This Matters

Guest: Kate Allen, climate change reporter

Fresh air, trees, grass on bare feet. The sound of birds while playing on a playground. Leisurely swinging in the shadow of a tree. Many of us have childhood memories outside in parks and forests, and research shows this time is key to our physical, mental and social well-being and development. So what about the children being raised in urban centres like Toronto, where green space has shrunk significantly over the past two decades as the region faces pressure to build housing and city reports warn that the amount of parkland per person risks falling further. As part of the Star’s “The Kids Aren’t All Right” series, climate change reporter Kate Allen joins “This Matters” to discuss the impacts on children and their development.

This episode was produced by Paolo Marques and Brian Bradley.

Guest: Victoria Gibson, affordable housing reporter

Housing affordability and accessibility are only getting worse. For many Canadians, they might be just one bill or unexpected expense away from being unable to afford that month’s rent. Renovations, rent, or repair expenses are all factors that have led to more than 600,000 kids growing up in precarious housing across the country. As part of the series “The Kids Aren’t All Right,” we take a look at what that means and how a child might experience these challenges.

This episode was produced by Paulo Marques, Brian Bradley and Saba Eitizaz.

Guest: Megan Ogilvie, health reporter

Ever since the COVID pandemic, Canada’s health care system is near a breaking point and may take years to fix. Among the issues, experts are worried that many children are not getting needed surgery within the safe medical window. An estimated 17,000 children are on long waiting lists for surgeries that could improve the quality of their lives. Some of them wait for months or years. Some might never recover. The Star’s health reporter Megan Ogilvie unpacks the impact it has on children and their families.

This episode was produced by Paulo Marques, Julia De Laurentiis Johnston and Saba Eitizaz.

Guest: Amy Dempsey, series editor

In many different aspects of life, kids in Toronto are struggling right now. Housing is unaffordable, educational supports are lacking, surgical wait times are long and the social safety net is frayed. Amy Dempsey is editor of the series “The Kids Aren’t All Right,” which looks at the varied and interconnected ways we’re letting down the next generation and what we might start doing to fix it.

This episode was produced by Sean Pattendon, Julia De Laurentiis Johnston and Edward Keenan.

Guests: David Rider and Ben Spurr

Since her election in June, Toronto Mayor Olivia Chow has begun the work she was elected to do — building relationships with councillors and the premier, trying to kick start affordable housing and working to fix the city’s budget hole. David Rider, city hall bureau chief, and Ben Spurr, reporter, have talked to her allies, opponents and city experts to evaluate how far she’s come, how much further she has to go and potential political landmines in the coming mayoral schedule.

This episode was produced by Sean Pattendon, Julia De Laurentiis Johnston and Edward Keenan.

Guest: Deborah Dundas, books editor

The 2023 Scotiabank Giller Prize, Canada’s prestigious literary award, will be handed out on Nov. 13. Five books were shortlisted last week from a longlist of twelve, picked out of more than a hundred books that were submitted across the country. Star books editor Deborah Dundas walks us through the most buzzworthy books and gives great recommendations to add to our holiday reading and gift lists.

This episode was produced by Paulo Marques, Brian Bradley and Saba Eitizaz.

Audio Sources: Wellington Square Books, Vancouver Public Library, Kobo, Waterstones, Notre Dame Day

Guest: Amy Laski, founder of the Tween Girls Hockey League

The city’s policy for allocating recreational permits for sports facilities favours tradition. Long-term permit holders get renewed year after year. That’s great for building up those leagues, but leaves any newcomers, including those trying to serve girls and others who feel left out of the existing sports culture, scrambling to try to find a way in. Hockey mom and league founder Amy Laski outlines her struggle to get the city to accommodate her league and fix the policies that led to it.

This episode was produced by Sean Pattendon, Julia De Laurentiis Johnston and Edward Keenan.

Guest: Dr. Sasha High, internal medicine and obesity physician

Ozempic has been all over the news and social media as it has been hailed as the miracle drug for weight loss. As it is a trend among A-list celebrities, it’s also found itself surrounded by controversy. Experts say Ozempic is a medicine, not a TikTok trend and needs to be taken with the advice of your doctor. Last year, Ozempic hype and reported off-label use led to a shortage of the drug in certain regions for people who needed it, including diabetics. It isn’t all black and white — diabetes and obesity are often interrelated — and this drug and others like it could be a game changer for those struggling with both. That’s around seven per cent of the population in Canada.

This episode was produced by Paulo Marques, Julia De Laurentiis Johnston and Saba Eitizaz.

Guest: Lydia Greene, student nurse

For a long while, Lydia Greene would forgo many vaccines for her and her children, believing them akin to poison. A mother of three and a former quality-control chemist for a pharmaceutical plant, Greene called herself an anti-vaxxer. But when COVID-19 put vaccine safety into the spotlight, she decided to dig deeper into the research and concluded she might actually be wrong. She talks to “This Matters” about how she got from there to here, what it was like to administer her first vaccine as a student nurse and about grappling with that very human quandary of what it feels like to realize you’re wrong.

This episode is produced by Alex Boyd, Julia De Laurentiis Johnston and Sean Pattendon

Guest: Amy Dempsey, feature writer

Less than a century ago, a single raccoon raiding a garbage bin was front-page news in Toronto, while today the trash pandas are everywhere. Feature writer Amy Dempsey, who documented how the creatures outsmarted the city’s waste-bin engineers, takes a closer look at our love-hate relationships with these animals, the city’s frustrated attempts to control them and how and why they’ve made themselves at home in Toronto (and invited themselves to join Amy’s wedding).

This episode was produced by Paulo Marques, Julia De Laurentiis Johnston and Edward Keenan.

Audio Sources: CBC, Toronto Star

Guest: Michael Lewis, journalist and author

In 2019, Sam Bankman-Fried set up a crypto exchange called FTX. Over the course of two years, as the price of crypto skyrocketed, so did his fortune, until it was estimated at as much as $26.5 billion U.S. SBF, as he became known, was feted by celebrities from football star Tom Brady to comedian Larry David. Then, in November 2022, it all came crashing down. SBF was accused of diverting $8 billion of investors’ money from FTX to his hedge fund Alameda Research, and making huge purchases, including more than $100 million in political donations. At just 31, he is now in U.S. court on seven fraud charges in the first of several trials. (This one expected to run six weeks.) Michael Lewis, journalist and author of such bestselling books as “The Big Short” and “Moneyball,” was in the position of following Bankman-Fried throughout his rise and spectacular fall and has just published a book on the subject, “Going Infinite.” Lewis joins “This Matters.”

This episode was produced by Sean Pattendon, Brian Bradley and Deborah Dundas.

More than a week ago Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau made an unprecedented move. He accused Indian government agents of involvement in the death of exiled Sikh activist Hardeep Singh Nijjar on Canadian soil; an accusation that New Delhi has denied strongly and dismissed as “absurd.” Since then, both countries have been in a diplomatic showdown, including tit-for-tat expulsions of each other’s diplomats. The tensions have spiralled since then with travel advisories for citizens on both sides, with India also suspending visa services in Canada. Diplomatic conflict between two G20 members raises the potential of drawing in mutual allies and transforming the conflict into a global one. The implications are serious, especially for ordinary people on both sides who will be impacted by the changing winds of foreign policy. We get two journalists from both countries to weigh in with the Canadian and Indian perspectives.

This episode was produced by Paulo Marques, Julia De Laurentiis Johnston and Saba Eitizaz.

The Blue Jays clinched a playoff spot on Sunday and will start the Wild Card series agains the Minnesota Twins on Tuesday. The Star's baseball podcast Deep Left Field has gone daily for the playoff run, so This Matters guest host Mike Wilner brings you this clinch episode.

You’ll hear from Blue Jays (and Deep Left Field regulars) Kevin Kiermaier and Jordan Romano, along with Vladimir Guerrero Jr., and Matt Chapman. You’ll also hear John Schneider’s post-game speech to the team. And we answer your email questions to DeepLFPodcast@gmail.com as we get you set for the Jays’ first-round date with Minnesota.

Hosts: Toronto Star columnists Edward Keenan and Emma Teitel

In this episode: The week that was in Toronto and beyond: Including questions about whether the Eglinton Crosstown will be built in any of our lifetimes (and whether they’ll let us know if it is), the fallout from the celebration of a Nazi soldier that ruined what should have been a good and meaningful day for the federal government, Olivia Chow’s measures of progress in Ottawa and at Queen’s Park, and Emma Teitel’s theory about why we’re destined to always hate Yonge-Dundas Square.

This episode was produced by Sean Pattendon, Julia De Laurentiis Johnston, Emma Teitel and Ed Keenan.

On this episode: Guest host Althia Raj talks with Bernie Farber, the founding chair of the anti-hate network, the former CEO of the Canadian Jewish Congress

Last week, the Speaker of the House of Commons, Anthony Rota, invited Yaroslav Hunka, a 98-year-old constituent, to come to Ottawa and hear Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s address. Rota introduced him in the House as a Ukranian who'd fought the Russians during World War Two and was proud to support the troops again. Hunka received two standing ovations before MPs, journalists and the world realized they were honouring someone who'd pledged allegiance to Hitler and fought with the Nazis. An international crisis erupted with Russia using the incident in its disinformation campaign. Rota was pressured to resign and Prime Minister Justin Trudeau offered an apology. But is it enough? Our guest today is Bernie Farber, the founding chair of the anti-hate network, the former CEO of the Canadian Jewish Congress and someone who knows more than most about Canada's history with Nazi war criminals.

Audio sources: CPAC

This episode was produced by Althia Raj and Sean Pattendon.

Guest: Toronto Star Queen’s Park Bureau Chief Robert Benzie

In this episode: Doug Ford’s foray into a mayoral election he promised to stay out of was just the start of a summer where nothing seemed to go right for his government and where the Greenbelt swap scandal exploded — costing his government cabinet ministers, senior staff members, and oodles of popular support. The Star’s Robert Benzie details how the summer sun scorched Ford’s popularity, and discusses the mood in the government caucus and where they go from here.

Audio sources: Canadian Press, Global

This episode was produced by Paulo Marques, Julia De Laurentiis Johnston and Ed Keenan.

Guest: Brandi Morin, French/Cree/Iroquois journalist from Treaty 6 in Alberta

Indigenous people have been on the frontlines of fighting to protect and sustain the land and environment for years. They warn that the west’s supposedly eco-friendly climate strategy is also a repeat of history. Resources needed for sustainable alternate energy such as mineral mining continues the practise of extracting from the earth, threatening Indigenous lands and people. One of these new frontlines is Nevada’s remote Thacker Pass where a battle is playing out in Paiute and Shoshone territories between the local Indigenous tribes and a Canadian mining company that is mining the lithium beneath their land.A recently released short documentary “Thacker Pass: Mining the Sacred” by award-winning journalist Brandi Morin and Geordie Day took us to the heart of it. It's part of a cross-border project between Ricochet Media, IndigiNews and The Real News Network in the United States.

According to the Real News Network, in 2022, the Fort McDermitt Paiute and Shoshone Tribe signed a Community Benefits Agreement with Lithium Americas. At roughly 64 kms away, the reservation is the closest – and poorest – in the region.The company said in a statement to Real News Network: '"We are pleased to have the support of the Fort McDermitt Paiute and Shoshone Tribe as we advance Thacker Pass and look forward to generations of future collaboration."'

Audio sources: Ricochet media, IndigiNews, The Real News Network

This episode was produced by Paulo Marques, Julia De Laurentiis Johnston and Saba Eitizaz.

Guests: Martin Regg Cohn, Queen’s Park columnist

In this episode, columnist Martin Regg Cohn joins to tackle the avalanche of news coming from Queen’s Park including Toronto Mayor Olivia Chow’s visit (and common ground with the premier), the debate for Liberal party leadership hopefuls and Premier Doug Ford reversing his earlier reversal on Greenbelt protections. All of that, plus what you can learn in the bleachers at a youth sports game.

This episode was produced by Edward Keenan, Sean Pattendon and Julia De Laurentiis Johnston.

Audio Sources: YouTube and The Dais at TMU

Guest: Mark Maloney, author

Mark Maloney is the author of the book “Toronto Mayors,” which profiles all 65 people who’ve held the city's top job. He joins “This Matters” to talk about the rogues gallery of scandalous scoundrels in our past, share who he considers the Mount Rushmore of best (and most beloved) mayors and give his thoughts on the city’s recurring state of explosive growth and underfunded infrastructure.

This episode was produced by Edward Keenan, Paolo Marques and Julia De Laurentiis Johnston.