Bill Morneau says business community was unhelpful, targets political divisiveness in speech

Barbara Shecter - Yesterday 
FINANCIAL POST


Former federal finance minister Bill Morneau says the business community did little to help advance crucial policy initiatives to boost Canada’s economy while he was in office, and was pre-occupied with lower taxes.


Former federal finance minister Bill Morneau: “When people of good conscience see politicians playing fast and loose with our institutions, they need to call out this behaviour.”

Morneau, who ran human resources services firm Morneau Shepell before going into politics in 2015 — subsequently resigning his seat and the finance portfolio in August 2020 — made the remarks in a lengthy prepared speech for an address at the C.D. Howe Institute’s annual directors’ dinner Wednesday evening in Toronto.

“On the collaboration front, it was tough to get helpful input from business,” he said in his first major speech since leaving politics. “Most of the advice I received from business leaders boiled down to demands for lower taxes, but the reality is that Canada’s marginal effective tax rates are competitive.”

He acknowledged that more could be done, but added that Canada’s productivity and economic problems “are about much more than taxes.”

Indeed, when Morneau resigned amid the WE Charity scandal in the summer of 2020, Ian Russell, then chief executive of the Investment Industry Association of Canada, said Morneau’s tenure had been “disappointing” on issues including business taxes. He also cited competitiveness, and foreign investment.

Morneau notably tried to get the business community to invest in public-private initiatives such as large infrastructure projects. In his speech Wednesday, the former finance minister said the Canada Infrastructure Bank had “fallen short of the hoped-for impact” due to “a lack of commitment to the idea and politicians’ worst instincts.”

While he is no longer part of the Liberal government, Morneau’s speech also appeared to take aim at Conservative leadership hopeful Pierre Poilievre and his attacks on the independence of the Bank of Canada. Poilievre has pledged to get rid of Bank of Canada Governor Tiff Macklem if he forms the next government.


“When people of good conscience see politicians playing fast and loose with our institutions, they need to call out this behaviour,” Morneau said.

“That might help you sell a few more memberships. It might even help you win an election. But when you put ‘exciting the base’ ahead of crafting good policy … when you cynically pander to conspiracy theorists … you are doing incalculable harm to the country you claim to love and to the people you seek to lead.”

Morneau defended the independence of the Bank of Canada in his speech, and said its structure should serve as a model in other areas.

“One of the most important and effective decisions of a previous generation was to make the central bank independent,” he said “We need to look for other opportunities to decouple policy from politics.”

Other targets of his speech included the “politicization” and divisiveness of debate, which he said isn’t inevitable despite a system that is partisan and adversarial by design to ensure government is held to account.

“Political competition is essential in the same way that competition is essential in the market,” he said. “But political competition doesn’t have to be ‘winner take all’. It doesn’t have to be stupid.”

The former finance minister also took aim at the media, whose scrutiny he said could feel personal even if journalists were doing their jobs to hold the powerful to account.

At the time of his resignation from politics, Morneau and Prime Minister Justin Trudeau were being probed by the federal ethics commissioner over family and personal ties to WE, which had been handed a lucrative student grants contract at the outset of the COVID-19 pandemic. Trudeau was later cleared but it was found that Morneau should have recused himself from cabinet discussions on awarding WE Charity the multi-million dollar contract, something he acknowledged after the ethics commissioner’s finding.

In his speech Wednesday, Morneau sounded a hopeful note for Canada’s prosperity — if various levels of government and the business community can find ways to work together to address Canada’s slipping productivity, “anemic” capital investment, and lagging comparative GDP growth projections.

“We need a national body that focuses attention and forces discussion on our need for economic growth — and we need to get over the idea that any one party has a monopoly on good ideas,” he said.

“In fact, we need to get over the idea that government itself can solve all the problems we face. Climate investments, addressing our productivity challenge, an aging society … those are all shocks to the supply side of the economy, and real solutions are more likely to be found around the boardroom table or in universities and think tanks than at the cabinet table.”

Lori Fox’s book, This Has Always Been a War stirs class, race and gender struggles

Lori Fox likened it similar to after a car crash, when days later, the reality of the experience floods in and the panic and craziness of it all sinks in. That’s how Fox views the nervous breakdown that occurred upon completion of their book.

The book, This Has Always Been a War: The Radicalization of a Working Class Queer, was released May 3. It is Fox’s first book, an accolade that sits atop an impressive pile of essays, articles, stories and newspaper clippings from prominent national and international publications (which includes writing for the News.)

Fox’s breakdown, documented in a personal re-telling published in the Globe and Mail, is aimed squarely at a system that fails to provide mental health services to working-class people. Denied therapy and proffered prescriptions for drugs that didn’t work, Fox spiraled into a near miss of self-destruction.

And Fox, unlike most, doesn’t keep quiet about it.

“That we have this two-tiered system is a disgrace. The way we treat people who cannot afford to pay for private care is a disgrace. What happened to me – what is happening to other people, even as I write this – is a disgrace.”

Fox is a freelance journalist, a gig worker, a labourer, a server, a 30-something, working class person struggling to make rent. Rent that is only going up and up. A chapter is titled “Other People’s Houses, rent is documented by dollar value, whether or not utilities were included, and by year.” For homeowners, the chapter is deliberately unsettling.

Fox came to the Yukon in 2012 and found work plentiful, but the housing situation dire. During three years of being housing insecure, Fox interviewed the former minister responsible for the Yukon Housing Corporation, Pauline Frost, while homeless and living in a van.

Fox told the News in an interview May 26 that they’d “watched the territory get more and more expensive, and have less and less options for working class people over the last decade.”

Fox is critical of the Whitehorse elites, the government workers and the resources extractors who congregate in the capital city. Fox cites the median household income disparity between Whitehorse’s $93,600 and Ross River’s $45,000, which is half of the median income of Whitehorse.

“Folks in the communities, especially rural folks, tend to make less money because they don’t have access to those government jobs,” Fox says, “The disparity is incredible.”

Fox’s heart lies with the working class, people who labor in low paying jobs and do not own property. The dedication in the book reads: “For my people, the working classes, who cook the meals and pick the fruit, who serve the tables and stock the shelves, who work the gigs and deliver the orders. We are the makers and builders and doers of this world, and all that is in it belongs to us.”

The book is Fox-raw: railing, angry, and exposed.

“The book is incredibly vulnerable. I’m incredibly blunt, and really upfront with some very difficult things. And I pull no punches.”


They add, “And that will not be a surprise to anyone who has ever read anything I’ve ever written”.

This Has Always Been a War is a mix of essays and stories, some previously published, many not. The book takes a longer view. The book looks back to childhood and why it matters, and how the truths that came to be, remain. And then, can change.

Fox spreads their arguments through a read of incidents, accidents and injustices; through jobs and locations linked together with perseverance and hard work.

Fox wields a pointy stick at systems of preference that ignores those without financial means, skin tones other than white, or varied genders and sexual orientations. A system that serves to make those most like it, more comfortable.

For example, reflecting upon Saltspring Island, British Columbia, Fox describes the split between the landowners and workers on the well-groomed island.

“It was an island of the rich and their servants.”

They described how that the only places to live were on landowners’ property who wanted labour in return for lodging.

In another chapter, while thinning fruit in the B.C.’s Okanagan region, Fox wrote, “I just want to know why one man should have two houses and an orchard full of fruit when other people in his village don’t even have a bed and a place to keep their beer cold.”

But Fox looks beyond. A childhood chapter reveals the stubborn harshness of their brutish father, yet recognizes that he is not just one thing. Fox understands the complexity of the human condition, and a larger rationale of the systems that created it.

“There’s no one story, no one straight narrative that can be told about a person, no matter how much we would like there to be,” Fox writes.

The book’s back-and -forth moves between specific events, and huge ideas. Small incidents are juxtaposed with larger concepts.

Fox writes, “Every little act of cruelty, whether intentional or not, makes us a little less than we were, than we would have been. It takes something from us. That’s what patriarchy is. That’s what capitalism is.”

“We cannot be absolved of responsibility for our actions. It’s okay to buy sneakers made in sweatshops and to drive gas-guzzling, carbon monoxide-spewing SUVs and to live guiltlessly on stolen land, because that’s just how it is.”

Fox challenges the status quo, and believes in our ability to change. They write: “So many things, really, are the way they are because we are taught — because we assume — that the way things are, is the way things have to be.”

“The way the world is today, right now, is not the way it has to be.”

Lawrie Crawford, Local Journalism Initiative Reporter, Yukon News

B&D FEMDOM AS WELL

Lynda Carter Defends Wonder Woman’s Status As A Queer Icon

Brent Furdyk - Yesterday


On the first day of 2022's Pride Month, Lynda Carter is revisiting her most famous role — and defending the character's stature as an LGBTQ icon.

Lynda Carter as Wonder Woman, 1976.

On June 1, Carter took to Twitter to share her thoughts about the character she played in the "Wonder Woman" TV series for three seasons in the late 1970s.

"I didn't write Wonder Woman, but if you want to argue that she is somehow not a queer or trans icon, then you're not paying attention," Carter wrote of the character.

She continued by sharing how her own personal experiences with fans have led her to that conclusion.

"Every time someone comes up to me and says that WW helped them while they were closeted, it reminds me how special the role is," she added.

Elliot Page Says He ‘Didn’t Expect’ The Reaction To His Transition To ‘Be So Big’: ‘Transphobia Is So, So, So Extreme’

Becca Longmire - Yesterday- ESQUIRE

Elliot Page feels like he can finally just be himself.


© Photo credit: RUVEN AFANADOR  Elliot Page.

The Canadian actor speaks to Esquire for their summer issue on what he has learned from transitioning, telling the magazine: “I can’t overstate the biggest joy, which is really seeing yourself. I know I look different to others, but to me I’m just starting to look like myself.

"It’s indescribable, because I’m just like, there I am. And thank God. Here I am. So the greatest joy is just being able to feel present, literally, just to be present.

"To go out in a group of new people and be able to engage in a way where I didn’t feel this constant sensation to flee from my body, this never-ending sensation of anxiety and nervousness and wanting out.

"When I say I couldn’t have ever imagined feeling that way, I mean that with every sense of me," he adds.

Page shares of the reaction to his transition, "I didn’t expect it to be so big. In terms of the actual quality of the response, it was what I expected: love and support from many people and hatred and cruelty and vitriol from so many others. I came out as gay in 2014, and it’s different. Transphobia is just so, so, so extreme. The hatred and the cruelty is so much more incessant."

Elsewhere in the candid interview, Page talks about his love of working out: “I’ve never worked out more in my life. Working out always felt like such a conundrum, because it didn’t feel good. I walked and I hiked, but that was it. The experience of being in my body now is so different. I’m absolutely hooked.

"The feeling of being really engaged with it, present, pushing it and getting stronger and gaining weight. It’s thrilling. I feel like a kid doing it.”

He adds of starring in "The Umbrella Academy": “I love making 'The Umbrella Academy'. I’ve learned how special it is to play one character for so long, to evolve with a family of characters.

"All of us have gone through a lot. Years have gone by, and we’ve changed and grown in our own ways. I love watching the growth happen alongside the show, our personalities interweaving and all of us having our own moments. I’m just learning to love the whole journey of it.”

The full interview is on Esquire and in the new summer issue, available everywhere by June 7.

Elliot Page on His Daunting Pre-Transition Struggle: 'That S– Literally Did Almost Kill Me'

Charna Flam - Yesterday -THE WRAP

In the spotlight for more than a decade, Elliot Page's internal battles with gender identity and opinions on certain roles are familiar to many.

But in a personal essay published to Esquire, Page says his battle with depression and anxiety before his transgender transition were not overblown.

"I wish people would understand that that s— literally did almost kill me," Page wrote in the essay published Wednesday.

Also read:
Elliot Page's 'Umbrella Academy' Character Comes Out as Transgender in Season 3

Before his 2020 transition, Page starred in hits from "Juno" to "The Umbrella Academy." But in Page's Esquire essay, "The Euphoria of Elliot Page," he divulges how he was ultimately affected by the reception to his transition and his apprehension with future roles.

"I came out as gay in 2014, and it's different," he said of America's shift in attitude. "Transphobia is just so, so, so extreme. The hatred and the cruelty is so much more incessant."

The success of "Juno" was impactful to Page, he wrote. But because of Fox Searchlight's aggressive demand for Page to present as the film's feminine figure, Page battled depression and anxiety.

Page, elaborating that the reaction to his transition was what he expected, said he received "love and support from many people and hatred and cruelty and vitriol from so many others." As a member of the LGBTQ+ community since 2014, Page said he anticipated a range of reactions to his transition announcement versus coming out.

Also read:
Elliot Page to Release Memoir 'Pageboy' in 2023

As the trajectory of Page's career ran in tandem with his gender-identity battles, he clarifies his gender identity shouldn't validate or invalidate his upcoming roles.

"I think when people say, 'Oh, he'll want to play cis male characters now,' the sensation I get is that the subtext is, they think that would be an accomplishment for me, versus I'm trans, I'm queer, and I want to play those roles," Page wrote.

Specifically, how he believes his "type" lends authenticity to roles about transgender characters.

"When I get asked, 'Are you worried about getting typecast?' You wouldn't say to J-Law or Rooney Mara or someone, are they worried about getting typecast as cis straight women? " Page explained.

Also read:
GLAAD Slams Ricky Gervais for 'Anti-Trans Rants' in Netflix Special

Though this claim refutes his personal professional aspirations, Page clarified what he wants for the transgender community.

"But at the same time, of course I want a space where trans people are getting cast as cis characters. Of course," Page wrote.

As Page details the complexity of being a trans actor, and playing either cis or trans roles, he remains hopeful for the community, as media perception and depiction of the trans community converts to the perceptions and attitudes of the larger community.

Also read:
Lil Nas X Calls Out BET Over Awards Snub in Now-Deleted Tweets

Although hopeful, Page acknowledged the difficulties of the ongoing "conversations."

"Why are people making it more difficult?" Page wrote. "It really breaks my heart. It really breaks my heart. That's literally all we're trying to communicate."

ALBERTA
212 confirmed graves of children at Saddle Lake Cree Nation Residential School

WARNING: the following story deals with very graphic imagery and may be triggering to some readers. Please advise.

Earlier this month, the Acimowin Opaspiw Society (AOS) — a Saddle Lake-based, survivor-led non-profit organization leading the investigation into the Blue Quills Residential School — announced they have confirmed that at least 212 children were buried in unmarked graves during the school’s operations.

The investigation team said they confirmed the student burials in confidential records. Due to issues of privacy, the Society has said that they would like to keep their source undisclosed as the investigation is on-going and extremely delicate.

At this stage in the investigation however, it is near impossible to determine how many children died and where they were placed to rest. This is due to the long and complicated history of the Blue Quills Indian Residential School — and the general lack of record-keeping seen so consistently in the Residential School system.

To be more precise: the first iteration of the Residential School operated from 1862 to 1898 in Lac La Biche, Alberta; it then re-located to Saddle Lake Cree Nation, where it operated between 1898 to 1931; before finally settling just outside of St. Paul, Alberta — where it still stands today.

Currently, the society only has access to burial records from 1898 to 1931, which is when the Saddle Lake site — previously named the Sacred Heart Indian Residential School — was operational. Meaning that the Saddle Lake site, to which the reason the announcement was made, has no locational relationship to the current Blue Quills University.

“It was one of the most horrific residential schools in Canada,” said Eric J. Large, lead AOS investigator. "The amount of missing children is extensive… The institution was strife with violence, illness, starvation, abuse and death.”


“It can be safely stated that in our community of 12,000 people, each family has had four to five children who went missing from this institution,” he continued.

The remnants of the Saddle Lake site are so extensive that grave diggers kept uncovering child-sized remains when digging graves for recently deceased band members. This is because the Saddle Lake site eventually became the Nation’s community cemetery — and it is still currently being used today.

In regards to the accidental excavations, Saddle Lake Councillor Jason Whiskeyjack is one of the main witnesses due to his work as a part-time grave-digger.

“I try to find a way to block it out of my mind,” he said. “None of these skeletal remains were in caskets. None of the graves had markings of any sort, such as cross of head stones. All the skeletal remains were the size of young children.”

Furthermore, the Society has said that there was also an accidental excavation of a mass grave located in the Sacred Heart site. This mass grave consisted of multiple child-sized skeletons that were wrapped in white cloth.

This means that not only were individual graves being found accidentally, but a separate mass grave was also discovered.

The Society believes the mass grave is made up of students from the Sacred Heart Residential School. They said that at one point, there was a massive outbreak of typhoid fever that caused the entire student population to perish, and that those in the mass grave are most likely those children.

Jacob Cardinal, Local Journalism Initiative Reporter, Alberta Native News

CANADA

Opposition MPs call for more transparency about secret orders-in-council

Elizabeth Thompson - CBC

Opposition MPs are calling on Prime Minister Justin Trudeau to be more transparent about secret orders-in-council his government has adopted.

New Democratic Party Leader Jagmeet Singh said a lack of transparency erodes trust in government institutions. He said the national security exemption for keeping such orders-in-council secret should be used judiciously.

"What we're seeing now is an increasing reliance on this ... approach, which is problematic," Singh told reporters. "It's something we disagree with. We want to see more transparency. We want to see people able to trust their institutions because they see the decisions being made in a transparent manner."

Singh's comments came after CBC News revealed that the Trudeau government has adopted 72 secret orders-in-council (OICs) since it came to power. While the Liberals criticized the Conservatives in 2015 for the number of secret OICs they had adopted over nine years in government, Trudeau's government has adopted more than twice as many over its six years in office.

The only indication that a secret OIC even exists is a missing number in the Privy Council's order-in-council database. Secret OICs can be used for anything from stopping a foreign company from buying a Canadian business to outlining who is authorized to give the order to shoot down a commercial airliner hijacked by terrorists.

More than half of the secret orders-in-council adopted by the Trudeau government have come since April 2020 — a month after the COVID-19 pandemic began. Eleven have been adopted so far this year.

While some of the decisions are related to national security reviews of foreign investment transactions, others are not.

Privy Council officials said that two orders-in-council adopted earlier this year could not be released because they fell under a section of the access to information law that restricts records related to things like national defence, international affairs or the "detection, prevention or suppression of subversive or hostile activities."

They also refused repeatedly to say why other OICs were being kept secret.

Former Liberal cabinet minister Jim Carr said that while cabinet decisions should be transparent, that's not always possible.

"I believe to the extent possible, the work we do should be transparent," Carr told reporters on his way into question period on Wednesday. "There are occasions when that's not possible, when there are national security issues or other matters of cabinet confidence."

Asked if he was surprised that the Trudeau government had adopted more secret orders-in-council than the Harper government, Carr said, "At my age, my stage, there are very few surprises."
Trudeau broke his promise to be transparent: Gladu

Conservative MP Marilyn Gladu called on the government to reveal details of the secret OICs.

"I think Canadians need to know what these things are," Gladu told reporters on her way into question period. "These are orders-in-council that will impact various aspects of Canadians' lives and so they need to be transparent, as they said they would."

Gladu said Trudeau hasn't delivered on his promise of more transparency.

"I think this has been the least transparent government we have had," she said. "Justin Trudeau said at the beginning that he was going to be open and transparent. That has never happened and this is just another example of that."

Alain Therrien, Bloc Québécois critic for democratic institutions, described the news that the Trudeau government had adopted 72 secret orders-in-council as "gigantic."

"We find it very worrying," he said. "It is a total lack of transparency. Seeing things like that won't help people regain confidence in politics."


Bloc Québécois MP Alain Therrien said he wonders why the number of secret orders-in-council has increased so much under the Trudeau government.

Therrien questioned the government's definition of national security, adding it is difficult to know the content of secret orders-in-council because the government is likely to cite national security.

Therrien said he would like to know why the numbers have increased so much under the Trudeau government.

"Is it normal to see such a strong increase in the number of secret orders-in-council?" he asked.

"The strategy has not yet been developed

CANADA

Energy transition study ‘waste of time’ because key witnesses weren’t heard, MPs say


A government study on how to create a fair, equitable energy transition has been a “waste of time,” say two MPs on the committee responsible for the report.

Bloc Québécois MP Mario Simard and NDP MP Charlie Angus took issue with the standing committee on natural resources Monday evening after they discovered why several of their parties’ witnesses were not selected to testify.

Angus said he asked to hear from Indigenous Clean Energy, the Athabasca Chipewyan First Nation, the Office of the Wet'suwet'en, the Just Transition Centre, the Labor Leading on Climate Initiative, the Workers Action Centre and Oil Change International, among others.

“Without having the voices that are key on this, this report is a joke,” Angus told the committee. “I can't sign off on a report at this point.”

The comments came during the second to last meeting on the study after committee members heard from witnesses representing the First Nations Major Projects Coalition, Indian Resource Council Inc., National Coalition of Chiefs and the Métis Settlements General Council. This witness list “heavily favoured pro-oil interests,” Angus told Canada’s National Observer.

The committee aims to table a report on the study before June 17 so the federal government will consider its findings when creating just transition legislation, as the Liberals promised in 2019.

At the outset of the meeting, Angus and Simard voiced concern that key witnesses they requested were not called to testify.

At the end of the meeting, committee chair John Aldag said the panel tried to make decisions about who would testify “proportional to the seats on the committee.” Committee members requested a total of 159 witnesses, he explained, but there were only eight to 12 sessions allocated for the study.

By the time the final session closes today, the Liberals will have had 16 witnesses come before the committee, followed by 11 for the Conservatives, four for the Bloc Québécois and three for the NDP, said Aldag.

“What I've seen from you and this committee is real bad faith,” Angus fired back. “You've never ever, ever told us that you are going to try and limit our input based on an arbitrary decision around seat allocation.”

He says this “major decision” prevents the NDP’s witnesses from being heard and “will certainly favour the government” and the Conservatives


“If that's how we're going to move forward, then we're going to play a lot more hardball with this committee from a New Democrat perspective,” said Angus. “Things you expect that are going to be easy to get through are not going to get through based on the kind of bad faith that I've witnessed here ...”

Aldag noted that not all witnesses on the list accepted an invitation to participate and not everyone was available. In an effort to hear from everyone on the list, Aldag said witnesses unable to attend the sessions have been invited to submit a 10-page brief.

Throughout the study, votes in the House of Commons have run longer than expected and a meeting with ministers was cancelled, placing additional strain on the already tight and “extremely ambitious” timeline, said Aldag.

Angus requested the presence of Indigenous Climate Action and the Union of B.C. First Nations Chiefs and both were scheduled to testify but couldn’t because of delays.

Grand Chief Stewart Phillip was invited to speak to the committee on a witness panel on May 4, Ellena Neel, communications manager for the Union of B.C. Indian Chiefs told Canada’s National Observer in an emailed statement. “There were significant delays starting the meeting due to a vote so (he) was unable to appear on that day,” her statement reads. That same day, representatives from Indigenous Climate Action were supposed to testify, but were also unable to do so because of the vote.

Deciding witnesses based on seat allocation in the House is a waste of the committee’s time, said Angus.

“Whenever I've been on a committee, if we had a lot of witnesses, we sat down and said, ‘What are our priorities?' We weren't given that opportunity,” he said.

Simard stopped short of calling the decision bad faith but said the study does not represent witnesses from Quebec because the committee didn’t hear from them.

Because the scope of the study is so broad and there were issues with witness selection, Simard said it feels like “it's been a bit of a waste of time.”

For future studies, Simard proposed setting clear rules on how the witness list works and discussing which themes and witnesses to prioritize in a subcommittee to make the process more efficient and the study clearer.

“I'm not trying to criticize my Conservative colleagues, but to advance the idea that there could be clean oil is one thing, but to taint the entire study that talks about the just transition with a list of witnesses that held that position … I don't think that that benefits the public and I think that's why we should be talking about it in subcommittees,” said Simard.

Today, Natural Resources Minister Jonathan Wilkinson and Labour Minister Seamus O’Regan are scheduled to be present for the first hour of the last session, followed by witnesses from the Canadian Critical Minerals and Materials Alliance and the Canadian Federation of Agriculture, among others.

Natasha Bulowski, Local Journalism Initiative Reporter, Canada's National Observer

A massive rockfall crashed down on Lake Powell. Record-low water levels from drought could be to blame

Rachel Ramirez - Yesterday


Memorial Day boaters captured the scene on video as a massive rockfall crashed into the waters of Lake Powell.

The dramatic rockslide happened on the Utah side of the lake – the second largest reservoir in the country – where water levels have continued to plunge due to the unrelenting drought conditions gripping much of the West.

Mila Carter, who shot the video, told CNN she was heading to Antelope Point Marina with her husband, Steve Carter, when they noticed rocks and sand falling off the cliff near the entrance of Warm Creek. They stopped the boat and started taking pictures and a video that captured the event unfolding.

“We were not expecting anything like that,” Mila Carter told CNN. As the section of the cliff broke off, her husband sped away for safety.

Once the rock fell into the lake, Mila Carter said, a big wave formed. “I feel like the video didn’t capture the wave at the end … it was very impressive,” she said.

No one was injured in their boat, she said, adding that “Luckily, no one was around.”

The rockslide comes as Lake Powell continues to drop to previously unthinkable lows amid the West’s climate change-driven megadrought.

Last month, the federal government announced it’s taking unprecedented, emergency steps to help boost water levels at the reservoir by releasing more water from upstream on the Colorado River, while holding back water in Lake Powell itself, instead of it being sent to states downstream.

At around 26% full, Lake Powell is at its lowest level since 1963, when the lake’s Glen Canyon Dam was built and the reservoir – near the Utah-Arizona border – was filled.

Lake Powell currently sits 29 feet lower than it did on Memorial Day weekend last year, and nearly 75 feet lower than the same weekend in 2020.

Related video: Massive Lake Powell rock slide caught on camera

Rocks plunge into Lake Powell on Monday, May 30. - Steve Carter/@WesternLifeStylePhotography

Tyler Knudsen, a senior geologist with the Utah Geological Survey, said it’s difficult to say this early whether the Memorial Day rockfall is linked to the ongoing drought, since rockslides can be triggered by several other external factors – including rainfall, earthquakes, and daily temperature fluctuations. Even the wave action from boats or the wind, he said, can help slowly erode slopes and potentially trigger rockfalls.

“We see increased rockfalls during intense precipitation events and earthquakes, but apparently none of those conditions existed at the time of the rockfall in the video, so its trigger remains unknown,” Knudsen told CNN. “Water-level decline certainly could have been the trigger, but, again, we can’t say for sure at this point.”

“We do know that the creation of Lake Powell and its historical water-level fluctuations have contributed to elevated rockfall generation,” he said. Either rising or declining water levels can contribute to rockfalls, he added.

Rising water levels can saturate rocks along the shoreline and weaken the cementing agents that bond the rock together, while declining water levels can destabilize the slopes by removing some of the rocks’ confining pressure.

Low levels can also increase the pressure of the water remaining within the emerging rock mass as it tries to equalize to a lower reservoir level.

“Is it possible that some cliffs that are now being dewatered for the first time in over 40 years are generating more rockfalls? Yes, it’s possible,” Knudsen said.

“Record low water levels are likely contributing to recent rockfalls along Lake Powell’s receding shores, but it’s difficult to definitively link a particular rockfall solely to declining water levels.”

Rockfalls are a major part of the natural expansion that continues to create the lake’s Glen Canyon, experts say. While there is likely at least one smaller-sized rockslide event happening each day somewhere within Glen Canyon, larger rockfalls – such as the one Mila Carter and her husband witnessed – are more infrequent.

“Since the great majority of rockfalls within Glen Canyon are not documented, we don’t have enough data to develop an exact frequency or recurrence interval for events such as this,” said Knudsen. But larger rockfalls, such as this, will “likely happen at least once every few years in Glen Canyon.”

As Lake Powell and its downstream neighbor, Lake Mead – the largest reservoir in the country – continue to drop at alarming rates, Mila Carter considers herself lucky to have had the opportunity to still enjoy the lake and catch this moment.

“We got to see nature and how strong it is, and how small we are,” she said.

HEY BOATERS, BEWARE OF GIANT BOULDERS SNAPPING OFF & FALLING INTO LAKE POWELL

FIRST NATION COVER FOR PRIVATIZATION 

Alberta accepts bid for private hip-knee surgical clinic on First Nation land

EDMONTON — The Alberta government has approved a bid by the Enoch Cree Nation near Edmonton to build a private clinic to perform thousands of publicly covered hip and knee surgeries.


© Provided by The Canadian Press

Health Minister Jason Copping says the clinic is to be built by the middle of next year to reduce a backlog of orthopedic operations in and around the capital.

The clinic will be a partnership between the Enoch Cree and Surgical Centres Inc., a private operator that runs seven clinics in Canada, including two in Calgary.

Alberta Health says the partners will be responsible for building and equipment costs, while surgeries themselves are to be covered by public funds.

Copping says there are almost 23,000 Albertans waiting for orthopedic surgeries, one-third of those for knee replacements.

Enoch Cree Chief Billy Morin says the centre will offer culturally appropriate care as well.

“When an Indigenous person from High Level comes here, they’re going to get not just the fancy building with the nice Indigenous pictures,” Morin said Wednesday.

“They’re going to get a new experience where they’re going to have a Dene person talking to them. They’re going to have traditional healing and medicine right here on the First Nation offered to them as well — and to all Albertans, quite frankly, if they want to go down that road, too.”


It's expected the clinic will perform up to 3,000 orthopedic procedures a year, an estimated 17 per cent increase in the Edmonton region.

Copping said more than half of all Alberta orthopedic patients are on hold for surgery beyond recommended wait times.

“People are waiting far too long for hip and knee replacements. We need to do a lot more of them and this is going to help us get it done."

Copping said the project is modelled on cataract and other eye procedures done under public care in private clinics to reduce wait lists.

The total surgical wait list is pegged at just over 70,000.

Copping said having the work done through public clinics saves money, but the Opposition NDP said it’s actually more expensive and inefficient in the long run.

“The UCP has provided no reason why new surgery facilities cannot be built in and operated in the public system,” said health critic David Shepherd.

“The UCP’s surgical initiative provides public dollars to help private companies profit, while deliberately neglecting Alberta’s public health care.

“The UCP’s mismanagement of health care and neglect of the public system has caused partial closures in more than 20 hospitals across Alberta.”

This report by The Canadian Press was first published June 1, 2022.

Dean Bennett, The Canadian Press

Enoch Cree Nation part of new charter surgical facility slated to be built next year

Ashley Joannou -EDMONTON JOURNAL


Enoch Cree Nation together with the company Surgical Centres Inc. are in negotiations with Alberta Health Services to offer hip and knee surgeries at a new charter surgical facility expected to be built next year.

Chief Billy Morin said the new Sovereign Medical facility will meet all medical standards while also being a chance to offer services to both Indigenous and non-Indigenous patients including those who might feel uncomfortable in a standard hospital setting.

“When an Indigenous person from High Level comes here, they’re going to get not just the fancy building with the nice Indigenous pictures,” he said at the announcement Wednesday.

“They’re going to get a new experience where they’re going to have a Dene person talking to them. They’re going to have traditional healing and medicine right here on the First Nation offered to them as well and to all Albertans, quite frankly, if they want to go down that road, too.”

While the contract with AHS is still being finalized, the government estimates the new facility will offer about 3,000 publicly funded hip and knee replacements and other joint procedures in the Edmonton area each year – about 17 per cent more than were performed from 2019 to 2020.

“Traditionally, chartered surgical facilities haven’t performed hip and knee replacements, since many patients need to stay overnight after those surgeries,” Premier Jason Kenney said.

“But I can say that Enoch Cree Nation and Surgical Centres Inc. have stepped forward with a very strong proposal to accommodate more complex surgeries while following the stringent standards of care that we expect in Alberta.”

Kenney said the new facility will offer more space for surgeons already working in Alberta who want to do more surgeries.

“Obviously they have a financial incentive. But they also want to get their patients to have shorter wait times but there’s limited capacity in the current hospital environment,” he said.

The UCP government has been expanding chartered surgical facilities as part of a promise to reduce wait times in the province down to clinically appropriate levels.

Alberta’s NDP Opposition has been openly opposed to the push to increase charter facilities, arguing that it diverts surgical resources out of the public system.

“The UCP has provided no reason why new surgery facilities can not be built in and operated in the public system. The UCP’s surgical initiative provides public dollars to help private companies profit, while deliberately neglecting Alberta’s public health care,” health critic David Shepherd said in a statement Wednesday.

A government statement said it is expecting cost savings in the range of 20 per cent for each procedure performed in the community facility rather than in a hospital.

Construction of this latest facility is expected to be complete in about 14 months so it can be offering surgeries starting in the 2023-24 fiscal year.

Details about how much the new facility is going to cost were not made public. Steve Buick, press secretary for Health Minister Jason Copping, said the government of Alberta is not contributing to the capital costs.

The details of the business partnership between Enoch Cree Nation and Surgical Centres Inc. are proprietary, “like the finances of any other company under contract,” he said in an email.

Surgical Centres Inc. already runs seven facilities across Canada, including two in Calgary.

ajoannou@postmedia.com
twitter.com/ashleyjoannou

Feedback on Alberta's K-6 curriculum shows low levels of support, frustration over process

Lisa Johnson - Yesterday 

POSTMEDIA

Alberta’s government has released hundreds of pages of reports from stakeholders and public survey feedback on the draft K-6 curriculum, showing a low level of support and a high degree of dismay over the process.

Education Minister Adrian LaGrange announced the release of the reports Tuesday on Twitter, writing that the feedback was used to update subjects from the original draft, first released in March 2021.

“We are listening to experts, educators and all Albertans as we work to finalize a new K-6 curriculum for our students,” LaGrange wrote.

We are listening to experts, educators, and all Albertans as we work to finalize a new K-6 curriculum for our students. (5/5)— Adriana LaGrange (@AdrianaLaGrange) May 31, 2022

One report summarizing more than 34,000 results of a public survey, noted general responses rated “positive” hit a peak of 21 per cent by the end of February, compared to 62 per cent deemed “negative.”

When asked to describe the strengths of the controversial draft social studies curriculum, a significant number of respondents said they didn’t have any.

In another report that dates back to January , the Alberta School Boards Association (ASBA) cited engagement session participants who worried the government just wasn’t listening.

“Our feedback is being asked, but that’s not what’s being heard,” the report said.

Maren Aukerman, associate professor at the University of Calgary’s Werklund School of Education specializing in curriculum and learning, said the feedback is “overwhelmingly negative,” and it’s pretty clear the curriculum is not popular.

“I am not surprised that people don’t feel heard. And I’m not surprised that there is a huge level of discontent,” said Aukerman.

The ASBA included feedback that said the curriculum needs to be de-politicized, as well as that the revised social studies blueprint provided some changes, but they were “minor and vague.”


Related video: Curriculum K-6 Draft Update

Much of the feedback contained in the documents echoes the same concerns critics have had since the draft curriculum was released more than a year ago, including that it is not suited for different age groups, and had a lack of proper First Nations, Métis and Inuit perspectives and ways of knowing, and a content load that is unrealistically heavy and too focused on the memorization of facts.

It also stressed the need for more consultation with teachers. No specific feedback from teachers, nor school divisions on the piloting of subjects starting last fall, were released Tuesday.

The government noted on its website that 360 teachers piloted content in classrooms with about 7,800 students. That represents about two per cent of students and one per cent of teachers in Alberta .

“Their insights were addressed through revisions that informed the updated K-6 curriculum that was released in April and May 2022,” the government website said . Those insights are not summarized, nor does the government point to any subsequent changes.

Teachers who participated in a working group in late 2020 to look at the curriculum, wrote an open letter in December calling it a “performative” exercise that didn’t take their input seriously, but the feedback of that group was not included in Tuesday’s release.

The ASBA report also flags the impact of COVID-19 on student and teacher mental health, noting that teachers are burnt out, the proposed implementation timelines are rushed, and the curriculum needs a “comprehensive rewrite.”

The Association of Independent Schools and Colleges of Alberta (AISCA) wrote in its report that “the strengths identified were outweighed in all of the subject areas by the views of participating teachers who recognized and described multiple areas as problematic.”

The provincial government has tweaked many of the subject areas, and there has been support for the inclusion of more financial literacy and a focus on early reading skills, but the government plans for the new curriculum in its entirety to be in classrooms for the 2023-24 school year.

The Education Ministry has said feedback prompted it to shift some concepts among grades to make sure material is more age-appropriate, include more representative First Nations, Métis, and Inuit content, and pare down content.

However, Aukerman said a truly transparent process would involve going back to stakeholders, outlining the changes, and asking if they are adequate, but major concerns haven’t really been addressed, and substantive changes haven’t been made.

“There is no listening to feedback that I’ve seen,” said Aukerman.

Aukerman said she would expect, and hope for, public support of between 70 and 80 per cent for a curriculum, and the typical timeframe for developing a curriculum is five years, while some subjects hitting Alberta classrooms will have been developed and implemented in less than two years.

Updates, released in April to K-3 math and English language arts and literature as well as K-6 physical education and wellness will be required starting this September. Final drafts for Grades 4 to 6 math and English will be optional for schools in the fall.

In May, the government released the K-6 curriculum for science, French first language and literature and French immersion language arts and literature. Piloting the three updated subjects this fall is optional.

lijohnson@postmedia.com
twitter.com/reportrix