Many of the attendees at the World Economic Forum (WEF) annual meeting are travelling by limousine and private jets. At the same time, they’re lecturing Canadians – and everyone else – about an “energy transition” at the expense of our oil and gas sector.
But does the WEF practice what it preaches? It doesn’t appear so. There is a big divide between what is being promoted at the conference and what’s actually done by people there.
True North’s Andrew Lawton is in Davos, Switzerland at the WEF conference and caught up with WEF officials to ask them about the brazen hypocrisy.
The International Air Transport Association (IATA) is demanding that the Trudeau government drop all COVID-19 pandemic travel restrictions to reduce crippling delays at Canadian airports.
Among the restrictions the IATA wants to see gone include vaccine requirements, random testing, the ArriveCan app and mandatory submissions of health information.
“It is clear that people want to travel,” said IATA regional vice-president for the Americas Peter Cerda. “We can therefore ill afford to have passengers subjected to unacceptable wait times both on arrival in the country or on departure.”
“The relevant authorities must urgently consider removing the last remaining travel-related COVID-19 restrictions and work with the industry on policies and processes which will allow passengers to pass through airports with no undue delay.”
This is the second major transportation group to call for an end to Canada’s air travel mandates and restrictions, which critics have called some of the harshest in the world.
Earlier in May, the Canadian Airport Council blamed government restrictions for travel chaos, saying that mandates quadrupled the processing time for air travellers.
In a recent statement, Conservative transport critic Melissa Lantsman called on the Trudeau government to immediately end the mandates and fix the delays.
“As countries around the world are reducing red tape and making it easier for citizens to travel, the Liberals continue to impose their outdated and unjustified mandates and testing that are leading to longer lines and slower recovery,” wrote Lantsman.
— Melissa Lantsman (@MelissaLantsman) May 17, 2022
Instead of lifting requirements, Liberal transport minister Omar Alghabra has maintained that the delays are no fault of the government, but due to a spike in post-pandemic travel.
“We will always be supporting our tourism sector,” said Alghabra. “We are all excited about the travel season coming up. Canadians are travelling. We are doing everything we can to address these lineups. We are working with airports. We are working with the airline sector.”
IATA spokesman Markus Ruediger called the continuation of the mandates “untenable.”
“It’s pretty dire. It’s delays, delays, delays,” said Ruediger.
According to Ruediger, the restrictions have downstream effects for Canadian airports other than those in Vancouver and Toronto and that they are also impacting air travel in other countries.
Nearly 50% of Canadians are finding it difficult to feed their families amid record-high inflation rates which have impacted the cost of groceries, according to a new survey.
Recent Angus Reid Institute research revealed that 49% of respondents are finding it difficult or very difficult to feed their families amid rising food prices. That number is up 13% from the last time Angus Reid conducted a similar survey in 2019.
In March, Canada’s food inflation rate rose 8.7% year over year, according to Statistics Canada. Meat and dairy products appear to be the hardest hit.
The Angus Reid data – which was gathered between May 4 and 6 from 1,992 Canadians who are part of the company’s online forum – shows that Canadians have an increasingly pessimistic outlook when it comes to their finances.
According to the survey, 36% of respondents say they are in worse financial shape than one year ago, compared to 24% who said that their finances had improved over the last 12 months.
A separate poll released by Nanos Research for Bloomberg News found similar findings among Canadians. The Nanos weekly poll, which surveyed 250 Canadians by telephone, found that 41% say their finances are worse today than a year earlier.
According to Bloomberg, average wages in Canada are growing only at about half the rate of inflation. According to the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives, wages rose by only 2.7% over the past two years, while inflation grew by 3.4% annually.
Canadians are also being hit hard by high interest rates as the Bank of Canada (BOC) tightens its monetary policy. Record-high inflation rates have prompted the BOC to lift borrowing costs from pandemic-era emergency lows in March and hike its benchmark interest rate by half a percentage point to 1%.
Conservative Party of Canada leadership candidate Pierre Poilievre has pledged if elected prime minister to fire BOC governor Tiff Macklem. Poilievre has accused Macklem of being an “ATM” for the Trudeau government’s spending, and of helping to fuel the inflation crisis.
“I would replace him with a new governor who would reinstate our low-inflation mandate, protect the purchasing power of our dollar, and honour the working people who earned those dollars,” Poilievre said.
The Carleton MP said those who caused the inflation crisis must be “held accountable.”
As many Canadians struggle to purchase their own homes due to the rising costs of real estate, taxpayers have been billed nearly $12 million to renovate Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s country estate – including a $2.5 million backup cottage.
According to records obtained by the Canadian Taxpayers Federation (CTF), the National Capital Commission (NCC) drastically under-budgeted the cost of renovating the Harrington Lake residence. The renovation originally had a projected budget of $8.6 million.
Harrington Lake has traditionally been used by Canada’s prime ministers as a recreational retreat and includes a 16-room main residence and the newly built backup cottage.
Internal NCC reports from Feb. 2019 claim the backup cottage would be used as “temporary accommodation” for Trudeau while Harrington Lake’s main residence was being renovated. The government plans to use the backup cottage as a workspace to accommodate security details and other officials after the renovations on the main cottage are finished.
“No Canadian would ever hire the NCC for a reno project because the bills always go through the roof,” said the Federal Director of the CTF Franco Terrazzano.
“The NCC didn’t need to spend millions on Harrington Lake and it definitely didn’t need to build a backup cottage. The NCC might be the most incompetent crew in the federal government.”
While Trudeau is able to bill taxpayers for his lavish lifestyle, many Canadians are unable to purchase their own homes. According to a recent Scotiabank survey, 43% of Canadians are delaying purchasing a home due to the out-of-control housing market. Last year that figure was 33%, while in 2020 it was only 20%.
With younger Canadians aged 18-34, the number of people delaying plans to purchase a house grows to 62%.
In Vancouver, it would cost a household 73.9% of its income to buy a home, while in Toronto that figure is 68.6%.
“Rapid price escalation in the early months of 2022 has already raised the bar to impossible levels for many homebuyers,” said RBC senior economist Robert Hogue. “Worst-ever affordability levels could well ensue, putting buyers in a precarious spot.”
Despite the Crown’s claim that Freedom Convoy organizer Tamara Lich violated her bail conditions for accepting an award from the Justice Centre for Constitutional Freedoms (JCCF), a federal judge ruled today that Lich will not be sent back to prison.
Judge Kevin Phillips gave his decision on Wednesday, saying that Lich’s “release remains appropriate” and that Lich has already “had a taste of jail.”
Judge Phillips has wrapped up his ruling and Tamara Lich isn't going back to jail.
She wanted her social media ban dropped, which the judge didn't agree to that but he is allowing Lich to come to portions of Ottawa. These are her bail conditions as they now stand #cdnpolipic.twitter.com/vVOQCjRxjr
Judge Phillips altered her bail conditions and ruled that Lich will be able to visit Ottawa as her daughter is attending a post-secondary school in the nation’s capital, but Lich will be unable to set foot downtown.
Lich was jailed after being arrested by police while helping to lead the Ottawa Freedom Convoy protest in February. She spent 18 days in custody over charges including mischief, obstructing a peace officer and others related to her time leading the demonstrations.
The convoy organizer is scheduled to receive the JCCF’s George Jonas Freedom Award on Jun. 16, but Crown lawyers argued that doing so was a breach of her bail conditions.
Lawyers representing the federal government claimed that the judge who granted bail made several errors of law of his own. They filed an application to have his decision to release Lich overturned.
Last week, Lich admitted to accepting the award but claimed that it did not break her bail conditions.
“I don’t feel that this is a breach. I don’t feel that that’s what the recognition is for. … I feel that the recognition is for inspiring Canadians to hold the government to account to the rule of law and to uphold their Charter rights,” said Lich.
Ontario Liberal candidate Granville Anderson has said there is a “silver lining” to record high gas prices – namely, that it may “take…pollutants off the road” and force people to find alternate modes of transportation.
Anderson, who is running to represent Durham and is also a former Ontario MPP, commented on high gas prices in a video posted to Twitter by Sun columnist Brian Lilley.
“I don’t know if soaring gas prices will take some of the pollutants off the road – maybe that’s a silver lining – and that may allow people to think outside the box and say, ‘maybe I better look at seeing if I can ride a bike to work or buy an electric car or find a different mode of transportation.”
Anderson then elaborated on his comments, saying, “ I think the price could be a lot lower than it currently is. But again, I say that may allow us to think twice and probably find another mode of transportation.”
When you want to represent a large, sprawling riding like Durham, saying high gas prices are a silver lining because people will ride their bikes to work is not a good idea. Liberal candidate Granville Anderson is the former MPP, you think he'd know better. #onpoli#OntarioVotespic.twitter.com/d2jGUtFkiI
Anderson was unseated as MPP in 2018. That election saw the Liberal Party of Ontario’s seat count plummet from 55 to 7 due to former premier Kathleen Wynne’s unpopularity.
Under Wynne, Anderson served as the parliamentary assistant to the minister of education. He currently serves as a city councillor for the Municipality of Clarington.
Canada has seen record high gasoline prices this past month, with costs in Ontario hovering around $2 per litre and reaching 206.6 per litre in May. Other provinces have it even worse, with prices in Vancouver hitting 233.9 per litre.
Fuel prices have been on the rise due to economic inflation and embargos on Russian energy that have driven down the supply of oil and driven up the price.
Affordability has been the top election issue in the Ontario election, with each party seeking to win over voters with plans to lower prices.
With electric vehicles out of financial reach for many Canadians – as well as unavailable for most forms of commercial transport including trains and long-haul trucks – higher fuel prices affect all areas of the economy, and make all sorts of goods and services costlier.
Despite soaring prices, the Trudeau government increased the federal carbon tax on fuel on Apr. 1 to approximately 11 cents per litre of gasoline, 13 cents per litre of diesel and 10 cents per cubic metre of natural gas.
In response to rising prices, Alberta stopped collecting its provincial fuel tax in March – saving Albertans about 13.6 cents per litre – and said it would not begin to collect the tax again until July at the earliest.
Trudeau environment minister Steven Guilbeault condemned the measure, however, saying that “climate change is killing people.”
“It goes against our efforts to fight climate change,” said Guilbeault. We shouldn’t lose sight of the fact that we’ve gone through a pandemic, there’s a terrible crisis happening in Ukraine, we’re seeing inflation.”
“But all of these crises will go, and climate change will still be there, and climate change is killing people in Canada. They’re just going for the easy solution, and probably one that is short-term in terms of political popularity.”
There has been a lot of discussion about the World Economic Forum (WEF) and how it impacts Canada. Unfortunately, the legacy media is doing a huge disservice to Canadians by ignoring their concerns and dismissing any criticism of the WEF as conspiracy theories.
What’s happening at the WEF annual meeting? How do the policies and ideas being promoted at the WEF impact Canada?
True North’s Andrew Lawton is on the ground in Davos and joined The Candice Malcolm Show to show True North viewers what’s really going on at the WEF.
A North American shortage of baby formula is reaching crisis levels as Canadian parents have begun panic buying the infant nutritional products wherever they can find them.
Shoppers are being met with empty shelves as both the US and Canadian markets struggle to ramp up waning production.
Canadian parents are also concerned after finding out that baby formula produced at a taxpayer-funded factory in Ontario – which uses Canadian dairy – are all being sent to China.
Canada relies on imports from the US for its baby formula rather than domestically produced supplies.
“We actually manufacture baby formula in Canada, but all of it goes to China,” said Dalhousie University director of the agrifood lab Sylvain Charlebois. “That’s why, right now, parents are scratching their heads wondering, why are we short?”
“Just seven days ago, the Retail Council of Canada was basically telling Canadians ‘don’t worry about it, don’t worry’. But I didn’t understand that message at all as eventually, it would affect the Canadian market – and now I think Canadians are not trusting what people are telling them to do.”
As reported by True North, the federally funded Canada Royal Milk Plant in Kingston exports all of the baby formula it produces to Beijing. The company – which is owned by China’s Feihe International Inc. – has received taxpayer funding to the tune of $225 million.
“Feihe International is the largest domestic producer of formula for infants and young children in the People’s Republic of China, and the company recently celebrated its 56th year in business,” the plant’s website states.
“Canada Royal Milk will manufacture formula for infants and young children using both cow dairy and goat dairy, building local supply chains to benefit the Canadian economy. Most of our production will be for export, but we intend to develop nutritional products for the North American market as well.”
In response to the shortage, US President Joe Biden announced “Operation Fly Formula” to use Air Force planes to bring in formula from Europe. Authorities have also ramped up efforts to reopen a shuttered baby formula plan in Michigan, which Charlebois says could alleviate the shortage within a month’s time.
Meanwhile, Health Canada has put out a statement announcing it would ease import regulations around baby formula products for countries with high health standards.
“The Department has published an interim policy to recommend enforcement discretion to facilitate the importation of equivalent and safe infant formulas that have been approved by a foreign regulatory authority or are allowed to be sold in foreign jurisdictions that have high quality and manufacturing standards similar to Canada,” Health Canada wrote.
World leaders, CEO’s and the global elite are in Davos, Switzerland to lecture others on how to live their lives. Panellists at the World Economic Forum (WEF) are discussing a wide-range of issues, including how to fight climate change, promoting equity and other leftist causes.
There have been a lot of discussion about the WEF in recent weeks, including its impact on Canada. But rather than take the concerns of Canadians seriously, the legacy media has characterized any criticism of the WEF as a conspiracy theory – including Conservative leadership candidate Pierre Poilievre. Over the weekend, Poilievre told his supporters that he would ban cabinet ministers from attending the WEF. Journalists in the legacy media immediately descended on Poilievre and accused him of pushing conspiracy theories.
What’s really going on at the WEF? What are the conspiracy theories and what are the facts?
On today’s episode of the Candice Malcolm Show, Candice discusses why Canada’s legacy media is wrong to ignore and chastise those that take issue with the WEF. Plus, True North’s Andrew Lawton is on the ground at Davos and joins the show to tell us what it’s like at the conference.
Some attendees at the residential school graves memorial in Kamloops, B.C. on Monday were unhappy with the presence of Prime Minister Justin Trudeau.
Trudeau faced loud heckling, jeers and chants as he made his way through the attendees on the Tk’emlups te Secwepemc Nation grounds. The opposition continued as he took to the stage alongside elected chief Rosanne Casimir, where he reminded his Indigenous detractors to “respect (their) elders.”
“I had the opportunity earlier to speak to a number of elders, and I know for them it’s something that they want to hear – me sharing my reflection,” said Trudeau. “I hear your anger towards me, that’s fine but I would ask you to respect your elders please. Thank you, sorry for your anger.”
“You’re a criminal,” one protester shouted from the crowd.
“We’re here to honour the missing,” Trudeau tried to continue.
“Shut up,” yelled another protester.
"You're a criminal!" Indigenous protesters can be heard yelling at Prime Minister @JustinTrudeau as he commences speech in Kamloops, BC on Monday. pic.twitter.com/0n8iW4I9nO
Before his speech, Trudeau was beset by drummers who chanted and shouted as he arrived.
“Take your disrespect out of our tribe,” one drummer chanted as Trudeau greeted a couple of supporters, one of whom wanted a selfie with the prime minister.
PM @JustinTrudeau was just met by Indigenous protestors in Kamloops, BC.
Trudeau also faced flack from the Tk’emlúps First Nation last year after skipping out on a National Day of Truth and Reconciliation ceremony to vacation with his wife in Tofino, BC.
Following Monday’s event, Trudeau acknowledged the protesters during a press conference and insisted that others “were glad” that he was attending.
“It was a difficult year for survivors and their families. It was a difficult year for Canadians as well. We have a long path ahead of us for reconciliation,” said Trudeau.
While speaking to the media, Trudeau was asked whether he believed “Canada exists on stolen Indigenous land.”
“Canada is a country that consists of Indigenous people who have been here for millennia who welcomed new settlers and in some cases were overwhelmed by settlers in others,” Trudeau replied.
Trudeau has dedicated a significant amount of money towards First Nations issues during his latest tenure. Last year the federal government settled a lawsuit for $40 billion to compensate First Nations children who claimed to be harmed by the government’s child and family services on reserves, and pledged an additional $18 billion for Indigenous communities.
In 2019, the prime minister claimed that Canada was involved in an ongoing genocide against First Nations people following an inquiry into missing and murdered Indigenous women.
