Federal inspectors yesterday disclosed a steep penalty for breach of migrant labour regulations. An Alberta gas station operator was fined $164,000 and banned from the Temporary Foreign Worker Program for five years: ‘The department previously conducted few on-site inspections.’
Military reserves are now 25 percent short of their targeted minimum strength, records show. The Department of National Defence in an in-house report said reserves were so poorly managed they did not spend more than a billion approved by Parliament to get them up to strength: ‘Lack of coherence has repercussions.’
Prime Minister Mark Carney yesterday said he will recuse himself from any dealings with Brookfield Asset Management, the New York-based conglomerate that paid him the equivalent of $9.8 million in stock options last December 31. The Opposition said Carney’s conflict was so glaring he should immediately dump all stock holdings: “Let’s say there’s a decision that will have a major impact on Brookfield.”
Donors to a defamation fund for Birju Dattani, ex-Liberal appointee to the Canadian Human Rights Commission, urge that he “free the world from Zionism” and “take them all down.” The comments were posted by donors to a crowdfunding site where Dattani is attempting to finance a libel suit against three Jewish defendants: “Bring them down!”
A rare forensic audit has identified hundreds of thousands’ worth of budget irregularities at a small northern Saskatchewan First Nation. The Department of Indigenous Services yesterday would not disclose its complete audit of Makwa Sahgaiehcan First Nation at Loon Lake, Sask., population 1,815: “The purpose of the forensic audit was to conduct an independent investigation into allegations.”
Taxpayers Ombudsman François Boileau yesterday faulted the Canada Revenue Agency for cutting off benefit cheques to foreigners found to be in the country illegally. Boileau said the Agency policy, though technically correct, was a hardship for people “whose status is expiring.”
“Look inside yourself,” Prime Minister Mark Carney yesterday told reporters questioning his refusal to divulge his stock options. Both the Prime Minister and Mrs. Carney were paid by federal contractors prior to his swearing in Friday: “What possible conflict would you have?”
Cabinet should repeal carbon tax legislation altogether after eliminating the 18¢ consumer charge on a litre of gasoline, Opposition Leader Pierre Poilievre said yesterday. The 18¢ break is “ultimately a trick” as long as the Greenhouse Gas Pollution Pricing Act remains on the books, he said.
Any future Conservative cabinet will again commemorate military exploits, John A. Macdonald and “our common Canadian identity,” Opposition Leader Pierre Poilievre said yesterday. Federal historical revisionism “weakened the bonds that used to tie us together,” he said: “We will be naming public monuments after Macdonald and many of our other historical figures.”
A mandatory security fee on all air travelers raised more than $832 million last year, a record, according to Access To Information documents. Cabinet hiked the fee 33 percent in its 2023 budget: “This is a tax on the flying public.”
A federal judge has dismissed a multi-billion dollar class action lawsuit alleging anti-Black hiring practices in the public service. The Federal Court cited a lack of evidence that thousands of individual hiring decisions over the past 55 years were the result of a colour bar: “No specific practice or policy is identified to substantiate this claim.”
Prime Minister Mark Carney has signaled an imminent election call with a gasoline price cut of 18¢ per litre. In a reversal of its signature climate plan, cabinet eliminated the consumer carbon tax effective April 1 after concluding it “created economic distortions.”
Prime Minister Mark Carney will not disclose stocks and other assets he and his wife hold with corporations on two continents including federal contractors. Carney told reporters he found it odd that anyone would ask: “That’s an odd question.”
RCMP are preparing for a “large number of demonstrators” at a G7 summit in June, according to a briefing note. The Mounties initially budgeted more than $46 million for security at the two-day meeting, a sum expected to be a small fraction of the final cost: “The RCMP will be prepared to deal with a large number of demonstrators.”
Prime Minister Mark Carney fired or demoted two cabinet members who opposed him for the Liberal leadership. Carney praised former Deputy Prime Minister Chrystia Freeland as an “exceptional minister, exceptional public servant” but demoted her to Minister of Transport, the 11th position in cabinet’s order of precedence: “We have new ministers with new ideas.”
