A Crown bank, Export Development Canada, yesterday disclosed it paid a consultant more than $208 million to manage a pandemic loan program. Legislators at the time were not told of payments to Accenture PLC that run to 2024: ‘The desire was to get this out as quickly as possible.’
Liberal and New Democrat MPs have opposed a budget amendment to cut the Governor General’s funding. Conservative MP Kelly Block (Carleton Trail-Eagle Creek, Sask.) sponsored the motion after accusing Rideau Hall of high living while Canadians turn to food banks: “The Governor General has shown a lack of respect for taxpayers.”
Newspaper publishers need the government, their chief lobbyist yesterday told the Senate transport and communications committee. “We need them,” said Paul Deegan, CEO of News Media Canada: “We have a market failure here.”
Cabinet’s budget bill last night cleared the Commons finance committee after 29 days and 667 roll call votes in a month-long Conservative filibuster. MPs protested the omnibus bill introduced or amended 51 different Acts of Parliament: “The idea that omnibus legislation is acceptable is simply wrong.”
Allegations that cabinet ignored misconduct by foreign agents will not alter New Democrats’ pledge to support the Prime Minister until 2025, NDP leader Jagmeet Singh yesterday told reporters. Withdrawing support and triggering a snap election made no sense, said Singh: “I don’t see how it’s logical.”
The House affairs committee must investigate attempts by Chinese agents to cost Conservative votes in the 2021 campaign, MP Erin O’Toole (Durham, Ont.) yesterday told the Commons. “My parliamentary caucus and myself were the target,” said O’Toole following a secret briefing with the Canadian Security Intelligence Service: “My parliamentary caucus and myself were the target of a sophisticated misinformation and voter suppression campaign orchestrated by the People’s Republic of China.”
Privacy Commissioner Philippe Dufresne has dismissed all complaints over federal vaccine and quarantine mandates. Pandemic measures enforced by cabinet were necessary and justifiable under the Privacy Act, he said: “The urgency of limiting the spread of the virus was understandably a significant challenge for government.”
David Johnston refuses to take questions by MPs over his work at the Trudeau Foundation. Members of the Commons public accounts committee yesterday threatened to issue a summons for Johnston, a first for a retired governor general: “It does seem like a drastic step.”
Cabinet will attempt to reintroduce an internet censorship bill by year’s end. Heritage Minister Pablo Rodriguez yesterday told the Commons heritage committee he would “have more to announce shortly,” adding: “We have worked a good deal on this issue.”
The Department of Public Works must uphold human rights in federal contracting, Conservative MP Stephanie Kusie (Calgary Midnapore) yesterday told the Commons government operations committee. Kusie served notice of proposed amendments to a Government-Wide Integrity Regime blacklist of ineligible suppliers: “It is astounding to me actually that McKinsey passed the Integrity Regime.”
Homeless people occupying tent cities are “claiming their rights,” says a report issued by Federal Housing Advocate Marie-Josée Houle. The report proposed a national ban on park evictions with free legal advice for tent city residents: “Residents have been arrested and criminalized under bylaws outlawing behaviour such as camping, bathing or defecating in public.”
The Commons yesterday by a vote of 209 to 113 upheld cabinet’s “safe supply” drug policy. The vote followed federal decriminalization of simple possession of cocaine, opioids and methamphetamine in British Columbia: “This is not about encouraging drug use.”
Cabinet seeks to break a month-long filibuster that has tied up Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland’s omnibus budget bill in the Commons finance committee. One Liberal MP called it “arbitrary filibustering” to upset cabinet’s calendar: “The point is quite clear.”
A federal labour board has agreed to hear the case of a government employee denied a waiver from the vaccine mandate on religious grounds. Data show the overwhelming majority of requests for religious exemptions were denied, often with no reason given: “The grievance is neither trivial nor vexatious.”
Parliament must change federal law to permit police, postal inspectors or First Nations constables to open letters in transit, says one of the nation’s largest Indigenous groups. Letter mail is a leading source of narcotics, says the Assembly of Manitoba Chiefs: “Postal shipments have become the most common method of distribution for illegal substances.”
