Major League Baseball has not signed off on a private Commons bill to legalize Vegas-style sports betting in Canada. Protests from Toronto Blue Jays management effectively killed the bill in Senate hearings three years ago: “We have a choice”.
High prescription drug costs will rise under pending free trade agreements, says Health Canada. A senior official confirmed that Pacific and European trade pacts will see Canadians pay more for medicines: “That’s correct”.
A parliamentary committee is questioning regulators over ad hoc enforcement of the Fisheries Act. The panel heard virtually every municipal wastewater plant may be in technical breach of the law: ‘They take the view all human activity contravenes the Act and then it falls to them to decide which are worth prosecuting’.
Canada must develop a national housing policy that includes subsidies for social housing, says the Minister responsible for CMHC. New funding of $2.3 billion over two years is probably insufficient to meet demand, MPs were told: “It’s always going to be below the needs”.
As many as 1 in 10 teenage minors frequently gamble online despite legal restrictions, says new University of Waterloo research. The findings followed questionnaires completed by 10,035 high school students: ‘We do need to be concerned about normalizing gambling behaviour’.
The cost of Air Canada fares may rise if cabinet doesn’t legislate new concessions for the airline, warns the Liberal parliamentary secretary for transport. A cabinet bill would sanction airline job cuts at maintenance shops in three provinces: ‘Air travel could be more expensive for Canadians’.
Cabinet has little chance of meeting greenhouse gas emission targets, say Liberal and Conservative members of the Senate energy committee. The warning followed admissions from the Department of Natural Resources it has not studied the level of carbon pricing needed to meet emission goals: “Personally I do not think they can be met”.
Heritage Minister Mélanie Joly could not name Fathers of Confederation in an impromptu quiz at a Commons committee hearing. The lapse came as Joly described plans for observance of the nation’s 150th birthday in 2017: “Of course I can”.
A Health Canada agency last year issued 14 fines on more than 1,600 violations of federal pesticide control regulations, says a new government report. Incidents included the repackaging of farm-grade chemicals for home use, and a case of gasified rat poison used to control bedbugs in an apartment building: “Certainly it’s concerning”.
A judge has upheld the release of public records by a federal agency after four years of delay. The case involved a Calgary contractor involved in the largest copyright infringement case in the country: “This makes a mockery of Access To Information”.
An RCMP union bill has so many management-friendly exemptions it breaches the spirit of a Supreme Court ruling, say police members. Parliament is under a Court order to lift a ban on collective bargaining for Mounties by May 17: “Are they large and serious issues? You bet”.
In the TV series ‘Suits’,
smart, good looking people
are busy sticking knives in
each other’s back.
If it reminds you of your
workplace,
you’re imagining things.
Chances are
folks you work with
aren’t so smart, or
good looking.
(Editor’s note: poet Shai Ben-Shalom, an Israeli-born biologist, examines current events in the Blacklock’s tradition each and every Sunday)
The Senate in a Canadian first yesterday passed a DNA privacy bill by unanimous vote. The bill’s Liberal sponsor dismissed insurance lobbyists’ claims that restricting access to genetic tests would see all policyholders pay higher premiums: “I come down on the side of privacy”.
Contentious 2012 amendments to the Fisheries Act will be restored “pretty much to the T”, says the fisheries minister. The changes on habitat protection prompted protest petitions and a successful federal lawsuit: ‘Everyone wants those lost protections restored’.
A private Conservative bill introduced in the Senate would legislate prompt payment for all contractors and trades on public works. It follows appeals from the National Trade Contractors Coalition for a crackdown on delinquent payments: “They need to deal with me”.
