October 2024

By Laura Osman The Canadian Press Published on October 10, 2024 at 6:25 p.m. 1 minute reading Reduce article font size Increase the font size of the article THE drug insurance This bill, which was at the heart of a political pact between the Liberals and the NDP, is now on the verge of becoming law after the Senate passed it without making any changes. The law will inform the creation of any future national and universal pharmacare plan. This will also allow the government to sign agreements with the provinces and territories to cover diabetes and contraceptive medications within the public health system. Receive weekly health news Receive the latest medical news and health information every Sunday. The wording and content of the bill were carefully negotiated under the now-defunct Appropriations and Confidence Agreement between the NDP and Liberals. British Columbia has already signed a memorandum of understanding with Ottawa to launch the program in that province. Health Minister Mark Holland hopes to have all provinces and territories sign on to the bill by next spring, but the bill will need to receive royal assent before these agreements can be officially signed. Current trend Hurricane Milton: Some Floridians refuse to evacuate – here are their reasons Roof of Tropicana Field torn to shreds by Hurricane Milton Story continues below advertisement 2:11 Health issues: British Columbia becomes first province to sign pharmacare agreement &copy 2024 The Canadian Press Source link

OTTAWA – A former chief of staff to a Liberal public safety minister has denied suggestions she worked to block approval of a spy service mandate in early 2021 because it directly affected operations of the Trudeau government. Zita Astravas called the allegation “categorically false” during her testimony Wednesday evening in a federal investigation into foreign interference. The inquiry heard it took 54 days for the Canadian Security Intelligence Service’s warrant request to be approved by then-Public Safety Minister Bill Blair. The average processing time for these requests is four to ten days. Michelle Tessier, CSIS’s deputy director of operations during this period, told the inquiry she was frustrated by the delay. A schedule filed at the inquiry indicates Astravas attended a briefing on the warrant request 13 days after CSIS sent it to Public Safety. Story continues below advertisement Astravas told the commission in a closed session over the summer that the questions she asked during the briefing were typical of those she would ask regarding such a request. Get the latest national news For news impacting Canada and around the world, sign up to receive breaking news alerts sent directly to you as they happen. A recently leaked summary of that testimony indicates that she recalls a separate conversation about the Vanweenen list that accompanied it – a list of individuals who might be in contact with the target of the warrant and therefore could be affected. Federal officials cited national security in refusing to publicly discuss who CSIS hoped to surveil through the warrant. Learn more about politics More videos Gib van Ert, lawyer for Conservative MP Michael Chong, suggested to Astravas on Wednesday that after seeing “the extent to which this mandate would involve CSIS in the affairs of your party and your government, you did not want this to continue, and if we had to move forward, we had to slow it down. Astravas responded that she could not mention the details of the mandate, “but I can tell you that your assumptions are categorically wrong.” Blair, now defense minister, is expected to testify before the commission of inquiry on Friday. Current trend As Hurricane Milton approaches, what Canadians with property in Florida should know Sentenced in the United States for violating sanctions against Iran, brothers adopt new identities in Ontario He has already stated during the in camera investigation that he became aware of the warrant application on the date he remembers signing it. “He was not aware that his office had received it before that date,” a summary of Blair’s testimony states. “He didn’t know what date his office received it and no one showed him the earlier dates on the documents.” Story continues below advertisement The summary states that on the date he signed the warrant, he learned that there had been discussions and questions raised by his office with the Director of CSIS and the Deputy Minister of Public Safety. “However, he did not know how long he had been in his office.” Astravas testified Wednesday that CSIS Director David Vigneault would flag priority issues and that “we would work with the director and his team” to put an item on the minister’s agenda. During this period, there were several contacts involving the director of CSIS, the minister and the deputy minister, she said. “At no time was (the arrest warrant) issued urgently. » The latest hearings of the commission of inquiry focus on the ability of federal agencies to identify and counter foreign interference. A final report is expected by the end of the year. &copy 2024 The Canadian Press Source link

Conservative leader Pierre Poilievre deplored House of Commons remains “paralyzed” Tuesday as his party prolongs the debate on the handing over of government documents to the RCMP. Poilievre was referring to the government’s delay in producing seven years of documents related to the Sustainable Development Technology Canada (SDTC) organization within 30 days. The now-defunct organization, which was federally funded but independent from the government, was found earlier this year to have violated conflict of interest rules and made “significant errors” in the management of funds public by the Auditor General of Canada. The Conservatives have taken to calling this a “green slush fund”. If you already feel lost, don’t worry. This is a natural reaction to the political posturing that typically occurs in the final days of a minority parliament. The debate on the publication of the documents paralyzed the work of the House of Commons for a week. Story continues below advertisement When asked why his party wouldn’t refer the issue to a Commons committee for study – miraculously curing Parliament of its paralysis – Poilievre responded that he wouldn’t let “corruption” pass so that “Justin Trudeau can go on with your day.” A House of Commons committee investigation doesn’t exactly sweep an issue “under the rug,” as Poilievre charged, and is the most likely outcome of the debate. In the meantime, however, conservatives can use this issue to level accusations of corruption against the Liberal government. Poilievre was absent during question period Tuesday, after being reprimanded by Speaker Greg Fergus for accusing Foreign Affairs Minister Mélanie Joly of pandering to “Hamas supporters” and refusing to retract his comments. Learn more about politics More videos But his deputy chief, Melissa Lantsman, insisted on the contents of the documents and why they did not turn them over. Get the latest national news For news impacting Canada and around the world, sign up to receive breaking news alerts sent directly to you as they happen. “How bad are these documents, that they would blockade this place for seven days, defying your order and hiding the $400 million they gave to their friends? asked Lantsman. “They are trying to get out of their own obstruction because they don’t want this issue to go to committee,” retorted Liberal House Leader Karina Gould. “Because they will hear from expert after expert about the blatant abuse of power that the Conservatives are trying to commit here to override the rights of Canadians. We are ready to move forward…only conservatives are afraid of the vote.” Story continues below advertisement SDTC and Conservative Privilege Earlier this year, Auditor General Karen Hogan’s office found that SDTC had awarded funding totaling $51 million to eight start-up projects that did not meet eligibility criteria. A subsequent investigation by the federal Ethics Commissioner found that SDTC President Annette Verschuren did not recuse herself from the funding decisions of organizations with which she had ties – including her own company, NRStor Inc. . In June, a Conservative motion demanded that the government turn over all SDTC-related documents to the House of Commons law clerk within 30 days. The clerk then handed them over to the RCMP. This means that all federal departments and agencies, as well as the Office of the Auditor General, would have to submit any documents relating to the foundation dating back to 2017 within one month. Although the House of Commons law clerk confirmed providing documents to the RCMP throughout the summer, not all files were turned over before the deadline. Story continues below advertisement This paved the way for Conservative House Leader Andrew Scheer to claim that the privileges of the House had been violated – a claim that Speaker Fergus found to be true. And this is what has brought the House of Commons to its current state of dysfunction. To further complicate matters, the RCMP has already confirmed that an investigation is underway into SDTC and has already received tranches of documents from the government, as first reported by the National Post. “Playground Tactics” and the Liberal Agenda Deputy Prime Minister and Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland, speaking to reporters in Ottawa on Tuesday, said the government’s work continues despite being “frustrated and dismayed by the spectacle the Conservatives are putting on the Parliament.” She said the government is in discussions with the New Democrats and the opposition Bloc Québécois about the fall economic statement – an economic update that would be a matter of confidence and, in the event of Failure would plunge Canada into a general election. Story continues below advertisement “We’re doing a lot, and we’re being thoughtful and creative about things, looking for areas where we can move forward and not be blocked by, you know, playground tactics,” Freeland said. When asked if the Liberal government was considering proroguing Parliament – ​​a potential way of resetting parliamentary business and the government agenda – Freeland responded with a resounding “no”. &copy 2024 Global News, a division of Corus Entertainment Inc. Source link

A 2021 analysis of China foreign interference The operations intended to spark discussions between senior government officials were not transmitted to Prime Minister Justin Trudeau or cabinet ministers, the Hogue commission learned Monday. The report, produced by the Privy Council Office (PCO) and the Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS) and delivered in January 2022, remained stuck for months in President Trudeau’s office. Jody Thomas, then national security adviser. The inquiry into foreign interference, overseen by Justice Marie-Josée Hogue, has heard repeatedly about the challenges of ensuring vital intelligence reaches senior decision-makers. As the nerve center of government, the BCP has a division called the Intelligence Assessment Secretariat, tasked with helping the prime minister and his national security adviser digest information from various sources. The 2021 analysis attempted to combine what CSIS knew about Chinese operations in Canada, gleaned from around 100 separate intelligence reports, with trends observed in Beijing’s interventions abroad. Story continues below advertisement National security sources told Global News the report was passed to Trudeau and some cabinet ministers, allegations the government has largely denied. Martin Green, a former senior intelligence official within the BCP, recommended to Thomas that the report be widely disseminated – to senior civil servants and ministers, as well as within the security and intelligence community. Learn more about politics More videos This does not appear to have happened. Green testified Monday that he delivered the report to Thomas in January 2022 and raised the issue repeatedly over several months, but the report does not appear to have received final approval or reached the prime minister’s office. Green noted in January 2022 that there were significant national security concerns – such as Russia’s looming invasion of Ukraine and the so-called Freedom Convoy descending on the Canadian capital – that may have relegated the issue of foreign interference in the background. Receive national news daily Get the day’s top news, politics, business and current affairs headlines delivered to your inbox once a day. “We were facing some pretty dramatic problems, so foreign interference at that immediate point was not, I think, a priority,” Green, who retired from the BCP Intelligence Assessment Secretariat, said Monday earlier this year. “I raised the issue a few times (with Thomas) thinking it would still be good to have that conversation, so I can’t really explain why it hasn’t come up in a meeting ( deputy ministers) or not… I can make the recommendation, but I can’t say, you know, you have to go. Story continues below advertisement Trudeau and his cabinet finally had to have this conversation – after the document was leaked to Global News and became part of an ongoing reporting on foreign interference operations in Canada. Green previously told the commission he remembered “feeling bad” when the document was leaked, and said it was “very problematic” that it was reported publicly. The heavily censored version of the report, released Monday by Hogue’s commission on foreign interference, reveals little that a casual observer of the foreign interference record would not already know. Namely that the Chinese government poses the most “significant” threat of foreign interference to Canadian democracy, that Canada remains “highly vulnerable” to these operations and that China’s activities are “sophisticated, persistent and multi-dimensional”. The Chinese government employs proxies to distort public opinion, deploys clandestine networks to “ring” elected officials for leverage, and threatens Canadian businesses and individuals to advance Beijing’s political goals, suggests the report. Chinese government officials have repeatedly rejected these claims, despite the mountain of increasingly public evidence to the contrary. Additional information, gleaned from 100 CSIS memos, was largely hidden in the unclassified version of the report. Current trend Elon Musk Joins Trump at US Election Rally, Says ‘I’m Dark MAGA’ Other events in Canada to mark the first anniversary of the Hamas attack on Israel But another BCP official, Lisa Ducharme, told commission lawyers she was “surprised” that so much attention was given to the report — which she said was never finalized. Story continues below advertisement “(Ducharme) explained that it is not uncommon for reports to be written in draft form, but to be delayed or left unfinished, for a variety of reasons, whether it be resource issues, overcoming events or a change in direction,” she told the commission’s lawyers. . Over the last year, the Hogue Commission has heard repeatedly about the government’s difficulties in ensuring that intelligence reports reach decision-makers, including senior officials and their political masters. “The evidence appears to demonstrate that the role of some actors in existing processes is not always well understood, that there are sometimes significant differences of opinion between the intelligence community and elected officials, and that fear of disclosing information that could harm national security is a problem. a major barrier to information sharing,” Hogue wrote in his preliminary findings, released in May. “The nature of the information collected and shared by intelligence agencies appears to arouse the suspicions of many people, who may prefer to refrain from acting when such information is brought to their attention. » These problems go well beyond why a single intelligence report, however informative, was not brought to the attention of the Prime Minister. But the commission’s lawyers will have the opportunity to get clarity on the specific incident on Wednesday, when Thomas is scheduled to testify a second time. Justice Hogue also took the time Monday to welcome the Liberal government’s desire to give her commission “extraordinary” access to classified documents and to have recently authorized the publication of the summaries of four memoranda to Cabinet – some of the most most sensitive in the possession of the federal government. . Story continues below advertisement Typically, this type of document falls under a principle called Cabinet confidentiality, under which discussions around the Cabinet table and the evidence that informs them cannot be publicly disclosed, in most cases for 20 years. “The government’s willingness to disclose this information to the commission will help me develop recommendations that will help preserve the integrity of Canada’s…