OTTAWA — After weeks of fierce criticism towards his lawful access bill, Public Safety Minister Gary Anandasangaree said Liberals will propose some changes to better protect encryption and water down the type of data companies must retain.

Speaking to reporters about Bill C-22, the minister also swung back at some of the tech companies opposing the hotly contested Bill C-22, arguing that they need to better protect Canadians’ privacy.

Parties had until Wednesday afternoon to table amendment proposals for the bill, which proposes a new regime that would compel electronic service providers to create or maintain capabilities for police and intelligence agencies to receive or intercept private data if granted a judicial warrant.

Anandasangaree told reporters that he is dead set on getting the bill through Parliament, arguing police and intelligence services desperately need many of the proposed changes to better tackle crime in the digital era, such as extortion or child sex abuse material.

But he accepted concerns that the bill did not spell out clearly enough that the government cannot demand that companies undermine their own encryption services.

“The encryption issue is one we will clarify, because this bill was never meant to breach encryption,” he said. “We look forward to working with the opposition on an appropriate language that we can live with.”

Lawful access, or the ability to obtain Canadians’ private information and intercept communications, is one of the most intrusive powers afforded to police and intelligence agencies. Creating such a regime for the digital age in Canada has been the subject of fierce debate for decades.

In Bill C-22, the government is proposing that police and the Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS) be able to approach telecommunications companies and ask them if, yes or no, an individual is a client before having to get a warrant for more information.

The bill also proposes new obligations to electronic service providers to organize and retain various types of client data for up to one year in a way that makes it obtainable by law enforcement or CSIS with a warrant.

That means that if passed, the bill would compel electronic service providers to store and make information like device locations or cameras available to police or CSIS with the requisite warrant. That could be used to track a person’s live location in case they pose a threat to national security or are considered to be in danger, the government cited as examples.

But the one-year metadata retention clause has become highly controversial, with privacy and security specialists arguing it’s far too long and a violation of Canadians’ right to privacy. But police services had told MPs they’d prefer the period be extended to two or three years.

The minister said Wednesday that the government would set a “clear definition” of the types of metadata to be retained, which is currently undefined in the bill. But he said he would not be changing the “up to one year” retention time.

“We will clarify what metadata is. It does not imply that we are looking for backdoor ways of collecting information,” he said.

Finally, the minister noted he was looking at legislating compensation for companies who have to put in place data interception or storage capabilities due to the bill, such as telecommunications providers.

Tech giants such as Apple, Meta and Google and many other encrypted services providers such as messaging platform Signal and VPN provider NordVPN have aggressively criticized Bill C-22 for undermining encryption and forcing them to create a “backdoor” for police.

Anandasangaree was visibly irritated at the firms on Wednesday and told reporters that they should look inside themselves first when discussing data privacy.

“We’re living in a world where big tech, whether it is Apple, Google, or the range of other big tech companies, are operating without any type of accountability, without any type of protection of privacy,” Anandasangaree said, visibly irritated.

“So, when we talk about privacy, there’s a real conversation to be had as to what that entails. So the companies that are coming forth and… talking about privacy, talking about privacy protection, talking about vulnerabilities, (had) better step up and provide their path to how they’re protecting the privacy rights of Canadians,” he added.

He pointed to the fact that many email providers use data from those messages to serve advertisements to users, or that his car tracks his location and feeds that back to the maker.

“My point is that there’s no transparency on what type of privacy that is being protected” by tech companies, he said.

In a subsequent interview with National Post, Anandasangaree watered down some of his criticism of tech giants, but maintained that there are many “misunderstandings” about what his bill does and doesn’t do.

On the same day, the leaders of the Conservatives, NDP and Green Party all lambasted the Liberals’ bill, arguing that it’s textbook government overreach.

National Post

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A new report proposes establishing a 350-seat Parliament in an effort to correct for imbalances in the House of Commons that have long left Ontario, Alberta and B.C. underrepresented compared with other provinces.

In the study, the Calgary-based Aristotle Foundation for Public Policy points out that Alberta currently has the lowest representation among provinces in the House, with one member of Parliament for every 135,057 citizens, when compared against 2025 population numbers. British Columbia has one MP per 133,077, while Ontario has one per 132,645. That is well higher than Prince Edward Island (44,820), Quebec (116,816), Saskatchewan (89,351) and other Canadian provinces.

“Political representation in Canada at present is not representative of the actual populations in each province,” it said.

The report comes as resentments over a range of issues — including a lack of federal representation in the House of Commons and Senate — has fed separatist sentiments in Alberta in particular. Alberta Premier Danielle Smith has proposed a referendum in October that will ask, among other things, whether Canada should amend the Canadian constitution to “abolish the unelected federal Senate.”

The Aristotle study, called “It’s 2026, not 1867: A 21st-century review of population and representation in the House of Commons,” compared representation in both the federal chambers over the last 50 years, and found that under-representation in Ontario, Alberta and B.C. has remained constant.

As of 2025, British Columbia was the most under-represented province in the Senate compared to its population, with 953,720 people per senator. Alberta was the next highest at 826,683. P.E.I., by comparison, had one per 44,820 people, Nova Scotia had one per 107,963 and Quebec had one senator per 379,651 people.

“One part of our rationale for change is that continued imbalances in representation will exacerbate Western alienation and feed potential separatist sentiment in Western Canada,” the authors said. “Another part of the rationale for change is that the principle of representation by population is critically necessary for legitimacy in a democracy, and Canadians deserve a House of Commons that reflects 21st-century realities, not those of 1867 or even 1982.”

The report was co-authored by Mark Milke, the head of Aristotle Foundation and former Canadian Taxpayers Federation director; Ven Venkatachalam, an economist; and Gordon Campbell, a former Canadian diplomat and premier of B.C. from 2001 to 2011.

“Canada’s House of Commons should reflect 21st-century population realities and restore a greater sense of fairness across the country,” Milke said in a statement.

The imbalance in the House of Commons or Senate is the result of a number of legal provisions, including a clause that stipulates that provinces should not have fewer MPs than they have senators. That, combined with another clause that ensures provinces have no fewer MPs than they had under a pre-set benchmark (which the Liberal government recently updated to 2019 levels), has led to “chronic underrepresentation” among some provinces, the report said.

As a potential remedy, the report’s authors suggest establishing a 350-seat Parliament, up from the current 343, to adjust for imbalances.

Under such a scenario — which the authors note would require legal and constitutional changes — Ontario would gain 12 seats, British Columbia would gain five, and Alberta would gain four. Saskatchewan, meanwhile, would lose three seats, Manitoba would lose one, and Quebec and the Atlantic provinces would all forgo two seats apiece.

The seat count in the House would be capped at 350, combined with regular redistribution to ensure fair representation according to population.

The authors acknowledge that cutting back representation for many provinces is “not a middle reform,” but argue it could be necessary for dampening Western separatist frustrations.

“In a national and constitutional crisis — should separatism soar in one or more Western provinces or revitalize in Quebec — fairness in parliamentary representation should be on the negotiating table.”

Gordon Campbell, who wrote the report’s foreword, said that Canada has gradually drifted away from its “one person, one vote” ideals.

While the country has made major democratic strides since confederation, like granting women the right to vote, Campbell said the weighting of voting power has become skewed away from a few select provinces, undermining the democratic process.

“That founding principle of democracy has been severely eroded in Canada today,” he wrote. “Different citizens in different parts of the country have different rights — whether they are indigenous or non-indigenous, or are considered ‘privileged’ or ‘oppressed.’ When Canadians go to the ballot box and cast a vote, more inequality results: the weight of their vote differs by province, with some worth more and others worth less.”

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OTTAWA — Prime Minister Mark Carney’s government is abandoning efforts by his predecessor to reintroduce into the Canadian Human Rights Act the ability to bring forward complaints of online hate speech.

The controversial provision, known as section 13, was repealed under the former Conservative government of Stephen Harper, with efforts to revive it advanced by former prime minister Justin Trudeau as part of his government’s online harms agenda, which never passed.

The last attempt was under Bill C-63 which, besides proposing to create a regulator for social media platforms, sought to amend federal human rights legislation to target “the communication of hate speech,” including online, allowing individuals to file complaints to the Canadian Human Rights Commission.

It proposed allowing for complaints to be brought forward without having to disclose the identity of the complainant to the individual or group whose speech was in question. Opposition Conservatives decried the change as censorship and warned that its language was overly broad and risked flooding the human rights commission with complaints, including those that could be frivolous.

Asked whether the federal government intended to reintroduce that section into Canadian Human Rights Act, Jeremy Bellefeuille, a spokesman for Justice Minister Sean Fraser, said in a statement on Wednesday, “no.”

Fraser, who is responsible for the human rights legislation, told the parliamentary justice committee while testifying earlier this week that when it comes to the government’s upcoming online harms bill, Parliamentarians should not expect “a simple copy and paste job of the previous legislation.”

He said Canadian Heritage Minister Marc Miller, who has been tasked with responsibility for the file, was looking at the issue with a fresh set of eyes.

The government has not set a timeline on bringing forward a new online safety bill, but Miller has said it was “very seriously” considering instituting a ban on social media for minors and had convened a roundtable of digital safety and other experts to explore the idea of including AI chatbots.

Advocates across civil society, including children’s health organizations, have underscored the need for the government to present a new bill, arguing children in Canada were less protected than those in countries like the United Kingdom and Australia that have online regulators meant to address the spread of harmful content.

Opposition Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre, whose party has been the most vocal critic in Parliament on the Liberals’ digital and privacy agenda, accusing the government of advancing censorship tactics, has said his caucus was exploring the idea of social media ban for minors, saying he did not yet have a position.

National Post

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A Sunwing Airlines pilot fired for sending an email to a Black supervisor that “played on racist and discriminatory tropes directed at Black people” has failed to win his job back.

The Air Line Pilots Association (ALPA) grieved Darren Acri’s February 2025 termination from Sunwing, which has been acquired by WestJet.

“Can I get a large bucket of fried chicken, with slices of watermelon and a six pack of non-alcoholic Bud light beer for me and my friends?” was Acri’s emailed food order during an April 8, 2024, layover in Fredericton, N.B.

Michael Simmons, who was Sunwing’s director of line operations at the time, was copied on Acri’s email, sent just after 1 a.m.

“Sunwing argues that this email was directed at a wide group of Sunwing employees and managers including Mr. Simmons who is the grievor’s direct supervisor and a Black man,” Jesse Nyman, a labour arbitrator, wrote in his recent decision.

“Sunwing argues that racist and discriminatory behaviour is serious misconduct.”

Acri was removed from service with pay pending an investigation.

The pilot wrote to the airline’s human resources department in May 2024, saying he “was unaware of the ‘stigma’ associated with the meal request,” and that it wasn’t his intention to insult or harass Simmons.

The pilot apologized for what he termed a misunderstanding.

“My interests that night were to access the local amenities and restaurants as detailed in our collective agreement. Nothing more, nothing less. The local grocery for beer and watermelon and Mary Brown’s for a bucket of chicken.”

After Sunwing received a report on the matter in January 2025, Acri was “placed on a suspension pending discharge,” said the arbitrator’s May 21 decision.

“The investigation revealed that there was no dispute as to the events of the night or the email and the sole factual issue in dispute was whether (flight crew member) Acri had made this food request because this is what he truly wanted to eat,” Nyman said.

The arbitrator concluded “that on a balance of probabilities it was not a legitimate food order.”

The food order came five hours after the pilot “first reached out seeking approval for transportation to a restaurant,” Nyman said.

After transportation was denied, Acri took two hours to choose his food delivery preference, said the arbitrator.

“It is difficult to accept that after complaining about a lack of transportation to restaurants for two-and-a-half hours, the grievor decided five hours later that all he really wanted was to pop into Mary Browns and a grocery store.”

According to the arbitrator, “the only reasonable conclusion on the evidence before me is that on a balance of probabilities the grievor was not making a legitimate food order when he sent his email.”

The “only other explanation offered,” Nyman said, “is that the grievor intentionally sent an email that played on racist tropes and I find that is what the grievor did.”

The airline dismissed Acri on Feb. 5, 2025.

“Sunwing argues that the racists tropes in the email are an assault on Mr. Simmons in front of a large group of colleagues and that this requires the strongest denunciation. While the grievor has apologized for ‘an unfortunate misunderstanding’ and an ‘unfortunate turn of events,’ Sunwing argues that implicit in the grievor’s apologies is his claim that he was making a legitimate food order and he only accidentally played on racist tropes. Sunwing argues there is nothing sincere in these apologies and that they are self-serving at best.”

Before he sent the fried chicken email, the pilot was frustrated at being assigned a hotel that wasn’t in downtown Fredericton and not having access to transportation so he could check out the food options available.

His union acknowledged that Acri’s email that night “contains a racist statement and that some discipline is warranted,” but that the pilot “has genuinely apologized for both the order and its impact.”

His union argued “that the absence of an intention to demean or insult means that the penalty must be less than discharge.”

The arbitrator didn’t agree.

“It is a well-worn and insidious trope that Black people eat fried chicken and watermelon,” Nyman said.

“It plays on racist stereotypes that project Black people as simplistic and inferior. Having reached the conclusion that this is what the grievor was referring to in his email, it does not take a great deal of imagination to understand what the grievor intended by his email. He was upset. He clearly felt that he was not being treated as he was entitled or deserved. The point the grievor is making in his email is that he feels he is being treated less than he deserves and therefore should get a food order that is commensurate with the circumstances he finds himself in. At its core is the implication that Black people are less deserving. It is grotesque. It is dishonest to call the email anything less than what it is.”

ALPA argued that Acri could be reinstated after completing sensitivity training.

But Nyman said Sunwing “had just cause to terminate” Acri. “The grievance is therefore dismissed.”

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OTTAWA — Google and Apple, whose software runs in nearly every phone and tablet in Canada, warned that the Liberals’ lawful access bill poses a “threat” to encryption and their users’ data and could facilitate crimes such as foreign interference.

Speaking to the House public safety committee Tuesday, representatives from both tech giants said they respect the government’s desire to adopt lawful access reform. They argued that their goal is to balance users’ privacy with the need for law enforcement to have the tools they need.

But they warned that the Liberals’ controversial Bill C-22 goes too far and needs to be reworked significantly, lest it force them to create a “backdoor” into their encrypted services to users.

Google and Apple’s software powers over 99 per cent of all cellphones and tablets sold in Canada, as well as a significant portion of portable computers. They also operate a significant portion of the cloud storage business.

“Our users trust Apple with their most sensitive information. They expect and deserve the strongest protections, that’s why we’re so concerned about the threat to encryption posed by C-22,” said Apple senior director Erik Neuenschwander .

Google’s Jeanette Patell went a step further, telling MPs that the bill as it stands could force the company to undo many of its security features and open the door to criminals.

“Without stronger definitions, the law could be used to force the dismantling of critical privacy and architecture, such as breaking encryption, overriding users’ data deletion controls, or building remote access capability, all of which could facilitate foreign interference and weaken global user privacy,” Patell argued.

The federal Privacy Commissioner Philippe Dufresne also told the committee the Liberals’ lawful access bill is overly broad and should be narrowed to protect Canadians’ rights.

The government has repeatedly sworn that the new obligations to telecommunications and electronic services providers would not compel them to decrypt encrypted information. They argue the bill would allow them to ask companies to decrypt information if that is already possible, but would not force them to develop ways to unlock encrypted information.

But, many of the bills’ clauses “don’t compromise encryption directly but try to get at it indirectly by circumventing it or bypassing it. It still have the same impact in terms of the vulnerabilities that they ultimately create,” the Canadian Civil Liberties Association’s Tamir Israel to MPs Tuesday.

Lawful access, or the ability to obtain Canadians’ private information and intercept communications, is one of the most intrusive powers afforded to police and intelligence agencies. Creating such a regime for the digital age in Canada has been the subject of fierce debate for decades.

Law enforcement agencies have long argued that Canada needs to modernize its laws for the digital age, saying they are struggling more and more to get critical information in urgent situations during emergencies.

In Bill C-22, the government is proposing that police and the Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS) be able to approach telecommunications companies and ask them if, yes or no, an individual is a client before having to get a warrant for more information. It can then apply to get a judicial warrant to obtain more “subscriber information” from the company.

The bill also proposes new obligations to electronic service providers to organize and retain various types of client data for up to one year in a way that makes it obtainable by law enforcement or CSIS with a warrant.

That means that if passed, the bill would compel electronic service providers to store and make information like device locations or cameras available to police or CSIS with the requisite warrant. That could be used to track a person’s live location in case they pose a threat to national security or are considered to be in danger, the government cited as examples.

It also proposes to give the minister of public safety the ability to issue secret “ministerial orders” to compel companies not captured by the bill to create intercept or data retention abilities, as long as it does not create a “systemic vulnerability” in the system.

Those orders would need to be approved by the Intelligence Commissioner and could challenged in Federal Court by the company.

Apple, Google, the CCLA and many other business groups and privacy advocates have argued that the secret orders put too much power into the minister’s hands and need to be narrowed or eliminated.

“I would say that the bill does not put a hole in the wall, it merely allows for secret orders to force putting a hole in the wall. And so our concern is motivated because, at the end of the day, there would still be a hole in the wall,” Apple’s Neuenschwander said.

During the hearing, many Liberal MPs pushed back on the concerns from Apple and Google, namely arguing that the bill would not force the companies to create holes in their encrypted systems.

But Montreal MP Anthony Housefather also conceded that he shared some of the companies’ concerns, suggesting that the Liberals are considering amendments to their controversial bill.

National Post

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A Texan-born actor is the unlikely star of an unlikely Toronto stage event — a Yiddish-language production of Fiddler on the Roof, directed by Broadway legend Joel Grey.

Stage veteran Steven Skybell reprises his role this month, from the long-running production in New York City. What began as a planned six-week engagement in New York in 2018 turned into an 18-month sensation, performed more than 500 times.

Set in the fictional shtetl of Anatevka in the early 1900s, Fiddler on the Roof follows Tevye, against the backdrop of the looming threat of Tsarist oppression, while challenged by his daughters who follow their hearts over tradition.

Based on Sholem Aleichem’s 1914 novella Tevye and His Daughters, it became an off-Broadway musical in 1957. The Broadway version launched in 1964 and won nine Tony Awards in 1965, including best musical, score, direction and choreography.

Sixty years later, the story has reverberated through the halls of international theatres in countless productions. Canadian director Norman Jewison directed the film version in 1971, with Israeli actor Chaim Topol playing the lead.

Presented by the Harold Green Jewish Theatre Company, the newest production with English subtitles, at Toronto’s Elgin Theatre from May 25 to June 7, is directed by Tony and Academy Award winner, Joel Grey. “There is something profoundly moving about hearing Fiddler in Yiddish,” Grey noted in a statement. “The language carries history, humour, sorrow and resilience all at once. Like hearing opera in its original tongue, it deepens every moment. It allows the story to breathe with emotional truth.”

Dave Gordon interviewed Skybell for the National Post.

What was your Yiddish like before the show?

My grandparents would speak it, but so we wouldn’t understand.

So they did us a real disservice, you know, because I heard the Yiddish, but I didn’t know how to speak it from them.

I studied it seriously online through YIVO (the Institute for Jewish Research), over Zoom for three semesters.

I’ve likened playing Tevye in Yiddish to Shakespeare roles that I’ve done.

Shakespeare is not a familiar vernacular, but as an actor, you have to really understand how the language is operating in Shakespeare, and knowing everything you’re saying. When we first did (the stage show), we had three Yiddish coaches at the same time.

And so they would whip us into shape. And with their help, I came to know exactly what I’m saying. And then it was a slow dawning on me as I’m trying to learn the role of Tevye in Yiddish that also I have to know what everyone else is saying to me!

I had to learn the whole script, and we all did. Even this new, incredibly great Canadian cast – on the first day, their Yiddish was already through the roof. Otherwise, it’s not going to be successful to the audience.

What was your research leading up to the role?

I’ve had a lifelong fascination with Fiddler.

I grew up in Texas and there was a community theatre there. And so right when the movie came out, they did a production and I played a chuppah (wedding canopy) boy, when I was 10 years old in 1972. I played Tevye when I was 17 at summer camp; played him again at college when I was 21.

The role has been in my bones my whole life. So coming to the Yiddish, there were choices as an actor that I couldn’t even tell you why I made them, they were just organic.

How is the Yiddish version different?

Shraga Friedman, who was an Israeli actor and director who got permission in ’65 to do the Yiddish version by the creatives, took some liberties with the text. In a really beautiful way, made Tevye a little more knowledgeable about Talmud learning. In the Broadway show, he just refers to the “good book” — which even sounds a little Presbyterian to me.

But in the Yiddish, he’s talking about (11th century commentator) Rashi. He’s talking about Targum Onklos (2nd century Aramaic translation of the Torah). See, that’s exactly what Tevye would do.

He may not be absolutely accurate, but he has the knowledge.

So that to me was very meaningful. Another example of subtle distinctions, is in the song Sabbath Prayer: “May you be like Ruth and like Esther.”

In the Yiddish, it invokes Sara, Rebecca, Rachel and Leah. So that to me, I was able to go down a path that no other English Tevye would ever have gone down.

I kind of feel like, if it’s in Yiddish, you get that shtetl feel.

Knowing that these characters would be speaking this language feels so authentic.

What was life like as a Jew in Lubbock, Texas?

It had 100 Jewish families. Small, but we knew everybody.

And having our grandparents there, and elder members of our family, certainly instilled a complete Jewish identity that over time we found more inroads into what the religion and the learning is all about.

I have said this before and it is the truth: growing up in Lubbock, Texas, in the ’70s, I never in my life personally experienced antisemitism.

I would take matzah for show and tell to elementary school. It’s only in my adulthood that antisemitism has made such a resurgence, and in a way that I never experienced growing up in a West Texas town.

Are you surprised that Fiddler is being presented in a city amidst a spike of antisemitism?

I definitely say: go loud and proud. But, one wants to be mindful of possible security measures. Our Yiddish Fiddler in New York, when we moved uptown to 42nd Street, we had no protests, no sort of anti-Jewish protests. The musical parade, which opened after we were already on playing, had a lot of anti-Jewish protests. But the Harold Green Theatre is taking care to make sure that we’re going to feel protected and safe.

Why do you think Fiddler is so enduring?

It’s great entertainment.

It’s a perfect musical. It’s not just fluff, and it’s very funny, very light, but also very meaningful.

I performed it at the Lyric Opera of Chicago, a huge operatic version that came over from Germany in English. The tagline for that production was, “Love is the greatest tradition of all.” The play really is about love.

It’s about family love, love between suitors, and would-be brides.

I think everybody responds to that.

I think that’s what makes it so enduring, is that family is universal. Unfortunately, trouble is also universal in the world. The final scene of the musical, when the Jews of Anatevka are forced to leave their homes is absolutely specific to what was happening to Jews in 1905, Russia and Ukraine.

But we still see it today throughout the world: displaced, disenfranchised people, immigrants who are being denied access, or have challenges. I think it hits a lot of buttons.

This interview was edited for brevity.

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Your grocery list this week probably didn’t include “luxury Normandy butter cups” or beef tenderloin, and you probably opted for the $25 bottle of red wine instead the one more than twice the price, but the Canadian Taxpayers Federation wants you to know that “Prime Minister Mark Carney and his entourage” are enjoying such luxuries when they fly internationally.

The advocacy group dug into House of Commons order paper questions and learned that just shy of $200,000 was spent feeding Carney and government officials who accompanied him on just three out-of-country flights in 2025.

Franco Terrazzano, the CTF’s federal director, contended that’s more than an average Canadian family will spend to feed themselves for a decade.

“When the government is paying more than a billion dollars a week to cover interest charges on the debt, it’s time to stop irresponsible overspending on luxuries like gourmet in-flight dining,” he said in a press release.

According to the latest Canada Food Price Report , the average family of four is expected to spend $17,571.79 on food this year, which, over ten years, is roughly $180,000.

Of the three overseas excursions, the most costly from a catering standpoint was the May 16-19 trip to Rome and Vatican City last September — where the devout Catholic and his wife, Diana Fox Carney, attended the inaugural mass of Pope Leo XIV — which rang in at almost $94,000.

Menu items included veal escalope, herb and smoked Gouda omelets, crème brûlée and chocolate mousse.

A trip to the U.K. two months prior to strengthen economic and security ties — just two days after being sworn in — ended with a catering invoice for over $52,610 sent to Ottawa.

One option on the way to London was red wine braised beef with a choice of edamame ragu or pearl onion and rosemary roasted red potatoes, while the return menu featured pan-seared salmon with lemon and herb couscous and broccoli.

On their trip to and from to the Netherlands last June for the NATO leaders’ summit, the total catering cost for Carney and 57 others on the Royal Canadian Air Force Airbus 330 was roughly $49,000 from a menu that offered beef tenderloin, Scottish salmon and the “luxury Normandy butter cups.”

On the subject of wine, Carney and his fellow passengers had a choice between a selection of four on each flight — two red and two white — all of them from wineries in Ontario or B.C.

A 2021 chardonnay from Inniskillin Montague Vineyard Chardonnay, reasonably priced at around $30 across Canada, was available on every flight, but more red options included Le Clos Jordanne Le Grand Clos Pinot Noir, which retails for $55 at the LCBO or the Meyer Family Vineyards Pinot Noir which commands a $56 price tag.

According to the Department of National Defence, which operates the 437 Transport Squadron responsible for moving the prime minister and other VIPs, catering costs “include the cost of food, non-alcoholic beverages, and associated fees, including catering handling and delivery, storage, cleaning and disposal of international waste, airport taxes, administrative fees, security charges, and local taxes.”

Terrazzano said the spending contradicts Carney’s campaign promise to tighten the government’s purse strings. Part of the Liberals’ election platform was to “spend less on government and invest more in the people and businesses that will grow our economy.”

“Carney has repeatedly told Canadians he would spend less, but he spent more money on airplane food than Trudeau,” Terrazzano said, noting that documents show the former prime minister spent $43,000 to cater his 2024 trip to Italy.

“The prime minister shouldn’t need a focus group to recommend him to stop billing taxpayers half a million dollars on airplane food in one year.”

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The British journalist’s sting that brought Kenneth Law to the attention of Canadian police three years ago played out with high cinematic tension.

Chasing reports of do-it-yourself poison kits marketed through an online suicide instructional chatroom and sold through a thinly disguised culinary supply website, Times of London reporter James Beal had tracked what he believed to be Law’s business to a post office box in a Mississauga, Ont., pharmacy.

Beal had spoken on the phone to a man he believed to be Law, posing as a customer. This man told him “many” of his customers had died from his product, so Beal and a photographer staked out the drug store from the parking lot on a cold winter day, hoping for a lucky break.

A man arrived in a Lincoln Town Car carrying a bunch of packages. Law was startled to be approached, Beal reported, but he was initially willing to talk, and invited the journalist to sit in his car. They spoke for six minutes.

Law grew increasingly agitated, and reportedly told Beal: “People do this but it’s not my business. It’s their life. They are killing themselves. I’m not doing anything. I’m just selling a product.”

Beal escalated the interview, confronting Law with the allegation that he had effectively murdered a young British man whose father had helped Beal track Law’s alleged online business. “If they have their intentions, I cannot stop them,” Law said, according to The Times. “Perhaps you want to stop people from buying knives?”

Law then ordered him out of the car. It was the beginning of the end for the alleged poison seller, whose business was allegedly global and has resulted in well over 100 deaths. A few weeks later, in May 2023, a week after The Times report was published, Peel Regional Police arrested Law, kicking off the most shocking Canadian prosecution in recent memory. They warned the public to be vigilant about online transactions and mailed packages, and listed several websites by name, allegedly connected to Law.

But the case will not go to trial. On Friday in a Newmarket, Ont., courtroom, Law, 60, intends to plead guilty to 14 charges of aiding suicide, according to his lawyer Matthew Gourlay. In exchange, the Crown is expected to abandon its charges of murder.

The victims include adults and children, with ages spanning 16 to 36. All are understood to have purchased poison allegedly from Law through an online store.

Law was originally charged with aiding suicide, first two counts and then 12 more, but after a few months his charges were upgraded to second degree murder, and then to first degree murder — planned and deliberate killing. This suggested both escalating seriousness of the evidence, but also perhaps an uncertainty about what specific crimes had actually been committed.

Law is expected to make his plea in front of a senior judge of the Ontario Superior Court, Michelle Fuerst, who until a few weeks ago was set to hear his trial before a jury on the far more serious charges of first degree murder. Conviction would have made Law one of Canada’s most prolific murderers, with more victims than child killer Clifford Olson, Toronto van attacker Alek Minassian, or Elizabeth Wettlaufer, a nurse who poisoned patients.

His trial would have taken place on legal territory that is both unmapped and hotly contested.

But Friday’s expected plea will instead mark the resolution of this controversial deal with the Ontario Crown, the seeds of which were planted years ago in an unrelated 2019 attempted murder-suicide that raised a fundamental legal issue about whether suicide can ever be a means of murder.

So the closing of the books on Kenneth Law also sets a crucial limit in Canadian criminal law.

Can someone be charged with murder if the deceased administers the fatal action themselves? The answer is yes, in theory. But the current leading precedent says this alleged murderer must overcome the victim’s free will. Otherwise, voluntarily taking poison is said to break the chain of legal causation from a poison seller’s actions to the death of a victim.

Because Law was allegedly nowhere near his victims when they took the poison, and indeed barely knew them when he sold it, this would be an obvious defence, and it could mean there is no reasonable prospect of convicting him of murder.

That seems to be part of the reasoning of prosecutors in recently agreeing to drop the murder charges in exchange for Law’s guilty pleas to aiding suicide.

The Supreme Court of Canada heard an appeal of the other unrelated attempted murder-suicide last year, but declined to firmly resolve this fundamental issue, drastically weakening the case against Law just weeks before his expected trial.

Many families of other alleged victims will be watching his plea closely, especially in the U.K., where Law is being sued by the family of a teenager who died by suicide, and where Law is allegedly linked to more than 100 deaths, currently under investigation by the National Crime Agency.

An online forum previously allegedly used by Law to promote his sales was fined almost 1 million pounds this month by a British government regulator for hosting illegal instructions about suicide. The Times investigation reported the theory of several grieving family members that Law used a false identity, “Greenberg,” claiming to be a retired pathologist from New York, to allegedly communicate with customers and direct them from the suicide forum to the culinary supply website, through which they would buy the poison, sodium nitrite, a salt that is used to cure meats and which is toxic in sufficient quantities.

Law has a background in business management and aerospace engineering, but when he was arrested, he had been working as a cook in the Fairmont Royal York hotel in Toronto.

His plea deal might reveal details of his alleged motivations, whether financial or ideological or both or something other entirely, but his alleged involvement already seems to have ideological aspects in the context of right-to-die activism.

Philip Nitschke, an Australian right-to-die campaigner and former general practitioner, has publicly claimed to have introduced Law, at a conference in Toronto, to the notion of sodium nitrite as an affordable and reliable means of suicide by poison.

Law’s alleged involvement in this business also coincides with personal bankruptcy and the loss of employment during the pandemic.

Behind the scenes before Law’s arrest, police forces across Ontario had been frantically trying to track packages he allegedly had already sent, more than 1,200 of them to more than 40 countries, and to arrange wellness checks for the intended recipients.

At the same time, the unrelated case of B.F., a hospital surgical nurse in Mississauga, Ont., was heading for an appeal, with a fundamental question with obvious relevance to the case against Law: Can suicide be murder?

Prosecutors believed B.F., anonymized by court order to protect her daughter and mother’s identities, had used insulin injections to poison her mother, her 19-month-old daughter, and herself, motivated by a custody dispute with her estranged husband. Both B.F. and her mother survived and recovered, but the child’s injuries to her brain and organs were life-altering.

B.F. was tried for aggravated assault and attempted murder, two counts each. A defence theory was that B.F.’s mother was an active participant in some of the actions that amounted to this alleged attempted murder-suicide, and might have injected herself with insulin.

The jury convicted B.F. of attempted murder on both, but acquitted on aggravated assault of the mother, which suggests reasonable doubt about who actually administered insulin to the mother.

Reviewing this, the Ontario Court of Appeal decided there was an air of reality to the defence theory about the mother, and that the mother’s possible participation and desire to die could have been relevant to whether B.F. was guilty of her attempted murder. Depending on her intent, the appeal court ruled, she might have been guilty of aiding suicide rather than attempted murder.

The problem was that the jury had not been instructed about the legal difference between attempted murder and aiding suicide, the same charge Law now faces, under section 241(1)(b) of the Criminal Code.

So the Court of Appeal voided the conviction for attempting to murder the mother, and ordered a new trial just on that. But this decision was itself appealed to the Supreme Court of Canada, which had the opportunity to clarify how voluntary suicide can be charged as murder, the very core of the case against Law.

It declined to do so.

It heard the case, and decided there had been no need for the judge to instruct the jury on this point. Aiding suicide was not on the table at trial. B.F. was never charged with it. It is not a lesser and included offence to murder. B.F.’s jury was not allowed to convict on it instead of attempted murder, as juries are sometimes able to do based on their well-instructed judgment, for example to convict merely on assault instead of assault causing bodily harm.

There was also “no air of reality” to the theory that the mother was an active participant in B.F.’s actions, the Supreme Court’s majority found.

Jury instructions need to be accurate and sufficient, not perfect, they decided. Instructing juries on far-fetched defence theories with no air of reality “would only serve to cause confusion and needlessly lengthen the judge’s charge.”

On the issue of whether a voluntary attempted suicide means no one else can ever be charged with attempted murder over the same incident — such as taking poison provided by the accused — the Supreme Court justices wrote that “No view is expressed.”

It said the Ontario Court of Appeal “unnecessarily complicated this matter…. The question of the legal relationship between attempted murder and aiding suicide has no bearing on the appeals.”

So the question remained. Can a person be found guilty of attempted murder for providing lethal tools that are used voluntarily by the victim? The Crown said yes, and B.F. said no.

In law, the clearest description of this problem is in the Ontario Court of Appeal’s decision, the outcome of which was overturned. But the point remains in the jurisprudence. In the case of a murder charge based on providing a suicide drug, a jury or judge should consider not only whether the accused provided the drug, “but also whether they interfered with the independent will of the person to self-administer it or not.”

The Supreme Court left this uncontradicted.

“I decline to conclusively resolve this abstract legal issue in this appeal,” wrote Justice Michelle O’Bonsawin for the majority.

For Law, this was more than an abstract issue, and this decision seems to have worked in his favour, now that the Crown has abandoned its murder prosecution.

Sentencing is expected to be argued at a later date. Aiding suicide carries a maximum sentence of 14 years.

• Kenneth Law, accused of selling toxic substances so people could die by suicide, expected to plead guilty
• Who is alleged serial killer Kenneth Law and what is he accused of?

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OTTAWA — It’s time to move past the battle against the trade threats from U.S. President Donald Trump and focus more on boosting Canadian competitiveness, one of the country’s most influential business groups told the Carney government in its pre-budget submission.

In a document sent this week to the House of Commons finance committee, the Canadian Chamber of Commerce said it’s urgent that governments cut excessive red tape and permitting delays, boost domestic capital markets, dismantle interprovincial trade barriers and slash taxes so that Canadian companies can compete better with those in the United States and elsewhere.

“If the theme for 2025 was strengthening Canada’s resilience in the face of external trade threats,” the chamber advises in its submission, “then our collective focus for 2026 must be on fostering Canadian competitiveness.”

David Pierce, the chamber’s vice-president of government relations, said the Canadian economy needs more than small moves around the margins to stay competitive and attract investment. “I think a big swing is needed.”

The chamber’s submission, obtained by National Post, was delivered to the parliamentary finance committee Tuesday, but has not yet been posted publicly or sent to Finance Minister François-Philippe Champagne. It marks the second pre-budget submission unveiled this week from a major business group that calls on the Liberal government to take an aggressive swing at improving competitiveness and economic growth.

The Canadian Federation of Independent Business (CFIB), which represents more than 100,000 independent or small businesses, said in its submission that Canada is facing an “entrepreneurial drought” in that more businesses have closed their doors over the last four quarters than have been launched, despite the country’s growing population.

CFIB’s policy wish list included a cut to the small business income tax rate, changes to make capital investments more enticing and adopt a range of measures to make hiring more attractive.

The Chamber of Commerce, meanwhile, told the committee that Canada can’t compete internationally with a tax and regulatory regime that is seen as slower, more cumbersome and less friendly to investment. The organization calls on the Carney government to review income tax policy to ensure that Canadian business taxes are on a level playing field with the U.S.; streamline and digitize processes to reduce the regulatory burden on business; and expand eligibility for the clean technology manufacturing investment tax credit.

The chamber also encouraged the government to establish an independent Canadian Resources Advisory Council to support the “responsible development” of the energy industry, change the labour code to add more resolution tools so that supply chains aren’t disrupted and consider attaching strings to major federal transfers to encourage provinces and territories to eliminate costly internal trade and labour mobility barriers.

Pierce said a competitive business landscape is the foundation for a successful economy. “Business success is what generates tax revenue.”

The Canadian economy has held up better than many economists expected last year when Trump began imposing new tariffs on Canada and others. But Canada has for years been battling against weakening productivity and competitiveness, challenges that directly affect business’ ability to grow and produce jobs and Canadians’ standard of living.

The federal and provincial governments are also sitting on growing piles of debt, which can affect interest rates. Separatist movements in Quebec and Alberta and Trump’s pro-business agenda have also made Canada’s investment climate a tougher sell.

In its first budget last fall and in last month’s spring economic update, the Carney government took some tepid steps to try to tackle competitiveness and productivity but is seen to have not yet taken the big swing that many business leaders believe is necessary and overdue.

Instead, Champagne has argued that Canada is among the leaders in the G7 when it comes to economic growth and its debt-to-GDP ratio. The federal government has now accumulated about $1.29-trillion in debt, almost half of which has been added over the last five years. In its spring economic update last month, the government said it expected to post a deficit of $66.9 billion for the past year, slightly less than expected.

But the Carney government’s economic strategy has received mild endorsements in recent days from the chief executives of two of Canada’s largest banks.

The Bank of Nova Scotia’s Scott Thomson said Wednesday on an earnings call that foreign investors are starting to look again at Canada, adding that he’s “relatively optimistic” about the country’s economic outlook.

The Bank of Montreal’s Darryl White, on that company’s earnings call, also said he sees stronger growth on the horizon. White pointed to Ottawa’s moves to set firm deadlines for major project reviews and approvals, streamline consultations, establish special economic zones and trade corridors, and simplify regulatory reporting.

National Post

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• Cut taxes and take big swing at boosting jobs and growth, small business group tells Ottawa

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A graduating student who tried to take his diploma while holding a Palestinian flag behind his back was told to ditch the banner before he could receive his certificate.

Video shared Tuesday on social media shows the University of California Berkeley student wearing dark glasses and presenting a Palestinian flag to the audience, who are cheering.

He then walks up to receive his diploma, but the dean who is handing them out pulls it back and they appear to be in conversation for about 40 seconds as the audience starts to boo and catcall.

At the point in the video a female voice can be heard from off camera.

“I’m sorry, but we’re not allowed to have flags,” the voice says. “Flags are prohibited. We’re not allowed to have flags.”

She continues: “It’s not our policy, it’s the university policy.”

The student then walks out of view of the camera, and the voice continues: “Do you want to leave it here? We are prohibited from displaying flags.”

WOW: UC Berkeley stopped a graduate carrying a Palestinian flag and required him to put it away before allowing him to receive his diploma. 🔥

I’m pleasantly surprised. 👏🏾 pic.twitter.com/XoA5Xi3Sex

— Brandon Tatum (@TheOfficerTatum) May 26, 2026

The student then walks to the edge of the stage to hand the flag to someone in the audience before going back to collect his diploma. He moved on quickly, and there was no handshake between student and official.

The incident happened last Friday. The video was posted by Brandon Tatum, an American political commentator, author and former police officer.

According to the New York Post , the event was the spring graduation ceremony for the Goldman School of Public Policy at the University of California Berkeley.

The news site Roya News , which says it “delivers global news with a focus on Jordan and the MENA (Middle East and North African) region,” also reported on the event, and said the Goldman School had confirmed that the student’s official diploma was temporarily withheld following the incident.

The university shared a statement shared with National Post from David C. Wilson, Dean of the Goldman School.

“Prior to the ceremony, all students were provided with written, content- and perspective-neutral guidelines which clearly stated that all ‘SIGNS / BANNERS / FLAGS’ were prohibited in the venue,” he wrote. “During the degree-awarding portion of the ceremony, one graduate brought a flag onto the stage and when the student reached me on stage, I communicated that their actions were not consistent with the written guidelines.”

He added: “Our dialogue was civil and, ultimately, the student complied, received their scroll and we finished the ceremony without further disruption. I am proud of him and of every member of the Class of 2026.”

In a separate story from earlier this month , Roya News reported that several graduating students were forcibly removed and escorted out of their commencement ceremony at George Mason University in Virginia after unfurling the Palestinian flag as they walked across the stage to receive recognition.

“University staff and security personnel immediately intervened, cutting the students’ participation short and marching them out of the venue,” the site reported. It added that one of the ejected students remarked: “My freedom and my rights were violated.”

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