Bank of England Adds Anti-Brexit Trade Expert to Rate-Setting Panel

David Goodman and Philip Aldrick
Thu, May 12, 2022


(Bloomberg) -- 

Swati Dhingra, a trade specialist and a vocal critic of Brexit, will join the Bank of England’s Monetary Policy Committee and bring the number of women on the panel to the most since 2005.

Dhingra, an economics professor at the London School of Economics, will start work at the UK central bank on Aug. 9, succeeding Michael Saunders, Chancellor of the Exchequer Rishi Sunak said in a statement on Thursday.

She will join a central bank at the vanguard of global interest-rate increases, with the BOE in the midst of its fastest tightening cycle since it gained independence as officials try to arrest inflation forecast to top 10% later this year.

Her appointment adds a trade expert to the BOE’s ranks as the UK tries to navigate a economy beset with supply-chain issues and continuing fallout following its exit from the European Union.

Dhingra’s position on monetary policy isn’t known, but could prove pivotal as the MPC tries to strike a balance between tackling inflation and supporting growth. Saunders, who she is replacing, is currently the most hawkish member of the committee and was in a minority seeking a half-point rate increase this month rather than the quarter-point move that transpired.

“Swati Dhingra’s experience in international economics will bring valuable new expertise to the MPC,” Sunak said. BOE Governor Andrew Bailey also highlighted that the institution would “benefit from her extensive research in international economics.”

Dhingra has been a critic of Brexit, and in 2019 wrote an article for UK in a Changing Europe entitled “UK economy since Brexit vote: slower growth, lower productivity, weaker pound.”

Writing in the London Review of Books in 2017, she said that “counting on future trade deals with countries like China, India and the US to replace our existing economic ties to the EU is wishful thinking.”

The appointment brings the number of women on the nine-member MPC to three, along with Catherine Mann and Silvana Tenreyro. That’s the highest number since 2005, and the most the panel has ever had in its 25-year existence.

Exclusive: Ontario Teachers to invest up to $1 billion in Macquarie offshore wind unit



The logo of Australia's Macquarie Group adorns a desk in the reception area of its Sydney office headquarters

Isla Binnie and Susanna Twidale
Thu, May 12, 2022

MADRID/LONDON (Reuters) - Major Canadian pension fund Ontario Teachers' Pension Plan has agreed to invest up to $1 billion in a new offshore wind business launched by Australia's Macquarie Group Ltd to develop projects around the world, the companies told Reuters on Thursday.

Soaring numbers of turbines planted off windy coastlines account for a large chunk of the renewable energy capacity targets set by countries such as the United States and Britain as part of a global drive to reduce planet-warming carbon emissions.

Pension and infrastructure funds often buy stakes in renewable energy generation projects, tempted by the predictable long-term returns, but it is less common for them to assume the risk of projects that have either not yet been built or not yet secured agreements from consumers to buy their power.

Under a deal with Macquarie's newly launched offshore wind developer, Corio Generation, Ontario Teachers' will invest up to $1 billion into the development of 14 fixed-bottom and floating wind farms in South Korea, Taiwan, Japan, Ireland and Britain, representing around 9 gigawatts of capacity.

Chris Ireland, Ontario Teachers’ managing director for Greenfield Investments and Renewables told Reuters there were benefits to getting involved earlier along in the process.

"It allows us to get access to good projects, that we can invest in for the long term without being in competition with others," he said.

Ontario Teachers' Pension Plan is one of Canada's biggest pension funds, managing total assets worth around $185 billion.

With demand in the space fierce, several deals for the acquisition of offshore wind projects have attracted hefty premiums in recent years such as Equinor's sale to BP of a 50% stake in two U.S. wind farms in 2020 which booked the Norwegian firm a $1 billion profit.

Denmark's Orsted last month agreed to sell half of the 1.3 GW Hornsea 2 project in Britain, to a French consortium for 3 billion pounds ($3.69 billion).

“The economics of doing development can be more attractive than buying operating projects," Ireland said.

Competition is increasing in the sector as governments around the world push to reduce carbon emissions from their power grids and reduce reliance on energy imports from Russia.

"We are almost at the start of an exponential growth curve," Corio Chief Executive Jonathan Cole told Reuters.

Europe, one of the leading regions for offshore wind invested 41 billion euros ($43.21 billion) in new wind farms in 2021, data from WindEurope showed.

($1 = 0.9489 euros)

($1 = 0.8123 pounds)

(Reporting By Isla Binnie in Madrid and Susanna Twidale in London; Editing by Marguerita Choy)

‘We’re very excited’: Canada’s clean energy firms eye soaring EU electricity prices

Jeff Lagerquist
Wed, May 11, 2022,

The European Union is reportedly preparing fast-track permits for clean energy projects to help replace Russian fossil fuels. REUTERS/Andreas Mortensen

Canadian clean energy producers say they’re benefiting from European electricity rates that prompted some governments to roll out measures to shield consumers and businesses from rising prices.

Kingsey Falls, Que.-based Boralex (BLX.TO) and Toronto-based Northland Power (NPI.TO) reported first-quarter financial results on Wednesday. In both cases, management noted the dual impacts of high electricity rates in Europe, as well as the push among nations on the continent to sever energy ties to Russia.

“We’re very excited about the new opportunities that are arising as a result of rising electricity prices, and the European push for energy security,” Northland CEO Mike Crawley told analysts on a post-earnings conference call on Wednesday. He said “higher market prices” from its Gemini wind farm off the coast of the Netherlands helped the company top analyst expectations in its latest quarter.

Boralex CEO Patrick Decostre pointed to a “sharp rise in energy prices” in France, mainly attributed to extended outages at many of the country’s nuclear reactors. The company is France’s largest independent producer of onshore wind power with more than 60 farms in operation scattered across the country, according to company’s website.

“The other good news is that the price in the UK has also increased a lot. So the demand for electricity is even higher,” Decostre said on a call with analysts. Boralex has plans for a 90 megawatt wind project in the highlands of Scotland.

EU nations including Germany, France, Italy and Spain have announced plans to cut taxes or issue rebates in a bid to soften the blow of higher energy prices. At the same time, the 27-member bloc is reportedly preparing fast-track permits for renewable projects to help replace Russian fossil fuels.

“Countries such as Germany, the UK, and the Netherlands have specifically higher targets for off-shore wind,” Crawley said. “Northland is well-positioned, we believe, to achieve these objectives.”

Toronto-listed Northland shares climbed 1.81 per cent to $38.34 at 1:45 p.m. ET on Wednesday. Boralex added 1.66 per cent to $38.04.

Scotiabank no longer a member of oil and gas lobby group CAPP


Wed, May 11, 2022



CALGARY — Scotiabank is no longer a member of the oil and gas lobby group Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers.

The bank has had a long-running relationship with CAPP and was the title sponsor of the group's annual energy symposium for many years.

Scotiabank declined to provide a reason for its exit, but confirmed in an email that it did not renew its associate membership in CAPP in 2022.

Scotiabank was the only major Canadian bank to hold a membership in CAPP.

At its most recent annual general meeting last month, Scotiabank came under fire from shareholders for not moving fast enough on climate change.

Greenpeace activists also attempted to disrupt the meeting, criticizing Scotiabank for its membership in CAPP and its financing of the fossil fuels sector.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published May 11, 2022.

Companies in this story: (TSX:BNS)

The Canadian Press

Canada banks face 'greenwashing' claims as oil & gas firms obtain sustainable financing

 

 Power-generating windmill turbines are seen during sunset in Bourlon

 A male elk crosses the Yellowhead Highway in Jasper National Park, Alberta


Nichola Saminather
Thu, May 12, 2022,

TORONTO (Reuters) - For banks in Canada, one of the world's largest oil producers, it's not easy being green.

In the past two years, Canadian banks have increased the amount of sustainability-linked financing (SLF) they extend to oil and gas clients. SLF refers to financing whose cost changes when certain environmental, social and governance (ESG) requirements are met at the company level but does not require the funds themselves to be used for climate-friendly purposes.

This has led to accusations of "greenwashing," with some environmental groups and investors claiming banks are using SLF merely to pretend to lower their carbon footprint rather than take meaningful steps in that direction.

If the use of financing instruments that do not require a reduction in overall carbon emissions keeps growing, it could delay banks' readiness for Canada's transition to a low-carbon economy, leading to higher risk and increased capital requirements to offset these.

The central bank and financial regulator have already warned that a lack of preparedness by the banks could expose them and investors to "sudden and large losses."

"This is a dangerous path to go down," said Angus Wong, campaign strategist at nonprofit environmental group SumOfUs, which represents thousands of Canadian bank investors. "These are just loans and bonds and adding one word like 'sustainability' and adding it to sustainable financing numbers ... really smacks of greenwashing."

The issue is especially pertinent in Canada, where SLF accounts for a bigger proportion of all sustainable financing than globally, as it offers a green option for the country’s extractive industries that typically cannot use more specific tools like so-called green bonds.

Sustainable financing is mostly made up of two kinds of products: SLF, and use-of-proceeds tools like green bonds, which must be utilized for environmentally friendly activities.

But the flexibility of the former means the financing terms can even allow for increases to emissions, which many critics say enables heavy emitters to lay a false veneer of sustainability over business as usual.

Many of the banks - including Royal Bank of Canada, Toronto-Dominion Bank and Bank of Montreal - have said that an orderly transition to a net-zero economy could take years and that the oil and gas industry needs ongoing support to meet continued demand as energy alternatives such as wind and solar are developed.

Net-zero emissions refers to the goal of emitting no greenhouse gases through human activities or offsetting them through processes or technologies that capture them before they are released into the atmosphere.

With increased focus on the transition to net-zero emissions, the use globally of sustainability-linked instruments (SLIs) more than quadrupled in 2021, according to Refinitiv data. In Canada's nascent market, their use grew nearly 20 times from 2020.

Sustainability-linked bonds (SLBs) have made up 11.2% of all sustainable bonds in Canada since the start of 2021, versus 9.8% globally, according to Refinitiv data. Energy companies issued a third of this.

Canadian companies' nearly $31 billion of sustainability-linked loans (SLLs) accounted for 90% of all sustainable loans in the same period, compared with 85% globally. Traditional energy companies made up 10% of these in Canada, from none in 2020.

Although Canadian banks do not currently face charges for funding high emitters, authorities have said climate disclosures will be required from 2024 and have hinted at future capital requirements.

'GOLD RUSH MENTALITY'

Canada is the world's fourth-biggest oil producer and sixth-largest natural gas producer, with the industry accounting for about 5% of gross domestic product.

Canadian banks, among the biggest Banking on Climate Chaosfinanciers of fossil fuels globally, are treading a fine line between their net-zero commitments and their pledges to continue supporting oil and gas clients.

The banks are incentivized to boost sustainable financing numbers because the government's C$9.1 billion emissions reduction plan and the growing popularity of green financing have created a "gold rush" mentality, said Matt Price, director of corporate engagement for Investors for Paris Compliance (IPC).

Recent SLB issuances by pipeline operator Enbridge Inc and oil producer Tamarack Valley Energy Ltd have shone a spotlight on the issue.

Their SLBs had two features that often draw criticism: a focus on cuts to emissions per unit of production, called intensity targets, rather than total emissions, and the absence of reduction targets for the biggest source of emissions, indirect ones from the company's value chain, called Scope 3 emissions.

Tamarack's issuance, as well as a previous SLL facility, funded acquisitions that would increase its oil production.

The use of intensity targets over absolute ones is due to continued growth in end-demand in some sectors like power, said Lindsay Patrick, head of ESG at RBC Capital Markets.

Scope 3 emissions are omitted from many companies' reduction goals because of a lack of data accuracy, methodology differences and little control over end demand, she said.

As regulatory focus grows, "we will all just become much more fluent in the language of greenhouse gas emissions," which will lead to better alignment of what ESG-focused investors want and what companies provide, Patrick said.

Canada's other major banks either declined to comment or did not respond to requests for comment.

If an oil company commits only to reducing the emissions intensity of its operations, which would exclude Scope 3 emissions, "we would not consider that to be a credible sustainability-linked instrument," said Kevin Ranney, senior vice president of corporate solutions at Sustainalytics.

"A credible SLB needs to include at least one (requirement) that points to the transition of the company's business model," he said.

Intensity-based targets are a "valid and recognized" way to reduce emissions, allowing the company to focus first on improving its assets' efficiency, an Enbridge spokesperson said, adding its 2050 target is focused on absolute emissions.

There is no current guidance on what constitutes Scope 3 emissions for the midstream sector, he said.

Tamarack did not respond to a request for comment.

To be sure, most bank investors do not oppose the provision of sustainable financing to traditional energy companies. A shareholder proposal brought by IPC at Royal Bank's April shareholder meeting calling for an end to the practice received only 9% of votes in favor.

"Canada has an oil and gas industry that needs significant injection of capital in order to reduce its emissions," said Jamie Bonham, NEI Investments' director of corporate engagement.

Nevertheless, "I don't think it should all be ... included in the same (sustainable financing) bucket," he said. "The current blurring of the lines ... is what is leading to claims of greenwashing."

($1 = 1.3019 Canadian dollars)

(Reporting by Nichola Saminather in Toronto; Additional reporting by Nia Williams in Calgary and Simon Jessop in London; Editing by Denny Thomas and Matthew Lewis)

Liberals spend $3.5M on abortion access projects as U.S. puts issue back in spotlight


Wed, May 11, 2022,



OTTAWA — The Liberal government is spending $3.5 million on two projects to improve abortion access in Canada, as the re-emergence of the landmark Roe v. Wade case in the United States brings renewed attention to the issue on both sides of the border.

The funding stems from a year-old budget pledge to spend $45 million over three years to help organizations make sexual and reproductive information and services more available. Advocates said last week that none of the money had been paid out yet.

Health Minister Jean-Yves Duclos told a news conference Wednesday that the legal battle has been won in Canada and its regulatory framework is strong.

"And yet for too many Canadians, access to abortion remains a significant challenge. Access — that is where our efforts should be focused, and that is why we are here today," he said.

Duclos was joined by Women and Gender Equality Minister Marci Ien, who said those working to provide sexual and reproductive health services are very familiar with the barriers that youth, racialized, LGBTQ and rural-residing people face when seeking abortion.

"No one should be denied an abortion because it is too far to travel or too difficult to co-ordinate an appointment. We know that we have to do better," Ien said.

Ien said the news of the leaked U.S. Supreme Court draft decision that would overturn the right to an abortion south of the border made her feel "sick."

Action Canada for Sexual Health and Rights will use the federal money to expand programs that provide accurate information about sexual and reproductive health and referrals, as well as help cover women's travel and accommodation costs.

The National Abortion Federation will use funding to give women seeking abortion services financial and logistical help, as well as train health-care providers to administer those services.

"These investments reflect our belief that women and women alone have the right to make decisions about their bodies, as well as our unequivocal commitment to ensure comprehensiveness and accessible reproductive health care for all in Canada," said Duclos.

The Liberals chose to make the abortion access funding announcement as well as a separate announcement on gun restrictions on Wednesday — the same day the Conservatives are holding their official English leadership debate in Edmonton.

Abortion access and gun control are both issues the Liberals have long used successfully as wedges against the Conservatives during elections.

Liberal Judy Sgro didn’t disagree when asked if she thought there was still a way to use them to drive a wedge against the Liberals main opponents.

“Of course there is," said the veteran Toronto MP on her way into the Liberal caucus meeting Wednesday.

Trudeau said the announcements are both things the government had been working on for a long time because “these are things that matter to Canadians.”

But asked whether it was just a coincidence they happened to be bringing both topics up the day of a Conservative leadership debate, Trudeau demurred.

“We continue to work on all these issues as we will, but if the Conservatives want to talk about these things, I think it would be a very good idea for Canadians to know where their perspectives are,” he said.

Asked about the timing of the abortion funding announcement, Duclos said the government has been working with Action Canada and the National Abortion Federation for many months.

Ien added: "It is never a bad day to talk about women's rights in our country and the right to choose in this country. It is never a bad day to do that."

The announcement also came a day before an annual anti-abortion March for Life rally on Parliament Hill.

Anti-abortion group Campaign Life Coalition spoke Wednesday in front of the Supreme Court of Canada ahead of Thursday's rally, which typically attracts thousands.

Pete Baklinski, director of communications for the coalition, said the leaked U.S. Supreme Court document has made the issue of abortion "suddenly explode" in Canada.

Josie Luetke, youth co-coordinator, said the coalition expects that Roe v. Wade will eventually be overturned, representing one step toward "abolishing abortions" in the United States and across the world, including in Canada.

The Liberals promised last fall to bring in new regulations solidifying access to abortion services as a requirement for federal funding under the Canada Health Act, but Trudeau last week raised the spectre of doing that in legislation instead. That could make it more difficult for future governments to make adjustments.

On Wednesday, Trudeau said the government is still looking at the best way to proceed, noting there are experts who say legislation is best and others who think it is not the way to go.

The prime minister is "rightly so" keeping options open to have the ability to move quickly in a fluid situation, said Ien, "as we keep a close eye on what is happening."

The $45-million fund for organizations providing sexual and reproductive health services and information was first announced in the 2021 budget. The budget projected $16 million would already be allocated by now.

Advocates said while the money is welcome, more permanent funding for sexual and reproductive health care is needed.

Health Canada said nine contribution agreements worth $15.2 million have been signed, including these two announced for the first time Wednesday that involve access to abortion.

There are another five projects involving LGBTQ communities and two addressing youth.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published May 11, 2022.

---

This story was produced with the financial assistance of the Meta and Canadian Press News Fellowship.

Erika Ibrahim, The Canadian Press

A new earthquake warning system will prepare Canada for dangerous shaking


Shona L.van Zijll de Jong, 

Adjunct Professor,

 Geological Sciences and Engineering, 

Queen's University, Ontario

THE CONVERSATION
Wed, May 11, 2022

Damaged wood houses after the San Francisco Earthquake, April 18, 1906. (Shutterstock)

Large earthquakes can wreak enormous violence upon lives, livelihoods, infrastructure and the environment. High-density urban populations in the relatively small, seismically active areas of British Columbia and the Québec City-Montréal-Ottawa corridor leaves residents extremely vulnerable to earthquakes.

A 2013 report commissioned by the Insurance Bureau of Canada notes that “a major earthquake would have a significant economic impact regionally, and cause a domino effect on the economy of Canada, with major impacts on critical infrastructure, such as roads, electricity, communication and agriculture, public assets, residences and much more.”

It concluded that a 9.0-magnitude earthquake in British Columbia would rack up almost $75 billion in costs, and a 7.1-magnitude earthquake in the Québec City-Montréal-Ottawa corridor would cost almost $61 billion.

Canada does not have an earthquake early warning system to provide alerts to the 10 million people who live in these areas — or a national education initiative to develop an earthquake-aware culture. But that will soon change.
10 million at risk

Canada’s most active seismic zones fall into three main areas:

Charlevoix-Kamouraska seismic zone, along the St. Lawrence River in southeastern Québec.

Cascadia Subduction Zone, stretching from the north end of Vancouver Island to Cape Mendocino, Calif., and connected to the Queen Charlotte Fault, from Haida Gwaii northward along the Alaska coast.

Baffin Island and the Boothia and Ungava peninsulas in the Arctic, due to post-glacial rebound, where the ground slowly rises as glaciers melt.

Seismologists forecast significant shaking for Québec (Montréal, Québec City, Rivière-du-Loup), Ontario (Ottawa, Toronto) and British Columbia (Vancouver and Victoria) in the future. But earthquake prediction timelines are an imprecise science.

For example, the recurrence interval for a large earthquake in the Pacific Northwest is about 500 years — there have been seven in the past 3,500 years. Seismologists say there’s a 30 per cent chance of a megathrust earthquake — a very powerful quake that occurs at a subduction zone — in this fault zone in the next 50 years. But earthquakes are quasi-random — they don’t occur at regular time intervals.

Read more: Contrary to popular belief, Eastern Canada is more at risk of earthquakes than perceived

In my work with communities in New Zealand, Samoa and Nepal that have experienced lethal earthquakes, I’ve learned about individuals’ heightened risk awareness after an earthquake. Their stories taught me that time lost is lives lost, and that those who took protective action survived.

This life-risk awareness is the foundation of an earthquake early warning system. With only seconds of advance warning, people can take protective action such as drop, cover and hold on. But developing an earthquake-aware culture can take time.

Earthquake-prone communities often experience fatalities, anxiety and fear, and widespread damage to homes, infrastructure and economies. A community with an earthquake-aware culture has grasped lessons from seismology, social science and economics, painfully aware of what damages and losses it might experience.

Developing an earthquake-aware culture relies on the data collected by seismologists. Their interpretations help us understand how local fault lines will shake during an earthquake, how often the shaking has occurred in a location and how fast the shockwaves might travel.
2024: All systems go

In March, Natural Resources Canada set up an earthquake-monitoring station at the Horseshoe Bay ferry terminal in West Vancouver, B.C., the first station in what will become a national early earthquake warning system by 2024.

The 1925 Charlevoix-Kamouiraska earthquake was felt all the way in Virginia and along the Mississippi River. It damaged several towns and cities along the St. Lawrence River and the aftershocks lasted for weeks. (Natural Resources Canada)

The system uses the same software as the early-warning system located along the U.S. West Coast. It aims to reduce the number of injuries, the cost of damage and losses, and the impact to critical infrastructure operations.

Millions of people — and the Canadian economy — could benefit from the early earthquake alert system. Once it is fully operational, it should provide five to nine seconds advance warning to those in Haida Gwaii, Queen Charlotte and Masset, B.C., for ruptures in the Queen Charlotte Fault, and 43 to 91 seconds for the mainland towns of Bella Bella, Prince Rupert and Kitimat, B.C. In Québec, a repeat of the 1988 Saguenay earthquake would offer 84 seconds advance warning for Montréal and 29 seconds for Québec City.

How people will respond to the alerts remains unknown. But Natural Resources Canada has funded the University of Calgary to work with the U.S. Geological Survey and the Incorporated Research Institutions for Seismology to learn from their experience of building an earthquake-aware culture, as well as with other nations, including Japan, China, Turkey, Greece and Italy.
Challenges and next steps

By 2024, the Canadian earthquake early-warning system will have more than 400 land-based sensors deployed throughout Ontario, Québec and British Columbia. It will send the alerts to radio, television, internet and cellular networks, allowing people to take action quickly.

The advance notice is meant to avert deaths. A mere 10 to 90 seconds warning could save lives, protect infrastructure and utilities. Researchers, however, still need a better understanding of how Canadians will respond to these alerts.

Vancouver Island’s historic earthquake was a 7.3 magnitude event that occurred at 10:13 a.m. on June 23, 1946. It damaged buildings in nearby communities, including the Bank of Montreal in Port Alberni. (NRCan)

For example, Canada’s earthquake hazard maps suggest there are two widely separated seismically active areas: one in Ontario, Québec and New Brunswick, and the other in British Columbia. But each location will suffer different types of damage and losses after a large earthquake.

These maps give the erroneous impression that the earthquake risk applies to everyone equally. My preliminary research shows distinct geological, political, economic and emergency management contexts between Eastern Canada and Western Canada.

For example, those in Eastern Canada are very vulnerable to seismic hazards: The soft soils in the Charlevoix-Kamouraska seismic zone amplify ground motion and the heritage housing cannot withstand shaking. There’s also low participation in earthquake preparedness exercises.

According to a 2017 report by Swiss Re, 65 per cent of home owners in Vancouver and Victoria have purchased residential property earthquake insurance. In contrast, in the Charlevoix–Kamouraska seismic zone, only two per cent of home owners in Québec City and five per cent in metropolitan Montréal have residential property earthquake insurance.

The ultimate goal of the earthquake early warning system is to ensure that those most at risk — the disabled, elderly, very young, caregivers and those living in remote rural areas — have practical knowledge of what to do — and what not to do — during an earthquake.

This article is republished from The Conversation, a nonprofit news site dedicated to sharing ideas from academic experts. It was written by: Shona L.van Zijll de Jong, Queen's University, Ontario.

Read more:
Why some earthquakes are so deadly

Too little, too late? The devastating consequences of natural disasters must inform building codes

Shona L.van Zijll de Jong receives funding from Department of Geoscience, University of Calgary

BUY CHAPMANS ICE CREAM

Ontario ice cream maker tarred by 'lies' from anti-vaxxers, this time after doctor's 'nice' tweet

Wed, May 11, 2022

Ashley Chapman, chief operating officer of Chapman's Ice Cream, says his company has been tarred with falsehoods on social media after an Ontario doctor praised the company for being a good corporate citizen. (Chapman's Ice Cream - image credit)

One of Canada's most iconic brands of ice cream has found itself in the eye of a social media firestorm after an Ontario doctor's tweet became the target of anti-vaxxers.

Chapman's Ice Cream is one of Canada's best-known brands in dessert products, manufactured at its family-owned Markdale, Ont., plant, about a two-hour drive northwest of Toronto.

The company has long positioned itself as a good corporate citizen, offering to buy a neighbourhood school to keep children of employees close to home, offering freezer space for the government's COVID-19 vaccination efforts, and keeping unvaccinated employees on staff at the height of the COVID-19 pandemic so long as they took two rapid tests a week.

Now, the company is embroiled in a controversy over a tweet from Dr. Sohail Gandhi, who was out getting ice cream for his wife on Mother's Day.

Doctor's ice cream tweet garners 'insults'

"I would not have expected the response I got," said Gandhi, a family physician based in Stayner and a past president of the Ontario Medical Association.

"I baked a strawberry pie for my wife for Mother's Day and I needed some ice cream. So I went to the store, I happened to see Chapman's and I said, 'Hey, this is a good corporate citizen. I should support them,' so I tweeted about them."

The tweet racked up thousands of likes and hundreds of comments, and while many of them were supportive, a number were critical and even downright hateful.

"Some of the comments were basically insults," Dr. Ghandi said. "What I was surprised about was there were some people making allegations about the way Chapman's ran their business without having the facts to prove them."

Those tweets — from allegations of firing employees who refused to get vaccinated, to misinformation about what the company puts in its ice cream — are lies, according to Ashley Chapman, the company's chief operating officer.

A lot of these people who didn't get the vaccine, I know them, I know their families, I know they're good people. - Ashley Chapman

"A nice doctor tweets something really nice about our product and suddenly all these really nasty people come back onto the scene," he said, referring to the fact his company has seen online backlash before, when it offered vaccinated employees a financial incentive.

"We were very concerned because we live in a small rural area, and a lot of these people who didn't get the vaccine, I know them, I know their families, I know they're good people.

"Being accused of segregation, medical fascism and some other insane things that people have been calling us, it just seems sad to be honest with you."

Chapman said he didn't want to let good people go, so he came up with a compromise: they could still report to work unvaccinated, but had to submit to a rapid test twice a week to keep others from getting sick.

Vaccinated workers, on the other hand, would receive a raise of a dollar an hour because the company didn't have to pay for any tests.

'We're not bad guys in this situation'

Once pandemic health restrictions ended, Chapman said, he raised the unvaccinated workers' wages so they were on par with their vaccinated counterparts, and bought a PCR test machine so all workers could self-diagnose if they had any unusual symptoms.

Chapman said he doesn't understand why a company that makes ice cream has become a political lightning rod, especially when it has put so much back into the community.

"We're just decent people. We're just trying to make a good product for a fair price. We always treat our community and our employees well, and we're not the bad guys in this situation. How suddenly ice cream gets to be a political thing is just silly."

Companies going public about vaccine policies

However, "a political thing" is exactly what vaccines have become, regardless if it's coming from a manufacturer of something as apolitical as ice cream, according to Alison Meek, an associate professor of history at King's University College in London, Ont., who studies cults and conspiracy theories, including the anti-vaccine movement.

Shutterstock

"I think these days there is no way to engage in this conversation about vaccines without it becoming politicized."

Meek said if companies want to be public in any way about their vaccination policies, they have to expect the conversation to become politicized, especially when it involves a company as well known as Chapman's Ice Cream.

That's because those who refuse to get vaccinated, Meek said, now portray themselves on social media as victims on a scale akin to some of the most persecuted groups in modern history.

"They are the new African Americans of the civil rights movement or Jews in the Holocaust because they refuse to submit," Meek said.

"Of course, it's ludicrous. Your choice not to be vaccinated is completely different from what we saw with Jews in the Holocaust or African Americans because of the colour of their skin, but that's just the age we live in."

Australia's #MeToo puts miners and ministers in crosshairs of history

The political response to revelations of workplace harassment is a white-hot issue in the run-up to a May 21 national election

Tourists walk around the forecourt of Australia's Parliament House in Canberra

By Byron Kaye and Praveen Menon

Wed, May 11, 2022,

SYDNEY (Reuters) - Australia's mighty #MeToo wave is piling pressure on mining and political leaders who are preparing to face a reckoning over sexual harassment scandals stretching from the arid Outback to Parliament House.

Over the past 18 months, thousands of women have exposed a culture of bullying and abuse in mining, the country's economic engine, as well as other workplaces, provoking public outrage and pledges of decisive action from politicians and executives.

Matters are now coming to a head.

The political response to revelations of workplace harassment is a white-hot issue in the run-up to a May 21 national election, with the ruling conservative coalition itself assailed by accusations of sexual impropriety and poor handling of an alleged rape case inside the parliament building in Canberra.

Meanwhile, mining companies are bracing for the publication next month of a report by Western Australia into sexual harassment at their operations in the state, one widely expected to zero in on their internal handling of complaints.

"Survivors of sexual misconduct should no longer live in fear, or shame, or silence," said Elizabeth Broderick, a former Australian sex discrimination commissioner. "When one woman speaks, others will follow. I call on those who lead in the mining and resources sector to listen and learn from these stories and to step up with strong action."

Reuters interviewed six women who said they had experienced sexual harassment or bullying at Australian mining sites in the past 18 months. Most of the alleged incidents were after Western Australia launched its highly publicised inquiry last August, putting the industry on notice to clean up its act.

Kylie-Jayne Schippers, a kitchen and maintenance worker at a remote mine owned by Adani Group was fired in December 2021, two days after lodging a complaint of sexual harassment and bullying that she said left her afraid to enter the site's communal dining room, according to copies of the complaint and termination letter reviewed by Reuters.

Schippers filed the formal complaint to her employer, French services contractor Sodexo, on Dec. 20 saying that an unknown person had circulated a note in the camp, falsely claiming to be from her, offering to grant a male engineer sexual favours at the site in exchange for favourable treatment.

On Dec. 22, she was fired for "failure to adhere to reasonable and lawful managerial instructions", according to her termination letter from Sodexo. The letter said a review of her complaint concluded "no finding of bullying or harassment was substantiated".

"I was scared, had anxiety through the roof, depression," said Schippers, 48, adding the experience drove her to leave the industry. "They've done nothing except swept it under the carpet and got rid of me so they don't have to deal with it."

Sodexo said Schippers' complaint "was urgently investigated before being resolved", and that her "employment was later terminated for reasons unrelated to the grievance".

Adani, which has renamed its Australian unit Bravus, said its staff had assisted Schippers during her experience and had made witness statements for Sodexo's investigation. However, since the investigation was finalised, "this now a matter for the contractor and the employee", it added.

'NO FEAR, SHAME, SILENCE'

Mining underpins the economy, with the industry accounting for 11% of national output and Western Australia providing more than half of the world's iron ore. Adani's Carmichael mine in Queensland is one of the world's largest untapped coal reserves.

But the sector's workforce of 150,000 is predominantly - five-sixths - male, a gender mix that's little improved since its beginnings over a century ago.

Melissa McLellan, who was a maintenance supervisor for mining giant BHP Group in Western Australia, said she filed a gender discrimination complaint in June 2021 after being passed over for increased responsibilities. Three days later, she was suspended from duties for a "fitness for work" assessment because she looked tired, a potential safety risk, according to documents and transcripts reviewed by Reuters.

"It's jobs for the boys," said McLellan, 37, who quit in January, citing bullying. "You're just second class."

BHP said McLellan's allegations of bullying and harassment were investigated promptly and found to be "not substantiated". A spokesperson added that the company was committed to creating a safe environment for people to speak up "and we regret that Ms McLellan did not have a positive experience with us".

Most of the women who spoke to Reuters, including McLellan and Schippers, said their lawyers had filed, or were preparing to file, claims for compensation from the companies in question with the Fair Work Commission, a national workplace tribunal.

The FWC declined to comment on individual cases.

Such cases comprise just a sliver of the industry's workforce. They nonetheless chime with a report published in February by leading miner Rio Tinto into its own culture that detailed an environment of bullying, harassment and racism - abuse described by CEO Jakob Stausholm as "systemic".

That review, conducted by former discrimination commissioner Broderick and informed by the experiences and views of more than 10,000 employees, found that nearly 30% of women had experienced sexual harassment at work, with 21 women reporting actual or attempted rape or sexual assault.

WOMEN VOTERS TO THE FORE

The country's political response to sexual harassment and discrimination is firmly under the public microscope.

Political commentators say a national furore over workplace harassment and discrimination have been a major cause of a decline in support for Prime Minister Scott Morrison's government among women, with opposition politicians and equality campaigners accusing the administration of shying away from necessary reforms.

In early 2021, female voters were evenly divided between the government and the opposition Labor party. By April this year, less than 40% of women planned to vote for Prime Minister Scott Morrison's government, according to pollster https://bit.ly/3LX7AH2 Roy Morgan.

The case of alleged rape in parliament, in which a former staffer has been charged with sexually assaulting a colleague in a ministerial office in March 2019, sparked nationwide protests. Morrison and the government subsequently issued a public apology for the treatment of women in Australia.

The former staffer denies the allegation and the case will be in court later this year.

Equality advocates want mining companies to be stripped of their powers to internally investigate complaints of bullying and sexual harassment, and for an independent oversight body to be established instead.

The federal government has acted on some recommendations from the Sex Discrimination Commissioner in 2020 to crack down on harassment in workplaces, but not all, and says existing laws should already cover many types of complaints.

The Minerals Council of Australia, an industry body, says it supports giving the Australian Human Rights Commission power to investigate sexual discrimination in workplaces, but with "carefully defined" parameters to ensure procedural fairness and avoid reputational damage.

A process for people to get a "stop sexual harassment" order – similar to a restraining order - from the Fair Work Commission against alleged offending parties in a workplace has proven ineffective since it began in November.

In the first three months of the program's existence, 17 people applied for the orders but none were granted, the Commission told Reuters, the first time those figures have been disclosed publicly.

A spokesperson for the FWC declined to comment on why it hadn't issued a single anti-sexual harassment order but noted that some complaints "may still be open or may have been finalised without an order being made ... or withdrawn".

University of Technology law professor Karen O'Connell, who advised the government commission that recommended the creation of the orders, said the orders were too narrow because they failed to intervene when a complainant had quit or when an accused harasser was moved elsewhere in the company.

"Those stop sexual harassment orders are still really important and they need to exist but they are not going to cover the vast majority of situations that people are in when they're being sexually harassed," said O'Connell, adding that laws putting a "positive duty" on companies to create a safe environment would be more effective.

"It's ridiculous to require an individual to step up and take on all of that system themselves."

($1 = 1.4370 Australian dollars)

(Reporting by Byron Kaye and Praveen Menon in Sydney; Editing by Pravin Char)

Healthy young adults on P.E.I. lived as if they had chronic illness during pandemic, researchers say


Wed, May 11, 2022

UPEI Canada Research Chair Caroline Ritter and Gemma Postill, a PhD candidate at the University of Toronto, looked at why healthy, young adults living in a relatively low-risk province like P.E.I. were lining up in droves to get tested for COVID-19 around December 2020. (Steve Bruce/CBC - image credit)

Young people on P.E.I. were so severely impacted by the social circumstances and policy regulations around managing the COVID-19 pandemic that they lived life as if they were ill even if they weren't, according to new research.

The research project — led by UPEI Canada Research Chair Caroline Ritter and Gemma Postill, a PhD candidate at the University of Toronto — examined why healthy, young adults in a relatively low-risk province like P.E.I. were lining up in droves to get tested for COVID-19 around December 2020.

The researchers examined the motivation to get tested, and found young Islanders felt profound negative effects from the virus regardless of whether they contracted it or not.

"With the real virus, you might have a fever or you might have a cough, those kind of symptoms. But what we found is kind of like when you're diagnosed with a chronic disease," said Postill.

"Living in the pandemic really shaped the day-to-day activities."

Evan Mitsui/CBC

Altered behaviours

Postill said young people were shaping their dreams and career goals around the pandemic as if they were ill.

"They changed their career because they wanted more stability in a way that one might if they were diagnosed with a chronic condition," said Postill.

The researchers found young people were prioritizing getting tested over going to work and were rearranging their days due to pandemic considerations.

"Living in the pandemic really shaped the day-to-day activities." - Gemma Postill, lead author and PhD candidate at the University of Toronto

The severe downturn of mental health proved to be another shared experience for many young adults on P.E.I.

Postill quoted one participant who said his mental state during the pandemic was the worst it's ever been.

"When you're so young and you maybe haven't had all these other lived experiences ... this really is kind of the mentally worst or the most difficulty that a lot of them had experienced," she said.

Risk factors

The research saw young people complied with public health restrictions because they were motivated by the moral obligation to support and be part of the community, on top of the stigma against a non-compliance to the rules.

"A couple of people compared non-compliance to drunk driving, which is quite a severe comparison. But I think it really speaks to how they viewed spreading COVID and those impacts," said Postill.

CBC

And while transmission among family and friends has been a general concern for most throughout the pandemic, the research showed young people were particularly concerned for everyone in the community — which Ritter and Postill said had something to do with the size of P.E.I. and its close-knit communities.

"Some participants reported they felt observed ... that the neighbours might see, or the neighbours might recognize them in the store if they didn't wear a mask, things like that," said Ritter.

She said public health measures also affected young people's social lives by forcing them to limit their social circles and increasing concern around how they would find life partners in their twenties with such restrictions in place.

Main takeaways

Ritter said the emotions revealed in the interviews were a mix of pride and guilt.

Young adults are motivated when things are going well, she said, and their pride in being part of a community comes with keeping it as a low-risk environment.

But when it came to comparing themselves to people in other provinces, the research found young people shied away from posting on social media to reduce the spotlight on what they were still allowed to do on P.E.I.

"These public health measures should really be treated as limited natural resources because it has these massive impacts ... on the mental well-being of young adults," said Ritter.

"A lot can be learned from our research, not just for P.E.I. but also for Canada internationally as a whole," Ritter said.

Both researchers will be sharing their work at the upcoming Congress of the Humanities and Social Sciences — Canada's largest academic gathering, taking place virtually this year from May 12-20.

Ritter said they plan on getting in touch with the provincial government and health officials to provide them with information that might be useful in navigating the ongoing pandemic.