Kidjo, Blackwell, Pärt awarded Sweden’s Polar Music Prize

Manitoba could soon have an autism strategy for the first time, thanks to a private member’s bill that’s garnered rare all-party support in the legislature.

Liberal MLA Cindy Lamoureux’s Bill 232, the Autism Strategy Act introduced in March, would require the government to establish a policy designed to improve the screening and diagnosis of autism spectrum disorder and support research.

It would identify ongoing supports and services needed by people with autism and their families and caregivers. It calls for annual reports tracking the implementation of the measures identified in the strategy, with a mandatory review and updates of the legislation every five years.

The bill goes before the legislature’s standing committee on social and economic development committee Friday. As of Wednesday, 87 private citizens and organizations registered to weigh in on the proposed legislation.

Support for combined approach

Re: Balanced drug blitz pays off (Oct. 14)

Your news and reporting on the positive results of co-ordinated outreach coupled with enforcement combining social, medical and police services is important progress towards a safer and healthier Winnipeg.

As is often stated and conclusively researched, the poverty, mental health, addictions and desperation of too many of our brothers and sisters on the streets is a very complex dilemma. Let’s really get behind and support these new initiatives with vigour and sustained support through this combined co-operation with front-line engagement coalition partners.

France’s violent student uprising has captured headlines in recent weeks. Yet India’s strongman Prime Minister Narendra Modi is struggling to tame an upstart gen Z challenge of his own — and it shows no signs of slowing down.

Youth-led protests beginning on Oct. 10 paralyzed central New Delhi for several days as demonstrators called for India’s election commissioner to resign over unexplained database changes that deleted 130 million people from voter registries. Many accuse Modi’s Hindu-first ruling party of ramming through the changes for its own benefit. Mass arrests were carried out by the 25,000-plus security forces brought in to lock down the capital.

It’s just the latest headache the Cockroach movement has caused for Modi.

At a court hearing in May, India’s top judge called jobless youth “cockroaches” and “parasites” for criticizing the country on social media. His offhand comments triggered instant fury, as Indian graduates often struggle to find work in their field in an economy dominated by low-skilled sectors. Their unemployment rate is three times higher than the country’s average — 40 per cent for graduates under 25.

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