Apr 25 2019 — Marieke Walsh — iPolitics — The braintrust behind the conservative group that helped to unseat the Ontario Liberals in 2018 has unveiled their federal counterpart aimed at taking out Canada’s Liberal government. “We want to defeat Liberals all over the country,” Canada Proud founder Jeff Ballingall told iPolitics in an interview. Ballingall, who is also the founder of the highly […]
Apr 24 2019 — Marieke Walsh — iPolitics — Finance Minister Bill Morneau says he has “no regrets” over his government’s handling of the SNC-Lavalin affair, as polls show the Liberals bleeding support to the Conservatives. The latest numbers from Nanos Research, CBC’s poll tracker and the Laurier Institute for the Study of Public Opinion and Policy all show the governing Liberals have lost […]
Apr 9 2019 — Michael Coren — iPolitics — This week the ultra-right-wing Canadian commentator Faith Goldy was banned from Facebook and Instagram, after earlier being prevented from crowdfunding on Patreon, from the online payment system PayPal, and even from Airbnb. The ban extends to pages and groups affiliated with her, and Facebook also banned, among others, the Canadian Nationalist Front, Aryan Strikeforce, Wolves […]
Apr 3 2019 — Tim Naumetz — iPolitics — Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and members of his cabinet raised more than $882,950 in contributions to the Liberal party during 14 exclusive fundraisers held between the beginning of the year and March 14, according to the first accounting from a new reporting regime under Elections Canada. While Trudeau and several of his top ministers appeared […]
Mar 31 2019 — Jolson Lim — iPolitics — Finance Minister Bill Morneau’s office is disputing the characterization of comments his deputy chief of staff allegedly made to Jody Wilson-Raybould’s chief of staff, which were documented in a submission to the House justice committee and published Friday. Morneau’s office also said conversations between his chief of staff, Ben Chin, and the former attorney general’s […]
Mar 27 2019 — iPolitics — Conservative Deputy Leader Lisa Raitt is asking the Commissioner for Federal Judicial Affairs to look into details that were leaked to journalists about a Supreme Court appointment. On Monday, CTV News first reported that Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and former attorney general and justice minister Jody Wilson-Raybould’s relationship “first began to fray” in 2017, over […]
Mar 20 2019 — Marieke Walsh — iPolitics — One of the senior federal officials that Jody Wilson-Raybould accused of interfering in the SNC-Lavalin criminal case is insisting that he did “nothing wrong.” In a very brief exchange Wednesday morning in Toronto, Ben Chin, chief of staff to Finance Minister Bill Morneau, told iPolitics that everything he did in relation to the controversy was […]
Mar 13 2019 — Graham Thomson — iPolitics — Alberta Premier Rachel Notley will absolutely call a provincial election next week — unless, of course, she doesn’t. And at this point it’s looking increasingly like she will wait. Or will she? Welcome to the intense and exhausting world that is the on-again-off-again pre-election speculation in Alberta. Trying to figure out exactly when Notley will […]
Mar 13 2019 — Marco Vigliotti — iPolitics — NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh says next week’s federal budget offers the Trudeau government its final opportunity to show “ordinary Canadians” it has their best interests in mind after spending the past three years siding with wealthy corporate interests. Speaking to reporters Wednesday in Ottawa, Singh and NDP finance critic Peter Julian laid out what the […]
Mar 1 2019 — Marieke Walsh — iPolitics — Justice Minister David Lametti said he was briefed on the SNC-Lavalin case and deferred prosecution agreements after taking office last month, even though the Public Prosecution Service had already decided that it would proceed with a trial against the Quebec firm. Lametti made the comments to reporters in Toronto on Thursday, saying he was briefed […]
Feb 25 2019 — iPolitics — Jody Wilson-Raybould wants all the “possible constraints” resolved before she testifies in the House justice committee’s investigation into allegations that officials from the Prime Minister’s Office (PMO) pressured her to resolve criminal charges against SNC-Lavalin while she was Canada’s attorney general and minister of justice. Wilson-Raybould wrote to the justice committee’s chair, Anthony Housefather, saying […]
Feb 25 2019 — iPolitics — Gerry Butts is still entitled to receive severance pay despite resigning as Justin Trudeau’s principal secretary last week amid allegations that members of the Prime Minister’s Office improperly interfered in the SNC-Lavalin case. However, the PMO and Treasury Board— the employer of the civil service — are not disclosing if he will receive any pay; […]
Feb 25 2019 — Scott Reid — iPolitics — In the fall of 2004, smack dab in the middle of the Gomery Inquiry, I sat in my office in Paul Martin’s Prime Minister’s Office and stared at a bank of television screens. From one network to the next, and in both official languages, the message was unrelenting: Those morons in the PMO were making […]
Feb 13 2019 — Marieke Walsh — iPolitics — The Ford government is defending paying thousands of dollars per day to the chair of a committee tasked with cutting waste. Treasury Board President Peter Bethlenfalvy announced in a statement Tuesday that Charles-Antoine St-Jean had been appointed chair of the government’s internal corporate audit committee. The news release didn’t disclose compensation but hours later Bethlenfalvy’s […]
Feb 7 2019 — Marieke Walsh — iPolitics — The Canadian Civil Liberties Association is calling for a police investigation into bombshell allegations that Justin Trudeau’s office interfered in the criminal case against SNC-Lavalin. “Messing with the administration of justice is not just bad politics. It may be a crime,” CCLA executive director Michael Bryant said in a statement Thursday. Earlier in the day, […]