Air passenger compensation rules to take effect by year’s end will treat paid tickets like “a contract with a customer,” Transport Minister Omar Alghabra said yesterday. “The airlines are responsible for delivering that service,” he told reporters: "There is a significant imbalance in power here."
Industry Minister François-Philippe Champagne today is under committee order to surrender a copy of documents regarding his agreement to pay Volkswagen Canada more than $13 billion to build a factory in St. Thomas, Ont. Champagne ignored an earlier demand from the Commons industry committee to detail all giveaways to VW: "It is a win for the world."
Independent MP Han Dong (Don Valley North, Ont.) in a court filing admits to at least a dozen phone calls with Communist Chinese diplomats including Beijing’s Ambassador to Canada. Dong called it “common practice” for any MP: "They are not close friends."
Airlines must answer passenger complaints within 30 days under an omnibus budget bill. Transport Minister Omar Alghabra today meets with reporters to detail stricter consumer protection rules for carriers: "We will take action."
Few Indigenous people trust the Canada Revenue Agency and say auditors are “only out to get theirs,” according to in-house research. The Agency surveyed Indigenous communities to determine why people didn't file tax returns even if it meant losing benefits: "I don’t get the sense they are looking out for people."
Cabinet has written a federal ban on animal testing by the cosmetics industry into its omnibus budget bill to guarantee passage this spring. The measure was first endorsed by Laureen Harper and the Humane Society in 2015: "Our government recognizes Canadians are concerned."
Poet Dahlia Kurtz writes: “There was one green leaf left on the tree and I just couldn’t understand; none of the others had survived yet that one green leaf was still alive…”
Not Fit To Stay acquaints modern readers with the “hookworm strategy” of immigration law. The facts are raw. Historian Dr. Isabel Wallace of Trent University is a skillful writer. The effect is startling. If bigotry is rooted in fear and economic despair, Wallace’s research proves even the mildest society is capable of devising something akin to the Nuremberg Laws.
More than a century ago Canada feared an influx of foreigners, especially South Asians bound for work in British Columbia’s lumber trade. A 1906 financial panic didn’t help.
The result was the “Hindu disease theory” embraced by legislators, media and trade unions, that South Asia was “a hotbed of the most virulent and loathsome” infections and its people were natural carriers of the plague, cholera, venereal disease, tuberculosis and smallpox. “From a sanitary point of view I consider them worse than the lowest class of Chinamen,” as Vancouver city health inspector Robert Marrion wrote in a 1912 report.
The Bank of Canada yesterday predicted little trouble with homeowners renewing mortgages at higher rates. Members of the Senate banking committee expressed unease with the sunny forecast: "If you talk to bankers they will always tell you Canadians will go to great lengths to make sure they can pay their mortgages."
Industry Minister François-Philippe Champagne yesterday confirmed he approved up to $13.8 billion in subsidies to build a single Volkswagen battery factory in Ontario. The giveaway is nearly triple the average annual cost of all federal aid for all corporations nationwide: "That money could be used to build more than a dozen hospitals."
MPs on the Commons health committee yesterday agreed to rewrite a Liberal “whitewash” bill that would have cabinet review its own Covid management. “Delete it, get rid of it,” said Liberal MP Nathaniel Erskine-Smith (Beaches-East York, Ont.), sponsor of the bill.
Environment Minister Steven Guilbeault yesterday defended his climate programs and pledged “full steam ahead.” His remarks followed a critical report by the Environment Commissioner that rated Canada the worst of the G7 in lowering emissions despite higher fuel costs and more regulations: "'‘Just trust us, it'll all add up’ doesn't work."
A 2019 cabinet promise to plant two billion trees within a decade is “unlikely to succeed,” Environment Commissioner Jerry DeMarco said yesterday. A separate Budget Office report earlier concluded the program would go 88 percent over budget: "They are not on track."
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau only hours into a national public service strike yesterday warned that “Canadians are not going to be very patient if this continues.” Cabinet dismissed contract proposals by the Public Service Alliance of Canada as “unaffordable” and “completely unworkable.”
Intergovernmental Affairs Minister Dominic LeBlanc’s sister in law yesterday stepped aside as acting Ethic Commissioner. Critics had protested the interim appointment: "You’re ineligible to win the Tim Hortons Roll Up The Rim contest if you’re a family member of an employee. This is ethics 101."
