Tag Archives: Prime Minister Justin Trudeau

Canada to put federal workers who refuse COVID-19 vaccination on unpaid leave

By Steve Scherer

OTTAWA (Reuters) -Canada’s federal employees who are not fully vaccinated against COVID-19 and are not exempt from getting the shots will be put on administrative leave without pay, officials said on Wednesday, while domestic air, train and cruise ship travelers and workers will soon have to show proof of vaccination.

Federal employees will be required to show proof of vaccination through an online portal by Oct 29. Workers and travelers on trains, planes and cruise ships operating domestically must show they have been inoculated by Oct. 30.

The introduction of these vaccine mandates was a cornerstone pledge by Liberal Prime Minister Justin Trudeau during his campaign for re-election. The Liberals returned to power in a closely contested election last month, but fell short of winning a majority.

Canada’s vaccine policy will be one of the strictest in the world.

Fiji in August forced public servants to go on leave if unvaccinated. If still not inoculated by November, they will lose their jobs. Later this month, Italy will require proof of vaccination, a negative test or recent recovery from infection for all the country’s workers.

Canada’s vaccine mandate for federal workers, first promised on Aug 13, will be reassessed every six months and stay in place until the policy is no longer required, one official said.

For travelers, a negative COVID-19 test will not be accepted as a replacement for proof of vaccination after Nov. 30, officials said. Children under 12, who are not yet eligible for vaccination in Canada will be exempted from the travel mandate.

Last week, Trudeau said he would introduce his new Cabinet this month, and lawmakers would be back in parliament this fall.

(Reporting by Steve Scherer in Ottawa, Additional reporting by Ankur Banerjee in Bengaluru; Editing by Saumyadeb Chakrabarty and Bill Berkrot)

Mail-in voting set to soar in Canada election, could undermine Trudeau, New Democratic Party

By David Ljunggren

OTTAWA (Reuters) – Mail-in voting in Canada is set to soar ahead of the Sept. 20 election amid fears of COVID-19, and the complex registration process could deter voters, possibly undermining Liberal Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s bid for a majority government.

Pollsters say mainly Liberal and left-leaning voters would like to use mail-in balloting, while Conservatives prefer to vote in person. But Liberal strategists are concerned the sign-up process for casting ballots by mail could discourage their supporters from using it and lead them to not vote at all.

Trudeau, 49, launched the campaign on Sunday, hoping that high vaccination rates and a post-pandemic economic rebound would help him rebuff a challenge from the opposition Conservatives and regain the parliamentary majority he lost two years ago.

Part of the problem is there is no substantive history of voting by mail during Canadian federal elections, where electors overwhelmingly go in person to polling stations. Of the 18.4 million people who cast their ballots in the 2019 election, just under 50,000 chose mail, and most of them were abroad.

But concern over COVID-19 means anywhere from 4 million to 5 million people out of 27 million potential voters could choose the mail this time, says Elections Canada, the independent body running the vote.

Some 71% of the country’s eligible population is fully vaccinated, but cases are creeping higher – mostly among the unvaccinated – in a fourth wave being driven by the Delta variant.

People who want to vote by mail must ask Elections Canada for a special ballot and provide proof of identity, either by applying online and sending a digital scan of documents, or by mail by with photocopies of identification.

“It is true that voting by mail demands an effort on the part of the elector,” Deputy Chief Electoral Officer Michel Roussel said in a phone interview. “We will insist, the moment the election is called, that if you plan to vote by mail, start now, because it is complicated.”

To better inform voters how to vote by mail, Elections Canada plans an advertising blitz once the campaign starts, using the Web, radio and television as well as social media channels.

But two Liberal sources who said they could not speak on the record said they feared that elderly voters – who tend to vote more than other age cohorts – would be put off by the application process while the fear of COVID-19 might keep them from voting in person.

“Support for mail-in is higher among New Democrats and Liberals and least popular among Conservatives,” said EKOS Research pollster Frank Graves, who said some 20% of mostly left-leaning voters want to vote by mail.

“If mail-in is more difficult than people would like, it would be least damaging to the Conservatives, because it’s not something they’re planning on using much anyway.”

Liberal and Conservative party spokespeople did not comment officially on the possible effects of mail-in balloting.

Opinion polls show the Liberals still might not have enough votes to win an outright majority in parliament.

Nationally, Liberals would win 35% of the vote, compared with 30% for the main opposition Conservative Party and 19% for the left-leaning New Democrats, a Leger Marketing poll showed on Aug. 12.

(Reporting by David Ljunggren, edited by Steve Scherer and Jonathan Oatis)

Canadian indigenous group finds 751 unmarked graves at former residential school

By Anna Mehler Paperny and Moira Warburton

(Reuters) -An indigenous group in Canada’s Saskatchewan province on Thursday said it had found the unmarked graves of 751 people at a now-defunct Catholic residential school, just weeks after a similar discovery rocked the country.

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said he was “terribly saddened” by the new discovery at Marieval Indian Residential School about 87 miles (140 km) from the provincial capital Regina.

He told indigenous people that “the hurt and the trauma that you feel is Canada’s responsibility to bear.”

It is not clear how many of the remains detected belong to children, Cowessess First Nation Chief Cadmus Delorme told reporters.

He said the church that ran the school removed the headstones.

“We didn’t remove the headstones. Removing headstones is a crime in this country. We are treating this like a crime scene,” he said.

The residential school system, which operated between 1831 and 1996, removed about 150,000 indigenous children from their families and brought them to Christian residential schools run on behalf of the federal government.

“Canada will be known as a nation who tried to exterminate the First Nations. Now we have evidence,” said Bobby Cameron, Chief of the Federation of Sovereign Indigenous Nations, which represents 74 First Nations in Saskatchewan.

“This is just the beginning.”

Canada’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission, which published a report that found the country’s residential school system amounted to cultural genocide, has said a cemetery was left on the Marieval site after the school building was demolished.

Cowessess First Nation has been in touch with the local Catholic archdiocese and Delorme said he is optimistic they will provide records allowing them to identify the remains.

“We have full faith that the Roman Catholic Church will release our records. They haven’t told us ‘No.’ We just don’t have them yet.”

The Cowessess First Nation began a ground-penetrating radar search on June 2, after the discovery of 215 unmarked graves at the Kamloops Residential School in British Columbia outraged the country.

The Kamloops discovery reopened old wounds in Canada about the lack of information and accountability around the residential school system, which forcibly separated indigenous children from their families and subjected them to malnutrition and physical and sexual abuse.

Pope Francis said in early June that he was pained by the Kamloops revelation and called for respect for the rights and cultures of native peoples. But he stopped short of the direct apology some Canadians had demanded.

(Reporting by Anna Mehler Paperny in Toronto and Moira Warburton in VancouverEditing by Chizu Nomiyama and Alistair Bell)

What special relationship? Canada grimaces amid hail of U.S. trade blows

By David Ljunggren

OTTAWA (Reuters) – After Prime Minister Justin Trudeau held a cordial first meeting with U.S. President Joe Biden in February, marking an end to years of battles with the Trump administration, a relieved Canadian official said, “We feel we are off to the races here.”

But old trade disputes that flared up during the Trump years show no signs of fading.

Last month Washington announced plans to double duties on imports of Canadian lumber and requested a dispute panel on Canada’s dairy import quotas. Biden is also promising a Buy America procurement plan that could hurt Canadian exporters.

The timing is awkward for Trudeau ahead of a likely election later this year, especially since his ruling center-left Liberals have traditionally enjoyed better relationships with the Democrats than the opposition Conservative Party.

“Canada’s economic relationship with the United States is breaking down rapidly,” said Candice Bergen, deputy Conservative leader, noting that “for months the Liberals have been telling us how much they agree with the Americans.”

The Trump era was exhausting for Canada, which sends 75% of its goods exports to the United States. At one point Trump called Trudeau “dishonest and weak” and threatened to tear up the North American Free Trade Agreement unless it could be renegotiated.

But the new-found cordial atmosphere has not blunted a dispute over U.S. allegations Canada is unfairly limiting imports of dairy products. Another contentious issue is Canadian softwood lumber exports, which U.S. producers have long complained are unfairly subsidized.

On lumber, “the United States has not been willing to reach an agreement; We are,” Natural Resources Minister Seamus O’Regan tersely told legislators last month.

Signs of trouble emerged early. Within hours of taking power, Biden revoked the permit needed to build the Keystone XL oil pipeline, killing an $8 billion project that would have brought Canadian crude to U.S. markets.

Canadian officials now want the White House to help solve another energy challenge in Michigan, where the governor wants to close a pipeline operated by Canada’s Enbridge Inc. The Biden team has declined to intervene.

Yet despite the recent unhappiness, there are big differences between the two U.S. administrations, Canadian officials say.

Biden, unlike Trump, is not threatening to scrap continental free trade. He has also not imposed tariffs on Canadian aluminum and steel on national security grounds.

Canadian Foreign Minister Marc Garneau played down suggestions of a rift.

“We can’t eliminate all the different issues that are important for the Americans. We have to deal with them one by one,” he told a Montreal business audience this month. “There is always going to be a bit of back and forth between our two nations.”

In private, however, Canadian officials are even blunter.

“The idea the Biden administration is bad for us on trade is nonsense,” said one senior source with direct knowledge of government thinking. “The Canada-U.S. trading relationship is largely open and free flowing.”

Chris Sands, head of the Canada Institute at the Washington-based Wilson Center, said Ottawa had been too optimistic about the potential for cooperation.

“I do think expectations ran ahead of the likely way that the Biden administration would unfold… most people thought something different was going to emerge,” he told Reuters.

The headaches show no signs of easing. Last Friday, Canada requested a dispute settlement panel to address U.S. tariffs on Canadian solar products.

“These tariffs are unwarranted and damaging,” complained Trade Minister Mary Ng.

The U.S. Trade Representative’s office did not directly address questions about increasing tensions.

“We have a close relationship with Canada and routinely collaborate on a range of topics,” said spokesman Adam Hodge.

(Additional reporting by Steve Scherer in Ottawa and Nia Williams in Calgary; Editing by Steve Scherer and Dan Grebler)

Remains of 215 children found at former indigenous school site in Canada

By Anna Mehler Paperny

TORONTO (Reuters) – The remains of 215 children, some as young as three years old, were found at the site of a former residential school for indigenous children, a discovery Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau described as heartbreaking on Friday.

The children were students at the Kamloops Indian Residential School in British Columbia that closed in 1978, according to the Tk’emlúps te Secwépemc Nation, which said the remains were found with the help of a ground penetrating radar specialist.

“We had a knowing in our community that we were able to verify,” Tk’emlúps te Secwépemc Chief Rosanne Casimir said in a statement. “At this time, we have more questions than answers.”

Canada’s residential school system, which forcibly separated indigenous children from their families, constituted “cultural genocide,” a six-year investigation into the now-defunct system found in 2015.

The report documented horrific physical abuse, rape, malnutrition and other atrocities suffered by many of the 150,000 children who attended the schools, typically run by Christian churches on behalf of Ottawa from the 1840s to the 1990s.

It found more than 4,100 children died while attending residential school. The deaths of the 215 children buried in the grounds of what was once Canada’s largest residential school are believed to not have been included in that figure and appear to have been undocumented until the discovery.

Trudeau wrote in a tweet that the news “breaks my heart – it is a painful reminder of that dark and shameful chapter of our country’s history.”

In 2008, the Canadian government formally apologized for the system.

The Tk’emlúps te Secwépemc Nation said it was engaging with the coroner and reaching out to the home communities whose children attended the school. They expect to have preliminary findings by mid-June.

In a statement, British Columbia Assembly of First Nations Regional Chief Terry Teegee called finding such grave sites “urgent work” that “refreshes the grief and loss for all First Nations in British Columbia.”

(Reporting by Anna Mehler Paperny, Editing by Rosalba O’Brien)

Canada virus hotspot Manitoba flies patients out as infections surge

By Rod Nickel

WINNIPEG, Manitoba (Reuters) -Canada’s latest COVID-19 hotspot of Manitoba said on Tuesday it was planning to fly additional critically ill patients to other provinces as infections multiply, even as Quebec and British Columbia announced plans to ease restrictions.

A third wave reached Manitoba later than other provinces, and pushed up its rate of daily cases to 233 people per 100,000 during the past week, the highest in Canada and triple the national average, mainly due to spread in the city of Winnipeg.

Manitoba has flown 18 critically ill COVID-19 patients to Ontario hospitals in the past few days, officials said. The provincial government is also talking with Saskatchewan and North Dakota officials about receiving patients, they said in a briefing, without providing a number.

No other province has taken such steps.

The province has scrambled to more than double its intensive care unit capacity by cancelling surgeries and occupying other spaces in hospitals.

“Our hospitals are being stretched to the limits right now,” Chief Provincial Health Officer Dr. Brent Roussin said. “There are hundreds of people struggling for their lives.”

A group of doctors urged the Manitoba government to impose a stay-at-home order and close non-essential businesses.

More than 25,000 people have died of COVID-19 in Canada since the pandemic began.

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said he was looking at sending medical staff to Manitoba through the Canadian Red Cross and other support from the Canadian Armed Forces.

Quebec, Canada’s second-most populous province, will continue to ease restrictions and by June 7 all restaurants and gyms will be able to reopen, Premier Francois Legault said.

The Pacific coast province of British Columbia laid out its four-part reopening plan on Tuesday, with some restrictions being lifted immediately and a full reopening anticipated by September, Premier John Horgan said.

Limited indoor and outdoor dining with a maximum of six people, indoor gatherings of up to five people from outside a household and low-intensity fitness classes are now permitted, Horgan said.

The province expects to lift all group limits on indoor dining and reopen casinos and nightclubs with limited capacity on July 1.

Ontario, Canada’s most-populous province, plans to loosen restrictions starting June 14.

(Reporting by Rod Nickel in Winnipeg; additional reporting by David Ljunggren in Ottawa and Moira Warburton in Toronto; Editing by Marguerita Choy and Cynthia Osterman)

Toronto area to close some workplaces amid COVID-19 surge

By Anna Mehler Paperny

TORONTO (Reuters) – Canada’s biggest city Toronto and neighboring Peel, both of which are in the midst of a third wave of COVID-19 infections, on Tuesday said they would order businesses to close if they had outbreaks involving five or more people, medical officials said.

The closures would be for a minimum of 10 days if workers “could have reasonably acquired their infection at work,” according to a release from Peel Public Health.

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said he is sending federal healthcare workers to help Ontario, the country’s most populous province, which includes Toronto and Peel.

Ontario Premier Doug Ford stopped short of closing workplaces like warehouses or manufacturers when he imposed a stay-at-home order over the weekend.

On Tuesday, Ontario’s science advisory table, which offers advice to the provincial government, called for paid sick leave, the closure of non-essential workplaces, and “public health guidance that works.”

“Our case counts are at an all-time high. Our hospitals are buckling. Younger people are getting sicker. The disease is ripping through whole families,” the science advisors said in the brief.

On Tuesday, Ford’s government appeared to open the door to implementing paid sick leave after months of refusing to do so.

Canada has been ramping up its vaccination campaign, but still has a smaller percentage of its population inoculated than dozens of wealthy countries, including the United States and Britain. On Tuesday, Canada extended travel restrictions.

There were 3,469 new cases in Ontario on Tuesday. Nationally, Canada has recorded an average of 8,680 new infections over the past week, a 7% increase from the previous seven days.

To accelerate vaccinations, Ontario, Alberta, Manitoba and British Columbia lowered the minimum age for recipients of the AstraZeneca Plc vaccine to 40 from 55. Quebec said on Tuesday it would lower the minimum age to 45.

Separately, the U.S. state of North Dakota will administer COVID-19 vaccines to Manitoba-based truckers transporting goods to and from the United States.

“With adequate vaccine supplies and all North Dakotans having access to vaccine … we want to do our part to ensure essential workers from Canada who are frequently traveling through our state are vaccinated,” North Dakota Governor Doug Burgum said in a statement.

(Reporting by Anna Mehler Paperny in Toronto, additional reporting by Allison Lampert in Montreal, writing by Steve Scherer Editing by Alistair Bell)

Canada to demand negative COVID tests from people returning across U.S. land border

By David Ljunggren

OTTAWA (Reuters) – Canada will step up its fight against COVID-19 by obliging citizens returning home over land from the United States to show they do not have COVID-19, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said on Tuesday.

Everyone arriving by air already has to prove they tested negative within the previous 72 hours and this rule is being expanded to land crossings starting on Feb. 15, Trudeau said.

Although non-essential travel between the two nations is banned, hundreds of thousands of Canadians have second homes in the United States, and Ottawa is obliged to allow them to return if they wish. People who arrive without test results can be fined C$3,000 ($2,360).

The measure only affects around 5% of returning Canadians because the majority arrive by air.

“We’re using every tool in the toolbox to get us all through this crisis,” Trudeau told reporters. Essential workers such as truck drivers are exempt from the new rules.

Canada has recorded a total of 20,835 deaths and 808,120 cases of COVID-19. Many provinces reimposed restrictions to combat a second wave of the coronavirus pandemic and as a result the number of new daily cases over the last week fell to around 3,500 from 8,000 in early January.

“This is gratifying progress,” chief medical officer Theresa Tam told reporters.

Trudeau also promised the supply of vaccines from Pfizer Inc and Moderna Inc would ramp up next week.

His Liberal government has been attacked by critics over the slow pace of vaccinations, caused in part by a temporary reduction in supplies from Pfizer.

Separately, officials said Canada would allow a sixth dose to be taken from each vial of Pfizer’s vaccine rather than the originally intended five.

They told reporters that six doses could be extracted provided a special syringe was used, mirroring moves taken by the United States and some European nations.

($1=1.2704 Canadian dollars)

(Reporting by David Ljunggren; Editing by Marguerita Choy and Mark Heinrich)

Canada’s Trudeau says scope for closer U.S.-Canada integration on EVs, critical mineral supply

By Steve Scherer

OTTAWA (Reuters) – Canada and the United States can collaborate more closely on manufacturing electric vehicles and on supplying critical minerals needed to make batteries for cars and other clean technologies, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said on Thursday.

“The integration of our economies, of our supply chains … I think gives a real opportunity for us to really take some leaps forward,” Trudeau said in a telephone interview.

After noting that Canada has many of the rare earths minerals needed for car batteries and solar panels, Trudeau said it was important to have “a secure supply from a friend and an ally”.

China has been one of the main suppliers of critical minerals to the United States, and Biden is planning to mandate a review of critical U.S. supply chains with an eye to securing U.S. industrial supplies, Reuters reported earlier this week.

Canada’s mineral wealth “is part of why so many automakers are now looking at setting up their supply chains for zero emission vehicles in Canada,” Trudeau said.

General Motors Co, Ford Motor Co and Stellantis NV have all announced plans to manufacture electric vehicles in Canada in coming years.

“We’ve already seen something like $6 billion worth of investment by auto companies in Canada over the past couple of years into zero-emissions or low-emissions vehicles,” Trudeau said.

“There’s a lot of really great opportunities to be developing partnerships and production facilities not just for the North American market, but for the world,” he added.

(Reporting by Steve Scherer; Editing by Daniel Wallis)

Canada considering drug decriminalization to fight overdose crisis

By Anna Mehler Paperny

TORONTO (Reuters) – Canada’s federal government is considering decriminalization of the possession of opioids and other illicit drugs in its efforts to tackle a spiraling overdose crisis, a government official said this week, even as data show the number of charges rising.

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s Liberal government is facing pressure to rein in drug overdoses, though it has previously downplayed decriminalization.

Vancouver has asked the federal government to exempt the city from part of the Controlled Drugs and Substances Act, decriminalizing the possession of small amounts of drugs within city boundaries. A spokesman for Health Minister Patty Hajdu said on Wednesday that decriminalization was under consideration and that discussions with Vancouver were under way but would not comment further

That could subject people caught with small amounts of drugs to fines or mandatory treatment.

Canada’s opioid toxicity death rate for the first half of 2020, 14.6 per 100,000, was the highest since national data began to be collected in 2016, according to the federal government.

The number of people charged with drug possession of non-cocaine, non-heroin drugs in Canada more than tripled to 13,725 in the past decade to 2019, according to Statistics Canada. The number of people charged with heroin possession almost quintupled, to 1,043.

“The idea that we’re kind of becoming more tolerant isn’t borne out by the data,” said Neil Boyd, director of the School of Criminology at Simon Fraser University.

The COVID-19 pandemic has disrupted illicit drug supply chains, making for a more toxic supply; it has also lessened supports and driven people to use alone, health advocates say.

Health Canada’s move to discuss decriminalization “comes at a time when the overdose crisis in our city has never been worse,” Vancouver Mayor Kennedy Stewart said in a statement Wednesday.

Many health experts argue decriminalization would encourage drug users to use in safer spaces where they can access medical care.

Trudeau dismissed decriminalization last year, telling the Canadian Broadcasting Corp it was not a “silver bullet.”

Portugal decriminalized illicit drug possession and consumption in 2001. In the 2020 election Oregon voted to decriminalize.

This week Montreal’s city council also voted to support decriminalization. The Canadian Association of Chiefs of Police came out in support of the move last summer.

(Reporting by Anna Mehler Paperny; Editing by Steve Orlofsky)