Feb 19 2019 — CBC — A house fire in the Halifax community of Spryfield has left seven children dead, police say. CBC News has confirmed a family with seven children who came to Canada as Syrian refugees lived in the home. Danielle Burt lives next door on on Quartz Drive and said she heard a loud noise in the middle […]
Feb 19 2019 — Neil Macdonald — CBC — A good headline, like Varsol, cuts through the grease and varnish applied to any story by political or corporate message-crafters. So, my suggestion for the big political headline of the day: “Nothing Happened, So I’m Quitting” — Gerald Butts Now, Gerry Butts — until Monday Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s principal secretary — is a smart […]
Feb 19 2019 — John Paul Tasker — CBC — A day after the bombshell departure of Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s closest adviser, the SNC-Lavalin affair shows no sign of abating as the opposition parties cast his resignation as a sign there may be more to the scandal than initially thought. The House of Commons justice committee will reconvene today to continue its study of […]
Feb 18 2019 — Elise von Scheel — CBC — No matter who won the 2016 U.S. presidential election, Canada was bracing for NAFTA to go down in flames. Internal documents, obtained by CBC News under access-to-information law, show the government started plotting out various “Plan B” options as early as August 2016 — months before Donald Trump was elected president.
Feb 17 2019 — CBC — Parents and supporters of the autism community rallied outside of PC MPP Jeff Yurek’s office in St. Thomas, Ont. on Thursday evening. They gathered to protest the government’s new Ontario Autism Program. Among them were Londoners Dan and Annette McLean. In early 2016, their three-year-old Blake was diagnosed with moderate-to-severe nonverbal autism.
Feb 17 2019 — Janyce McGregor — CBC — As the Trudeau government decides whether to join its security and trading partners in banning Huawei Canada from supplying technology to build Canada’s 5G wireless network, it risks an expensive lawsuit under the terms of a foreign investor protection agreement signed by its predecessor. Stephen Harper’s Conservative government concluded negotiations on the Canada–China Agreement for […]
Feb 16 2019 — CBC — Public relations firm Edelman says it’s suspending its consulting arrangement with former B.C. premier and former high commissioner to the U.K. Gordon Campbell pending a British police investigation. The firm says it hired Campbell on a retainer as a part-time consultant in July 2018. “In light of the recent allegations, Edelman and Mr. Campbell have […]
Feb 16 2019 — Elise von Scheel — CBC — In the week since the SNC-Lavalin story broke, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has changed his talking points several times. After the story first hit, Trudeau insisted that the allegation in the Globe and Mail story — that Jody Wilson-Raybould had been pressured by the Prime Minister’s Office while serving as minister of justice to help […]
Feb 15 2019 — Murray Brewster — CBC — The top lawyer at the Privy Council Office apparently asked federal prosecutors if it was possible to “engineer the issues at stake” in the criminal case against Vice-Admiral Mark Norman. The remarks — made on Sept. 18, 2018 and attributed to PCO lawyer Paul Shuttle — were contained in prosecution notes entered into evidence at […]
Feb 15 2019 — CBC — Prime Minister Justin Trudeau opened the door to more questions this morning about his conversations with former justice minister Jody Wilson-Raybould about the SNC-Lavalin bribery case and his reasons for then shuffling her out of that role. Since the story broke in the Globe and Mail late last week, Trudeau has denied Wilson-Raybould was pressured […]
Feb 15 2019 — Peter Zimonjic — CBC — This week, the House of Commons justice and human rights committee held an emergency meeting to probe allegations that the Prime Minister’s Office applied pressure to the minister of justice to help the Quebec-based engineering firm SNC-Lavalin avoid criminal prosecution in a bribery case. During that meeting, Liberal, Conservative and NDP MPs sparred over which […]
Feb 15 2019 — CBC — The Canadian government should have seen this coming, says international security expert Christian Leuprecht. The Royal Military College professor says Canada could have planned for what to do when its own citizens — ISIS members, their wives and children — were captured or surrendered on the battlefield in Syria.
Feb 14 2019 — David Cochrane — CBC — Justin Trudeau’s government was just four months old when SNC-Lavalin came knocking on the door, looking for help. The stakes for the global construction and engineering firm were enormous. In 2015, federal prosecutors charged SNC-Lavalin with offering Libyan government officials $48 million in bribes and defrauding Libyan organizations of another $130 million.
Feb 14 2019 — CBC — The Liberal MP of the Northwest Territories says he’s “disappointed” Canada lost Indigenous cabinet minister Jody Wilson-Raybould, after she resigned from her post as veterans affairs minister earlier this week. “Now we have no one on cabinet that’s Indigenous,” he said. McLeod joins a chorus of Indigenous politicians voicing concerns after Wilson-Raybould quit cabinet on […]
Feb 14 2019 — John Paul Tasker — CBC — A group of Indigenous senators — most of them appointed by Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, — issued a statement today praising the “integrity” of Jody Wilson-Raybould and saying her sudden departure from cabinet leaves “many questions and concerns.” “The resignation … this week has led to a national conversation leaving many questions and concerns from […]