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These are the top stories:
Elections Alberta now says it will disclose names of recipients of fines for breaking election laws
After briefly reverting to an old policy that saw that information redacted, Elections Alberta issued a statement that said it would start identifying violators again and also add information to previous records for 2018 and 2019.
The agency said this was a long-standing policy put in place before last year, based on legal advice, and that it would review its disclosure practices.
The interruption in disclosure came to light after Elections Alberta posted details of a fine against Alan Hallman, who was campaign manager for now-Premier Jason Kenney in a 2017 Calgary by-election.
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Malta’s government on edge as journalist’s murder probe widens
The former leader of the opposition in the Maltese parliament said he expects the Prime Minister, Joseph Muscat, to resign soon as more reports emerged linking his former chief of staff to the murder of a journalist whose corruption allegations shook the top levels of government.
Muscat has been under enormous pressure since the focus of the murder investigation shifted to his office. On Monday, his chief of staff, Keith Schembri, was arrested in connection with Daphne Caruana Galizia’s assassination and resigned his post. On Friday, Muscat’s government decided to reject a request for immunity by Yorgen Fenech, a businessman who was arrested last week while trying to leave Malta on his yacht.
Caruana Galizia was Malta’s best-known investigative journalist and spent years using her blog to make allegations of corruption that reached the senior level of government.
The U.S.-China trade war is a boon for Atlantic Canada’s lobster harvesters. But what’s the catch?
In Nova Scotia, companies with lobster fishermen around the province are now getting more than $10 a pound for their catches. A year ago, those same lobsters fetched $7.50 a pound.
That price hike owes a lot to a Washington-Beijing trade war, with levies on products including lobsters. Now, especially with Chinese New Year celebrations looming, Chinese seafood importers started buying more Canadian lobster – a lot more.
As Maritimers build more boats, reap higher prices and go to greater lengths to corner the market, some wonder what will happen when Beijing and Washington patch things up.
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ALSO ON OUR RADAR
Huawei providing surveillance tech to China’s Xinjiang authorities, report finds: The Chinese technology giant has provided sophisticated computing and big data services to authorities in the country’s northwestern region, where authorities have ordered construction of an extensive architecture of digital surveillance and control even as large numbers of Muslims are locked inside prison-like centres for political indoctrination and skills training.
Provincial and territorial leaders will gather in Toronto next week: After a divisive federal election campaign, the premiers will focus their efforts on areas of agreement such as demands for Ottawa to boost health-care transfers, economic development and internal trade.
Ottawa-area campaign managers call for Scheer’s resignation at private event: Sources speaking on condition of confidentiality to discuss internal party matters told The Globe that among the concerns cited was the campaign’s failure to define Mr. Scheer, leaving it open for the Liberals to do instead.
Quebec politicians and media figures criticize “21 reasons to move to Manitoba" ad campaign: The ad refers to Bill 21, which became law in Quebec earlier this year and bans teachers, police officers and other civil servants from wearing religious symbols, including the Muslim head scarf, Sikh turban and other objects.
Jody Wilson-Raybould says Ottawa needs to resolve the First Nations child-welfare case: Wilson-Raybould, the first Indigenous justice minister, said she is “extremely disappointed” in the Trudeau government’s decision to seek a judicial review of findings by the Canadian Human Rights Tribunal, as well as a stay pending that review.
Purdue Pharma is seeking to temporarily halt all litigation against the company in Canada: Purdue is accused of fuelling the epidemic with overly aggressive marketing of OxyContin, it is seeking to settle thousands of lawsuits in the U.S. over a deadly opioid epidemic.
MORNING MARKETS
Global stocks slip on trade worries as record high stays elusive: World shares slipped on Friday as a leading index strained for a record high, with nerves gnawing away from Asia to Europe over how, or when, the U.S. and China can agree on a truce in their damaging trade war. Tokyo’s Nikkei lost 0.5 per cent, Hong Kong’s Hang Seng fell 2 per cent, and the Shanghai Composite slid 0.6 per cent. In Europe, London’s FTSE 100 was down marginally by about 4:45 a.m. ET, with the Paris CAC 40 little changed and Germany’s DAX down 0.2 per cent. New York futures were down. The Canadian dollar was above 75 US cents.
WHAT EVERYONE’S TALKING ABOUT
Health care needs a course correction that only Ottawa can deliver
Kevin Smith: “The original premise of medicare was a pact between the federal government and provinces to share the costs of publicly insured services. That balance has been eroded.” Smith is president and CEO of the University Health Network
What Jason Kenney and Albertans can learn from Texas
Max Fawcett: “There is still time to restore the tax credits, re-invest in the province’s postsecondary institutions and embrace the province’s enormous renewable-energy assets. And perhaps Kenney’s visit to Texas has shown him that investments in non-energy businesses don’t have to be treated as a threat to the old economic order.” Fawcett previously worked in Alberta’s Climate Change Office.
Andrew Scheer is boiled celery, and it’s hard to get excited about boiled celery
Robyn Urback: “It might not be fair that the unlikely leader of the Conservatives, head of a now-more-powerful Official Opposition, would be rewarded by his party with a kick in the pants and map to the exit. But this isn’t about fairness.”
TODAY’S EDITORIAL CARTOON
Brian GableBrian Gable/The Globe and Mail
LIVING BETTER
Your best Amazon Prime Video, Netflix and Canadian streaming bets for this weekend
Read the full reviews on what to watch this weekend, no commute required.
- Amazon Prime Video: In The Souvenir, director Joanna Hogg aligns her film with its most despicable character. This is not a movie that lets life play out as it is or was – it is instead a collection of memories.
- Netflix: Mati Diop’s Atlantics is a sensual and heady stew of romance, family drama, police procedural, political polemic and ghost story.
- Crave: Directed by the late Tony Scott and written by the profane buddy-cop maestro Shane Black, The Last Boy Scout is a relic of the truly ridiculous early nineties.
MOMENT IN TIME
The inaugural game of the Montreal Forum
Courtesy of NHL.comCourtesy of NHL.com
Nov. 29, 1924: “Two records tumbled” on the evening of Nov. 29, 1924, according to a report in The Globe (not yet “and Mail”): The crowd of 9,000 fans at the inaugural game of the Montreal Forum – a tilt between the hometown Canadiens and the Toronto St. Patricks – was the largest ever to witness an ice-hockey game in that city; and “never before has Montreal had hockey as early as November.” The match only took place at the Forum because the new arena – built in less than six months, at a reported cost of $1-million, for the upstart anglo-oriented Montreal Professional Hockey Club (a.k.a. the Maroons) – possessed ice-making machinery, and the rink at the Canadiens’ regular home, the Mount Royal Arena, was not yet ready. Two years later, the Canadiens joined the Maroons at the Forum, beginning a decades-long run that included a record 23 NHL championships. (The Maroons won it twice before folding in 1938.) The Canadiens left the Forum for the larger, shinier Bell Centre in 1996, three years after winning their last Stanley Cup. Since then, they haven’t even made it back to the finals. — Simon Houpt
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