Subsidized media should check their conflicts of interest with Parliament’s Ethics Commissioner, Opposition Leader Pierre Poilievre said yesterday. His remarks came at a news conference when a reporter questioned Poilievre’s proposal to cut CBC funding: “We need a neutral and free media, not a propaganda arm for the Liberal Party.”
The Department of Indigenous Services will not tell MPs what it spent on legal fees in a 16-year dispute over First Nations child welfare funding. A firm represented by one lawyer in the case, former Liberal Senate appointee Murray Sinclair, was paid $169,365 for two months’ work: “The department cannot speak to a specific amount in legal fees.”
A CBC reporter in apparent breach of the network’s ethics code publicly campaigned against coverage by “all white” editors at a rival newsroom. The CBC code mandates that employees “maintain professional decorum” in personal use of social media: “I should start a list of all the insensitive bullshit published in The Record.”
Parliament’s Budget Office yesterday confirmed the federal ratio of debt to GDP will increase this year despite cabinet’s earlier promise to hold the line. Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland had called it “a line we will not cross.”
Housing Minister Ahmed Hussen yesterday quietly wrote more loopholes into his own Act restricting foreign real estate speculators. Canada needs foreigners to build houses, wrote Hussen’s department: “Development activities are needed to increase Canada’s housing supply.”
Three political aides yesterday would not comment over an attempt to censor Facebook links to a 2021 Sun column critical of the government. Aides implicated in the failed scheme did not respond to questions: ‘They tried to have it banned as misinformation because it was embarrassing to them.’
Bank of Canada Governor Tiff Macklem yesterday ruled out any interest rate relief this year despite risk of a recession. Bank data show rate hikes have cost households billions: “Income spent on interest payments will continue to rise as homeowners renew their mortgages.”
Cabinet yesterday granted municipalities two years to meet retroactive payment of union wages at the RCMP. However local authorities will be charged interest: “Jurisdictions may require additional time to repay the total amount owing due to financial hardships.”
Laziness is not a firing offence, a federal labour board has ruled. The decision came in the case of a prison guard who performed night shift duties while relaxing on a mattress: “She had a lax, nonchalant attitude toward a very serious situation.”
Environment Minister Steven Guilbeault’s department spent more than $79,000 polling Canadians on whether they preferred the phrase “climate change,” “extreme weather” or “climate crisis.” Results were inconclusive: “Duh, of course the climate changes.”
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau yesterday blamed unnamed critics he identified only as “those people” for discrediting the taxpayer-subsidized Trudeau Foundation. The group’s CEO and board of directors abruptly resigned weeks after admitting to accepting a $200,000 donation from China: “It is a shame to see the level of toxicity and political polarization that is going on in our country these days.”
Black men in Canada typically earn less today because “Black people were seen as a source of cheap labour” in the 18th century, says a Department of Justice report. The claim contradicts Statistics Canada data showing most Black families in Canada immigrated here after 1971: “However their slavery and exploitation were part of Canadian society for over 200 years.”
Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland yesterday pledged ongoing subsidies to Ukraine until it “wins the war.” Cabinet re-announced additional loans and grants detailed in Freeland’s March 28 budget that bring total taxpayer aid to $8 billion and counting: “We will be there until Ukraine wins the war.”
Cabinet budgeted dental care grants for children at more than quadruple the typical cost, according to Canadian Dental Association figures. Grants were a maximum $650: “Overall 96 percent of all claims submitted for children under age 12 were for less than $650.”
Canadians expect to suffer from food inflation and high interest rates for years to come, say federal data. “There was a sense of pessimism about the future of the economy” well into 2025, said a Department of Finance report: “There was a mentality of having to ‘ride it out,’ of things getting worse before they get better.”
