Housing Minister Gregor Robertson’s department has quietly dropped its longstanding promise to target a minimum 500,000 housing starts annually as the minimum required to restore affordability. The department is no longer focused on “housing unit counts,” it said. READ MORE
Industry Minister Mélanie Joly yesterday told reporters she will soon have “good news” on investment in Canada by multiple American companies but would not discuss details. Joly five months ago similarly claimed an unnamed automaker had secret plans to export Canadian-made cars to the Middle East, without result: "What I have done in the United States is attract investment." READ MORE
Attorney General Sean Fraser yesterday declined comment on Access To Information records showing a Liberal appointee directed government employees to help Crown prosecutors in ongoing criminal cases. Fraser earlier told MPs a justice system free of political taint was one of “the most beautiful things about the country.” READ MORE
The Procurement Ombudsman yesterday faulted Rideau Hall for breaking federal rules in awarding a five-figure IT contract. Ombudsman Alexander Jeglic has repeatedly complained of irregularities that see insiders “using the system.” READ MORE
Proposed changes to air passenger regulations are unfair to the public, says one of the nation’s largest travel operators. The proposal inserted in an omnibus budget bill would see compensation claims for poor service referred to adjudicators of the airlines’ choosing: "Where is the oversight?" READ MORE
Employers subject to new private sector bilingualism rules “may choose to move,” the Budget Office said yesterday. Regulations mandating bilingualism in federally regulated workplaces will apply in select cities from Edmonton to Yarmouth: 'Thirty-seven percent of the banking sector in Ottawa knows French while only 5 percent in Winnipeg does.' READ MORE
A political appointee in the Department of Canadian Heritage helped Crown lawyers in Toronto prosecute multiple criminal cases, Access To Information show. The disclosure follows the Attorney General’s pledge that prosecutors must at all times “make a decision separate and apart from the political arm of government.” READ MORE
I can remember towns where you could walk across the border, go from a garage across the border where they shared services. I grew up in British Columbia and we’d go back and forth to Seattle. It was a daily occurrence, no problem. The border today is actually a fortified border. That whole security concept, the way in which all governments are operating today as a result of 9/11, is imperceptibly changing the way we do business. Ultimately it will affect the way we see ourselves.
