Provinces are to blame for failing to stock up on pandemic supplies, says Health Minister Patricia Hajdu. Testifying at the Senate social affairs committee, Hajdu said the Public Health Agency “isn’t really in the business” of maintaining a national stockpile though Parliament created the Agency in 2004 specifically for pandemic preparedness: “What went wrong?”
A Nova Scotia senator has missed a year’s work with pay under doctor’s orders. Senator Dan Christmas was unable to work after his wife died seven months ago, a spokesperson said: ‘It was ordered by his physician.’
Environment Minister Jonathan Wilkinson is granting municipalities a twenty-year waiver to keep dumping raw sewage in fish habitat. The regulatory notice follows a 2019 promise to “keep our waters safe, clean and well-managed”.
The Department of Environment predicts extreme heat will become a killer due to climate change, though data show more Canadians die in winter than summer. An earlier questionnaire of physicians nationwide concluded extreme heat is a rare problem: “They don’t consider it to be an issue.”
The likelihood of a second, more severe wave of coronavirus infection is “reasonable” as the economy reopens, says the nation’s chief public health officer. Federal researchers predict as many as seventy percent of Canadians may become infected before the pandemic runs its course: “What is your plan?”
The Governor General
could go easy
on those who prefer astrology, alternative medicine,
or biblical stories,
over facts and reason.
After all,
evolution didn’t only create
scientists and engineers.
It also created the artists, the spiritualists,
and the climate change skeptics.
And those who follow the scriptures
and believe in divine intervention
could forgive the Governor General.
After all,
God extends His grace
to the atheists too.
(Editor’s note: poet Shai Ben-Shalom, an Israeli-born biologist, examines current events in the Blacklock’s tradition each and every Sunday)
The Canada Revenue Agency yesterday said it will review six years’ worth of U.S. real estate transactions in a hunt for Canadians with unreported income. Auditors will examine “current and historical records”, the Agency said: “Penalties and interest associated with unreported real estate sales can be substantial.”
Cabinet yesterday appointed Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s favourite charity to manage a pandemic grant relief program. The Prime Minister’s wife has appeared as an “official ambassador” and public speaker at We Charity events in New York: “I’m curious how that’s not a conflict of interest?”
The Senate today will pass into law the last of a flurry of spending bills that drive the federal debt to a trillion dollars. One Senator noted bills received scant scrutiny: “A $44 billion supply bill whipped through here in forty-six seconds.”
The Governor General yesterday said Canadians must be wary of “self-appointed experts” on the internet. The remarks by Julie Payette came as cabinet ponders mandatory registration of all digital media: “It’s difficult to decide what is real.”
Senators yesterday expressed regret for misconduct by ex-legislator Don Meredith. An unnamed “independent expert” is to recommend compensation for employees who accused Meredith of lewd behaviour: “It is just so exasperating.”
Arbitrary rules under the $71.3 billion Canada Emergency Response Benefit program discourage people from working, Opposition leader Andrew Scheer said yesterday. Conservatives proposed a descending scale of benefits instead of an all-or-nothing regulation that disqualifies applicants who earn more than $1,000 a month: “Workers are penalized for picking up shifts.”
The Public Health Agency of Canada paid more than $300,000 to host a convention including meetings at a ski hill at the same time it ordered cancellation of hockey games, church services and other public events, records show. The Agency yesterday confirmed it cannot get a refund: “We take that extremely seriously.”
The ex-chief of the federal public service predicts job cuts in the aftermath of the pandemic. “The federal service will be smaller,” said Michael Wernick, former $326,000-a year clerk of the Privy Council: “We saw that before.”
Police unions have “frequently been a huge problem” in protecting bad officers, says the Liberal chair of the Commons public safety committee. The RCMP Commissioner told a hearing on police abuses she “won’t appreciate getting thrown under the bus” by union members.
