Another day in B.C.

#BritishColumbia
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🇨🇦🇱🇧Canada to deploy troops to Lebanon amid increasing tensions to aid in possible evacuations

The Canadian Armed Forces is reportedly sending more troops to the Middle East in case an evacuation of Canadian citizens from Lebanon is ordered.

For months Canada has been pre-positioning assets in the region, but on Wednesday night, troops received an order to be ready to leave Canada in 48 hours.

Canada and Australia have jointly rented a cruise ship for evacuating Canadians.

#Lebanon
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Former Canadian parliamentarian tried to influence Parliament on behalf of foreign state, inquiry told

A former Canadian parliamentarian is suspected of trying to influence Parliament’s business on behalf of a foreign government, according to documents tabled Friday at the Hogue inquiry into foreign meddling.

The Canadian Security Intelligence Service, in co-operation with other government security agencies, produced a list of six significant instances of suspected foreign interference since 2019.

The document detailed a previously unknown instance of a former parliamentarian who was “suspected of having worked to influence parliamentary business on behalf of a foreign government.”

The CSIS document did not identify the parliamentarian or explain whether it was a Member of Parliament or a Senator. It also did not say what foreign country the parliamentarian was assisting.

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Trudeau says he's 'still waiting' for Quebec premier's plan on temporary immigration

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau is accusing Quebec's premier of saying things that he "knows aren't true" about immigration as the two leaders continue to clash over the issue.

His response comes after Premier François Legault last week asked the Bloc Québécois to support a Conservative non-confidence motion to topple the government on the grounds the federal Liberals haven't acted strongly enough to reduce temporary immigration in Quebec.

Despite the Bloc's refusal to vote against the Liberals in the confidence vote, Legault has suggested immigration should be a ballot-box question in the next federal election. He has asked all the parties to commit to cutting the number of non-permanent residents to his province by half.

#Quebec #immigration #Trudeau
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📊 Majority of all Canadians now disapprove of Trudeau — except hardcore Liberals: poll

A new Postmedia-Leger poll has found that Prime Minister Justin Trudeau is popular only with an ever-dwindling coterie of hardcore Liberal voters, with every other voter demographic wanting him gone.

Disapproval of Trudeau was the one issue that united every conceivable demographic in roughly equal margins; women and men (64 vs. 65 per cent), rural and urban (71 vs. 64 per cent) and even under-35s and senior citizens (66 vs. 64 per cent).

The only exception was those who identified as Liberal supporters. In that group, the approval rate was a whopping 83 per cent, against just 15 per cent who disapproved.

#Trudeau
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Bloc pension demands at odds with Liberal political strategy, economic plans

The government has just weeks to decide if it will meet the $16-billion demand from the Bloc Québécois to stave off an election for a few more months, but the stipulation may be at odds with the political and fiscal plans of the Liberals.

The Liberals have taken great pains in the last year to mould their political strategy around a sense of injustice among millennials and generation-Z Canadians who feel their work isn't paying off like it did for previous generations.

While Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has been touting policies aimed at "fairness for every generation," the Bloc has given him until Oct. 29 to green light spending for its private member's bill to increase old age security for seniors under the age of 75.

If the government doesn't support the bill by then, Bloc Leader Yves-François Blanchet says he will enter talks with other parties to bring down the Liberal minority government before the new year.

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❌Alberta municipal leaders quash advocacy for permanent resident voting rights

A Calgary city councillor's plea to have permanent residents be given the right to vote in municipal elections, an idea long dismissed by Premier Danielle Smith as unconstitutional, has been defeated.

Coun. Courtney Walcott made his case to fellow municipal officials from across the province this week during the Alberta Municipalities annual conference.

Walcott's resolution needed a majority to pass but only got about 42 per cent support in the end — 46 votes short.

If the votes were in his favour, Alberta Municipalities, the organization that represents villages, towns, and cities throughout the province, would have adopted the motion and lobbied the provincial government to make the necessary changes to the Local Authorities Election Act.

#Alberta
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🎓Federal Court to launch new plan for Canadian study permit appeals amid rising immigration cases

The Federal Court is launching a new initiative to streamline how it reviews refused study permit applications. This comes as the number of immigration cases coming before the court continues to surge for the third consecutive year, with filings expected to reach 24,000 by the end of the December — about four times the yearly average in the five years immediately preceding the COVID-19 pandemic, according to a news release issued by the Federal Court on Thursday.

Currently, people challenging an immigration matter must first apply to the court for permission to reconsider the decision, which will then be reviewed and determined if reconsideration is merited.

#immigration
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'Certainly a world where we could reduce' immigration targets, says minister Miller

Immigration Minister Marc Miller says he is exploring the rare option of reducing the number of permanent residents allowed in each year as he gets set to announce the annual immigration targets in November.

The targets have generally been maintained or increased for more than a decade, but with declining job vacancies, rising unemployment — especially among newcomers and younger people — and the growing concerns about affordability, “there is certainly a world now in which we see reductions,” he said.

#immigration
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Elections Canada to recommend tighter nomination rules after foreign influence probe

Elections Canada is set to recommend tighter rules for political parties’ nominations after a federal inquiry referred to the contests as a “gateway” for foreign interference.

Documents published by the Foreign Interference Commission Tuesday afternoon suggest Elections Canada expects to publish the recommendations, including greater transparency measures and stronger enforcement of party rules, by the end of September.

Nominations, where candidates vie for the chance to run under a party’s banner, typically receive less public and media scrutiny than elections or byelections. A significant number of nomination contests for the upcoming general election are already in the books.

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🇨🇦Canada's housing affordability crisis may persist for years despite rate cuts

Buying a house may remain out of reach for many Canadians for the foreseeable future, with mortgage costs unlikely to fall enough to offset lofty home prices and weak spending power, economists and real estate agents say.

Even with expectations that Bank of Canada will keep cutting rates in the coming months, the issue of home affordability - which has strangled Prime Minister Justin Trudeau's poll numbers - is unlikely to fade before the next election.

Canadian house prices on average have increased by more than 30% since April 2020 while interest rates soared by 4.75 basis points until they started coming down in June.

Calculations based on average house prices from the Canadian Real Estate Association show that monthly interest payments on a five-year fixed rate mortgage are still 40% higher than in January 2020, even after a drop in mortgage costs from last year's highs.

🔎 Source
#Canada

☠️ Blood Meridian

A 9-year push to increase P.E.I.'s population has radically changed the Island

More than 20,000 people have arrived from other countries, roughly 10,000 are foreign nationals living on P.E.I. with temporary permits and a greater number have arrived from other parts of Canada than the almost 30,000 who left for other provinces.

This motion of people has caused crises in housing, health care and general pressure on provincial infrastructure of all kinds.

The mass migration to and from P.E.I. dates back to 2015, when Wade MacLauchlan became leader of the Liberal Party and premier at the same time.

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Conservatives' second attempt to topple Liberal government fails

The Liberal government has survived a second non-confidence vote in as many weeks, once again putting at bay the possibility that Canada would be plunged into an immediate election campaign.

Members of Parliament voted on a Conservative motion that called for MPs to declare they have lost faith in Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and his nine-year-old government.

The Liberals, NDP and Bloc Quebecois voted against the motion, as they did with a similar motion last week.

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🇱🇧Canada reserves 800 seats for Lebanon evacuation

Canada has reserved 800 seats on commercial planes to evacuate its citizens from Lebanon. About 45,000 Canadians are currently in Lebanon.

The Canadian military has set up emergency resources in Cyprus if commercial flights are interrupted.

#Lebanon
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📊Majority of Canadians don't see themselves as 'settlers,' poll finds

The pollsters found that 47 per cent of Canadians disagree with the term “settler” as a denoscriptor. Thirty per cent didn’t know about the term, leading the researchers to note that it’s “reasonably safe to conclude that the 30 per cent … simply don’t understand the notion of settler colonialism.”

41 per cent of Canadians ages 18-34 were negative about being labelled colonists. That compares with 47 per cent of 35-54 year-olds and 53 per cent of respondents who were 55 years and older.

The respondents who identified with the settler label said there were from the left side of the political spectrum. That includes 47.2 per cent who identify themselves as “left” and 32 per cent of those who said they are “left of centre.” That compares with just 17.1 per cent of people who identified as “right.”

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Canadian Tire store in Toronto under investigation for alleged mistreatment of temporary foreign workers

The owner of a Canadian Tire store in Toronto is being investigated by the provincial and federal governments for allegedly mistreating and financially exploiting employees hired through Ottawa’s Temporary Foreign Worker Program. At least 13 of those employees resigned or were fired by the store late last year.

They allege their wages were arbitrarily reduced by the owner and that they were forced to do jobs for which they were not hired. They also claim the owner threatened to fire them on multiple occasions when they brought up their concerns about the working conditions.

Federal government rules dictate that employers cannot arbitrarily decrease the wages of temporary foreign workers or materially change their job duties. If they do, they will have to apply for a new labour market impact assessment (LMIA), a document needed to hire foreign workers.

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🏠 Affordable rent out of reach for Canadian minimum wage earners nearly everywhere, report finds

Finding an affordable apartment to rent in most of Canada’s larger cities is nearly impossible for people earning minimum wage, a new report from the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives (CCPA) says.

Only 22 neighbourhoods out of nearly 800 in larger Canadian cities have average rents for two-bedroom apartments that would be affordable for someone earning minimum wage, the report says. The situation has grown worse since the CCPA’s first study of the issue in 2019.

#housing
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💔Trudeau says it 'bugged' him when Singh ended governance agreement without calling first

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau says it "bugged him" when NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh ended his party's supply and confidence agreement with the Liberals without calling first.

The relationship obviously wasn't what I thought it was. I know that if I had chosen to end it, it would have started with a call to him. I would have said, 'You know what, Jagmeet? It's not going to work.' You make those tough calls.

#Trudeau #Singh
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Quebec premier says Ottawa should forcibly relocate half of asylum seekers

Premier François Legault has made immigration a major focus of his visit to Paris, demanding that the federal government force asylum seekers in Quebec to move elsewhere, including people who have already settled in the province.

Half of the would-be refugees currently in Quebec should be transferred to other provinces, he told reporters on Wednesday at the offices of the Quebec delegation in Paris.

Legault’s latest remarks follow similar comments on Tuesday, when he said his government has asked Ottawa to create waiting zones for asylum seekers entering the country, similar to a system that has existed for decades in France.

#Quebec #immigration
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