Media subsidies buy “social cohesion,” says a report by Heritage Minister Pascale St-Onge’s department. The report defended 100 percent payroll rebates under a program the Canadian Association of Journalists praised for saving unemployable reporters from working in hardware stores: "We are hurting emotionally."
Parliament should not regulate advertising for sports betting, says the NHL. The League in a Senate petition made no mention of its partnership with legal bookies: "We’re simply adapting to the evolving legal landscape."
Balloting is down in federal prisons, new data show. Elections Canada had no explanation for inmates’ declining interest in government: "It’s still no fun to be in jail."
Poet Shai Ben-Shalom writes: “He touched the perfect body of Suzanne with his mind, then wrote a poem about it. Or was it a song?…”
There is an urban myth in Moose Jaw, Sask. that local Chinese built subterranean opium dens where God knows what went on. Local tour operators sold tickets to see the tunnels. Did Chinese drug fiends dig them? “Some may have worked and lived in these spaces to avoid prosecution,” says one titillating website.
Not exactly.
When Professor Allison Marshall of Brandon University set out to compile her intriguing social history of Chinese migration on the Prairies, she notes local gossips kept bringing up the opium dens of Moose Jaw. “Even to this day, the city perpetuates images of Chinese who dwelled underground in tunnels and lived the life of heathens in opium dens, laundries and gambling joints,” writes Marshall.
“None of my research participants had much involvement with Moose Jaw, though non-Chinese participants were quick to try to steer me there,” adds Marshall. “Urban myths circulated that there were also tunnels in Winnipeg’s Chinatown; however, this is untrue.”
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s Privy Council commissioned confidential research on whether Canadians would support citizenship for illegal immigrants, records show. Researchers found stiff resistance against queue jumpers including by legal immigrants who spent “many years” following the rules, said a report: "We pass all the requirements to come here and they just walk in to Canada and Canada takes them in."
MPs yesterday said they suspected the Department of Foreign Affairs misled Parliament in defending its purchase of an $8.8 million Manhattan penthouse for New York Consul Tom Clark. One department manager testified she used a “mis-word” in writing a staff email stating Consul Clark asked for a new condo at taxpayers' expense: "Things you are saying are tough to believe."
CBC-TV will “reassess the need” for future cuts after paying its managers millions in bonuses, says a senior executive. Carol Najm, chief financial officer, defended bonus payments at the Senate national finance committee: "What sacrifices were asked of the management at CBC?"
The RCMP yesterday denied soft-pedaling its treatment of Communist Party “police stations” used by the People’s Republic to intimidate Chinese emigres in Canada. Counsel at the Commission on Foreign Interference questioned why Mounties appeared distracted by “diplomacy.”
More Canadians must buy electric cars, Industry Minister François-Philippe Champagne said yesterday. A federal memo earlier proposed cabinet nearly double rebates: "Make sure we have adoption."
Cabinet yesterday lost a key test of its grip on Parliament. A majority of MPs including five Atlantic Liberals ignored cabinet orders in calling for funds to raise Old Age Security: 'This Halloween might be Trudeau's last as Prime Minister.'
Canadian insurers yesterday told a Senate committee “tens of thousands of employers” are reviewing workplace benefits for potential cutbacks if Parliament passes a pharmacare bill. Health Minister Mark Holland called the testimony “a bunch of malarkey” and asked that senators pass the bill by Thanksgiving: "I’ve got to try to wash that away, that nonsense."
A federal judge has issued a rare Court order blocking public access to an anti-Israel website. The temporary order was requested by Indigo Books & Music Inc. against anonymous protesters: "It is not an order that engages freedom of expression."
Elections Canada yesterday released Official Voting Results showing loss of Liberal Party support in a pivotal summer byelection in Toronto was widespread. Liberals lost dozens of polls in Toronto-St. Paul’s, once among the safest Liberal seat in the country: "They are not happy."
Québec is home to the country’s heaviest drinkers, Statistics Canada data showed yesterday. Saskatchewan residents were the least likely to drink heavily: "A higher proportion of those living in Québec reported drinking."
