Federal managers stressed secrecy in drafting a 10-year consultants’ contract to manage the government's website at an undisclosed cost, Access To Information records show. Cabinet had repeatedly promised to cut spending on consultants: "We have determined our safest approach is to maintain confidentiality."
A quarter of Canadian students surveyed say they are so hard up they skip meals, says a Food Banks Canada report to the Commons human resources committee. MPs are studying youth unemployment including the impact of cabinet’s now-rescinded 2023 decision to let a million foreign students into the workforce: "Something is not working."
Teachers, pharmacists and other young professionals who relocate to rural Canada are eligible for $65.3 million a year in Canada Student Loan forgiveness under regulations that took effect yesterday. A similar program in the medical field was credited with drawing 17,921 doctors and nurses to rural practice: "The loan forgiveness benefit was very impactful."
The Department of Environment yesterday began enforcement of a national ban on the manufacture and import of compact fluorescent bulbs due to mercury poisoning. Then-Minister Steven Guilbeault drafted the ban in 2024 on bulbs once touted as climate-friendly energy savers: "How many people know?"
Happy New Year! Blacklock's pauses this week for our annual holiday break. We're back Friday, January 2 -- The Editor
Poet Shai Ben-Shalom writes: “Canadian doctors asked to volunteer in West Africa, help fight Ebola…”
Any tourist can describe Burmese jungles or the snows of Kilimanjaro. It takes talent to write a travel book about shopping malls. “I am writing a book on boredom, on repetition, on déjà vu, on replication, on the dysphasia of constructed landscapes, on the tackiness of the world and how it is shrinking,” writes Swiss author Rinny Gremaud.
All The World’s A Mall pops and snaps. It is outstanding. “It never ceases to amaze me how fatalistic people are about the ugly environments they live in,” she writes. Yes, the food courts in Edmonton and Casablanca look much alike. Yet Gremaud’s book is no tiresome rant against commercialism. She captures the contrasts of life on Earth through the lens of shopping centres.
It’s easy to sneer at malls as “sinister places, cultural and aesthetic deserts where the dead souls of a population that has converted to the religion of consumerism mill around,” writes Gremaud. They are much more.
Warmest wishes to friends and subscribers for a safe and happy Christmas. Blacklock's pauses to bid you the best of the season -- The Editor
The Department of Employment last year disciplined 629 employees for misconduct from absenteeism to theft and fraud, records show. Disclosure was intended to “show what happens when wrongdoing or misconduct is reported.”
Chief Science Advisor Mona Nemer’s office worked up an excuse to spend more than $34,000 on a UFO survey no parliamentarian asked for, records show. Staff in an Access To Information document sought “justification for why the survey is needed” at a time when cabinet pledged to cut unnecessary spending: "Explain the manner in which this research is required."
The Government of Mexico complains it is too expensive and bureaucratic to do business with Ottawa. The candid report by diplomats comes three months after Prime Minister Mark Carney announced a “new era of cooperation" with Mexico: 'Many expressed concern about excessive requirements, cost or red tape.'
Labour Minister Patty Hajdu undermined constitutional rights with her frequent use of strike bans, says the nation’s largest pilots’ association. The union in a submission to the Commons human resources committee said strike bans had “now become commonplace.”
A phone call cost the Canada Revenue Agency $879,092 in a tax dispute, according to evidence in Federal Court. Justice Danielle Ferron ruled a conversation between a tax lawyer and a dismissive collections officer amounted to “breach of procedural fairness.”
“An arsenal of illegal weapons” is being smuggled across the border from the United States, says a Canada Border Services Agency audit. The report said criminals are attempting to bypass controls by shipping plastic firearms parts through the mail: "We were informed that three dimensional printing of firearms parts sent via the postal mode pose a risk."
The Public Health Agency admits it's wasted more than $170 million buying and storing now-expired medical goods marked for landfill. MPs have questioned why no executive has been fired for ongoing mismanagement of inventory first uncovered five years ago: "How many individuals have been held accountable?"
