Fraud charges against a federal contractor accused of stealing $250,000 are only the beginning, a Department of Public Works manager said yesterday. The theft of millions is suspected, MPs were told: "Is it not true at this very minute there are middle men just soaking Canadian taxpayers?"
U.S. protests over the Government of Canada’s poor record on protecting copyright owners is merely a “political tool,” says a staff briefing note to Trade Minister Mary Ng. The United States placed Canada on its 2024 “watch list” over concerns on copyright thievery: “Canada does not recognize the validity of the report.”
Solar panels pose a “significant pollution risk,” the Department of Public Works said yesterday. Landfilling of used panels too costly to recycle will see toxic chemicals leach into groundwater, it warned: "The volume of end of life solar panels will grow which will result in significant pollution risks."
New Democrats are now election-ready, Jagmeet Singh said yesterday. “We are getting close,” Singh told reporters while touring Northern Ontario where the Party stands to lose a veteran incumbent due to resignation and redistricting: "We are getting close to an election."
Indian Residential School “denialism” is undermining reconciliation with First Nations, says a federal memo. The Department of Crown-Indigenous Relations did not define the term: "We must not deny what happened."
There are “going to be some issues” with a federal IT project to digitize border collections of Customs duties, says a federal memo. Cost of the program under development since 2016 is more than $526 million: "There are no doubt going to be some issues."
Canadian National Railways has agreed to pay $8 million for breach of the Fisheries Act, the Department of Environment said yesterday. The fine follows crude oil spills from two Northern Ontario derailments in the winter of 2015: "It was minus 30 degrees at the time."
Canadians’ Charter right to a speedy trial applies in traffic court, a Justice of the Peace has ruled. A charge of red light running against an Oakville, Ont. driver was dismissed after prosecutors waited too long to bring the case to court: "It is not a complex matter."
Cabinet was willing to “use all tools at our disposal” under its drug policy including “national decriminalization,” says a federal document. The memo to Addictions Minister Ya’ara Saks is dated just five weeks before British Columbia abruptly ended its experiment with decriminalized drug use on complaints of public disorder: 'Tools include approaches to decriminalization.'
Public Safety Minister Dominic LeBlanc’s department is refusing comment over its hiring of forensic auditors to assess risk of a “national compensation program.” Staff would not confirm they anticipated millions in fraud and waste through a costly gun buyback scheme scheduled in 2025: "Help."
The federal Phoenix Pay System failure has now cost taxpayers $3.7 billion and counting, the highest figure disclosed to date. The latest damages are cited in a Department of Public Works briefing note: "It gives us all kinds of lessons about how to build a better public service."
CBC employees should not “feel compelled to weigh in on controversial news stories” on Twitter, says a network ombudsman. The advisory followed one CBCer's tweet in sympathy with a Palestinian activist arrested for threatening to kill Jews and drink their blood: "The journalist should have included more context."
A performance audit of the Canada Summer Jobs program is underway with investigators’ findings due by year’s end, says a federal memo. It is the first audit since program managers were accused of withholding hire-a-student subsidies from employers who did not subscribe to cabinet’s political views: 'Follow-up focuses on religious beliefs.'
Poet W.N. Branson writes: “Old stones, ancient lines. Boundaries. Demarcated. Decimated. The blind lead the Blinded…”
Thursday, August 6, 1981 was a day to remember. At 11 am Eastern the Bank of Canada raised the prime rate to 21 percent. The country had a million unemployed for the first time since the Dustbowl. Farmers and small business owners had a hunted look. Mortgage and trust companies collapsed, 17 of them, and then the banks.
No one who survived the summer of ’81 ever forgot it. “Scarring,” the economists call it now. At a 2017 hearing of the Commons agriculture committee, members were chattily debating farm debt when an oldtimer, then-MP Bev Shipley (Lambton-Kent, Ont.), spoke up. “I remember the 1980s,” he said. The room froze.
Author Aaron Hughes’ 10 Days That Shaped Modern Canada omits that date to remember. Hughes acknowledges his work is necessarily subjective. Hughes’ favourite dates are neither mine nor yours. That is not the point.
