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Maple Chronicles 🇨🇦
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Always fresh maple syrup with a generous dosage of political analysis
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🇨🇦🇺🇸🇲🇽 Canada, US and Mexico meet in Cancun to discuss trade deal

North America’s trading partners are in Cancun for two days of meetings to take stock of the last three years under the U.S.-Mexico-Canada Agreement.

International Trade Minister Mary Ng is sitting down with U.S. Trade Representative Katherine Tai and Raquel Buenrostro, Mexico’s economy secretary.

Tai’s office says the U.S. exported nearly US$790 billion in goods and services under the trade deal in 2022, 31 per cent more than in 2012.

The U.S. Department of Commerce estimates North American exports supported some 2.1 million jobs in 2021.

All three sides will likely be thinking about the agreement’s six-year review clause, which requires a comprehensive assessment of the deal by June 2026.

#US #Mexico

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Justin Trudeau tweets invitation to Taylor Swift asking her to bring tour to Canada

While Taylor Swift announced Wednesday that she is adding new stops to her international tour through Mexico, Europe, and Asia, no Canadian cities have been included so far. 

Trudeau responded to Swift's tweet with paraphrased lyrics from her own songs, posting:

"It's me, hi. I know places in Canada would love to have you. So, don't make it another cruel summer. We hope to see you soon."

Trudeau is preoccupied with really important things, as we can see.

#Trudeau

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Tantallon wildfire in Nova Scotia causes over $165m in insured damage

The devastating wildfire that ravaged Tantallon, Nova Scotia, from May 28 to June 4, 2023, has resulted in initial estimates of over $165 million in insured damage, according to Catastrophe Indices and Quantification Inc.

The majority of claims, approximately 90%, were related to personal property losses. Officials have now confirmed that at least 200 properties, including 151 homes, were either destroyed or damaged during the catastrophe.

Canada has experienced a significant surge in insured damage caused by severe weather events, now surpassing $2 billion annually.

#NovaScotia #wildfires

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🇨🇳 Chinese owner of Manitoba mine revives talk of draining lake to reach more cesium

The Chinese owner of the Tanco mine in eastern Manitoba has revived talk of partly draining a lake in order to extract more cesium from one of the world's few deposits of this element.

Sinomine Resource Group is musing about a long-term redevelopment of its mine it purchased in 2019 along the shore of Bernic Lake, a small Canadian Shield body of water located between Whiteshell and Nopiming provincial parks.

The goal is to reach cesium that can not be mined right now because it's embedded in vertical columns that hold up the roof of the underground mine.

The push to mine what's left of Tanco's cesium stems from the worldwide scarcity of the element, which is used in drilling fluids for oil and gas wells, medical imaging and maintaining time in atomic clocks, among other uses.

All of this suggests that there will be no investigation into foreign interference. Who would want to fight when there is big money at stake?

#Manitoba #China

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A man was seriously injured after getting into a fight with a man armed with a knife on a Toronto subway today.

Video recorded by an unknown passenger shows a bleeding man being chased through the train. He pleads for help but people run away. This happened as the train was approaching Eglinton station.

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CRA investigates 600 employees for CERB fraud

The Canada Revenue Agency (CRA) announced it fired 20 employees—and is investigating upwards of 600 others—who improperly received the Canada Emergency Response Benefit (CERB) during the pandemic.

The agency will discipline employees it discovers inappropriately accepted CERB payments on a case-by-case basis, and penalties include revocation of employees’ reliability status, which is a condition of employment.

In the wake of the pandemic, the CERB program was rolled out to support Canadians who lost their jobs or had been furloughed with up to $2,000 monthly. However, late last year, Canada’s auditor general estimated the federal government overpaid Canadians by $4.6 billion.

The CERB program is estimated to have distributed $211 billion in taxpayer funds during the pandemic.

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Canada's unemployment rate rose to 5.4% in June, economy adds 60,000 jobs

Statistics Canada says the unemployment rate rose to 5.4 per cent in June — the highest it's been in over a year.

That's up from 5.2 per cent in May and the highest it's been in over a year. It also marked the second month in a row the unemployment rate has risen as economists watch for softening in the labour market amid high interest rates.

The increase came as the Canadian economy added 60,000 jobs for the month, far more than was estimated by economists and driven by gains in full-time work.

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Canada agrees to $11bn subsidy to save Ontario battery plant

The Canadian government has agreed to provide a subsidy of US$11.2bn to restart work on a stalled battery factory in the city of Windsor, Ontario.

The project is being undertaken by NextStar Energy, a joint venture between South Korean battery maker LG Energy and automaker Stellantis, the Amsterdam-based company formed by the 2021 merger between Fiat Chrysler and Peugeot.

They propose a plant with an annual production capacity of 45GWh, employing 2,500 workers when it begins production in 2024. However, the two companies halted the project in May and demanded that the Canadian government provide state aid equal to that offered by the US government under its Inflation Reduction Act.

NextStar Energy announced yesterday that the Canadian government had signed an agreement to provide the subsidies demanded.

#Ontario

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B.C. port strike enters day 7

The strike by thousands of workers at more than 30 B.C. ports has entered its seventh day, as their union and the association representing B.C. maritime employers trade barbs about the stalled contract negotiations.

The president of the International Longshore and Warehouse Union Canada, which represents about 7,400 striking workers, told a solidarity rally on Thursday that the B.C. Maritime Employers Association has walked away from the table three times.

The B.C. Maritime Employers Association later issued a statement saying it has learned of layoffs in related industries due to the job action and the strike has potentially disrupted $4.6 billion worth of cargo.

Dock workers have been off the job since Canada Day to back demands for improved wages and provisions against contracting out and automation, but negotiations stalled Monday over maintenance issues.

#BritishColumbia

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Nearly 1 in 4 Canadians won’t be able to pay their bills

A large share of Canadians aren’t confident in their ability to repay their bills.

🔹Nearly a quarter (23%) of households said they will be unable to make the full payments on at least one bill. While most are confident (77%) in their ability to cover their payments, that’s still a lot of people that are getting buried by an overindulgence in credit.

🔹Fading confidence is also seen in the expectations of household finances. Only 55% of consumers felt their finances are going as planned in Q1 2023, down 5 points from the previous quarter. Over 2 in 5 households are uneasy about the way their finances are heading.

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🏠 Canada ranked 1st in global housing vulnerability

Five criteria were used to assess developed world economies’ sensitivity to rising interest rates: a weighted average of private sector credit growth and nominal home price appreciation since 2020, housing price to income, year-over-year change in mortgage rate and percentage of mortgages with terms less than five years.

Canada ranked first. Canada’s 136.3 per cent housing price to income ratio was the highest in the developed world, challenged only by New Zealand’s 131.9 per cent and the U.S.’s 133.0 per cent. The 1.9 percentage point increase in shorter-term mortgage rates was largely in line with the G10 average.

The domestic house price rise of 16.4 per cent was below Australia’s 22.1 per cent, U.K.’s 26.4 per cent and New Zealand’s 26.9 per cent.

#housing

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Canadians are choosing to spend less on summer travel or not travel at all over financial concerns

More Canadians are planning on spending less on summer travel or putting their vacation plans on hold completely compared to previous years, according to a new survey conducted by Nanos Research.

🔹This year, 38 per cent of Canadians say they are more likely to spend less on their summer travel plans, an increase from 31 per cent reported in 2015. Additionally, 57 per cent of Canadians say they have no interest in travelling internationally this year.

🔹Across Canada, 51.1 per cent of residents in the Atlantic provinces said they will be spending less on their summer vacation plans than they usually would, followed by Quebec with 43.2 per cent, the Prairies with 40.6 per cent, B.C. with 35.3 per cent and Ontario with 33.6 per cent.

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Hundreds rally in Vancouver to support striking B.C. port workers

Hundreds of people gathered in Vancouver on Sunday for a rally to support striking British Columbia port workers as their job action stretches into its second week.

About 7,400 members of the International Longshore and Warehouse Union Canada employed at more than 30 B.C. ports have been on strike since Canada Day.

ILWU Canada vice president Pat Bolen told the crowd the collective agreement lays out "very clearly" that anything to do with the movement of cargo on docks or ships is the jurisdiction of the union, but says those powers have eroded over several years as more contractors with "no skin in the game" have been brought in.

Bolen says that while the union can't prevent automation from being used at the ports, it should fall to union members to make repairs if robots break.

The BC Maritime Employers Association has accused the union of trying to "aggressively expand" its control of maintenance duties far beyond what the association says has been established for decades.

#BritishColumbia

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Over half of Canadians want Trudeau, Poilievre replaced as party leaders before next election

Just over half of Canadians believe the federal Liberals and Conservatives need new leaders heading into the next federal election, according to a new Nanos Research poll.

🔹The poll found 53 per cent of respondents were in favour of Justin Trudeau being replaced as Liberal Leader, while 51 per cent say Pierre Poilievre should not lead the Conservatives into the next election.

People have less trust in the current government.

#Trudeau #Poilievre

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Forwarded from Topic du jour
🇺🇸🇨🇦 U.S. Indigenous nation asks Ben and Jerry's to return the 'stolen' native land

Ice cream maker Ben and Jerry's had a lot of fun on Independence Day. The company posted on Twitter: “this 4th of July, it’s high time we recognize that the US exists on stolen Indigenous land and commit to returning it."

On Canada Day, just three days prior, Ben and Jerry's also took to Twitter, posting “O Canada, our home on stolen land.”

Now, a U.S. Indigenous nation is asking that the company start by returning the 'stolen' land on which its Vermont headquarters are located. Nulhegan Band is one of four tribes recognized by the state of Vermont as being the descendants of the region’s original Abenaki inhabitants.

“We are always interested in reclaiming the stewardship of our lands throughout our traditional territories,” chief of the Nulhegan Band of The Coosuk Abenaki Nation, said.

Your move, Ben and Jerry's!

🚀Topic du jour | Fighting the good fight
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🇯🇵 Canadian teen accused of vandalizing 1,200-year-old Japanese temple

A Canadian teen has been accused of carving a name into a UNESCO World Heritage site in Japan and was questioned by police, according to local media.

The 17-year-old boy allegedly carved the name "Julian" with his nails into a pillar at the Toshodaiji Temple in Nara prefecture, the Kyodo News Agency reported on Friday citing local police.

The report said staff at the Buddhist temple were alerted by a Japanese tourist who witnessed the alleged vandalism, and the teen was subsequently questioned by authorities on suspicion of violating the cultural properties protection law.

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🇨🇦🇱🇻 Trudeau says Canada will more than double military presence in Latvia

Trudeau held a joint press conference with Latvian Prime Minister Krisjanis Karins at the Ādaži military base outside Riga on Monday, where he also greeted some of the 800 Canadian Armed Forces members currently deployed to the mission.

Trudeau revealed plans to grow a multinational NATO battle group in Latvia.

Both sides signed a document, which sets out three phases for the work, which will eventually involve as many as 2,200 persistently deployed Canadian troops plus the ability to add hundreds of additional Armed Forces members as needed. It states that brigade buildup will be completed in 2025, and that Latvia will work to build new infrastructure.

While the government is making ambitious plans, things are not going so well on the ground. There have been earlier reports that Canadian troops in Latvia were in need of equipment, which they often had to purchase at their own expense.

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🇨🇦🇨🇳 Canada probes Nike, Dynasty Gold over alleged use of forced labor in China

Canada's corporate ethics watchdog on Tuesday launched separate investigations into Nike Canada and Dynasty Gold to probe allegations the companies used or benefited from forced labor in their supply chains and operations in China.

The companies are alleged to have or have had supply chains or operations in China identified as using or benefiting from the use of Uyghur forced labor, the Canadian Ombudsperson for Responsible Enterprise said in a statement.

#China

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Most Canadians concerned about losing access to news because of Bill C-18

As the Liberal government and tech giants go head-to-head over the future of digital Canadian news, many Canadians worry about losing access to news on their go-to platforms, according to a new survey.

Last month, Bill C-18 became law in Canada. The bill, commonly known as the Online News Act, requires companies such as Meta and Google to compensate Canadian media publications for making news content available on their platforms.

🔹61 per cent of Canadians, agree tech companies should compensate Canadian news organizations for their content. However, a similar amount, 63 per cent, are concerned about losing access to Canadian news on their go-to platforms like Facebook and Google.

🔹49 per cent say the federal government should “back down” in its battle against the tech giants, 26 per cent say they should “stand firm” and 25 per cent are unsure about the best path forward.

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Olivia Chow to be sworn in as Toronto's mayor on Wednesday

Olivia Chow will be sworn in as Toronto’s 66th mayor on Wednesday.

Since John Tory’s resignation and departure in February, the role and those responsibilities have been held by Deputy Mayor Jennifer McKelvie. Today, McKelvie was ready to pass the baton.

While some key matters have been accomplished, such as $235 million from the province for Toronto’s 2022 shortfall related to transit and housing, Chow inherits a host of issues, including a massive budget shortfall.

#Ontario

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Federal labour minister gives deadline for proposed deal in B.C. port strike

Canada's Minister of Labour has given a federal mediator a deadline to propose a settlement in a strike at B.C.'s ports that he describes as "paralyzing" the country's imports and exports.

In a brief online update Tuesday evening, the BC Maritime Employers Association noted that they, along with the union representing thousands of striking dock workers, received correspondence from Seamus O'Regan saying he has invoked his statutory powers under the Canada Labour Code to instruct the mediator to draft the terms of a recommended settlement within 24 hours.

After that is received, the minister will share the proposal with both sides and give them a further 24 hours to "review and communicate their willingness to recommend the terms for ratification to their respective members."

#BritishColumbia

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