David Johnston, 82, is out as acting chief of the Federal Leaders’ Debates Commission. Cabinet in a pre-election order did not fire Johnston outright but voted to replace him with an employee in case of “absence or incapacity.”
The Department of Public Works yesterday said it sent letters to contractors asking for repayment of at least part of the $59.5 million cost of the ArriveCan program. The department did not specify when it expected an answer: "Letters to that effect have gone out."
The Public Health Agency auctioned $22,000 ventilators as scrap metal for pennies a pound because they couldn’t give them away, documents show. The Agency said the costly StarFish Medical devices were declared surplus within months of their purchase: 'Why were they sold as scrap?'
The Treasury Board yesterday said it knew of 163 cases of in-house conflicts in contracting in the past two years. The number applied only to federal managers who voluntarily disclosed conflicts: "You don’t have the dollar amount?"
Canadians are embracing home economics in a bid to beat high grocery prices, says Department of Agriculture research. Data show more consumers are canning, freezing and planning meals to save money: 'The need for home economics has influenced purchase behaviour.'
Canadians may share media passwords without payment or permission, a federal judge has ruled. The decision by Federal Court Justice Yvan Roy came in the case of a Government of Canada manager who bought a single Blacklock’s subscription then shared the password with nine people: “There is a significant public interest in reading articles.”
The United Nations is being used by countries that “don’t share our values,” says a Department of Foreign Affairs briefing note. It follows Prime Minister Justin Trudeau's public praise for the UN while waging an unsuccessful 2020 campaign for a temporary seat on the Security Council: "Send the message that Canada is back."
The Financial Consumer Agency of Canada is no help to consumers, say members of the Senate banking committee. The protests follow Access To Information records showing the Agency did not answer a single one of 27,323 consumer complaints it received since 2019: "It was a disaster."
An air passengers’ visa program intended to keep dangerous foreigners out of Canada instead drove up refugee claims to record levels, Budget Office data show. The number of refugee claims by travelers who bought a $7 electronic visa is up 672 percent, said analysts: 'The average cost for each asylum claimant is $16,500.'
School boards nationwide should rewrite curricula to include education on seal hunting, says the Senate fisheries committee. Senators said lessons are needed to revive an industry that is “no longer economically viable.”
Poet Shai Ben-Shalom writes: “By the entrance, names of employees and their whereabouts. Andy went for a dental appointment; Shawn is in a conference; Barbara on vacation…”
Otto Boyko of Edmonton recalls the day he enlisted in the army during the Korean War, and went home to tell Mother he’d take basic training at Camp Petawawa, Ont. “Oh, that’s where your dad was held in the internment camp,” she said.
Another oldtimer, Andrew Antoniuk, remembered when his father bought his first car in 1937, he insisted on taking the family to see a clearing in the bush near Jasper, Alta. “He showed us the area where his eldest brother said he had worked clearing the forest in an internment camp,” said Antoniuk: “It didn’t mean that much, but now as I am reviewing the history, I see the place again and I think about it. Oh, my God.”
The Stories Were Not Told documents the First War internment of 8,579 people, most of them Ukrainians. Yes, detainees included women and children. Yes, men were shot trying to escape. Author Sandra Semchuk describes her work as an attempt at “gathering clues that have been emptied of meaning and forgotten.”
The Department of Finance yesterday said it had no choice but to raise the debt ceiling by a trillion dollars in three years. “The increase is a result of the borrowing,” Alexander Bonnyman, director of debt management, told the Commons finance committee.
The Canada Revenue Agency last year fired 177 employees for security breaches, records disclose. The Agency did not explain each firing though past dismissals involved unauthorized snooping through tax files: "All 177 were revocations of reliability status."
Nine independent publishers and commentators yesterday denounced federal newsroom subsidies. The first organized opposition to media bailouts was initiated by the Macdonald-Laurier Institute, an Ottawa think tank: “Our media companies will not accept the per employee subsidies.”
