The pandemic has claimed hundreds of thousands of “zombie businesses” that are insolvent but unable to file for bankruptcy, the Senate national finance committee was told yesterday. Covid-19 shutdowns slowed proceedings in bankruptcy courts: “We’re only at the tip of the iceberg.”
Paperwork is so difficult for veterans filing legitimate claims for benefits that “I mightn’t be great at it myself,” Veterans Affairs Minister Lawrence MacAulay said yesterday. A backlog of claims by injured vets numbered 49,216 this year, according to the Budget Office: “These are people who served this country.”
Canadian consumers should be on the lookout for China-made products and challenge importers to prove they are not relying on slave labour, the chair of the Commons ethics committee said yesterday. A separate subcommittee of Parliament on October 21 said it believed slave-made imports from China are sold here: “This is actually happening.”
Members of the Senate national finance committee yesterday complained information is so sparse Canadians can’t be sure of the size of the deficit. Parliament is the only assembly in Canada that has yet to see a 2020 budget: “Why is there no reporting?”
Cabinet just prior to the pandemic polled Canadians’ views on a “climate budget”, according to records. The concept fared badly in focus groups. A planned March 30 budget was cancelled and never rescheduled: “Many more felt it was a bad idea.”
More than a third of election officers in the last federal campaign encountered voters whose names were missing from the National Register Of Electors. Data follow disclosures the voters’ list contained at least 312,000 names of ineligible electors including dead people and foreigners: ‘They were unable to be registered at the polling station.’
An ex-Liberal MP who left caucus over nepotism had been an outspoken critic of ethical lapses on Parliament Hill. “Canadians deserve better accountability,” MP Yasmin Ratansi (Don Valley East, Ont.) earlier told legislators.
Fewer than half of Northern families can afford a federally-recommended nutritious diet despite $103 million a year in grocers’ subsidies, say auditors. Investigators said the costly fly-in Nutrition North Program had little impact: “The subsidy focuses on the price of food and not the economic realities.”
Canadians have shown disrespect to the Communist Party and should use care in discussing the People’s Republic, says the Chinese ambassador to Canada. Cong Peiwu in an interview with an Ottawa periodical said he could not abide public criticism of his country: “Canadians do not respect the Chinese system.”
Blacklock’s Reporter today pauses for Remembrance Day observance with gratitude to all who honoured our country. Thank you for your service — The Editor.
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s agent destroyed years’ worth of records sought by MPs, the Commons ethics committee learned yesterday. The committee since July 22 has sought details of more than $1.3 million in corporate sponsorship fees paid to Trudeau and his wife Sophie: “Interesting.”
Parliament must enact laws to curb Communist Party propaganda in the Chinese-Canadian community, a former editor of the nation’s largest Chinese-language daily yesterday told MPs. Foreign agents have attempted to infiltrate Chinese-Canadian groups, he said: “The ultimate goal is to brainwash.”
A federal agency in a revised Code Of Ethics forbid employees from criticizing the government in the press. Cabinet in 2019 Ministerial Mandate letters described media engagement including public criticism as essential: ‘Do not demoralize or offend others through cynicism.’
A Montréal judge has acquitted a suspected marijuana user found relaxing in a parked car in broad daylight. Public use of legalized cannabis is not an offence, ruled Municipal Court: “People smoking pot on the street, are we going to see that picture?”
Drug overdoses in federal prisons have risen steadily since Parliament passed a Drug-Free Prisons Act, records show. Legislators had questioned the 2015 law as ineffective: “It is doubtful there is a prison in the world that is drug-free.”
