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A student-loan company that just took over 5 million borrowers' accounts has 'a growing list of scandals and abuses,' report says

asheffey@businessinsider.com (Ayelet Sheffey) 

© Provided by Business Insider College graduates. ROBYN BECK/AFP via Getty Images

The Student Borrower Protection Center said student-loan company Maximus has a history of abuse.
Low-income borrowers allege Maximus engaged in "unfair" debt collection practices.
A Maximus spokesperson says it is not a lender and simply does backend IT support for federal loans.

The largest student-loan company in the world may not be acting in borrowers' best interests, according to a new report.

The Student Borrower Protection Center and the Communications Workers of America released a report on Monday that found student-loan company Maximus, which services federal loans under the name Aidvantage, has been accused of "a growing list of scandals and abuses." Maximus recently took over 5.6 million federal borrowers' accounts from Navient, which was also accused of misleading behavior.

Specifically, the report highlighted litigation filed by low-income borrowers that alleged Maximus engaged in "unfair" debt collection practices. Some also said Maximus caused illegal garnishment of their wages when they stopped paying their bills after being defrauded by the for-profit school they attended.

"When student loan companies cut corners and skirt the law to pad their profits, the most vulnerable people with student debt are always forced to pay the price," Mike Pierce, executive director of the Student Borrower Protection Center, said in a statement. "Our investigation offers an early warning to regulators and people with student debt: Maximus and Aidvantage are now running the same failed servicing playbook that left millions of Navient borrowers financially bruised and broken. This newly minted student loan giant must change course before it is too late."

A spokesperson for Maximus told Insider the report is inaccurate and mischaracterizes the work Maximus does for Federal Student Aid, adding that the company's contract with the government is to simply service loans and follow the direction of the Education Department on handling loan defaults.

The spokesperson emphasized that Maximus is only in charge of back-end IT support, and questions or complaints about a borrower's account is referred to the lender, which, in this case is the federal government. Additionally, in response to the nearly 200 complaints borrowers have filed against the company, the spokesperson said 178 of them have been successfully addressed.

A 'newly minted student loan giant'

Last year, student-loan company Navient announced it would be shutting down its federal services, and the Education Department later announced that Aidvantage would be taking over Navient's accounts. While student-loan payments have been on pause for two years as part of pandemic relief, three student-loan companies announced they would be ending their federal services during the pause, causing 16 million borrowers to be transferred to new companies.

Those transfers had some lawmakers and advocates concerned, given the administrative burden successfully and accurately transferring millions of borrowers would be. While Navient had a controversial history with accusations of misleading borrowers, Monday's report suggested those borrowers might not be better off under Maximus.

The report also highlighted several other lawsuits against Maximus. In 2019, a defrauded student accused the company of continuing debt collection efforts despite being directed to halt those efforts while the student's loan forgiveness application was pending, which resulted in the seizure of her tax refunds. More recently, in January, nine borrowers accused Maximus in a lawsuit of misleading them about their ability to get out of loan defaults.

Maximus said 'it is imperative' it gets the repayment transition right

In November, Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren wrote a letter to Maximus expressing concerns with how the 5.6 million borrowers it would be servicing would be treated. Following Warren's letter, the company's spokesperson told Insider: "This is a defining moment for student borrowers, and we couldn't agree more with Sen. Warren — it is imperative we get it right."

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, along with Federal Student Aid head Richard Cordray, have spoken out on potential abuses of student-loan companies, and the need to hold them accountable. Cordray told The Washington Post he is reviewing the Student Borrower Protection Center's report and will work to address them.

"All borrowers should be able to count on timely and accurate information about their student loans," Cordray said. "That is why FSA has renewed its partnerships with federal and state regulators, cleared roadblocks to state oversight by clarifying federal preemption rules, and negotiated new accountability terms in our recent contract extensions."

Cordray said last year that student-loan servicers will be held to higher standards, and if they don't meet those standards, they will "face consequences." The CFPB has also launched a series of investigations into accusations of servicers misleading borrowers and pledged it would be increasing oversight.

OILSANDS BY ANY OTHER NAME

Chevron is ready to trade Venezuelan oil in place of Russian oil if US eases sanctions on South American nation, a report says

ujamal@businessinsider.com (Urooba Jamal)

The Chevron logo is displayed at a Chevron gas station. 

PATRICK T. FALLON/AFP via Getty Images

Chevron is preparing to expand its ventures with Venezuela's state-run oil company PDVSA, Reuters reported.

The company's presence in Venezuela is dependent on political moves between the country and the US.

Chevron's expansion in the country could boost global crude oil supplies.

Chevron is prepared to trade Venezuelan oil in place of banned Russian oil imports if the US eases its sanctions on Caracas, Reuters reported.
The release of more Venezuelan oil would help offset oil losses in wake of the Russia ban, put in place on March 8 over its invasion of Ukraine. However, the move is dependent on fraught political talks with the South American nation.

Still, sources told Reuters that Chevron has been preparing to expand its four ventures with Venezuela's national oil company PDVSA.

It has assembled a trading team to market oil from the South American nation, asked the US government for a license to have greater control over the ventures, and is starting to arrange Venezuelan visas for its employees from Aruba, Reuters reported.

Chevron did not immediately respond to Insider's request for comment, made outside its normal working hours.

Venezuelan oil is an important alternative to Russian supply

Sanctions were imposed on Venezuela by the Trump administration in 2019 to pressure Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro to leave power. Since then, the country has allied itself closely with Russia.

Seeking to break the ice and develop alternatives to Russian oil, the US and Venezuela held their first high-level bilateral talks in years on March 5 in the Venezuelan capital of Caracas.

Crude oil prices have surged as a result of the supply crunch from sanctions against Russia, jumping nearly 20% on March 7 to almost $140 a barrel for the first time in nearly 14 years. The price appears to now be heading towards a weekly decline of 4%.

Chevron's moves in Venezuela could boost crude supplies to offset the loss. Before US sanctions, its joint ventures with PDVSA produced around 200,000 barrels of oil per day, according to Reuters. They now produce 140,000 barrels per day, Bloomberg reported.

"Since Venezuelan barrels were banned in the United States in 2019, and Colombia and Mexico reduced key exports to the United States, Russian barrels have been feeding the Gulf refiners," one person involved in the bilateral talks told Reuters.
Chevron's expanded presence in Venezuela is still dependent on a number of political moves

Thawing relations between Washington and Caracas in recent weeks appear to have had some impact.

US officials are seeking the release of more jailed Americans in Venezuela, after Maduro released two last week, Reuters reported. Washington also wants more guarantees of free elections and the resumption of talks with Venezuela's opposition, the agency also reported.

During the talks in early March, Maduro had, in turn, pushed for a total lift on sanctions on its oil exports, sanctions on him and other government officials, as well as a return to government control of Citgo Petroleum, a US subsidiary of PDVSA.

Even if sanctions are relaxed, challenges still abound for the Venezuelan oil industry. Years of government mismanagement mean the industry is nowhere near its oil-producing boom days in the 1990s when it produced 3.2 million barrels of oil a day. It now averages around 800,000 barrels a day.

Ancient prairie, home to endangered bees and rare plants, may soon be razed by airport

Illinois, the Prairie State, was once dominated by 22 million acres of grasslands, home to an almost unimaginable diversity of plants and animals. But now, only one-ten-thousandth of the state’s original prairies, or roughly 2,500 acres, remain.

© Photograph by Clay Bolt, Nature Picture Library A rusty-patched bumblebee near Madison, Wisconsin. These endangered bees also call Bell Bowl Prairie home.

Susan Cosier 

 National Geographic

One of the rarest grassland types, dry gravel prairie, is the most endangered: Only 18 high-quality acres remain. Now, Chicago-Rockford International Airport plans to destroy Bell Bowl Prairie, which contains five acres of this precious biome, as part of a planned expansion.

But a growing coalition of environmental groups, scientists, and advocates—including local middle schoolers—are fighting to protect this habitat. Among other reasons, they point out that Bell Bowl hosts nearly 150 plant species and supports a wide variety of birds and insects, including endangered species such as the rusty-patched bumblebee.

“These remnant sites are the most important things in Illinois,” says Paul Marcum, a botanist with the Illinois Natural History Survey. “It bothers me to no end that a site like this could be destroyed.”

The airport says that they could begin construction as early as June 1, as soon as consultations with the Fish and Wildlife Service conclude.

Meanwhile, conservationists are taking action and weighing their options. How could such a rare and important ecosystem be razed?
Balancing growth and protection

© Photograph by Joni Denker A view of Bell Bowl prairie, a unique landscape that faces imminent destruction due to the expansion of the Rockford Airport. But many are fighting back to save it.

Bell Bowl was originally protected thanks to its shape. Naturally carved out of the side of an earthen terrace, it was too steep to farm. Instead, it became part of Camp Grant, where soldiers trained during World War I. In 1957, the Greater Rockford Airport Authority received roughly a thousand acres of the camp, protecting part of it. For the better part of a century, conservationists have been calling for its preservation. Nevertheless, Bell Bowl has gotten smaller and smaller, reflecting the trend in prairies nationally.

© Photograph by Chicago Tribune, Getty Images Cargo planes are visible behind the Bell Bowl Prairie adjacent to Chicago-Rockford International Airport on Oct. 20, 2021. The airport currently plans to bulldoze the prairie.

What remains is a tiny fraction of what existed in the 1800s when settlers arrived. The tallgrass prairie that once covered 170 million acres, a grassland sea in the middle of the continent, takes up just four percent of its original expanse, according to the National Parks Service.

Bell Bowl is rare in that it grows in gravelly rocks, unlike the wetter, loamy soils characteristic of most prairies. It sustains plant species rarely seen in other prairies, including the leadplant, the pasqueflower, and the prairie smoke, a rose with a pink feathery seed head. A survey conducted by the Natural Land Institute lists 146 plant species that thrive there.

The pollinator community is equally diverse. On another prairie in a nearby county, Laura Rericha-Anchor, a biologist with Cook County Forest Preserve District, has found up to a hundred bee species in an area less than half the size of Bell Bowl. At that managed site, only 70 percent or less of the species are the same from one foot to the next. Bell Bowl likely has similar diversity.

For decades, the airport preserved the area, and worked with the Natural Land Institute, a nonprofit organization focused on conserving acreage in northern Illinois, to manage the land by pulling non-native plants and conducting controlled burns.

The airport, however, is growing at record pace. Airports Council International named the Rockford airport the fastest growing airport in the country three years ago.

The second-largest UPS hub in the country, the airport has received millions of dollars from the federal government in the last few years for an expansion project, thanks in part to help from Senators Tammy Duckworth and Dick Durbin.

In February, Senator Durbin said in a form letter, “I hope that the airport’s plans can be adjusted so that Bell Bowl Prairie can be preserved while allowing Rockford Airport to continue to expand and serve as an economic anchor for the Rockford community.” But Durbin, Duckworth, and Governor J.B. Pritzker all failed to reply to requests to comment for this article.

Yet the airport could expand without ripping up the prairie, conservationists say

“We are not trying to stop the expansion of the airport,” says Kerry Leigh, director of the Natural Land Institute, which is leading the conservation effort. “We really believe that in this century, we can have both/and: We can have both responsible sustainable economic development and protect our natural resources.”

Even the small remaining sections of prairie “should be worshipped in and of themselves,” revered for their 8,000-year ecological history, says Rericha-Anchor. The state government seemed to agree when, last September, the governor established the thirty-by-thirty task force, a coalition to help protect 30 percent of Illinois’ land and water by 2030.

Planned expansion

Last summer, Rockford residents noticed excavating equipment at the airport and notified the Natural Land Institute and the Illinois Department of Natural Resources. Airport officials explained that the prairie would be bulldozed as part of the facility’s $50 million expansion. The airport had already completed an environmental review and received a finding of no significant impact by the Federal Aviation Administration, a November press release states, a requirement under the National Environmental Policy Act. An environmental consultant who conducted a one-day assessment of the area in August 2018 found no federal or state listed endangered species.

But last August, a Department of Natural Resources biologist saw a rusty patched bumblebee in Bell Bowl. Construction temporarily halted.

The bee itself, however, may not be enough to keep the project from moving forward. Though the bee is listed under the federal Endangered Species Act, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service declined in September 2020 to designate critical habitat for the species—areas necessary for its survival and recovery that require protections—meaning those habitats could be destroyed. The Natural Resources Defense Council, a nonprofit environmental organization, filed a lawsuit against the agency in March 2021 to challenge the decision.

Leigh and representatives from the Natural Land Institute asked to meet with airport officials and pushed them to redesign the expansion but got little traction. The institute filed lawsuits in October to delay construction, saying the original environmental assessment completed by the airport was inadequate. Just before the airport planned to resume the project, officials announced they would reinitiate an environmental review and consultation with the Fish and Wildlife Service to determine the proposed project’s potential impact on the bumble bee. (The agency declined to comment on the project because of the ongoing litigation.)

“Until [consultation is] complete and approvals granted,” says Zack Oakley, the deputy director of operations and planning for the airport, “there won't be any construction happening on the areas that are under review.”

This month, airport officials announced they would not start work for another three months. If the project continues as planned, advocates say the state could lose yet another section of prairie that is critically important to the region and defines the state.
Precious habitat

The rusty patched bumble bee, one of the 500 bee species Rericha-Anchor and many others have observed thriving in the region’s prairies, is one of the only bee species listed under the Endangered Species Act. Though they used to be common, they are now only found in five to 10 percent of the areas they used to inhabit.

Prairies are key for the species’ recovery, says Rich Hatfield, a conservation biologist at the Xerces Society for Invertebrate Conservation, even five acre chunks like Bell Bowl.

In the winter, the queens burrow into soils and emerge in the spring to nest. Yet scientists don’t have much information about where they spend the colder months, says Elaine Evans, an entomologist at the University of Minnesota who has studied the species for 25 years: “What we're really missing is that overwintering habitat.”

But most bees, including the rusty patched bumble bee, nest in the ground close to where they forage. “If you find one worker in that Bell Bowl Prairie, that prairie is valuable because that bee is practically gone,” says entomologist Sydney Cameron, professor emerita at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign who has spent decades studying native bees.

Leigh would still like to see the airport redesign the expansion—something she says the organization has offered to help with—and permanently protect the prairie so that conservationists don’t have to continually fight to save it.

The lawsuits the institute filed are ongoing, and advocates hope that the governor’s recent commitment to protecting the state’s resources with the thirty-by-thirty task force will help address some of the inadequacies of current laws to protect these important natural areas.

Airport officials have said ecologists will relocate some of the state-listed endangered plants the bees rely on, but they can’t move the entire prairie community. And moving plants alone wouldn’t do much good, says Rericha-Anchor.

“They can transplant them elsewhere, but that's not the Bell Bowl Prairie any longer. The microclimates, the ancient soils in which the plants’ root zones have developed, and those relationships in the soil microbiome, that's destroyed. It would all be broken, the ecology would be completely disrupted.”

USA COULD LEARN A LESSON

Germany to disarm far-right extremists, restricts gun access

BERLIN (AP) — Germany's top security officials announced a 10-point plan Tuesday to combat far-right extremism in the country that includes disarming about 1,500 suspected extremists and tightening background checks for those wanting to acquire guns.

© Provided by The Canadian Press

Interior Minister Nancy Faeser said the far right poses the biggest extremist threat to democracy in Germany and said authorities would seek to tackle the issue through prevention and tough measures.

“We want to destroy far-right extremist networks,” Faeser told reporters in Berlin, saying this included targeting financial flows that benefit such groups, including merchandising businesses, music festivals and martial arts events.

Authorities will work to remove gun licenses from suspected extremists, crack down on incitement spread online through social networks and combat conspiracy theories online.

Faeser said an emphasis will also be put on rooting out extremists who work in government agencies, including the security forces. Reports about far-right extremists among the policeand military in Germany have raised particular concerns because of fears that they could use privileged information to target political enemies.

Parliament’s commissioner for the military, Eva Hoegl, said separately Tuesday that there were 252 “reportable events” among German troops in 2021, an increase compared to previous years that she attributed to heightened sensitivity surrounding extremism in the ranks. She called for swifter court martial proceedings so that soldiers found to have broken the law or breached conduct rules can be fired faster.

Thomas Haldenwang, the head of Germany's BfV domestic intelligence service, said his agency planned to release a report in the coming months about extremists who work for the authorities.

The agency is also monitoring the Alternative for Germany political party after a court ruled last week that it can designate the party as a suspected case of extremism, he said.

Haldenwang said authorities have recorded a small number of far-right extremists traveling to Ukraine as foreign fighters, but most of the chatter online by people saying they planned to do so appeared to be “swagger.”

___

Kirsten Grieshaber contributed to this report.

Frank Jordans, The Associated Press

Germany issues hacking warning for users of Russian anti-virus software Kaspersky

BERLIN (Reuters) - Germany's cyber security agency on Tuesday warned users of an anti-virus software developed by Moscow-based Kaspersky Lab that it poses a serious risk of a successful hacking attack.

 

© Reuters/MAXIM SHEMETOV FILE PHOTO: 

The logo of Russia's Kaspersky Lab is on display at the company's office in Moscow

The BSI agency said that the Russia-based cyber-security company could be coerced by Russian government agents to hack IT systems abroad or agents could clandestinely use its technology to launch cyberattacks without its knowledge.

Kaspersky said in a statement it was a privately-managed company with no ties to the Russian government. It said that the warning by BSI was politically motivated, adding it was in contact with the BSI to clarify the matter

USING KASPERSKY BEST WAY TO CATCH RUSSIAN HACKERS

The BSI warning comes as Russia's invasion of Ukraine escalates with the Russian army's shelling of the capital of Ukraine.

The BSI said that German companies as well as government agencies that manage critical infrastructure were particularly at risk of a hacking attack.

(Writing by Joseph Nasr; Editing by Nick Zieminski)

University of Alberta initiative aims to protect Ukrainian archives, research
Stephen David Cook 

© David Bajer/CBC

 The Canadian Institute for Ukrainian Studies at the University of Alberta is part of an initiative to offer free, secure and confidential digital storage to academics and institutions in Ukraine.

Academics at the University of Alberta are aiming to help protect digital data in Ukraine under threat because of the war.

The Canadian Institute of Ukrainian Studies recently helped launch an initiative offering free, secure cloud storage to archivists, librarians, scientists and other institutions in Ukraine.

Director Natalia Khanenko-Friesen said the Ukraine Archives Rescue Team came as a result of brainstorming on how to assist colleagues in areas afflicted by the devastation of the Russian invasion.

"In particular, we're very concerned for our colleagues and for their work, which they have been pursuing in the south of Ukraine in the eastern part of Ukraine, where we have seen the advancement of the Russian military the most."

Khanenko-Friesen said she's heard reports of archives and museums being destroyed or vandalized.

The digital storage is available to scholars and institutions of all disciplines, although Khanenko-Friesen said there is an important cultural dimension to the initiative.

Russian President Vladimir Putin, in the lead up to the invasion, presented a false narrative that Ukraine was not a true nation but an artificial creation carved from Russia by its enemies.

"We are indeed pursuing this initiative out of the fear that we may have not just the collections lost, but we may see the extermination of cultural legacy and cultural heritage," Khanenko-Friesen said.

The working group includes the CIUS and the Kulov Folklore Center at the U of A as well as other Canadian research institutions.

The institute is responding to the crisis in other ways, including a "Did You Know" information series aimed at answering basic questions about the conflict.

Khanenko-Friesen said it is also planning to launch a media monitoring and analysis initiative to combat disinformation.

Past lessons

Frank Sysyn is a professor of history and the director of the CIUS' Toronto office. He said the work of digitizing and sharing data is crucial for future scholarship.

"We all think of Sarajevo, of the destruction of the wonderful library in Bosnia, and of the need later to try and recreate that library with anyone's notes that were left."

Sysyn began his academic career in the 1970s, when the Soviet Union limited access to its archives. The emergence of more open post-Soviet states offered academics the chance to delve into information previously unavailable to them.

He said the Russian Federation and Ukraine have in the decades since diverged in their level of access. Ukraine's "virtually totally open" archives are important not only for better studying the country but the wider region.

"This has been extremely important for developing the field of history, culture in new ways," he said, adding that those who would previously have gone to Russian cities to study materials from the Soviet Union, including secret police files, now visit Ukraine or Baltic states.

Sysyn fears that if these archives fall under the control of Putin's regime, important documents could once again be inaccessible or even destroyed.

"We've got to look ahead and make sure that this will be preserved, whatever happens."

Russia's military forces kept up their punishing campaign to capture the Ukrainian capital of Kyiv on Monday after an airstrike on a military base near the Polish border brought the war dangerously close to NATO's doorstep.

A new round of talks between Russian and Ukrainian officials raised hopes that progress would be made in evacuating civilians and getting emergency supplies to besieged areas.

The talks were later put on hold Monday and were expected to resume Tuesday.

Verbatim: Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy's address to Canada's Parliament

OTTAWA — Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy delivered an address to Canadian parliamentarians in the House of Commons on Tuesday, where he appeared through a video link.

© Provided by The Canadian Press

Here is a full transcript of his speech, as translated into English from the original Ukrainian by a parliamentary interpreter:

"Ladies and gentlemen, Mr. Speaker, Prime Minister — dear Justin — members of the government, members of Parliament, all distinguished guests, friends, before I begin, I would like you to understand my feelings and the feelings of all Ukrainians, as far as it is possible, our feelings over the last 20 days — 20 days of the full-scale aggression (by the) Russian Federation after eight years of fighting in Donbass region.

"Can you only imagine? Imagine that at 4 a.m., each of you, you start hearing bomb explosions, severe explosions. Justin, can you imagine hearing — you, your children — hearing all these severe explosions? Bombing (the) airport, bombing the Ottawa airport, tens of other cities in your wonderful country? Can you imagine that?

"Cruise missiles are falling down on your territory and your children are asking you what is happening. You are receiving the first news (as to) which infrastructure objects have been bombed and destroyed by the Russian Federation and you know how many people already died. Can you only imagine? What words? How can you explain to your children that a full-scale aggression just happened in your country? You know that this is a war to annihilate your state, your country. You know that this is the war to subjugate your people.

"And on the second day you receive notifications that huge columns of military equipment are entering your country, crossing the border. They are entering small cities. They are (laying) siege, encircling cities and they start to shell civilian neighbourhoods. They bomb school buildings. They destroyed kindergarten facilities, like in our city, in the city of Sumy, like in the city of Okhtyrka. Imagine that someone is laying siege to Vancouver. Can you just imagine that for a second and all these people who are left in such a city? And this is exactly the situation that our city of Mariupol is suffering right now. They are left without heat or hydro, or without a means of communicating, almost without food, without water, seeking shelter in bomb shelters.

"Dear Justin, dear guests, can you imagine that every day you receive memorandums about the number of casualties, including women and children? You have heard about the bombings. Currently, we have 97 children that died during this war. Can you imagine if the famous CN Tower in Toronto was hit by Russian bombs?

"Of course, I don’t wish this on anyone, but this is our reality in which we live. We have to contemplate, we have to see where the next bombing takes place. In your church's square? We have a Freedom Square in the city of Kharkiv, our Babi Yar, the place where victims of the Holocaust were buried, and it has been bombed by the Russians.

"Imagine that Canadian facilities have been bombed similarly as our buildings and memorial places are being bombed. A number of families have died. Every night is a horrible night. The Russians are shelling from all kinds of artillery, from tanks. They are hitting civilian infrastructure. They hit big buildings.

"Can you imagine that there is a fire starting at a nuclear power plant and that is exactly what happened in our country. Each city that they are marching through, they are taking down the Ukrainian flags. Can you imagine someone taking down your Canadian flags in Montreal and other Canadian cities? I know that you all support Ukraine. We’ve been friends with you, Justin, but also I would like you to understand and I would like you to feel this, what we feel every day. We want to live and we want to be victorious. We want to prevail for the sake of life.

"Can you imagine when you call your friends, your friendly nations, and you ask ‘Please close the sky. Please close the airspace. Please stop the bombing? How many more cruise missiles have to fall on our cities until you make this happen?' And they, in return, express their deep concerns about the situation. When we talk with our partners they say ‘Please hold on. Hold on a little longer.’

"Some people are talking about trying to avoid escalation and at the same time in response to our aspiration to become members of NATO, we also do not hear a clear answer. Sometimes we don’t see obvious things. It is dire straits, but it also allowed us to see who our real friends are over the last 20 days and as well in the eight previous years.

"I am sure that you’ve been able to see clearly what is going on and I am addressing all of you. Canada has always been steadfast in their support. You have been a reliable partner to Ukraine and Ukrainians and I am sure this will continue. You have offered your help, your assistance, at our earliest request. You supply us with the military assistance, with humanitarian assistance. You imposed severe sanctions. At the same time, we see that unfortunately they did not bring the end to the war. You can see that our cities like Kharkiv, Mariupol and many other cities are not protected just like your cities are protected — Edmonton, Vancouver. You can see that Kyiv is being shelled and bombed.

"It used to be a very peaceful country, peaceful cities, but now they are being constantly bombarded. Basically, what I am trying to say is that you all need to do more to stop Russia, to protect Ukraine, and by doing that to protect Europe from Russian threats. They are destroying everything: memorial complexes, schools, hospitals, housing complexes. They already killed 97 Ukrainian children.

"We are not asking for much. We are asking for justice, for real support, which will help us to prevail to defend, to save lives, to save life all over the world. Canada is leading in these efforts and I am hoping that other countries will follow the same suit. We are asking for more of your leadership and please take a greater part in these efforts, Justin, and all of our friends of Ukraine. Old friends owe the truth. Please understand how important it is for us to close our airspace from Russian missiles and Russian aircraft. I hope you can understand. I hope you can increase your efforts, that you can increase sanctions so they will not have a single dollar to fund their war effort. Commercial entities should not be working in Russia.

"Probably you know better than many in any other countries that this attack on Ukraine is their attempt to annihilate the Ukrainian people, and there nothing else to it. This is their main objective. It’s actually a war against Ukrainian people, and it’s an attempt to destroy everything that we, as Ukrainians, do. It’s an attempt to destroy our future, to destroy our nation, our character.

"You Canadians, you know all this very well, and that is why I am asking you, please, do not stop your efforts. Please expand your efforts to bring back peace in our peaceful country. I believe and I know that you can do it. We are part of the antiwar coalition and, jointly, I am sure that it will achieve results.

"I would like to also ask our Ukrainian diaspora in Canada: This is a historical moment, and we need your support, your practical support. We hope that with your practical steps, you will show that you are more than part of Ukrainian history. Please remember, this is a practical, modern-day history of Ukraine. We want to live. We want to have peace.

"I am grateful to every one of you in the Parliament of Canada who is present there and to every Canadian citizen. I am very grateful to you, Justin. I am grateful to the Canadian people, and I am confident that, together, we will overcome and we will be victorious.

"Glory to Ukraine. Thank you to Canada."

This report by The Canadian Press was first published March 15, 2022.

The Canadian Press

 

 As Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy spoke to Parliament Tuesday morning, the National Post convened an expert panel to consider his words and his delivery: Dominique Arel, professor and chair of Ukrainian Studies at the University of Ottawa; Robert Danisch, professor in communication arts at the University of Waterloo who studies political rhetoric in democratic societies; Natalia Khanenko-Friesen, professor and chair of the Canadian Institute of Ukrainian Studies at the University of Alberta; and Ronald Beiner, professor emeritus of political science at the University of Toronto and author of Dangerous Minds: Nietzsche, Heidegger, and the Return of the Far Right. Zelenskyy’s words here were delivered in Ukrainian and are presented in English according to the Parliamentary translation.

ZELENSKYY: Before I begin, I would like you to understand my feelings, and the feelings of all Ukrainians as far as it is possible. Our feelings over the last 20 days, 20 days of full-scale aggression of Russian Federation after eight years of fighting in Donbas region. Can you only imagine? Imagine at 4 a.m., each of you, you start hearing bomb explosions, severe explosions. Justin, can you imagine hearing? You, your children hear all these severe explosions, bombing of airport, bombing of Ottawa Airport. Tens of other cities of your wonderful country. Can you imagine that?

DANISCH: In terms of a communication structure, he’s doing the classic, what we call in rhetoric, identification. He wants us to identify with Ukraine and share their emotional position. It’s a classic speechmaking strategy that’s been around for 2,000 years. It invites the audience to make an imaginative leap, and one function is to put the audience in the right frame of mind in order to persuade them.

AREL: He’s very good at that. He relates the human story. He was an actor before, but he’s not acting now, that’s why he’s so effective. He has the ability to speak from the heart and to the heart. Of course we can’t imagine that, but how could Ukrainians imagine that themselves just three or four weeks ago? The last time any city in Ukraine was bombed was 1944.

ZELENSKYY: Cruise missiles are falling down on your territory and your children are asking you what happened. And you are receiving the first news, which infrastructure objects have been bombed and destroyed by Russian Federation, and you know how many people already died. Can you only imagine what words, how you can explain to your children that full-scale aggression just happened in your country. You know that this is war to annihilate your state, your country. You know that this is the war to subjugate your people. And on the second day you receive notifications that huge columns of military equipment are entering your country, crossing the border. They’re entering small cities, they’re giving siege, they’re encircling cities and they start to shell civil neighbourhoods. They bomb school buildings. They destroyed kindergarten facilities. Like in our cities of Sumy, like in city of Okhtyrka. Imagine that someone is laying siege to Vancouver? Can you just imagine for a second, and all these people who are left in such cities. This is exactly the situation that our city of Mariupol is suffering right now, and they are left without heat or electricity or without means of communicating, almost without food, without water, seeking shelter in bomb shelters. Dear Justin, dear guests, can you imagine that every day you receive memorandums about the number of casualties, including women and children. You’ve heard about the bombings. Currently we have 97 children that died during this war. Can you imagine the famous CN Tower in Toronto, if it was hit by Russian bombs?

DANISCH: Zelenskyy’s speech to the British Parliament echoed and rephrased familiar lines from Churchill and Hamlet. It is saying he is kin with his fellow British world citizens. He didn’t do that with us. He did not quote literature. It’s funny, but it would have been more powerful in a certain way. He was generic in his reference to the CN Tower.

ZELENSKYY: Of course, I don’t wish this on anyone, but this is our reality in which we live. We have to contemplate, we have to see where the next bombing will take place. We have a Freedom Square in the city of Kharkiv. Our Babyn Yar, the place where victims of Holocaust were buried, it has been bombed by the Russians. Imagine that Canadian facilities have been bombed similarly as our buildings and memorial places are being bombed. A number of families have died. Every night is a horrible night. Russians are shelling from all kinds of artillery, from tanks. They’re hitting civilian infrastructure, they’re hitting buildings. Can you imagine that there is fire starting at a nuclear power plant, and that’s exactly what happened in our country. Each city that they are marching through, they’re taking down Ukrainian flags. Can you imagine someone taking down your Canadian flags in Montreal or other Canadian cities. I know that you will support Ukraine. We’ve been friends with you Justin, but also I would like you to understand, and I would like you to feel this, what we feel everyday.

DANISCH: I’m worried that there’s a bit of Instagrammable fame to this moment for him. He’s media savvy. It helps him gain attention, but often on Instagram and TikTok, they’re quick burns. You get a lot of attention quickly, and then it dissipates. If he wants us to not forget about him, he has to amplify the stakes, and I’m not seeing it that way. I’m seeing the Instagrammable qualities.

ZELENSKYY: We want to live and we want to be victorious. We want to prevail for the sake of life. Can you imagine when you call your friends, your friendly nation, and you ask, “Please close the sky, close the airspace, please stop the bombing, how many more cruise missiles have to fall on our cities until you make this happen?” And in return they express their deep concern about the situation. When we talk with our partners, they say please hold on hold on a little longer. Some people are talking about trying to avoid escalation, at the same time in response to our aspiration to become members of NATO, we also do not hear a clear answer.

BEINER: It’s not clear that a speech, however powerful, will induce NATO to get more enmeshed in this conflict than it already is. But one hopes that at least a way can be found to put the Polish MiGs at the disposal of Ukrainian pilots, so Ukraine can do the work itself of closing Ukrainian airspace to Russian attacks. This is not something that Canada can do, but perhaps it can at least urge the U.S. to find a solution.

ZELENSKYY: Sometimes we don’t see obvious things. It’s dire straits, but it also allowed us to see who our real friends are over the last 20 days, and as well eight previous years.

BEINER: What does full friendship require in this situation? More than Ukraine is currently getting from Canada and other allies. Sanctions have not stopped the war, nor will they stop innocent Ukrainians from dying.

ZELENSKYY: I am sure that you’ve been able to see clearly what’s going on, and I’m addressing all of you. Canada has always been steadfast in their support. You’ve been a reliable partner to Ukraine and Ukrainians, and I’m sure this will continue. You’ve offered your help, you assistance at our earliest request. You supply us with military assistance, with humanitarian assistance, you imposed severe sanctions, serious sanctions. At the same time we see that unfortunately this did not bring the end to the war. You can see that our cities like Kharkiv, like Mariupol, are not protected just like your cities are protected, Edmonton, Vancouver. You can see that Kyiv is being shelled and bombed. It used to be we were a very peaceful country, peaceful cities, but not they’re being constantly bombarded. Basically what I’m trying to say that we all need to do, you all need to do more to stop Russia, to protect Ukraine, and by doing that to protect Europe from Russian threat. They are destroying everything. Memorial complexes, schools, hospitals, housing complex. They already killed 97 Ukrainian children. We are not asking too much. We are asking for justice, for real support which will help us to prevail, to defend, to save life all of the world.

DANISCH: He was trying to be gently critical because he wants more from us. The identification was meant to soften that criticism, make us more receptive to the criticism. I got the sense that he was exhausted by that labour of gently critiquing governments. He knows he has to perform the identification first so the criticism doesn’t push us away, but the strategy is not working. He is not getting the no-fly zone. The criticism may have to be stronger to get us to listen.

ZELENSKYY: Canada is leading in these efforts, and I am hoping that other countries will follow suit. We are asking for more of your leadership, and please take more, greater part in these efforts, Justin and all of our friends of Ukraine, all friends of the truth. Please understand how important it is for us to close our airspace from Russian missiles and Russian aircraft. I hope you can understand.

BEINER: Alas, he’s asking for something that Canada and other NATO members won’t dare do, as Zelenskyy knows.

AREL: Just a month ago, the position of Canada was that we would not send lethal weapons. Why? For fear to escalate. And then of course now we’re sending massive amounts of weapons. What is unimaginable now may not be unimaginable a month from now, so Zelenskyy will keep asking.

ZELENSKYY: I hope you can increase your efforts, you can increase sanctions so they do not have a single dollar to fund their war effort. Commercial entities should not be working in Russia. Probably you know better than many other countries that this attack on Ukraine it’s their attempt to annihilate Ukrainian people, and there’s nothing else to it. This is their main objective. It’s actually the war against Ukrainian people, and it’s an attempt to destroy everything that we as Ukrainians do. It’s an attempt to destroy our future, to destroy our nation, our character. You, Canadians, you know very well all this. That’s why I’m asking you please do not stop in your efforts. Please expand your efforts to bring back peace in our peaceful country. I believe, and I know that you can do it. We are part of the anti-war coalition, and jointly I’m sure that will achieve results. I would like to also ask our Ukrainian diaspora in Canada. This is a historical moment and we need your support, your practical support. We hope that with your practical steps you will show that you are part of more than Ukrainian history. Please remember, this is a practical modern day history of Ukraine. We want to live, we want to have peace. I am grateful to everyone of you in the Parliament of Canada who is present there, to every Canadian citizen. I am very grateful to you, Justin. I am grateful to Canadian people, and I am confident that together we will overcome and will be victorious. Glory to Ukraine. Thank you to Canada.

DANISCH: I thought what was more notable was what he didn’t do. He did not tell us why democracy matters, or why it’s good. He opted out of that, which to me was kind of a mistake. He didn’t paint it as a conflict between democracy and fascism, and that was a miss.

AREL: The war’s goal is to overthrow government. It is eminently anti-democratic. Russia has been good at confusing the narrative internationally. Domestically they extinguish free media. Propaganda is built on denying the reality of the war that they won’t call a war. When Zelenskyy is saluting “friends of truth,” I think he’s getting at that. This is the real truth. we’re fighting for freedom, for statehood, and what we say is real.

ANOTHER INTERNECINE LEADERSHIP RACE

Poilievre pitches to new immigrants, as Brown attacks him over 2015 niqab ban bill

OTTAWA — Brampton Mayor Patrick Brown and high-profile Conservative Pierre Poilievre spent Monday battling over a seven-year-old election promise to prohibit face coverings during citizenship ceremonies — a sign of what could be the makings of a tense rivalry between candidates in the Tory leadership race.

© Provided by The Canadian Press

Brown, who launched his bid on Sunday, blasted longtime Ottawa-area MP Poilievre over his actions back in 2015 when the party promised to create a "barbaric cultural practices" tip line and require people's faces to be visible during citizenship oaths.

The attack came as Poilievre spent the past few days meeting with cultural community leaders in the Greater Toronto Area and promising to cut red tape for immigrants wanting to access the necessary licences they need to work in regulated industries. Among those he met with were members of the Armenian, Muslim and Pakistani communities as well some of the party's candidates from the area.

Regardless of who is chosen as leader Sept. 10, Conservatives know they must make inroads with immigrants and racialized Canadians if theyhope to pick up seats in the region as well as other major cities and suburbs, considered key to defeating three-term Liberal Prime Minister Justin Trudeau.

Poilievre pledged Monday to revive similar programs that were in place under the last Conservative leader who did well in communities of visible minorities: former prime minister Stephen Harper, at least prior to 2015.

He promised toincentivize provinces to require occupational licensing bodies to decide on an immigrant's application within 60 days of receiving their paperwork, rather than forcing them to wait for months.

As well, Poilievre pitched offering small loans to immigrants who might need to take extra courses to gain a professional or trade licence to work in their respective field.

As Poilievre made these pledges, Brown, who is positioning himself as the candidate who stands for religious freedoms, released a statement saying the MP lacks credibility on any policy that impacts minority communities given his role in the Conservatives' 2015 election campaign.

It was during that race when the party, then led by Harper, promised to create a tip line for so-called "barbaric cultural practices." Conservatives at the time said it was meant to report things like forced marriage.

During that election, Poilievre was running for re-election as a candidate. He was also a member of Harper's government when it introduced a bill banning people from wearing face coverings during citizenship ceremonies. That was ultimately struck down in court. The promise was also included in the party's election campaign, when Harper also mused about possibly extending it to federal public servants.

Brown said Monday that Poilievre has never spoken out against these measures. The MP also has Jenni Byrne on his team, who was the party's national campaign manager in 2015.

"This is the same campaign which platformed those two abhorrent policies, and lost the Conservatives the 2015 general election," Brown's statement read.

"Even if he attempts to distance himself from his silence today, it would be a hollow gesture in an insincere bid to gain votes."

Poilievre responded Monday by calling Brown a "liar," accusing him of mischaracterizing what Harper was doing.

"There was no niqab ban," he said in a statement released on social media.

"I would never support that, nor did Mr. Harper. What Mr. Harper proposed was that a person's face be visible while giving oaths at citizenship ceremonies."

Poilievre, whose statement didn't address the past proposal of a "barbaric cultural practices" tip line, added he would continue to support immigration and equality.

In response, National Council of Canadians CEO Mustafa Farooq tweeted that "leadership requires accountability" and pointed out some of Poilievre's fellow MPs have apologized for what happened in 2015.

Among those is Edmonton MP Tim Uppal, a co-chair on Poilievre's campaign, who has apologized for his role as a minister in promoting the ban on niqabs during citizenship ceremonies.Before the leadership race, Uppal said the party was still dealing with the fallout from racialized communities because of the 2015 campaign.

A post-mortem from the Conservatives' 2021 election loss submitted in January came to a similar finding, according to three sources who spoke to The Canadian Press on the condition of anonymity.

Melissa Lantsman, a newly elected Ontario MP who is also supporting Poilievre in the race, shared on social media last fall that while she was stood in favour of banning the niqab during citizenship ceremonies in 2015, her "view has since evolved."

Michael Diamond, a campaign strategist who, among other campaigns, worked on Peter MacKay's 2020 Conservative leadership bid, said Brown's attack over the issue and targeting of Byrne is a "proxy" attack on Harper, who is highly respected among the membership.

"It seems like folly to me to attack the last campaign of the man who remains the most popular figure in this party."

He added it's still early days in the race and cautioned that the debates playing out between the campaigns and on social media were occurring in an "echo chamber."

This report by The Canadian Press was first published March 14, 2022.

Stephanie Taylor, The Canadian Press

Kai Cheng Thom: Canada's sex work laws are harming the people they were designed to protect. It's time to decriminalize prostitution

Special to National Post

The federal government is currently reviewing the laws governing one of society’s most controversial issues — sex work. It is time for Canada to decriminalize sex work between consenting adults.

In 2013, the Supreme Court of Canada struck down provisions in the Criminal Code that criminalized sex work, only for those laws to be replaced shortly thereafter by the Protection of Communities and Exploited Persons Act (PCEPA), which essentially does the same thing. PCEPA purports to protect vulnerable individuals, but instead unfairly punishes consenting adults for trying to make a living.

It is important to note that sex work, the commercial trade of sexual services for money or barter between adults, is categorically distinct from human trafficking, which is the commercial trade of human beings of all ages and genders for exploitative purposes.

Human trafficking can involve forced sexual labour, but also occurs in many other contexts, such as sweatshops, the illegal sale of infants to adoptive parents and organ harvesting. Alarmists across the political spectrum often conflate sex work with human trafficking, but the difference is stark. It is the difference between enslavement or indentured servitude and paid employment.

Here we come to the crux of the issue: slavery and indentured servitude, it goes without saying, are abominable and must be wiped out. Seeking to make a living by willingly selling services — however intimate, provided that both seller and buyer are adults with the full capacity for consent — many would argue, is a human right.

As a former social worker and longtime activist for human rights, I have had the privilege of meeting many sex workers, all of whom were resilient and resourceful individuals seeking to make the best of their economic circumstances, as all of us do.

Some were also brilliant businesspeople, primarily women and LGBT people from disadvantaged socioeconomic backgrounds who used their bodies and brains to achieve a middle class standard of living — an opportunity that might have otherwise been denied to them. Many are raising and supporting families.

PCEPA is based on the so-called “Nordic model” adopted by some European countries, which claims to protect sex workers while punishing their clients by allowing for the independent sale of sexual services by an adult, while criminalizing the purchase of those services. Also criminalized are third parties who might facilitate the sale of sexual services, such as advertising platforms and escort agency agencies.

The idea that this protects sex workers is nonsense. Imagine trying to run a plumbing or hairdressing business in a country where everyone trying to hire a plumber or get a haircut was committing a criminal offence.

People would still get their toilets fixed and bangs trimmed, but it would be vastly more difficult for those who ply such trades to make a living. It would also make it more difficult for them to form honest business relationships and receive the same legal protections as everyone else takes for granted.

PCEPA has driven sex work into the shadows, endangering the very communities it claims to serve. Not only does it place sex workers in serious financial precarity, it makes it hard for them to change careers and prevents them from working together to improve their safety, since law enforcement may interpret this as selling another person’s sexual services. PCEPA also makes screening out potentially abusive clients far more challenging, because it makes them more reticent to provide identifying information.

It should go without saying that the law should prioritize the protection of children and vulnerable individuals. But women and children are forced to sew clothing for terrible wages all over the world. That does not mean that the garment industry should be criminalized. Instead, we should work to ensure that everyone’s human rights are protected.

We all deserve the right to make a living in the way we see fit, so long as our work doesn’t harm others. Sex workers are no exception.

National Post

Kai Cheng Thom is a writer and consultant based in Toronto. She holds a master’s degree in social work and a master’s degree in couple and family therapy from McGill University.

Sex Work is Work - Working-Class Voices: First Person ...

https://newlaborforum.cuny.edu/2019/02/26/sex-work-is-work

Sex work was a term politicized in the 1970s by Carol Leigh who wanted to join all sex workers together by the nature of our work. There is a lot of stratification that happens around sex workers, degrading one another based on perceived differences in the work; it’s frequently called “whoreaphobia” within the industry.

Sex workers can tell you why sex work is work – speak to ...

https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/beyond-trafficking-and-slavery/sex...

Sex work as work, sex workers’ rights as workers’ rights. GAATW’s support for the sex worker rights movement stems from our conviction that women are …

Sex Work is Real Work, and it's Time to Treat it That Way

https://www.aclu.org/news/lgbtq-rights/sex-work-is-real-work-and-its...

Sex Work is Real Work, and it's Time to Treat it That Way Sex workers aren’t always a part of the conversation about police brutality, but they should be. Police regularly target, harass, and assault sex workers or people they think are sex workers, such as trans women of color.

Sex work is work. That’s the problem… and the key | Eurozine

https://www.eurozine.com/sex-work-work-thats-problem-key

‘Sex work’ is the term chosen by sex workers to refer to the labour they perform, with the clear intention to emphasise that it is ‘work’ and to avoid the moral judgments associated with the term ‘prostitution’. Sex work can be considered part of the service industry, which is often undervalued, unwaged and feminized.

Why Sex Work Is Real Work - Teen Vogue

https://www.teenvogue.com/story/why-sex-work-is-real-work

Sex work is legal in Amsterdam, but it isn’t in many other places, though some people are working to make it so. In South Africa, where I am based, for instance, sex 

CRIMINAL HIP CAPITALI$M

Canopy Growth fined nearly $500K by CRA for allegedly growing cannabis before licence
Christopher Nardi 

OTTAWA – Canadian cannabis company Canopy Growth was fined nearly half-a-million dollars in 2020 by the Canada Revenue Agency because it began growing plants on an outdoor farm before receiving its licence from the agency, National Post has learned.

© Sean Kilpatrick/The Canadian Press/File A worker at Canopy Growth's Tweed facility in Smiths Falls, Ontario.

Now, the Ontario-based company is appealing the $434,611 fine to the federal court, arguing that it had complied with all its obligations required by both Health Canada and the CRA contrary to the latter’s claims.

But one cannabis law expert says it will be an uphill battle for Canopy Growth because there are a number of “challenges” with their arguments against the tax agency.

“If I had to pick which side of the argument to argue on, I would be wanting to be on the federal government side of this one,” said Trina Fraser, partner at Brazeau Seller law firm in Ottawa.

In court documents consulted by National Post, the company says the penalty is tied to its “Outdoor Farm” project launched in the summer of 2019.

Under “significant pressure” to produce enough cannabis after legalization in late 2018, the company set up a corporate subsidiary in early 2019 that applied for a cultivation licence from Health Canada for an outdoor farm, according to the appeal.

Health Canada eventually gave them their licence in June, “which was well into the 2019 outdoor growing season.”
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The company then applied for a separate cannabis licence from the CRA, which is mandatory under the Excise Act. Court documents say it received the licence roughly one month later.

But just over one year later, CRA sent Canopy Growth a letter informing them they were being fined $434,611 because it found the company had begun cultivating cannabis before it received its licence from the agency.

“The receipt and cultivation of vegetative cannabis plants prior to obtaining a cannabis licence under the (Excise Act) is a contravention of the (Excise Act),” reads an excerpt of a letter sent by CRA and quoted in court documents.

The amount of the fine was based on two-thirds of CRA’s estimated market value of the 2019 crop, the company said, meaning the total value was likely around $650,000.

“In reality, the fair market value of the 2019 Crop was nil, as evidenced by the fact that the crop was destroyed, and no viable cannabis product was ever produced from the crop,” the company argued in its appeal.

The company also argued that it never contravened the law because it had received its Health Canada cannabis licence and believed that nothing in the Excise Act prevented it from beginning cultivation while waiting for the CRA licence.

“The CRA Letter contained no conditions, limitations, or restrictions, with respect to the production of cannabis products,” the company argued.

“The Alleged Offence that the (CRA) has accused (the company) of committing is not an offence under the EA,” the documents read.

In the appeal, Canopy Growth also said that sections of the Excise Act only state that a “cannabis licence” is required for legal cultivation, which they argue is referring to the one emitted by Health Canada under the Cannabis Act, and not the one by CRA under the Excise Act.

“They’re going to have a hard time establishing that, when you see the phrase ‘cannabis licence’ in that section (of the Excise Act), that it could possibly mean a cannabis licence issued by Health Canada,” Fraser said. “I think it’s clear, but it’s up to the court to decide.”

In its appeal, Canopy Growth is asking the Federal Court to either cancel the fine and order the agency to reimburse the money, or diminish the value of the fine if the court considers that the company did commit an illegal act.

Both the CRA and Canopy Growth declined to comment on the case because it is in front of the Court. A company spokesperson confirmed that it had paid the fine in full in 2019 “to avoid further financial penalties associated with late payment.”

Last year, Marijuana Business Daily revealed that CRA had levied 22 cannabis-related fines worth a total of $1.3 million in 2019 and 2020, though the agency refused to name the companies penalized.

According to their data, Canopy Growth’s $434,611 fine was by far the most significant in 2020, though the largest one dolled out by the agency at that point was worth $507,660 in 2019 to an unnamed firm.

Marijuana Business Daily also reported last February that Canopy Growth reported a $115 million net loss in the last quarter of 2021 as cannabis sales continue to fall in Canada.

Fraser said the CRA has even asked her to remind her cannabis company clients that they need to receive their licence under the Excise Act before beginning cultivation.

“CRA reached out to me at one point and said….‘We are seeing lots of situations where new licence holders are commencing production before they get their CRA cannabis licence. That is a problem. We will not hesitate we take that very seriously,’” she said.