“Freedom Party candidate Silvio Ursomarzo today is expressing concerns about NDP candidate Cheri DiNovo’s silence in response to comments made by her “team” member, federal NDP MP Peggy Nash…” Click here to read the full media release.
Aug 232006
Aug 212006
“…Freedom Party’s candidate, Silvio Ursomarzo, today wrote to DiNovo demanding to know whether she shares Ms. Nash’s position on Hezbollah…” Click here to read the full media release.
Apr 292006
“…Freedom Party leader Paul McKeever is today objecting to the McGuinty government’s decision to give the taxpayer’s money to religious organizations…” Click here to read the full media release.
Nov 242001
VIDEO – DESCRIPTION:
Following the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, and the commencement of war in Afghanistan (starting October 7, 2001), Freedom Party held an informative dinner in London featuring two experts, Dr. Kenneth Hilborn (Professor Emeritus of History at the University of Western Ontario) and John C. Thompson (Executive Director of the Mackenzie Institute). This video commences with a brief contextual overview of the events which preceded the dinner. Note: expletives have not been “beeped” out of the footage, and some may find some of the images in the overview – including the bombing and collapse of the World Trade Towers – to be disturbing. Govern yourself accordingly. Continue reading »
May 131999
VIDEO – DESCRIPTION:
On May 13, 1999, Freedom Party leader Paul McKeever, Paul William Roberts (author), Anwar Syed (Canadian Muslim Civil Liberties Association) and Rukhsana Khan (author), were panelists on Michael Coren Live! (CTS). The topic of discussion: Salman Rushdie (author of “The Satanic Verses”) and the fatwa issued on February 14, 1989 by Iran’s then “supreme leader” Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini calling upon all Muslims to kill Rushdie for having insulted the Prophet Mohammed in “The Satanic Verses”, a book that Khomeini said was “blasphemous against Islam”. Continue reading »
Dec 151996
AUDIO – DESCRIPTION:
In this recording, Freedom Party member and former Ontario Vice-president Lloyd Walker calls Jim Chapman, host of “Talk of the Town”, and convinces Chapman that there should be no ban on opening one’s retail store on Boxing Day. On December 16, 1996, Ontario’s legislature passed an amendment to Ontario’s Retail Business Holidays Act which removed Boxing Day from the list of days on which the opening of most retail stores is prohibited). The ban on retail shopping on Boxing Day took effect on December 19, 1996.
Oct 251996
AUDIO – DESCRIPTION:
On October 24 and 25, 1996, Ontario’s Divisional Court heard the Ontario Human Rights Commission’s appeal of the August 24, 1994 decision of Board of Inquiry Chair Ajit S. John in the matter of Chippheng Hom and Ontario Human Rights Commission v. Elijah Elieff and Elieff Investments Ltd. (Decision # 94-022). The Board of Inquiry Chair had found the Elieff had not violated Hom’s rights to equal treatment under Ontario’s Human Rights Code. Jim Chapman, host of CJBK 1290 AM (London, Ontario’s) Talk of the Town Program had apparently mentioned a report in the London Free Press from that day concerning the Divisional Court’s hearings the previous day. Freedom Party of Ontario president Robert Metz had represented Elieff and his company at the Board of Inquiry hearing, and he called in to discuss the appeal.
Sep 301993
Description:
On November 16, 1992, an Ontario Human Rights Commission Board of Inquiry commenced a 10 day hearing in the matter of Chippheng Hon v. Elijah Elieff (COM. No. 20-1775). Hon was a tenant of Elieff’s apartment buildings. Hon was originally from Cambodia, and Elieff was originally from Macedonia. Each had difficulties with the English language. In her complaint to the Ontario Human Rights Commission, Hon alleged that Elieff had subjected her to harassment due to her “ethnic origin”. Although her complaint was initiated in 1989 – three years before the hearing began – counsel for the commission was allowed to add “race” as a basis of harassment on day 1 of the hearings. She was also permitted to add as a respondent the owner of the apartment buildings, which was not Elieff, but a corporation in which Elieff was a shareholder. Freedom Party president Robert Metz took an interest in the hearings, which were being held in London, Ontario, so he attended them. He quickly grew concerned by what he witnessed.
Freedom Party’s Jack Plant (later to be party leader) researched the press coverage of Elieff and his Cheyenne Apartments at London’s public library, and made photocopies of the London Free Press articles that he there found about the subject. The articles would assist Metz in his successful defence of Elieff. These are the articles that Plant copied, and upon which Metz relied. A number of post-hearing articles are included below, also, having been added to Freedom Party’s newspaper clippings file for the Elieff matter. Continue reading »
Nov 051992
Description:
On November 16, 1992, an Ontario Human Rights Commission Board of Inquiry commenced a 10 day hearing in the matter of Chippheng Hon v. Elijah Elieff (COM. No. 20-1775). Hon was a tenant of Elieff’s apartment buildings. Hon was originally from Cambodia, and Elieff was originally from Macedonia. Each had difficulties with the English language. In her complaint to the Ontario Human Rights Commission, Hon alleged that Elieff had subjected her to harassment due to her “ethnic origin”. Although her complaint was initiated in 1989 – three years before the hearing began – counsel for the commission was allowed to add “race” as a basis of harassment on day 1 of the hearings. She was also permitted to add as a respondent the owner of the apartment buildings, which was not Elieff, but a corporation in which Elieff was a shareholder. Freedom Party president Robert Metz took an interest in the hearings, which were being held in London, Ontario, so he attended them. He quickly grew concerned by what he witnessed. On the fifth day of the hearings – February 2, 1993 – Metz was acknowedged by the Tribunal to be Elieff’s agent. Ultimately, largely thanks to Metz’s assistance, Elieff was found by the Tribunal not to have discriminated against Hon or his other Cambodian tenants. Along the way, Metz uncovered what can only be called a conspiracy that was an attempt to use a human rights complaint as just one part of a campaign to smear and financially ruin a landlord so that another entity affordably – and with taxpayer money – could take-over his buildings. It is a story that involves a local politician, a daily newspaper, and a major organized religion…and it’s all evidenced by the transcripts of the testimony of those involved.
These are transcripts of the proceedings of all 10 days of the Board of Inquiry’s hearings of the matter, as recorded by the official court reporter in the matter. In Freedom Party’s physical archive, the transcripts are bound together in two binders or “books”.
Continue reading »
Jun 101988
AUDIO – DESCRIPTION:
Beginning June 7, 1988, Freedom Party of Ontario Action Director Marc Emery spent 4 days in jail for having refused to pay a $500 fine that was imposed upon him by a court for having opened his bookstore on a Sunday, contrary to provincial law. He had opened his store as an act of civil disobedience, in conjunction with his efforts as Action Director of the Freedom Party. In the face of organized proponents of the ban on Sunday shopping – including organized religion, organized business interests, and all three of the political parties holding seats in the Ontario Legislature – Emery was the front man for Freedom Party of Ontario’s lonely, but ultimately successful, campaign against the Sunday shopping ban.
In this radio broadcast, “Radio Docs” host Mario Circelli mentions that Emery has just been released from jail to join him on the program (that makes June 10, 1988 the most likely date of the broadcast; Freedom Party president Robert Metz recalls having brought money to the Elgin-Middlesex Detention Centre in the early morning hours of a June Friday to pay the money [collected from supporters as “Pennies for Principles”] necessary to secure Emery’s release). Arguably, the fact that Emery has just emerged from jail can be heard not so much in Emery’s voice, as in his words on the program. This arguably is Emery in his finest form.