The Commons yesterday by a 193 to 134 vote rejected an Opposition motion to freeze mandatory fees charged video streaming services. Companies like Netflix and Disney Plus face a tripling of rates, from 5 to 15 percent of their yearly Canadian revenues, under a May 21 CRTC order: "Who will pay for this?"
The CBC was flooded with angry emails after former TV host Travis Dhanraj told MPs he was instructed to keep Conservatives off the air, Access To Information records show. “We don’t hit the mark in every story,” one manager acknowledged in discussing Dhanraj’s March 10 testimony at a parliamentary committee hearing: "Perceptions of bias, whatever direction they take, are of great concern."
Federal managers yesterday testified they never authorized a $10 million charge by Indigenous Languages Commissioner Ronald Ignace to host a four-day conference in Ottawa. An internal audit is underway: "How many Indigenous people could have learned their language with $10 million?”
The Department of Immigration says there is “high interest” in foreigners applying to become Canadians under 2025 changes to the Citizenship Act. Conservative MP Brad Redekopp (Saskatoon West) in Commons debate on budget Main Estimates pressed for a number: "Does the Minister stand by her estimate?"
Prime Minister Mark Carney has yet to comment on federal data showing Canada fell into recession for the first time since the pandemic. Figures were confirmed Friday, one day after Carney mistakenly told New York business leaders that Canada would “have the second-fastest growth in the G7 this year.”
Attorney General Sean Fraser says as a former Catholic schoolboy he would never enact legislation restricting freedom of religion. Fraser spoke in defence of his Bill C-9, opposed by Catholic Bishops, that would permit prosecution of hate speech "based on a belief in a religious text" in specific circumstances: "I read Scripture in church every week."
Labour inspectors must ensure no illegal immigrants are working on federal public works, says Conservative MP Kyle Seeback (Dufferin-Caledon, Ont.). Cabinet has admitted it does not know how many, if any, of an estimated 500,000 illegal immigrants in Canada are drawing wages in subsidized construction: "Can the Minister cite one investigation?"
Federal figures confirm cabinet granted Beijing the equivalent of half the battery electric car market in Canada through 2031. The Minister of Industry had downplayed the China concession as “a small quota.”
Civilian trades at Department of National Defence shipyards have lost a key labour ruling. Federal judges ordered a new hearing into whether unions' expression of support for picket lines during a 2023 dispute breached an Act of Parliament: "Strikes and lockouts pose challenges."
Poet Shai Ben-Shalom writes: “Bovine Respiratory Disease; the most common illness of beef cattle in the world. Calves lose appetite; develop fever; experience breathing difficulties…”
Subsidized media today are so self-pitying it is no surprise they missed the biggest scoop of their lives, the death of subsidized media. Spy the columns and TV punditry and you encounter the same excuses. It was Russian bots or internet poaching of Chevrolet dealer ads or misinformation or Instagram micro-shocks or inflation. It was always someone else’s fault.
Tara Henley, podcaster and former CBC producer, gets the answers. “If media want to restore public trust, we have to examine our own actions,” she writes. “Unpacking our role is essential for making sense of the crisis in media.”
“Most people do not distrust the media for vague, rote reasons but instead for achingly specific ones,” writes Henley. “Indeed, they frequently cite the specific wording in the specific stories that they believe falls short.”
Canadians do not expect infallibility. They expect hard work and honesty. It is not too much to ask. The Trust Spiral notes the descent of media under withering scrutiny blew wide open in the pandemic, an “overheated moment.”
Prime Minister Mark Carney’s “sovereign wealth fund” will cost taxpayers $750 million a year in debt interest charges, finance department figures show. The estimate yesterday followed criticism the $25 billion Canada Strong Fund was not a savings account: "It’s actually a debt fund."
Labour department managers yesterday could not corroborate Minister Patty Hajdu's story that a medical emergency justified quashing a legal 2025 strike by Air Canada flight attendants. Hajdu denied making it up though Access To Information records showed Air Canada’s worry was over lost tourism fares, not life-saving organ transplants: "Was it actually true?"
The equivalent of a tenth of Greater Toronto Area residents now eat at a food bank, the CEO of the city’s Daily Bread Food Bank yesterday testified at the Commons finance committee. Many recipients work full time, he said: "Staggering."
Being a “good person” does not excuse a taxpayer from a justifiable audit, says a Tax Court judge. The remarks came in the latest appeals by participants in what the Canada Revenue called one of the largest tax shelter schemes in the country: "They simply made the same stale arguments."
