Blacklock's Reporter

Federal agencies are running a backlog of 437,000 garbled financial transactions affecting employees, the Senate national finance committee was told last night. The collapse of the failed Phoenix Pay System has prompted thousands of union grievances and cost taxpayers more than $1 billion, not including compensation claims or legal fees: “Lesson learned: You just don’t hit a button and hope something magically works.”

Federal agencies have spent nearly $5 million on “truth-based” Indigenous sensitivity courses for public employees, records show. Courses include videos like What Does Indigenous Mean? ‘It helps develop a deeper understanding.’

A federal agency yesterday credited billions in subsidies with “creating” 29,000 jobs in Ontario, the equivalent of 0.4 percent of the provincial workforce. The Federal Economic Development Agency for Southern Ontario did not explain its figures: “There was a discussion around a vision statement.”

An Alberta Senator is apologizing for disclosing minutes of a closed-door committee hearing to her 46,900 Twitter followers and 8,700 Facebook friends. Paula Simons (Independent), a former Edmonton Journal columnist, kept the posts up even after other legislators protested: “This was not a simple slip of the tongue.”

CFL Commissioner Randy Ambrosie yesterday told MPs a “singular focus on concussions magnified by media” is ruining the sport. Testifying at a Commons special committee on sports-related brain injury, Ambrosie said a major problem facing athletics is “too many kids are not playing sports”.

Any national handgun ban will have to wait until after an October 21 election, Border Security Minister Bill Blair yesterday suggested at the Senate national security committee. Blair said he hoped to release recommendations to cabinet by June in the last days of the 42nd Parliament: “Frankly, we’re not afraid to consider anything.”

Cabinet members yesterday heaped scorn on two former colleagues purged from the Liberal caucus as untrustworthy. “They cannot part be part of this team,” said Prime Minister Justin Trudeau.

Cabinet yesterday served notice the Senate must pass nine major bills in 30 work days before Parliament adjourns for pre-election campaigning. The unprecedented motion would cut short debate. Far-reaching bills range from jury selection at criminal trials to oil tankers on the Pacific coast: “The government has decided to play hardball.”

The latest North American free trade pact will cost Canadians an extra $23.8 million a year in higher drug prices, the Parliamentary Budget Office said yesterday. An earlier 2017 trade pact with the European Union also raised drug costs a third of a billion dollars with extensions to patent rules: “This will make it so much worse.”

Transport Canada has been too slow to adopt new bus safety reforms, says the chair of the Transportation Safety Board. The Commons transport committee yesterday opened safety hearings prompted by the Humboldt Broncos disaster: “I’m thinking of all these families.”

The Public Service Commission says the time required to hire fresh talent by federal departments and agencies should take about three months. The current average is nearly 7 months: “Can we go beyond that Absolutely.”

Environment Commissioner Julie Gelfand yesterday faulted regulators for haphazard protection of fish habitat from mining effluent. Investigators counted 42 lakes, streams, creeks and rivers nationwide where mining companies are licensed to dump tailings: ‘When there were environmental effects, there was no requirement to do anything.’

Commons business yesterday slowed to a crawl with eight work weeks left in the parliamentary calendar. Opposition MPs pressed cabinet for a full investigation of the SNC-Lavalin Group Inc. political scandal: “I will speak for hours and hours on end.”

Police should conduct social media checks on gun owners to spot buyers with “hate in their hearts”, an advocacy group yesterday told the Senate national security committee. Senators questioned if the measure would be constitutional: “We’re really dealing with subjective matters.”