CBC News reported on New Years’ Eve that Allard, the rookie UCP MLA for Grande Prairie, visited Hawaii on a family vacation earlier in December. She was out of the province from December 19 to December 26.
Canada
‘Teens’ wanted for murder of Calgary police officer turn themselves in
Two teenagers were arrested Friday evening on first-degree murder warrants in relation to the New Year’s Eve death of Calgary police Sgt. Andrew Harnett.
Investigators believed a 17-year-old was behind the wheel of the vehicle when it struck Harnett. Global News is not naming the 17-year-old in accordance with the Youth Criminal Justice Act.
He and the 19-year-old passenger, Amir Abdulrahman, are both charged with murder, and turned themselves in at police headquarters at about 5:30 p.m. Friday.
Hate crime committed at Catholic church in Edmonton
Police say on Dec. 13, a man allegedly interrupted the service with offensive comments and gestures. He also filmed the incident, before posting it on social media.
Premier Kenney refuses to discipline Alberta MLAs, government staff over international travel
Kenney made the remarks in a New Year’s Day press conference after revelations that MLA Pat Rehn travelled to Mexico and Municipal Affairs Minister Tracy Allard travelled to Hawaii.
Calgary police issue 1st-degree-murder warrants for 2 teens in the death of a Calgary police officer
Murder warrants issued against 2 people in death of Calgary police officer
Al-Azan Shah Muhammad, 17, and Amir Abdulrahman, 19, both from Calgary, have been identified as suspects in the case. First-degree murder warrants have been issued against both men.
What did Canadians search on Google in 2020?
Canadians had many questions in 2020 and they turned to search engines to make sense of what they were seeing and hearing.
With the year ending, the analytics data from Google provides a unique insight to what Canadians were reading about throughout the year.
Certain events occupied Canadians’ attention for long enough to dominate the trending data and others events reached so many people, so quickly, they would own a top spot for the entire year.
Canada now resettles more refugees than any other country, mostly through private sponsorship
Every day Andrea McCoy receives up to five emails from refugees desperate to come to Canada. As the messages flood in, she writes back, “I can’t help you at this time.”
She works for the Anglican diocese on Vancouver Island, which has privately sponsored more than 800 refugees since 2016. But its parishes cannot resettle everyone who writes.
A subversion of sovereignty and democracy dressed up as virtue.
Prince Charles says Canadian Indigenous peoples must be heeded on environmental issues
Prince Charles says he has been in discussion with Canadian Indigenous leaders – adding it’s time for people to start to listen to them on environmental issues.
‘We are not prepared’: The flaws inside Public Health that hurt Canada’s readiness for COVID-19
As a global pandemic began to take root in February, China held a series of backchannel conversations with Canada, lobbying the federal government to keep its borders open.
With the virus already taking a deadly toll in Asia, Heng Xiaojun, the Minister Counsellor for the Chinese embassy, requested a call with senior Transport Canada officials. Over the course of the conversation, the Chinese representatives communicated Beijing’s desire that flights between the two countries not be stopped because it was unnecessary.
“The Chinese position on the continuation of flights was reiterated,” say official notes taken from the call. “Mr. Heng conveyed that China is taking comprehensive measures to combat the coronavirus.”
Canadian officials seemed to agree, since no steps were taken to restrict or prohibit travel. To the federal government, China appeared to have the situation under control and the risk to Canada was low. Before ending the call, Mr. Heng thanked Ottawa for its “science and fact-based approach.”
Looks like the Globe released this from the paywall. Interesting but distressing read of our ruling class at work.
h/t CT
Quebec police ticketed 41 Canadians for Christmas gatherings over the weekend
Over the Christmas break, Quebec police have been busy ticketing families for gathering to celebrate Christmas together.
What keeps Trudeau from Sanctioning China for Human Rights Abuses?
At the start of the pandemic doctors and other Chinese citizens were reprimanded or legally punished for putting out any information on the pandemic that was not in line with the Chinese government’s narrative that it was under control.
This is a pattern of behaviour from the authoritarian Chinese government not likely to stop unless an outside force puts pressure on them to stop.
Of course, the UN Human Rights Office is not going to do anything substantial about China’s gross abuse of human rights seeing as they simply stated that they were “concerned” by the obvious move to silence those trying to get the truth about the virus to the public.
KNIGHT: Trudeau’s complete disregard for the taxpayer
Justin Trudeau has racked up the biggest deficit in Canadian history in a matter of two months. Our deficit is nearing $400 billion and our national debt is a whopping $1.4 trillion.
To make matters worse, there is no oversight and no accountability for this historical amount of spending. Even the Parliamentary Budget Officer has acknowledged that there is a lack of information available to the public.
What’s at stake for the main political parties as an election looms in 2021
For all the bluster among federal political leaders about not wanting an election any time soon, the political truth is as cold as a winter’s wind: the potential for one is a reality in 2021.
For now, political parties say getting through the long dark winter without the health-care system collapsing due to COVID-19 is a priority, as is ensuring vaccines quickly and effectively reach all parts of the country.
But running parallel to that is the ongoing debate over how to cushion the economic blow caused by the pandemic.