Governor General Mary Simon must economize in her $24.7 million annual budget, the Commons government operations committee said yesterday. MPs protested spending was so lavish that Rideau Hall did not tell the whole truth when questioned about the cost of overseas junkets: “You got caught red-handed.”
The Public Health Agency has censored thousands of pages of data on cellphone users it collected in the name of pandemic lockdown enforcement. The Agency invoked commercial confidentiality in refusing to disclose weekly reports drawn from cell tower tracking data on millions of mobile customers: “We have developed internal policies to limit access to these data.”
The Commons ethics committee last evening targeted an investigation of alleged “green-washing” by a federal foundation suspected of sweetheart subsidies for environmental technology firms. Industry Minister François-Philippe Champagne suspended funding for Sustainable Development Technology Canada over “allegations of mismanagement.”
Canadians should be ashamed over mistreatment of Indigenous people, says Senator David Arnot (Sask.). The former Saskatchewan human rights commissioner said “ritualized boilerplate statements” of contrition are insufficient: “Be shocked, appalled and ashamed.”
Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland’s department yesterday said it does not know how many billions it is currently spending on debt interest charges. One senator expressed disbelief: “All the smart people are in the Department of Finance.”
A tax holiday for apartment builders will cost more than $4 billion, the Department of Finance disclosed yesterday. Expenses are triple those estimated two years ago by the Budget Office: “We are talking about $4.5 billion over the next five years.”
Cabinet under a 2009 international pact has an obligation to name Nazi fugitives let into Canada, a Liberal-appointed Senator said yesterday. Authorities will not release the confidential 1985 list of 20 suspected war criminals: “They knew.”
Canada is unsafe for Canadian Broadcasting Corporation reporters, says CEO Catherine Tait. The network chief in a report to Parliament claimed CBC employees “face rising threats to their safety both online and in the field.”
Parliament yesterday elected its first Black Speaker 55 years after Black MPs entered the Commons. Liberal MP Greg Fergus (Hull-Aylmer, Que.) told the House he was “nothing more than a referee.”
The Canada Revenue Agency polled accountants and tax lawyers on whether to grant amnesty to scofflaws who confess to not paying their taxes. Internal research at the Agency acknowledged the idea was “contentious.”
Attorney General Arif Virani will not commit to disclosing a confidential list of 20 suspected Nazi fugitives who immigrated to postwar Canada. The secret list was compiled in 1985 by a federal war crimes commission: “There is always room to learn.”
Stephen Harper donated more than 1.2 million official photographs to the federal archives, records show. The entire collection of Harper photos, emails and paraphernalia is the largest of any prime minister donated for an undisclosed tax credit: ‘It was an eye-opening experience.’
A Canadian mission censured for running a fraud ring has passed a federal audit. Misconduct at the Embassy in Port-au-Prince, Haiti prompted worldwide audits of Canadian diplomatic offices: “Numerous fraud schemes were discovered.”
The Department of Justice complains it cannot keep lawyers on staff. An internal audit gave no specific reason though the department three years ago conducted “violence risk assessments” due to office squabbles: “Interviewees reported they had witnessed or experienced harassment, disrespectful treatment or discrimination in the workplace.”
Universities have successfully purged research programs of China security risks, say campus administrators. The Commons science committee was told universities now run active watch lists of suspicious donors: “So far our measures are working.”
