Five arrested, two sent to hospital at Hamilton street parties that drew thousands

Street party arrests, injuries

Photo: Hamilton Police Service

Hamilton Police arrested a handful of people during unsanctioned street parties on Saturday, Sept. 30, 2023.

Police in Hamilton arrested five people on Saturday at a series of unsanctioned street parties they say drew thousands.

Police say they received 49 calls about the parties near the McMaster University campus. 

They estimate that between 8,000 and 9,000 people were in attendance at the peak of the revelry.

Officers say paramedics received 10 calls for service over the course of the gatherings, and two people were taken to hospital for public intoxication.

In addition to the arrests, police say they issued 10 provincial offence notices.

They say five people were charged under the nuisance party bylaw, which city council enacted last month and requires attendees to leave an area once their gathering has been deemed a nuisance.

Save the Children advocate says aid cut hinders Canada's leadership in youth rights

Aid cut criticized

Photo: The Canadian Press

Children play with stones at an Afghan refugees camp on Joint Base McGuire Dix Lakehurst, N.J., on Monday, Sept. 27, 2021. The camp currently holds about 9,400 Afghan refugees and has a capacity to hold up to 13,000. THE CANADIAN PRESS/AP-Andrew Harnik

Save the Children's global advocate says Canada could lead an effort to have youth steer the reform of global institutions to fight climate change, while urging Ottawa to reverse aid cuts.

"Canada is uniquely placed today to really help the world to lead differently, to help young people to find hope for the future," said Rotimy Djossaya, the charity's global policy head, during a recent visit to Ottawa.

"Canada can play a critical role in ensuring that the world is prioritizing gender and human rights."

In mid-September, leaders gathered at the United Nations to take stock of the Sustainable Development Goals, a set of objectives such as gender equality, ending extreme poverty and ensuring a quality secondary education for every child. The goals involve 140 specific targets agreed upon in 2015, to be achieved by 2030.

Yet the United Nations says just 15 per cent of those targets have been reached, and 193 countries have agreed to speed up progress over the remaining seven years.

"We are off track. So, we need leaders; we need commitment," Djossaya said.

In the case of Canada, Djossaya said a feminist international aid policy has inspired other countries to take gender equality seriously, and to reform how they fund projects in developing countries in order to empower groups on the ground.

Yet he said the funding Canada has promised and the timelines it has set out do not account for the challenges these countries are facing, or the targets set out by the United Nations.

In this spring's budget, the Liberals earmarked a $1.3-billion drop in funding, amounting to 15 per cent less than the year before.

The Trudeau government insists this is not a cut, since the budget remains larger than Canada's aid expenditures before the COVID-19 pandemic and Russia's invasion of Ukraine. But it fits a trend of western countries pulling back on aid spending amid a series of climate disasters and refugee crises.

Those trends are hitting children hard, Djossaya said. His organization has surveyed 54,000 children across 41 countries, and found they roundly feel adults aren't doing enough to deal with what they perceive as increasing inequality and climate chaos.

"They are struggling to understand the world that we'll live in tomorrow. They are struggling to understand the unprecedented scale of the impact of climate change of natural disasters," Djossaya said.

This month, the Overseas Development Institute said Canada has contributed just 51 per cent of its "fair share" of the billions needed to help countries adapt to climate change, based on greenhouse gas emissions, gross national income and population size.

Meanwhile, in August the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights stated that inaction on climate change amounts to violation of the Convention on the Rights of the Child that virtually every country adheres to, which gives more teeth to legal challenges of governments that don't take climate change seriously.

"There's an urgent need for us to step up," Djossaya said. "How are we using the tools to really deliver, for the next generation, a livable planet? It's for me something which is alarming."

At the United Nations, Canada has argued there is not enough funding available to poorer countries to meet these targets, particularly those coping with increasing natural disasters associated with climate change.

For example, about 60 per cent of people in Africa don't have access to early-warning systems to help them escape disasters, according to the World Meteorological Organization.

Ottawa has argued the most viable way to face these types of challenges is to reform global financial institutions, to give more financing for carbon-neutral infrastructure that better protects these countries from hurricanes and wildfires.

Djossaya said those reforms are crucial, but Canada and its peers shouldn't shirk their own responsibilities.

He noted an underfunded program in Burkina Faso designed by young adults, to make sure that families on the move due to climate change can make sure their children keep up with their schooling, through a network of schools in various regions that can integrate kids who had to move partway through a school year.

That program is in a region where young people are facing limited opportunities, and are recruited by terrorist groups.

"The only way to be successful … is to really put the children and young people themselves at the heart of the solutions," Djossaya said.

"We don't have time to lose. We need to act now, and make sure that we are shaping a world which will remain livable for the generations to come."

International Development Minister Ahmed Hussen wouldn't say whether Ottawa will further boost its current aid allocation, but he noted the United Nations has put Canada as one of the leaders of an advocacy project for the Sustainable Development Goals.

"Canada is actually leading in this space," Hussen said. "This is not the time to pivot … we are at the halfway point and if we work hard, we can get the job done."

Head of Canadian Ukrainian group defends man who fought for unit created by Nazis

Hunka treated unfairly?

Photo: The Canadian Press

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy speaks in the House of Commons in Ottawa on Sept. 22.

The president of the Ukrainian National Federation of Canada is defending a Second World War veteran of a Nazi unit who was recently lauded as a hero in Canada's Parliament.

Jurij Klufas has not met 98-year-old Yaroslav Hunka but says the veteran is being treated unfairly. He says Hunka was fighting for Ukraine — not Germany — and that countries, including Canada, have cleared his division of war crimes.

"If you're a soldier doesn't mean you're a member of a certain party from the country," Klufas said Friday in a phone interview. "In this case, the senior gentleman here was a soldier, in his understanding, fighting for Ukraine."

Hunka received a standing ovation in the House of Commons on Sept. 22 after being introduced by the Speaker as "a Ukrainian hero and a Canadian hero'' during Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy's visit to Ottawa.

The incident drew widespread international criticism after it was revealed Hunka was a member of a mostly volunteer unit created by the Nazis to fight the Soviet Union. The revelation forced the resignation of Anthony Rota as Speaker and an apology on behalf of Parliament by Prime Minister Justin Trudeau.

Ivan Katchanovski, a Ukrainian-Canadian political science professor at the University of Ottawa, says the actions of Hunka's Waffen-SS Galicia Division have been "whitewashed" in Canada.

He says supporters have tried to present the division as a patriotic Ukrainian force despite the fact it collaborated with Nazis and was involved in a variety of atrocities, including the killings of Jews, Ukrainians and Poles.

"They represent this division as fighting not for Nazi Germany, but fighting for Ukrainian independence, even though there was never any opportunity to fight for any Ukrainian independence," he said. "They were fighting under German command until the end of World War II."

He said the heroic interpretation is particularly prevalent in Canada, where many of the division's members immigrated under a controversial process that was opposed by Jewish groups.

In 1950, the federal cabinet decided to allow Ukrainians living in the United Kingdom to come to Canada “notwithstanding their service in the German army," as long as they went through a security screening.

A 1986 commission report on war criminals living in Canada found there were about 600 former members of the Waffen-SS Galicia Division living in Canada at the time.

But Justice Jules Deschênes, who led the commission, said membership in the division did not in itself constitute a crime, and that "charges of war crimes against members of the Galicia Division have never been substantiated, either in 1950 when they were first preferred, or in 1984 when they were renewed, or before this commission."

Jewish groups have noted the existence of at least two Canadian monuments to the division, in Oakville, Ont., and in Edmonton.

In response to questions about Hunka, the Ukrainian Canadian Congress said Thursday that the people of present-day Ukraine, including its Jewish population, suffered successive occupations by "foreign empires and colonizers" going back centuries.

"There are difficult and painful pages in the shared history of the communities who made their home in Ukraine," congress CEO Ihor Michalchyshyn said in a statement. "The UCC acknowledges that recent events that brought these pages to the forefront have caused pain and anguish."

Frank Sysyn, a history professorat the University of Alberta, says it's accurate to say that Hunka was not a Nazi, despite fighting for Nazi Germany, because non-Germans weren't allowed to join the party.

He said Canada's choice to allow veterans of the unit to live out their lives in the country ultimately came down to a decision that membership in the unit was not reason enough to prosecute someone, if there was no proof they committed individual crimes. Ukrainians, he added, are far from the only group of postwar immigrants to benefit from such an approach.

"Most of our Italian immigrants of the 1950s, if they were men of a certain age, had probably been in the Italian army and fought for Fascist Italy," said Sysyn, who is a member of the Canadian Institute of Ukrainian Studies.

John-Paul Himka, a University of Alberta professor emeritus and the author of a book about Ukrainians and the Holocaust, said many of the young men who joined the Galicia division in 1943 were motivated by the atrocities they witnessed under Soviet occupation, including the murder of thousands of political prisoners and mass deportations to labour camps.

“So for the people in this region, the Soviets were the nightmare and the Germans were relatively tolerable," he said. "So that, I think, explains why so many of them thought that what they were doing fighting against the Soviets was patriotic.”

He said some Galician units did participate in atrocities, including murders in Polish villages. The division had an antisemitic newspaper and accepted into its ranks “policemen who had been very important in the Holocaust, who had rounded up Jews for execution and sometimes executed Jews themselves," he said.

He blames the Ukrainian community for failing to fully acknowledge and grapple with the country's Second World War history, including Nazi ties. However, he said many Canadians are guilty of not learning enough about the truths of the war on the Eastern front, including the rapes and murders perpetrated by the Soviets on the Allied side.

Klufas blames the branding of Hunka as a Nazi on "Russian disinformation," adding, "the fact that he was a soldier does not mean that he was a Nazi." He also said there was nothing wrong with Parliament applauding a man "who fought for his country." However, he conceded that it "maybe wasn't correct" in the circumstances, given that the people there didn't fully understand the issue.

Green Leader Elizabeth May mulls seeking job as Speaker of House of Commons

May mulls Speaker's job

Photo: The Canadian Press

Green Party Leader Elizabeth May. Patrick Doyle, THE CANADIAN PRESS

Green Party Leader Elizabeth May will leave her name on the ballot for the election of a new Speaker in the House of Commons on Tuesday, months after a mild stroke saw her on doctor’s orders not to travel by plane to Ottawa.

May, who represents Saanich-Gulf Islands, is one of several MPs who have stated their intention to leave their name on the ballot.

“I’m still thinking about it,” said May. “I will definitely want to give a speech on Tuesday morning about what a Speaker should do and what the role of a Speaker is.”

By convention, all 338 MPs are considered to be in the running, and MPs who do not want to run for the role must remove themselves from the ballot.

The election will be held Oct. 3 to replace MP Anthony Rota, who stepped down as Speaker Wednesday after drawing international criticism when he invited the House to recognize a 98-year-old Ukrainian veteran from his North Bay, Ont. riding who was later revealed to have served in a Nazi unit.

Bloc Quebecois MP Louis Plamondon — the longest-serving member of Parliament — is the interim Speaker and will preside over the election.

For a candidate to be successful, they must receive at least 50 per cent of the vote plus one.

May travelled by ferry, train and vehicle to get to Williams Lake on Saturday to join residential school survivor Phyllis Webstad for a National Day of Reconciliation event.

After having a mild stroke on June 29 that left a hematoma or pooled blood in her brain, May is waiting for an MRI to be scheduled to hopefully show the blood is no longer present. Until then, she is not permitted to fly.

May would be unable to get to Ottawa by train in time for Tuesday’s vote anyway, she said. She is permitted to make her speech via live video but in absentia she is not allowed to take part in the secret paper ballot vote.

Monday evening is the last time members of Parliament can withdraw their name from the paper ballot, but MPs can still verbally withdraw Tuesday.

“If I were Speaker, I’d be making sure our rules were enforced,” said May.

A Speaker can demand that MPs apologize if they use unparliamentary language and have an MP removed from the chamber.

May said the Speaker should bring back decorum.

“I’ve never yelled, I’ve never heckled, I’ve never interrupted another person,” said May. “It’s really important to me that we observe our rules and those rules also say you treat everyone with respect.”

On Friday, May spoke to many other MPs who may be leaving their names on the ballot including Chalottetown Liberal MP Sean Casey, Hull-Aylmer MP Greg Fergus and Nova Scotia Conservative MP Chris D’Entremont.

The Speaker presides over House of Commons business, acts as an impartial arbiter of House proceedings, and maintains order and civility during debates.

The Speaker can’t be a leader of a party with official status or be a minister.

Although May is a party leader, the Green Party is not officially recognized in the House because the party only has two seats. Twelve seats are required for official party status. That makes May eligible to run for Speaker.

May said this is the first time that being the leader of a party not officially recognized in the House has served her well. May put her name forward for Speaker in 2019.

The Speaker is considered non-partisan and does not sit in a party caucus or take part in debates.

The Speaker enters the House in a procession led by the Sergeant-at-Arms carrying the Mace, a symbol of the Speaker’s authority. MPs rise as the Speaker goes to their chair and once it’s determined there are enough MPs in attendance, the Speaker opens the sitting.

If chosen Speaker, May said she would return to the rule that sees the Speaker recognize who speaks in the House and not allow partisan party whips to offer up lists of names to the Speaker as has become the custom.

May is emphatic that she would not have made the mistake Rota did in not thoroughly vetting a constituent invited to sit in the public gallery during Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s address to Parliament.

“I feel sick about what happened,” said May, in a phone interview.

“People say it’s embarrassing. It’s not embarrassing. Embarrassing is when you mispronounce somebody’s name. Giving a standing ovation to a Nazi, is mortifying.”

May said that it is uniquely the prerogative of the Speaker to recognize people in the gallery.

May recalled it being impossible for her — making requests through Rota — to have Canadian environmentalist David Suzuki recognized in the House. Many other attempts were also denied, she said.

“I think Speaker Rota broke his own rules to recognize someone from his riding and it’s heartbreaking, it’s a violation and what it means to the Jewish community is unspeakable,” said May.

May suggests being Speaker would be less work than being party leader, but on the other hand she said it would leave her unable to travel to events like CCOP28, to be held Nov. 30 through Dec. 12 in Dubai.

The United Nations annual climate change conference, also known as the Conference of the Parties, is a gathering of world leaders, ministers and negotiators who discuss how climate change should be addressed.

“I think the reality is the Green Party is the only hope for the world right now,” said May.

May said her decision Tuesday will basically be about “making a choice between being Speaker and climate.”

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Two killed in bear attack at Banff National Park, grizzly euthanized: Parks Canada

Two killed in bear attack

Photo: The Canadian Press

A bear attack in Alberta's Banff National Park has left two people dead, Parks Canada announced late Saturday.

Natalie Fay, external relations manager for Parks Canada's Banff field unit, said the agency received an alert from a GPS device originating from the Red Deer River Valley at approximately 8 p.m. on Friday, indicating a bear attack.

In a statement, Fay said a team specially trained in wildlife attacks was immediately mobilized, but weather hindered their response time.

"Weather conditions at the time did not allow for helicopter use, and the response team travelled through the night to the location by ground," she said.

"The response team arrived on-site at 1 a.m. and discovered two deceased individuals."

While in the area, the response team encountered a grizzly bear displaying aggressive behaviour, Fay said, leading Parks Canada staff to euthanize it on-site for public safety.

RCMP arrived at 5 a.m. to transport the victims to Sundre, Alta., she said.

"This is a tragic incident and Parks Canada wishes to express its sincere condolences to the families and friends of the victims," the statement read.

A closure is in place around the attack area — including the Red Deer and Panther valleys, from Snow Creek Summit east to the National Park boundary, and north to Shale Pass — until further notice as a safety precaution.

Environmental groups increasingly using competition law to fight fossil fuel sector

New tactic in fossil fuel fight

Photo: The Canadian Press

In the last year, Canadian green groups have lodged at least four formal complaints with the Competition Bureau, alleging false or misleading environmental claims by fossil fuel companies. Suncor's base plant with upgraders in the oil sands in Fort McMurray Alta., on Monday June 13, 2017. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Jason Franson

Splashed across billboards and city buses, onnewspaper spreads and Facebook feeds, the "Let's Clear the Air" ad campaign by the Pathways Alliance group of oilsands companies is a multi-million-dollar public relations blitz by an industry keen to show it's committed to helping fight climate change.

It's also the target of the latest strategy by Canada's environmental movement, which has expanded its war against the fossil fuel industry to a new battleground: the federal Competition Bureau.

In the last year, Canadian green groups have lodged at least four formal complaints with the bureau, the independent law enforcement agency tasked with protecting consumers by fostering a competitive marketplace.

The complaints allege false or misleading environmental claims by fossil fuel companies or — in the case of a complaint against RBC — those who finance them.

Under Canada's Competition Act, it only takes six signatories to a deceptive advertising complaint to compel the bureau to launch an investigation. 

While no conclusion of wrongdoing has been reached in any of the ongoing cases, the environmentalists hope their new strategy will raise awareness of what they call "greenwashing" — a perceived tendency by companies to market their products and practices as more sustainable than they really are.

"We're at a point, I think, with climate change where there are very few actual deniers left out there," said Keith Brooks, program director of Environmental Defence, which is a co-signer to Greenpeace Canada's complaint against the Pathways Alliance as well as the lead complainant alleging deceptive marketing in a campaign by Enbridge Gas.

"Most companies now are agreeing that this is an issue and that we need to go as far as net-zero (emissions) ...  but, you know, the problem is that if it's just words, and not backed up by real action, then it actually is a tactic to delay action."

In the case of the Pathways Alliance ad campaign, the oilsands industry is promoting its plan to achieve net-zero greenhouse gas emissions from production by 2050 — a plan that includes spending $16.5 billion to build what would be one of the largest carbon capture and storage projects in the world.

But environmentalists argue the ads are misleading because they don't make it clear that oilsands firms are actually planning to increase oil output overall — their net-zero goals only apply to the actual extraction process, not the product they produce.

In the complaint against Enbridge, as well as one against the Canadian Gas Association, activists take issue with the industry's depiction of natural gas as a "clean" energy solution, arguing that natural gas is a fossil fuel that contributes to global warming.

And when it comes to RBC, complainants say the bank's record of financing fossil fuel projects doesn't line up with its own public statements on the environment.

The Pathways Alliance said it was taken aback by the complaint against its ad campaign, which it says was only intended to let Canadians know the oilsands industry has heard their concerns about climate change and wants to be part of the solution.

"To get a complaint to the Competition Bureau, I think it did surprise us initially because we sort of feel we’re listening and responding to what’s being asked of industry," said Kendall Dilling, Pathways Alliance president.

There is some precedent for the Competition Bureau to intervene in cases related to a company's environmental claims.

In January 2022, Keurig Canada agreed to pay a $3 million penalty after a Competition Bureau investigation concluded the company's single-use "K-cup" coffee pods were not as recyclable as Keurig had made them out to be.

A few years before that, the bureau reached an agreement with Volkswagen that ultimately saw a total of $17.5 million in penalties paid by the automaker in the wake of a 2016 emissions-reporting scandal.

But Leah Temper with the Canadian Association of Physicians for the Environment — a group that has backed three Competition Bureau complaints — said Canada lags behind many other countries on this issue. 

The EU, for example, recently passed a law that aims to crack down on greenwashing by banning the use of terms such as "carbon neutral" in product claims.

"If we look at what other jurisdictions are doing, they're being much more proactive in this area," Temper said, adding the federal government's ongoing review of competition policy in this country means now is the perfect time to raise these concerns.

"The Canadian Competition Bureau doesn't have a green task force, which is something a lot of our trading partners have."

The Competition Bureau says cracking down on deceptive marketing, including false, misleading and unsubstantiated environmental claims by companies of all types, is a priority for the agency.

It notes that as more Canadians demand products and services with a reduced environmental impact, there has been a noticeable increase in false, misleading or unsupported environmental claims by businesses.

But Joanne McNeish, an associate professor of marketing at Toronto Metropolitan University, said the fossil fuel industry in particular likely feels pressure to communicate not just to consumers, but to investors and governments, what it's doing on climate change.

"I think they feel that if they don't talk back, they leave a gap where only the activists are talking," she said.

And those activists, she added, are increasingly using modern, corporate tools — such as competition law — to fight their battles.

"Environmental activism used to mean, you know, getting in a ship and blocking a tanker. Now it's transitioning into more of a paperwork-bureaucracy-regulations kind of activity," she said.

"It's this sophistication of activism."

Indigenous police officer hopes to inspire with trilingual 'O Canada' at Jays game

Trilingual 'O Canada'

Photo: The Canadian Press

Sgt. Chantal Larocque sings "O Canada'" in English, French and Algonquin at Rogers Centre before American League MLB baseball action against Tampa Bay Rays in Toronto, Saturday, Sept. 30, 2023. Larocque, who is an officer with the Anishinabek Police Service, sang the national anthem on Saturday as part of the Major League Baseball team's ceremony for National Truth and Reconciliation Day. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Frank Gunn

Sgt. Chantal Larocque hopes that singing "O Canada" in English, French and Algonquin at Rogers Centre before a Toronto Blue Jays game will open everyone's eyes to the possibilities of creating a more inclusive game experience.

Larocque, who is an officer with the Anishinabek Police Service, sang the national anthem on Saturday as part of the Major League Baseball team's ceremony for National Truth and Reconciliation Day. She said that including Indigenous languages in the national anthem more frequently would help Canadians work toward reconciliation year-round, not just once per year.

"It's what we do the remaining 364 days in the year where we can break down the barriers, the stereotypes, the misinformation that we've received over the years in the education system," said Larocque. "Maybe it will open the door to all sporting venues to have performances of 'O Canada' with Indigenous language.

"The more we expose people to it, I think the more we're headed toward reconciliation."

A moment of reflection was part of the ceremony, followed by Larocque's rendition of the national anthem.

Chief Jamie Wolfe of Muskowekwan First Nation, Chief Lloyd Buffalo of Day Star First Nation, Chief LeeAnn Kehler of Kawacatoose First Nation, and Chief Byron Bitternose of George Gordon First Nation were scheduled to throw out the ceremonial first pitch. Members of the Touchwood Agency Tribal Council, part of the Jays Care Indigenous Rookie League, were on hand at the Jays Care Community Clubhouse.

Larocque said it was an honour to be included in the ceremony and that she's happy the Blue Jays are shining a spotlight on the Anishnabek Police Service.

"It's so meaningful to me but so many other people as well, because, at the end of the day, it's not about me, it's about Indigenous people," said Larocque. "It's about Indigenous policing.

"How often have you seen Indigenous policing be highlighted in a positive way? What a huge honour for our little police service to get this opportunity."

The Anishinabek Police Service serves 16 First Nations communities across Ontario. It has 71 sworn officers and 20 civilian members at 12 detachments.

"We're mandated to provide the same services (as other police forces) but we do it in a culturally sensitive manner, more in tune to the history of Indigenous people in Canada," said Larocque, noting that police officers from other forces were used to forcibly remove children from their families and put them in residential schools, making Indigenous policing an important part of reconciliation.

"The one thing we do, I think, better than most police service services out there is community policing and we do it without any funding.

"We do it because we're involved with the community, we're engaged with the community, and often community members are friends, relatives, family members. It's that personal touch that makes us a bit different."

Jays Care, the Blue Jays charitable foundation, also donated a total of $150,000 to 13 Indigenous-led organizations across Canada.

American band Green Day to headline Grey Cup halftime show

Green Day at Grey Cup

Photo: The Canadian Press

Billie Joe Armstrong performs with Green Day at the 2017 Global Citizen Festival in Central Park, Saturday, Sept. 23, 2017, in New York. The festival aims to end extreme poverty through the collective actions of Global Citizens by 2030. (AP Photo/Michael Noble Jr.)

Grammy Award-winning band Green Day will headline the halftime show for the 2023 Grey Cup game.

The CFL made the announcement Saturday night during halftime of the Hamilton Tiger-Cats-Calgary Stampeders game at Tim Hortons Field. The Grey Cup game will be held Nov. 19 in Hamilton.

"You better be ready because we're about to turn the Grey Cup green and into the loudest f****** night in CFL history," the band said in a statement.

Green Day, a punk-rock band that's captured five Grammy Awards, has sold more than 75 million records. It was inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 2015, its first year of eligibility.

Green Day was formed in the East Bay of California in 1987 by lead vocalist/guitarist Billie Joe Armstrong along with bassist/backing vocalist Mike Dirnt. The band is credited with popularizing mainstream interest in punk rock in the United States.

On Tuesday, Hamilton's Grey Cup organizing committee announced that country star Carrie Underwood will perform on Nov. 17 as part of the Grey Cup Music Festival. Underwood's performance will be at Hamilton's FirstOntario Centre and mark her first appearance in the city since 2016.

Green Day's performance will be broadcast live across Canada on TSN and RDS.

Pierre Poilievre called out for Truth and Reconciliation Day photos with Inuk elder

Poilievre photo called out

Photo: The Canadian Press

Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre has found himself to be the subject of online criticism after he posted photos with Inuit alongside a caption about meeting with Algonquin Elders on Parliament Hill on the National Day for Truth and Reconciliation. Poilievre rises during Question Period, in Ottawa, Thursday, Sept. 28, 2023. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Adrian Wyld

Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre found himself the subject of online criticism after posting photos with an Inuk elder alongside a caption about meeting with Algonquin elders on the National Day for Truth and Reconciliation.

Poilievre posted two photos to X, formerly known as Twitter, on Saturday with a caption about joining Algonquin elders and leaders at the eternal flame on Parliament Hill to mark the holiday at an event hosted by the Algonquin Nation and the National Centre for Truth and Reconciliation.

Marc Miller, the former minister of Crown-Indigenous relations, responded to Poilievre's post by pointing out that the people in the photos are not Algonquin, but rather Inuit.

"We are all learning some difficult truths, particularly today, and mistakes can happen [sic]," Miller posted. "The Indigenous people in this picture are Inuit, not Algonquin, wearing Inuit traditional clothing, including Elder Manitok Thompson, who is very well known."

MP Lori Idlout similarly confirmed it was Thompson in the photos on X, saying she is Inuk and originally from her Nunavut riding.

In one photo, Poilievre is standing head-to-head with Thompson near the eternal flame, with her hand placed on his shoulder.

The second photo taken in front of Parliament shows Poilievre standing beside Thompson and three others, including two wearing traditional Inuit clothing.

A spokesperson for Poilievre's office said the Conservative leader was at an event led by Algonquin leaders to commemorate the day, and spoke with other Indigenous Peoples there, including "these Inuit women" who were in attendance.

Poilievre was seen at the event speaking with Claudette Commanda, a well-known elder and residential school survivor from Kitigan Zibi Anishinabeg, an Algonquin community located about an hour and a half away from Ottawa.

Thompson was posting about her meeting on X with Poilievre as early as Friday evening, saying she was ready to speak with him in the morning.

"My issues are Inuit priorities -- elder care, health, housing, economic development, hydro opportunities, carbon tax effecting Nunavut cost of living, food security, homelessness, addiction centres," she wrote.

After the meeting, she posted that Poilievre "took time" and listened to her. In another post, she said they prayed for Canada and "all the people who have been hurt by the residential school years."

"I prayed to God and told him to bless Pierre for taking the time to stand with us at the ceremonies."

Poilievre was at the event earlier in the day, but left before the official broadcasted events commenced.

Thompson took issue with Miller's post, saying if politicians could work in a nonpartisan manner, implementing the Calls to Action from the Truth and Reconciliation Commission could be a quicker process.

"I speak for myself as an aboriginal, I’m not a people of pain, we want businesses, we want to own homes, we want to get ahead with our own independence, we don’t want government handouts," she wrote. "We were an independent people before contact. We want to be equal. We are not downcast."

Saturday was the third year of the federal statutory holiday, adapted from the grassroots Orange Shirt Day, that recognizes the abuse suffered by Inuit, First Nations and Metis people at hundreds of state- and church-run residential schools.

Residential school survivors and Indigenous leaders were among the crowd of thousands who converged on Parliament Hill for the commemorative event, including Crown-Indigenous Relations Minister Gary Anandasangaree and Governor General Mary Simon.

Calgary Flames assistant GM Chris Snow dies from ALS complications

Flames assistant GM dies

Photo: The Canadian Press

Chris Snow, an assistant general manager for the Calgary Flames, throws out a ceremonial first pitch before the baseball game between the Boston Red Sox and Tampa Bay Rays at Fenway Park, Thursday, Aug. 12, 2021, in Boston. (AP Photo/Mary Schwalm)

Calgary Flames vice-president of data and analytics and assistant general manager Chris Snow has died of complications from amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS).

Snow, 42, was diagnosed in 2019 with ALS, which is a progressive nervous system disease affecting brain cells and the spinal cord, and causes a loss of muscle control.

Chris's wife Kelsie confirmed Snow's death on Saturday.

Snow's father, two uncles and a cousin also died of what's also known as Lou Gehrig's disease. 

Gehrig, a New York Yankee, was diagnosed with it at age 36 and died in 1941.

Snow's wife Kelsie poignantly chronicled their family's journey with Chris's disease via her podcast "Sorry, I'm sad", her blog and social media accounts.

The couple met when they were both sportswriters for The Boston Globe in Chris's hometown. They were married in 2007 and have two children, Cohen and Willa.

Chris was a baseball writer when the NHL's Minnesota Wild hired him as their director of hockey operations in 2006.

When the Wild made organizational changes, the Flames brought Chris on board in 2011 as director of hockey analysis. He was promoted to assistant general manager in 2019 and worked primarily in data and video analysis.

Chris continued to work for the Flames after his diagnosis. He participated in clinical trials that involved a spinal injection every four weeks and lived well beyond the 12-month prognosis he was given.

"Not once did you ever see him feel sorry for himself for what he was going through," Flames head coach Ryan Huska said.

"He continued to do his job to the best of his ability every day."

The Calgary Flames Foundation has raised almost $600,000 for ALS research in a "Snowy Strong" campaign.

Chris, Kelsie and Cohen received their Canadian citizenship in 2022. Willa was born in Calgary.

The Flames promoted Chris to vice-president of data and analytics in May.

He wrote in a Twitter post in June "I may be diminished, but I am not sick, and I am not deterred. Into Year 5 I go. As we say in our family — Improvise and overcome."

ALS weakened his muscles and hampered his ability to speak and eat.

Kelsie wrote in a social-media post Sept. 27 that her husband became unresponsive and suffered cardiac arrest the previous day.

He'd suffered a brain injury due to lack of oxygen and would not recover, she wrote. His organs were donated.

"In life, Chris offered his body to a clinical trial to help others. In death he will do the same," his wife wrote. "We are so proud of him."

An estimated 3,000 Canadians live with ALS and approximately 1,000 die from the disease each year, according to ALS Canada.

Canada marks National Day for Truth and Reconciliation with events across country

Work towards reconciliation

Photo: The Canadian Press

Communities are gathering across Canada today to recognize the third annual National Day for Truth and Reconciliation.

UPDATE: 11:30 a.m.

Seas of orange flooded events across the country on Saturday as Canadians gathered to acknowledge systemic oppression of Indigenous people and observe the third annual National Day for Truth and Reconciliation.

The federal statutory holiday, adapted from the grassroots Orange Shirt Day, recognizes the abuse suffered by Inuit, First Nations and Metis people at hundreds of state- and church-run residential schools.

At a ceremony in Ottawa, Chief Dylan Whiteduck of Kitigan Zibi Anishinabeg said the consequences of the residential school system can be felt to this day, including the loss of Indigenous language speakers.

"Today, First Nations communities have goals," he said. "We seek prosperity. We want a sustainable future. And we want our Indigenous languages back. But unfortunately, we are in survival mode, and this is unacceptable.

"We ask you to help us achieve these goals. Let us all work towards economic reconciliation and reshape this great country. Not for today, but for the next seven generations."

Residential school survivors and Indigenous leaders were among the crowd of hundreds who converged on Parliament Hill for the commemorative event, where smudge wafted through the air.

A red banner with the names of children who didn’t make it home from residential schools was carried through the crowd, prompting people to rise as a sign of respect as it made its way to the stage.

Attendees were invited to place shoes on the stage as a symbol to remember those children, and within minutes the front of the platform was covered with moccasins and other footwear.

The federal statutory holiday was created in response to one of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission's 94 calls to action, after ground penetrating radar found unmarked graves near the site of a former residential school outside of Kamloops.

It's an evolution of Orange Shirt Day, a grassroots initiative started in 2013, inspired by Phyllis Webstad's story of having the orange shirt her grandmother gave her taken away when she arrived at residential school.

Joanna Bernard, interim national chief of the Assembly of First Nations, used the day to urge the government to implement the rest of the commission's calls to action.

"Reconciliation is an ongoing process of establishing and maintaining respectful relationships. Part of this work includes taking concrete actions to advance the implementation of the TRC Calls to Action," she said in a written statement.

The group said only 13 calls to action have been completed so far -- three of them in the last year.

Events are also slated to take place in locales across the country, including powwows in Victoria, Winnipeg and Toronto.

In Montreal, orange-clad marchers gathered to walk from the base of Mount Royal to the pedestal where a statue of Canada's first prime minister, John A. Macdonald, once stood before being toppled in 2020.

Macdonald was an architect of the residential school system.

As march participants gathered at the starting point, Resilience Montreal Board Director Ann Deer said she hopes the event serves as a reminder.

"I’m hoping the general public understands that today we’re here to talk about a horrible time in Canada’s history,” Deer said.

"If we don’t learn our past we’re going to repeat our past. And because of that dark history we have many people still struggling."

The Canadian Museum for Human Rights in Winnipeg is offering free admission today, as is the Canadian Museum of History in Ottawa.

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, who is in Saskatchewan to observe the day, said the occasion should be about listening to survivors.

"We must never forget the past and the injustices committed against Indigenous Peoples at residential schools, as well as the intergenerational trauma that remains today," he said in a written statement. "Right now, with denialism sadly on the rise, uncovering the whole truth is more important than ever."

ORIGINAL: 6:20 a.m.

Communities are gathering across Canada today to recognize the third annual National Day for Truth and Reconciliation.

The federal holiday recognizes the legacy of Canada's residential school system and its harms to Indigenous Peoples.

In Ottawa, residential school survivors and Indigenous leaders are set to attend a commemorative event on Parliament Hill beginning at noon.

There are also events taking place across the country, including powwows in Victoria, Winnipeg and Toronto.

The Canadian Museum for Human Rights in Winnipeg is offering free admission today, as is the Canadian Museum of History in Ottawa.

In Montreal, a rally and march starts at 1 p.m. featuring speakers and drummers.

Indigenous police officer hopes to inspire with trilingual 'O Canada' at Jays game

Trilingual 'O Canada'

Photo: Anishinabek Nation

Sgt.  Chantal Larocque

Sgt. Chantal Larocque hopes that singing "O Canada" in English, French and Algonquin at Rogers Centre before a Toronto Blue Jays game will open everyone's eyes to the possibilities of creating a more inclusive game experience.

Larocque, who is an officer with the Anishinabek Police Service, sang the national anthem on Saturday as part of the Major League Baseball team's ceremony for National Truth and Reconciliation Day. She said that including Indigenous languages in the national anthem more frequently would help Canadians work toward reconciliation year-round, not just once per year.

"It's what we do the remaining 364 days in the year where we can break down the barriers, the stereotypes, the misinformation that we've received over the years in the education system," said Larocque. "Maybe it will open the door to all sporting venues to have performances of 'O Canada' with Indigenous language.

"The more we expose people to it, I think the more we're headed toward reconciliation."

A moment of reflection was part of the ceremony, followed by Larocque's rendition of the national anthem.

Chief Jamie Wolfe of Muskowekwan First Nation, Chief Lloyd Buffalo of Day Star First Nation, Chief LeeAnn Kehler of Kawacatoose First Nation, and Chief Byron Bitternose of George Gordon First Nation were scheduled to throw out the ceremonial first pitch. Members of the Touchwood Agency Tribal Council, part of the Jays Care Indigenous Rookie League, were on hand at the Jays Care Community Clubhouse.

Larocque said it was an honour to be included in the ceremony and that she's happy the Blue Jays are shining a spotlight on the Anishnabek Police Service.

"It's so meaningful to me but so many other people as well, because, at the end of the day, it's not about me, it's about Indigenous people," said Larocque. "It's about Indigenous policing.

"How often have you seen Indigenous policing be highlighted in a positive way? What a huge honour for our little police service to get this opportunity."

The Anishinabek Police Service serves 16 First Nations communities across Ontario. It has 71 sworn officers and 20 civilian members at 12 detachments.

"We're mandated to provide the same services (as other police forces) but we do it in a culturally sensitive manner, more in tune to the history of Indigenous people in Canada," said Larocque, noting that police officers from other forces were used to forcibly remove children from their families and put them in residential schools, making Indigenous policing an important part of reconciliation.

"The one thing we do, I think, better than most police service services out there is community policing and we do it without any funding. 

"We do it because we're involved with the community, we're engaged with the community, and often community members are friends, relatives, family members. It's that personal touch that makes us a bit different."

Jays Care, the Blue Jays charitable foundation, also donated a total of $150,000 to 13 Indigenous-led organizations across Canada.