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Governor-General Julie Payette has resigned in the aftermath of a scathing independent review of workplace harassment allegations at Rideau Hall. A key figure in Canadian parliamentary democracy, her departure leaves the institution in disarray amid a pandemic, a stalled economy and a country facing a possible federal election this year.
Ms. Payette said in a statement that no formal complaints or official grievances were filed against her and that she was not afforded due process.
- Campbell Clark: A very Trudeau mistake created this governor-general fiasco
- FAQ: What happens when the governor-general resigns?
- Quicks facts about Julie Payette
- Readers react: “Justin Trudeau needs to be held to account for this.”
Canada's Governor General Julie Payette inspects the guard as she arrives to deliver the Throne Speech in the Senate, as parliament prepares to resume in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada September 23, 2020.PATRICK DOYLE/Reuters
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THE POWER GAP
For women in the workplace, progress has stalled. By almost by every metric, they continue to lag generations behind men. Two and a half years ago, The Globe and Mail set about trying to understand why. What we found is that inequities run much deeper than compensation or a lack of female CEOs.
In public-sector workplaces across Canada, men and women are separated by more than just salary: Women and racialized people can’t break through to the highest levels of decision-making. The Globe spent two years analyzing hundreds of salary records to find out why.
This is the first in a series of stories that will examine the role of women in the workplace. The data focuses on the public sector because it is the only available workplace pay data in Canada.
Illustration by Christy Lundy
More from the Power Gap series
- See for yourself: Explore the data illustrations, individual entity data is included in each sector.
- The backstory: Robyn Doolittle set out to expose the wage gap, but the term seemed inadequate in describing what she was seeing. This is how it started.
- Profiles: Here are reasons why women don’t advance in the corporate world and how it plays out in real-life scenarios.
- How did we do it? It took careful research to compare thousands of jobs at hundreds of workplaces. For example, we commissioned Statistics Canada to complete a gender analysis for this project.
Illustration by Christy Lundy
COVID-19 news
Montreal manufacturer CAE Inc., won a $282.5-million contract in April to produce 10,000 ventilators as part of the emergency response to the COVID-19 pandemic.
But the distribution of thousands of ventilators was delayed by several months last year when federal officials found what they described as critical deficiencies, new documents reveal. Internal records released to Parliament this week show that a review had “concluded that the ventilators failed the technical assessment due to critical deficiencies that pose patient safety risks.”
Employee volunteers of CAE, a flight simulator builder and designer, work on constructing ventilators to be used to help in the COVID-19 pandemic in Montreal, Que. on Aug. 12, 2020.Andrej Ivanov/The Globe and Mail
A new variant of COVID-19 that is inflicting heavy damage across Southern Africa can evade the immunity that is normally provided by previous infection, researchers are discovering.
Vaccine delays from Pfizer-BioNTech that continue to worsen. Major-General Dany Fortin, who is leading Canada’s vaccine logistics, told reporters the delivery from Pfizer for the week of Feb. 1 will be cut to just 79,000 doses, amounting to a 79-per-cent drop.
Long-term-care homes are being affected by the delays. The pandemic has left one facility, Barrie’s Roberta Place, where an unidentified variant has been detected, vulnerable to a devastating outbreak.
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ALSO ON OUR RADAR
Biden launches sweeping COVID-19 initiatives: He also made a personal plea to all Americans to wear masks over the next 99 days to stop the spread of the virus.
Newfoundland and Labrador female politicians experience sexism and abuse: Sarah Stoodley warns volunteers against knocking on doors of people who have sent her abusive e-mails.
First Nations group calls for more input into ESG standards: A paper was commissioned by the First Nations Major Projects Coalition in advance of a conference designed to spur discussion on how to incorporate Indigenous perspectives into ESG decisions.
MORNING MARKETS
World stocks ease: Global shares slipped off record highs on Friday as gloomy data reminded investors of the struggles facing the economic recovery, curbing a rally fuelled by hopes of U.S. stimulus by newly inaugurated President Joe Biden. Just before 6 a.m. ET, Britain’s FTSE 100 was down 0.56 per cent. Germany’s DAX and France’s CAC 40 fell 0.62 per cent and 0.99 per cent, respectively. Japan’s Nikkei lost 0.44 per cent. Hong Kong’s Hang Seng fell 1.6 per cent. New York futures were lower. The Canadian dollar was trading at 78.75 US cents.
WHAT EVERYONE’S TALKING ABOUT
Canadians’ outrage over vaccine delays is misguided – not to mention entitled
Gary Mason: “When it comes to the vaccine, and its rollout, perspective is needed. Complaining about a delay of a few weeks is not just taking political pot shots, it reeks of rich-nation privilege.”
Trump could have left the White House with power and influence – but ruined it
Robyn Urback: “The power he had in reserve after the election was squandered on an altar of ego and paranoia. Mr. Trump lost the election, but he didn’t have to be this much of a loser.”
TODAY’S EDITORIAL CARTOON
Brian Gable/The Globe and Mail
LIVING BETTER
Supplied
Fire pits are this winter’s hottest accessory
In the time of COVID-19, the humble fire pit has gone from cozy amenity to something resembling a lifeline for people across the country.
Businesses are also finding access to fire pits a major draw. The trendy Solo Stoves, for example, are back ordered for a month. And Calgary’s Winter Fire Pits Program, a winter initiative that encourages citizens to book public fire pits in parks around the city, proved so popular when it first launched bookings that it had to be temporarily paused when the hotline became overwhelmed with requests.
MOMENT IN TIME: Jan. 22, 1905
Shooting in the Palace Square on January 22, 1905: Bloody Sunday (or Red Sunday) in the Winter Palace Square, Tsar Nicholas II's residence in St. Petersburg.© Photo Josse/State Museum of Political History of Russia / Bridgeman Images
Russian troops kill protesters in the Bloody Sunday Massacre
For Russia, Bloody Sunday was the moment that hastened the march to revolution. On Jan. 22, 1905, a priest named Georgy Gapon led a crowd estimated at up to 140,000 to the square in front of the Winter Palace in St. Petersburg to present a petition to the czar. The unarmed demonstrators were peaceful and largely made up of workers and their families dressed in their Sunday best. Many held aloft pictures of the man they came to see. But their optimism was misplaced. For one, Nicholas II wasn’t there. For another, he never would have agreed to demands such as shorter work days and universal suffrage. Instead, the throng had to contend with the troops, who saw things differently: They were vastly outnumbered; they had only lethal weapons (rifles, not whips); they had no experience in crowd control because demonstrations were banned; they had experience from terrorism and assassinations. A slaughter ensued. Estimates of the number killed ranged from fewer than a hundred to thousands, depending on who reported it. Either way, the sight of bodies of all ages being pulled on sleds tarnished Nicholas’s reputation – and presaged the day the guns would be turned on him. Joy Yokoyama
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