The attempted assassination of Donald Trump at a Pennsylvania rally has raised serious concerns about Secret Service missteps and security gaps at the event, with many wondering how a gunman was able to access a rooftop only 150 metres away from the former president. 2012 presidential candidate Michele Bachmann joined True North’s Andrew Lawton to discuss.
Bureaucracy under Trudeau balloons by 42%, tripling private sector growth
The number of employees on the federal government’s payroll has increased three times more than the population of Canada has since Prime Minister Justin Trudeau took office.
Since 2016, just after Trudeau took office, the federal public service has increased by over 108,000 people, or 42%, according to data released by the Treasury Board of Canada Secretariat.
During the same period, Canada’s population has only increased by just over five million people or 14%.
Franco Terrazzano, federal director of the Canadian Taxpayers Federation, told True North that ordinary taxpayers are paying the price for the hiring spree.
“The federal bureaucracy consumes more than half of the federal government’s day-to-day spending, so higher taxes and debt are a direct result of Trudeau’s ballooning bureaucracy,” he said.
The Canadian Taxpayers Federation noted that the cost of the federal payroll reached a record high of $67.4 billion last year. This is a 68% increase since 2016 when the federal government payroll was $40.2 billion.
In the most recent fiscal year, the Liberals dished out $406 million in bonuses to federal departments and Crown corporations.
These bonuses come despite the Parliamentary Budget Officer, Yves Giroux, reporting that fewer than 50% of the government’s own performance targets are being met.
“We’ve seen an increase in the number of public servants and in public expenditures, but year after year, despite the fact that departments choose their own performance indicators and the targets, they don’t seem to be getting significantly better at reaching them,” Giroux testified to a parliamentary committee.
Between 2023 and 2024, an additional 10,000 people joined the federal public service, pushing the total from 357,247 to 367,772.
The Treasury Board told True North that the federal public service’s growth rate slowed to 2.9% last year, down from a 5.5% growth rate between 2017 and 2023.
The federal committee said that the 2024 budget announced $4.2 billion in savings over four years.
“These savings will be primarily achieved through natural attrition in the federal public service of around 5,000 full-time equivalents over the next four years,” said a spokesperson.
The spokesperson added that government spending dedicated to personnel has remained relatively stagnant over the last decade.
“This is about smarter government, not smaller government, and the government of Canada will continue to prioritize high-quality service delivery to Canadians,” said the spokesperson.
The Canadian Taxpayers Federation pointed out that this doesn’t change the reality of a ballooning public sector.
“The feds have hired tens of thousands of extra bureaucrats, handed out more than one million raises, and rubber-stamped hundreds of millions in bonuses in recent years and still can’t deliver good services,” said Terrazzano.
While the Liberals’ hiring spree has seen the federal public service’s employment balloon, all government employees in Canada have grown at a smaller rate.
Between Oct. 2015 and June 2024, the number of public sector employees in Canada has grown from 3,554,500 to 4,412,100, an increase of just over 24%.
Meanwhile, the private sector has grown from 11,709,000 to 13,430,100 employees between 2016 and now, an increase of 14.7%.
The Canadian Taxpayers Federation said that the average salary for a full-time federal employee is $125,300. The average salary for a full-time working Canadian was less than $70,000 in 2023.
Terrazzano said any government that wants to balance the budget “must take air out of the ballooning bureaucracy.”
The Liberals’ 2024 budget proposed $111.2 billion in new spending over the next five years, a $40 billion deficit, and no plan to balance the budget.
“Canadians need a more efficient government, not a bloated government full of highly paid bureaucrats,” said Terrazzano. “Had the bureaucracy only increased with population growth, there would be 72,491 fewer federal paper-pushers today.”
Immigration Minister Miller admits gang members exploit vulnerabilities to gain entry
Liberal Immigration Minister Marc Miller admitted that gang members were exploiting vulnerabilities in Canada’s immigration system and slipping into the country undetected.
In a press conference with ethnic media outlets on Monday, Miller was asked how criminals from India can slip through the vetting process and come to Canada.
Miller admitted that gang members are coming into the country, implying that it was inevitable when dealing with sophisticated criminal organizations.
“Well-determined actors regardless of the country, and particularly sophisticated gangs, are often able to get around even the most stringent immigration requirements,” said Miller.
“Canada has some of the most robust requirements in the world when we are checking people, but it’s not perfect.”
While Miller did not specifically name India, he said that the Canadian government often admits immigrants from countries whose governments are unreliable, allowing gang members to slip in with phoney police background checks.
“We all know how unreliable at times depending on the country that police certificates can be and if we were to rely on a country that is sometimes not the most – well I would say a reluctant partner, those certificates often become quite questionable as to their reliability.”
Miller touted the federal government’s immigration vetting process, however, admitted that criminals are coming into the country to commit crimes.
“Regrettably at times people do get in and they do commit crimes. Well-determined actors do have an ability despite best efforts to get in.”
In recent years, the Trudeau government has increased the government’s immigration targets to record levels, as Canada has seen a massive surge of immigrants coming to Canada, with a substantial number coming from India.
According to Statistics Canada, between 2016-2021, the top country of birth for recent immigrants is India, responsible for nearly a fifth of all newcomers to Canada.
The Trudeau government has also substantially increased the number of international study permits granted, with the figure rising to 807,730 as of 2022.
Of the 807,730 international students in Canada, 319,000 study permit holders are from India.
The government of Canada’s relationship with the Indian government has deteriorated over recent years.
Last year, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau rose in the House of Commons to accuse the government of India of killing Canadian citizen Hardeep Singh Nijjar in Surrey, B.C., resulting in a sharp reaction from the Indian government and the expulsion of a majority of Canada’s ambassadors in India from the country.
Rachel and the Republic | Trump’s V.P. loves Canada
Today on Rachel and the Republic with Rachel Parker, Rachel explains who Donald Trump’s running mate is and why he’s good news for Canada. Ohio Senator J.D. Vance has a long history of commenting on Canadian issues and explains a deeper understanding of Canadian conservatives than most of our politicians. Also on the show, Rachel has an update about the Republican National Convention.
Tune into Rachel and the Republic now!
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LAWTON: True North journalist describes moments during Trump rally shooting
On Saturday, Former President Donald Trump was targeted in an attempted assassination during a rally in Pennsylvania, leaving one spectator dead and two others injured. True North journalist Rachel Emmanuel joined Andrew Lawton to describe what she witnessed in the moments leading up to, and following, the shocking incident.
The Daily Brief | BC library banned “Grave Error” book without reading it
Executives at a British Columbia library decided to ban “Grave Error: How the Media Misled Us (and the Truth about Residential Schools),” a book debunking the political narrative that hundreds of graves were supposedly discovered at former residential schools, before conducting a review of its contents.
Plus, the Trudeau government’s directive to banks to relabel the carbon tax rebates landing in some Canadians’ bank accounts is being criticized as an attempt at putting “lipstick on a pig.”
And Donald Trump’s running mate Ohio Senator J.D. Vance has a history of chiming in on Canadian politics, including by voicing support for the Freedom Convoy.
Tune into The Daily Brief with Cosmin Dzsurdzsa and Lindsay Shepherd!
Corus stock hits all-time low of $0.12 amid restructuring and layoffs
The parent company of Global News saw its stock price hit 12 cents on Tuesday.
On the verge of becoming a penny stock, Corus Entertainment has fallen from its peak stock price of $25.16 on Mar. 8, 2013 — a decrease of 99.52% in a little over a decade.
The company announced in a press release that its shareholders suffered a net loss of $769.9 million in the third quarter of 2024 and $747 million so far this year.
“The third quarter results reflect the ongoing impacts of a challenging advertising environment,” said Troy Reeb, co-chief executive officer who began his career with Corus 25 years ago as a political journalist.
Corus’ former CEO retired in Jun. and was replaced by Reeb and John Gossling, with the latter also continuing on as chief financial officer.
“As part of our mandate as co-CEOs, we are decisively reducing more costs and taking actions to right-size our business given the realities of our operating environment,” said Gossling. “We have made difficult decisions to part with certain legacy assets and are identifying additional opportunities to streamline our business with the aim of improving profitability. We are also working with the Board to develop a comprehensive plan to strengthen the balance sheet and manage liabilities.”
As of May 31, 2024, Corus Entertainment owns almost $1.6 billion in assets, over $1 billion less than the nearly $2.75 billion they had in assets on Aug. 31, 2023.
However, the organization has nearly $1.9 billion in liabilities, lowering slightly from almost $2.3 billion as of Aug. 31, 2023.
The difference in assets and liabilities resulted in a deficit of around $311 million.
Corus suffered the recent forfeiture of key programming rights to Warner Bros Discovery Inc., which will transfer to Rogers Communications Inc. when the current deal expires on Dec. 31. The channels affected, including HGTV, The Food Network, and the Cooking Channel, which have been significant revenue drivers for Corus.
Analysts have predicted that the Corus Entertainment stock could fall lower, with some suggesting it could fall as low as one cent.
During Corus’ third quarter earnings conference call on Monday, Gossling said the company expects to reduce its workforce by 25% by Aug., or 800 jobs less than Sept. 2022. As of May, Corus has already let go of 500 employees.
He added that two legacy radio stations will cease operations in Vancouver and Edmonton. Global TV’s Big Brother Canada has not been renewed after 12 seasons, and the Oprah Winfrey Network will cease operations under Corus effective Sept. 1, 2024.
“Our priorities are to aggressively cut costs and manage our liabilities. We are making tough decisions to shutter areas of business we can no longer sustain and pause longer term development activities, while we implement efficiency initiatives to further strengthen assets with more growth potential,” said Gossling.
Bell Media’s parent company slashed 9% of its workforce back in Feb. They placed much of the blame on the Canada Radio-television Telecommunications Comission for implementing regulations. Bell Media sold 45 of its 103 regional radio stations, and 4,800 employees were affected.
Despite the CBC similarly announcing recent layoffs amid struggling viewership, they recently announced more executive bonuses.
Reeb said that local news is “very challenged” in small markets.
“There was a time when a local television station could have a good hold on the local advertisers in the market. Now, local advertisers can go to literally hundreds of other options. And, of course, Google and Facebook have driven very hard into the local advertising space,” he said.
He added that to date, Corus’ restructuring efforts have been focused on the small markets and will continue to be.
Despite the challenges of local content, Reeb said that Corus’ national news has done well and operated as a growth engine for the company.
“There are sort of two stories when it comes to news and (they) both rely on some really innovative thinking to take costs out of the overburdened local television space and put it into a place where we can operate news at scale,” he said.
Gossling said that the company is taking significant actions to bring Corus to a “smaller, more sustainable state while addressing our debt levels.”
Driven by lower gasoline costs, Canada’s inflation rate cools to 2.7% in June
The latest Statistics Canada inflation figures show a 2.7% year-over-year reduction in June, down from 2.9% in May.
A slump in the rise of gasoline prices led to the slow down with only a 0.4% increase reported in June compared to a 5.6% rise in May. Excluding gasoline, inflation rose by 2.8% in June.
While inflation in shelter fell from 6.4% to 6.2% between May and June, it remained the highest among product groups in the Consumer Price Index. The lowest inflation was reported for the clothing and footwear category with a -3.1% change year-over-year. The price of gasoline fell by an equal 3.1% month-over-month.
The Consumer Price Index measures price changes in a variety of goods and services purchased by households.
June’s version of the Consumer Price Index tracks the inflation of groceries back to Jan. 2023, when the inflation for groceries stood at 11.4%. The Consumer Price Index of groceries fell almost every month since then, reaching a low of 1.4% in Apr. 2024. Grocery inflation has risen for two consecutive months, reaching 2.1% year-over-year.
On a monthly basis, the Consumer Price Index fell 0.1% in June, following a 0.6% increase in May. The decrease was led by a price decrease for travel tours of 11.1%, while gasoline fell 3.1%. When seasonally adjusted, the Consumer Price Index rose 0.1% in June.
The carbon tax’s impact on inflation remained evident in this month’s regional data. Two provinces that removed carbon and fuel tax remain on one end of the spectrum, while the other provinces remain generally grouped on the other side.
Saskatchewan and Manitoba remained with the country’s lowest inflation between June 2023 and 2024, at 1.4% each. The next lowest province was Quebec, where inflation grew by 2.2%. The province with the highest Consumer Price Index, measuring a year-over-year change between June 2023 and 2024, was Nova Scotia, at 3.5%.
Between May and June 2024, Quebec fell from a Consumer Price Index of 3.1% to 2.2%.
“Lower prices for traveller accommodation (-20.2%) contributed to the slowdown in Quebec, stemming from a base-year effect,” reads the report.
In May, the closest province to Manitoba and Saskatchewan had a Consumer Price Index of 2.6%.
A recent survey revealed that 57% of Canadian households have seen their income outpaced by inflation, while 38% anticipate higher payments for bills and loans in the next three months.
“Safe supply” drugs fuelling drug trade, London police say
Police in Ontario are finally admitting that so-called “safe supply” drugs are being exchanged on the streets for fentanyl.
At a press conference Tuesday morning, London, Ont. police said “safe supply” drugs — referring to prescription opioids legalized by the federal government as part of so-called harm reduction initiatives — are being resold into the community.
“It’s being trafficked into other communities, and it is being used as currency in exchange for fentanyl, fuelling the drug trade,” said London police chief Thai Truong.
Conservative candidate Aaron Gunn has documented how addictive opioids are flooding Canadian streets in his 2023 documentary “Canada is Dying.” He told True North that “deadly and addictive” drugs are making their way to youth and vulnerable groups resulting in “windfall profits for organized crime.”
“By marketing these drugs as ‘safe’ and haphazardly dispensing them into our communities, the Trudeau-NDP coalition is getting vulnerable Canadians hooked on opioids and leading them into the destructive cycle of addiction,” Gunn told True North.
“Instead of handing out free drugs, we need to be investing in treatment and recovery and working to return our loved ones home drug free.”
Scott Courtice, the executive director of the London Intercommunity Health Centre, one of several healthcare providers responsible for prescribing medical-grade opioids, said the centre has protocols to minimize the risk of diversion, or re-selling the drugs.
Those protocols include requiring urine samples from patients to ensure prescription drugs are in their systems. If the patient is found to be taking illegal street drugs, the patient is removed from the safe supply program.
Still, London deputy chief Paul Bastien said they’ve seized 12,000 hydromorphone tablets just this year. All but 675 tablets were legalized tablets as revealed by the Dilaudid eight milligram form.
London-based addictions doctor Sharon Koivu told True North that even those 675 tablets could be from the “safe supply” system because the prescription opioids are also measured in four milligram form.
Koivu said she wasn’t surprised about the police’s announcement, but she hopes the revelation will result in a more robust response to the opioid crisis.
“As far as safe supply, I’m hoping we can recognize that it is extremely harmful to a community, we can reevaluate whether any form of this type of distributing of drugs is, in fact, safe,” she said.
In May, Ontario Premier Doug Ford asked Ottawa to stop approving new “safe supply” sites, and for Health Canada to review approved sites nationwide.
“Due to Health Canada’s siloed approval process, the province is completely in the dark about where these federally approved sites are operating and the quantity of controlled and illegal substances they dispense,” Ford wrote in a letter to Prime Minister Justin Trudeau in May. “This is frankly unacceptable.”
Ford’s request came after B.C. moved to recriminalize the use of drugs in public spaces citing public safety concerns. The pilot program introduced in January 2023 to allow adult drug users to carry up to 2.5 grams of drugs for personal use without facing criminal charges lasted just over a year.
Poilievre “can’t wait” to defund the CBC as state broadcaster approves bonuses
Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre says he “can’t wait” to defund the CBC in response to news that the state broadcaster approved another round of bonuses for its executives and non-unionized staff.
The decision was quietly approved last week, despite recent layoffs and struggling viewership. It was also announced only days after the House of Commons rose for its summer recess.
The CBC laid off 141 employees and eliminated 205 vacant positions last year, while also giving bonuses to 1,194 employees.
“I can’t wait to defund the CBC and sell off the headquarters for housing,” wrote Poilievre in a post on X.
Poilievre’s post also included a link to a petition to defund the CBC
The petition accuses the state broadcaster of undercutting private sector and independent media companies “while receiving more than $1 billion in direct taxpayer subsidies.”
“The CBC mostly provides opinions and coverage that are widely available in a free and competitive media marketplace,” continues the petition. “Therefore, be it resolved that we call on this Liberal government to defund the CBC to save taxpayer dollars and ensure a free and competitive press in the Canadian media landscape.”
Poilievre first began taunting the CBC with the notion that he would convert the Crown Corporation’s over $400 million worth of real estate holdings into housing for Canadians last fall.
“It warms my heart to think of the families that will move into a home they can afford, at the former headquarters of the CBC,” wrote Poilievre on X last September.
True North asked CBC why such high bonuses were being given out while employees were also being laid off.
“Decisions about performance pay are taken every year in June, at a regularly scheduled meeting of the Board of Directors. It followed the Board’s review of the Corporation’s performance for 2023–2024 fiscal year, which ended March 31, 2024,” CBC spokesperson Leon Mar said.
“Government departments, Crown corporations, and most private companies use performance pay (also called “at-risk pay”) as a portion of compensation for non-union employees to help ensure delivery on specific targets.”
Mar did not divulge the cost of the next round of bonuses, saying it is part of CBC’s “internal financial operations.”
Poilievre introduced a motion to ban all bonuses for CBC executives last December after CBC president Catherine Tait confirmed the Crown corporation would lay off 10% of its workforce. The motion was voted down in the House of Commons.
Internal documents obtained by the Canadian Taxpayers Federation revealed that $14.9 million in bonuses were doled out last year.
A total of $114 million in bonuses has been given out by the CBC since 2015 and the state broadcaster is slated to receive $1.4 billion in taxpayer money this year, breaking all previous funding records.
That figure does not include the additional $42 million it received from the Trudeau government in top-up funding, following CBC president Catherine Tait’s complaints that it suffered from “chronic underfunding.”
“At $33 per Canadian — a dime a day — CBC/Radio-Canada is one of the worst-funded public broadcasters in the world, with four times less funding than the U.K. and France and eight times less than Germany,” Tait told a committee of MPs in May.
“Until that situation changes, we must continue to manage with what we have and do our very best to stretch limited resources to meet our mandate.”
Tait earns an annual salary that ranges between $472,900 and $623,900, according to its senior management compensation summary.
The Angus Reid Institute conducted a poll last year that found 36% of Canadians want to see the CBC’s funding cut off.