This summer Canada ratified its first International Labour Organization (ILO) Convention in over a decade.

The Canadian Medical Association (CMA) has recently released its 10th edition of the National Report Card on Health Care. At the top of the list of concerns among Canadians is the fear that the quality of health care in the country will decline as a result of increased strain on the health care system as the baby boom generation gets older.

With the Canadian economy slowly improving, it is more important than ever that policymakers realize that we could just as easily drift back into recession if we do not continue to make targeted and strategic stimulus investments.

After years of putting a priority on premium reduction, the Alberta WCB simply doesn't have the funds to fulfill its mandate of supporting and rehabilitating injured workers. But instead of increasing premiums, they find new ways to deny claims and otherwise reduce pay-outs.

This past June a study was released by the Commonwealth Fund – a US organization that promotes evidence-based quality health care there – that compared the American health care system with that of six other nations, including Canada. Not surprisingly, it ranked the United States last or close to last in almost every category.

What the Federal Government must have perceived as a relatively minor policy change has developed over the last week or so into a much more significant political issue.

The G-20 leaders have left and the fences have been torn down. The media coverage focused attention on the alarming costs for security and the clashes between police and protesters. Unfortunately, this distracted the general public from the important question: what did the leaders actually accomplish at this summit?