Only one percent of small and medium-sized business in Canada are exporters and stand to benefit from a European trade deal, a Commons committee has been told. Trade officials said the overwhelming majority of small operators do not have the means to trade: “They don’t know what they’re getting into”.
A Senate panel is appealing to Health Canada to adopt “essential” reforms to safeguard use of prescription drugs and antibiotics. The science committee yesterday concluded nearly three years of research with a call for more proactive regulation of medicines: “The committee was discouraged by frequent testimony regarding Health Canada”.
Most Chinese-Canadians have no religion while Jamaicans are more likely to be poor or unemployed, according to Ethnic Backgrounders written by the Department of Citizenship. Authorities gave no reason for compiling the data, released through Access To Information: ‘It’s the changing nature of Canada’.
Cabinet supports expanding federally-regulated security screening to regional airports nationwide, but won’t detail who will pay or how much. Transport Canada endorsed a Commons motion permitting small airfields to join a national airport security system following petitions from local authorities from Sherbrooke, Que. to Fort Nelson, B.C.: “It’s about time”.
A cabinet bill limiting corporate liability for oil leaks will leave taxpayers with millions in costs from any spill the size of a 2010 Enbridge Inc. pipeline breach in Michigan, MPs say. Bill C-46 caps no-fault liability at $1 billion; comparable U.S. law carries no such limit on clean-up costs: “One billion dollars is a drop in the bucket”.
A cabinet bill touted as a remedy for prison drug abuse merely codifies existing practice and appears pointless, the Commons has been told. The Department of Public Safety said there is “still room for improvement” in curbing inmates’ addictions: “Does this bill actually bring forward new policy?”
A 65-year old Hamilton, Ont. firefighter has lost a long legal battle to overturn a mandatory retirement law. The Supreme Court declined to hear the case: “We are an aging society; there is a shifting landscape”.
Nearly 6 in 10 Canadians would strip citizenship from children born here based on the immigration status of their parents, according to in-house government polling. Citizenship Canada posed the question in a confidential survey, obtained through Access to Information.
“This would be a very fundamental change,” said attorney Peter Edelmann of Edelmann & Co. in Vancouver, an executive member of the Canadian Bar Association’s national immigration law section. “The question they have asked is suggestive,” Edelmann said. “It pushes people to a certain answer that is out of the broader context.”
The citizenship department’s 2014-2015 Tracking Study asked Canadians, “Currently anyone born in Canada is automatically granted Canadian citizenship”; “Some say that Canadian citizenship should only be granted on an automatic basis to those born in Canada if their parents are Canadian citizens or permanent residents. Others say that Canadian citizenship should continue to be granted on an automatic basis to anyone born in Canada even if their parents are only here temporarily or are here illegally. Which is closer to your view?”
Fifty-seven percent supported revoking citizenship from children born to temporary residents or illegal migrants; only 39 percent supported the law as it stands. The findings were based on interviews with 3,028 Canadians nationwide. Costs of the survey were not disclosed.
“The problem is that if these people born here don’t get citizenship here, they won’t be able to get citizenship anywhere,” said Edelmann. “You would wind up with stateless individuals.”
Edelmann said the fact the Department of Immigration polled the question suggested that “immigration has become very politicized, especially with this government”; “I know the department has spent a significant amount of time on media management and this doesn’t surprise me. I think there are better ways for this department to spend its money.”
Contrary To 1947 Law
Christopher Veeman, an attorney with the Bar Association’s immigration law section executive, noted that revoking automatic citizenship for all babies born here depending on their parents’ status is contrary to Canada’s original Citizenship Act.
“Our system has operated this way since 1947,” said Veeman, of Veeman Law in Saskatoon. “It has not been an issue.”
The Tracking Study also noted 37 percent of Canadians surveyed believe there are too many immigrants in Canada; 35 percent said refugee claimants should be denied the same health care benefits as citizens; and only 20 percent said Canada should let in more immigrants over the next five years.
Asked whether Canada “should focus on helping unemployed Canadians rather than looking for skilled immigrants for our workforce,” 74 percent agreed in the Tracking Study.
“I can understand why politicians react to negative news stories, but ideally they should base these decisions on the best interests of the economy and the country,” Veeman said; “When you talk to Canadians about immigration in the abstract you’ll have people say, ‘Oh, yes, there are too many.’ When you ask Canadians about immigrants they actually know – the guy at the Tim Hortons or the highly-skilled engineer at work – they react much more favourably.”
Canada accepts 259,000 immigrants a year. The rate peaked in 1913 when 401,000 immigrants arrived in Canada.
By Tom Korski 
A $64,000 dispute over safety improvements to a Nova Scotia rail crossing makes the case for tighter federal regulations, says an MP. The City of Halifax had to appeal to the Canadian Transportation Agency to determine who’d pay to upgrade a crossing used by Canadian National Rail Co.: “There are issues”.
Heavy ice throughout the Great Lakes has forced a week’s delay in the opening of the St. Lawrence Seaway. It follows the coldest winter in the region since 1889. Some $34 billion a year in economic activity depends on the Seaway system: “We want to make sure”.
Cabinet proposes to close a 1.4-gram loophole in the Tobacco Act it says has been exploited by industry to peddle cigars to children. Health Canada detailed amendments to fix legislation it originally passed six years ago: “It doesn’t go far enough”.
Once, behind the deli counter,
there was a 4-foot salami.
The centrepiece of the display.
Little changed
when the first customer
asked for eight razor-thin slices
for a sandwich.
Still larger than life.
Another customer
took another few slices.
This one wanted twelve
to send with her kids
to school.
That one, thirty for a party.
One even ordered a-pound-and-a-half
for a corporate luncheon.
I see where the salami used to be.
Only the tail end is left;
a shadow of its former glory.
Customers ignore it,
look for another chunk to sink their teeth into.
Once, in the heart of Ottawa,
there was an Experimental Farm.
(Editor’s note: poet Shai Ben-Shalom, an Israeli-born biologist, examines current events in the Blacklock’s tradition each and every Sunday)
Frequent flyers are most likely to be dissatisfied with the airport experience, according to research by the Canadian Air Transport Security Authority. The agency said “target customers” – Canadians who fly more than 11 times in a two-year period – are likelier to grumble over security lineups: ‘It doesn’t make any difference’.
An Alberta company has lost a bid for exemption from federal trucking regulations though its delivery vehicles cross provincial boundaries. The Supreme Court declined to hear the case from the firm fined $10,000 for breaching the Motor Vehicle Transportation Act: “Even for constitutional lawyers it’s not clear-cut”.
Cabinet hints it will appeal a court ruling that it may have breached constitutional rights with a 2014 bill on territorial development permits. The ruling by the Northwest Territories Supreme Court halts enforcement of a bill earlier praised by the Prime Minister’s Office as a “notable achievement”: “It defies logic as to why Canada proceeded in this way”.
