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In Sunday’s paper, I told you about two NDP want ads that appeared on Craigslist. One ad sought English-speaking phone canvassers for the NDP at a rate of pay of $17 an hour. The other ad sought Punjabi-speaking phone canvassers for just $13 an hour.

The contrasting pay rates smacked of blatant discrimination. And with Mulcair campaigning for a $15-an-hour minimum wage, the cut-rate pay for Punjabi canvassers was also extremely hypocritical.

When I asked the NDP for an explanation, the party could not offer one, suggesting the Punjabi ad — placed on Craigslist by Burnaby-based employment agency Express Professionals — may have been a mistake.

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This goes to show how much government have to be on the ball on everything when it comes to hiring on their behalf by third parties. Lets face it companies don’t have any morals. If they can get away with it to earn extra money, they will do their best to get away with doing the wrong thing. — MADSPIC

“Ignorance is no excuse. It doesn’t matter that they “didn’t know.” Before the New Democrats make demands of everyone else, they should at least make sure they practise what they preach.”

So, by this logic, we should all condemn Harper for what he didn’t know about Nigel Wright’s action. That’s fine – just so long as you don’t think you have it both ways. — Penmore

This doesn’t seem like a big deal to me. The agency in Burnaby I’m guessing takes a percentage of the the pay, as most subcontracting companies do. So what most likely happened is that Strategic Communications gave them the number of $17/hour and didn’t take into account the subcontractor fees, which if that was the case is pretty dumb. Either way someone from the NDP handling the canvassing should have been keeping an eye how everyone was getting paid. — El_Cid