Public Safety Minister Marco Mendicino yesterday defended a cellphone search bill as necessary and constitutional. Liberal-appointed senators likened the bill to a fascist measure that would promote racial profiling: "It’s the same kind of searches I witnessed in Spain during Franco."
Canadians can now wait an average three months to renew a passport, Social Development Minister Karina Gould said yesterday. Gould recommended the public take complaints to their MP: "I would recommend you contact your Member of Parliament."
Cabinet yesterday admitted failure with a pre-election bill allowing municipal handgun bans. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau instead introduced what he called a proposed a “national freeze” on sales: "It didn't make sense for them."
University students who take a “gap year” after high school typically lose thousands in long term earnings, says Statistics Canada data. There were no similar impacts on high school graduates who waited before entering trades: "A gap year may have long term economic implications."
The abrupt resignation of VIA Rail’s chief executive is a “privacy matter,” Transport Minister Omar Alghabra yesterday told the Commons transport committee. The $318,000-a year CEO quit May 20 with two years remaining on her contract: "I don’t think you want this committee to do a performance review on individual employees."
The head of CMHC in a private meeting complained of a “need for home prices to stall,” according to Access To Information records obtained by the Canadian Taxpayers Federation. CEO Romy Bowers also welcomed tips from equity tax advocates on a strategy to “brief political leaders” on the tax scheme: "Her own personal view is that real estate being 14 percent of GDP is not a strong path."
Online black market drug dealers sell more marijuana pound for pound than federally-licensed distributors, says a Department of Public Safety report. Data suggested criminal gangs prospered when Parliament legalized recreational cannabis four years ago: "Factors put the online illicit market on par with the online legal market."
A federal contractor Thomson Reuters paid to host the Prime Minister’s chief of staff and her deputy at the invitation-only White House Correspondents’ Association Dinner, according to ethics filings. Katie Telford was earlier quoted by a cabinet minister as boasting she could manipulate press coverage: "Kim Kardashian and Pete Davidson made a splash."
Nunavut has the largest government payroll outside Scandinavia, new federal figures show. Statistics Canada estimated 29 percent of the territory’s workforce is employed by government: "The public service is the largest employer in Nunavut,"
Conservative and New Democrat MPs joined in condemning a Supreme Court decision striking lifetime imprisonment without parole as unconstitutional. Parliament in 2011 amended the Criminal Code to permit literal life sentences for multiple murderers: "This is unacceptable."
Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland’s luxury tax on planes, boats and automobiles will cost jobs and generate less revenue than estimated, the Parliamentary Budget Office said yesterday. The ten percent tax takes effect September 1: "There would certainly be job losses."
Aggressive sales tactics remain commonplace at major banks, according to an undercover sting operation by a federal agency. Auditors posing as customers were routinely oversold products they neither sought nor required: "The Agency expects banks will not misplace this trust."
Environment Minister Steven Guilbeault yesterday approved a six-figure climate change grant to Canada's largest beer maker. Guilbeault’s department paid $250,000 to replace a diesel boiler in a St. John’s brewery: "We are a company based in nature."
Cabinet will not overturn a CRTC decision blamed for high wholesale telecom rates, the Department of Industry said yesterday. “It would be irresponsible,” André Arbour, director general of internet policy, told reporters in a technical briefing: "That does not mean to say there is not room for improvement for competition."
Vaccination status is “fundamentally private,” a national broadcast ombudsman said yesterday. The Canada Broadcast Standards Council ruling came in the case of an Edmonton announcer Lochlin Cross who outed a listener as unvaccinated: "Revelation of this private, confidential medical information was not only careless but egregious."
