The Canada Border Services Agency has launched a probe to determine if plywood is being subsidized or sold at unfair prices in Canada.

A news release from the agency says the investigation began on April 10 and focuses on imports from producers operating in or exporting from China.

It says the practices can harm Canadian industries by undercutting Canadian prices and undermining fair competition.

The investigation comes after a complaint was filed by Columbia Forest Products and the Canadian Hardwood Plywood and Veneer Association, which say they’ve faced lost sales, poor financial results and reduced employment.

...

Yan Li doesn't want to uproot her two young daughters again and be forced back to China, but she fears that could happen if Ottawa doesn't heed calls for an extension to federal work permits this year.

She joined more than 100 people who rallied at the steps of the Manitoba Legislative Building on Tuesday to call on government to extend federal work permits that are set to expire.

"Most of us here ... work permits will be expired this year, and if we don't have [an extension], we go back where we come from," Li, 38, said. "That would be very terrible."

Li came to Winnipeg from Wuhan two years ago and graduated from a culinary arts program at the Manitoba Institute of Trades and Technology. Now employed as a cook, she hopes the provincial government is advocating for people like her so her daughters can stay.

The rally comes about two years after Ottawa said it would no longer be extending post-graduate work permits.

...

That announcement came in late 2023, though in 2024 the federal government approved a request from Manitoba to extend permits for thousands of workers for at least two years.

The cut and past extensions came on the heels of a spike in the number of temporary foreign workers and international students who arrived during the COVID-19 pandemic amid a labour shortage.

...

• Canada passed the Supply Chain Act in 2023 after the United Nations reported that China had committed serious human rights violations in Xinjiang against Uyghurs
• Now Canadian lawmakers across multiple parties criticize the government in Ottawa that the law lacks proper enforcement
• Expert claim the Canadian government’s efforts need to be “far more robust” to screen out products linked to forced labour in areas like China’s Xinjiang region.

Archived link

A multi-party group of parliamentarians is urging Ottawa to step up its efforts to stop Canadian companies from profiting from slavery in their operations abroad and through imports.

Parliament passed the Supply Chains Act in 2023, which requires Canadian companies and government institutions to report annually on what they did to prevent or mitigate against the use of child labour or forced labour. Advocates argue the bill is not being adequately enforced.

The International Justice and Human Rights Clinic at the University of British Columbia analyzed filings of 119 companies over the past two years and found them to be extremely vague on their efforts to weed out forced labour.

There is no requirement for reporting on forced labour from companies involved in services, mining and real estate. The researchers say this is due in part to Public Safety Canada’s guidance for companies, which they say is much less comprehensive than what the law requires.

McMaster University researcher Sima Fallah-Tafti said an artificial intelligence analysis of more than a thousand filings under the law found an average 36 per cent score on specificity.

“Most reports we analyzed were boilerplate -- generic language, no specific suppliers named, no meaningful risk identification,” she said.

“Firms are filing paperwork. They are not doing due diligence.”

...

It’s really, in my opinion, a problem of implementation,” Sen. Julie Miville-Dechene, who helped shepherd the legislation through Parliament, told the news conference in French.

“There must be clear guidelines so that we can have something other than generic reports that say very little about the activities of a company.”

Former Liberal MP John McKay said Ottawa’s efforts need to be “far more robust” to screen out products linked to forced labour in areas like China’s Xinjiang region.

...

Parliament passed the Supply Chains Act after the United Nations reported in 2022 that China had committed serious human rights violations in Xinjiang against Uyghurs that “may constitute international crimes, in particular crimes against humanity.”

Global Affairs Canada reported that same year that China “is using otherwise legitimate programs for retraining and relocation of unemployed workers as instruments of a broader campaign of oppression, exploitation and indoctrination of the Uyghur Muslim population.”

...

McKay said the incident with Ma illustrates the conundrum facing Canada.

“The depth of the problem is such that Canada has a choice here. If we go along to get along, then we will compromise our own values,” McKay said.

Conservative MP Arnold Viersen told Tuesday’s news conference that the Tories remain concerned about Canada’s posture toward China.

...

GAC redacted details about what was discussed during the meetings.

Loblaws and others cheating customers again

Kevin Kielty, was charged with two counts of alleged employment-related offences under the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act (IRPA), including employing foreign nationals in a capacity in which the foreign nationals are not authorized, and counselling foreign nationals to work in Canada without authorization.

On March 2, 2026, he pleaded guilty to both counts and was sentenced to two years’ probation, 50 hours of community service and was fined $70,000.

The gap between Canada's richest and poorest grew last year as financial markets gained, interest payouts declined and the job market softened, said Statistics Canada on Monday.

The agency says the income gap — measuring the difference in the share of disposable income between households in the top 40 per cent and those in the bottom 40 per cent — reached 46.7 percentage points in 2025.

The result compared with a gap of 46.4 percentage points a year earlier.

The wider gap came as the lowest-income households saw wages rise slower than the overall average and saw their investment income fall because of lower interest payments on savings, the agency said.

Meanwhile, Statistics Canada says the top 20 per cent of the wealth distribution accounted for 65.7 per cent of Canada's total net worth at the end of 2025, averaging $3.5 million per household.

I heard about this new Microslop data center called YTO 40 from a segment of The Rational National and I looked it up since I'm bordering Etobicoke. It's at 401 and Islington. The closest house is less than a kilometer away. If you've been following the latest on dc noise pollution, you probably understand what this means. Keep an eye for new structures in empty spaces or former big box plazas around you and talk your neighbours and councillors if you don't want 'em.

Prime Minister Mark Carney welcomed Hungary’s shift toward support for both Ukraine and liberal democracy on Sunday after voters in the European nation ended 16 years of far-right government.

After Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban conceded defeat to Peter Magyar and his Tisza party on Sunday, Carney congratulated Magyar “on a decisive election victory” in a social media post.

“The Hungarian people have chosen a new path. We are ready to work with you, and our European allies, to deepen our co-operation in trade, defence, and security,” Carney wrote.

Former Liberal leader Michael Ignatieff called it a historic moment for democracy in Central Europe.

...

Dozens of Edmonton police officers patrolled the city’s streets in December equipped with body cameras that used artificial intelligence to scan faces, looking for what the police have deemed "high-risk offenders."

Documents and emails obtained by CBC News offer new insight into the Edmonton Police Service’s trial of bodycam facial recognition technology — the first police agency in Canada to do so.

The AI-powered facial recognition software was trained to detect the faces of about 7,000 people on a watchlist, based on mugshots of people police say have serious criminal warrants or are flagged as potential safety risks.

Key details from the documents include:

• The privacy assessment submitted to Alberta’s privacy watchdog by EPS includes wording that experts told CBC could open the possibility of sharing sensitive information;

• A “critical fault” system outage prevented matches for several days and may have extended the pilot project;

• The facial recognition model was supplied by Corsight AI, an Israeli company whose technology has reportedly been used for mass surveillance in Gaza.

Winnipeg's homeless community may be growing despite efforts to reduce some of the pressures forcing people onto the street.

End Homelessness Winnipeg says there were 8,248 people using shelters, temporary spaces or living on the streets as of the end of March.

"We know Winnipeggers are deeply concerned about our unsheltered relatives," End Homelessness CEO Jennifer Moore Rattray told CBC News on Monday.

"The problem of lack of safe, affordable housing is just growing, as we can see from the data year over year and even month over month."

End Homelessness says the number of people entering homelessness "is outpacing" those able to secure housing, with 104 newly homeless people in March compared with February.