Federal managers yesterday confirmed Prime Minister Mark Carney’s Buy Canadian policy benefits 100 percent foreign-owned corporations with storefront operations in Canada but couldn’t say if a company hiring temporary foreign workers would qualify. Carney announced the policy last September 5 on a promise to “build Canada strong.” READ MORE
A Bank of Canada executive yesterday blamed immigration in part for high youth unemployment rates. Nicolas Vincent, external Deputy Governor, said young jobseekers face difficulties not seen in a generation: "Their contribution to the rise in overall long-term unemployment exceeds what we saw during the recession in the early 1990s." READ MORE
Federal boundary commissioners renamed several ridings with Indigenous references to promote reconciliation, one participant yesterday told the House affairs committee. A cabinet bill currently before the committee would delete Indigenous names given two ridings: "Indigenous place names are already deeply embedded in Canadian political geography even if we do not always stop to notice: Mississauga, Skeena, Nanaimo, Temiscaming." READ MORE
Labour Minister Patty Hajdu yesterday said cabinet seeks “better relationships” with organized labour and employers. Cabinet ten times in two years unilaterally issued orders under the Canada Labour Code to quash legal strikes, a record: "Strikes are very disruptive." READ MORE
The Public Health Agency in an April 30 memo said measles was not “widespread across Canada” despite a 2025 outbreak. Canada’s loss of measles-free status with the World Health Organization was merely a “classification used to guide surveillance,” it said. READ MORE
An unidentified automaker is drafting a secret plan to export Canadian-made passenger cars to Asia and the Middle East, Industry Minister Mélanie Joly said yesterday. MPs on the Commons industry committee expressed skepticism: "No company has come to any committee on Parliament Hill or gone to the media to suggest that this is a viable business plan." READ MORE
Canadians are resigned to failure in eliminating U.S. tariffs, says in-house Privy Council research. Federal focus groups were unable to reach any consensus on whether Prime Minister Mark Carney was “on the right track” after promising to negotiate a win for Canada: "Few thought that it was likely that an agreement could be achieved where all tariffs would be removed." READ MORE
I remember one oldtimer telling me, “You don’t have to be smart or know all the answers to work hard. You can compensate for a lot with hard work.” I never forgot that miner’s advice. On completing high school I landed my first industrial job as a hard-rock miner for Copperline Mines Ltd. in Parsons, B.C. My mother Angeline had raised us at our home in Trail. My father Vincent worked at the Cominco smelter. Dad didn’t want me working there. Sickness robbed him of a happy retirement. So, I worked.
