I’ve been involved in 3 news worthy stories in my life. Every newspaper article on these events contained, at minimum, 2 errors. I had an uncle die in a house fire – there were articles about it in 3 different papers. Two of the articles contradicted each other about the facts of the fire – and both were wrong. I kind of take everything I see in the papers with a grain of salt.
Further, there’s a piece in the Star today by Benzie, titled ‘Ontario Liberal leadership candidate Sandra Pupatello calls rivals ‘too Toronto’’
Er…. no. She called Tim Hudak ‘too Toronto’. There were a few quips about looking at the needs of the whole province, factor for regional diversity and whatnot, but that headline is malarkey.
Strange that the main coverage of the debate seems to have focused completely on one issue and you’re saying they got that completely wrong in what was said by the leading candidate? Seems less like bias or malice, more just simple incompetence.
The more interesting thing for me in the article is that the LCBO had $4.7B in sales. Wow. If Ontario has ~14M people, and 1M are over 75 and 3M are under 19… giving us ~10M potential drinkers… we spend almost $500 per head per year? That’s an eye-opener. 35% margins don’t surprise but the size of market does, holy crap.
It would be neat for a (competent) reporter to compare a collection of provinces with different distribution models and chart spending per drinker and subsequent final proceeds to the province. If Ontario hands over more of the distribution business inevitably some of the 35% margin will be taken by the new retailers as they get involved, you’d hope though that you could remain government revenue neutral by the market itself growing in size but holy crap, consuming almost $500 per head, Ontario may be “tapped” out already- it would be interesting to see how size of market per capita compares. Plus, if more is consumed in the market it may begin to have a negative impact on general economic growth, trading away any growth in alcohol revenue for lesser general tax revenue.
Warren – I happened to come across yesterday’s mini debate on CPAC and am wondering what you find false in the Globe story… it is pretty much what I remembered her and Mr. Murray saying?
If you are going to provide a forum for folks to discuss how often Canadian media screws up……i hope your server is up to snuff. Reporting on bad reporting…….deserves a website of its own.
What? The Lieberal Globe writes flat-out categorically false information? What a cruel disapointment. I even read a few articles explaining why Tom Mulcair will be the best PM Canada ever had. Tout fout le camp.
She didn’t say she definitively favoured it like Glen Murray did, but she did comment on the fact there are already 200 rural grocery/convenience stores licenced to sell alcohol. She also made clear she was opposed to privatizing the LCBO. I do know in the Toronto Star in anticipation of the 2005 report, she was one of the Liberal MPPs on record saying she thought selling alcohol in a grocery store was a good idea. But considering all the issues I think there is pretty much zero chance this will happen before the next election. After that who knows. I do know that almost all jurisdictions in the world do it without any serious problems. Its not just the US, but Quebec has been doing it for years. I am not one of those who sell alcohol as an evil product that needs to be heavily restricted. Yes controlled, but reasonable. Also too regardless of what think of an issue, I am not going to determine my vote on an issue as trivial as this.
I’ve been involved in 3 news worthy stories in my life. Every newspaper article on these events contained, at minimum, 2 errors. I had an uncle die in a house fire – there were articles about it in 3 different papers. Two of the articles contradicted each other about the facts of the fire – and both were wrong. I kind of take everything I see in the papers with a grain of salt.
Further, there’s a piece in the Star today by Benzie, titled ‘Ontario Liberal leadership candidate Sandra Pupatello calls rivals ‘too Toronto’’
Er…. no. She called Tim Hudak ‘too Toronto’. There were a few quips about looking at the needs of the whole province, factor for regional diversity and whatnot, but that headline is malarkey.
Strange that the main coverage of the debate seems to have focused completely on one issue and you’re saying they got that completely wrong in what was said by the leading candidate? Seems less like bias or malice, more just simple incompetence.
The more interesting thing for me in the article is that the LCBO had $4.7B in sales. Wow. If Ontario has ~14M people, and 1M are over 75 and 3M are under 19… giving us ~10M potential drinkers… we spend almost $500 per head per year? That’s an eye-opener. 35% margins don’t surprise but the size of market does, holy crap.
It would be neat for a (competent) reporter to compare a collection of provinces with different distribution models and chart spending per drinker and subsequent final proceeds to the province. If Ontario hands over more of the distribution business inevitably some of the 35% margin will be taken by the new retailers as they get involved, you’d hope though that you could remain government revenue neutral by the market itself growing in size but holy crap, consuming almost $500 per head, Ontario may be “tapped” out already- it would be interesting to see how size of market per capita compares. Plus, if more is consumed in the market it may begin to have a negative impact on general economic growth, trading away any growth in alcohol revenue for lesser general tax revenue.
Enough from me, back to my morning rye…
Warren – I happened to come across yesterday’s mini debate on CPAC and am wondering what you find false in the Globe story… it is pretty much what I remembered her and Mr. Murray saying?
Thanks, kevin
Warren,
If you are going to provide a forum for folks to discuss how often Canadian media screws up……i hope your server is up to snuff. Reporting on bad reporting…….deserves a website of its own.
Sorry, realize now that my comment was off your desired thread…. blame the rye!
What? The Lieberal Globe writes flat-out categorically false information? What a cruel disapointment. I even read a few articles explaining why Tom Mulcair will be the best PM Canada ever had. Tout fout le camp.
She didn’t say she definitively favoured it like Glen Murray did, but she did comment on the fact there are already 200 rural grocery/convenience stores licenced to sell alcohol. She also made clear she was opposed to privatizing the LCBO. I do know in the Toronto Star in anticipation of the 2005 report, she was one of the Liberal MPPs on record saying she thought selling alcohol in a grocery store was a good idea. But considering all the issues I think there is pretty much zero chance this will happen before the next election. After that who knows. I do know that almost all jurisdictions in the world do it without any serious problems. Its not just the US, but Quebec has been doing it for years. I am not one of those who sell alcohol as an evil product that needs to be heavily restricted. Yes controlled, but reasonable. Also too regardless of what think of an issue, I am not going to determine my vote on an issue as trivial as this.