Blacklock's Reporter

The Canadian Union of Postal Workers yesterday served notice of rotating strikes effective Monday. Cabinet did not comment. The action would see brief, temporary shutdowns in select cities. Canada Post has responded in the past with costly national lockouts: “The intent is to highlight issues by taking action one town at a time.”

The chair of the Senate banking committee yesterday invited a registered business lobbyist to join in releasing a report advocating corporate tax cuts.  “It’s unusual,” acknowledged Senator Douglas Black (Independent-Alta.), committee chair: “We think it’s so important for the country.”

Factory managers yesterday told the Commons trade committee metal tariffs have cost Canadian jobs and may result in plant closures. “When you lose it, you lose it,” said one manufacturer: “We have basically lost 25 percent of our business.”

The Treasury Board yesterday warned federal employees must not consume marijuana at work. One department, Public Works, earlier fired two employees for smoking cannabis on their break: “Don’t get too excited.”

Full costs of cabinet’s decision to nationalize a British Columbia pipeline are confidential and will not be disclosed, officials yesterday told the Senate national finance committee. The refusal came moments after the Privy Council Office boasted of its “payback” analysis on public spending: “I can’t say more.”

A federal lawsuit is targeting a major bank’s ban on marijuana home-grows for mortgage holders. Scotiabank in 2010 pulled one homeowner’s loan though medical cannabis was grown under a federal license: “It may have been a factor.”

The Royal Canadian Mint yesterday blamed bad digital imagery and not faulty historical research for depicting a foreign helmet on an Armistice coin. “That image is definitely not a Canadian helmet,” said one militaria expert.

Canadian playwrights have seen royalties drop 86 percent since 2011 under changes to the Copyright Act, a professional association yesterday told the Commons industry committee. “It boggles the mind,” a witness said.

The Commons industry committee yesterday by a 5-to-4 vote rejected hearings on copyright terms of a tentative U.S. trade pact. MPs complained cabinet negotiated legal changes at the very moment the committee is conducting a statutory review of the Copyright Act: “That would simply be odd.”

Cabinet yesterday ordered a fresh review of school bus safety. The initiative followed a TV report that Transport Canada concealed crash-test data confirming seatbelts would prevent injury: “This problem needs to be fixed now.”

Statistics Canada is planning a first-ever national questionnaire on children’s addiction to electronics, according to Access To Information records. The 2019 survey of 30,000 to 50,000 families, the first of its kind, includes questions ranging from breastfeeding to bad friends at school, and how often families eat take-out food: “We need to understand this.”

The Federal Court of Appeal has disclosed a case of sexual assault at a Customs office. The Court upheld an ex-employee’s claim for compensation for workplace harassment and assault that a labour board earlier dismissed as an office prank: “It is necessary to take care not to inappropriately downplay or diminish the seriousness of unacceptable conduct.”

The Department of Finance in an Access To Information memo estimates up to $1 trillion is needed to pay for unfunded repairs to Canada’s roads, bridges and utilities. The figure was attributed to third-party estimates; no federal agency to date has calculated the “infrastructure deficit”.

Department of Canadian Heritage in-house research shows after decades of official bilingualism, 43 percent of Anglophones disagree or have no opinion on whether two official languages is “an important part of what it means to be Canadian”. The department plans 2019 observances marking the 50th anniversary of the Official Languages Act: “Canadians are divided.”