The Commons fisheries committee tomorrow is expected to pass a cabinet bill restoring environmental protections under the Fisheries Act. MPs yesterday approved technical changes to the bill, but rejected a New Democrat amendment mandating regular reporting of damage to habitat: “It takes a lot of work to improve legislation.”
A national broadcasting regulator has suspended airplay of a country and western hit 60 years after its release. One adjudicator in a rare dissenting opinion said the ruling on a Hank Thompson song set a dangerous precedent: “This decision could chill future broadcast of older songs.”
A former CMHC auditor in a Federal Court claim alleges he was fired after embarrassing managers with disclosures of misuse of funds by Québec’s provincial housing corporation. The allegations predate a February 20 review that faulted the Société Habitation du Québec for breaching provincial law: “The audit was an extreme success.”
Most Canadians consider mandatory minimum sentences unfair and unnecessary, according to polling commissioned by the Department of Justice. “We put our trust in judges,” one respondent told researchers.
A union representing flight attendants has lost a five-year court challenge of Transport Canada safety regulations. The Canadian Union of Public Employees complained it had a right to be heard by cabinet, but was never fully consulted: “There is no duty of procedural fairness.”
The Department of the Environment is granting a mining company approval to turn a freshwater lake into a tailings pond. The order requires that mine operators spend $2.2 million to create a new lake stocked with pickerel: ‘It would destroy fish habitat.’
Blacklock’s pauses for the Victoria Day holiday with best wishes to subscribers and friends. We’re back tomorrow — The Editor.
Dundurn Press marks the twilight of an era with an intriguing project. They compiled commentaries from the nation’s most distinguished monarchists in what may be the last book of its kind in the era of Queen Elizabeth, 92. It’s a souvenir that documents deep public ambivalence. Canada in 2018 is one of only fifteen nations to retain the Queen as head of state. Others include Papua New Guinea and the Solomon Islands.
“The concept of the Queen of Canada or the Queen of New Zealand is an important legal and political reality,” writes contributor Sean Palmer. “However, beyond these constructions the public understanding of the Crown in each realm is not necessarily robust.”
Essays in The Canadian Kingdom are refreshingly candid. Steven Point, former lieutenant governor of British Columbia, recalls riding to his swearing-in ceremony in a big white Lincoln past a group of protestors that included his own brother. They exchanged friendly waves. “The Crown is not so much misunderstood as ignored by Canadians,” writes Point.
“In my role as lieutenant governor I learned that government representatives have ears and listen to people of influence inside their respective ridings or electoral districts,” says Point. “I recall one instance when members of the royal family were coming for a visit. The lieutenant governor, who is second in precedence to the Queen, had not been invited to events surrounding the visit. It took a phone call from a wealthy citizen to change this oversight.”
The monarchy once embodied all the mythology of English superiority that was important to Canadians of the pre-war era. Anything English was therefore better: English tea, English fabric, English monarch. Today we think of a constitutional monarchy like alternating current: Sure it’s important, but if we didn’t have it, we’d have something else, and the lights would come on either way.
Contributor Christopher McCreery, private secretary to the lieutenant governor of Nova Scotia, notes 3 of 10 provinces – Alberta, Saskatchewan and Québec – do not even maintain an official residence for vice-regal appointees. Alberta was the first to evict its lieutenant governor, in 1938, amid popular support. “This erodes the dignity of the office in a tangible manner,” writes McCreery. “No longer are citizens summoned to attend events at Government House. Instead, they trundle off to some rented venue, usually entirely devoid of history or dignity of the state.”
Canadians as members of the Commonwealth do not feel part of something important or even relevant. We neither praise nor scorn the monarchy, but are simply indifferent. If MPs and federal judges still swear an oath of true allegiance to Her Majesty, Senator Serge Joyal (Liberal-Que.) notes the ritual has been the subject of nine court challenges since 1992.
“The interpretation given by the courts to the meaning of the oath of allegiance confirms that the loyalty and allegiance sworn is to our form of democratic constitutional monarchy,” writes Joyal. “However, it will tend to make the person of the sovereign appear more remote from the operation of our system of government. The bond between the monarch and her subjects will seem looser over time. The emotional, affectionate element of the oath between the Queen as a person and the one who pledges his or her allegiance will tend to fade away, making the sovereign an abstract concept, devoid of any humanity.”
By Holly Doan
The Canadian Kingdom: 150 Years of Constitutional Monarchy; edited by D. Michael Jackson; Dundurn Press; 248 pages; ISBN 9781-4597-41188; $25
Federal in-house research shows Canadians are wary of any free trade agreement with China. Cabinet has been attempting to negotiate a pact with the People’s Republic since 2016: “I distrust China.”
The Canadian Transportation Agency has denied general compensation to unhappy Air Canada travelers including an 89-year old woman left without a wheelchair, and a young family denied boarding amid confusion over travel visas. Cabinet has promised enactment of a passenger rights’ bill with statutory damages by year’s end: “It’s frustrating.”
Invasive insects may spell an end to ash trees in whole regions of Canada, caution University of Waterloo researchers. Damage from the emerald ash borer first detected in Windsor, Ont. in 2002 is estimated in the billions: “It’s sort of like a slow-moving catastrophe.”
The Department of Public Works will not say if Canada’s largest engineering firm will be struck from its bidders’ lists after a former executive yesterday was charged with arranging illegal political contributions. Under a 2015 policy, federal contractors convicted of wrongdoing can be blacklisted.
A federal consumer watchdog says it has lesser powers than provincial regulators to protect Canadians from unfair treatment by banks. The review by the Financial Consumer Agency of Canada was prompted by 2016 Senate protests that the Agency is weak: ‘They essentially admit it’s something of a toothless tiger.’
The Privy Council has asked federal managers to sign an oath that they will pay students hired for government work. The pledge obtained through Access To Information followed complaints from two-thirds of students hired last year: “We will hold ourselves accountable.”
Cabinet yesterday introduced long-promised regulations to counter dumped goods like China-made steel. Amendments to the Special Import Measures Regulations followed two years of review: “We’d like to see them go further.”
