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The military dropped the remaining charge against Lieutenant-General Steven Whelan on Monday, after failing to have additional e-mail evidence admitted in the case last week.
Lt.-Gen. Whelan had been charged with one count of “conduct to the prejudice of good order and discipline” under the National Defence Act. Under that charge, he was accused of improperly changing the complainant’s performance evaluation in 2011 while they were on tour together in Jerusalem. The military alleged he acted out of fear that she would disclose their interactions to headquarters.
The Globe and Mail’s Marieke Walsh reports here that military prosecutor Major Max Reede made the announcement in court Monday just before the complainant in the case was set to be cross-examined by the defence.
“We do have a continuing duty to assess our case as the evidence comes out and have concluded that our prosecutorial discretion can be exercised to seek or withdraw this charge,” Maj. Reede told the court.
He said the decision was based on the “assessment of the evidence that’s been put before the court.”
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TODAY'S HEADLINES
University of Alberta facing calls to return thousands more in donations connected to Waffen SS veterans - The University of Alberta says it is reviewing other donations it has received after returning $30,000 from the family of Yaroslav Hunka, a Waffen SS veteran who got a standing ovation in Parliament during a visit by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky last month. Story here.
Alberta’s information watchdog opens systemic probe into ministries’ handling of access requests - Alberta’s access watchdog has launched a systemic investigation into the provincial government’s handling of freedom of information requests after reporting by The Globe and Mail’s Secret Canada project. Story here.
Ontario government had targeted more Greenbelt sites without public’s notice, documents show - The Ontario government’s now-cancelled bid to open up parts of the province’s environmentally protected Greenbelt to development was more ambitious than previously known, documents show. Story here.
By-election drama in Quebec - Quebec’s governing Coalition Avenir Québec is looking to hang on to the hotly contested Quebec Cotu-area Jean-Talon riding in by-election Monday. Story here.
Ex RCMP civilian alleged to have shared secrets gets day in court - A former RCMP civilian who was once regarded as a star in the national police force will get his day in court after a four-year wait with his multiweek criminal trial set to begin on Tuesday. Story here.
Quebec seeks to join class-action lawsuit against opioid manufacturers, distributors - The Quebec government intends to table a bill in the coming days to enable it to join a class action lawsuit brought by British Columbia against more than 40 pharmaceutical companies accused of downplaying the harmful effects of opioids. Story here.
Overdoses from smoking toxic drugs outpace B.C. prevention sites - Nearly two-thirds of the overdose deaths in British Columbia this year came after smoking illicit drugs, yet only 40 per cent of the supervised consumption sites in the province offer a safe place to smoke, and the chief coroner says that needs to change. Story here.
Manitoba PC ad suggesting voters shouldn’t be ashamed to vote for them taken down within hours - In the final days of the provincial election campaign, the Progressive Conservatives posted and quickly yanked an online advertisement that suggests some Manitobans may feel judged for casting their ballot, but they should “vote how you feel, not how others say you should.” Story here from CBC.
‘We are sorry’: Newfoundland and Labrador makes first apology for residential schools - In a small gymnasium Friday in southern Labrador, Newfoundland and Labrador Premier Andrew Furey delivered a solemn apology to the region’s survivors of residential schools. Story here.
Former Justice Minister Irwin Cotler tells CTV News that nearly 40-year-old documents on suspected war criminals living in Canada should be unsealed. Story here.
THIS AND THAT
Today in the Commons – The House of Commons will not sit today as it is a federal holiday to mark National Truth and Reconciliation Day. The day is marked each year on Sept. 30, which fell on a Saturday this year. Events were held across the country. The House will resume on Tuesday, starting with an election to replace Anthony Rota as Speaker. Mr. Rota resigned last week over his decision to invite a member of a Nazi unit to the House during an official visit by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.
Duncan cancer update - Former federal cabinet minister Kirsty Duncan provides an update here on her treatment for cancer.
PRIME MINISTER'S DAY
Private meetings in Ottawa.
LEADERS
Bloc Québécois Leader Yves-François Blanchet is in Paris at the beginning of a trip that will include stops in Edinburgh and Belfast through Oct. 11. His stop in Paris includes meetings with representatives of the Department of the Americas at the French Ministry for Europe and Foreign Affairs, the founding partner of the quantum technologies funding company Quantonation, Olivier Tonneau, and former Prime Minister Jean-Pierre Raffarin.
No schedules provided for other party leaders.
THE DECIBEL
On Monday’s edition of The Globe and Mail podcast, European Correspondent Paul Waldie talks about why tensions between Poland and Ukraine are growing and why support, in Poland, for Ukrainians fleeing the war is waning. The Decibel is here.
OPINION
Veteran Parliament Hill reporter Dean Beeby, an expert on freedom of information laws, writes as a contributor to The Globe and Mail that The Access to Information Act needs urgent repair. Will Pierre Poilievre be the politician to fix it?: “The Conservative Leader is right to challenge secrecy, especially when it’s self-serving and ingrained. The Access to Information Act needs urgent repair, and should be high on the to-do list of any freshly elected party.
But opposition parties often lose their appetite for openness once they grab the levers of government. Power is allergic to transparency. And that’s exactly what happened in the Harper government in which Mr. Poilievre once served.”
Marcus Gee (The Globe and Mail) writes that Toronto’s endlessly delayed Eglinton Crosstown transit line shows what happens when no one is accountable: “Fiascos like the Crosstown delay are not just an annoyance. They undermine faith in Toronto’s future. The city faces all sorts of grown-up problems, from the proliferation of homeless encampments to sky-high downtown office vacancy rates to a dire shortage of housing that ordinary people can afford.
Its transit system has not kept up with the explosive growth of the city and its region, which is taking in hundreds of thousands of newcomers. While other world cities have built out their networks at a staggering pace, Toronto has lagged.”
Kelly Cryderman (The Globe and Mail) on Alberta looking to Ontario for an ally on electricity regulations: “Hot on the heels of the odious discussion of leaving the Canada Pension Plan and taking more than half the fund’s assets in the process, it’s unlikely anyone in the rest of Canada wanted to hear more from the Alberta government this week. The province’s contention that blackouts could hit because of the federal government’s coming Clean Electricity Regulations appears, at first blush, to be digging the credibility hole deeper. The scenario of a mother of a baby struggling without a light to turn on in the middle of the night – a flourish added by Alberta Environment Minister Rebecca Schulz during a news conference on Thursday – is designed to both shock and tug on people’s heartstrings. Federal Environment Minister Steven Guilbeault said in an e-mail any claim that building a clean electricity grid in the next dozen years will lead to blackouts is “misinformation, designed to inflame not inform.”
Konrad Yakabuski (The Globe and Mail) on hotshot Quebec novelist Kevin Lambert stirring the pot in Montreal and Paris: “A nuanced critique of the Quebec bourgeoisie,” is how Quebec Premier François Legault described Mr. Lambert’s novel in a July Facebook post. “Interest groups and journalists look for scapegoats in Montreal’s housing crisis. The difficulty of debates in our society.” Mr. Lambert did not take the Premier’s review sitting down. “Mr. Legault, in the middle of a housing crisis, as your government works to sap the last ramparts that protect us from extreme gentrification in Montreal, highlighting my novel is pathetic of you,” he wrote. “You would have to read with your eyes closed not to see that the portrait of the city in my novel goes against the destructive anti-poor people, anti-immigrant, pro-owner, pro-rich policies of your government.”
The Globe and Mail Editorial Board on why Canadians deserve more than smug silence when public projects go off the rails: “Last week, the head of the public transport agency in charge of a repeatedly delayed transit project in Toronto stood in front of a microphone and refused to say when the new light-rail system would at long last go into service. “We have a really good idea of … what the approximate trajectory of the completion of this project is,” Phil Verster, the chief executive of Metrolinx, said with regard to the Eglinton Crosstown LRT line. “However, I am seeing too many defects and issues arising from the testing and commissioning phase. And therefore I can’t give you a range that I’m comfortable with, that will give enough certainty.”
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