Cabinet yesterday moved to limit the scope of an Opposition bill to publicly name corporate tax delinquents. “It’s an important measure of public transparency,” Conservative MP Adam Chambers (Simcoe North, Ont.), sponsor of the bill, told the Commons public accounts committee.
Cabinet has found $60 billion in savings in unnamed programs, says Finance Minister François-Philippe Champagne. Budget documents tabled to date do not identify $60 billion in savings, and Champagne did not elaborate: "We should put the record straight."
A federal agency that spent $37.8 million last year to lower greenhouse gas emissions did not keep track of whether it cut emissions or not, says an internal report. Auditors complained of a lack of focus at the Clean Energy Innovation Research Centre: "Emissions are not consistently measured."
Policies enacted by two successive immigration ministers cost thousands of Canadian students' jobs, says a federal memo. The Department of Employment for the first time admitted an 18 percent jobless rate for Canadian students was due to “large numbers” of foreign students, contradicting earlier claims by Ministers Sean Fraser and Marc Miller: "Labour market outcomes have been worsening for youth since early 2023."
Hundreds of voters abroad were improperly registered to cast ballots in the 2025 federal campaign, according to Access To Information records. Elections Canada did not say what if any impact irregularities had, though results were close in four ridings that went to judicial recount: "We will take necessary steps to ensure that automated preventive measures are in place before the next election."
Elections Canada has stripped the Libertarian Party of its federal registration for failing to meet a filing deadline. The Party’s leader said he was quitting political life: "It has been a very frustrating experience on my part."
Alexander Mackenzie, Canada’s first Liberal prime minister, lived near Parliament Hill in a beautiful Gothic Revival home. He was an honest, thrifty fellow who helped transform the country yet could not stand parliamentary life. “Politics is very low,” he wrote. Today the house is gone and forgotten, just like Mackenzie.
If mushrooms killed or hospitalized 10,700 Canadians every year MPs would order committee hearings and mushroom regulations would fly like confetti. Now replace the world “mushroom” with “traffic” and consider the fact accidents claim 10,700 casualties every year. This does not include 150,000 minor injuries.
Parliament for years has not enacted a single new traffic safety initiative. A bill that would have required installation of side guards on heavy trucks, C-344 An Act To Amend The Motor Vehicle Safety Act, died in the Commons in 2011. Ontario’s chief coroner said it would have saved bicyclists and pedestrians from being dragged to their deaths.
Author Neil Arason attempts to bring the country to its senses. No Accident is a compelling, plain-spoken appeal for what at first glance seems an incredible goal: to eliminate virtually all traffic fatalities.
Prime Minister Mark Carney misled media on his private meetings with Chinese Communist leaders, Privy Council records show. Documents written by cabinet aides directly contradicted Carney’s claims that he raised human rights and foreign interference with his Beijing hosts: "On human rights, with the President, yes, we did discuss human rights."
Almost half of Canadians surveyed nationwide say immigration is “causing Canada to change in ways I don’t like,” according to in-house research by the immigration department. Two thirds complained immigrants must “do more to integrate.” The research followed Immigration Minister Lena Diab’s most recent cuts to quotas on a promise of “taking back control over our immigration system.”
Cabinet agreed to ease some restrictions on migrant labour under lobbying by Tim Hortons franchisees, Access To Information records show. Operators claimed tens of thousands of jobs would go unfilled if they couldn’t hire foreigners: "The food service sector faces over 63,000 job vacancies."
Cabinet's Buy Canadian policy does not mean a majority of supplies used in public works or home construction must be Canadian, Housing Minister Gregor Robertson said yesterday. “We’re not being rigid about this,” he told reporters.
The Supreme Court yesterday agreed to hear gun owners’ challenge of Public Safety Minister Gary Anandasangaree’s blacklisting of “assault style” firearms. Two lower courts upheld the ban as reasonable though it was introduced without data showing it would fight crime: "There is no way to know exactly."
Defence Minister David McGuinty yesterday said cabinet for the first time will meet its minimum 2 percent NATO target on military spending by month’s end. MPs have noted the NATO calculations include budget line items of little military value like unarmed Coast Guard lifeboats: "We just can’t have creative accounting to get to 2 percent. We actually need capability to protect Canada."
Weak growth forecasts for 2026 will get weaker yet, Bank of Canada Governor Tiff Macklem yesterday told reporters. A January 28 outlook is already out of date, he said: "It looks like it is going to come in lower than what we previously forecast."
