service access in various areas. Users limiting connection to only certified internet service providers prevents a cracker providing temporary internet services gathering personal information for the purpose of identity theft. Redundancy is achieve by multiple service provider bids selected for service access in each area. Some suggested quality requirements include following spectrum usage requirements as laid out by CRTC, following Ipv4, Ipv6 service standards, meeting bandwidth and latency requirements. Local providers buy bandwidth from carrier providers and route customer bandwidth through multiple providers, in order to provide redundancy at the lowest bandwidth cost. The local providers summarize and publicly publish bandwidth consumption records. The community pays certified local providers according to the bandwidth they provided.

A limitation of community internet service is people outside the community may free load off the community internet service. This is not a problem for wifi wireless or building/block wired connections. Wifi is relatively short range. Wifi and wire connections require people outside the community to physically relocate themselves into the community in order to use the internet service. However it is easy for free loaders to abuse longer range wireless internet services such as cellar.

Community internet service cannot meet the needs of long distance mobile service and many communities may decided not to provide community internet service. In order to meet internet need where community internet service is not available, a customer buys a service sign on key from an internet service billing company. The customer would submit this key during the initial connection with a certified local cell/wireless provider. The local cell/wireless provider examines the sign on key and determines the issuing internet service billing company. If the provider has an agreement with the internet service billing company, the accepted sign on key is passed to the internet service billing company who authorizes access. The provider may have a dynamic agreement with the internet service billing company. Such agreements allow the internet service billing company to prefer lower cost providers first, enabling high cost providers after the lower cost providers are unavailable, being either full or off line. The quick rejection of the sign on key by the local provider enables the customer to quickly try multiple local providers until success.


As illustrated there are a number of billing approaches which do not require internet service billing companies to be localized near monopolies. Selling spectrum to internet service billing companies is selling them a monopoly to abuse the public and business who depend on internet services for their livelihood. http://www.neowin.net/news/main/08/07/20/canadas-wireless-spectrum-auction-is-coming-to-a-close
Instead local internet service providers should be certified to use the spectrum and competitively provided local access to customers. Separate internet service billing companies with very large economies of scale provide cost effective customer billing.

According to professor Milton Friedman, laws against monopolies cause more harm than good, but unnecessary monopolies should be countered by removing tariffs and other regulation that upholds monopolies. The internet service billing companies have unnecessary near monopoly control of local wireless internet service as result of the artificial barrier to entry created through spectrum sales.

Unique Nature of Information and Intellectual Property

My perspective regarding the economic nature and businesses needs driving the development of Information Technology.

Information is unlike traditional renewable and non-renewable resources which diminish as they are consumed and suffer from over consumption. Information does not diminish as it is consumed. Instead information grows with wider distribution and consumption. With wider distribution and consumption the growth rate of knowledge increases. Unlike traditional resources rationing information does not preserve this precious resource, but ratter as access to knowledge is reduced fewer contributors are able to pass on their precious knowledge and knowledge is lost. Knowledge and information does not stand in isolation.

Much of how our Information Technology has developed and will develop is direct result of the particular nature of information. Much has changed since the early years of mainframes, to Unix workstations, to personal computers, to web enabled technology. Accessibility and low cost distribution are the hallmarks of success. Unix workstations provided a common OS interface expanding its users and contributors. Personal computers with its common OS put computing power into the hands of the people, enabling low cost software through the massive customer base. At the same time proprietary software companies restricted access to the knowledge required to build their increasing complex computers systems. This gave advantage to the largest corporation which could assemble the largest pool of knowledge and contributors. In areas where communication and storage standards were not defined the largest corporation had ability to define proprietary formats and insure these formats were propagated through the large user base. However with the traditional proprietary model the knowledge required to understand the systems inner workings was a deeply held secrete, which met outside contribution was highly restricted. The growth and economic benefits of Information Technology has presented an increasing demanded for engineers and scientists. Deep knowledge of proprietary licensed systems is restricted, driving contributors to explore open systems with either optional sharing or mandatory sharing, BSD licenses or GPL licenses. Proprietary technology may come and go, but openly shared technology which comes out of BSD and GPL licensed solutions will remain.

Information Technology businesses require access to engineers and scientists trained in the deep inner workings of Technology on which Information Technology is based. Information Technology spans virtually all industries; industrial and mobile control, manufacturing automation, finance, distribution, sales, communications, consumer electronics and entertainment. I believe Universities of Science and Technology have an important role to play meeting the business demand for skill engineers and scientists.

Cost of Living and Late Families

In addition not only is the population of British Columbia and Canada aging, the birth rate is low. There are many factors contributing to this tread. Faced with a high cost of living and limited access to affordable multi-bedroom homes near transit, many people like myself have delayed having a family and will probably only have one child.

High cost of living also results in a higher supply chain cost, where labour is significant portion of this supply chain cost. A lower cost of living will reduce the burden of the aging population and make investment in British Columbia more attractive.

The cost of living is primarily housing, transportation and food. To reduce these cost it is important to build efficient cities which are not sprawling over a large area. Sprawling cities are the often the result of insufficient and inefficient redevelopment. Sprawling cities have very high personal transportation cost and semi-ironically very high housing cost when living within a reasonable commuting
distance/time. It is very important that expensive urban transit is not under utilized. In order to utilize urban transit it is important that the area around transit stations, which may be train/subway stations or bus terminals is redevelopment in a timely manner. Property value taxes do not accurately reflect the social value of land. High value land enjoying access to social transit services are
under valued. As a result people sit on this land preventing redevelopment. Traditionally property owners near transit stations hold on to their land in order to capture the increased land value which results from being near a transit station. The traditional practice slows redevelopment near transit, and result in a slower
property value appreciation which does not reflect the much high land value. Many more people would have an opportunity to enjoy access to transit if land near transit stations was more effectively redeveloped.

Near transit stations land value not property value should be taxed. Land near transit stations have an increase economic value of economical efficient transportation and should be taxed according. Land near a transit station has access a much higher transportation density. Height restrictions near transit are senseless. Green space regulations however do make sense.

For example land within walking distance to transit station should be taxed at assumed building hight of 10 stories. Of course public green space within this vivacity should not be taxed because of is significant social value to the community.

As the land value tax is phased in over a reasonable time frame of 5yrs, many land owners will redevelop the land as higher density. However not all transit stations are equally attractive for redevelopment. Taking this into consideration an urban development corporation should be formed to purchase property near transit
stations at the present market value + market real estate appreciated value. Failing this many land owners of low density property near transit stations would not have an opportunity to sell their property before incurring a significantly higher tax charge. And they would be rightly hostile and against converting from a property value tax to a land value tax. The land acquired by the urban development corporation
can be build into high density property.

To increase availability of multi-bedroom homes near transit, I believe it is a good idea for the urban development corporation to build much of the high density property with finished exteriors and unfinished interiors. Many stores and office buildings are already built this way. The unfinished interiors will allow first time home owners to buy a larger home and as a result start a family sooner. Young people are a very mobile work force and will often change jobs in order to advance their career. The transit access will enable many of them a ability to change jobs without needing to relocate themselves. With less disruption of their social network and access to schools there should be less pressure to delay having a family.

Fair and Free Canadian Elections

We have a responsibility to hold those who violate free and fair elections accountable.

Remaining in power those who violated a fair and free election will seek to influence opinion, and may succeed in decriminalize or otherwise avoiding justice due.

This means ALL PARTIES must vote their non-confidence of the government at the next voting opportunity. This non-confidence of the government must be shown regardless of a party's desire for the particular vote at hand. Efforts to ensure election freedom and fairness must over rule all other concerns. As Loyal Opposition Parties you hold the responsibility to vote your non-confidence, before those violating a free and fair election is able to intimidate investigators.


As a professional I took an oath of service. In a similar light I believe every elected member of government took a similar if not greater oath of service. When faced with difficulty I remember my oaths and stand up.