Cash-strapped VIA Rail is in the “early stages” of contract talks with employees including review of the Crown railway’s pension liabilities. VIA reported a record $317.1 million deficit in 2014: ‘There are cost pressures on our bottom line’.
A DNA privacy bill has passed Second Reading in the Senate amid appeals to protect employees and insurance policyholders from discrimination. Lawmakers referred the Liberal bill to hearings of the human rights committee: “It’s unconscionable”.
Lawyering fees are ballooning to rates so “disturbing” that courts are inaccessible to all but corporations and wealthy Canadians, says a senior judge. The remarks came over six-figure claims for costs in a routine appeal in a civil case: “When a client asks his lawyer the time of day he doesn’t need to be told how to build a watch”.
The fisheries department cut funding for scientific research by as much as 18 percent in the past decade, new accounts show. Cuts included reductions in programs on fisheries protection and management.
“That’s serious, and it reduced their capacity,” said MP Kennedy Stewart, New Democrat science critic. “There really are no better teams of scientists anywhere in the world than people who work in fisheries, yet the department is not funding these people to do basic research.”
“It is really strange,” said Stewart, MP for Burnaby South, B.C. “I think this deserves clarification from the Minister.”
Financial records tabled in Parliament at Stewart’s request indicate the department’s funding for “fundamental research” fell from $317 million a year in 2007 to as little as $259 million by 2013. Funding last year was $272 million. Major cuts included the 2014 closure of Nova Scotia’s Mersey Biodiversity Facility, and New Brunswick’s St. Andrews Biological Station, the nation’s first federal marine research centre dating from 1899.
Other reductions included a $7.6 million cut to research on integrated fisheries management; $4.7 million to oceans management; $4.1 million to hydrographic products and services; $3.9 million to fisheries protection; and $3 million to the department’s sustainable aquaculture program.
“The cuts to science have been huge,” said Dr. Susanna Fuller of the Ecology Action Centre. “One of the impacts we have seen in the Atlantic region is the move to multi-year assessments.”
“Instead of a stock assessment every year there is a stock assessment every five years,” Fuller said. “That means you can’t do adaptive management, and you can’t look at stock on a year-to-year basis. There is no way to make science-based decisions on that basis.”
Other cuts included $373,000 to research on aquatic animal health; $275,000 in reduced funding for biotechnology; and $245,000 less for management of species at risk.
“I think a big piece is the complete lack of inclusion of climate change science into fisheries stock assessments,” Fuller said. “In Canada, we have no integration of impacts of climate change or ocean acidification on our fish stocks – whereas south of the border, in New England and Washington State, they have had commissions on ocean acidification and the impact on fisheries. They have a plan.”
The fisheries department, asked in Parliament whether it would restore all funding to previous levels, replied in an Inquiry Of Ministry: “Not yet determined.”
By Kaven Baker-Voakes 
Cabinet is effectively rolling back Conservative changes to the National Energy Board Act that limited the scope of public hearings on pipeline projects. Final decisions on two pipeline expansions already under review will be deferred for months: “We will do this right”.
Directors and senior executives of publicly-traded companies face caps on benefits under a Liberal bill introduced in the Senate. The bill also imposes term limits on directors: ‘Let’s get competent directors who recruit competent managers’.
The Canada Revenue Agency cut payouts 23 percent under a tax credit scheme it dubbed an “open bar” for industry. It followed an increase in fines on companies that falsified claims in applying for the Scientific Research & Experimental Development tax credit: “You can’t have an uncapped program”.
Canadians have a 100 percent chance of waiting on the phone when they call a 1-800 federal call centre with pension complaints, record show. It follows a pledge to “transform” communications with taxpayers: “They would disconnect you, and you’d call back later”.
Health Canada has never revoked a single conditional permit for the sale of any pesticide even if manufacturers failed to comply with federal regulations, a new report discloses. “There appeared to be no consequences,” wrote Commissioner of the Environment Julie Gelfand.
Thousands of Canadians are asking Parliament to enshrine gun rights in the Constitution, ban cat fur imports and permit visa-free travel by Ukrainians under a new electronic petition system. It follows a warning to MPs that anything goes with internet signature campaigns: “I’ve never been an enormous fan of e-petitioning”.
The Canadian Tourism Commission is hiring consultants to determine if its internet marketing program actually works. It follows a 19 percent budget cut four years ago, and the $150,000-a year sponsorship of foreign-language Tweets: “Most newspapers still have a travel section”.
Cabinet expects quick reforms of the National Energy Board following a federal audit that cited the regulator as inefficient and inadequate, says the Minister of Natural Resources. A random audit of 49 licensing conditions on pipeline companies found more than half, 25, were not properly monitored: “It’s not well organized and they’re not talking to each other”.
Federal lawyers improperly concealed government documents sought in a Charter of Rights case, a federal judge has ruled. The Department of Employment falsely invoked solicitor-client privilege to withhold a report that wasn’t written by any of its solicitors: “Access to information is a fundamental human right”.
Cabinet faces fresh demands for reform of the Temporary Foreign Worker Program following restrictions imposed in 2014. Advocates for migrant farmworkers said foreigners should be allowed to become permanent residents: “It isn’t going anywhere”.
Federal police are expanding an auto theft sting in the province with the sharpest rise in stolen vehicles. Electronic surveillance will see bait cars equipped with hidden cameras, streaming video and secret audio recordings to catch thieves: ‘The equipment is invisible to the naked eye’.
