VANCOUVER -- Marijuana activist Marc Emery's battle to avoid going to a U.S. prison got a boost this week in the House of Commons. Three MPs -- Libby Davies of the New Democratic Party, Ujjal Dosanjh of the Liberals and Scott Reid of the Conservatives -- presented a petition asking Justice Minister Rob Nicholson not to sign extradition papers that would send Mr. Emery south to serve a five-year sentence for selling marijuana seeds online in 2005.

There was cautious optimism Thursday in response to the federal government's promise of $10 million over two years to address the issue of hundreds of missing and murdered native women in Canada. "It's a start, because five and 10 years ago, the issue of missing and murdered aboriginal women in Canada never passed the lips of a single cabinet minister, that I'm aware of, over all those years," said Ernie Crey, whose sister Dawn disappeared from Vancouver's Downtown Eastside in 2000....Vancouver East NDP MP Libby Davies, whose riding includes the Downtown Eastside where 64 women disappeared from 1978 to 2001, said the solution to this epidemic cannot come solely through "a criminal justice lens."

Canada's showcase home pavilion at the 2010 Winter Olympics is a fine example of German engineering. The Canada Pavilion tent was not made in Canada, but rather manufactured in Germany by the Losberger Group and hastily assembled for the Games. NDP MP Libby Davies said it is disappointing that "something as symbolic" as the country's Olympic pavilion couldn't be Canadianmade. "What strikes me is people everywhere are so proud wearing Canadian jackets. It feels embarrassing that the Canadian government couldn't take the time to buy Canadian," said the Vancouver East MP.

Hundreds of homeless and poverty protesters -- using the Olympic spotlight to their advantage -- flooded into a vacant lot in the 100-block of West Hastings Street on Monday and erected a tent city. Libby Davies, NDP MP for Vancouver East, said she supported the tent city as a way to raise awareness for greater government support, especially by a federal government in need of a national housing strategy to help the poor and homeless.... "This is a prime site for social housing," she said. "I'm so happy so many people are here today to draw attention to this issue. It's a vacant lot and it's very visible, a symbol of what's going on in this neighbourhood."

OTTAWA — Opposition parties say Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s office has gone too far with hyper-partisan attacks, and it’s time to apologize and play fair. Liberal Leader Michael Ignatieff demanded Thursday that Harper say sorry for a Conservative party email circulated by the Prime Minister’s Office that depicted one of the country’s top bankers as a shill for the Liberal party. And the NDP called on Harper to rein in his main spokesman, Dimitri Soudas, whom it accused of making “reckless and conspiratorial partisan smears.” The NDP complaint came on the heels of Soudas accusing New Democrat MP Libby Davies of encouraging a Vancouver protest Wednesday which he said endangered the lives of children, war vets and other Chinese Canadians who were awaiting a visit from the prime minister.... Soudas fired off emails to all reporters in the national press gallery accusing Davies, who had tweeted about the “impressive“ turnout,“ of encouraging protesters to block the exits... “It’s turned into a day of almost terror for local seniors, children, veterans,” he wrote....Davies participated in the protest but said she didn’t organize it and had no knowledge that exits had been blocked. Vancouver police said they removed the chains and tape, made no arrests and allowed the protest to continue without further incident.

Federal Justice Minister Rob Nicholson, who is pushing the government's tough on crime agenda and plans to revive the bill on mandatory minimum sentences for drug crimes in the next Parliamentary session, did not support the proposed law when he was a Mulroney backbencher. In 1988, Mr. Nicholson vice-chaired a Parliamentary committee that released a report recommending mandatory minimum sentences not be used, except in the case of repeat violent sexual offenders. The committee found, based on testimony and the U.S. experience, that the law didn't work and increases prison populations....NDP MP Libby Davies (Vancouver East, B.C.), whose party voted against Bill C-15, said Mr. Nicholson's zest for introducing mandatory minimum sentences for drug crimes is purely political.

A sports arena is not the place to do the people's business, federal cabinet minister James Moore declared yesterday, as he strongly distanced his government from British Columbia's contentious policy of buying up nearly $1-million worth of Olympic tickets, including many in private suites, for the use of provincial politicians and prospective investors. "They are free to take that approach," Mr. Moore said, "but I certainly don't plan on doing any government business in the stands of a hockey game. In my judgment, I don't think that's realistic." Opposition MPs have spurned even that, arguing that it is not right for MPs to have special access to Olympic tickets, regardless of whether they pay for them...Added Libby Davies of the NDP: "We decided we did not want any preferential treatment, where the public could not get tickets. So we declined them."