All parties yesterday pledged support for a Bloc Québécois motion to unmask foreign spies in Parliament. “What more will it take for us to act?” asked MP René Villemure (Trois-Rivières, Que.), sponsor of the motion: “We can’t keep making empty speeches.”
Irregularities in sole-sourced federal contracts to McKinsey & Company point to widespread “disregard for the rules,” Auditor General Karen Hogan said yesterday. Hogan told MPs her auditors also encountered federal employees too frightened to disclose what they knew of misconduct in contracting: “Yes, they are afraid of reprisals.”
New federal taxes on capital gains are still cheaper than rates in California, Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland said yesterday. Freeland introduced an expected Notice Of Ways And Means Motion to raise billions more in taxes on the sale of businesses, stocks, vacation homes and other equity: “That’s a lot of additional money.”
An $87,100 budget cut to a Senate committee junket to Africa is “difficult to bear,” says Senator Peter Boehm (Ont.), a Liberal appointee. Boehm sought $265,400 to lead the foreign affairs committee to Addis Ababa, complaining other senators take more useless trips to write reports nobody reads: “I don’t think it’s particularly fair.”
Covid ventilators auctioned as scrap metal at $6 apiece were ordered under a Public Health Agency contract that paid millions up front, records show. The secret terms were disclosed through Access To Information: “The contract went fine.”
A third of Canadians will be foreign-born by 2041 based on current immigration trends, says a Statistics Canada briefing note. Canadian-born residents would become a minority in Toronto, it said: “We have made a conscious decision to be an open country.”
A federal internet censorship bill is so flawed and unpopular it will never be enforced, says a Commons critic. Conservative MP Michelle Rempel Garner (Calgary Nose Hill) predicted a slow death for Bill C-63: “The government is close to the end of its mandate and does not have a lot of public support.”
Further hikes in Employment Insurance premiums are required, says a Department of Employment memo. However the department acknowledged a rate hike this summer would be poorly timed and unpopular with employers: “Future improvements to the Employment Insurance program will require additional premium rate increases at a time when many economists are predicting a recession.”
Large chunks
found in stomachs of seals,
turtles, whales.
Tiny particles
eaten by small fish, crabs and plankton,
move up the food chain.
Plastic clogs our oceans;
90 percent
comes from just 10 rivers.
Eight in Asia. Two in Africa.
That is how developing countries
pollute the globe,
harm nature and seaways.
Here in Canada,
rivers are kept clean.
Our garbage is sorted,
collected,
handled professionally.
Because we care.
In the Port of Vancouver,
container ships
loaded with Canadian plastic waste
ready to depart.
Destination Asia.
By Shai Ben-Shalom
Few historians delve into the role of violence in Canada’s economic and political life. It’s an awkward topic, layered with disapproval. Yet of four Fathers of Confederation honoured with statues on Parliament Hill, two were shot, and incidents of workplace violence are commonly cited in case law by labour boards and tribunals.
Could street violence be a rational response to government over-reach in a democracy? Certainly Britain, the U.S. and France have a 300-year history of it. Now, historian Jeremy Milloy of Trent University asks, could workplace violence be a rational and predictable response to economic dysfunction?
“It is crucial that we do not fall into the trap of naturalizing violence by essentializing working class men as violent,” writes Milloy. “Instead, we need to look at the social structures and cultural contexts that have increased the likelihood of violent actions.”
Good point. We hear of workplace violence at factories and employee cubicles, never yacht clubs or bank boardrooms. Wealthy people need not resort to sabotage or assault; all conflict is quickly resolved with a call to a lawyer or the mayor’s office.
“When we look closely at workplace violence, we learn that individual violence cannot be separated from structural factors,” writes Milloy; “Even when violence is used to communicate, it is often a brutalist form of communication deployed when the hierarchical gap between actors inhibits understanding or empathy.”
An example: In 1967 a Chrysler stock checker, Willie Brookins, went off-site to buy a snack on his lunch break. Returning to the factory, Brookins carried a paper bag: “He showed the bag’s contents to the plant guard stationed at the gate – two hot sausages, purchased at a nearby deli – and passed through,” writes Milloy.
“As Brookins continued walking to his spot on the assembly line, a second guard demanded Brookins show him the bag, hinting that perhaps it contained a bomb. Brookins ignored the guard and got on an elevator.” More security guards were summoned.
“When the captain arrived, an altercation broke out between Brookins and the two guards,” Milloy continues. “One guard allegedly dumped Brookins’ meal and stomped it into the factory floor. According to another source, Brookins hit the captain in the arm with a pair of wire cutters and punched him in the face with his fist.” Police were called, and pelted with a hail of bolts and washers thrown by workers.
Blood, Sweat And Fear is fresh, unpredictable and candid. Milloy examines workplace culture in postwar Chrysler plants in Ontario and Michigan, a “hyper-masculine” environment, he writes. “Violence at work in Windsor Chrysler plants was not aberrant, bizarre or senseless,” says Milloy. “It was just the opposite: In both Detroit and Windsor plants, violence was built into labour processes, workplace practices and the shop floor culture.”
Milloy’s research is meticulous. He examines why people do what we do. Blood, Sweat And Fear spares the moralizing. In 1971 there were 68 incidents of sabotage at Chrysler Canada plants, typically targeting hated supervisors. Yes, of course, sabotage is wrong, but Milloy raises the more compelling point: Why did it happen? The answer is intriguing.
“When I was working on this project, another historian asked what my category or analysis was: Class? Race? Gender?” writes Milloy. “After thinking for a moment, I replied that it was violence.”
By Holly Doan
Blood, Sweat and Fear: Violence at Work in the North American Auto Industry 1960-80, by Jeremy Milloy; UBC Press; 228 pages; ISBN 9780-7748-34544; $29.95
Public Safety Minister Dominic LeBlanc yesterday said he knows the names of Parliament Hill spies and which foreign governments they work for, but cited national security in refusing to disclose the information. One MP noted the Security Of Information Act permits the unmasking of foreign agents “in the public interest.”
Defence Minister Bill Blair yesterday testified his department does not “shovel taxpayer dollars” to consultants. However Blair said he opposed a blanket ban on inside contracting as recommended by MPs: “We don’t shovel taxpayer dollars to anyone.”
Cabinet inflated claims of benefits under Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s school lunch program, figures show. A promise to feed 400,000 schoolchildren daily will only be met if meal costs are cut to $2.78, below the minimum identified by the Breakfast Club of Canada: “We would need at least $3 to $6 per child per day.”
The Department of Finance claims it has no documentation whatsoever on its selection of June 25 as the deadline to begin enforcing steep increases in the capital gains tax. Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland’s department said it could not find any files or even emails “regarding the deferral.”
False claims for pandemic benefits cost billions more than originally feared, says the Canada Revenue Agency. Rising costs detailed in Agency records did not include the growing expense of auditing taxpayers who claimed $2,000 monthly Canada Emergency Response Benefit cheques: “That is 22 percent more.”
