Less than one percent of consumer complaints against airlines ever get a federal hearing, data show. The Canadian Transportation Agency yesterday would not comment on its backlog of thousands of complaints of lost luggage, cancelled flights and poor service: “Passengers will not get a dime.”
Pandemics are trickier in real life than in the movies where “you can easily follow the trail of bodies”, says Canada’s deputy chief public health officer. Dr. Howard Njoo made the comment in a YouTube appearance in which he also divulged the national infection rate is likely to be three times greater than claimed by the Public Health Agency: “It might actually be easier if it’s like, you know, some of the movies.”
A key pandemic relief program intended to save business payrolls has not worked as planned, the Department of Finance admitted last night. Cabinet is expected to introduce more changes to the Canada Emergency Wage Subsidy: “Why do you think that is?”
A multi-billion dollar pandemic relief program intended for post-secondary students will pay jobless teenagers whether or not they are studying. High school graduates need only mail a student application to a college or university to qualify for federal cheques, according to regulations detailed yesterday: “I admit this is not a perfect system.”
The Canadian Red Cross yesterday defended a federal shipment of pandemic supplies to China, saying Chinese donors have since given three times as much equipment back to Canada. “Everything is of quality,” the Commons health committee was told.
Cabinet yesterday acknowledged its costliest pandemic relief program was under-subscribed by small businesses. Widening the wage subsidy program will not increase costs, the Department of Finance said: “It came too late.”
A parish hall that refused to accommodate a Pride Week fundraiser must face a human rights hearing, a British Columbia adjudicator has ruled. The Catholic Church complained the banquet would have featured drag queens and same-sex dancing: “There are significant facts and issues in dispute.”
Canada Post is funding $500,000 in research on financial services after introducing a currency exchange home delivery program. A postal union yesterday predicted a return to some form of postal banking for the first time in more than fifty years: “I think we’re going to move forward.”
Deficit spending is unsustainable, Parliamentary Budget Office Yves Giroux yesterday told the Senate national finance committee. Giroux said this year’s budget shortfall is now an unprecedented $260 billion and counting, five times the previous record of $55.6 billion set a decade ago: “We’d be looking at a level of taxation that’s not been seen for generations.”
Environment Minister Jonathan Wilkinson’s delegation to a UN climate change conference last December in Spain cost more than $680,000 including $178,000 in air fares and the expense of two chauffeurs. Delegates were told “our house is on fire”.
The taxpayer-financed Canada Infrastructure Bank endorsed a scale of million-dollar bonuses for its CEO, according to records. The Bank had withheld the disclosure under Access To Information: “It’s a little hard to ask questions about the Bank because nothing is really public at all about it.”
A media outlet suing for the privilege of asking questions of Prime Minister Justin Trudeau says in a Federal Court affidavit it was banned from accreditation by the Parliamentary Press Gallery. The Gallery is intended to be nonpartisan. The executive last night did not comment: ‘It is government influenced.’
The Department of Justice loses almost a third of lawsuits at a taxpayers’ cost in legal fees averaging more than $200 million a year, says a newly-released audit. Of cases settled out of court, 44 percent were paid out just before trial.
“Stakeholders believe Justice Canada could engage in forms of dispute resolution more often,” said an Evaluation Of Litigation Services. Sixteen percent of federal lawyers interviewed said the department “never or does not often use these methods and that substantial improvements in this area are needed.” Another 27 percent of lawyers said “at least some improvement is needed”.
Auditors examined tens of thousands of lawsuits managed by the department over a five-year period from 2015 to 2019. Costs to taxpayers of legal fees averaged $222 million a year not including the expense of settlements and court awards. The Government of Canada last year paid out $405.9 million in settlements and court awards to successful litigants.
Over the period a total 58,045 cases never went to trial and were either dismissed outright or settled. “There may be room for improvement in the case of certain dispute resolution methods such as mediation, arbitration and neutral evaluation which can be used to avoid lengthy court trials,” said Evaluation. The report noted “about half of files are settled” after federal lawyers had billed thousands of hours in costs, “which means that substantial resources have been devoted to the file”.
“Justice Canada is spending more hours on files with higher risk and complexity,” said the report. Auditors estimated 31 percent of cases were settled or lost at trial.
“Overall the expectation is that demand will continue to increase for litigation services based on a number of factors including an increase in class action litigation consistent with trends seen across our society,” said Evaluation. The department handles an estimated 30,000 cases a year.
Federal departments most often sued are the Canada Revenue Agency, Department of Immigration and the Department of Crown-Indigenous Relations. Immigration cases had declined since 2014 with a larger number of complaints resolved by the Immigration and Refugee Board instead of Federal Court.
“Counsel across Justice Canada are required to assess legal risk and complexity on their files,” wrote auditors. “These assessments are an important method for the department to communicate with clients about the work it is undertaking for them in a consistent and coherent way so that clients have a clear understanding of the legal risk and complexity of their litigation files.”
Federal lawyers bill an average 1.29 million hours each year, by official estimate. Cabinet in 2016 struck a committee to review civil litigation. The committee never issued any public findings.
By Staff 
Canada needs about three billion pandemic masks as the economy opens up, says a federal contractor. The Public Health Agency had just 100,000 high-grade N95 masks in a national stockpile before the Covid-19 outbreak: “We’re going to need a lot more.”
Federal 1-800 centres have improved their rate of dropped calls by not answering the phone. The president of Shared Services Canada, the federal IT service, said an undisclosed number of jobless callers seeking benefits received endless busy signals: “The call would never get dropped, it would just never get answered.”
