ANNOTATED

Polls says it's time to make educational workers an essential service

CONSIDER THE SOURCE
Brian Lilley - Yesterday - Toronto Sun

CUPE workers on the picket line at Queen's Park on Nov. 7, 2022.

MAKING THEM ESSENTIAL WORKERS VIOLATES INTERNATIONAL LABOUR LAW

A majority of Ontario voters say it’s time for education workers to be made an essential service, according to a poll from Maru Public Opinion.

A MAJORITY OF THOSE POLLED IS NOT A MAJORITY OF ONTARIANS 

Results from the poll show the public is divided on questions such as using binding arbitration or the notwithstanding clause, but a strong majority believe education workers should be an essential service.

The poll of 600 Ontario adults — conducted on Monday and Tuesday of this week — asks respondents the best way to settle such disputes.

“The public wants this solved so that kids and parents are left alone and if it takes banning the strikes to stop what happens today, they are fine with that,” said John Wright, executive vice president of Maru. “They want peace in the land.”

The polling started while 55,000 education workers were engaged in the second day of their walkout and concluded the next day when their union, CUPE, and the government had agreed to return to the bargaining table.

Asked whether the dispute should be settled by binding arbitration — a process to impose a contract on both sides — or through ongoing collective bargaining, it was the negotiated settlement from collective bargaining that won with 53% support, compared to 47% support for arbitration.

On the question of using back-to-work legislation and the notwithstanding clause if workers walk off the job again, 44% said they would support such action to keep schools open, while 56% insisted they would oppose such a measure.
 

BTW IS ALSO ILLEGAL UNDER INTERNATIONAL LABOUR LAW

Wright said that it’s important to note almost half are willing to support Ford using this heavy-handed option to stop further school disruption.

Finally, on making education workers an essential service to ensure there are no strikes in the future, the majority said they favour that path. A total of 59% of poll respondents supported the idea of making education workers an essential service, while 41% did not.

“Making workers an essential service takes the hammer away from both parties,” Wright said.  BULLSHIT

Maru said for comparison purposes, a poll with a probability sample of this size has an estimated margin of error of 4.2%, 19 times out of 20. It was conducted with an online panel

.

POST-MODERN ROBBER BARON

Elon Musk failed to give laid-off Twitter employees previously promised severance packages, lawsuit alleges

mloh@businessinsider.com (Matthew Loh) - 8h ago

Laid-off Twitter employees are suing the company saying they were promised a range of severance benefits.

The lawsuit says they were assured these benefits would hold after Elon Musk bought Twitter.

However, recently laid-off employees say Twitter reneged on the promised severance pay.

Laid-off Twitter employees suing the social media platform say the company — now owned by Elon Musk — reneged on previously promised severance benefits.

Five employees — who filed a class-action suit against Twitter on November 1 — now say they were promised at least two month's severance pay, bonus plan compensation, cash value of vested Twitter equity, and healthcare coverage, but these promises were not kept when Musk laid off about 3,700 staffers on November 4.

Since his $44 billion deal to buy the social network closed in October, Musk has introduced a contentious update to Twitter's verification process, laid off 50% of the company's staff, and reportedly reversed those layoffs for some workers.

The site joins a growing list of companies tied to the world's richest man, who leads multiple massive organizations. Over the past five decades, Musk has become the CEO of both Tesla and SpaceX, founder of The Boring Company, and cofounder of OpenAI and Neuralink, all while focused on his long-term goal: escaping Earth and colonizing Mars.

It hasn't always been a smooth road for Musk — he almost went broke more than once and incited lawsuits and government scrutiny.

Here's how he became one of the most divisive figures in the business world.
The fresh allegations were made in updated court filings to the San Francisco federal court on Tuesday, which were also seen by Insider.

According to the Tuesday update, Twitter's management previously said at several all-hands meetings, wrote in a recent FAQ, and stated in a merger agreement that employees would get at least the equivalent of the originally promised package if they were laid off after Musk acquired the company.

Twitter employees "reasonably relied" on this promise in the weeks leading up to Musk's purchase and chose not to look for jobs elsewhere, the lawsuit shows.

However, Twitter later told employees affected by November's mass layoffs that they would only get one month's base pay after their termination, the updated lawsuit alleged.

This claim appears to contrast a November 4 tweet from Musk, which said that all exited employees were offered three months' severance.

Musk has worked every day to find new ways to screw over Twitter staff, attorney says

In response to queries from Insider, Shannon Liss-Riordan — the attorney who filed the lawsuit — said Musk is counting an extra two months of severance pay because some workers were told on November 4 that they would be laid off in two months' time.

These employees, which include three of the plaintiffs, were locked out of their company accounts on November 3, but were told they would be paid until January 4, 2023, their lawsuit said.

"This pay is not severance pay," Liss-Riordan wrote in the lawsuit, accusing Musk of using this period of payment only to comply with federal and state labor laws. The WARN Act, or the Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification Act, is a federal law that requires businesses with 100 or more employees to give 60 days advance notice of mass layoffs or other work disruptions.

Liss-Riordan filed an emergency motion on behalf of the five employees on Wednesday evening. It seeks to compel Twitter to tell laid-off employees about the pending lawsuit before it can reach any separation agreements with workers.

The motion accused Twitter of trying to get employees to release all claims on their compensation benefits in exchange for their one month of severance pay.

"Since taking control of Twitter just two weeks ago, it seems Elon Musk has worked every day to find new and creative ways to screw over the company's workers," Liss-Riordan said in a statement to Insider. "This emergency motion that we just filed is an effort to protect the employees Twitter is laying off from signing away their rights to get what they are owed by the company."

Twitter's former top four executives — Parag Agrawal, Ned Segal, Vijaya Gadde, and Sarah Personette — stood to gain a collective $88 million from being fired by Musk. On October 31, Musk denied reports that he fired the top executives "for cause" in order to avoid giving them hefty severance payouts.

Musk did not immediately respond to Insider's request for comment, which was sent after-hours. Twitter's no longer employs its communications department.

Musk Reportedly Bans Remote Work At Twitter And Warns Of ‘Difficult Times’ In Internal Email

Siladitya Ray, Forbes Staff - Yesterday 

Topline

Twitter’s new CEO and owner Elon Musk scrapped the company’s remote work policy and ordered all employees to return to the office in his first email to staffers since taking over the company, Bloomberg reported, marking further impact to the firm’s workforce after nearly half of its staff was laid off last week.

Key Facts

According to Bloomberg, Musk’s first email sent to staffers late on Wednesday night warned of “difficult times ahead” for the company, adding that there was no way to “sugarcoat the message.”

Musk also ended Twitter’s lenient remote work policy that has been in place since the start of the pandemic and allowed employees to work from anywhere, corroborating earlier reports.

In his email, Twitter’s new CEO reportedly said the policy change will go into effect immediately and employees are expected to be in the office “at least 40 hours per week.”

Any exemptions to the remote work policy change will have to be personally approved by Musk himself, the report added.

As advertisers flee Twitter over content moderation concerns, Musk wants $8 per month subscriptions from the new Twitter Blue to make up half of Twitter’s total revenue—a far cry from the current situation where 90% of the company’s revenue comes from ads.

Forbes has reached out to Twitter for comment.

Key Background

Musk’s first official email to Twitter employees comes days after the company laid off nearly half of its workforce, gutting several important teams in the process. The entire layoff process was so chaotic that the company had to eventually ask some of the laid-off workers to come back to the company. People who were asked to come back included those who were reportedly fired “by mistake” and others whose skillset the new management did not anticipate would be necessary to help build some of the new features being demanded by Musk. Twitter was also hit with a class action lawsuit last week accusing the company of violating federal and state labor laws by failing to give the laid-off workers adequate notice. Apart from canceling remote work, Musk previously also scrapped Twitter’s “days of rest” policy which was a company-wide extra off day every month that went into effect during the pandemic.

Tangent

Musk has been vocal about his distaste for remote work several times this year. In June, the Tesla CEO scrapped remote work at the electric car company and ordered its executive staff to work a minimum “40 hours a week” a week from office or leave. When asked on Twitter about people wanting to work remotely, Musk responded, “they should pretend to work somewhere else.” In his email to Tesla workers Musk reportedly added: “The office must be where your actual colleagues are located, not some remote pseudo office. If you don’t show up, we will assume you have resigned.” Speaking at an event in May, Musk criticized American workers, stating: “People are trying to avoid going to work at all.” The billionaire’s dig at U.S. workers came after he praised Tesla’s factory workers in China, who he said were willing to work as late as 3 a.m. or not even leave the factory if needed.

Further Reading

Musk’s First Email to Twitter Staff Ends Remote Work (Bloomberg)

Twitter Reportedly Asks Fired Workers To Return—Here’s What To Know About The Aftermath Of Its Mass Layoffs (Forbes)

Musk warns Twitter's survival is at stake as staff quits

Elon Musk warned Twitter employees Thursday to brace for “difficult times ahead” that might end with the collapse of the social media platform if they can't find new ways of making money.


 The Canadian Press

Workers who survived last week's mass layoffs are facing harsher work conditions and growing uncertainty about their ability to keep Twitter running safely as it continues to lose high-level leaders responsible for data privacy, cybersecurity and complying with regulations.

That includes Yoel Roth, Twitter’s head of trust and safety — a previously little-known executive who became the public face of Twitter’s content moderation after Musk took over and who had been praised by Musk for defending Twitter’s ongoing efforts to fight harmful misinformation and hate speech. An executive confirmed Roth’s resignation to coworkers on an internal messaging board seen by The Associated Press.

The developments were part of another whirlwind day in Musk's acquisition of the social media platform. It began with an email to employees from Musk on Wednesday night ordering workers to stop working from home and show up in the office Thursday morning. He called his first “all-hands" meeting Thursday afternoon. Before that, many were relying on the billionaire Tesla CEO's public tweets for clues about Twitter's future.

“Sorry that this is my first email to the whole company, but there is no way to sugarcoat the message," wrote Musk, before he described a dire economic climate for businesses like Twitter that rely almost entirely on advertising to make money.

“Without significant subscription revenue, there is a good chance Twitter will not survive the upcoming economic downturn,” Musk said. “We need roughly half of our revenue to be subscription.”

At the staff meeting, Musk said some “exceptional” employees could seek an exemption from his return-to-office order but that others who didn’t like it could quit, according to an employee at the meeting who spoke on condition of anonymity out of a concern for job security.

The employee also said Musk appeared to downplay employee concerns about how a pared-back Twitter workforce was handling its obligations to maintain privacy and data security standards, saying as CEO of Tesla he knew how that worked.

Musk’s memo and staff meeting echoed a livestreamed conversation trying to assuage major advertisers Wednesday, his most expansive public comments about Twitter’s direction since he closed a $44 billion deal to buy the social media platform late last month and dismissed its top executives. A number of well-known brands have paused advertising on Twitter.

Musk told employees the “priority over the past 10 days" was to develop and launch Twitter's new subscription service for $7.99 a month that includes a blue check mark next to the name of paid members — the mark was previously only for verified accounts. Musk's project has had a rocky rollout with an onslaught of newly bought fake accounts this week impersonating high-profile figures such as basketball star LeBron James and the drug company Eli Lilly to post false information or offensive jokes.

In a second email to employees, Musk said the “absolute top priority" over the coming days is to suspend “bots/trolls/spam” exploiting the verified accounts. But Twitter now employs far fewer people to help him do that.

An executive last week said Twitter was cutting roughly 50% of its workforce, which numbered 7,500 earlier this year.

Musk told employees in the email that “remote work is no longer allowed" and the road ahead is “arduous and will require intense work to succeed," and that they will need to be in the office at least 40 hours per week.

Twitter's ongoing exodus includes the company's chief privacy officer, Damien Kieran, and chief information security officer Lea Kissner, who tweeted Thursday that “I’ve made the hard decision to leave Twitter.”

Roth’s resignation is a “huge loss” for Twitter’s reliability and integrity, said his former coworker and friend Emily Horne.

“He’s worked incredibly hard under very challenging circumstances, including being personally targeted by some of the most vicious trolls who were active on the platform,” said Horne, who oversaw global policy communications at Twitter until 2018. “He stayed through all of that because he believed so deeply in the work his team was doing to promote a public conversation and improve the health of that conversation."

Cybersecurity expert Alex Stamos, a former Facebook security chief, tweeted Thursday that there is a “serious risk of a breach with drastically reduced staff” that could also put Twitter at odds with a 2011 order from the Federal Trade Commission that required it to address serious data security lapses.

“Twitter made huge strides towards a more rational internal security model and backsliding will put them in trouble with the FTC” and other regulators in the U.S. and Europe, Stamos said.

The FTC said in a statement Thursday that it is “tracking recent developments at Twitter with deep concern."

“No CEO or company is above the law, and companies must follow our consent decrees," said the agency's statement. “Our revised consent order gives us new tools to ensure compliance, and we are prepared to use them.”

The FTC would not say whether it was investigating Twitter for potential violations. If it were, it is empowered to demand documents and depose employees.

In an email to employees seen by the AP, Musk said "Twitter will do whatever it takes to adhere to both the letter and spirit of the FTC consent decree.”

“Anything you read to the contrary is absolutely false. The same goes for any other government regulatory matters where Twitter operates," Musk wrote.

Twitter paid a $150 million penalty in May for violating the 2011 consent order and its updated version established new procedures requiring the company to implement an enhanced privacy protection program as well as beefing up info security.

Those new procedures include an exhaustive list of disclosures Twitter must make to the FTC when introducing new products and services — particularly when they affect personal data collected on users.

Musk is fundamentally overhauling the platform's offerings and it's not known if he is telling the FTC about it. Twitter, which gutted its communications department, didn't respond to a request for comment Thursday.

Musk has a history of tangling with regulators. “I do not respect the SEC,” Musk declared in a 2018 tweet.

The Securities and Exchange Commission recently examined for possible tardiness his disclosures to the agency of his purchases of Twitter stock to amass a major stake. In 2018, Musk and Tesla each agreed to pay $20 million in fines over Musk’s allegedly misleading tweets saying he’d secured the funding to take the electric car maker private for $420 a share. Musk has fought the SEC in court over compliance with the agreement.

The consequences for not meeting FTC's requirements can be severe — such as when Facebook had to pay $5 billion for privacy violations.

“If Twitter so much as sneezes, it has to do a privacy review beforehand,” tweeted Riana Pfefferkorn, a Stanford University researcher who said she previously provided Twitter outside legal counsel. “There are periodic outside audits, and the FTC can monitor compliance.”

—-

AP reporters Frank Bajak and Marcy Gordon contributed to this report.

Matt O'brien, The Associated Press

Why inequality is growing in the U.S. and around the world

Fatema Z. Sumar -

THE CONVERSATION

U.S. income inequality grew in 2021 for the first time in a decade, according to data the Census Bureau released in September 2022.

That might sound surprising, since the most accurate measure of the poverty rate declined during the same time span.

But for development experts like me, this apparent contradiction makes perfect sense.

That’s because what’s been driving income inequality in the United States—and around
the world for years—is that the very rich are getting even richer, rather than the poor getting poorer.

Brett Arends: One reason the rich get richer

In every major region of the world outside of Europe, extreme wealth is becoming concentrated in just a handful of people.
Gini index

Economists and other experts track the gap between the rich and the poor with what’s known as the Gini index or coefficient.

This common measure of income inequality is calculated by assessing the relative share of national income received by proportions of the population.

In a society with perfect equality—meaning everyone receives an equal share of the pie—the Gini coefficient would be 0. In the most unequal society conceivably possible, where a single person hoarded every penny of that nation’s wealth, the Gini coefficient would be 1.

The Gini index rose by 1.2% in the U.S. in 2021 to 0.494 from 0.488 a year earlier, the Census found. In many other countries, by contrast, the Gini has been declining even as the COVID-19 pandemic—and the deep recession and weak economic recovery it triggered—worsened global income inequality.

Inequality tends to be greater in developing countries than wealthier ones. The United States is an exception. The U.S. Gini coefficient is much higher than in similar economies, such as Denmark, which had a Gini coefficient of 0.28 in 2019, and France, where it stood at 0.32 in 2018, according to the World Bank.

In 2021, the richest 1% of Americans owned 34.9% of the country’s wealth, while average Americans in the bottom half had only $12,065—less money than their counterparts in other industrial nations. By comparison, the richest 1% in the United Kingdom and Germany owned only 22.6% and 18.6% of their country’s wealth, respectively.

Globally, the richest 10% of people now possess nearly 76% of the world’s wealth. Meanwhile, the bottom 50% own just 2%, according to the 2022 World Inequality Report, which analyzes data and the work of more than 100 researchers and inequality experts.

Drivers of extreme income and wealth

Large increases in executive pay are contributing to higher levels of income inequality.

Take a typical corporate CEO. Back in 1965, he—all CEOs were white men then, and most still are today—earned about 20 times the amount of an average worker at the company he led. In 2018, the typical CEO earned 278 times as much as their typical employees.

But the world’s roughly 2,700 billionaires make most of their money not through wages but through gains in the value of their stocks and other investments.

Their assets grow in large part because of a cascade of corporate and individual tax breaks, rather than salaried wages granted by shareholders. When the wealthy in the United States earn money from capital gains, the highest tax rate they pay is 20%, whereas the highest wage earners are on the hook for as much as 37% on every additional dollar they earn.

This calculation does not even count the effects of tax breaks, which often slash the real-world capital-gain tax to much lower levels.

Tesla SpaceX and Twitter CEO Elon Musk is currently the world’s richest man, with a fortune of $174 billion, according to a Bloomberg estimate. The $383 million he made a day in 2020 made it possible for him to buy enough Tesla Model 3 cars to cover almost the whole of Manhattan had he wished to do so.

Musk’s wealth accumulation is extreme. But the founders of several tech companies, including Alphabet Meta and Amazon have all earned many billions of dollars in just a few years. The average person could never make that much money through a salary alone.

Another day, another billionaire

A new billionaire is created every 26 hours, according to Oxfam, an international aid and research group where I used to work.

Globally, inequality is so extreme that the world’s 10 richest men possess more wealth than the 3.1 billion poorest people, Oxfam has calculated.

Economists who study global inequality have found that the rich in large English-speaking countries, along with India and China, have seen a dramatic rise in their earnings since the 1980s. Inequality boomed as deregulation, economic liberalization programs and other policies created opportunities for the rich to get richer.
Why inequality matters

The rich tend to spend less of their money than the poor. As a result, the extreme concentration of wealth can slow the pace of economic growth.

Extreme inequality can also exacerbate political dysfunction and undermine faith in political and economic systems. It can also erode principles of fairness and democratic norms of sharing power and resources.

The richest people have more wealth than entire countries. Such extreme power and influence in the hands of a select few who face little accountability is raising concerns that are part of a robust debate on whether and how to address extreme inequality.



Many proposed solutions call for new taxes, regulations and policies, along with philanthropic strategies like using grants and community-based investments to dismantle inequality.

Voters in Massachusetts approved a tax increase on the income earned by their richest residents in November 2022. Proponents of these initiatives claim the revenue raised would boost funding for public services, such as education and infrastructure. President Joe Biden is also proposing to almost double the top capital-gains tax for those making over $1 million.

However societies choose to act, I believe change is needed.

Fatema Z. Sumar, executive director of the Center for International Development, Harvard Kennedy School

This commentary was originally published by The Conversation—Why inequality is growing in the US and around the world

B.C. company watching closely as opposition grows to deep-sea mining

Kylie Stanton and Simon Little - 

A Vancouver company is trying to navigate difficult political and environmental currents, amid a growing debate over the future of deep-sea mining.


A GreenPeace flag opposing deep sea mining.

It comes amid a high-stakes international meeting in Jamaica that could have lasting effects on access to what some believe to be the key future source of key minerals used for electric vehicle batteries.

B.C.-based mining enterprise The Metals Company is hoping to exploit a large deposit of what are known as polymetallic nodules located in what's known as the Clarion Clipperton Zone near the Hawaiian archipelago.

Read more:

Canada to make electric vehicle, battery manufacturing pitch Japanese automakers

"It’s conceivable that the supply from this resource could become the number one provider of battery metals for those important ingredients," The Metals Company chairman and CEO Gerard Barron told Global News.

Located 4,000 metres below sea level, the small, potato-shaped nodules are rich in cobalt, nickel, copper and manganese, and could go a long way towards meeting growing demand for electric vehicle batteries.

Video: B.C. ocean expedition goes to new depths to explore sea life

But there’s also growing opposition to mining the sea floor.

"These nodules have taken millions of years to form, they are in ecosystems that are very slow moving, very deep seas -- the impacts on biodiversity are irreversible," said Susanna Fuller, vice-president with conservation group Oceans North.

Read more:

Scientists ‘shocked’ to find life in extreme depths under Antarctic ice

The International Seabed Authority is currently meeting in Kingston, Jamaica, to come up with regulations to allow deep sea mining as early as 2024.

But so far, Germany, Spain, Costa Rica, New Zealand, Chile, Panama, Fiji, and the Federated States of Mirconesia have demanded a “precautionary pause” on the practice, due to a lack of scientific data.

France, meanwhile, has called for an outright ban.

Canada has yet to take a position on the the issue.

"The potential for a cascade of effects all the way up the water column is great," Catherine Coumans, research coordinator with MiningWatch Canada, told Global News.

"This is what the scientists are saying, so we need to take the time to understand what it is that we are going to be impacting before we destroy it."

The Metals Company is conducting its own research, and says it understands why people are cautious as they push into this new frontier.

But Barron insists that given the growing effects of climate change, the risk to the planet is far greater if the resource is not explored.

"We need to have an open mind, and look at the whole range of impacts and be prepared to make decisions off the knowledge and the science that’s being prepared by companies like ourselves," he said.

Alberta sovereignty act, protection for the unvaccinated part of Shandro's mandate


EDMONTON — Alberta's justice minister has received a long to-do list from Premier Danielle Smith in a mandate letter.


Alberta sovereignty act, protection for the unvaccinated part of Shandro's mandate© Provided by The Canadian Press

The letter says Tyler Shandro is to develop and enact the proposed sovereignty act to challenge "unconstitutional federal encroachments on areas of provincial jurisdiction."

"I expect our cabinet to remain united and determined in the face of a federal government that no longer treats its partners in Confederation as equals," Smith writes in the letter dated Wednesday.

"We must proactively protect Albertans from continued federal government overreach, including hostile economic policies that landlock our provincial resources, that chase billions in investment and thousands of jobs from our province, and that are detrimental to the short-term and long-term prosperity of Albertans."

In an interview with The Canadian Press on Thursday, Shandro said the sovereignty act is the priority and will be ready by next month.

"That's going to be Bill 1. It's going to be sponsored by the premier so definitely from that perspective," he said Thursday.

"One of the directions I've received from the premier is for this to be constitutionally compliant and the way of confronting the federal government's repeated intrusions and stepping into provincial jurisdiction."

The letter says Shandro is also to take legislative or regulatory steps to prohibit discrimination on the basis of COVID-19 vaccination.

"A lot of Albertans and many of my caucus mates have heard anecdotes from people who continue to be discriminated against," Shandro said.

"We are in the endemic stage and so it says in the letter for us to take a look at whether there are any steps that need to be taken to address those concerns of discrimination."

Smith has previously said the unvaccinated are the "most discriminated group" she has seen in her lifetime.

In addition, Smith asks Shandro to make a final decision on establishing a provincial police service.

Shandro said there is no date for when a decision will be made, but added that the province is consulting with municipalities in a working group to address any concerns that still exist.

"It's not in the approval process at this time. I think because of that working group, we are closer than we ever have been before in this province," Shandro said.

Smith spoke to the fall convention of the Rural Municipalities Association in Edmonton on Thursday. She outlined government priorities but did not mention the provincial police plan. She didn’t take questions from reporters.

Paul McLauchlin, the president of the association, said his members have been clear they want to work with the RCMP.

"My members are just saying, 'You know what? Should we spend energy creating a new police force or should we spend energy on the root cause of crime?' And my members are saying today, wholeheartedly, 'let's invest in the root cause of crime,'" McLauchlin said.

"I've talked to pollsters and they're (saying) this is not a good idea from a strategic political standpoint. It is not resonating from a polling standpoint (and) it’s not resonating from the folks I represent."

In the letter, Smith says she also wants legislature security officers to be designated as peace officers and be allowed to carry firearms.

Shandro said this is a matter that has been studied since 2014. He said because the legislature officers answer to the Speaker, firearms have been prohibited. A simple amendment to the Legislative Assembly Act, however, is possible and would make the legislature a safer place, Shandro added.

"This is a long time coming," he said. "It has been studied to death and we're pleased to be able to look at whether there could be a legislative amendment to help this come forward."

Smith has also ordered Shandro to ensure Alberta fully participates in the Public Order Emergency Commission to challenge Ottawa's use of the Emergencies Act and to help develop policy recommendations to prevent the future use of the legislation from violating provincial jurisdiction.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 10, 2022.

— By Bill Graveland in Calgary

The Canadian Press

Competition Bureau opens probe of alleged 'greenwashing' by natural gas association
Barbara Shecter - 


Blue flames on a stove powered by natural gas.© Provided by Financial Post

The Competition Bureau has opened an inquiry into allegations of “greenwashing” by the Canadian Gas Association after receiving a complaint in September from a group of doctors, nurses and public health advocates.

The inquiry concerns representations about natural gas made through the association’s “Fuelling Canada” advertising campaign as well as other representations made to the public outside this campaign, according to a Nov. 4 letter sent to the Canadian Association of Physicians for the Environment (CAPE) by Josephine A.L. Palumbo, deputy commissioner in the competition authority’s cartels and deceptive marketing practices branch.

The complaint alleged representations by the Canadian Gas Association that natural gas is “clean” were false and misleading, as were claims that methane gas is more affordable than other home energy systems.

“When properly accounted for, ‘natural’ gas has comparable greenhouse gas emissions to coal, in part because methane, the main ingredient in ‘natural’ gas, has up to 80 times the climate-warming potential of carbon dioxide,” CAPE claimed in a statement Thursday.

“The extraction and production of gas also pollutes the air and contaminates water sources, while closer to home, gas appliances cause indoor air pollution and pose a serious health risk for children’s respiratory health.”

Late Thursday, the Canadian Gas Association said it was informed by the Competition Bureau on Nov. 4 that an inquiry had been opened related to messaging around natural gas.

In an emailed statement, Timothy M. Egan, chief executive of the CGA, said the association plans to cooperate and is confident in its position.

“Natural gas plays an important part in Canada’s energy mix, meeting 38 per cent of Canadians’ energy needs, a number that is growing,” he said.

“Canadians need access to energy they can count on, and natural gas meets that need.”

Marie-Christine Vézina, a spokesperson for the Competition Bureau confirmed the watchdog “has launched an investigation into the Canadian Gas Association’s alleged deceptive marketing practices“ after receiving an application, and said the Competition Act obligates the Bureau to launch a formal investigation to determine the facts as long as such an application meets technical requirements.
“As the Bureau is obligated by law to conduct its work confidentially, we cannot provide any further details related to this matter,” she said in an email.

Greenwashing, in which environmental claims are not backed by substantial action, came under fire this week from Catherine Mckenna, Canada’s former minister of environment and climate change, at this week’s COP27 United Nations Climate Change Conference in Sharm El-Sheikh, Egypt.

As chair of a UN expert group focused on net zero, McKenna laid out expectations for governments and companies and said it’s “time to draw a red line” around greenwashing.

“Too many of these net-zero pledges represent little more than empty slogans and hype,” she told the Canadian Press.

This is the second probe Canada’s Competition Bureau has opened into complaints about greenwashing.

Royal Bank of Canada is facing a probe following a complaint last summer by a handful of individuals backed by environmental groups. The complaint said the bank’s claims of being a climate leader were misleading because it continued to finance fossil fuel projects.

Groups making claims of greenwashing have scored some recent victories.

In October, HSBC Holdings PLC, one of the world’s largest banks, was forbidden from showing ads it had created when the United Kingdom’s marketing authority agreed with complaints they were “misleading” about the financial institution’s efforts to tackle climate change. In its first finding of greenwashing, The Advertising Standards Authority ruled that HSBC “omitted material information” about its activities, which include financing businesses that contribute to carbon dioxide and greenhouse gas emissions.

Amazon has made history as the first public company ever to lose $1 trillion in market value, as the tech sell-off worsens

htan@insider.com (Huileng Tan) - Yesterday 

Amazon's share price has almost halved so far this year. 

Mike Segar/Reuters© Provided by Business Insider

Amazon has become the first public company ever to lose $1 trillion in market value, per Bloomberg.

Its share price closed 4.3% lower at $86.14 on Wednesday, taking its market value down to $879 billion.

Amazon's market value was nearly $1.9 trillion in July 2021.

Amazon has become the first public company ever to lose $1 trillion in market value amid a tech stock rout, according to Bloomberg. That's almost like losing Google parent Alphabet's worth of market value, which is now around $1.13 trillion.

The world's largest online retailer's share price closed 4.3% lower at $86.14 on Wednesday, taking its market capitalization to about $879 billion.

Related video: Amazon A New High Score

Duration 0:32   View on Watch

The stock has lost around 48% of its value this year alone, and is a far cry from July 2021 when the company's market cap almost touched $1.9 trillion, per Bloomberg.

Amazon's market value fell below the $1 trillion mark on November 1, days after the company posted mixed third-quarter earnings and projected the company's slowest fourth-quarter growth ever.

It's not just Amazon that's bleeding money, the top five US tech companies by revenue have already lost nearly $4 trillion in market value so far this year, thanks to rising inflation and macroeconomic headwinds, per Bloomberg.

"We are seeing signs all around that, again, people's budgets are tight, inflation is still high, energy costs are an additional layer on top of that caused by other issues," Amazon CFO Brian Olsavsky told the reporters in a call on October 27, per Reuters. "We are preparing for what could be a slower growth period, like most companies."

The dip in Amazon's share price has also hit Amazon founder Jeff Bezos' net worth. The world's fourth richest person is now worth $113 billion after starting the year at $192.5 billion, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index.

Danielle Smith's lobbying record holds clues to her governing agenda, observers say


EDMONTON — Alberta Premier Danielle Smith promised to focus on the concerns of everyday people after winning a seat in the legislature Tuesday, but observers say other clues to her agenda can be found in her record as a lobbyist for one of the province's most powerful business groups.



"I find this extremely useful as an indicator of what she's going to do," said Laurie Adkin, a political scientist at the University of Alberta.

"These are her people. These are the people she worked for."

Smith first registered as a lobbyist in June 2019 for the Alberta Enterprise Group, a Calgary-based association of 100 companies of which she was also president. It represents a broad swath of the provincial economy with members ranging from oilsands giant Syncrude to the Oilers Entertainment Group, the company behind the Edmonton Oilers NHL team. It also includes firms from health care, transportation, construction, energy, law and finance.

It refers to itself as "Alberta's most influential business organization."

Smith last renewed her lobbying status for the group in January. Ten months later, she was premier.

"They now have their president as premier," said Adkin. "Whose premier is she?"

In response to a question about how Smith's lobbying record might suggest her legislative priorities, Rebecca Polak, the premier's press secretary, wrote in an email: "Premier Smith has always operated in accordance with the Lobbyists Act and the Conflicts of Interest Act."

The registry lists more than a dozen pages of issues Smith lobbied the government on during her years with the business group.

They include a "free enterprise approach to delivering public services such as health spending accounts and vouchers in child care."

Smith, a former advocate of bogus COVID-19 cures such as Ivermectin, met with then-health minister Tyler Shandro — now Alberta's justice minister — to discuss "the College of Physicians and Surgeons interference with doctors' ability to prescribe medications based on best available medical research."

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She and Shandro also discussed "a new accountability model for delivering health care that would split the roles of purchaser, provider and performance oversight."

Smith advocated a government-run "concierge" service for large development projects. She argued for a "streamlined model" to assess rural property taxes on roads and pipelines for the oilpatch. Smith lobbied for charter schools.

She held repeated meetings on the so-called RStar program, which would give energy companies an up to $5-billion break on their royalties if they met their legal obligations and cleaned up their abandoned wells. That proposal is now being considered by Alberta Energy.

Many items on her list have already been enacted under former premier Jason Kenney, such as the 50 per cent cut in the corporate tax rate.

The list is consistent with the agenda Smith has pursued her entire public career, said Lori Williams, a political scientist from Calgary's Mount Royal University.

"It's more or less a confirmation of what we've already seen," she said.

But Williams said if Smith's legislative agenda follows her lobbying efforts, she may alienate Albertans.

"In some respects, Jason Kenney misread Alberta as being more conservative than it actually is. Danielle Smith seems to have tacked even further to the right."

Smith's lobbying work immediately preceding the resumption of her political career "raises lots of questions," Williams said.

"We often hear conservatives discussing special interest groups and their undemocratic influence on government. There could be questions raised whether Danielle Smith represents all Albertans or will allow disproportionate influence to an interest group."

New Democrat Opposition deputy leader Sarah Hoffman said Smith's lobbying record isn't in sync with what Albertans care about.

"Most Albertans want to have a public health system where if they get diagnosed with something scary that they have access to quality treatment as soon as possible, not based on how much money they've got in their bank account," she said. "I think most Albertans are concerned about the cost of living, want things to be more affordable for them.

"These are top of mind for most people, not wanting to push a voucher system."

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 10, 2022.

— Follow Bob Weber on Twitter at @row1960

Bob Weber, The Canadian Press

Russian man accused of being global ransomware mastermind arrested north of Toronto

Adrian Humphreys - 

A Russian-Canadian man accused of being one of the world’s most prolific ransomware operators behind high-stakes attacks on critical infrastructure and companies has been arrested north of Toronto after an international investigation by European, American, and Canadian police.


Ukrainian officers and officials with European and United States agencies search a home in Kyiv in 2021 after the arrest two men accused of being LockBit ransomware accomplices of a man arrested in Ontario in October.

When police raided Mikhail Vasiliev’s house in Bradford West Gwillimbury, 60 kilometres north of Toronto, on Oct. 26, officers found him sitting in the garage at a table with an open laptop computer. Police restrained him before he was able to lock his laptop, according to authorities.

On the open laptop, police found a browser window with several open tabs including one titled “LockBit LOGIN,” at a site hosted on a dark web domain, according to allegations.

He is accused of being the mastermind behind LockBit, perhaps the most notorious of recent extortion tools called ransomware, that targets, blocks and locks access to computers and private data until a ransom is paid.

The Ontario Provincial Police arrested Vasiliev, 33, but kept it quiet while a large, international response unfolded.

While Vasiliev was charged by the OPP only on gun charges after two weapons and ammunition were allegedly found on the premises, he now faces an extradition request by the United States and attracts keen interest in Europe. He appeared in court in Barrie Thursday on the extradition request, a hearing adjourned until next week.

European authorities said he is alleged to have deployed LockBit to attack infrastructure and large industrial groups across the world. Companies in Canada, Europe and the United States have been hard hit.



Ukrainian officers and officials with European and United States agencies search a home in Kyiv in 2021 after the arrest of two men accused of being ransomware accomplices of a man arrested in Ontario in October.© Cyber ​​Police Of Ukraine

Europol, the European police agency, said he is allegedly known for extortionate ransom demands ranging between 5 million to 70 million euros, which is about $7 million to $95 million in Canadian currency.

Investigators from the French Gendarmerie, the FBI, and Europol’s European Cybercrime Centre were deployed to Ontario to jointly conduct investigative measures with Canadian police, Europol said.

Europol said two guns, eight computers and 32 external hard drives were seized in the search of the home, along with 400,000 euros in cryptocurrencies, which is about $544,000 Canadian.

The timing of the raid seems to have caught Vasiliev by surprise, but that police would return likely didn’t. His home was first raided by Canadian police in August, according to documents filed in U.S. court in New Jersey.

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During that raid, officers found a file titled “TARGETLIST” which appears to be a list of prospective or historical cybercrime victims. It included a New Jersey based business that was hit last November, according to an affidavit from FBI Special Agent Matthew Haddad, that is attached to a criminal complaint against Vasiliev.

Canadian authorities also seized screenshots of messages sent on an encrypted platform from a user named “LockBitSupp,” believed to be short for “LockBit Support” and a moniker known by authorities to have been used in ransomware communications. Also found was a file that appears to be instructions for deploying a LockBit attack, according to Haddad.

Police seized source code for a data encryption program and photos of a computer screen showing usernames and passwords belonging to employees of a LockBit victim in Canada that was hit in January, according to Haddad.

When police returned to his home last month, and arrested him at his open laptop, officers found further potential evidence — the FBI believes the tab was a LockBit control panel. Other files on the computer showed it had working access to the site, the U.S. complaint alleges.

Police also found a seed phrase for accessing a Bitcoin wallet. The wallet showed a payment on Feb. 5. The FBI alleges the funds originated as a portion of a ransom payment made six hours earlier by a confirmed LockBit victim. At the time, the cryptocurrency deposit was worth about $53,000. This morning the same amount was worth about $18,500 after a drop in Bitcoin value.

The OPP would only confirm that guns were seized — and that is all he was charged with in Canada — although the OPP confirmed the arrest is part of a cross-border ransomware investigation. The OPP said it worked with the RCMP’s National Cybercrime Coordination Centre.

Vasiliev faces charges in Ontario of possession of a prohibited weapon, possession of a prohibited or restricted firearm with ammunition, possession of a prohibited device or ammunition, and careless storage of a firearm.

He originally appeared in court in Orillia the day after his arrest and has been released on bail pending a court appearance. The OPP said its investigation remains active. His release conditions include GPS monitoring and for him not to be within 10 kilometres of Pearson international airport nor within 20 kilometres of any land border with the United States.

The U.S. Attorney’s Office in the District of New Jersey said U.S. charges against Vasiliev were filed on Nov. 9, followed by a request for his extradition to New Jersey. He is wanted in Newark for conspiring to damage protected computers and to transmit ransom demands.

Two of his alleged accomplices were arrested last year in Kyiv, Ukraine. An investigation by French and Ukrainian police led to the arrest of two men accused of being prolific LockBit operators.

Europol said they were part of an organized group that was one of Europol’s high-value targets and, at the time, said officers continued to search for the “main operator.” Along with those arrests in September 2021, police seized US$375,000 in cash, two luxury vehicles, and froze assets of US$1.3 million in cryptocurrencies.

According to analysts at Blackberry, LockBit ransomware has been particularly damaging.

“LockBit ransomware has been implicated in more cyberattacks this year than any other ransomware, making it the most active ransomware in the world,” according to a report by Blackberry.

LockBit was first detected in 2019, LockBit 2.0 in 2021; and the current version, LockBit 3.0, was detected in June.

“LockBit attacks typically employ a double extortion tactic to encourage victims to pay, first, to regain access to their encrypted files and then to pay again to prevent their stolen data from being posted publicly,” the report says.

LockBit attracted added scrutiny when analysts found it had a special process before launching an attack: It determined where the target’s servers were located and if they were in Russia or one of the former Soviet Union states, it would abort the attack.

• Email: ahumphreys@postmedia.com | Twitter: AD_Humphreys

‘A twisted joke’: UN’s flagship climate summit sees sharp jump in fossil fuel industry delegates

Sam Meredith - 14h ago

The sharp jump in attendees associated with some of the world's biggest polluting oil and gas giants at the U.N.'s flagship climate conference is thought to reflect the rise in the influence of the fossil fuel industry to shape the debate.

Campaigners described the findings as a "twisted joke."

The data showed more fossil fuel industry delegates were set to attend COP27 than any national delegation from the African continent, despite the talks being described as the "Africa COP."


The sharp jump in attendees associated with some of the world's biggest polluting oil and gas giants at COP27 is thought to reflect the rise in the influence of the fossil fuel industry to shape the debate.© Provided by CNBC

SHARM EL-SHEIKH, Egypt — More than 600 fossil fuel industry delegates have been registered to attend the COP27 climate talks in Egypt, according to analysis from campaign groups, reflecting an increase of over 25% from last year.

The sharp jump in attendees associated with some of the world's biggest polluting oil and gas giants at the U.N.'s flagship climate conference is thought to reflect the rise in the influence of the fossil fuel industry to shape the debate.

Campaigners described the findings as a "twisted joke" and said it appeared to set the stage for COP27 to be a "festival of fossil fuels and their polluting friends, buoyed by recent bumper profits."

A spokesperson for Egypt's COP presidency was not immediately available to comment on the findings of the report.

Around 35,000 delegates from nearly 200 countries are expected to convene in the Red Sea resort town of Sharm el-Sheikh to discuss collective action to tackle the climate emergency.

An analysis of data from the U.N.'s provisional list of named attendees by campaign groups Corporate Accountability, Corporate Europe Observatory and Global Witness found that 636 fossil fuel lobbyists had been registered to take part in the talks.

That reflects an increase of over 100 when compared to last year's talks in Glasgow, Scotland.

It means that more fossil fuel lobbyists are represented at the two-week-long summit than any single country besides the United Arab Emirates, which has 1,070 delegates registered compared to 176 last year.

Why poorer countries want rich countries to foot their climate change bill

The data also showed that more fossil fuel industry delegates were set to attend COP27 than any national delegation from the African continent, despite the talks being described as the "Africa COP."

Researchers pored through the U.N.'s provisional list of named attendees to count the number of individuals registered either acting on behalf of the fossil fuel industry or those directly affiliated with oil and gas companies, such as BP, Shell and Chevron.
'Extraordinary presence' of the fossil fuel industry

"With time running out to avert climate disaster, major talks like COP27 absolutely must advance concrete action to stop the toxic practices of the fossil fuel industry that is causing more damage to the climate than any other industry," a spokesperson for the groups said.

"The extraordinary presence of this industry's lobbyists at these talks is therefore a twisted joke at the expense of both people and planet," they added.

To be sure, the burning of fossil fuels such as coal, oil and gas, is the chief driver of the climate crisis.

A flurry of major U.N. reports published in recent weeks delivered a grim assessment of how close the planet is to irreversible climate breakdown, warning there is "no credible pathway" in place to cap global heating at the critical temperature threshold of 1.5 degrees Celsius.

"There's been a lot of lip service paid to this being the so-called African COP, but how are you going to address the dire climate impacts on the continent, when the fossil fuel delegation is larger than that of any African country?" said Philip Jakpor of Corporate Accountability and Public Participation Africa.

"More than 450 organisations around the world are calling on world governments to do what they should have done from day one," Jakpor said in a statement. "It's time to kick Big Polluters out! No more writing the rules or bankrolling the climate talks."