Law students call on York University to reverse planned cut to its Innocence Project
York University law students working on Osgoode Hall’s Innocence Project are calling on their dean to reverse a decision to offer only one-third the spots in the upcoming school year.
The project, the first of its kind in Canada when it launched at York in 1997 — and still the only law school in Ontario to offer the program — currently has 12 students examining cases of suspected wrongful conviction and working to seek proof of incarcerated people’s innocence.
That will be cut to four in the 2022/23 academic year, with the near-weekly seminars offered by practicing lawyers as part of the program also at risk, the students wrote in an open letter published earlier this week.
“This decision will harm Osgoode Hall Innocence Project’s wrongfully convicted clients, reduce opportunities for Osgoode students to learn how to defend society’s most marginalized people, and tarnish Osgoode’s reputation as a law school that values social justice initiatives,” the students said in the letter dated Feb. 7 and addressed to Mary Condon, Osgoode’s dean.
Condon said in response to queries from Canada's National Observer that the program remains integral to Osgoode’s programming.
“Next year’s reduction is temporary while the law school puts in place the structure needed to make the Innocence Project clinical program stronger, more sustainable and an even better experience for Osgoode law students,” she said, noting the school hopes to offer more external placements with experienced lawyers.
Students who have applied to take part in the Innocence Project for next year have been advised of the shift, although the magnitude of the reduction has not been finalized at this point, the school said.
The Osgoode program has notched some notable achievements over the years, including playing a significant role in the overturned conviction of Romeo Phillion, who served 31 years in jail after being wrongly convicted of murder in 1972.
Forty students from the project investigated the case over a five-year period, uncovering testimonies never heard in earlier trials.
Osgoode students also found fresh evidence to exonerate Gary Staples and their work on the case of Bradley Albon, while not leading to his acquittal, pushed Ontario courts to recognize a constitutional right to post-conviction disclosure, seen as an essential tool for the innocent to appeal their convictions.
The open letter from current students notes that the reduction will mean the project must close client files and seek out lawyers who could take on matters currently before the courts or the federal government’s criminal conviction review group.
They said many of those they work with can’t afford to hire a lawyer but don’t qualify for legal aid, meaning replacement counsel would need to be able and willing to work pro bono on the files.
“Our clients have already suffered enough at the hands of the justice system and we do not want to disrupt their lives any further; as future lawyers, we feel ethically bound not to abandon our clients,” they said.
Morgan Sharp, Local Journalism Initiative Reporter, Canada's National Observer
Sunday, February 13, 2022
Canada's prison watchdog 'very disappointed' the government keeps ignoring his reports
Christopher Nardi - POSTMEDIA - Friday
© Provided by National Post
More than one in four Canadians support jail time for the unvaccinated, poll finds
It also committed to conducting an audit of its “culture” to further fight racism within its department, and that it was working to address all the other issues highlighted in the report.
Zinger said he was wholly unsatisfied by the department’s response, which he says is basically committing to redo the work his office just completed.
“The response that I got is … defensive and inappropriate. They simply don’t accept the findings of our investigation,” Zinger told reporters.
He says their response should have been to create “an action plan, drafted right now. It should have started as soon as they got my report.”
His disappointment doesn’t stem just from this year’s report. Last month, National Post reported that the department still had no idea how many inmates are victims of sexual violence in prison, two years after Zinger concluded that it’s a pervasive problem.
The federal correctional investigator added that he sees a glimmer of hope with new Public Safety Minister Marco Mendocino, whose mandate letter orders him to address many of these issues already.
“I think where there’s a disconnect, and even I would say cognitive dissonance, between what those mandate letters from the ministers say and what (CSC) is actually moving in terms of trying to address my recommendations,” Zinger concluded.
Christopher Nardi - POSTMEDIA - Friday
© Provided by National Post
Canada’s prison watchdog says he is consistently disappointed by the government’s responses to his reports, which keep revealing significant and systemic problems with the country’s correctional system.
“It’s been two years in a row now that I’m very disappointed with the response of the Correctional Service of Canada,” federal Correctional Investigator Dr. Ivan Zinger said during a press conference marking the release of his office’s latest annual report.
“Absolutely, I’m very disappointed.”
In his 2020-2021 report, Zinger’s office once again found “serious shortcomings” in the Correctional Service of Canada’s (CSC) work ensuring “secure and humane” detention conditions for prisoners. It also contains 20 recommendations covering six investigations concluded in the past year.
One exhaustive review by his office found that use-of-force incidents — meaning events during which correctional officers used force to subdue an inmate — has jumped in recent years, and that Black, Indigenous and People of Colour are disproportionately the target of uses of force.
This, despite the department putting forward a new “Engagement and Intervention Model” that aimed to reduce the use of force by correctional staff.
“Since 2015-16, there have been 9,633 documented use-of-force incidents. Despite the overall decrease in admissions to federal prisons and decreases in the prison population, the number of use-of-force incidents has increased steadily over the last five years,” Zinger’s report notes.
“While concerning, these increases are particularly troubling given that they coincide with the introduction of strategies aimed at reducing uses of force.”
During the press conference, senior policy adviser Leticia Gutierrez said that Black and Indigenous people accounted for over half of all cases of use-of-force incidents despite representing just over one third of the carceral population.
“Based on the rather compelling evidence from our investigation, we conclude that force is indeed disproportionately used against Black and Indigenous persons in federal corrections in Canada. And that race is significantly and uniquely associated with the application of force in federal prisons,” she explained.
Zinger said he was “particularly concerned” by those findings and recommended that CSC address the “systemic prejudice” within its department and make public all changes to policy and practice it may put in place to address the “over-representation of these groups.”
His study didn’t identify exactly why Black and Indigenous people were overly targeted by use of force, but he theorized that it could be that correctional staff are “ill-equipped” to de-escalate situations, “cultural barriers” or “unconscious bias.”
Another troubling study by his office found that conditions for incarcerated women have worsened since a “ground-breaking” report aimed at better adapting the correctional system for women was published 30 years ago.
© THE CANADIAN PRESS, file
“It’s been two years in a row now that I’m very disappointed with the response of the Correctional Service of Canada,” federal Correctional Investigator Dr. Ivan Zinger said during a press conference marking the release of his office’s latest annual report.
“Absolutely, I’m very disappointed.”
In his 2020-2021 report, Zinger’s office once again found “serious shortcomings” in the Correctional Service of Canada’s (CSC) work ensuring “secure and humane” detention conditions for prisoners. It also contains 20 recommendations covering six investigations concluded in the past year.
One exhaustive review by his office found that use-of-force incidents — meaning events during which correctional officers used force to subdue an inmate — has jumped in recent years, and that Black, Indigenous and People of Colour are disproportionately the target of uses of force.
This, despite the department putting forward a new “Engagement and Intervention Model” that aimed to reduce the use of force by correctional staff.
“Since 2015-16, there have been 9,633 documented use-of-force incidents. Despite the overall decrease in admissions to federal prisons and decreases in the prison population, the number of use-of-force incidents has increased steadily over the last five years,” Zinger’s report notes.
“While concerning, these increases are particularly troubling given that they coincide with the introduction of strategies aimed at reducing uses of force.”
During the press conference, senior policy adviser Leticia Gutierrez said that Black and Indigenous people accounted for over half of all cases of use-of-force incidents despite representing just over one third of the carceral population.
“Based on the rather compelling evidence from our investigation, we conclude that force is indeed disproportionately used against Black and Indigenous persons in federal corrections in Canada. And that race is significantly and uniquely associated with the application of force in federal prisons,” she explained.
Zinger said he was “particularly concerned” by those findings and recommended that CSC address the “systemic prejudice” within its department and make public all changes to policy and practice it may put in place to address the “over-representation of these groups.”
His study didn’t identify exactly why Black and Indigenous people were overly targeted by use of force, but he theorized that it could be that correctional staff are “ill-equipped” to de-escalate situations, “cultural barriers” or “unconscious bias.”
Another troubling study by his office found that conditions for incarcerated women have worsened since a “ground-breaking” report aimed at better adapting the correctional system for women was published 30 years ago.
© THE CANADIAN PRESS, file
A segregation cell at the Fraser Valley Institution for Women in Abbotsford, B.C.
“Nearly all of the problems identified thirty years ago (inadequate infrastructure, oversecuritization, lack of programming and services, poor community reintegration practices) remain significant areas of concern today, some have deteriorated even further and all are contributing factors to poor correctional outcomes for many women,” Zinger’s report reads.
In fact, the most significant change for women in the federal carceral system over the past three decades has been the sheer increase in their numbers.
In 1990-1991, there were 170 new federally incarcerated women in the country. By 2019-2020, that had jumped to 562, the report found.
In response to the report, CSC put out a statement noting that it took the issue of use of force “very seriously.” To that point, it committed to carry out its own review of those incidents and how they involved “diverse sub-populations,” including BIPOC people and those with mental health needs.
“Nearly all of the problems identified thirty years ago (inadequate infrastructure, oversecuritization, lack of programming and services, poor community reintegration practices) remain significant areas of concern today, some have deteriorated even further and all are contributing factors to poor correctional outcomes for many women,” Zinger’s report reads.
In fact, the most significant change for women in the federal carceral system over the past three decades has been the sheer increase in their numbers.
In 1990-1991, there were 170 new federally incarcerated women in the country. By 2019-2020, that had jumped to 562, the report found.
In response to the report, CSC put out a statement noting that it took the issue of use of force “very seriously.” To that point, it committed to carry out its own review of those incidents and how they involved “diverse sub-populations,” including BIPOC people and those with mental health needs.
More than one in four Canadians support jail time for the unvaccinated, poll finds
It also committed to conducting an audit of its “culture” to further fight racism within its department, and that it was working to address all the other issues highlighted in the report.
Zinger said he was wholly unsatisfied by the department’s response, which he says is basically committing to redo the work his office just completed.
“The response that I got is … defensive and inappropriate. They simply don’t accept the findings of our investigation,” Zinger told reporters.
He says their response should have been to create “an action plan, drafted right now. It should have started as soon as they got my report.”
His disappointment doesn’t stem just from this year’s report. Last month, National Post reported that the department still had no idea how many inmates are victims of sexual violence in prison, two years after Zinger concluded that it’s a pervasive problem.
The federal correctional investigator added that he sees a glimmer of hope with new Public Safety Minister Marco Mendocino, whose mandate letter orders him to address many of these issues already.
“I think where there’s a disconnect, and even I would say cognitive dissonance, between what those mandate letters from the ministers say and what (CSC) is actually moving in terms of trying to address my recommendations,” Zinger concluded.
Marijuana bills stall in Virginia's GOP-controlled House
Thursday
RICHMOND, Va. (AP) — As the Virginia General Assembly reaches the halfway point of this year’s session, one of the year’s most complicated issues — possible changes to the state’s new law legalizing recreational marijuana — has stalled in the GOP-controlled House.
Terry Kilgore, the chamber's majority leader, said this week that he does not expect the House to vote on its own measures before the Tuesday deadline for each chamber to complete work on its own legislation. Instead, he said the caucus would wait for the Democrat-controlled Senate to send a bill over and “go from there.”
“We want to get it right. There’s a lot of regulation, enforcement ... so there’s just a lot of questions, and you’re running out of time," he said Wednesday.
Last year, when state government was under total Democratic control, lawmakers passed legislation that legalized adult possession of up to an ounce of marijuana and created a path for retail sales to begin in 2024. The bill passed in a chaotic rush, strictly along party lines, with no GOP support. But because the bill has a reenactment clause, lawmakers are scheduled to vote again this year on the complex regulatory structure needed to set up the retail marijuana market.
With adult possession legalized but no way to legally buy recreational marijuana in Virginia, both Republicans and Democrats have expressed support for moving up the date for retail sales to try to prevent growth in the illicit market. But the two sides do not agree on how to reinvest tax revenues from marijuana sales or on social equity provisions that would give advantages in the licensing process for marijuana businesses to people and communities that have been hurt by old marijuana laws.
The legislation passed last year called for 30% of tax revenues to go the Cannabis Equity Reinvestment Fund, which would funnel the money to predominantly minority communities disproportionately affected by the war on drugs. A bill proposed this year by Senate Minority Leader Tommy Norment that called for redirecting the money to the state's general fund was quickly quashed by Senate Democrats.
Another bill sponsored by Republican Del. Michael Webert includes a provision that would redirect the tax revenue to a fund for rebuilding crumbling school buildings around the state.
The legislation, which appeared to be the main marijuana bill offered by House Republicans, also called for eliminating a provision in the 2021 law that calls for giving special consideration for marijuana business licenses to social equity applicants, including people convicted of marijuana crimes or members of their immediate families. And it would have slashed the overall tax rate on marijuana sales from 21% to 10%.
But Webert's bill, along with several others drafted by House Republicans, have had no movement at all during the first four weeks of the session, a sign that the caucus has been unable to reach consensus.
Kilgore acknowledged concerns about the issue from some caucus members.
Last week, Speaker Todd Gilbert told The Associated Press, “The whole space is a bit of a mess right now.”
“The mess was not created by us,” added Gilbert, who now leads the chamber after Republicans retook it and swept Virginia's statewide offices in the November election.
Other Republican bill sponsors and committee chairs did not respond to requests for comment from the AP.
Democratic Sen. Adam Ebbin, a lead architect of the 2021 law, is sponsoring two key pieces of Senate marijuana legislation this year. One bill would allow existing medical marijuana providers to begin selling recreational marijuana to adults a year earlier than the Jan. 1, 2024, date called for in the 2021 law. Among other things, the second bill calls for requiring cannabis retail stores to close by 9 p.m. and open no earlier than 8 a.m. and requiring the Cannabis Control Authority to come up with regulations by Jan. 1, 2023, instead of July 1, 2023.
Ebbin is also planning to incorporate a bill from Sens. Louise Lucas and Scott Surovell that would allow resentencing of people currently incarcerated for marijuana crimes.
Ebbin said he has had discussions with several House Republicans “in the hopes we can work out an equitable arrangement” on establishing the state's retail marijuana market.
“I know there are members of the House on both sides of the aisle who would like to see the illicit market reduced and eventually even close to eliminated,” Ebbin said. “In that spirit, I'm hopeful we can work out a way for adults 21 and over to be able to access a tested, regulated, taxed product.”
JM Pedini, executive director of the Virginia chapter of the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws, said that if a reenactment bill is going to succeed during the current legislative session, “it will require major compromise.”
Denise Lavoie And Sarah Rankin, The Associated Press
BLACK HISTORY MONTH
Randi Mann - Friday
The Weather Network
On Monday, July 26, 1948, President Harry Truman issued Executive Order 9981, which abolished discrimination "on the basis of race, colour, religion or national origin" in the U.S. Armed Forces.
The Tuskegee Airmen were a group of the U.S. military’s first Black pilots who fought in the Second World War. They were trained at the Tuskegee Institute, located near Tuskegee, Ala. These men fought in the segregated army air forces (now called the U.S. air force). So, with the first Black air force pilots came the first Black weather officers, dubbed the Tuskegee weathermen.
© Provided by The Weather NetworkThe first Black weather officers joined a segregated U.S. Air Force during WWII"Members of the 332nd Fighter Group in a mission briefing, Ramitelli, Italy, 1945." Courtesy of Toni Frissell Collection/Library of Congress, Washington, D.C. (LC-USZC4-4335)
But it wasn't so easy to just enlist the leading Black meteorologists because, at the time, there weren't any in the U.S. Weather Bureau.
The army recruited black men who had a background in science and trained them in meteorology.
Charles E. Anderson, who studied chemistry in college, was accepted to the army air forces. He wanted to fly, but his eyesight was too poor.
Archie Williams also wanted to be a pilot in the army air forces, considering he already knew how to fly a plane.
Williams was in great shape, winning the gold medal during the 400-metre event in the 1936 Olympics. But, at 27, he was too old for military flight training. So, Williams worked on weather forecasts, weather maps, and even taught intro to flying.
There were 14 Tuskegee meteorologists, about 0.2 per cent of all weather officers in the army air forces.
Black pilots were also few in numbers and were regarded with suspicion.
The Tuskegee Airmen and weathermen were a great team, which is evidenced by the results of their missions.
© Provided by The Weather NetworkFirst Black weather officers joined a segregated U.S. Air Force during WWII"Members of the 332nd Fighter Group preparing for a mission, Ramitelli, Italy, 1945." Courtesy of Toni Frissell Collection/Library of Congress, Washington, D.C. (LC-DIG-ppmsca-13259)
Air force historian Dan Haulman said, “Of the 179 bomber escort missions, they lost bombers to enemy aircraft on only seven of those missions,” adding that in total, they lost 27 bombers, while other groups lost 46 bombers on average.
Haulman said that “Just as the black pilots proved that they could fly military aircraft in combat as well as the white pilots, so did the black weather personnel prove that they could perform meteorological functions as well as the white officers."
The Tuskegee Airmen helped change the attitudes of their white counterparts. Williams saw this change occur, because at the beginning "...a lot of guys there were bigoted. The white guys didn’t want to fly with them and all, but they found out that these guys could fight, could shoot good and protect the bombers.”
© Provided by The Weather NetworkThe first Black weather officers joined a segregated U.S. Air Force during WWIIMemorial honouring the Tuskegee Airmen at the Tuskegee Airmen National Historic Site, Tuskegee, Ala. Courtesy of Staff Sgt. Christine Jones/U.S. Air Force
The Tuskegee weathermen had the same positive and progressive influence due to their success in weather forecasting.
Thumbnail image: Members of the 332nd Fighter Group, Ramitelli, Italy, in 1945. Courtesy of U.S. air force.
BS THEY MADE RECORD PROFITS
Manulife, Sun Life say they are raising premiums to offset cost inflation
By Nichola Saminather - Thursday
© Reuters/John TilakFILE PHOTO - Roy Gori, chief executive of Manulife Asia, speaks at the company?s headquarters in Toronto
TORONTO (Reuters) -Manulife Financial Corp and Sun Life Financial, Canada's two biggest life insurers, are increasing premiums to offset higher costs this year from inflation that has risen to a three-decade high, executives said on Thursday.
A 50-basis-point increase in fixed income yields would also translate into a C$1.85 billion ($1.5 billion) rise in embedded value, Manulife Chief Executive Roy Gori told analysts on a post-earnings call.
Manulife on Wednesday posted core fourth-quarter earnings of 84 Canadian cents per share, up 13.5% from a year earlier and beating analysts' expectations.
Smaller rivals Sun Life Financial and Great-West Lifeco on Wednesday also reported higher earnings.
Manulife shares jumped 3.9% to C$27.95 in morning trading in Toronto, their highest intraday level since 2008. Sun Life, whose U.S. earnings dropped 51% due to higher COVID-related death claims, declined 3.9% to C$70.97, while Great-West shares fell 1.55%.
The main Toronto index rose 0.6%.
"There are some aspects of our business where higher rates will create some headwinds, but we have flexibility as it relates to driving scale through expenses or price changes to offset those," Gori said.
The company could push up prices in its long-term care business, which may be susceptible to increased costs, although a shift to cheaper home care prompted by the pandemic has offset some of that, Chief Actuary Steve Finch said.
Sun Life executives said higher costs due to inflation could be a positive in its stop-loss business, which protects employers against unpredictable losses.
As policies reprice every year, "we would be able to react very quickly," Dan Fishbein, president of the insurer's U.S business, said on an analysts call. "Not that we're hoping for medical inflation, but the primary impact of medical inflation on our stop-loss business would be more premium."
Sun Life has already raised premiums in its disability and group life businesses, but those will take some time to take effect as policies are longer, he said.
Sun Life's MFS Investment Management unit, which focuses primarily on equities, could see some challenges, CEO Michael Roberge said.
An expected increase in market volatility, higher interest rates and high stock valuations are likely to send more investors into cash, reducing flows into funds in 2022, he said.
($1 = 1.2647 Canadian dollars)
(Reporting By Nichola Saminather; Additional reporting by Manya Saini and Mehnaz Yasmin; editing by John Stonestreet and Chris Reese)
Manulife and Sun Life earnings rise on asset management growth
Nichola Saminather and Sohini Podder
Wed., February 9, 2022
The Sun Life Financial logo is seen at their corporate headquarters in Toronto
(Reuters) - Canadian insurers Manulife Financial and Sun Life Financial narrowly beat quarterly earnings expectations on Wednesday, driven by strong growth in their asset management units, but Sun Life warned that the spread of the Omicron variant will impact first-quarter earnings.
Government stimulus and pandemic savings over the past year have sparked a boom in the wealth and asset management businesses of Canadian insurers, helping offset the impact of claims related to the COVID-19 pandemic.
The chief executive of Manulife, Roy Gori, said in an interview that during the quarter "Asia saw the challenges associated with ... COVID, but over the full year, it had a tremendous performance."
Manulife's 27% increase in global wealth and asset management earnings helped offset declines in profits in Asia, Canada and the U.S.
Core earnings in the three months through December rose to 84 Canadian cents per share, up 13.5% from a year earlier and compared with analysts' expectations of 82 Canadian cents per share, according to IBES data from Refinitiv.
Manulife, Canada's biggest life insurer, also saw new business growth across all markets.
"Manulife came in ahead of expectations on the back of ongoing growth in its Asia platform," Barclays analyst John Aiken said in a note. "The recovery in profitability from the third quarter, increase in its book value, and outlook for 2022 should help support its valuation moving forward."
Smaller rival Sun Life reported underlying profit that was largely in line with estimates, thanks to 15% growth in its asset management unit, to C$382 million. That, combined with increases in profits in Canada and Asia, helped offset a 51% decline in the U.S. business and lifted overall earnings 4%.
"The death rate in the working age-group was significantly higher in the fourth quarter in the U.S.," related to the Delta variant, CEO Kevin Strain told Reuters. "Omicron has high numbers of infections, which is becoming a higher number of hospitalizations and deaths, and we see Omicron having an impact on the first quarter."
Growth in Asia was partially offset by COVID-19-related mortalities of C$12 million, mostly in the Philippines.
Sun Life's underlying quarterly profit grew 4.2% to C$898 million from a year earlier, or C$1.53 per share, compared with analysts estimates of C$1.52 per share.
($1 = 1.2669 Canadian dollars)
(Reporting by Sohini Podder in Bengaluru and Nichola Saminather in Toronto; Editing by Anil D'Silva and Leslie Adler)
Manulife, Sun Life say they are raising premiums to offset cost inflation
By Nichola Saminather - Thursday
© Reuters/John TilakFILE PHOTO - Roy Gori, chief executive of Manulife Asia, speaks at the company?s headquarters in Toronto
TORONTO (Reuters) -Manulife Financial Corp and Sun Life Financial, Canada's two biggest life insurers, are increasing premiums to offset higher costs this year from inflation that has risen to a three-decade high, executives said on Thursday.
A 50-basis-point increase in fixed income yields would also translate into a C$1.85 billion ($1.5 billion) rise in embedded value, Manulife Chief Executive Roy Gori told analysts on a post-earnings call.
Manulife on Wednesday posted core fourth-quarter earnings of 84 Canadian cents per share, up 13.5% from a year earlier and beating analysts' expectations.
Smaller rivals Sun Life Financial and Great-West Lifeco on Wednesday also reported higher earnings.
Manulife shares jumped 3.9% to C$27.95 in morning trading in Toronto, their highest intraday level since 2008. Sun Life, whose U.S. earnings dropped 51% due to higher COVID-related death claims, declined 3.9% to C$70.97, while Great-West shares fell 1.55%.
The main Toronto index rose 0.6%.
"There are some aspects of our business where higher rates will create some headwinds, but we have flexibility as it relates to driving scale through expenses or price changes to offset those," Gori said.
The company could push up prices in its long-term care business, which may be susceptible to increased costs, although a shift to cheaper home care prompted by the pandemic has offset some of that, Chief Actuary Steve Finch said.
Sun Life executives said higher costs due to inflation could be a positive in its stop-loss business, which protects employers against unpredictable losses.
As policies reprice every year, "we would be able to react very quickly," Dan Fishbein, president of the insurer's U.S business, said on an analysts call. "Not that we're hoping for medical inflation, but the primary impact of medical inflation on our stop-loss business would be more premium."
Sun Life has already raised premiums in its disability and group life businesses, but those will take some time to take effect as policies are longer, he said.
Sun Life's MFS Investment Management unit, which focuses primarily on equities, could see some challenges, CEO Michael Roberge said.
An expected increase in market volatility, higher interest rates and high stock valuations are likely to send more investors into cash, reducing flows into funds in 2022, he said.
($1 = 1.2647 Canadian dollars)
(Reporting By Nichola Saminather; Additional reporting by Manya Saini and Mehnaz Yasmin; editing by John Stonestreet and Chris Reese)
BOTH COMPANIES PROVIDE RETIREMENT PLANS AND BENEFITS FOR PRIVATE SECTOR BUILDING TRADES UNIONS IN CANADA
Nichola Saminather and Sohini Podder
Wed., February 9, 2022
The Sun Life Financial logo is seen at their corporate headquarters in Toronto
(Reuters) - Canadian insurers Manulife Financial and Sun Life Financial narrowly beat quarterly earnings expectations on Wednesday, driven by strong growth in their asset management units, but Sun Life warned that the spread of the Omicron variant will impact first-quarter earnings.
Government stimulus and pandemic savings over the past year have sparked a boom in the wealth and asset management businesses of Canadian insurers, helping offset the impact of claims related to the COVID-19 pandemic.
The chief executive of Manulife, Roy Gori, said in an interview that during the quarter "Asia saw the challenges associated with ... COVID, but over the full year, it had a tremendous performance."
Manulife's 27% increase in global wealth and asset management earnings helped offset declines in profits in Asia, Canada and the U.S.
Core earnings in the three months through December rose to 84 Canadian cents per share, up 13.5% from a year earlier and compared with analysts' expectations of 82 Canadian cents per share, according to IBES data from Refinitiv.
Manulife, Canada's biggest life insurer, also saw new business growth across all markets.
"Manulife came in ahead of expectations on the back of ongoing growth in its Asia platform," Barclays analyst John Aiken said in a note. "The recovery in profitability from the third quarter, increase in its book value, and outlook for 2022 should help support its valuation moving forward."
Smaller rival Sun Life reported underlying profit that was largely in line with estimates, thanks to 15% growth in its asset management unit, to C$382 million. That, combined with increases in profits in Canada and Asia, helped offset a 51% decline in the U.S. business and lifted overall earnings 4%.
"The death rate in the working age-group was significantly higher in the fourth quarter in the U.S.," related to the Delta variant, CEO Kevin Strain told Reuters. "Omicron has high numbers of infections, which is becoming a higher number of hospitalizations and deaths, and we see Omicron having an impact on the first quarter."
Growth in Asia was partially offset by COVID-19-related mortalities of C$12 million, mostly in the Philippines.
Sun Life's underlying quarterly profit grew 4.2% to C$898 million from a year earlier, or C$1.53 per share, compared with analysts estimates of C$1.52 per share.
($1 = 1.2669 Canadian dollars)
(Reporting by Sohini Podder in Bengaluru and Nichola Saminather in Toronto; Editing by Anil D'Silva and Leslie Adler)
ANTARCTICA
Satellites capture rapid disintegration of ice in the Larsen B embaymentScott Sutherland - Thursday
The Weather Network
Nearly two decades after the Larsen B ice shelf collapse, satellites captured another collapse of sorts, as warm winds flowing over the Antarctic Peninsula disintegrated the sea ice inhabiting the waters the ice shelf once covered.
Back in March of 2002, the Larsen B ice shelf — 3,200 square kilometres of floating glacial ice attached near the tip of the Antarctic Peninsula — broke apart and collapsed into the sea. In the weeks leading up to this event, satellites spotted numerous melt ponds collecting on the ice shelf's surface due to warm summer temperatures over the region. Then, in just three days, starting on March 2, satellite imagery captured dramatic views as nearly the entire ice shelf fractured and surged out into the Weddell Sea.
© Provided by The Weather NetworkSatellites capture rapid disintegration of ice in the Larsen B embaymentTwo views from NASA's Terra satellite from 2002. On February 14 (left) Larsen B was still intact, but numerous melt ponds are clearly visible on the surface. Just over a month later, the same view (right) shows nearly the entire ice shelf having collapsed into a flow of icebergs and newly freed sea ice. Credit: NASA Worldview
Now, close to 20 years after that event, we've seen a second collapse of the ice in that part of the world.
Once an ice shelf collapses, it's unheard of to see it regenerate. Unlike sea ice, which melts and refreezes each year, an ice shelf forms when the leading edge of a glacier pushes out over water, becoming a direct extension of the land ice. Icebergs break off the edges of ice shelves from time to time simply due to the stresses of ocean currents and sea ice collisions. The sheet ice is replenished from the glacier on land, though. So it would take decades or longer for an immense ice shelf to regenerate, even without the continued stresses of global warming.
However, starting in 2011, a swath of sea ice set up in the Larsen B embayment. This was not the thick glacial ice that was there a decade before. Instead, it was 'landfast' ice — comparatively thin sea ice that became fastened to the shoreline.
"It was the first time since the early 2002 shelf collapse that the Larsen B embayment was seen to freeze up and stay frozen through multiple austral summers," Christopher Shuman, a glaciologist with NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center, said in NASA Earth Observatory's Image of the Day post from February 2.
Year after year, this landfast ice persisted in the embayment. As captured by orbiting satellites, it even took on the shape (if not the thickness) of the original ice shelf. However, throughout December 2021 and the first half of January 2022, satellites recorded a repeat of the same pattern that occurred in 2002. Numerous blue melt ponds were spotted on the surface of the landfast ice. Then, in a matter of days, the ice disintegrated and drifted away.
© Provided by The Weather NetworkSatellites capture rapid disintegration of ice in the Larsen B embaymentTwo views of the same region of the Antarctic Peninsula from January of 2022, before the collapse of the Larsen B landfast ice and after. Credit: NASA
On January 11, days before this multi-year ice broke apart, the National Snow and Ice Data Center (NSIDC) noted that the extensive meltwater ponds resulted from a series of wind storms that crossed the Peninsula since December. Like the Chinook winds of southern Alberta, when wind storms pass over the Antarctandes — the mountain range that stretches along the northern part of the Peninsula — it results in warm, dry air flowing down the lee side of the range. In Antarctica, these are called Foehn winds.
Each of these wind storms had a strong impact on the melt season across the Peninsula. For example, in late December, the amount of melting detected was roughly three times greater than the average for that same period from 1990 to 2020.
© Provided by The Weather NetworkSatellites capture rapid disintegration of ice in the Larsen B embaymentA series of wind storms passing over the Antarctic Peninsula produced strong melting periods throughout December and January. Credit: L. Lopez, NSIDC, M. MacFerrin, CIRES and T. Mote, University of Georgia
A series of wind storms passing over the Antarctic Peninsula produced strong melting periods throughout December and January. Credit: L. Lopez, NSIDC, M. MacFerrin, CIRES and T. Mote, University of Georgia
Meltwater ponds profoundly affect the stability of the ice they rest upon, whether it is sea ice or a thick ice shelf. The water from these ponds erodes the ice underneath them, weakening the overall structure and making it easier for the ice to fracture and break apart.
CONCERNS FOR SEA LEVEL RISE
The disintegration of this landfast ice will not directly impact sea level rise. This is for the same reason a new iceberg, or even the collapse of an ice shelf, does not contribute much to this particular aspect of climate change. The ice was already floating before it broke away from the land, so its weight was displacing the water underneath it. Therefore, its contribution to ocean levels was already accounted for.
There is an indirect concern stemming from this event, though.
According to NASA Earth Observatory: "This summer's breakup of the sea ice in the embayment is important because — unlike the meltwater from an ice shelf, icebergs, and sea ice (already floating) — the meltwater from a glacier adds to the ocean's volume and contributes directly to sea level rise. With the sea ice now gone, "the likelihood is that backstress will be reduced on all glaciers in the Larsen B Embayment and that additional inland ice losses will be coming soon," said Shuman.
THE LARSEN ICE SHELF
The Larsen ice shelf is an expanse of thick glacial ice along the eastern shoreline of the Antarctic Peninsula. After it was completely mapped out, it was divided into four different sections — Larsen A, B, C, and D.
© Provided by The Weather NetworkSatellites capture rapid disintegration of ice in the Larsen B embaymentThis view of the Larsen A and B embayments includes annotations showing the past extents of the ice shelves, and includes an inset map of the entire Larsen ice shelf. Credit: NASA Earth Observatory
Larsen A was the northernmost of these ice shelves. It collapsed in January of 1995. Larsen B held on until 2002, before it disintegrated.
Larsen C made headlines in 2017 when iceberg A68 broke away from its leading edge in July of that year.
The largest iceberg in the world at the time, A68 ended up floating out to sea and got as far as South Georgia Island by late 2020. There, it crashed into the island shelf and then shattered into numerous pieces.
© Provided by The Weather NetworkSatellites capture rapid disintegration of ice in the Larsen B embaymentThe remainder of A-68a, along with other large pieces that also broke off of A-68, on January 11, 2021 near South Georgia Island. (NASA Earth Observatory image by Lauren Dauphin, using VIIRS data from NASA EOSDIS LANCE, GIBS/Worldview, and the Suomi National Polar-orbiting Partnership)
So far, the rest of Larsen C and all of Larsen D currently remain intact.
KAMLOOPS, BC
Protesters call for urgent action on opioid overdose crisis
Kamloops resident Angela Bigg brought the memory of her son with her to a protest calling for decriminalization and safe supply of drugs on Thursday morning (Feb. 10) amidst B.C.'s worsening overdose crisis.
From thin white string around Bigg’s neck hung a poster, pasted with photographs of her son, Casey, during his youth. Alongside those were stickers that spelled out “I Miss You” and a handwritten message Bigg had for her son.
Casey, 37, was one of 60 people who died in Kamloops in 2020 from a fatal drug overdose. In 2021, that number increased to the highest-ever 77 deaths, according to statistics released by the provincial government on Wednesday. They were among a record 2,224 people across B.C. who died from illicit drug overdoses in 2021.
Bigg said her son sought assistance for his addiction, but couldn’t get admitted to Phoenix Centre due to COVID-19 restrictions.
“We did everything we could to get him in to something [treatment program], but we couldn’t,” she told KTW.
When he died 16 months ago, Casey had been clean for two weeks, but was in pain and struggling. Bigg said he slipped up and used behind a local Tim Hortons, where he was found brain-dead. She said doctors told her, while her son was on life support, that he overdosed from a mix of fentanyl and crystal meth.
“He was a good man,” an emotional Bigg said.
On Thursday, two groups of protesters, associated with The Loop drop-in centre and Moms Stop The Harm, rallied outside the offices of Kamloops MLA s Peter Milobar (in the 600-block of Tranquille Road in North Kamloops) and Todd Stone (in the 400-block of Victoria Street downtown) demanding policy changes from government.
The rallies involved a “die-down” display, in which the protesters lay on the ground for 77 seconds — one second for each life lost to illicit drug overdoses in Kamloops last year.
About 10 people took part in the Tranquille Road demonstration, waving signs and using a bullhorn to shout slogans supporting safe supply.
Milobar’s office was closed.
Proponents of a safe illicit drugs supply say it can help prevent overdose deaths by providing access to clean, government-regulated substances as an alternative to the toxic illegal street supply, known to contain fentanyl, which is causing more than 80 per cent of deaths.
Mick Sandy, a local advocate associated with The Loop, led the North Kamloops protest.
“We need action,” Sandy said is his message to his local MLAs. “We need true, legitimate safe supply now so we can stop having these preventable deaths at an exponential rate.”
An average of 6.1 people per day in B.C. died from drug overdose deaths in 2021. Kamloops had a rate of about six to seven people a month who lost their lives.
“The lack of action, at this point, is negligent,” Sandy said. “There are evidence-based and research supported methods to assist these people that we are not acting on.”
Along with a call for a safe drug supply, those demonstrating are also urging the provincial government to increase treatment beds and pressure Ottawa on decriminalizing the simple possession of hard drugs.
Michael Potestio, Local Journalism Initiative Reporter, Kamloops This Week
Protesters call for urgent action on opioid overdose crisis
Kamloops resident Angela Bigg brought the memory of her son with her to a protest calling for decriminalization and safe supply of drugs on Thursday morning (Feb. 10) amidst B.C.'s worsening overdose crisis.
From thin white string around Bigg’s neck hung a poster, pasted with photographs of her son, Casey, during his youth. Alongside those were stickers that spelled out “I Miss You” and a handwritten message Bigg had for her son.
Casey, 37, was one of 60 people who died in Kamloops in 2020 from a fatal drug overdose. In 2021, that number increased to the highest-ever 77 deaths, according to statistics released by the provincial government on Wednesday. They were among a record 2,224 people across B.C. who died from illicit drug overdoses in 2021.
Bigg said her son sought assistance for his addiction, but couldn’t get admitted to Phoenix Centre due to COVID-19 restrictions.
“We did everything we could to get him in to something [treatment program], but we couldn’t,” she told KTW.
When he died 16 months ago, Casey had been clean for two weeks, but was in pain and struggling. Bigg said he slipped up and used behind a local Tim Hortons, where he was found brain-dead. She said doctors told her, while her son was on life support, that he overdosed from a mix of fentanyl and crystal meth.
“He was a good man,” an emotional Bigg said.
On Thursday, two groups of protesters, associated with The Loop drop-in centre and Moms Stop The Harm, rallied outside the offices of Kamloops MLA s Peter Milobar (in the 600-block of Tranquille Road in North Kamloops) and Todd Stone (in the 400-block of Victoria Street downtown) demanding policy changes from government.
The rallies involved a “die-down” display, in which the protesters lay on the ground for 77 seconds — one second for each life lost to illicit drug overdoses in Kamloops last year.
About 10 people took part in the Tranquille Road demonstration, waving signs and using a bullhorn to shout slogans supporting safe supply.
Milobar’s office was closed.
Proponents of a safe illicit drugs supply say it can help prevent overdose deaths by providing access to clean, government-regulated substances as an alternative to the toxic illegal street supply, known to contain fentanyl, which is causing more than 80 per cent of deaths.
Mick Sandy, a local advocate associated with The Loop, led the North Kamloops protest.
“We need action,” Sandy said is his message to his local MLAs. “We need true, legitimate safe supply now so we can stop having these preventable deaths at an exponential rate.”
An average of 6.1 people per day in B.C. died from drug overdose deaths in 2021. Kamloops had a rate of about six to seven people a month who lost their lives.
“The lack of action, at this point, is negligent,” Sandy said. “There are evidence-based and research supported methods to assist these people that we are not acting on.”
Along with a call for a safe drug supply, those demonstrating are also urging the provincial government to increase treatment beds and pressure Ottawa on decriminalizing the simple possession of hard drugs.
Michael Potestio, Local Journalism Initiative Reporter, Kamloops This Week
Charlie Angus's book Cobalt reveals reality of mining
“There’s something absolutely beguiling about these great mineral rushes,” Angus says.
Author of the article: Postmedia News
Publishing date :Feb 09, 2022 •
Still, there was sometimes successful pushback; It was the Cobalt Miners Union that forced the passage of Canada’s first workmen’s compensation act.
Ultimately, it’s the people, both the noble and ignoble, who drive Angus’s story. For example, a typhoid outbreak brought out the worst in an industry that continued forcing miners to defecate in the tunnels because of a refusal to provide portable toilets, thereby leading to contamination of a water supply which miners frequently had to drink. But on the heroic side there was the example of the remarkable Annie Saunders whose “hospital” played a vital role in fighting the epidemic.
“Annie Saunders appears in town from England as a single mom,” Angus marvels. “She doesn’t tell anybody that she’s a nurse, but then there’s a disaster and people need her.”
The mining culture has always fascinated Angus, the son of Scottish immigrants who came to Canada to work in the mines. “I moved to Cobalt with my own young family just in time to watch all the mines close down and we saw a lot of heartache. But I’ve always thought there was something magical about this place even during its darkest history.”
One of his favourite characters is the larger-than-life Jack Munroe — vaudeville actor, professional boxer, mining promoter and politician, the first Canadian soldier to step on the shores of France during the First World War, and the enterprising hustler who almost succeeded in setting up a heavyweight fight in Northern Ontario with the legendary Jack Johnson.
When Munroe enlisted and was sent overseas with the Princess Pats, he smuggled his beloved collie, Bobbie Burns, on board the troopship. Overseas he and Bobbie became friends with author Eric Knight who — legend has it — would make this Canadian collie the hero of his novel, Lassie Come Home, a book that launched one of the most lucrative franchises in Hollywood history.
Unlike some historians, Angus resists sanitizing the past. He gives no quarter to the coldly mercenary conduct of the mining industry, and the suffering it caused, or the complicity of other sectors of Canada’s establishment.
“What also shocked me were stories of violence,” Angus says. He was jolted by a judicial system which condoned the acquittal of a man who had murdered one prostitute and disfigured another. “Yet the jury is not going to convict him because he’s an outstanding citizen.”
Angus reserves his greatest sorrow over the most unpalatable truth of his story: “The removal of Indigenous people from their lands was the first step to gaining control of the North,” he writes. Repeatedly in this book, with respect to Indigenous betrayal, the past rises to haunt the present. “Nobody told me until recently that there had been 2,000 years of silver mining in Cobalt with Indigenous people trading across North America. How come we don’t know that story?”
Angus is haunted by the terrible story of Chief Tonene of Temagami First Nation who was credited with launching one of the North’s major gold rushes when he staked a claim in his traditional hunting ground. Rival white prospectors jumped his claim, and Tonene was unable to fight them in the courts because the Indian Act forbade him to hire a lawyer.
“The ground he’s staked becomes one of the richest gold mines in Canadian history,” Angus says. “He’s robbed of it. He cannot go to court and ends up being buried in what became a garbage dump.”
– Jamie Portman
“There’s something absolutely beguiling about these great mineral rushes,” Angus says.
Author of the article: Postmedia News
Publishing date :Feb 09, 2022 •
Charlie Angus was jolted by a judicial system that condoned the acquittal of a man who had murdered one prostitute and disfigured another.
There were the cockroach races that saw miners betting as much as a $1,000 on the outcome.
There was the day vaudeville performer Daisy Primrose walked down the street in Harem pants, a new form of female apparel so scandalous that it had been condemned by the Pope.
There’s even an appearance by a dog named Bobbie Burns who may well have been the inspiration for Hollywood’s most celebrated canine star.
So if Charlie Angus had wanted, he could easily have confined himself to delivering a robust history of Cobalt, the fabled Northern Ontario mining town in which the New Democrat MP has long lived. But although he is a born storyteller with a passion for popular history that matches the best of Pierre Berton and James H. Gray, Angus had a lot more on his mind when he set out to write his latest book, Cobalt.
He was fascinated by the contrast between legend and reality when it comes to the “wild, ragged and haunted town” that flourished in the early years of the 20thCentury as the world’s fourth largest producer of silver before sinking into an obscurity that lasted for decades until another mineral, cobalt, would rekindle interest in it.
“There’s something absolutely beguiling about these great mineral rushes,” Angus says from his Cobalt home, a rebuilt mine shaft. “They bring people from all over the world, and they’re larger-than-life characters, and every one knows it’s not going to last. It’s a really crazy real-life fantasy story, yet it’s underwritten in tragedy.”
It’s a story that sees Cobalt’s glory days launch Canada on its path to world dominance as a mining superpower, so there were numerous themes Angus wanted to pursue, and he admits ending up with several versions and going down “many rabbit holes” before he was satisfied. “When you read this book, I hope you’re taken on a journey to places you wouldn’t have expected to encounter.”
It’s an entertaining journey even revealing the reality behind the facade. Consider Cobalt’s distinguished Prospect Hotel, “four storeys tall with a large wooden-rail balcony extending out from the first floor.” Impressive for a frontier town like Cobalt — at least outwardly so. “Inside there were a multitude of tiny rooms separated by one-inch plywood. On bitterly cold nights, the wind blew through the cracks in the boards, freezing both the water jug and the chamber pot beneath the bed.” There was also a communal toilet — of sorts — in a lean-to behind the building, with an iron stove top with two holes serving as the seat.
Primitive? Oh yes. But that’s not the whole story. “If you tell somebody in Toronto in Vancouver that Cobalt had a stock exchange before they did, they would laugh out loud,” Angus says. These urbanites would be similarly incredulous to be told that Cobalt once was part of the North American vaudeville circuit and that acting legends like Beerbohm Tree and Mary Pickford played there.
Angus juggles a lot of balls in a book that is nonetheless driven by one extraordinary fact. “It was stocks from Cobalt that turned Toronto from an international backwater to an international global capital for mine financing,” Angus says. And it’s a success story accompanied by notoriety.
“Some pretty extraordinary scams and stock frauds can be traced right back to the deals that were going down in the early days of Cobalt” Furthermore, not much has changed, Angus argues. “Canada is not known as an international Boy Scout when it comes to resource extraction.”
In the early 20thCentury, Ontario’s government acted as enabler in allowing mining interests to establish fiefdoms over Cobalt and other mining towns. Conventional property rights didn’t exist which is why homeowners had no recourse if a company decided to sink a shaft in the middle of their land. Communities were not permitted by mine bosses to meet vital infrastructure needs, and mine workers — often targets of racial and ethnic hatred — were constantly exploited.
“There were decisions made that gave hugely favourable terms to the mining companies, meaning they would be paying some of the lowest taxes in the world,” Angus says. “Yet at the same time communities were left without the ability to have the kind of investments necessary to create sustainable communities when the mines shut down.”
There were the cockroach races that saw miners betting as much as a $1,000 on the outcome.
There was the day vaudeville performer Daisy Primrose walked down the street in Harem pants, a new form of female apparel so scandalous that it had been condemned by the Pope.
There’s even an appearance by a dog named Bobbie Burns who may well have been the inspiration for Hollywood’s most celebrated canine star.
So if Charlie Angus had wanted, he could easily have confined himself to delivering a robust history of Cobalt, the fabled Northern Ontario mining town in which the New Democrat MP has long lived. But although he is a born storyteller with a passion for popular history that matches the best of Pierre Berton and James H. Gray, Angus had a lot more on his mind when he set out to write his latest book, Cobalt.
He was fascinated by the contrast between legend and reality when it comes to the “wild, ragged and haunted town” that flourished in the early years of the 20thCentury as the world’s fourth largest producer of silver before sinking into an obscurity that lasted for decades until another mineral, cobalt, would rekindle interest in it.
“There’s something absolutely beguiling about these great mineral rushes,” Angus says from his Cobalt home, a rebuilt mine shaft. “They bring people from all over the world, and they’re larger-than-life characters, and every one knows it’s not going to last. It’s a really crazy real-life fantasy story, yet it’s underwritten in tragedy.”
It’s a story that sees Cobalt’s glory days launch Canada on its path to world dominance as a mining superpower, so there were numerous themes Angus wanted to pursue, and he admits ending up with several versions and going down “many rabbit holes” before he was satisfied. “When you read this book, I hope you’re taken on a journey to places you wouldn’t have expected to encounter.”
It’s an entertaining journey even revealing the reality behind the facade. Consider Cobalt’s distinguished Prospect Hotel, “four storeys tall with a large wooden-rail balcony extending out from the first floor.” Impressive for a frontier town like Cobalt — at least outwardly so. “Inside there were a multitude of tiny rooms separated by one-inch plywood. On bitterly cold nights, the wind blew through the cracks in the boards, freezing both the water jug and the chamber pot beneath the bed.” There was also a communal toilet — of sorts — in a lean-to behind the building, with an iron stove top with two holes serving as the seat.
Primitive? Oh yes. But that’s not the whole story. “If you tell somebody in Toronto in Vancouver that Cobalt had a stock exchange before they did, they would laugh out loud,” Angus says. These urbanites would be similarly incredulous to be told that Cobalt once was part of the North American vaudeville circuit and that acting legends like Beerbohm Tree and Mary Pickford played there.
Angus juggles a lot of balls in a book that is nonetheless driven by one extraordinary fact. “It was stocks from Cobalt that turned Toronto from an international backwater to an international global capital for mine financing,” Angus says. And it’s a success story accompanied by notoriety.
“Some pretty extraordinary scams and stock frauds can be traced right back to the deals that were going down in the early days of Cobalt” Furthermore, not much has changed, Angus argues. “Canada is not known as an international Boy Scout when it comes to resource extraction.”
In the early 20thCentury, Ontario’s government acted as enabler in allowing mining interests to establish fiefdoms over Cobalt and other mining towns. Conventional property rights didn’t exist which is why homeowners had no recourse if a company decided to sink a shaft in the middle of their land. Communities were not permitted by mine bosses to meet vital infrastructure needs, and mine workers — often targets of racial and ethnic hatred — were constantly exploited.
“There were decisions made that gave hugely favourable terms to the mining companies, meaning they would be paying some of the lowest taxes in the world,” Angus says. “Yet at the same time communities were left without the ability to have the kind of investments necessary to create sustainable communities when the mines shut down.”
Still, there was sometimes successful pushback; It was the Cobalt Miners Union that forced the passage of Canada’s first workmen’s compensation act.
Ultimately, it’s the people, both the noble and ignoble, who drive Angus’s story. For example, a typhoid outbreak brought out the worst in an industry that continued forcing miners to defecate in the tunnels because of a refusal to provide portable toilets, thereby leading to contamination of a water supply which miners frequently had to drink. But on the heroic side there was the example of the remarkable Annie Saunders whose “hospital” played a vital role in fighting the epidemic.
“Annie Saunders appears in town from England as a single mom,” Angus marvels. “She doesn’t tell anybody that she’s a nurse, but then there’s a disaster and people need her.”
The mining culture has always fascinated Angus, the son of Scottish immigrants who came to Canada to work in the mines. “I moved to Cobalt with my own young family just in time to watch all the mines close down and we saw a lot of heartache. But I’ve always thought there was something magical about this place even during its darkest history.”
One of his favourite characters is the larger-than-life Jack Munroe — vaudeville actor, professional boxer, mining promoter and politician, the first Canadian soldier to step on the shores of France during the First World War, and the enterprising hustler who almost succeeded in setting up a heavyweight fight in Northern Ontario with the legendary Jack Johnson.
When Munroe enlisted and was sent overseas with the Princess Pats, he smuggled his beloved collie, Bobbie Burns, on board the troopship. Overseas he and Bobbie became friends with author Eric Knight who — legend has it — would make this Canadian collie the hero of his novel, Lassie Come Home, a book that launched one of the most lucrative franchises in Hollywood history.
Unlike some historians, Angus resists sanitizing the past. He gives no quarter to the coldly mercenary conduct of the mining industry, and the suffering it caused, or the complicity of other sectors of Canada’s establishment.
“What also shocked me were stories of violence,” Angus says. He was jolted by a judicial system which condoned the acquittal of a man who had murdered one prostitute and disfigured another. “Yet the jury is not going to convict him because he’s an outstanding citizen.”
Angus reserves his greatest sorrow over the most unpalatable truth of his story: “The removal of Indigenous people from their lands was the first step to gaining control of the North,” he writes. Repeatedly in this book, with respect to Indigenous betrayal, the past rises to haunt the present. “Nobody told me until recently that there had been 2,000 years of silver mining in Cobalt with Indigenous people trading across North America. How come we don’t know that story?”
Angus is haunted by the terrible story of Chief Tonene of Temagami First Nation who was credited with launching one of the North’s major gold rushes when he staked a claim in his traditional hunting ground. Rival white prospectors jumped his claim, and Tonene was unable to fight them in the courts because the Indian Act forbade him to hire a lawyer.
“The ground he’s staked becomes one of the richest gold mines in Canadian history,” Angus says. “He’s robbed of it. He cannot go to court and ends up being buried in what became a garbage dump.”
– Jamie Portman
ONTARIO
WSIB takes claims for powder
THUNDER BAY — Miners who became ill after inhaling an aluminum-based powder mistakenly believed to protect them from exposure to silica dust can now make compensation claims to the province’s Workplace Safety and Insurance Board (WSIB).
Up until last week, the board had refused to recognize claims from workers in mines and other industries who had occasion to inhale what was called McIntyre Powder over a 35-year period until 1979.
“The theory, eventually proved false, was that inhaling the powder would protect workers’ lungs” from diseases like silicosis, a United Steelworkers union news release said on Tuesday.
“Instead, it made workers sick, and led to many deaths,” as well as cases of Parkinson’s disease.
The Workplace Safety and Insurance Board was unmoved until last week, after a relentless campaign by Sudbury resident Janice Martell to have McIntyre Powder-related ailments recognized appeared to get through to the provincial government.
According to the Ministry of Labour, in March of 2020 it received a report from a cancer specialist who “found a statistically significant increased risk of Parkinson’s disease in miners exposed to McIntyre Powder.”
A ministry spokeswoman said her department has since “made amendments to a regulation under the Workplace Safety and Insurance Act, to now formally recognize Parkinson’s disease as an occupational disease linked to work-related McIntyre Powder exposure.”
In a statement, Labour Minister Monte McNaughton said the change “will guarantee compensation for workers who have suffered unfairly as a result of exposure to McIntyre Powder.”
McNaughton said the decision “is just a start.”
“Our government will continue to make investments to help identify and recognize occupational illnesses and support those who have been injured by exposure on the job,” he added.
Martell’s father, who worked in an Elliot Lake uranium mine in the late 1970s, died in 2017.
“My dad did not live to see this day, but it is a fitting legacy to a man who always enjoyed breaking the trail . . . to make the path easier for those coming behind him,” Martell said in the United Steelworkers news release.
Carl Clutchey, Local Journalism Initiative Reporter, The Chronicle-Journal
WSIB takes claims for powder
THUNDER BAY — Miners who became ill after inhaling an aluminum-based powder mistakenly believed to protect them from exposure to silica dust can now make compensation claims to the province’s Workplace Safety and Insurance Board (WSIB).
Up until last week, the board had refused to recognize claims from workers in mines and other industries who had occasion to inhale what was called McIntyre Powder over a 35-year period until 1979.
“The theory, eventually proved false, was that inhaling the powder would protect workers’ lungs” from diseases like silicosis, a United Steelworkers union news release said on Tuesday.
“Instead, it made workers sick, and led to many deaths,” as well as cases of Parkinson’s disease.
The Workplace Safety and Insurance Board was unmoved until last week, after a relentless campaign by Sudbury resident Janice Martell to have McIntyre Powder-related ailments recognized appeared to get through to the provincial government.
According to the Ministry of Labour, in March of 2020 it received a report from a cancer specialist who “found a statistically significant increased risk of Parkinson’s disease in miners exposed to McIntyre Powder.”
A ministry spokeswoman said her department has since “made amendments to a regulation under the Workplace Safety and Insurance Act, to now formally recognize Parkinson’s disease as an occupational disease linked to work-related McIntyre Powder exposure.”
In a statement, Labour Minister Monte McNaughton said the change “will guarantee compensation for workers who have suffered unfairly as a result of exposure to McIntyre Powder.”
McNaughton said the decision “is just a start.”
“Our government will continue to make investments to help identify and recognize occupational illnesses and support those who have been injured by exposure on the job,” he added.
Martell’s father, who worked in an Elliot Lake uranium mine in the late 1970s, died in 2017.
“My dad did not live to see this day, but it is a fitting legacy to a man who always enjoyed breaking the trail . . . to make the path easier for those coming behind him,” Martell said in the United Steelworkers news release.
Carl Clutchey, Local Journalism Initiative Reporter, The Chronicle-Journal
Philippines activists ready for long battle to keep Marcos from power
MANILA (Reuters) - Petitioners seeking to bar Ferdinand Marcos Jr from the Philippines presidency said on Friday they were bent on keeping "autocratic figures" from power and would use all legal channels to stop the election frontrunner, including the Supreme Court.
Complainants failed to convince the Commission on Elections (COMELEC) to disqualify Marcos, 64, the son and namesake of the late Philippines dictator, on the grounds of his decades-old conviction for tax violations. Commissioners on Thursday said the petitions lacked merit.
Loretta Ann Rosales, a petitioner and one of thousands of victims of state brutality under the 1970s-1980s martial law of the elder Marcos, said opponents were ready to appeal to the highest court.
"All measures must be used to stop autocratic figures from winning in the polls that would contribute to the destruction of democratic rule," she said.
Opponents of political veteran Marcos see the prospect of his family returning to the presidential palace decades after it was overthrown in a people's revolt as unpalatable.
Vic Rodriguez, spokesperson for Marcos, said the petitioners should respect courts and quasi-judicial bodies "by not elevating lies that they have peddled".
The Supreme Court was required to rule on a high-profile case before the last election in 2016, involving then presidential frontrunner, Grace Poe.
It reversed COMELEC's decision The Philippine Supreme Court on Tuesday ruled that a senator who spent much of her life in the United States is eligible to run for president, reversing a decision by the election commission and putting her in line to reclaim her position as frontrunner to disqualify Poe over questions about her citizenship. Poe finished third overall.
Howard Calleja, a lawyer for one of the petitioners, will next week file a motion asking the full bench of COMELEC to overturn the ruling of its first division.
He said the decision "does not put the disqualification to a close, but further cast doubt not only on the case but on the COMELEC as well."
(Reporting by Karen Lema; Editing by Martin Petty)
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