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These are the top stories:
Saskatchewan is urging changes to loan rules to help student truck drivers
The province wants the federal government’s loan rules adapted to allow people taking mandatory safety training programs to apply for financial aid.
The required training, put in place after the Humboldt Broncos bus crash, typically costs around $10,000. But those taking licence programs lasting less than 12 weeks aren’t eligible. The issue extends to those in Alberta and Manitoba, where similar courses are in place.
Ottawa says it’s looking into ways to address Saskatchewan’s request.
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B.C. students have been caught up in the Hong Kong-China dispute
From Hong Kong pamphlets to a patriotic Chinese film, the debate over democratic freedoms on the other side of the Pacific is playing out at schools in B.C.’s Lower Mainland.
Last week, the Vancouver Society in Support of Democratic Movement handed out information kits to social studies teachers at a professional development conference. The flyers, which organizers hoped would reach mainland Chinese students, drew attention to Tiananmen Square and the Hong Kong protests. The group was one of 46 organizations to set up booths.
That campaign came days after a Richmond teacher showed her Mandarin class trailers for a film celebrating the 70 years of Communist Party rule in China. An assignment based on the trailers drew complaints from parents that the videos were pro-China propaganda.
In other China news, a former adviser to Barack Obama is urging Ottawa to scale back its engagement with China until Beijing releases two Canadians detained since last December. Tarun Chhabra also said the federal government should bar Huawei from supplying 5G technology on national-security grounds.
Strong winds have led to new and widening California wildfires
Around 26,000 people were forced to evacuate a region northwest of Los Angeles just one day after a separate fire erupted near the Getty Center Museum. The new fire nearly hit another major institution: the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library.
Winds of up to 80 kilometres, coupled with dry conditions and low humidity, have led to embers flying through the air and igniting spot fires ahead of advancing flames.
Glaciers are under threat from the Arctic to the Alps
Canada’s High Arctic glaciers are vanishing at an accelerating pace, with melting now happening at five times the pre-2005 rate. Locally, scientists are working to understand the impact it could have on marine life and Indigenous communities tied to the ocean. The world is watching, too: Canada’s glaciers contribute to sea-level rise.
Glacier melts aren’t limited to the Arctic: Scientists are preparing for the death of Planpincieux, which is situated on a stretch of Western Europe’s highest mountain. The disappearance of glaciers in the Alps is triggering concerns about a crisis that would damage farming, hydro power, wildlife and tourism.
The latest on autism funding in Ontario
An advisory panel is pushing for an overhaul of the province’s autism program. But even with a reversal to the Ford government’s controversial cuts, the panel said annual caps on services families receive are “inevitable.”
Recommendations include a new needs-based program for various therapy programs as well as early intervention for those under 6. The province says the report will serve as the “foundation” for a new autism plan.
Separately, the families of seven adults with autism are taking Ontario to court for breach of contract and negligence after their funding was abruptly cut off this summer.
And an autism group that received free media training from Warren Kinsella’s consulting firm said they were threatened with legal action when they questioned possible ties to the Ford government. Kinsella said his firm’s contracts with the government were unrelated to the pro-bono work.
Politics snapshot: MacKay weighs in, Tory senators make bids, Singh outlines demands
Peter MacKay says Andrew Scheer missed a “breakaway on an open net” in the federal election. The former Tory cabinet minister, whose name has been floated as a possible leadership replacement, said Scheer failed to address concerns about his views on abortion and same-sex marriage.
Conservatives senators are jockeying for the position of opposition leader in the Red Chamber. Some senators say the role is set to be a key check on power now that the Liberals will be governing with only a minority in the House of Commons.
NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh says he wants the Trudeau government to support a future private members’ bill on universal, single-payer pharmacare. He also wants Ottawa to drop its challenge of a tribunal ruling that called for compensation on Indigenous children unnecessarily taken into the child-welfare system.
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ALSO ON OUR RADAR
Massive fire on moving train kills 71 passengers in Pakistan: The fire broke out when a gas stove exploded as breakfast was being prepared on board. Flames roared through the cars as the train approached the town of Liaquatpur in Punjab, the latest tragedy to hit Pakistan’s dilapidated, poorly maintained and mismanaged rail system.
U.S. military releases video and new details of al-Baghdadi raid: The general who oversaw the U.S. raid on Islamic State leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi provided the most detailed account yet of the operation and said the U.S. is on alert for possible “retribution attacks” by extremists.
Halloween postponed in Quebec: Montreal is pushing festivities to Friday in response to what Environment Canada is calling the “trick-or-treat storm.” Near-freezing temperatures and snow are expected in the Prairies, while Ontario and Quebec could see torrential downpours and fierce winds.
Nationals win first World Series title: The Washington Nationals – a franchise that was founded as the Montreal Expos before a move to the U.S. – have claimed their first Major League Baseball championship. All four wins against the Houston Astros came on the road.
Sidewalk Labs agrees to scaled-back project: The Google sister company has agreed to a version of the Toronto development that would be much smaller than the 190-acre site it asked for in June. A confidential document from 2016, meanwhile, laid out an early vision with plans for data collection, tax powers and criminal justice.
MORNING MARKETS
Stocks touch 20-month high, bond yields fall after Fed cuts: World stocks edged to their highest in 20 months on Thursday after the Federal Reserve cut rates even as it signaled it would hold back from further reductions, sending bond yields and the dollar down. Tokyo’s Nikkei gained 0.4 per cent, and Hong Kong’s Hang Seng rose 0.9 per cent, while the Shanghai Composite lost 0.4 per cent. In Europe, London’s FTSE 100 and the Paris CAC 40 were down by between 0.1 and 0.3 per cent by about 4:45 a.m. ET, with Germany’s DAX up marginally. New York futures were up, though slightly. The Canadian dollar was trading just below 76 US cents.
WHAT EVERYONE’S TALKING ABOUT
Ontario’s vaping-advertising ban is a first but meagre step amid a growing public-health crisis
Adam Kassam: “Building on her announcement, [Health Minister Christine] Elliott should impose limits on the types of flavours being produced and marketed, restricting the locations where these products can be sold and considering raising the age requirements for e-cigarette purchase to ensure responsible purchasing of a product that we still don’t know enough about.” Dr. Adam Kassam is a Toronto-based physician.
How Ukraine can avoid the swamp of Donald Trump’s impeachment hearings
Yuri Polakiwsky: “There will be continuing and mounting pressures to participate, but Kyiv must not fall into this trap. Being part of the daily narrative is a losing proposition for Ukraine’s government, as it would be forced to stake out a definitive position in this domestic U.S. matter, and at least be seen as having picked a side.” Yuri Polakiwsky is a Toronto-born writer, living in Kyiv.
TODAY’S EDITORIAL CARTOON
(Brian Gable/The Globe and Mail)Brian Gable/The Globe and Mail
LIVING BETTER
Full Stream Ahead: Your best Netflix, Crave and Canadian streaming bets for this Nov. 2-3 weekend
On Netflix, Eddie Murphy’s Dolemite Is My Name is a comfortable and fun take on a movie star’s bid to make a blaxploitation film. On Crave, there’s Québécois coming-of-age drama A Colony, which won best picture at this past spring’s Canadian Screen Awards. And on under-the-radar streaming service Kanopy, low-budget thriller Prospect is worth the watch. Read more about the films here.
MOMENT IN TIME
Pope John Paul II canonizes Marguerite Bourgeoys, an influential pioneer in Quebec
(Walter Bibikow/Alamy)Walter Bibikow/Alamy
Oct. 31, 1982: Long before she was canonized in 1982, Marguerite Bourgeoys was thought of as a saint. She was so revered in New France that upon her death in 1700, objects that touched her hands as her body lay in the chapel of the Congrégation de Notre Dame in Montreal were considered relics. Bourgeoys was the great pioneer of women’s education in New France. She came to Fort Ville-Marie, as Montreal was then known, from France in 1653, and started the city’s first public school in 1658. She recruited teachers from France, and helped the Filles du Roi – young women sent by Louis XIV to New France to become wives for settlers – adapt to their new lives. To help spread education, Bourgeoys established a non-cloistered religious order of nuns who lived and worked in the community, often trekking throughout the St. Lawrence Valley by foot and canoe. “The members of the Congrégation sacrifice their health, their satisfaction and their rest for the sake of the girls they teach,” she wrote. When Pope John Paul II canonized Bourgeoys in Rome on Oct. 31, 1982, in front of 20,000 faithful catholics, he praised her talents as a teacher, adding that “we have great need, have we not, for clear-sighted aims such as she had.” – Mark Rendell
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