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Fully vaccinated Canadians and permanent residents entering the country after July 5 will no longer need to quarantine, though they will still need to isolate until an arrival COVID-19 test comes back negative.

Federal officials made the announcement on Monday morning, and said this is the first phase of relaxing the country’s pandemic border restrictions. These changes mean that returning travellers arriving by air will be exempt from the mandatory hotel quarantine. Travel restrictions are still in place for foreigners though, and Canadians who are not fully vaccinated will still need to quarantine.

On Friday, the government announced that it’s extending border restrictions on non-essential travel between Canada and the U.S. for another month until July 21.

Officials faced questions about the delay in opening the border with the U.S, and why they’re not releasing the specific metrics that today’s reopening plan is based on. Health Minister Patty Hajdu said on Monday that a key metric in the reopening plan is to have 75 per cent of Canadians fully vaccinated.

Ministers also announced that the flight ban between Canada and India has also been renewed for another month; however, the flight ban between Canada and Pakistan is ending. These bans were put in place because of the spread of the Delta variant, which is becoming the globally dominant variant of COVID-19, a WHO official said on Friday.

The Delta variant is the cause of a recent outbreak of COVID-19 in Ontario’s Waterloo Region. Elsewhere in the province, a delayed shipment of Pfizer vaccines mean that many Ontarians getting a shot this week will get a Moderna dose.

Opinion: Two good reasons for keeping the border closed, and one bad one (The Globe and Mail Editorial Board)

This is the daily Politics Briefing newsletter, written by Ian Bailey. Menaka Raman-Wilms is filling in today. It is available exclusively to our digital subscribers. If you’re reading this on the web, subscribers can sign up for the Politics newsletter and more than 20 others on our newsletter signup page. Have any feedback? Let us know what you think.

TODAY’S HEADLINES

Finding the remains of children at the former Kamloops Indian Residential School in British Columbia has woken people up to genocide in Canada, said Assembly of First Nations National Chief Perry Bellegarde in an interview with The Globe and Mail.

Liberal MPs have been using parliamentary funds to pay companies that help run the party’s digital campaign operations, as well as its voter-contact database.

Before MPs break for the summer this week, the Liberal government is focusing on two key pieces of legislation: a bill that would ban conversion therapy, and one that would set national targets for reaching net-zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050.

After a turbulent couple of weeks, Green Party Leader Annamie Paul said she’s determined to move the party forward amid the schisms.

POLITICAL READ Q AND A

Today we’re launching a new section in the daily politics briefing: a Q and A with the author of a political book. Our first interview features Hamish Telford.

It took political scientist Hamish Telford five years to write and revise his textbook Engaging Canadian Politics (Northrose Educational Resources, 2021). But it will take his students at the University of the Fraser Valley in B.C. a year to consume the 325-page text. It’s the history of Canada from its creation to Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, with all the politics in-between. The process of pulling together the book has taught the veteran educator some lessons about the role of such texts in conveying the realities of Canadian politics.

How is the role of the textbook different from the media in explaining Canadian politics?

The media provides us with the first cut of history. It reports events almost as they happen, and it is driven to a large extent by the words and actions of our political leaders. Journalists give us an account of politics from the front lines – political scientists tend to view politics from 30,000 feet up. [In textbooks] we are trying to tell the story of Canadian politics over time rather than day to day.

What does this textbook – or any textbook – provide that first-year university students can’t get off their smartphones or through Google?

The internet is a great tool for getting basic facts quickly. I am always confusing Brian Mulroney’s record setting 1984 election (211 seats) with Wayne Gretzky’s scoring record (215 points in the 1985-86 season), and a quick Google search sets me straight. But a textbook written by a bona fide academic will provide a framework for understanding the basic facts. It will also be much more comprehensive.

How has the shift to e-books affected the textbook industry, and how would it affect future textbooks you might write?

We are still in the shift, so it is a perhaps a bit too soon to know exactly how e-books will transform the industry. But some companies have made the shift completely to e-books and one thing that has become apparent is the process of revising a textbook has changed. Instead of waiting a couple of years to produce a new edition of a text authors and publishers are now involved in continuously updating a text.

What advice would you give to others about writing a political textbook?

When I was a graduate student at UBC in the 1990s, I recall Professor Allen Sens saying not to even think about writing a textbook until you have taught a course for at least five years. If anything, Allen understated the case. You really have to be intimately familiar with a subject before you can begin to explain it at the introductory level.

Are you working on a new politics textbook?

I would like to write a book on B.C. politics but following the Sens rule I need to teach my B.C. politics course a few more times – and do a lot more reading on B.C .history – before I can embark on that project.

This interview has been edited and condensed.

OPINION

Perry Bellegarde (contributing to The Globe and Mail) on why the passage of Canada’s UNDRIP bill is a triumph we should all celebrate: “No one expects the Act will result in overnight change. However, this collaborative process represents a profound improvement over Canada’s long history of denial and antagonism toward Indigenous rights.”

Paul Evans and Yuen Pau Woo (contributing to The Globe and Mail) on why Anti-China sentiment is becoming anti-Chinese prejudice in Canada: “It is not racist to be critical of China or to take issue with advocates of continued engagement with China. But criticism crosses a threshold when it sensationalizes Chinese actions and stigmatizes individuals or groups with connections to China.”

Campbell Clark (The Globe and Mail) on why Tories need to look beyond an election with COVID-19 recovery plan: “The Liberal blueprint is out there, sort of, in a budget bill before Parliament. But the Conservatives’ recovery plan is still a few bullet points sketched out by Leader Erin O’Toole. So it’s worth asking. Do the Tories have a different economic recovery policy?”

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