Government employees are being cautioned on ethics after a cabinet aide was cited for accepting perks from two trade associations and a mining company. Ethics Commissioner Mary Dawson said public officials must beware of gifts from lobbyists: ‘It’s all part of the Ottawa scene’.
Federal regulators are giving the go-ahead to retire old-fashioned payphones after conceding the service now costs more than telecom companies recoup in 50¢ calls. Fewer than 56,000 payphones remain in service nationwide, said the CRTC: “We want to make sure Canadians are notified”.
The tax department is buying Walkie-Talkies in event of a civilian emergency that knocks out all communications at its Ottawa offices. Canada Revenue Agency did not say what scenario it feared would cause a mass telecom failure: “This is quite a stretch”.
Nearly a third of a billion dollars in student loans are being written off by the Government of Canada. Authorities disclosed the write-off at the Senate national finance committee: “It’s a lot of money”.
Railways face an April 1 deadline to comply with safety management policies once deemed too secretive and inaccessible to employees and the public. Rules require that all federally-regulated railways account for safe practices and report non-compliance: “These are long overdue”.
Sport fishing is an $8 billion business though the number of anglers is the lowest in years, the Commons fisheries committee has been told. The Department of Fisheries said it aimed to do more to monitor the industry: “To be candid we are hit and miss”.
Canadian farm debt has climbed to a record $78 billion – an eight percent increase since 2012 – but is manageable if farmers are cautious, says the CEO of Farm Credit Canada. The federal agency has repeatedly insisted there is no farm debt bubble: “We’re watching”.
A proposal to proclaim Remembrance Day a statutory holiday is not “as simple” as other private bills and will face extensive scrutiny, says the chair of the Commons heritage committee. Businesses have protested the bill will lead to unavoidable costs: “The time is short”.
Federal privacy law has failed to keep pace with technology that sees Canadians unwittingly surrendering personal information, says a Conservative MP. The remarks came at hearings on a bill expanding corporations’ use of personal data without consent: “Do people really understand?”
Staff at the century-old National Research Council complain they are poorly led and overworked, with nearly half saying they’re ambivalent about going to work in the morning. The data released through Access To Information follows a 2011 cabinet program to turn the agency into a “concierge” to industry: ‘My work suffers’.
A long, cold winter is creating a massive cover of thick ice on the Great Lakes that could be worse than last year’s ice buildup, which delayed the start of full navigation by a month, according to shippers’ data: “It’s going to be difficult out there”.
A Department of Finance scheme permitting tax-free investment income is inherently “regressive” and mainly helps wealthy Canadians at other taxpayers’ expense, says the Parliamentary Budget Office. Researchers faulted Tax-Free Savings Accounts, introduced in 2009, as a multi-million dollar subsidy for individuals with money: “It’s unfair and it’s unaffordable”.
Canada Revenue Agency must work harder to track “aggressive tax planning” like offshore accounts that cost billions in legitimate tax collections, says a Commons report. It follows a federal survey that rated the agency as inconsistent and weak in tracking wealthy tax avoiders: ‘It is not acceptable’.
A popular home heating oil is toxic and should be listed under schedule 1 of the Canadian Environmental Protection Act, say regulators. Health Canada cited more than 6,300 spills of Fuel Oil No. 2 over a nine-year period: “It hits the ground, you see the environmental impact right away”.
Health Canada is endorsing a Commons report citing the perils of marijuana use though critics dubbed the study a “sham”, and the government’s own surveys show many Canadians are ambivalent about cannabis use: “It was a set up”.
