Canada

Now is the time to draw inspiration from wherever we can, and stand with workers while they fight the employer-led race to the bottom.

For most Canadians, COVID vaccines will be free.

There are two exceptions. Alberta charges $100, and Quebec $150 to $180, for those who fall outside what those provinces define as high-risk groups.

Two of the most senior purchasing officials at Alberta Health Services in 2022 were also briefly directors of a numbered company with ties to a supplier that has been awarded hundreds of millions of dollars in business by the health agency, The Globe and Mail has found.

https://www.theglobeandmail.com/canada/article-alberta-health-services-supplier-procurement-mhcare/

Archive: [ https://archive.ph/KuN6m ]

Archived version

The R-C-M-P has warned the federal public safety minister the police force has "resourcing challenges" when it comes to tackling the threat of foreign interference.

The concern arises as the Mounties and other federal security agencies face pressure from diaspora communities to do more to counter meddling and transnational repression by such countries as China, Russia, Iran and India.

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Australia and Denmark offer a study in contrast when it comes to making daycare more accessible

Archived version

More than 3,000 kilometres north of the nation's capital, soldiers, ships and aircraft of Canada's Armed Forces gathered this week in one of the most remote areas of the country to answer one question: How would they board a foreign vessel that neither wanted to be seen, nor stopped.

What if the crew of that ship was near sensitive military sites in the North?

It may seem far-fetched. But vessels run routinely through the north with their transponders switched off — largely invisible to other ships, and not necessarily seen by Canada's satellite and surveillance systems.

The annual exercise is known as Operation Nanook, and took on particular significance this year with a collision of geopolitical changes: China's growing ambition in the Arctic, Prime Minister Mark Carney's plans to substantially increase the capabilities of the military and the newly recognized value of minerals in the North.

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Canada's traditional adversaries have shown growing interest in the North's rich deposits of critical minerals. Not to mention the opening of new, shorter shipping routes between Asia, North America and Europe through the Northwest Passage as climate change makes for an increasing number of ice-free days.

"That would be Russia and, increasingly, China," said Stephanie Carvin, a former national security official and now an academic with Carleton University in Ottawa.

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CRA is running a public consultation on automatic tax filing. You can fill it out here.

Here's the verbiage about the project

It's unbelievable that Canada makes people with trivial tax needs jump through so many hoops. If someone is elderly and poor, they need to file taxes to receive their full benefits. That's a huge barrier to many people.

Measles is scary. Breakthrough measles is even scarier.

https://www.theglobeandmail.com/life/article-measles-breakthrough-vaccine-joy-spearchief-morris/

An informative interview with Bob Rae, our UN ambassador, on where our gov't seems to be at the moment.

Archive: [ https://archive.is/Snxyj ]

I think the Beaverton has it right, his elbows are in a quantum state.

If she wants to leave Canada she can always just move and leave Alberta.

Archived

Canada has signed a bilateral free trade agreement with Indonesia, which aims to eliminate or reduce tariffs on over 95 per cent of Ottawa's exports to its largest market in Southeast Asia.

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Canada's exports include wheat, potash, timber and soybeans.

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The agreement also provides for the elimination of more than 90 per cent of tariffs on Indonesian imports, a boon to Indonesia's export of garments and leather goods to the North American market.

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Simultaneously, a defence cooperation agreement was signed aimed at strengthening collaboration in military training, maritime security, cyber defence and peacekeeping.