Electric School Bus Adoption:

1. PEI 33%
2. Quebec 15%
3. BC 5.0%
4. Can 3.8%
5. NB 1.8%
6. Ontario 0.5%
7. AB 0.02%

The three decisive drivers of successful electric school bus adoption: clear regulatory targets, robust and predictable provincial funding, and proactive charging infrastructure planning.

Archived link

...

The retired Winnipeg Police Service officer and a veteran of the Ukraine war will spend up to six months traversing deserts, mountains and deep forests before crossing back into Canada.

[Peter] Derksen, 59, spent roughly one year inside embattled Ukraine, beginning in September 2022. His journey included months on the front lines, where he fought Russian forces alongside Ukrainian soldiers.

“I’m very lucky I survived that, and I don’t want to tempt fate twice, but the plight of freedom for the Ukrainians needs to be in people’s minds,” Derksen said, speaking by phone from a campground near Campo, Calif., close to the trail’s southern terminus.

...

“I’m here to try to make a difference in this war, but instead of being in Ukraine, I am going to be here and trying to raise money for the heroes in Ukraine.”

...

Derksen plans to write an online blog documenting his hike of the Pacific Crest Trail, which spans about 4,265 kilometres through California, Oregon and Washington before ending in B.C. While he is not accepting any personal donations, he is asking supporters to contribute to United24, a fundraising effort launched by the Ukrainian government.

Donors can also contribute through the Canada-Ukraine Foundation, which offers tax receipts for Canadians.

He has pledged to match the first $2,000 in donations, dollar for dollar.

...

The veteran will be mostly alone as he hikes, but has the support of his wife and three adult children, who say they are proud of his relentless desire to help others.

“We’re just cheering him on, and so grateful that he’s found a way to serve his brothers and sisters in Ukraine without going back to the front line,” said his wife, Shannon Derksen.

She described harried phone calls during her husband’s time in Ukraine, during which it was not uncommon for her to overhear the whistle of incoming artillery shells in the background.

...

Beijing is pushing Ottawa to back its bid to join a major free trade agreement between Indo-Pacific nations, including Canada, Japan and Australia, according to a Canadian senator who just returned from a diplomatic mission to China.

Archived link

Senator Clement Gignac, who co-chairs the Canada-China Legislative Association, said he in turn urged his Chinese counterparts to lift travel sanctions on Canadian MPs who have been critical of Beijing’s human rights record.

Mr. Gignac, and fellow co-chair Liberal MP Zoe Royer, spent March 14 to 21 in China, visiting Beijing, Shanghai and Shenzhen to promote closer bilateral ties. They met senior members of the National People’s Congress.

...

Mr. Gignac said China is keen for Canadian support to join the Comprehensive and Progressive Trans-Pacific Partnership, or CPTPP, a multilateral free trade agreement.

CPTPP replaces the Trans-Pacific Partnership, or TPP, a proposed agreement that included the United States until President Donald Trump withdrew from the trade pact in 2017.

...

China first applied for membership in 2021 but has been blocked several times.

...

China imposed sanctions on the entire Canadian House of Commons subcommittee on international human rights in 2021 after it accused China of committing “genocide” against Muslim groups in its Xinjiang region.

...

The sanctions were applied after Canada joined with the U.S., Britain and the EU in imposing human-rights-related sanctions against senior officials in Xinjiang.

...

Last week, federal Finance Minister François-Philippe Champagne travelled to China and the two countries signed a joint statement to deepen financial-sector ties.

When asked, Mr. Champagne did not give a straight answer on Chinese forced labour [video, 2 min, alternative Invidious link].

...

Archived link

Recently, Canada’s Prime Minister Mark Carney seemed to downplay forced labor in China. When asked about the risks, he said some regions in China are “higher risk” and that it is an issue all around the world. His comments follow his colleague dismissing concerns about forced labor in China in a parliamentary hearing on March 26. Carney has defended Member of Parliament, Michael Ma, as well as the country’s efforts to keep forced labor out of its market.

But advocates are not convinced that Canada has “strong protections” in place as the Prime Minister insists. With forced labor import bans in the US and the EU, there are concerns that countries such as Canada can become potential dumping grounds. Further, Canada has previously taken a much stronger stance on forced labor in China.

...

Canada has put measures in place aimed at blocking imports tied to forced labor. However, experts say these rules are rarely applied. Consequently, very few shipments are stopped at the border. Indeed, conservative MP Michael Chong, said Canada has a “terrible track record” of preventing the importation of products made with forced labor.

MP Chong told CBC, "I strongly disagree and I think many experts and many human rights groups would strongly disagree with the prime minister’s assessment that we have a rigorous system for preventing the importation of these products."

...

This recent controversy comes after Michael Ma dismissed the legitimacy of evidence presented by experts as “hearsay.” The MP asked her repeatedly if she had seen forced labor with her own eyes. Since she cited reports by Human Rights Watch, Ma said, “I don’t believe reports, I only believe in things that I can see with my own eyes.”

...

Chong called Ma’s performance at committee “incredibly damaging for Canada’s reputation.”

“It signals to the [People’s Republic of China] that they can intimidate the government of Canada into silence,” he said.

Ma later apologized for his comments. But PM Carney faced intense questioning throughout the week. At a news conference in Quebec, reporters asked if he agreed with a 2021 House of Commons motion declaring China’s treatment of the Uyghurs as genocide. He refused to answer, instead telling reporters, “There are fundamental issues in terms of China’s treatment of the Uyghurs in the past, and they’ve been rightly called out.”

...

As recently as January 2026, UN experts raised renewed alarm about the Uyghur forced labor system in China. They noted that the “coercive elements” were “so severe” they amounted to “enslavement as a crime against humanity.”

...

Meanwhile, after his China visit last week, Canadian Minister of Finance and National Revenue François-Philippe Champagne did not give straight answer on Chinese forced labour (video, 2 min, here is an alternative Invidious link).

...

From spyware to "silencing tactics," the threat to free people in free countries is growing every day. Experts testify about the complicated landscape of foreign interference. In Canada's subcommittee of International Human Rights, they discuss the persistent threats from regimes like Iran and China, and why the West must stay vigilant to protect the freedom of its individuals.

[video, 6 min., alternative Invidious link].

cross-posted from : https://lemmy.zip/post/62104295

Invidious

New polling suggests a majority of Canadians think Canada ought to explore joining the European Union at a fraught time for geopolitical relations.

A survey of 4,000 people conducted by Spark Advocacy’s polling arm in March found that one in four respondents thought it would be a good idea for Canada to formally join the economic and political bloc of European nations.

A further 58 per cent indicated it was a proposal worth exploring further, while the remainder felt it was a bad idea.

Spark’s chief strategy officer Bruce Anderson says the survey suggests Canadians are increasingly open to finding ways to buck Canada’s reliance on the United States after more than a year of tariffs under U.S. President Donald Trump’s second administration.

France’s foreign minister last month openly floated the idea of Canada joining the EU, while Prime Minister Mark Carney has said he’s looking to deepen trade and security ties with the continent but not as a formal member of the bloc.

...

crosspostato da: https://mander.xyz/post/50076835

...

The Artemis II mission is expected to complete a record-breaking lunar flyby today.

The Canadian Space Agency says astronaut Jeremy Hansen and his three American crewmates are set to become the space explorers who will have ventured farther into space than anyone before, surpassing a record set by Apollo 13 in 1970.

...

When Orion passes behind the moon, the spacecraft will enter a communications blackout of about 40 minutes as the lunar surface blocks radio signals.

Later, it will come as close as about 6,500 km to the moon’s surface, and from that vantage point Hansen has said the moon will look like a basketball held at arm’s length.

...

"The crew will make their lunar observations with real-time data analysis, guidance provided by a team of scientists and the knowledge acquired through their geology training in Labrador, Iceland and in class to describe surface textures, shapes, and colours, providing valuable data for future exploration of the moon,” reads a news release from the Canadian Space Agency.

The flyby promises views of the moon’s far side that were too dark or too difficult to see by the 24 Apollo astronauts who preceded them.

...

Officials of the East Turkistan Government in Exile (ETGE) and members of the Uyghur community staged protests across the United States and Canada, calling for global accountability and urgent international action over what they described as China’s “ongoing genocide” in East Turkistan, also known as the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region of China.

These protests were held on Sunday in Washington and Edmonton, Canada, to mark the 36th anniversary of the 1990 East Turkistan Uprising, also known as the “Baren Uprising”, which the ETGE said was “one of the most significant acts of national resistance” against China’s “colonial occupation” of the region.

According to the ETGE, thousands of East Turkistanis rose up on April 5, 1990, in Baren Township of Xinjiang to protest China’s “genocidal enforcement of coercive population control policies”, under which it alleged that over 250 Uyghur women were subjected to forced abortions.

The exiled authorities claimed that the Chinese authorities responded by deploying over 20,000 troops, helicopter gunships, and heavy artillery, killing more than 3,000 people and arresting over 7,600 more, following the uprising.

Calling the Baren Uprising a legitimate act of “anti-colonial resistance”, the ETGE said, “Mass imprisonment, forced labour, coercive population control, family separation, and the systematic destruction of Uyghur, Kazakh, Kyrgyz, and other Turkic cultures continue across occupied East Turkistan.”

...

Web Archive link

The Canadian company gets paid in the local country's currency for the power from the solar farm, so the company has invested in a Chili pepper plantation beside the solar farm, and sells the chili peppers on the international market for a return on their investment in dollars. There is farming, and then there is farming.

The Canadian Space Agency has also been posting short recap logbooks on their website: https://www.asc-csa.gc.ca/eng/missions/artemis-ii/daily-logbook.asp

The BC Counter Human Trafficking Unit and Richmond RCMP have made multiple arrests that they say will deter predators looking to purchase sex from potential trafficking victims.

But a criminologist who specializes in sex work laws and an organization that supports sex workers — some of whom have been trafficked themselves — say police operations like this actually make sex work more dangerous and make it less likely that someone who is being trafficked will speak with police.

On March 17 the RCMP put out a press release saying it had completed a one-day operation in which officers posed as sex workers online, spoke with more than 100 people and made multiple arrests when potential clients showed up. All individuals were released pending further investigation.

The BC Prosecution Service told The Tyee that at this time no charges have been laid.

The former MP who spent more than a decade pushing to legalize single-event sports betting says he doesn't regret it — but says its implementation is in some ways "sad" and "deplorable."

He also says more regulation is required to curb the volume and methods of gambling advertising in Canada.

Former NDP MP Brian Masse introduced a private member's bill to lift the prohibition in 2019, and one year later, Conservative MP Kevin Waugh re-introduced Masse's bill.

But Masse says, five years later, legalized sports betting hasn't been implemented in the way he had envisioned.

Erick Serpas Ventura knows the bones of a good home.

In El Salvador, where he was born, Serpas Ventura was raised in a small house until the age of five. When a civil war broke out, he and his family emigrated to Vancouver.

They settled in a 1920s heritage home held together by ancient trees and handmade bricks, a structure similar to the one featured in the video above. Having lived in a smaller, simpler abode in El Salvador, Serpas Ventura gained appreciation for the people who built their Vancouver home. He says it felt like “a massive mansion” compared with what they’d known back home.

And it caused a twinge of sadness whenever he saw a similarly old but sturdy house being bulldozed to make way for new construction.

So, after a decade in the Royal Canadian Air Force, Serpas Ventura pivoted and founded Vema Deconstruction in 2022. The goal? Reuse the materials — wood, metal, bricks — that make up many of the homes on the West Coast.