The U.S. says the Wagner Group is a transnational criminal organization. Here’s why
The U.S. Treasury Department this week designated the Wagner Group a significant transnational criminal organization — part of an effort to crack down on an entity responsible for a growing number of atrocities in Ukraine. The Wagner Group — a private military company owned by Russian oligarch Yevgeny Prigozhin — first took to the battlefield […]
Canadians ‘must not be complacent’ as antisemitism, hatred rise: Trudeau
Canadians cannot be complacent as antisemitism and hatred grow across the country, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau says. Speaking at a Holocaust Remembrance Day memorial in Ottawa on Friday, the prime minister warned that in times of peace, people “look back at this atrocity, bewildered at how it could ever have been permitted to happen.” “We […]
Central bank’s ‘definitive’ language on pausing future rate hikes an ‘appropriate’ choice, say economists
Many observers were pleased with the Bank of Canada’s “definitive” language that its latest interest rate hike will likely be the last for some time—barring unexpected circumstances—but there was less consensus among economists on how different segments of Canadians will experience the bank’s monetary tightening. “It’s pretty definitive that if things unfold the way they […]
Ontario Premier Doug Ford says he’s disappointed the federal environment minister indicated he’d consider intervening in the province’s Greenbelt development plans. The province announced in November that it is removing about 7,400 acres from 15 different areas in the protected Greenbelt lands, while adding more parcels elsewhere, in order to build 50,000 homes. Media outlet […]
Read MoreThe Supreme Court of Canada has ruled that a mandatory minimum sentence of four years for firing a gun at a house is unconstitutional on the basis it could amount to cruel and unusual punishment. In a companion judgment Friday, the top court said two other minimum sentences, both involving armed robbery offences, do not […]
Read MoreA pair of senior U.S. senators is urging the Biden administration to get tough with Canada for “flouting” obligations to its North American trade partners. Democrat Sen. Ron Wyden of Oregon and Republican Sen. Mike Crapo lay out their concerns in a letter to U.S. Trade Representative Katherine Tai. The letter says American dairy producers […]
Read MoreThe Liberals have spent years trying to pass online streaming legislation and now the current iteration, known as Bill C-11, is closer than ever to passing. However, standing between the Liberals and getting this contentious commitment to the finish line is a potential legislative showdown, after senators made 26 amendments to 12 clauses of the […]
Read MoreElizabeth May says the Green Party will investigate and conduct a “root to branch review” of all of its data-retention systems after member information was mistakenly posted online. The Green Party leader says she does not know how the security breach happened but says the information, including names and addresses of donors, had been available […]
Read MoreThe federal government is preparing to revive an independent commission that would offer advice to cabinet on reforming Canadian laws. Justice Minister David Lametti’s office says it is hoping to make an announcement about the commission “soon,” but has offered little detail — other than saying the minister is “eager to get it going again.” […]
Read MoreFeatured Ink
Today in Canada’s Political History: R.B. Bennett delivers his maiden address in the House of Lords
It was on this date in 1942 that one of Canada’s greatest parliamentary performers, R.B. Bennett, took to his feet for the first time as a member of the House of Lords at Westminster. His service in that historic chamber meant he now held a unique parliamentary. Bennett had now been a member of the […]
How Ottawa can help fix health care: first, send less money
The early 2000s were a fertile period for health care reform. The deficit reduction battles of the previous decade had left their mark. Federal transfers to the provinces had fallen to just over 2 per cent of GDP, half what they were at their peak. Provinces had in turn been forced to curb spending across […]
Justin Trudeau and Pierre Poilievre need to stop insulting each other
We like to blame social media or pandemic stress or economic hardship for what feels like growing political polarization. But our leaders fan the flames. Which is why Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre should stop insulting each other. Mr. Trudeau started the latest dust-up. When Susan Delacourt of the Toronto Star […]
OK, but everything does feel kind of broken – Frustration is a feeling too
Here’s a former leader of Quebec’s Parti Québécois calling for people who walk across the Canada-US border and claim asylum to be packed onto buses and sent to Ottawa. The panel is an oddly popular feature on Radio-Canada’s all-news channel, featuring people who used to be involved in politics. The guy talking is Jean-François Lisée, […]
Alberta Premier Danielle Smith with peace offering to Justin Trudeau
Alberta Premier Danielle Smith has suddenly and dramatically moved off her scorched earth stance against the Trudeau Liberal’s Just Transition plan to radically change the Canadian economy in the name of slashing carbon emissions. In a new letter to Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, Smith invites Trudeau to meet in February with the goal of negotiating […]
New health deal could help heal fractured nation
Canada is not broken, the prime minister insists, and to prove it, he has invited the premiers to Ottawa next month to finalize a new health-care deal. It’s a risky move. Parliament Hill is used to rabble rousers in February, after the occupation by the Freedom Convoy last year. The premiers may not bring their […]
Justin Trudeau is looking past the ‘Freedom Convoy’ — but Ottawa is holding its breath
Ottawa doesn’t need to brace this weekend for a replay of the convoy protest, says the new police chief, because “lots has changed since last year.” For one thing, the chief has changed. Eric Stubbs, who took over late in 2022, told CBC’s Ottawa Morning on Wednesday that while he hasn’t talked to the man […]
Stepping on Rakes
One of Canada’s leading portfolio managers told me something a week ago that keeps popping into my mind. “One of the most important things a pension fund manager knows,” he said “is not to do anything that puts you on the front page of the newspapers.” That makes sense. The only time you really see […]
Charles Sousa enters parliament as a different kind of Trudeau Liberal
This week, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and his Cabinet met for a three-day retreat in Hamilton to plan for the government’s legislative and policy agenda for the upcoming parliamentary session. One voice who wasn’t around the Cabinet table but may be in the near future is Charles Sousa. The former Ontario finance minister will officially […]
Why private health care will save lives
A fearlessly pragmatic intervention or a desecration of our national fabric and everything we hold dear? A slippery slope certain to trigger a mass exodus of public health care workers or an innovative plan to boost collaboration and ease the burden across a strained-to-the-breaking point sector? Or, finally, rerouting water away from the dam (to […]
I cherish medicare. As a teenager, I suffered a life-threatening anaphylactic reaction while on vacation in another province. My parents rushed me to the nearest hospital emergency room where I was rapidly treated and kept overnight for observation before resuming my holiday. Three years ago, my mother underwent complex cancer surgery that required significant rehabilitation. […]
Read MoreCanada’s former defence minister has always struggled with the facts about our next fighter jet. “The facts truly speak for themselves,” Canada’s former defence minister Peter MacKay triumphantly wrote last Monday in the Toronto Sun. He was talking about the F-35 fighter jet. Its procurement is among Canada’s lengthiest, and ended officially earlier this month […]
Read MoreClint Eastwood once said that when you’re young, you’re reckless. Then you get conservative. Then you get reckless again. The same appears true of prime ministers. Justin Trudeau made some audacious bets on the road to Rideau Hall, from his infamous boxing match with Conservative senator Patrick Brazeau in 2012, to gambling in 2015 that […]
Read MoreAs a former deputy minister of Finance – he was Paul Martin’s right-hand man in the deficit-busting 1990s – David Dodge would know a thing or three about misrepresenting the country’s finances. In those days the game was “hide the surplus”: Federal budgets serially understated the strength of the government’s fiscal position to fend off […]
Read MoreThe political situation looked bleak for Sir John A. Macdonald and his Tories as January 1887 dawned. The party had been in power for almost a decade, was old and tired, and had seen reverses in provincial elections held in Manitoba and Ontario in December. Famed Macdonald biographer Donald Creighton described the scene. “It was […]
Read MoreAt a time when human rights are under attack across the globe — when the executions of Iranian protesters, the revocation of reproductive rights for American women, Russia’s daily brutality against Ukrainians, the accumulating atrocities of Myanmar’s military and a whole range of Orwellian violations of privacy and human integrity make up just the first […]
Read MoreA couple of weeks ago, Canadian politics—particularly those in the conservative fold—lost a one-of-a-kind character. Asad Wali died far too young at age 53 at his home in Toronto after a lengthy fight with multiple sclerosis. The broad Canadian public would not have known Wali, but if they did, they would have loved him as […]
Read MoreCanadian constitutional disputes are like zombies. Just when you think they are buried, they rise from the dead, looking to claim their next victim. Politicians often exhume them to boost their standing and win an election. But they had better beware: like most monsters, the undead have no loyalty, and will happily turn on those […]
Read MoreIt is a great personal and professional pleasure to send out birthday greetings to one of Canada’s greatest living historians. I speak, of course, of Professor John English. Canadians are very much in his debt, particularly those who enjoy studying Canadian political history. In the last 30 years, for example, he has produced two volume […]
Read MoreWhen Alberta Premier Danielle Smith announced that former Reform Party leader Preston Manning would be leading a review of the province’s COVID-19 pandemic response, few could appreciate the pure genius of the move. Yes, the cost is steep: a budget of $2-million and a salary of $253,000 for Mr. Manning. But not many knew at […]
Read MoreEntertainment Plus
Serena Williams, Kristen Bell, North West join cast of ‘Paw Patrol: The Mighty Movie’
Tennis champion Serena Williams and “Frozen” star Kristen Bell are among the names joining the Paw Patrol movie sequel. Toronto-headquartered Spin Master Entertainment announced the additions to the cast, which also include North West joining her mom Kim Kardashian, who was in the first movie. Distributor Elevation Pictures says “Paw Patrol: The Mighty Movie” will […]
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