I’ve been a Blue Jays fan for as long as I can remember. From meeting most of the team in Minneapolis as a 12-year-old in 1987 to painting my face blue as a high schooler after their first championship to remembering exactly where I was when Jose Bautista did the bat flip. So the loss Saturday night hurts profoundly.

But there is something about this Blue Jays team that is different. They weren’t just playing for a championship. They weren’t just playing for Toronto or even Canada. This team was playing for each other. You could hear it in their interviews. You could see it in the dugout, and you could “feel” it through the TV. These guys weren’t just a team. They were a family. They truly loved playing baseball and they loved each other. What an example for young ball players and teams from all sports. But even more so, what an example to anyone who holds a job, is part of a committee or is part of any group working together. The message: love what you do and who you do it with.

I hope that the example of the 2025 Toronto Blue Jays will encourage everyone to appreciate their job and co-workers. It certainly has for me.

Brad Unger

On Oct. 22, 300 residents packed the Cooks Creek Community Centre to capacity. They came to learn about two deeply important issues: Sio Silica’s renewed application threatening our aquifer and an update on the Winnipeg Metropolitan Region (WMR)’s Plan 20-50 and how Winnipeg will obtain control over Springfield’s land planning decisions. Residents also came because they are tired of decisions made without their consent. This meeting was proof that the people of Springfield are wide awake and watching.

Councillors Mark Miller and Andy Kuczynski had the courage to organize a public meeting so residents could finally hear the truth. For many, this was the first time they had heard unfiltered facts. It was democracy in action (held in Miller’s own Ward 3). Couns. Glen Fuhl and Melinda Warren attended as invited guests. Mayor Patrick Therrien declined. Residents were clearly thankful for the opportunity to ask questions and learn more.

But the success of the public meeting clearly made some people nervous. The next day, an unsigned “official” statement appeared on the RM of Springfield website, claiming the “community forum was not an official event of council and was not sanctioned by the full council.” There was no council vote. No approval. No discussion. Yet the statement was released publicly, as if to discredit the councillors who dared to hold the meeting. Mayor Therrien, nor CAO Colleen Draper have the authority to act on their own and release official RM of Springfield documents. The statement further said, “The council remains committed to transparent and inclusive engagement through communications, decisions and public open houses.” This was not transparency. This was damage control. The statement was posted on the RM’s Facebook page. Residents immediately saw it for what it was, an attempt to undermine and silence the voices of those who showed up and pushed back.

In a surprising turn, The Clipper Weekly flatly refused to publish a summary of the meeting, even as a paid advertisement. When offered full payment to print it, the refusal still stood. Meanwhile, Steinbach’s The Carillon accepted the same submission without hesitation. They even published their own article covering the event, including Mayor Therrien’s dismissive response that the public meeting was “confusing for residents.” The difference between the two papers couldn’t be clearer: one respects free speech; the other protects the powerful.

In any well functioning democracy, there are checks on power. In a country like Canada those checks can take a variety of forms. The most obvious is the voter. While elections are often separated by several years, every government knows that at some point it must appear before the ballot box for the voters to pass electoral judgement. This naturally serves as a check on the actions of any government.

Another check on the power of government in Canada is the constitution to which all laws, with few exceptions, need to conform to. It is left to the courts to determine when government legislation steps beyond these boundaries and is deemed unconstitutional. The courts themselves serve as a check on government. To undertake this duty the courts have long argued for complete independence including on things such as the continuing education judges are required to take, judicial salaries and benefits, and sentencing. Many of those in judicial circles have long argued against measures such as mandatory minimum sentences, saying they remove the independence of judges.

These mandatory minimum sentence laws have come from elected officials responding to public outcry for sentences that have been deemed too lenient by societal standards. Rightly or wrongly, the outcry has only grown over the last many years as violent and sexual crimes have increased.

For that reason, many Canadians, and elected officials across Canada, responded with outrage when the Supreme Court of Canada struck down, in a close 5-4 decision, the mandatory one-year sentence for child pornography crimes. While the case before the Supreme Court dealt with offenders who had more than 1,000 images of horrific child pornography, the court chose to imagine an entirely different type of case that they believe could lead to unfairness if the one year minimum were applied.

In a recent private member’s statement, I had the pleasure of recognizing Gilles Crevier for his exceptional contributions as a musician and resident of Dawson Trail. Gilles is a French Canadian, Red River Métis with nearly four decades of experience as a career musician. Throughout his career, Gilles has performed in Canada, the United States, and Europe, as a member and musical director for the Ensemble Folklorique de la Riviere Rouge. He also served as concertmaster for the Winnipeg Pops Orchestra for nearly 15 years and is a founding member of the francophone folk group, La Bardasse.

Today, his musical focus lies mainly with playing Métis fiddle music, which in May, led him, along with his daughter Sara, to his recent representation and performance as an Indigenous member of the official Government of Canada delegation for the 80th anniversary of the Liberation of the Netherlands and the end of the Second World War in Europe. Gilles also spends his time serving his community by volunteering with the “comité culturel de Sainte-Anne” and the local Knights of Columbus chapter. I am honoured to have been able to highlight Gilles Crevier and his amazing accomplishments and ongoing contributions to our Dawson Trail community.

It is November now, which means it is also Movember. Movember is an organization and global movement that was started in 2003 to raise awareness and funds for different health issues affecting men, particularly mental health and suicide prevention, prostate cancer, and testicular cancer. This movement that started out as 30 men has grown to over six million participants, and they’ve been able to help fund over 1,300 men’s health projects around the world. I had the pleasure to meet with some of the folks at Movember recently and chat with them about men’s health and the important work they do. I am so glad that there are organizations like Movember who are dedicated to raising awareness about men’s mental and physical health, breaking down stigma, and transforming the way health services reach and support men.

For more updates and information, visit my website at boblagasse.com. If you have any questions or concerns, feel free to contact my constituency office at ca.lagasse@outlook.com or 204-807-4663.