Cabinet approved scant funding for a vaunted crime crackdown on tobacco smuggling, new accounts show. RCMP and the Canada Border Services Agency spent less than one percent of their budgets on a program cabinet claimed would “make our streets safe”.
Environment Canada has granted two mining corporations long extensions to comply with federal law on pollution controls. An advocacy group described the concessions as disturbing: “Industry gets what it wants”.
A federal agency that oversees airport security is winning praise from Canada’s chief auditor despite being cited for unlawful contracting. Auditor General Michael Ferguson said he found no irregularities at the Canadian Air Transport Security Authority amid damning Federal Court judgments: “We’re satisfied”.
The Canadian Transportation Agency says it’s reviewing a website notice found to mislead air passengers over compensation for delayed and cancelled flights. One advocate said the notice was “disgusting”.
“The Agency is looking into the matter,” a spokesperson said. The Agency declined further comment. In a Fly Smart guide the Agency urged consumers not to get their hopes up for compensation over snarled airline schedules. The notice:
The notice is wrong on all three counts, said Dr. Gábor Lukács of Air Passenger Rights. Lukács noted under case law and the Agency’s own rulings, airlines must notify passengers of changes in flight plans; liability is assigned regardless of who is responsible for a flight delay; and courts have compensated passengers for “stress, inconvenience and loss of enjoyment” caused by delays or cancellations.
“This is appalling,” said Lukács, who wrote a letter of complaint to regulators. “Most passengers would go to the website and may not know about the rulings. Obviously the Agency is supposed to speak through its rulings, but this disconnect between those decisions and what is on the Agency’s website raises some serious concerns about the impartiality of the current decision-makers at the Agency.”
Bruce Cran, president of the Consumers’ Association of Canada, said the notice appeared clearly misleading. “This is a sign of disgusting unprofessionalism on the part of the CTA,” said Cran.
“We ask for a quick correction from the Agency,” Cran said. “They seem to have an anti-consumer attitude. We’ve been seeking a Passengers’ Bill of Rights that past governments have seen fit to reject.”
The last Parliament twice rejected private bills mandating minimum compensation for travellers. Bill C-459 An Act Regarding The Rights Of Air Passengers proposed that airlines pay customers up to $1,000 for flight cancellations or delays. The New Democrat bill was defeated on a 149 to 134 vote in 2013.
The Transportation Agency has acknowledged Canada is one of the few industrialized countries without a passenger rights bill, noting compensation for delays, cancellations or denial of boarding is the law in Argentina; Brazil; Chile; China; Colombia; Iceland; India; Israel; Nigeria; Norway; Pakistan; Peru; The Philippines; Switzerland; Thailand; Turkey; Uruguay; Venezuela and the United States, where delays of more than four hours entitle passengers to 400% compensation to a maximum US$1,300. The European Union requires that carriers reimburse passengers for delays of five hours or more, regardless of the reason.
By Dale Smith 
Regulators are turning a profit on the National Do Not Call List. Sales of the list to telemarketers plus revenues from fines on scofflaws point to a multi-million dollar gain for the CRTC: “This could be a hefty cost”.
Cabinet cut research funding for the Canadian Space Agency by 85 percent even as it appointed a Space Advisory Board to promote science, newly-released accounts show. A former Agency president earlier described its state as “depressing”.
Budget data show Agency funding for research to support new discoveries fell from $54.7 million a year to just $8 million in the period from 2009 to 2015. Cuts included the 2009 elimination of a $33.9 million Space Technology Research Program.
“It’s not just research, it’s everything,” said Marc Boucher, director of the Canadian Space Commerce Association. “Some programs were cut altogether, including education. Public outreach was gutted and basically doesn’t exist anymore.”
Cabinet in 2014 appointed a Space Advisory Board under General (Ret’d) Walter Natynczyk to promote research. Canada was the third country in space after Soviet Russia and the U.S., with the 1962 launch of the Alouette I satellite.
“The general consensus is the Space Agency isn’t playing the game,” said Mark Fricker, president of the Canadian Space Society. “The rest of the community isn’t playing that game, either. If there’s funding for start-up ideas then you will find small funding from others, but as soon as the Space Agency backs out the company interests go with them.”
“It’s not a direct reaction, it’s a secondary reaction,” Fricker said. “That’s what hurts. We can’t leverage other assets because the major player has left.”
The Agency in 2014 hired consultants to “capture the economic argument for investment in space”, in an initiative former astronaut Marc Garneau called incredible: “I’m flabbergasted the Agency feels the need to have some contractor tell them what value they give to Canadians,” Garneau said in an earlier interview.
“When I was president of the Canadian Space Agency I didn’t need anyone to tell me how the work benefited the country; we knew it,” said Garneau, now Liberal transport minister, who left the Agency to run for Parliament in 2005. “This is kind of depressing.”
“It’s basically saying, help us talk to the politicians so they will think we do something useful,” Garneau said. “I find that extraordinary. When I was president we had no question what our value was to Canadians. It was our mandate.”
The Agency had said it needed publicists’ help to “present a common narrative in how and why Canada should invest in space”; “The primary audience of the ‘value proposition for space’ is senior officials within the Government of Canada.”
A 2014 survey by the Professional Institute of the Public Service of Canada found 80 percent of federal researchers cautioned that cuts had hurt innovation, while 80 percent of Space Agency scientists said funding was inadequate.
“The consensus is Canada is not punching above its weight like we used to,” said the Space Society’s Fricker. “We are a dog without teeth. Unfortunately we are no longer the sought-after partner we were in the past for anything, let alone our specialty in space robotics and telecommunications.”
By Kaven Baker-Voakes
Railway attorneys have lost their first Federal Court challenge of mandatory arbitration for shippers. Lawyers for CN sought access to confidential emails between an arbitrator and regulators at the Canadian Transportation Agency: “We have been railroaded for far too long”.
Transport Canada can withhold port employees’ security clearance on hearsay, a federal judge has ruled. The decision came in the case of a Port of Vancouver electrician denied clearance on unproven allegations of wrongdoing: “It puts applicants in a difficult position”.
Senate Conservatives will take a “very close look” at Liberal repeal of two labour bills, says a senior lawmaker. Conservatives retain a seven-vote majority in the Senate.
“The Liberals are not even giving these bills a chance,” said Senator Don Plett (Conservative-Man.). “If this was six years down the road and the big union bosses had issues, I’d say we’d be more open to it.”
Cabinet introduced Bill C-4 An Act To Amend The Canada Labour Code to repeal two Conservative bills enacted in 2015. Bill C-377 mandates disclosure of confidential union finances on a government website; and Bill C-525 abolishes the card-check system for union certification in federally-regulated industries in favour of secret balloting, and decertification on the votes of as few as 40 percent of employees in a union local.
“I have not changed my opinion on these bills,” said Plett. “Clearly these bills are intended to help the little guy, and I believe our party did just that – helped union members. And the Liberals want to help the union bosses.”
“I don’t know that I want to speculate on what we will do with these bills,” Plett said. “We will review every piece of legislation. What we’re going to do is give this a very close look. We’re not making any blanket statements. It wouldn’t be fair. The Senate doesn’t work that way.”
Current standings in the Senate are 45 Conservatives; 28 Liberals; ten independents including seven Conservative appointees; and 22 vacancies. Cabinet is expected to name five new Liberal appointees to fill a portion of the Senate vacancies by February 29.
“We hear horror stories about what’s going on with the big union bosses,” Plett said. “I have had one of them look me in the eye and say they would do everything in their power to make sure Conservatives were not elected in 2015. How democratic is that?”
Labour Minister MaryAnn Mihychuk said repeal of the two bills is necessary. “They were originally not formulated in accordance with democratic principles of consultation and need,” Mihychuk said. “These were political instruments to attack the labour movement. We are going to reset a fair and balanced platform and move from there.”
Mihychuk earlier told reporters all Conservative labour measures are under review. Bills passed by the previous government included repeal of the 1935 Fair Wages & Hours Of Labour Act that required federal contractors publish all wage scales; provide minimum time-and-half pay for overtime; forbid discrimination in hiring; guarantee wages of all employees of subcontractors in case of default; and submit records to labour department inspectors.
A 2013 omnibus budget bill also amended the Public Service Labour Relations Act to give cabinet “the exclusive right to determine whether any service, facility or activity of the Government of Canada is essential because it is or will be necessary for the safety or security of the public or a segment of the public.” Union executives opposed the measure as an unconstitutional infringement on the right to strike, noting previous governments had negotiated terms of which employees would be designated as “essential”.
By Tom Korski
Air Canada is seeking a federal order to halt public release of its compensation schedule for passengers stranded by flight cancellations. A passengers’ advocate who obtained the data gave it to reporters: “There are no nuclear secrets here”.
The Department of Public Safety says it can’t commit to restore funding for a prison addiction research centre, the only facility of its kind. Newly-released accounts show cabinet cut funding by $2.2 million – 38 percent more than originally claimed – even as it drafted a Drug-Free Prisons Act: “It could be that it was politically driven”.
Canada’s wind turbine promoters must be nice to neighbours if the industry is to expand, says University of Waterloo research. Noise complaints earlier prompted thousands of Health Canada questionnaires: “It’s a part of daily life”.
Canada Revenue Agency has lost again in its three-year legal battle with an oil company over a lost letter. A federal judge ruled ConocoPhillips Canada Resources Corp. is entitled to ask the Agency to reconsider a reassessment over millions in unpaid oil royalties: “The Minister owes a duty of fairness to all taxpayers”.
The National Capital Commission
wants to develop LeBreton Flats:
9.3 hectares between the downtown core,
the War Museum, and the
river.
They call on the world’s best
to reimagine this exceptional site,
bring design excellence and animation,
create a point of civic
pride.
A year goes by.
Two proposals submitted:
one from an Ottawa team, one from
Gatineau.
The other world’s best
appear to have ignored this golden
opportunity.
They may have been busy with the
Hudson Yards Redevelopment Project in
Manhattan,
Changi International Airport in
Singapore,
or the Ferrari World indoor theme park in
Abu Dhabi.
(Editor’s note: poet Shai Ben-Shalom, an Israeli-born biologist, examines current events in the Blacklock’s tradition each and every Sunday)
Conservative senators are being pressed to block repeal of two key labour bills, 377 and 525, passed by the last Parliament. Cabinet yesterday introduced legislation to revoke the bills that made it easier to decertify union locals, and required disclosure of confidential labour records: “It repeals the good work that we did”.
