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It's Wednesday, February 20th.

Fidel Castro is stepping down as Cuba's president.

Currently, Castro plans to spend the first two years of retirement delivering his retirement speech.

This is The Current.

Employees With Disabilities

The Supreme Court of Canada is set to begin hearing a case that could re-write the rules about what employers owe their employees with disabilities. It could also end up handing out the largest punitive damages payment in an employment case in Canadian history.

The case centres on Kevin Keays and his dismissal from his job at Honda Canada. Mr. Keays is disabled -- he has Chronic Fatigue Syndrome -- and he says Honda Canada didn't live up to its responsibility to accommodate his disability. Hugh Scher is Mr. Keays' lawyer and he spoke to us from Ottawa.


Employees With Disabilities - Employer Perspective and Honda Statement

The Current requested an interview with Honda Canada. The company declined the request, but Jim Miller, Executive Vice President of Honda Canada did offer us a statement about the case.

Because of the potential importance of this case, several organizations are intervening in it, including the Human Resources Professionals Association of Ontario. Stephen Rotstein is Counsel for the association and he joined us from Ottawa


Employees With Disabilities - Labour Law

No matter how this case is decided, it has the potential to have a major impact on Canadian labour law. For his thoughts on the significance of Keays v. Honda, I'm joined now by Michael Lynk. He specializes in Canadian labour law at the University of Western Ontario in London, Ontario.

Listen to The Current:Part 1



The Current: Part 2


Cuba After Castro - Relations With Canada & United States

After 49 years in power, Fidel Castro announced that he would neither seek nor accept another term as President of Cuba. And the one thing -- maybe the only thing -- that everyone can agree on is that what happens next is anything but clear. To look at what kind of relationship a post-Castro Cuba might have with Canada and The United States, we were joined by John Kirk, who has written many books about Cuba and teaches Latin American Studies at Dalhousie University in Halifax.


Cuba After Castro

Omar Lopez Montenegro was one of the founders of the Cuban human rights movement back in 1988 and he was imprisoned several times for non-violent activities. He's been living in exile in the United States for the last 15 years. He is now the Director for Human Rights with the Cuban-American National Foundation in Miami and offered some thoughts about his hopes for the future.

Fidel Castro was a thorn in the side of ten United States Presidents. And for 45 of those years, the U.S. imposed economic embargo has helped keep Cuba isolated and under-developed.

For his thoughts on if and how any of that will change now that Castro is on his way out, we were joined by Saul Landau. He's a scholar, author and documentary maker who has made four films about Cuba. He's also a Fellow at the Institute for Policy Studies. He spoke to us from Allamed, California

Listen to The Current:Part 2



The Current: Part 3


Bread Prices

Canada is a country where endless, rolling fields of wheat have been granted iconic status. But that hasn't stopped the price of our daily bread from skyrocketing: in the last five years, the cost of wheat has almost doubled. The increase is being blamed on a number of factors, including soaring demand, rising oil prices, and most recently government mandated biofuel use. But the end result is that Canadians are paying considerably more for basic food items like bread, pasta and cereal. And bakeries across the country are struggling to stay in business, including the Bread and Roses Bakery in Ottawa. Owner Jodi Turner, owner says she's had to raise prices, forcing her bakery to cut staff and sell wholesale.

But the rising price of wheat isn't just affecting people who buy high-end, organic bread. Gail Nyberg is the Executive Director of the Daily Bread Food Bank in Toronto. And she says more and more lower income Canadians are having real trouble putting any kind of bread on the table. We were also joined from Washington by Janet Larson, director of research at the Earth Policy Institute.


Bread Prices - Biofuel Crops

One of the reasons for the increase in the price of wheat is that many farmers are switching from crops like wheat and barley to more lucrative crops that are being grown for biofuels, not food. So while bakers and consumers are bemoaning the rising cost of wheat, some farmers are celebrating other crops that are saving the family farm. Mark Silzer farms in Humboldt, Saskatchewan, about two hours east of Saskatoon and he joined us from there.

Last Word - Bay of Pigs

Earlier in the program, we talked about how Cuba's relations with Canada and the United States might change now that Fidel Castro is leaving office. One of the defining moments in Cuban-American relations was the Bay of Pigs invasion back in 1961, when 1,300 U.S.-backed Cuban exiles tried unsuccessfully to oust Castro. The invasion cemented the already well-developed distrust between Cuba and The United States. It also inspired well-known Cuban singer Silvio Rodriguez to pen a song called Playa Giron, which is how the Bay of Pigs is known in Cuba. We closed this episode with that song.


Listen to The Current:Part 3

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