The federal government is “broken” and bungles basic tasks with little cabinet scrutiny, Budget Officer Yves Giroux said yesterday. “There needs to be a crack of the whip, big time,” he said: “Hold the government to account. I cannot do this just by myself.”
Cabinet is on the wrong track and appears overwhelmed by events, Canadians tell pollsters in Privy Council in-house research. Participants in federal focus groups also gave cabinet a failing grade in tackling inflation: “Very few participants believed the Government of Canada was currently on the right track.”
Employment Minister Carla Qualtrough yesterday disclosed she was never told dozens of department employees were under investigation for fraud. Qualtrough said she only learned after the fact that 49 were fired for cheating the Canada Emergency Response Benefit program: “No one brought to your attention specifically that there were employees being investigated within your department?”
The Commons yesterday by a unanimous 320 to 0 vote ordered a special audit of federal contracts to McKinsey & Company, a global consulting firm formerly led by a friend of Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland. Liberal MPs endorsed the Conservative motion amid complaints the Opposition was looking for evidence of corruption: “We have a right to know what is going on.”
Communist Party agents cost a Conservative MP his seat in Parliament, the House affairs committee was told yesterday. MP Kenny Chiu (Steveston-Richmond East, B.C.) was targeted by a “massive campaign of disinformation,” testified an investigator who looked at the case: “If had not been for that disinformation Mr. Chiu would still be in Parliament.”
Any federal attempt to unmask Chinese foreign agents must be “culturally sensitive,” Public Safety Minister Marco Mendicino said last night. Legislators have sought passage of a Foreign Agents Registration Act similar to a law enacted by the United States in 1938: “It would help to bring people out of the shadows.”
The Public Health Agency yesterday claimed it saved 800,000 lives in Canada under its vaccination program. The claim was made as MPs questioned auditors’ findings that the Agency wasted $1 billion of the $5 billion it spent on Covid shots: “Shame on you.”
Several minutes of a public hearing have been censored by a Commons committee. MPs erased a 26-minute portion of video recordings in which a witness divulged details of a sex crime: “This testimony has been deleted.”
There has been a “significant increase in the prevalence of drug use” by drivers since Parliament legalized marijuana, says a Department of Public Safety report. Findings were drawn from self-reporting by cannabis users and blood testing of those hospitalized with traffic injuries: “There are some concerning indicators.”
Cabinet boosted election-year government advertising to $140.8 million, the highest figure disclosed to date. Only half the spending was related to pandemic safety measures: “This is very difficult to justify.”
The Lobbying Act permits corporations to secretly negotiate sole-sourced federal contracts without disclosing the fact, the Commons ethics committee has learned. MPs questioned the practice in cases like Baylis Medical Co., a firm run by former Liberal MP Frank Baylis that subcontracted a $237.3 million order for pandemic ventilators: “There was a lot of money.”
Federal departments and agencies spent almost $16 million investigating their own employees, records show. Expenses for private investigators followed introduction of a new law curbing workplace harassment: “What are the details?”
Cabinet regrets its latest gun bill, says Government House Leader Mark Holland. Amendments to restrict hunting rifles were abruptly withdrawn Friday in the face of stiff opposition in the Commons public safety committee: “I get it, deeply, profoundly.”
Mandating use of electric cars will result in a 23 percent increase in overall demand for electricity, says a Department of Natural Resources report. Estimates of resulting impacts on power rates are “still being developed,” it said.
Recovery of millions in subsidies sunk into a failed vaccine factory is not an immediate priority, says Industry Minister François-Philippe Champagne. Cabinet had approved $173 million for construction of a Medicago Inc. plant in the health minister’s Québec City riding: “We need to move on.”
