Loyola High School principal, Paul Donovan talks to the B.C. Catholic about his school's fight to be exempted from the Ethics and Religious Culture program. The article argues that the outcome of this case will have profound implications for the religious freedom of all institutions. To read the full article, click here.

"Paul Donovan speaks about the situation in which Loyola finds itself and about how the situation is relevant to all Canadians who may believe religious freedom is a safe and protected right," writes Peter Baklinski on LifeSiteNews.com .

Milton Friesen, Program Director, Social Cities is published on the Social Enterprise World Forum blog. His article "The Business of Re-Weaving a Good City" was first published for Comment in 2010. To read the article, click here.

At the end of September, Comment Editor James K.A. Smith will be presenting two lectures as part of The Bentall Lectures in Christian Theology through the Chair of Christian Thought at the University of Calgary. To read an interview with Smith in The Calgary Herald, click here.

"The cross is not, for me, a government approved decoration. My religious life is not a function of politically acceptable furnishings." Convivium Publisher Peter Stockland comments on Quebec's Charter plan to ban religious symbols. To read the full article, click here.

Listen to Comment Editor, Jamie Smith discuss institutions on Pittsburgh radio station 101.5 WordFM. Listen (starting at 12:06) here.

The Hamilton Spectator has come out in favour of open tendering legislation. "The status quo is deeply flawed in that it excludes dozens of potential bidders just because they are not covered by the union certification. Harris is right again when he says: 'I believe every qualified contractor should have the right regardless of their union affiliation, to work on publicly funded infrastructure.'"To read the full article, click here. Program Director, Work and Economics Brian Dijkema recently published a briefing note on open tendering.

Pop quiz: which Canadian politician was responsible for the first piece of legislation allowing trade unions in Canada? J.S. Woodsworth? Tommy Douglas? Ed Broadbent? The obvious answer — one might say the conservative Canadian answer — would be one of the above. The correct answer is, in fact, none of the above. None other than Canada’s first prime minister, Sir John A. Macdonald, passed the Trade Unions Act in 1872. You read that right: it was a Conservative prime minister who first legally recognized trade unions in Canada. That this would come as a surprise to many reflects our assumptions about the way conservatives react on the labour file, instead of leading in step with their principles. Recent efforts are a case in point. For those who haven’t been following, the current government’s efforts in labour relations reform have been limited to nibbling at the edges via private member’s bills. Bill C-377, which sought to force labour unions to disclose to everyone, not just their members, all spending over $5,000, loans over $250, and wages of employees making more than $100,000 The other attempt at reform was Bill C-525, which would require unions to achieve a threshold of support in workplaces of 50 per cent plus one of all employees (not just those who vote). In other words, it would require unions to receive a mandate not currently enjoyed by any current governing party in Canada, or any government in Canada ever. Bill C-525 didn’t make it to second reading, and Bill C-377 was deemed — by the normally compliant Senate, no less — so poorly written that it was infamously sent back to the House of Commons with amendments. Both of these bills are efforts to solve real problems with Canadian labour unions. Union spending on fringe causes — Israel apartheid week anyone? — is worthy of scrutiny. So are many of the deceptive practices unions use to get members in the door. But what both bills have in common is that they buy into the very adversarial mentality that many of the socialist labour unions in Canada have against conservatives. In doing so, the federal Conservatives (and conservatives) are letting the left frame the conversation instead of taking a page out of Macdonald’s book and charting their own course. Canadian labour law has not fundamentally changed since 1944 when Canada adopted the American model based on the Wagner Act of 1935. That model is based on the false premise that workers and owners are adversaries rather than parties with different, yet entwined interests. There are rumours the government is considering bringing back a version of C-377 this fall. Let us all hope it is not so. The choice facing the federal government over the summer is whether to continue symbolic tinkering with a broken model that diminishes mutual respect and trust, or to substantially reshape labour relations to account for the fact that workers and capital both win when they work co-operatively. The latter approach reflects values inherent to Conservative governments: recognition of the entwined nature of labour and capital, respect for the limited role of the state, and the value of private associations. Framing the debate according to conservative principles of limited government with a view to increasing competition between unions would break up the current anti-conservative labour monolith and, paradoxically, lead to the development of more unions. In other words, it would be good for workers, and good for the country. It would be a legacy worthy of Sir John A. Macdonald himself.