Canadian residents who require a visa to visit the United States face the longest wait times in the world.

A CBC News analysis of wait times for appointments to obtain U.S. tourist visas shows that while wait times in countries like India and Mexico have been improving since November 2022, wait times in Canada have been getting worse.

Six of the 10 longest wait times around the world were recorded at the U.S. embassy and consulate offices in Canada that offer visa appointments.

Currently, those who apply for a B1/B2 visitor visa appointment in Ottawa or Quebec City face the longest wait times in the world — 850 days. Halifax is not far behind at 840 days, followed by Calgary at 839 days. Getting a visa appointment in Toronto takes 753 days, while in Vancouver it's 731 days.

So why did the Canadian government ramp up their support for an unelected government that was showing themselves to be increasingly more repressive and undemocratic? Maria Cueva of the Quebec-Peru Solidarity Committee provided North Star with an explanation:

"Currently, [Canada] has mining companies that operate there, and the government also sells arms to Peru. That's the point of interest, because we have lots and lots of minerals. That's why they continued their support. And Pedro Castillo's government didn't want to renew the contracts. With Dina Boluarte, they have been renewed. That's it. And the people don't want the mines because they contaminate the whole environment, their territory."

The teamsters have been fighting for safety provisions regarding fatigue and for CN workers to be able to stay with their families. According to the union’s website, CPKC wants to gut fatigue provisions which would mean crews have to stay awake longer, increasing the risk of derailments and other accidents.

CN is also targeting fatigue provisions. As well, it wants to implement a forced relocation scheme, which would see workers ordered to move across the country for months at a time to fill labour shortages.

The Transportation Safety Board has put fatigue on its watch list since 2016. Crews often work long and irregular schedules which can make it difficult to get restorative sleep, according to the safety board’s website. The board wrote it is concerned about how fatigue can affect the performance of crews and therefore the safety of operations.

Albertan minister, a Chamber of Commerce guy and a CN rail official. No union representation. This is a bit shameful from the CBC. At least the interviewer did ask a few questions on behalf of labor.

Hello Canadians! I'm Emily, and I am participating in a scholarship competition run by Canadian Blood Services. I'm an active blood donor and advocate (currently the club president at my university!). I would love your help. I'm looking to recruit and have current donors join my team through the link. I would be more then happy to explain the process for registering to be a blood donor as well! Your donations save lives across Canada, and even if you aren't interested in joining my team specifically I would still love it if you could look into becoming a blood or plasma donor. It's only a bit of your time and will completely change another's. The donation count on my team is from members across Canada, and currently you have all had over 100 donations completed during the summer which is absolutely incredible! Feel free to remove this as well, absolutely no hard feelings.

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.ca/post/27490241

CN and CPKC locked out employees across Canada on Thursday 22 Aug 2024, due to a labour dispute between them and Teamsters Canada Rail Conference.

Archived version

A former United States ambassador to Canada is sounding the alarm that a second Donald Trump presidency would cause chaos for Canadians as he urged Americans abroad that their votes could prove crucial in the presidential election.

Bruce Heyman, who served as ambassador from 2014 to 2017, gave Canada a "tsunami warning," saying if Trump takes the White House, Canada is at great risk.

[...]

He says there are at least 6.5 million eligible voters living in other countries, mainly in Canada and Mexico.

When U.S. President Joe Biden was elected in 2020, Heyman says votes from Americans abroad played a key role in clinching battleground states.

Heyman said much of that support was shored up through a website and outreach targeting American voters from abroad.

Those efforts resulted in the amount of votes from Americans elsewhere in the world increasing by more than 73 per cent in 2016, and half of those votes went to battleground states.

"Americans in Canada, you can be part of the decision of who wins the election in the United States," Heyman said on Wednesday.

[...]

The first Trump administration proved tumultuous for Canada, he said, with the former president's policies affecting more than trade.

Thousands of people in the U.S., afraid of rumours of deportation, started travelling into Canada outside of regular border crossings.

Trump has promised to deport 11 million undocumented immigrants if he gets a second term. Heyman said he believes that people, once again motivated by fear, would start to flee north in even higher numbers.

More than three years have passed since Veterans Affairs Canada (VAC) agreed to ease up restrictions on access to mental health services for the families of troubled soldiers, sailors and aircrew — and the country's veterans ombudsperson says very little has changed in that time.

Nishika Jardine released a new retrospective report on Wednesday that presents a snapshot of her office's recommendations in several reports over the years, and evaluates whether they have been implemented or not.

Four years ago, CBC News profiled a handful of veterans' families whose mental health coverage had been denied or restricted, mostly because of policy changes at VAC.

In 2021, the veterans watchdog released a report which called on the federal government to "ensure that family members, including former spouses, survivors and dependent children, have access to federal government funded mental health treatment in their own right," and to ensure their access does not depend on whether the veteran was in treatment.

Advocates in Thunder Bay say the Ontario government's move to close a number of safe consumption sites (SCS) will be detrimental to people living with addictions.

Health Minister Sylvia Jones announced Tuesday the province is banning the sites within 200 metres of schools and child-care centres, meaning 10 locations in the province, including Path 525 in Thunder Bay, must shut down by March 31, 2025.

Path 525, which is operated by NorWest Community Health Centres (NWCHC), is on the city's south side, around the corner from Ogden Community Public School.

Opened in 2018, the service's clients can bring in drugs from the street to use in the presence of a registered nurse, who can help them if they overdose.

A Calgary pastor on trial for protesting at several library drag storytime events has been found guilty of criminal harassment and breaches of his bail conditions but was acquitted Wednesday on charges of causing a disturbance.

Derek Reimer's trial wrapped up this week after Justice Karen Molle heard closing arguments from prosecutor Matt Dalidowicz and defence lawyer Andrew MacKenzie.

On Wednesday, Molle convicted Reimer on four counts of breaching his bail conditions and one count of harassment. A date for sentencing will be set later this week.

Months after Ottawa police beat a young Black man in a case of mistaken identity, CBC News has obtained internal reports from the force that shed light on the severity of the violence, and what officers say they were thinking as they pursued the wrong suspect and attacked him with a stun gun.

The files identify the suspect officers were actually looking for, reveal that a Starbucks employee had called police with a mistaken report, and provide more detail about the level of force police used — including a closed-fist strike that caused an officer's hand to bleed.

The documents confirm the broad strokes of the account Nyondagara gave of the incident — that he was chased, tackled and struck — but also suggest officers feared for their safety as they confronted and chased the 27-year-old in Orléans on the morning of Feb. 16.

Employees and patrons at the Starbucks on Innes Road had spotted someone they believed to be that suspect several times over the week of Feb. 10, and reported him to police. According to police, three separate members of the public believed that person to be the murder suspect.

Police rushed to the scene and confronted Niyondagara, who they believed was Bakal, after he left the Starbucks. They say he ignored commands and repeatedly moved his hands toward his waist. Some officers said Niyondagara appeared to be scoffing or smirking.

John A. Macdonald once assured the pre-Confederation Legislative Assembly of Canada that an appointed Senate, then under consideration, would "never set itself in opposition against the deliberate and understood wishes of the people."

It's important to note what Macdonald said immediately before those words.

"There would be no use of an Upper House if it did not exercise, when it thought proper, the right of opposing or amending or postponing the legislation of the Lower House," the future first prime minister said.

"It would be of no value whatever were it a mere chamber for registering the decrees of the Lower House. It must be an independent House, having a free action of its own, for it is only valuable as being a regulating body, calmly considering the legislation initiated by the popular branch, and preventing any hasty or ill-considered legislation which may come from that body ..."

Macdonald's words offer a nuanced take on the Senate. They describe an institution that would have no purpose if it didn't periodically exercise its constitutional powers — an institution that's also bound by deference to the elected House of Commons. In that sense, the question is not whether the Senate should be willing to oppose, amend or postpone, but when or how — or to what extent.

Police say no explosives have been found after mass email sent Wednesday morning

Wednesday morning, Indian media outlets reported that an email with seemingly identical wording had been sent to "at least 100" hospitals, companies and government institutions in New Delhi.

Did this happen in any other country or is someone targeting Canada and India specifically?

International Development Minister Ahmed Hussen says Canada will provide $5.7 million for Ukrainians to meet their basic needs.

Ottawa says it’s maintaining solidarity with Ukraine two-and-a-half years into Russia’s full-scale invasion as Hussen visits Kyiv.

The trip has a focus on children, with Hussen visiting the main children’s hospital, which was damaged by a Russian missile in July.

The funding includes $2 million for Save the Children Canada, which has helped Ukrainian kids with food, education and psychosocial support.

A popular and well-connected Indian media personality is ominously predicting that India will interfere in Canada’s upcoming federal election in 2025, and he says right-wing parties and think tanks in Canada need financial and political support.

In a video posted a few months ago on a YouTube channel run by Gaurav Arya, a retired Major with the Indian Army turned right-wing media personality, Arya suggested India will take direct and indirect steps to remove Justin Trudeau from power.

“India will put all their pressure, whether indirectly or directly, so Justin Trudeau’s government will fall and another government will come,” Arya said in a May 8, 2024 video on Arya’s YouTube talk channel called “Majorly Right.”

“In Canada, the think tanks and the right-wing parties will need to be supported, because there are a lot of right-wing parties in Canada,” Arya added .“They will be supported, either financially, politically or diplomatically.”

The city of Thunder Bay is known as the “Gateway to Northwest Ontario” and the 150,000 lakes and rivers in the area. Visitors come to experience rolling mountains, majestic forests, and Lake Superior—North America’s largest freshwater lake and, by many measures, one of the healthiest. Cruise companies are picking up on the region’s natural offerings. One 2025 Viking cruise, marketed as the “Undiscovered Great Lakes” voyage, will take passengers from Thunder Bay to Milwaukee to “hike boreal forests, watch for wildlife and learn about Anishinaabe First Nations heritage.” An eight-day voyage on these floating hotels with swimming pools, buffets, theatres, and spas starts at about $9,000 per person.

Cruise ships have been coming to Thunder Bay since 1996 but paused for some time amid infrastructure issues and changes in popular cruise ship itineraries. Following improvements to the city’s marina and cruise terminal, luxury cruiser fleet operators like Viking returned in 2022 after a decade-long absence. Now, while the global cruise industry battles growing concerns over its emissions, noise, and pollution, 2024 is set to see a record of seventeen cruise ships in the lake port from late spring into fall.

This pattern is expected to boom, creating tension between tourists who want to experience “unexplored” nature and the fact that the very act of arriving on cruise ships is poised to ruin the things drawing them to the region. Lax Canadian cruising regulations allow for luxury cruises to sail through giant loopholes in environmental protections.

In 2022, Transport Canada implemented interim measures for cruise ships to follow, including avoiding grey water and sewage discharge within three nautical miles of the shore and appropriately treating sewage, with filtration and chemical procedures or through biological composting, when possible. Its second interim order, a copy-paste of the first, expired in June this year. Now the agency has further renewed the interim order until 2025—which Stand.earth has called a “lazy” approach, especially given the increased number of cruise ships in new areas.