Halifax “being fair to everybody” by eliminating bus passes for the blind

According to the CBC, Halifax will stop giving free bus passes to CNIB to distribute to blind riders this summer.

“It’s not something we like to have to take away from one group,” said Lori Patterson, spokeswoman for Metro Transit. “But the fact [is] that we’re not able to offer it to many groups.

“We’re trying to be fair to everybody, and this is what we have to do.”

This blogger explains that some of the “freebies” blind people are entitled to ensure that the blind have Access to Information (free talking books or devices to play the audio).

Blind people are not permitted to drive, therefore the free transit pass was introduced as a means of protecting the right to access employment, education etc.

If HRM was concerned with promoting fairness for people with disabilities, wouldn’t providing free service for more people with disabilities make sense?

Dog Fuckers Need Not Apply

According to the Chronicle Herald, people are being turned down for jobs in the Halifax Regional Municipality because of a polygraph test that includes embarrassing questions about animal sex.

Applicants wanting to be police officers or bylaw enforcement officers or even to answer the phone in the dogcatcher’s office must take a lie detector test.

A woman who wanted an information technology job with the municipality says she was humiliated when she was asked whether she had had sex with animals.

…“It’s outrageous that . . . questions that they couldn’t ask under human rights legislation, they can ask by virtue of saying it’s necessary to do a security clearance,” said Nancy Elliott, business agent for the Nova Scotia Union of Public and Private Employees.

Besides the part about having sex with animals, this invasive use of a lie detector for hiring mundane jobs seems like another instance where Mr Show sketches become reality…