Yn oedd yn digwydd, yn rhoi dwylo mwyn sy'n deunydd ym M Perm Prid ymryd II erioedr, ond felly mae'n byw meddwl, oherwydd mae'n holl ffagwcle, yn rhan o'n rhan o'r methau myth 720p. Yn oedd gan amlwg Femol, mae'n dweud bod y pethau sydd wedi gweld am hyn sy'n rhan o'r gweithfyrdd ..facilitated by smart phones, social networking... ..the creation of very large quantities of social data... ..and the computing power to work with that. So, actually, there's only... ..this pattern of behaviour you've only been around for a decade or so... ..and the term is still in evolution. So, I should give a rather sort of high level top. Well, basically, the intuition's this... ..that we have an idea that, you know, his society with machines... ..we have society which is the sort of the fleshy pastel shade soft bits... ..and then there's the silver, black plastic and metal bits... ..and we can kind of...that's the big division. And the idea is actually you could possibly start... ..starting on more meaningfully doing some vertical characterisation... ..of these agencies and sort of imply that this, this and this... ..each in their different ways have different kinds of agency. So, what we're kind of thinking of... ..we're thinking of what does human behaviour look like... ..in the context of networking technology... ..working at very large scales, a lot of distributed agency... ..self-organising groups, a lot of communication between people... ..but also between the technology, the technologies and people... ..and people mediated by technology, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera... ..with huge quantities of data. So, the term itself... ..you find the term in literature going back... ..Norman Mailer, for example, American novelist and Looney... ..writes about social machines in very disparaging ways. But the social machine research comes... ..there's sort of a quote from Tim Berners-Lee's book, Weaving the Web. It says, real life is and must be full of all kinds of social constraints... ..the very processes from which society arises. Computers can help if we use them to create abstract social machines on the web... ..processes in which people do the creative work... ..and the machine does the administration. That's quite an optimistic view. We get quite a lot of social machines in which... ..the machine does the creative work and the people do the boring bits. And then later on he says the stage is set for an evolutionary growth... ..of new social engines and he's talking about new forms of social process. So, that's a kind of 1999 prediction of the sorts of behaviour... ..that we're starting to see more recently. So, if you can imagine a graph... ..this graph actually works with it. You can do almost any research topic you like with this. But if you imagine that we get more and more people involved in computing... ..and more and more machines involved... ..this graph looks like this. So, in the bottom corner, there's conventional computation... ..the sort of stuff we use to people just working with laptops. As we get more people involved, more machines involved... ..then we get distributed computation grids, things like that. If we have not many machines but lots of people... ..then we start to look at things like social networks... ..and then social machines kind of start appearing in the top right corner. So, you might have scientific computation over there... ..but when you get more people involved, you start getting big data... ..and get it up the side as more machines involved... ..you start getting these kind of issues. And the general trajectory is just up into the top corner... ..and things like artificial intelligence, machine learning... ..and the internet of things which we haven't talked about today... ..which will be a big driver of all this kind of research... ..kind of pushing the large number of machines... ..and the large number of people involved further and further. So, these are the kinds of problems. So, when you think about not many machines involved... ..then you have your sort of crowdsourcing... ..or co-creation like Wikipedia, social networking. When we get into the top right, we start to look at things... ..like social responses to emergencies, crime, transport and so on. So, you start dealing with... ..or at least trying to address certain social problems. So, I'm not going to define social machines... ..there's a number of reasons I'm not going to do that... ..and this is trying to summarise it. I think it's one of these concepts where you're in danger... ..of either casting the definitional net too widely... ..so you include processes that aren't really very interesting... ..or too narrowly, in which case you'd miss out on... ..some rather juicy examples that you'd want to include. And this is partly exacerbated because we've got really, really fast changes... ..in technology and practice. Of course, interlinked as they co-create each other. And it would be very easy to write a definition... ..that completely missed some new thing on the horizon. Before social networking emerged in the middle of the last decade... ..I don't know anyone that really predicted it would happen. It's very hard to define in terms of communication... ..because communication is mediated by the technology. So, it's very hard to understand whether a person is talking to a person... ..via a machine, or whether a person is talking to a machine... ..who's then sending instructions to another person. The structures are quite difficult to disentangle. So, I like to think about what methods are you going to use... ..to look at a social machine... ..because that will tell you the sorts of social machines... ..that you're going to be interested in. I'm interested in social machines... ..where there's a very high level of social activity... ..where there's a lot of person-to-person interaction. And I don't mind fudging the definition... ..to make it clear that that's the sort of thing I'm interested in. So, I'm just going to give you a few examples of the sorts of things... ..because, actually, the examples are much more instructive... ..than wiffling on about distribution, scale and technology. So, here's one example, Ushahidi. So, this came about in the context of... ..there was a disputed election in Kenya a few years ago... ..and there was a lot of violence afterwards. It was very difficult to understand how the violence was happening... ..and mapping the violence. And someone had a very good idea of producing an interactive Google Map... ..that you could upload photographs of the violence, too. And in the technology via your smartphone... ..it's a very high level of smartphone usage in Kenya. So, because of the metadata in the photographs that were being uploaded... ..you could then place those photographs on the map. So, you actually got a real-time dynamic map... ..of where the violence was happening in Kenya... ..and it was validated through being actual photographs. So, that's an example of how you couldn't do that with the people... ..with just with people. You couldn't do that just with machines. Nobody knew the entire picture, but everybody knew a part of it. So, the trick was how to aggregate all those things... ..to produce the map of the Kenyan violence.  That was kind of an early example. Here's another example. This is Cajun Navy. So, there were floods in Louisiana a few years ago... ..and someone set up a Facebook group of boat owners... ..who would react to reports of people being stranded in the floods... ..and they would be able to do that. So, they coordinated a rescue operation entirely bottom-up. This was nothing to do with the authorities entirely bottom-up... ..across Louisiana. And that's been replicated two or three times... ..in other flooding incidents in the US. Here's a slightly more sinister one. This is Blue Servo. This is large numbers of people who are concerned... ..about immigration in the US... ..looking at CCTV photographs at the Mexican border. At the US Mexican border. So, there's no wall here, as you will see. I don't know why that hasn't been built yet... ..but this has been marked up as, oh look... ..there's these infrared images... ..which is interesting and possibly disturbing. Some social machines are utterly lunatic. This is 4chan think tank. So, this is the Boston Marathon bombing... ..and a load of 4chan users got together... ..to really examine the photographs of the crowd... ..to determine who the bomber was. A lot of people thought it was this chap here... ..with the baseball cap, because here he is. He's got a bag. And now look, he hasn't got a bag. And oh look, everyone's watching the race... ..and he's looking over here. So, it must be him. Of course, it wasn't him at all. It was a completely mad idea. But that's another example of... ..you couldn't do that with people... ..and you couldn't do that with machines... ..but you could do that with the combination. Here's a slightly more sanguine example. This is Zooniverse. This is Citizen Science. This is the idea that many, many people at scale... ..can do certainly classificatory jobs within science... ..far better than scientists themselves could do. Zooniverse is a platform for doing this... ..run by the University of Oxford... ..and they run many, many projects on this. And this is Snapshot Serengeti. The idea is that people... ..they have hundreds of thousands of volunteers doing this. Quite happy to look at photographs taken... ..by cameras set up on the Serengeti... ..and they identify the animals within that. This is the interface for that. So, there are lots and lots of social science projects... ..a lot of astronomy stuff... ..a lot of stuff... ..decoding old letters. So, handwritten letters in the 18th century... ..very hard for a computer to read... ..but people can do it quite well... ..and getting the interaction. I'll next slide, actually. Well, the AI is quite often social rather than machine. And what I'm trying to get over is... ..or what the talk will try and get over is... ..there's actually not much of a distinction between the two. So, but this is a slide of the Zooniverse platform. This is how it works. And this structure is very important. So, what I'm saying is you have a load of data... ..which in the case of Snapshot Serengeti... ..is the photographs from the Serengeti National Park. Your scientists, your actual zoologists... ..will decide what data gets put onto these Zooniverse platforms... ..which sends that data to volunteers. Now, the volunteers of whom, as I say, there are hundreds of thousands... ..so you've got very, very large-scale interactions... ..do lots of things. They try and classify these objects... ..but they also talk amongst themselves. So, that's the top right there. And they have lots of discussions and they find anomalies. They worry about particular types of concepts... ..and that's quite informative for the scientists. They also talk directly to the scientists themselves. So, there are loads of conversations going on. I mean, there are many millions of conversations going on. This data goes back then to the... ..their classifications go back to the Zooniverse platform... ..which then goes into a kind of AI module here... ..which is at the bottom right. So does all the stuff from the talk.  And then the data science... ..you get a feedback to the volunteers. Basically, we'll adjust the data that the volunteers receive... ..viair the Zooniverse platform. And indeed, it can do other things like... ..you can also start to look for particular human behaviour patterns... ..so you can start to formulate hypotheses... ..about when a volunteer is getting bored... ..and is going to want to do something else. So then you'll send that person more interesting input... ..to keep their interest going... ..or possibly send them messages about exaltatory messages... ..to say you're doing a wonderful thing for science. So I don't know if that makes that clearer. They're all online. It's all the whole things online... ..so they just store the whole thing and pass it over. Yeah, so social activity happens... ..is it my... ..well, in fact, I'll just go on to this one. I want to draw a distinction between the platforms... ..on which discussions take place... ..and these are things like Twitter, Facebook and so on... ..and the social machines that take place on the platforms. So as another example of social machines... ..often talked of as Mechanical Turk. This is the Amazon's cheap labour crowdsourcing system. And you find that sociality breaks out... ..in all these things quite often. So Amazon's model insists that... ..the people using the volunteers in Mechanical Turk... ..in fact, they're not volunteers, they're paid... ..don't talk to each other. So they're trying to repress that social instinct.  So people on the same task will talk to each other... ..by another route, which then Amazon can't capture. So the sociality of social machines... ..breaks out all over even if you try to suppress it. Zooniverse itself, the citizen science platform... ..is talking about actually encourages that. It actually encourages conversation talk. And it's original models in there. They've learned that by trial and error. They've learned over many examples and many projects... ..that actually if you provide a really good forum... ..for volunteers to talk both to each other... ..and to professional scientists... ..you get far better output. So that's a few examples of social machines... ..and this concept actually makes sense. So my colleague David DeRour of the Oxford Research Centre... ..who is the co-author of this slide set... ..teachers, in fact, at this very moment... ..is teaching a digital humanities course in Oxford. And what we find there is that... ..you don't need to do much explanation of the concept of social machines... ..for the students to get it. It does kind of make sense. A social machine built or designed by post-grads... ..based on an existing voluntary charitable network... ..in somewhere in Latin America... ..a group called the Madres and the Mothers... ..who basically try and feed homeless and poor people... ..using leftover food from restaurants. And they immediately thought, well, OK, we could build that for that... ..and that would co-ordinate the behaviour in various ways. And they were very quickly, in the course of like an hour's... ..training able to produce really quite complex designs... ..such as that one. How am I doing for time? I'm probably getting quite... ..five to seven minutes. OK, I will probably skip... ..I'll talk about... ..the metaphor is a metaphor of a machine. The term machine is obviously a metaphor. Those are the sort of metaphorical interesting things. The slides you can download from the conference system. So I won't talk about that. This is a slide about how social machines tend to group together. You tend to get ecosystems of social machines. But I just want to talk briefly about... ..so I'm not really talking about a method of something. It's sort of a perspective on a phenomenon. And the comparator I like to use is digital divides. It's very hard to pin down what a digital divide is. But actually it's a phenomenon that most of us see and can identify. And social machines is a similar kind of thing. So you need the kind of methods you want to use... ..to investigate social machines. You're looking at the same methods that you used to investigate crowds... ..or crowdsourcing network interactions... ..and indeed any kind of data or information processing. So it's a kind of descriptive layer of granularity... ..that's between the individual and the web. It's not a micro description of what's going on. It's not a macro description. These are the kinds of methods that you would approach that kind of data with. But I think more interesting is... ..and this is something that is very nascent... ..how would you theorise social machines? And there's lots of ways of doing that. All social machines are... ..exclusory in some respects and inclusory in other respects. That's an interesting factor. Gender, ethnicity, all those well-known divides... ..the big discussion, Wikipedia I think is a classic social machine. There's a big discussion about gender on Wikipedia. It's a very largely male dominated system. And there's a lot of discussion about how that affects... ..the output of Wikipedia classification. Social construction, technology, social shaping of technology... ..clearly very useful, et cetera, et cetera. Social capital I think is a very interesting perspective. And the sort of Marxian perspective of what's the value... ..what's the appropriation of labour... ..and how much of that value is going to the platform... ..and how much to the people in the participants of the machine... ..is an interesting question. So the writing of intelligence... ..I'll just talk about intelligence very briefly. This is a very interesting example. This is a contest. This was, again, probably about 10 years ago, DARPA, the American Defence Research People, set up this thing called a red balloon challenge. So what they did, they put 10 weather balloons across the United States in these area... ..on announced areas. That's where they placed them. There were nine states of the USA right across from east to west. And then they... ..so they basically said... ..the contest was... ..which there was a prize of however many... ..a thousand pounds for the group who could find all 10 balloons... ..quick, fastest. And this was the winning... ..the winning team was the team from MIT. And this was their pitch. And they said, look, we're giving $2,000 per balloon to the first person to send us the correct coordinates. And $1,000 for the person who invited them. And $500 to who invited the inviter and so on and so on and so on. And then it kind of goes on to explain. And what... ..that worked well enough... ..so Sandy Penton from MIT. So the model of rewarding whoever finds the balloon but awarding whoever invited the inviter is called a query incentive network model developed by Kleinberg in 2005. And they began with a team of four. They ended up with 5,000 participants. And the whole thing took 10 hours. And in fact the runners-up, who used a similar method, had found nine balloons in that 10-hour period. Which is, again, you couldn't imagine any individual, any group of humans, whether they were four or 5,000, doing that without the technological affordances. But equally you couldn't imagine the technology achieving anything like that without 5,000 people going around looking for balloons and inviting their friends. The key thing is there were two incentives. One, you had an incentive to find and report the balloon, but then you're in danger, of course, of getting people free-riding, people in competition with each other. So then the second incentive to introduce new people into the network kind of nullified that question of rivalry. Probably running out there. There was just going to be a few examples of how social processes in the finance sector are being used to add additional value to the AI in some quantified context, but I won't talk through those. So I'll just wrap up. So social machines is a kind of a lens on human machine networks at scale. We tend to expect very rapid and unanticipated assembly. So we expect the unexpected, partly because of the creative subversive powers of human beings who will never do what you expect them to do, but you can probably say the same of machines as well. We were all completely surprised when this technology worked and our slides came up first time. In terms of intelligence, what's happening is that the intelligence of both the machine and the human are being augmented by the social processes. Data's a really big issue. These social machines got to create and they're going to consume lots of data, lots of interesting issues about who gets it. And just the ethics piece is very important. There are ethical pieces about how you design these things and how do you manage them and what are your ethical responsibilities there. Research is clearly, you're looking at social interactions so there are lots of research ethics issues. Privacy is a given privacy is a problem with all these things, as Mark has already alluded to. And then there's the issue about, you see a lot of things that we might call the crime area, ways of conning people out of their money so you can get what we might call antisocial machines. Not all these things do good. Things have started to appear on the research radar, just a couple of projects, which are both just finished. Sociom is sort of an EPSRC project that you might want to visit their website. And Smart Society is an EU project covering pretty much the same kind of ground. That says, please don't sue me if I've stolen your image. And thank you very much.


Two Vermont stands with Ukraine, congregating in a shade, because it's a hot sunny day. My name is Jeanette Visavius, and I am Ukrainian-American. And I live in the Burlington area, and I'm a Vermonter now. I'll be your emcee for today. Thank you for coming out. I know there are so many things happening locally in our country and the world. So many tragedies and upsetting things, including the war in Ukraine. The war continues. It hasn't stopped. Part of the reason we're having this event is to bring awareness that the war is still happening every day in Ukraine. We're going to bring awareness, and we're going to have local, speaking today, local Ukrainian Vermonters about how this war is impacting us. And also our connection to our culture. Parents and great-grandparents escaped from Ukraine during the time of Stalin to save their lives. I feel myself trembling as I say that. I can feel the generational trauma in my bones, in my blood, in my soul. And I know that other Ukrainians and Ukrainian-Americans feel the same way. We carry this trauma in us. And now it's happening again, and we can see what happened to our families and grandparents and great-grandparents all over the Internet, all over the news. And it can be traumatizing for you to know this about your Ukrainian friends. When it was through this last war, Russia's war in Ukraine, Russia's war in the homeland of my grandparents and great-grandparents, that I finally started meeting other Ukrainians here. I was looking for all of you, but I didn't know where you were. I met Yulia and Yana on the other side of City Hall Park when the war started. We started getting to know each other, supporting one another, and having rallies and fundraising and other activities. And this is one of them. We've been working on it for months. So thank you for coming. I'm going to invite Yulia, one of the co-main amazing organizers, to come with me to talk about what to expect for this rally and the rest of the day. Yulia Galenko-Rudik. Coming today. And I'm really happy to see, you know, you guys showed up, even though it's a really hot and warm day today. So thank you. I just wanted to give a quick update on what's happening today. So the rally here will be from one o'clock until 2.30, and we'll have multiple speakers, mostly Ukrainian-Americans, talking about the situation in Ukraine and how it's impacting them. And then at 2.30 we'll march. So we'll gather all together. We'll have flags. We'll have a big banner. We'll walk all together from this place and all the way up to the top of the Church Street, where there's a Church Street Unitarian Church lawn. And we'll finish there at about 2.40 with a cultural program. So from 2.40 till 6 o'clock at the Unitarian Church, 1.52 Pearl Street, at the end of the Church Street. There is a beautiful program set up on the lawn with Ukrainian food, music, arts and crafts. So you can come and just experience Ukrainian culture for a few minutes today. And there's lots of shade. Can you say that? Yes, there's lots of shade, okay? So definitely come there with us at 2.30. And then a huge thank you to the Church Street. Church Street Marketplace has been involved in this, and we have 25 businesses participating with us here today. So 25 businesses on Church Street, yeah, big round of applause. Thank you so much. 25 businesses has donated, participating, have specials. So please, there are booklets. There's information table in the shade right there. So please come. Look at the booklets. Check out the businesses. Come and support them. They've supported the cause. And the cost today is World Central Kitchen. So they have been in Ukraine in over 290 cities feeding people, feeding people that are fleeing their homes, people that don't have, you know, house or food or means to support themselves due to the war, and they've been displaced. And so World Central Kitchen is right there on the ground feeding those people, providing meals. And everything we raise today, everything that we sell, whether it's the flags or the pins or things of the cultural program, 100% everything goes towards Ukraine, as well as all the donations raised through Church Street businesses, 25 of them today. All of that will go towards World Central Kitchen. So please, I just ask, you know, please come and support those businesses. Come and support our cultural program. And the last but not least, we do have a silent auction. So also businesses donated the gift card. So they all start at pretty low bids. So there's a good opportunity to try and grab, you know, whether it's a sweetwaters or reruns or any other, you know, businesses on Church Street that you're interested in, there's plenty of gift cards starting as low as 25 bucks and as high as 150. So if there's an restaurant you're interested, you might as well just grab a gift card for a low price and, you know, enjoy a meal there if you're going to eat there anyway. But that way the funds that are going to go towards, again, Ukraine, World Central Kitchen feeding people in Ukraine. And that's all I have today. Again, I encourage you to come to the information table. Booklets are there. Lots of details. Thank you for coming. Thank you, Yulia. I was complaining about the hot sun about a half hour ago as I sweat. But then I remembered the Ukrainian soldiers and armed forces in their uniforms. How hot are they? So I stopped complaining. And you can remind me that if I complain again, for real. And there is a ton of shade at the UU. So I would like, oh, and also Yana, Yana, do you want to raise your hand She's also one of our co-organizers. Thank you, Yana. So Yana, Yulia, and I with Peace and Justice organize this event. So again, just want to acknowledge all of us and all of you. So I want to formally introduce Yulia Galenko-Rudik. Please forgive me if I don't pronounce your names correctly. I'm trying. Yulia Galenko-Rudik was born in Ukraine and currently lives in Chittenden County. She has close friends and family in Ukraine. Yulia has been actively pushing local events and projects in Vermont to help people in Ukraine. And again, she is one of the main organizers and powerhouse behind this event. We welcome Yulia Galenko-Rudik to the stage. Thank you, everyone. I'm here to give a little speech about kind of how this war impacts me and the situation in Ukraine. And first, I wanted to start with a song. I'm just going to read the lyrics to the song. The name of the song is 1944, and it was written by Ukrainian Crimean singer. Her name is Jamala, and it's a song that won a revision contest. And the song is 1944. It's talking about German invasion in Ukraine. But it really feels pretty much exactly the same, and it's really relevant to the situation that's happening in Ukraine now with Russia invading. When strangers are coming, they come to your house.  Where is your mind? Humanity cries. You think you're gods, but everyone dies. Don't swallow my soul, our souls. We could build a future where people are free to live and love the happiest of time. Where is your heart? Humanity rise. So who am I? I'm a US citizen, but I was born and raised in Ukraine. I've spent about half of my life in Ukraine and half here in the US. I've lived in Vermont for over 15 years now, and I'm a really proud member of this beautiful community. And it's really truly now my home. And I absolutely love this beautiful place and wonderful people of Vermont. And as a matter of fact, I'm so happy to see all of you show up here, or the fellow Vermonters just coming and supporting this cause. However, I still have a special place in my heart for the place where I was born, my motherland, my Ukraine. And I still have a lot of close family and friends there, and specifically my dad and my grandparents. And so as some of you may recall, the war started on February 24. I woke up that day, and I saw social media from my friends in Ukraine posting about the bombings. And I still remember just the feeling of horror I felt that day. And I called my dad in panic because my dad is in Ukraine, obviously.  And I just remember this terrible feeling of being afraid for your loved one, for someone you really care about, and being in a situation where they're physically in danger, where there's a bomb that could fall in their head and they could be in real danger. And I just remember being afraid to hang out my phone because I wasn't sure if I'd be able to talk to him again. So I try and stay in the phone for as long as I could. And that was the first day of the four months that follow of just constantly being afraid for my friends and my family and close ones. And just so many horrible things that's been happening over the last four months was Russian army invading Ukraine. The thing is, we live in the 21st century, where modern, connected, civilized, diplomatic society, and the society we live in today, we should be focused on solving global world problems. No one should be afraid to die, should be fearful for their lives. No one should be afraid that their loved ones will be killed in the explosion just because another country is proclaiming it's an empire. This is the things that should have gone into history. People of Ukraine are just like people of Vermont here. So just like all of us here, there are some farmers, there's teachers, there are small business owners, some analysts and professionals. A lot of these people worked really hard all their lives to build their livelihoods, to buy a house, build a home, build their lives. And now the Russian army is destroying all those hard-earned lives, all the homes that the people built. Can you just imagine that someone can just come into your house, take it all, say it's not yours, it's theirs, and not only take it, but actually destroy it. It's not like they even gonna use it. There are cities that's been completely torn down to the ground, completely bombed to the ashes. People live there, people build their lives. It was someone's livelihood, it was someone's home, and they just came and completely destroyed it. And we're not just talking material things, but also lives. Over 12 million Ukrainians have been displaced from their homes and had to flee. But even over 40,000 has been estimated civilians had died in the last four months. It's not just homes that are getting destroyed. Literally, we're seeing casualties every single day in the civilians. Just like the US, Ukraine is a nation that's been always driven by desire for freedom, democracy, and justice. As we know, US has been built on the promise of freedom, on the desire for freedom. And just like that, people of Ukraine, they also believe in freedom, democracy, and justice. People of Ukraine just want their freedom. They want to be able to choose their government, choose their laws, choose their language and traditions. Why should the Russian army just come and claim the Ukrainian land as their own and allow themselves to do whatever they want there? Just like there should be no person breaking into someone's house and taking something, even more so there should be no country that just comes and says, Ukraine is our own. Let's take people's homes. It's just not okay. It messes up the whole world order. And this is a catastrophe that's not only on the Ukrainian level, that not only impacts Ukraine, but the whole worldwide world. And the ripple effect is already impacting supply chain and economies worldwide. So how can the leaders of this world continue to let this happen? What can we do to help? The one thing that I ask, if our government hears me today, I ask them to do everything in their power to stop this war and provide requests and assistance and weapons to Ukraine to win this unjustified, unprovoked, and meaningless war. The war needs to stop and it needs to stop now before any more precious human lives are lost. It needs to stop by any means necessary. No more death, no more destruction. All of it needs to stop now. And now what all of you can do today to help?  Again, thank you all so much to home, however, everyone who just showed up. And I can tell you having close family and friends in Ukraine, I know firsthand the amount of positive energy and inspiration, the support from remote places like Vermont brings to people in Ukraine. They see pictures and videos and it gives them the inspiration to keep fighting, to keep on going, to know that they're not alone and the whole world stands behind them. And look, the Russian invasion has been going on for almost four months and war fatigue unfortunately seems to be setting in. And I know some are starting to get a little bit tired of hearing the war, it's been for a while. But the truth is, it has not slowed down.   So we need to stop. And as the public attention starts to decrease, people of Ukraine need help and support now more than ever to win this war. So please keep showing up, keep showing your support, share images of Ukrainian flags or sunflowers on social media and keep spreading in the world and awareness. No matter how tired it is, we have to continue until the war ends. And if you're able, please donate to the cause. There are so many areas of humanitarian crisis where people desperately need basic necessities to survive, from water to shelter to food. Every single penny counts and helps. And again, all donations here today goes to World Central Kitchen, feeding people who have no longer homes and access to food. So whatever you can do to help, whether it's a donation, just simply showing up and sharing a picture, I can tell you it matters. People in Ukraine know and see your support through pictures and videos, and it gives them a new wave of hope to win this war. So it does matter. It matters that you're here with us today. Thank you. Thank you, everyone, for coming, showing up here today and standing united in solidarity and support for other human beings across the globe fighting for their freedom. Thank you. Thank you, Julia. Vermont stands with Ukraine. Let me hear you say it. Vermont stands with Ukraine. Vermont stands with Ukraine. Vermont stands with Ukraine. So our next speaker will be Olga Hardin. And after Olga, Natalie and Marina and Marco and I are going to sing a song. Olga Hardin was born in the Ivano-Frankivsk region in Ukraine and currently lives here in Shinden County with her family. Olga wants to express support for her birth country of Ukraine. Olga. And thank you for being here today. Last time we met here was in March and it was cold and snowy. And that was the first time that we gathered together after the horrific news of the war in Ukraine broke out. It's hard to think that now we're in a different season where it's warm and sunny here and life is going on and things are moving along in most areas of life, but the war still persists in Ukraine. When Russia started the war in Ukraine, it was too shocking and too horrific to imagine that it could persist long-term. Since then, tens of thousands of people have lost their lives. Many were displaced. Cities and infrastructure has been destroyed in many places. Millions of families have been torn apart and children have been displaced from their homes. Many horrific war crimes have been committed that are too horrific to even talk about here. But our Ukrainian identity is stronger than ever. Majority of the world is supportive and has noted the persistence of the Ukrainian people. Unfortunately, it doesn't look like the war will end in the easy or quick fashion and it's vital that we continue to support our Ukrainian people and that our leaders continue to support the Ukrainian nation on a broader scale. I was born in Ivano-Frankivsk region of Ukraine in a city called Dolina. Dolina means valley and it's nestled in the Carpathian Mountains in Ukraine. It's strikingly similar to the Green Mountains of Vermont and it's now that I appreciate the beauty of the state in a different way and the reminder that I get daily of the people that don't have the same luxury of enjoying the summer without bigger concerns about their safety. I hope that our support here is heard and offers some light to those that feel that way and I hope that we can support Ukrainians in more than just a moral support way. I hope that the world leaders continue to assist with vital resources and the rest of the world also supports the millions of refugees that are trying to find their new normal. I hope that this evil, unjust war and soon. Slava Ukraine. As the singers come up, thank you Olga. Yulia, I wonder if you and I can teach these slogans ahead of time because I hear people calling out in Ukrainian. Can we teach them? Okay. Do you wanna say something about? We're gonna teach you how to say in Ukrainian glory to Ukraine and glory to the heroes. So Yulia's gonna teach us the Ukrainian part and it's a call and response. So there's a call and there a response and we're also gonna do this to the march. All right, so is everyone ready? Yes. So repeat after me. Slava Ukraini. Slava Ukraini. Slava Ukraini. Slava Ukraini. And then the response is hroyam slava. Hroyam slava. Slava Ukraini. Slava Ukraini. Glory to the heroes. And I'm gonna do introductions. Natalie Babi, who is here, is a third generation. Can people hear me? Yeah? Natalie Babi is a third generation Ukrainian-American whose grandparents were displaced from Ukraine during World War II. She grew up strongly involved in the Ukrainian diaspora, communities of Hartford and Willamantic Connecticut. I want to acknowledge Natalie for creating the website Stand With Ukraine, Vermont, and for creating a page on her website for this event. Thank you, Natalie. I just met Natalie a couple weeks ago and I've always wanted to learn this song. I only have the first part down, but there's other singers here that can help. So she'll introduce the song, but wait, I'm first gonna introduce Marina. Marina Varoneva is a Russian person with Ukrainian roots. Marina's father is Ukrainian. His family is from Kyrgyzstan and Odessa. Some of Marina's family is in Odessa right now. And also we have, I'm gonna try to pronounce it correctly, Marco Boreda, and he is from Boston. There he is on the guitar. He came down from Boston or up from Boston to help sing with us. He was born in Kiev and he lives in Boston now. On his day job, he's a lawyer and he's also a musician and singer and he has a passion for singing Ukrainian songs and playing Ukrainian music. And we're grateful he's with us. So anyone, Natalie will introduce the song and if anyone wants to join us here on the stage or down there, you're very welcome to. All voices are welcome. I'm just learning this song. Thank you, Jeanette. Say Sophia's next. Okay, and Sophia will be speaking after us. So we're going to sing a couple verses of a well-known patriotic song of Ukraine that has had a recent resurgence during this war. It's called Oy Uluzy Chervona Kalina, which translates to, oh, the red viburnum in the meadow. As Jeanette mentioned, if anyone else knows the song and would like to sing with us, well, we welcome you to come right up here and join us or sing from wherever you are. The song came to prominence in 1914 as the anthem of the Ukrainian siege rifleman who fought during World War I and were the first Ukrainian military formation in modern times. And the song has remained a symbol of Ukrainian nationalism and the fight for independence throughout the past century. In March of this year, the frontman of the Ukrainian rock band Boombox left his tour and returned to fight for his country in Ukraine and he recorded a rendition of this song in the streets of Kiev while wearing army fatigues and holding a rifle. That video and the remixes went viral and now people around the world are singing this song in solidarity with Ukraine. It's a song about fighting for liberty and a determination to win. Each verse ends with a refrain, hey, hey, our glorious Ukraine will rejoice. The red hill has fallen, our glorious Ukraine will rejoice. For the good will of the Ukrainian brothers, our glorious Ukraine will rejoice. It's with Ukraine. And with Ukraine. I'm going to get my notes to introduce Sophia. Sophia Shatkyvska is an artist who was born in Western Ukraine. She has lived in Vermont most of her life, most of her adult life that is. A few weeks after Russia invaded Ukraine this time, she decided to go and protest by herself in Montpelier, the capital of Vermont. Soon another woman joined her and then soon others joined Sophia, protesting the war in our beloved homeland. And now twice a week, people protest the war in Ukraine and hold vigil in front of the Montpelier Post Office and the federal building, twice a week since the war started and there are some of those folks here, including Sophia. Sophia, I can't wait to hear you speak. Sophia, everyone. And the next person after Sophia is Ellen Matz. Thanks to everyone and thank you, you are here on this beautiful day. I would like to talk, thank you, I'd like to talk about one person, one person, the most hated person in the world. Million people wishing him to be dead. This never happened in the history before. And it is not a pleasurable subject to talk about it. He titled himself, Sabiratil means collector of Russian lands, sort of gatherer, pick it up. On St. Petersburg economical meeting a few days ago, Mr. Putin compared himself to historical figure, Peter the Great. But we know that Russian Tsar opened the window to the Europe, but this one instead built the second Berlin wall with the fighting openings for artillery to scare the world. One can go to the woods to pick up mushrooms or strawberries on the field, not a land though, destroying buildings and killing humans before. In 10 commandments declared written, do not kill, do not steal, like last week all sun electrical station was stolen. I will not mention to love your neighbor. Conrad Putin's explanation called be different every day. Most of his speeches directed onto his own public. It could be about so-called protection Russian speaking people. I'm sure he looks now on Israel where are a lot of Russian speaking immigrants. Or for example, he could free Brooklyn. How about Brooklyn? A lot of Russian speakers over there. Denuncification of Ukraine mean genocide. And the third one, he calls it their historical land, such as Crimea, Belarus, Baltic countries, Syria, Kazakhstan, or some countries in Africa today were now inserted Russian KGB Orthodox Church. Why not? Peter's a great occupied land of Ogeroffins, Angra land before World War II. The names of those towns and villages around St. Petersburg was urgently changed. How about Karellium? Now his appetite is about Herson, Donetsk, Luhansk, Crimea, Harkiv. Putin's army takes a city, destroys it, and then called it historical Russian land. Down deal. His plan is accomplished. Sort of constant program. From the first day of the ending of the USSR, they felt regret and always wanted to return to the native to have their communist power in the world. And Putin's last speech in Crimea, he announced exactly this vision. Following this all in Donetsk, Luhansk, all local bureaucrats was exchanged on the Russian officers. We understand that the next will be Harkiv-nipro Odessa-Moldova until the Romanian border and then will be occupied the western part of Ukraine. Every night, every night, 30 huge military trucks full of Russian soldiers passing Ukrainian border onto Herson direction, still no success. In Kremlin, continue hysteria. They sending long distance rackets onto peaceful cities, destroying schools, hospitals, living quarters, infrastructions. Now let's look what is going on with the Russian society. One sober Russian journalist mentioned that it looks like people over there got some kind of mental disorder, destructive social consciousness, moral addicts. Everybody needs a serious healing process. Sort of deputinization, dystallinization. It will take a lot of time. That phenomena is much worse than fascism, putting a chief total destruction on his own nation by creating some sadists and executors. How to heal, you would ask. Physicians from the world would be needed to help to understand what is going on with their heads, some kind of brain occupation. Conrad Putin thinking only how to frighten the world, how to destroy Ukraine, how to rule all Russia and all Europe. We heard about one historical figure in much smaller territory. Remember, it was Herod the Great, Tsar of Judea. Same fear, same revenge, but we have plus nuclear button. The Minister of International Affairs, Mr. Lavrov, Minister of the War says, we didn't enter Ukraine by our own wishing. It is United State made us to be over there. It is West follows wrong direction, providing wrong politics toward Russia and we just protecting ourselves. Let's look at the Europe. What is Europe doing about us? The president of France, Mr. Macron, is listening. Around 100 hours he spent on a phone with the president of Russia, helpful, I guess. The grand world fight for humanity will the mentally unstable emperor of the 140 million people country. This is fatal minute. Will appear when all civilized people will unite and lift up their swords. It is only the beginning. We will have to forget some reverences and don't stop staring, steering our political dirt. We have to recover our side on a threshold. Unfortunately, it is time to forget about gas, balalaikas and price for gasoline. A brilliant journalist, Nevzoro, beautifully described the political system in Kremlin. I would like to share with you a little bit of this. It is funny image. He compare the system in Kremlin wisdom, Shishkibon, native Asian gourmet food. He said, there's cure it's main structure of Kremlin politics, Russian government. So skewer is this metal is Putin. Just imagine on this long twisted metal rod, a big juicy meat hang on it. So the rod skewer is Mr. Putin. But the pieces of meat, it is their weapons, clans, procurators, first bad pro-peganda, media, money, and et cetera. So if this nicely marinated meat in mystical Putin's marasm, it's mean craziness and cooks and the flame of the numerous forever wars. They hate him. They hate each other, but they depend on him. They adore him as a giver of job and power. It is a sect. If not that sect, which on historical, a lot of sects even in the United States, but never sect was occupied the government. So this sect created this war, created this politics and whole world supposed to unite and together we are stronger and world will win. But now whole world could see how other country was dealing, making business with home actually, with this monster. So now we recognize this and the world will win. I'm sure of this. Slavo, Ukraine. Thank you, Sofia. Also, I don't know if we mentioned peace and justice center was an integral part in making this happen. So I'm gonna thank the peace and justice center of Vermont for helping to organize with us and making this possible with the Ukrainians. Thank you, peace and justice center. They're an amazing organization, if you don't know them. So I'm gonna introduce Ellen Matz. Okay. Ellen Matz is a medical student at UVM. Ellen is a first generation Ukrainian-American. Ellen spent a lot of her childhood in Ukraine. When the war began, she and another medical student, Caitlin Marasi, joined together to find a way to make it easier for the Vermont community to help out. And they started Vermont for Ukraine. The mission of Vermont for Ukraine is to provide essential medical supplies and aid to those affected by the war in Ukraine. And after Ellen, we have Irene. Ellen Matz. Hi, everyone. Thanks so much for coming and supporting. Sorry, I'm a little nervous. My name's Ellen. I'm a student here and I just moved to Vermont last August. Came from New York, New Jersey. I was always living in a heavily Eastern European community. I think I took it a little bit for granted how easily accessible my roots were there. My dad is Ukrainian. I spent many of my childhood summers in Ukraine. My mom is Azerbaijani and we all speak Russian, so I'm very used to just saying that I'm Russian so that I don't have to go through explaining how complicated it is. But now I've been trying to let everyone know that I am Ukrainian and make a conscious effort. But despite that, I only speak Russian and feel like the language is tainted by what's happening. And it's really sad to see the divide that's happened between Russians and Ukrainians when we come from the same blood. And it's heartbreaking to think about a place that I've spent so much time in, one that's beautiful and kind to be attacked in such a way and it feels deeply personal. Coming to Vermont in August, it was really strange to be away from all of my loved ones who the war was affecting. And seeing that I wasn't talked about as much here as it would have been in my community in New York, it felt very strange to learn about the digestive system and have to keep going with school and pretend that it matters when so many horrible things were happening. So I felt like I needed to take something, like do something about it. And when Caitlin, one of my colleagues, when we learned that we're both passionate about it, we started Vermont for Ukraine. And the thinking was that we lived during a time where it seems that it's sort of one tragedy after another and with social media, you're kind of bombarded with it. And it's easy to get burnt out and feel like you can't do anything. And then you see the same infographics being reposted on social media and there's so many different charities. You don't know which one to choose and it gets overwhelming. And then sometimes you end up not doing anything at all. So that's why I'm really appreciative that there are events like this where we can come together and do something proactive. And that was sort of the goal of starting Vermont for Ukraine. It was to give people an easy way to help and to come together. And we were able to send out half a ton of medical supply to Rosem, which means together in Ukrainian, it's a Ukrainian nonprofit based in New York and they send all of this medical supply to Ukraine and we've sent things like tourniquets, portable ultrasounds. We've had a lot of donations from people in the community and from healthcare staff. And it was really great to see Ukrainians, Americans and really everyone come together for this cause. And I guess the main takeaway is that in times like this it's easy to feel helpless, but any donation counts and one tourniquet can save a life. And there's a saying I like that to save a life is to save the world and I truly believe in it. So I hope everyone, including the people of Vermont keep this cause in their hearts because it's easy to kind of get really rallied about it in the beginning and then to forget and then move on to all the other tragedies that are happening. But it is important to keep fighting and when my dad, similar to what Yulia was saying, when my dad told some friends in Ukraine what different people in Vermont were doing, they were very touched and it was great from where I'll because they know that even somewhere as seemingly random as Vermont people are thinking about them. And while in the past we were collecting direct medical donations, we're now shifting more to collecting money, we just got our 501C3 status and we'll be collecting donations next week and using our contacts at the UVM hospital that handles hospital supplies to order larger equipment like AAD machines and portable ultrasounds to send over. So we'll be updating our social media and website this week, so I guess watch out for that and you can find us at Vermont4Ukraine on Facebook and Instagram and vermont4ukraine.com and thanks again for coming and supporting in Slavo-Ukraine. Thank you so much, Ellen, raising money and collecting medical supplies, thank you. Amazing, I think she, what did you say, a ton or half a ton? Half a ton of medical supplies, that's amazing. There's so many ways we can support Ukraine and Ukrainians. Just gonna give a moment for those bells and maybe we can send our love to the people in Ukraine as the bells ring. It's only two o'clock, we can keep sending the love. Oh, I feel a cool breeze, that feels nice. So, next we have Irene and Yuri Bihun. Irene Bihun grew up in the Ukrainian diaspora in New Jersey, in a Ukrainian-speaking home. Irene loves the Ukrainian language, the culture and the traditions. Irene loves sharing her Ukrainian culture with others and is proud of the fact that she and her husband Yuri raise their Vermont-born children to speak Ukrainian and care deeply about Ukraine, especially given the current situation. In a moment I will welcome Irene and Yuri, but Barbara, you are up next. Irene and Yuri Bihun, welcome. Just like this. Hello, good? I think that's good, okay. Good afternoon. Good afternoon. It's, I too like Ellen, I'm nervous, but it's a pleasure to see all of you here today. And a little more to the right, okay, is that better? Okay. It's a pleasure to see so many of you here today and it's an honor to share some of my story with you, my Ukrainian story. I was born in New Jersey in 1953. The first person in my family to be born in America. My parents had arrived here from Ukraine in 1950 as refugees, although back then they were known as displaced persons.  My parents were both the oldest children in their families when they managed to escape the post-World War II and take over by the Communist Soviet Union.  Throughout my childhood, my mother sometimes expressed her sadness saying, I never dreamed that I would not see my mother ever again. And today sometimes I think I can't help but wonder how many current Ukrainian refugees may someday repeat this line to their children. I never met my grandparents or aunts or uncles or cousins, but all of that changed in 1991 when Ukraine regained her independence. I have traveled to Ukraine many times in the last 30 years and had the opportunity to live in Western Ukraine in 2003 with my husband and daughter. I established close relationships with my family, made many friends and fell in love with the mountains, villages and cities of Ukraine. You can't imagine how I mourn the loss of all of this. As I meet with other Ukrainian Americans, we all have the same question. What will happen to our beloved Ukraine? How will this end? My family still left in Western Ukraine does not plan on leaving. Aside from frequent air raid sirens, they remain safe, but we all know that in time of war, this can change overnight. And I pray that this part of Ukraine remains peaceful and quiet. Despite the fact that we receive terrible news from Ukraine every day, my husband, my children, my 97-year-old mother in New York State, and perhaps everyone here, we all hold out hope. Haven't we all learned about the resilience of the Ukrainian people? I have never been more proud to be Ukrainian. Please continue to hold Ukraine in your hearts. Glory to Ukraine. Good afternoon. I don't have any prepared statement. I was afraid this would be impromptu, but for a forester that spends most of his time in the woods and a quasi-academic, that should be easy to do. Last week, we had the opportunity here, John Herbst, who was a former ambassador to Ukraine when I was there in my Fulbright in 2003, 2004. I speak at the Hula Center down by the lake. If you haven't been there, it's beautiful. And I've heard John speak in Kiev. I've heard him speak in D.C. at Congressional hearings. John's a bulldog. He's very hawkish on Ukraine. And the first thing he said is, why should Americans care about Ukraine? What does it matter if you're walking down Church Street?  So, well, things have changed since February and we all learned a lot about Ukraine. But he said it was in the interest of our security and our long-term prosperity to be interested in Ukraine. So I'm going to end soon, but all I can say is, I urge you who are here to keep that in the forefront. Let's not forget Ukraine. There's a hot war. It's chronic. It's not going away. And they will need support. So, on that note, Slava Ukrainyi. Thank you both. Whoo! I have a little bit of a loud voice. I'm going to step back. Thank you, Irene and Yuri. Irene, I especially felt really moved. Some tears really came throughout many of the speeches, but for some reason yours really touched me, especially. Yeah, so just taking a breath. And that's something I need to keep remembering to take some breaths all the time because this hits home. So next, we have someone who's not Ukrainian, but she is someone who is an ally of the Ukrainians, Barbara Filidi. I'm going to read a little bit about Barbara. I met Barbara at the first rally on the other side of City Hall Park when the war first came out. And she asked if she could speak for a few moments. And she has more than a few moments. Barbara Filidi lived and worked in Ukraine from 2005 to 2008, post-Orange Revolution on a US-funded democracy project. Barbara regularly attends the weekly vigils for Ukraine and Montpelier. Today, Barbara will share a message and poem from her friend currently living in Kiev, Barbara Filidi. And then after Barbara, we have Yana. Barbara. Thank you, Jeanette. Yes, I'm here with a message and a poem from a very dear friend in Kiev. And as Jeanette said, I worked there for several years at a time when democracy was really going through a very lively and vibrant period. And I can attest firsthand to how deeply Ukrainians care about their democracy. And so by reading my friend's message in poem today, I am trying to honor her and also all of my friends who are in Ukraine to let them know that we do not forget them, that we remember them, and that we support them. So these are the words of someone who has been living through the war. We are OK, but the pressure does not decrease. I can't get used to the situation because every day we receive messages from our friends or their friends about someone who suffered from this war. A daughter of my classmate lived in Irpin. Her apartment is practically destroyed by Russians. Our daughter is a professor at the university, unlike teaching her students even during this war. Thank you for all your support to Ukraine. Thank you for pushing your government to make the decision to support us in winning this war. Our victory is needed not just for saving Ukraine, but for saving the whole world from evil called Russian Nazism. I can't believe it's the 21st century. I know that Russia will wake up one day. I just feel real pity for all civilized Russians, who are captured in there and who realize the deep of this into which the Putin regime is pushing Russia. And then just this morning after I wrote to her and told her about this event, she sent me this message. I wish your event to be a great success. I wish the participants to renew their electricity of empathy and love, which will make our joint efforts more powerful and invincible.  We are continuing to lose lives. Our houses are being continuously burnt down to ashes. We do not spend our time to be afraid. We are focusing on one major goal, to push the enemy away from our beloved land. We do not have other goals. We do not have a fear. No. Well, not exactly. We do have one fear, that you all are getting tired. Please do not allow yourselves to get tired. We do need your support. We do need your love. Please help us to keep the divine light on. It's only by joining our forces, by joining our love that we are able to win the war against the darkness. So my friend's poem that I'm going to read was written in March. And it was the day after Russia bombed the theater in Mariupol, where about 1,000 to 2,000 civilians, mostly children and elderly people were sheltering. And the theater was the one which was bombed despite the fact that in very large letters outside the Russian word for children was displayed as a way to warn the jets away from them. But here is her poem. I stand on the edge of the abyss. In front of me is Russian haze. It's the same as before. I will not surrender to the arms of evil. I stand on the edge of the abyss. And behind me is my land. My Ukraine is heavenly. I'm with you, my country. I stand on the edge of the abyss. Above me is the universal light. There is no fear. There is only hope that the world will remember its vow, a vow that is a call to life, that vow which is a call to love. Are you afraid?  Come on. Don't betray me. Don't let me down. Ukraine stands guard. Down there is hatred, vengeance. I will not go down. I know it.  We are the message, the message that there is to be peace. The message that there is to be life, to be. To remember the sacrifices and that no one will forget the evil done. Do not forget. Mara Florence Skyer, March 17, 2022. Slava Ukraini. Thank you, Barbara. And thank you to your friend. Powerful, powerful words, powerful message. To not get tired. To not forget Ukraine. So we have Yana Walder up next. And again, Yana is one of our main organizers. We're almost finished with the rally just to give the heads up. After Yana, we are going to sing the Ukrainian anthem. So any Ukrainians or non-Ukrainians who want to come sing with us up here, it's gotten a little cooler up here. You're welcome to. It would be very nice. Or you could sing down there. The words are in your brochure. And they'll be closing the rally and marching. So about Yana, Yana Walder is originally from Ukraine and has been a Vermonter for 11 years. Again, Yana is one of the core organizers of this event. Thank you, Yana. Yana spends time and energy every day, hours, communicating with single mothers in Ukraine. Hours. There have been meetings where Yana was supposed to be there, but she's like, I can't. I'm talking to the single mothers. I'm trying to raise, I am raising money. I'm raising money for these single mothers and their children. And she'll talk more about that. That moves me. That moves me. And I hope that moves you. Yana Walder, you can speak more about this. Come to the microphone. More louder? Okay. Tina, just a little higher. Thanks. Thank you. Sorry, I lost my voice. My name is Yana Walder and I'm a Vermont resident for 11 years and living in the US since 2001. I'm involved with gathering of financial donations for direct cash grant support of Ukrainian single moms and dads. Families with young children, families where dads are missing in action and war, support of grandparents raising minor children, support of teenagers stranded and not able to reunite with their families in Russia occupied Ukrainian territories and teens without families. This type of work is not my profession, but it is my passion. I'm a commercial real estate agent here in Burlington, Vermont, but I have been involved with fundraising for Ukrainian orphanages on and off since moving to US. I'm grateful that with support of my friends and colleagues during this time of a full scale Russian invasion and genocide of Ukrainian people, I'm able to help Ukrainians directly without going through any large international organizations. I'm convinced that the decisions that we all make to help in whatever small way are moving the scales of history toward justice and the victory of good over evil. What Russia has done to Ukrainian people is pure evil.  Russian soldiers physically harm women and children as young as nine months in ways that are difficult to talk about. They also indiscriminately murder Ukrainian men for saying something wrong or not saying anything at all, just for the fact that Ukrainian blood runs in their veins. A too small of a donation doesn't exist, a too small of an effort. Every thoughtful kind gesture matters like never before. Every person here in Vermont and around the world is important in the fight for victory of a young democracy against an oppressor. Ukraine is a young democratic country and its victory is important to every person in the United States. So I'm going to read a list of folks, of people that reached out to me this week seeking help. So I was able to transfer $100 to Natalia in Zaporizhia who suffered a stroke after seeing her 23-year-old son being shot in the abdomen by the Russian soldiers. And I was also able to raise $800 for her son to have his fourth surgery to repair the damage. I sent you $200 to two sisters, 20 and 15 years old, who had to evacuate from Russia-occupied territory with their father. Their father died of a heart event last week and the village scraped together enough money for bus tickets so they could go to Western Ukraine to see their mom who is currently terminally ill. And they're living in the kindergarten as a displaced Ukrainian person.  She said it took a very long time to give birth under sounds of distant explosions. I was able to find $500 for Anastasia Machushenko in Harkiv region. The town where I was born, Peromysky, is hosting 5,000 internally displaced people that is proportionally equal to Burlington, hosting 7,100 displaced Vermonters from Plainfield. The bombing is that close. 16 people to a room in a kindergarten building, they need to buy slow cookers so that people can make food for themselves. But they also need everything else from clothing to mattresses to shampoo to groceries. And that was just one day, Thursday. And before that, I was able to send $100 to a volunteer named Ivan Medved. He had a loaded van full of food and supplies for the soldiers on the front line in Harkiv and needed money for gas. Previously, I was able to find $600 for ballistic helmets for soldiers who for three months kept Harkiv, a population similar to San Diego, California, saved from Russian occupation and ruined Putin's plan to take my city in three days. I sent $250 to Volodymyr Shapochnikov, who had four boxes of diapers and baby food, which another volunteer in another part of Ukraine was able to trade for sunflower oil. Volodymyr is going to buy pasta and groceries and delivered to a small village in Taranivka, which he actually did while I was here, which is hosting over 1,000 internally displaced Ukrainians, and that's in the village of 5,000. I was able to send $200 to a female soldier who is collecting money to buy a vehicle for her unit to evacuate wounded soldiers. Their vehicle got shot up and destroyed. I sent $100 to an Asetian bakery located in occupied Herson, the baked bread and make soup every day and the lines for food are getting longer. And Russians do not let humanitarian aid pass into the city to deliver life-saving supplies. I sent $30 worth of baby items to a grandma who is alone with a one-month-old baby. Previously, we set her up with all the baby necessities like formula diapers, stroller, baby carrier, and some cash. On June 19, I sent transfers totaling $1,800 to 13 months with a total of 25 kids. It included a young couple who barely evacuated from occupied Herson. Young mother literally negotiated with Chechen soldiers to let them through and not leave them in the field overnight on their bombs with a newborn. She had to lie and pay them. It included two single moms who had four kids each. It included kids with disabilities. On June 16, I found $200 for a dad with a baby. Mom went to visit her elderly parents and is now unable to leave occupied Militopole. Russian soldiers were not let her out. On June 15, I sent 21 transfers to moms with a total of 36 kids, totaling $2,700, including many elderly that these women are also taken care of, including moms battling cancer, including children in need of medical attention, including a pregnant woman who hasn't eaten in four days. Every person I talked to on video to get a little bit about their situation and the urgency is a real person suffering greatly and not at their fault. My wish for the world is to never know the sound of an airplane bomber flying low and dropping rockets on homes and in your beloved homeland, and my other wish is that we do not look away from what is happening in Ukraine and that we always remember that by some chance of luck we ended up here, and if by chance you ended up being born in Ukraine and we're there now with your kids and your elderly parents under bombs and without food and you reached out to someone like me living in the US for help. My hope is that I would make an effort to help you too. Thank you, Yana Walder, thank you for everything you do. My grandmother, again who escaped Ukraine around World War II, she always said to us, we never thought we would come to the United States, we never thought that, and she said, you never know what's gonna happen, you never know where you're gonna end up, and I have some feeling that as I hear people speak. So thank you, Yana, where are my glasses? They're here on my shirt. So next, I believe it's time for the Ukrainian anthem. We welcome anyone who wants to sing with us to come with us. It doesn't matter what your voice sounds like. You're welcome to sing down there, sing with us, we welcome it, we really do. And he's like, just stand right there. So we'll give a moment for a few people to join us. I'm gonna read a translation that my friend Tatyana from Minnesota, it's her own translation, her own interpretation of the Ukrainian anthem. Ukraine still lives. Her freedom and glory still live. Brothers and sisters, luck shall smile upon us. Our enemies shall disappear. Like dew in the morning sun, and we shall remain masters of our own beloved land. We do not fear to give our body and soul, if that is freedom's price.  Slava Ukraini. Heroine Slava. Slava Ukraini. Heroine Slava. Slava Ukraini. Heroine Slava. So Marco from Boston will lead us and we'll all sing together. She never died in Ukraine. Neither Slava, nor Olya. She is our brother in Ukraine. She will smile upon us. Our enemies shall disappear. Like dew in the morning sun, and we shall remain masters of our own beloved land. We do not fear to give our body and soul, if that is freedom's price. And we shall show that we are brothers of the Cossack family. We shall give our body and soul, if that is freedom's price. And we shall show that we are brothers of the Cossack family. Radoom! It feels really, really good to be with all of you here and to see all of you outside there. Don't forget Ukraine. And we have more. In a few moments we'll have a march. Yulia is going to say a few more words. We're going to talk about what's. I love singing the Ukrainian flags. Thank you for standing with us. So we're going to talk a little bit about what's happening next and then we're going to march up Church Street. So we'll be closing the rally piece and we'll be marching up the top Church Street. We're at 2.40. Once we end the rally, we'll start cultural programs. So again, there'll be food. There'll be some water. And it's been a hot couple of hours. There'll be chairs and shade and tables to sit down. We'll bring silent auction there. There's amazing, beautiful Ukrainian art for sale, as well as different beautiful clothing and other art pieces. Pysenka, there will be demo of live Pysenka. People actually making and painting Ukrainian eggs. And then we just have other wonderful things for sale and other things going on. We do have a workshop at 3.30 and 4.30. So the workshops include one of the workshops is making the head crown. So you can see I'm wearing one of these beautiful Ukrainian flower head crowns. So one of the workshops, you can actually make your own Ukrainian head crown from flowers. So that's one workshop at 3.30. And then we have another workshop at 4.30 that you can learn to make Ukrainian embroidery. So you can see we're all wearing these beautiful embroidered shirts, which is Ukrainian traditional clothing. And it's pretty interesting because Ukrainian clothing, the embroidery actually have hidden messages. Every little stitch means something, whether it's a letter, a symbol, a word. So there's different symbolism behind it. And you can learn a little bit about it over there and actually can make your own stitching. So we hope to see as many of you here and again, Chair Street businesses participating. So along the way, you can also stop by. The booklet have information. We have 25 businesses participating. So please stop by. I know Red Square right there. They're serving some special Ukrainian drinks, blue and yellow, which sounds like really fun. And then we have multiple other stores that are doing 10% specials. So just check out in the booklet. We have a variety of places that are supporting us today. And again, thank you. I hope you all march with us to the Cold Show program. Thank you. We're also going to have more music. I know she mentioned that Marco will be singing and playing more Ukrainian music. Natalie and Marina. And we also have two other performers and much more. We have amazing borscht and other Ukrainian food. Please join us. Let's gather by the tables for the march. Thank you everyone for coming. Thanks again to the Peace and Justice Center for supporting us. Slava Ukraini! The people of Kostan are not just a few, they are young and happy. Well, I think song number one has to do with song number two. Here with me. It's been written about 15 years later or in 1962. I'm now an official anthem of Kiev. It talks about the beauty of the hills over the Knieper, of the quiet nights. And the frame is, how could I possibly not love you, my Kiev? So my wife translated the first words so beautifully. So I got to start with the English lyrics and then go into Russian, go into Ukrainian. Safe, great, swing, swing Quiet days burning low How dear and lovely Hard to meet Knieper slopes Where branches are swaying In dream-seered love Not to love you, my Kiev How could I possibly not love you, my Kiev? Safe, great, swing, swing Quiet days burning low How dear and lovely Hard to meet Knieper slopes Where branches are swaying In dream-seered love Not to love you, my Kiev How could I possibly not love you, my Kiev? So my wife translated the first words so beautifully. So my wife translated the first words so beautifully. Safe, great, swing, swing Quiet days burning low How dear and lovely Hard to meet Knieper slopes Where branches are swaying In dream-seered love Not to love you, my Kiev How could I possibly not love you, my Kiev? Safe, great, swing, swing Quiet days burning low How dear and lovely Hard to meet Knieper slopes Where branches are swaying In dream-seered love Not to love you, my Kiev How could I possibly not love you, my Kiev? So, Odessa is a wonderful, wonderful city. A multicultural hot spot. Fabric where Russians, Ukrainians, Jews, Greeks and many, many other nationalities wait to get for hundreds of years. Odessa is a unique human, unique food abiding in protection. And of course, we're at sea. So this song is about Odessa, the city of beauty in my dreams. There is a city that I see in my dreams But if you knew how dear The black sea that I saw The next Caucasians The next Caucasians The next Caucasians There is a city where I swim and dance On the shore I would go to happiness There is a air where I breathe in my childhood And I could not breathe in my home And I could not breathe in my home The black sea I will never forget my bulwars The fire of the passage of life The rock where we are my dear In the first sight In the first sight In the black sea My dear country, my friend We were lying in the fire, we were fighting I will not give wine, I will not drink gold And we are in my city, in the city And my city is called a hero In the black sea And life is always wonderful As long as you are old or young But with each spring, I will meet In Odessa, my sunny city In Odessa, my sunny city In the black sea In the black sea In the black sea A real genius, Bowdy Walsuk Who had a number of hit songs around that timeframe He was a student at the medical university in Chalm FC And also became a performing artist He was really a unique talent This song is also one of his I think this is his first real hit Real well known song And it's absolutely beautiful lyrically I will go to further mountains and a broad meadows and I will ask the wind so the wind won't sleep in the middle of the day because could wind fall on his free wings over the mountains over the woods and help me find my beloved with her hazel eyes and black eyebrows. My darling, my love, the world is brighter because of you.  I'm bringing love, I'm bringing my dreams and gardens are blossoming for me when I go to see you. I will go to further mountains and a broad meadows and I will ask the wind so the wind won't sleep in the middle of the day because could wind fall on his free wings over the woods over the woods and help me find my beloved with her hazel eyes and black eyebrows. My darling, my love, the world is brighter because of you.  I bring love. So I'm very proud and happy that I could do it in the original Ukrainian for you today. The song is about Kobzar, an old Bandura player who is looking back at his life, at his love at the city square, Maidan, where he sang his songs, where he met people, where he saw his life happening all around him in this village. And so he is begging to help him cross Maidan one last time before he dies. He's singing about his son, singing with him at Maidan today about his wife, who can no longer even recognize because he's losing his eyesight. It's a beautiful poetry and quite an emotional song. Hopefully we'll do justice. Like I said, I don't think you ever heard this in Ukrainian, even though you might have heard it a few times in Russian. So I'm very proud and happy that I could do it in the original Ukrainian for you today. So I'm very proud and happy that I could do it in the original Ukrainian for you today. So I'm very proud and happy that I could do it in the original Ukrainian for you today. So I'm very proud and happy that I could do it in the original Ukrainian for you today. So I'm very proud and happy that I could do it in the original Ukrainian for you today. Thank you, thank you.


The following is a production of New Mexico State University. You have been working here for a long time, and you are successful. I'm not saying I'm successful, but 10 years ago, we started this restaurant here. Wow, 10 years ago. Actually, I know that there are a lot of strict rules for opening a restaurant here in America. Can you teach me? Okay, I'll share my personal experience with you, okay? Okay, thank you. At first, I didn't really understand the American restaurant. But after a while, I found that it wasn't that hard to follow. Look at my restaurant. The business is not bad. My customers here are my familiar customers. They like my restaurant. It's clean. Actually, following the American restaurant is good for my business. You know that the Chinese and American restaurants are not the same. But the American restaurant is not that hard to follow. What should I do?  Okay. The American restaurant is very well-off. If you don't pay attention to the American restaurant, the small restaurant is four times bigger. These small restaurants will make people sick. The American restaurant's rules are to help you to be safe. The customers won't get sick. Hey, Anna, can I have some tea? Okay. Think about it.  Your business may be in trouble. First of all, you have to go to the restaurant in line with the rules. In the US, it's very difficult to find a restaurant for your customers. In China, you can find chicken, pork, beef, fish, eggs, and vegetables on the street. You can't find them here. Where should I go? You can buy them from a Chinese restaurant or from a food supplier. You can buy vegetables from the local food market. You also have to check the food at the same time when you arrive at your restaurant. If there is a problem with the food, you have to immediately retire. Because such food may not be safe. Checking your food is not good. Your business and your business will be in danger. The police will ask you to separate the chicken, meat, fish, and vegetables from the restaurant. The rules of the restaurant must also be put in the fridge or in the freezer. What should I do if I only have a fridge? You should put the chicken and meat in the freezer and put the vegetables in the freezer so that the meat will not touch the vegetables. You should also keep in mind the temperature of the food. The police will also check if the temperature of the food is above 130 degrees. But keep the food at such a high temperature. The food may turn dry. The fried rice cooked with rice may not taste good. After the opening of the restaurant, the food is safe to eat. I have learned a lot about the quality of the fried rice. If rice does not stay at a high temperature, the fried rice will grow very fast. It will make people sick. If people think the fried rice is sick, I believe it will not come back. It will also be told to others. I have heard that there are several restaurants in the area. One of them went to the restaurant and ate something that was not clean and was not sick. How can you maintain the temperature of the food and have enough water to cook the fried rice? After the food is cooked, put the rice in a rice cooker. Do not turn off the heat. Cover it with a lid. When the rice is cooked, add some water to prevent it from turning dry. The police will also check the temperature of the food. As you know, the Chinese restaurant uses high temperature to fry the fried rice. And the restaurant uses low temperature to fry the fried rice. So the temperature of the fried rice is not a problem. But no matter what, you must ensure that all the raw ingredients before frying the rice keep the temperature low. You must keep the raw meat, chicken and fish low temperature. Otherwise, the rice will grow on the ingredients. Fried rice cannot kill all the rice. You must separate the other ingredients. Americans like clean food and clean restaurants. If the restaurant is not clean, it will not come back again. So clean restaurants are good for business. I am responsible for the employees' washing. I used to wash the employees' towels and towels. Later, I proposed to them that they must wash their hands before doing anything. For example, I proposed to the employees to wash their hands before cutting the meat. After cutting the meat, they should wash their hands. Before cutting the vegetables, they should wash their hands. Also, I told them that they cannot wash their hands in the mountains. They cannot accept that. They must use warm water to wash their hands for at least 20 seconds. Then, they should use clean water to wash their hands. Then, they must use a tissue to wash their hands. Many Chinese people will think that using a tissue is very wasteful. It is very useful for business. I used a lot of clean water to wash the towels. Don't wait until the water is boiled before changing them. The police also requested that the towels should be disinfected after washing them. First, you need to wash the towels. Then, you need to use clean water. Then, you need to soak them in the water. You can kill the water and maybe keep all the small things on the towels. Add a cup of white water and add it to the warm water. Don't use the smelly white water because it is not safe. Also, put all the chemical products in a place that is far away from being eaten. This way, they will not be polluted. I have been doing this for a long time. Although I am making it in a very serious way, I never let them do the work of being sick. If they come, I will arrange them to go home and take care of their health. They will be sick. Now, they understand that if they take care of their health, they will take care of their customers and their colleagues will be sick. Also, if the workers are cut off, I will tell you that they must take care of the important gloves. I think this is the key to opening a restaurant in the United States. There are some differences and there are many details and requirements to be remembered. At first, I had the same problem. Later, I got used to it. Moreover, to me, following the American restaurant rules has become very simple. I have been in the restaurant for 10 years. I have never been alone. I have always been in the restaurant in terms of cleanliness. Remember cleanliness. In other words, clean hands, clean plates, clean restaurants, and next to you, means to be pure and clean, to be clean and clean. To be clean and clean. To be감, means to be clean, to eat and drink when it is at room temperature. To be clean and clean. So that food and meat are safe and sound. Thank you. You did a good job. Overall, I am happy to help. The preceding was a production of New Mexico State University. The views and opinions in this program are those of the author and do not necessarily represent the views and opinions of the NMSU Board of Regents.


People look at the sperm and people use cell phones and the sperm, usually sperm swim and they swim straight. But if you expose them to radiofrequency, mobile phone waves, they swim in circles. There's a chronic link to cancer. It decreases your sperm mobility. It has put billions and billions of dollars in the past 30 years to mislead the public as to the health effects and keep the public on. Children are much more affected than adults. And there are clear indications of a link between increased electromagnetic fields and autism spectrum disorders. We took 10 autistic signals under the form of radiofrequencies. Well, then there is no doubt that artificial radiofrequencies such as those of cell towers and in particular these new types of towers that have a much higher damage. Radiation can lead to cancer as heart tumors, brain tumors, DNA damage. Wireless radiation is linked to infertility, to autism, Alzheimer's and more.


Seeing no further introductions, it's now time for a member's statements. The member from Alderman Orpho. Speaker, Christmas Spirit received a boost locally with the flip of a switch opening the town of Simkel's Christmas Panorama River of Lights, Ontario's original light festival. Magic and childhood fantasy blend with tradition, family, and multi-generational connectedness combined with hot chocolate and horse-drawn wagon rides. Volunteer crews have been working as they have for the past 60 years to set up the approximately 60 displays from the three little pigs to a red tractor to a plethora of Christmas related exhibits. The tales, the legends of our youth are brought to light every evening in a stunning sea of 300,000 lights loops through and around the trees. Besides bringing joy and a smile to the face of the young and young at heart, the exhibits attract many from afar boosting business and our winter tourism economy. Simkel's Panorama and all of our area Christmas parades, the concerts, remain iconic spectacles of this wonderful time of year. It's really a fanciful, thrown-together blend of the religious, the commercial, civic pride, and quite honestly, just plain fun. Here, here. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. Today I want to talk about service dogs and the important role they play in Ontario. Children are being denied access to their school for their service dogs. Dogs that have, they have with them at all other times. They help relieve anxiety, provide them with safety and independence. That has to change, Speaker. We are joined by, today with, by Deanna Elaine for my riding of Hamilton Mountain. Deanna is 17 years old and she's been volunteering with autism dog services since she was 10. She came to Toronto today with Carlin, who she is training so that a child can get the full benefit of what Carlin has to offer. But she made that trip with trepidation because as a service dog in training, Carlin can be denied access at any time. The rules under the AODA for service dogs do not apply to dogs in training. Security here at Queen's Park understands that to be properly trained, service dogs must be exposed to exactly the same situation that they will encounter in their future lives. But there is nothing to ensure that elsewhere. Deanna is also an advocate. Thanks to her lobbying, Hamilton City Council passed a bylaw last May that ensures access for service dogs in training to all public facilities in our city. I urge this government to take action so that service dogs are fully accommodated. They bring incredible benefits to so many people and they deserve our support. Thank you very much. Thank you. I remember Samus, the member from Kingston and the Islands. Thank you, Mr. Speaker. At 5.30 this morning, I did a bit of grocery shopping at the local 24-hour store. Mr. Speaker, I left with more than I bargained for, but not in the usual sense. The store was primarily empty except for me, a few staff members and a man working behind the check out. As he was scanning my items, we made small talk and I learned how he had spent the last 12 hours serving his customers. Throughout the night, he was regularly visited by individuals with addictions to drugs and alcohol, people suffering from mental health problems and what is worse still, he feared for his safety. He was from Africa and working hard to have a good life here in Canada. All he wanted was to have a home of his own, but no matter how hard he'd worked, he can't get ahead. There are many others in the same situation who are living on a minimum wage trying to make ends meet. When he learned that I worked at Queen's Park, he thanked me for the recent increase in minimum wage. Mr. Speaker, I am so proud of our government's commitment to ensuring the best future for all Ontario families and workers through Bill 148. As I left the store, I looked back at the man and I watched him greet his next customer. For once, I was pleased that I was leaving with more than I had shopped for. Thank you. Merci, Miigwech. Thank you for the member Samus, the member from Kitchener Conestole. Yes, thank you, Speaker. For the past 33 years at the beginning of December, as dusk falls in the town of New Hamburg, residents have gathered at the corner of Huron and Piel, streets of St. Carol's and St. Wellesley, Apple Cider. As they await the official lighting of the New Hamburg Tree of Light. And this Friday marks the 34th annual celebration. Kicking off with the New Hamburg Concert Band, of course, the lighting of the tree and new tree may I add, will soon eliminate the township thanks to the many Walmart businesses and community members who ensure that not one light goes dim. Speaker, for more than three decades, the New Hamburg Lioness and Lions Club have been working tirelessly throughout the year to make this event the success that it is. And for 34 years, they have raised over $300,000 to support projects within our community. Speaker, the Tree of Light event kicks off a series of Christmas parades, of course, in my riding this weekend. I'll be participating in the Almira, Baden and New Hamburg parades and following them throughout the month of December, Wellesley, St. Agatha, St. Clemente, and New Dundee will also be holding their annual Christmas parades each year. I look forward to attending and meeting many of my constituents who come out and brave the cold to come together and join in the Christmas holiday spirit. Of course, get a glimpse of Santa as well. Speaker, I'm always so impressed with how our communities come together with small budgets, but big hearts to make this time of year one of joy, happiness and togetherness for all those of all ages. That's what our communities are all about. It's what the Tree of Light celebration is about. And it's, of course, what Christmas is all about. Speaker, Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to everyone. Thank you. Thank you. For the member statements, the member from Nickel Belt. Thank you, Mr. President. Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I wish to talk about the bill which create the Francophone University in Ontario. We thought it would be joy for us because I work on that file for many years. And today, I'm shameful. The government will bear this creation to enact other laws. The omnibus bill, nobody will remember all other universities in Ontario. The other bill, it's a tradition in Ontario that goes back to 1841 when Queen University was created in Kingston within 2008 when Algoma was created in 2008. Why was this bill was buried? We will not talk about some issues. For example, the Franco-Iterian will have a limited mandate with the limited program other than other programs, nursing and architecture. And the Francophone University will not be allowed to offer this program even though the demand exists. I don't know why liberals of Mrs. Nguyen are not able that all other government have done in Ontario to have our university with a unique bill to that effect. For the member statements, the member from Ottawa, Vanier. Yesterday, the federal government excused to LGBT communities and underscore the importance of all these groups everywhere in the world. I think it's also important to remember the heroes that were there and defended and protected these rights throughout the world. One of these women heroes is a former colleague of mine, a law professor named Nicole La Violette. She was a pioneer in the area of sexual and gender minority refugees. For 18 years, she trained members of the Immigration Refugee Board on how to adjudicate sexual and gender minority claims. She was also one of the key people who assisted the United Nations in developing guidelines to recognize LGBTQ refugees because it's hard to imagine, but at a point in time, gays and lesbians were not recognized as deserving to be considered as refugees. Now, she was able to advise the United Nations to develop the guidelines. Now, I want to say I am sad to say that my former colleague founded the Ottawa Capital Rainbow Refugee was the first one to sponsor a private sponsor of a refugee in Ottawa. Sadly, she died of cancer in 2015, so she was not there yesterday in Ottawa for the apology, but her partner, Lisa Ebert, was and she and other people continue to do the good work that Nicole had started. Capital Rainbow has now sponsored more than four dozen people so far. I just want to say thank you to Lisa and I want to say a la mémoire de Nicole, merci pour tout en fin. And to the memory of Nicole, thank you for all the work she's done. The spirit of Christmas is very much alive and nipissing with a host of seasonal events taking place to inspire the Yuletide cheer. I understand the North Bay Santa Claus parade was a huge hit as always. Speaker, I was here for the weekend votes, but this past Friday I did have the opportunity to take part in the annual downtown Christmas walk, which features the traditional tree lighting and showcases our downtown merchants. It was a great opportunity. Our office stays open late and I can tell you firsthand the cookies that my wife Patty, Ms. P, as she's called at home, offers up their well worth the visit to the office. The holiday season and nipissing also offers up some wonderful music entertainment. The Canadian Forces base North Bay Band just held its annual concert at the Capital Centre. Scholar Hall was packed for the third annual Christmas concert in support of the nipissing Serenity Hospice. Haley Fest is an annual one-night celebration of local children's school choirs in memory of Art and Doris Haley. It too, it takes place at the Capital Centre a week from tonight and the Ontario Northland Christmas train rolls into North Bay on Sunday evening and of course the volunteers with the North Bay Santa Fund are hard at work once again raising funds and tapping into the enormous generosity of our community to help those families less fortunate in our area, in our area. Speaker, I'm so proud that in nipissing the Christmas season is about spreading joy and good cheer and making a difference in our communities and don't forget your red kettles. Thank you, Speaker. Thank you for their member's statements. Further member's statements? The member from Wellington, Halton Hills? Mr. Speaker, our official opposition caucus is united in enthusiastic endorsement of the People's Guarantee. What the Toronto Star calls a serious plan that will deserve serious consideration from voters. Included in this plan are strong statements about the need to protect and preserve our natural environment. Our caucus accepts the scientific consensus on climate change. The earth is warming and human activity is a significant contributing factor and we in Ontario need to do our part to reduce carbon emissions. Premier Wins government is for a cap and trade scheme that will ship 466 million taxpayer dollars to California. Our caucus categorically rejects that approach, but we also know that doing nothing is not an option. Why is this? The Trudeau government in Ottawa is mandating a carbon pricing benchmark. While no one likes or wants new taxes, all the provinces will need to respond. There is a better way for the people of Ontario. We say that every dollar collected in carbon price revenue should be returned to Ontario families and taxpayers in the form of corresponding tax relief as verified by the Auditor General. We also say that action needs to be taken to support initiatives which clean up our great lakes and reduce sewage going into our lakes and rivers. That is our leaders assurance to the people of Ontario, part of his people's guarantee. We commend this plan for positive change to the people of Ontario. We also need to protect our ground water for today and for future generations. That's why I continue to advocate for a science-based approach to considering applications for large scale permits to take water in Ontario and I'm starting to question why we don't have some kind of effective deposit return system for plastic single use beverage containers. Surely we can do better to improve the recycling rates of empty plastic bottles. Together let us embrace the promise of the future. Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. Thank you. I thank all members for their comments. It's now time for reports by