The last of Canada’s COVID-19 border restrictions will disappear at the end of this month with the expiry of a cabinet order affecting mandatory vaccinations, testing and quarantine of international travellers.
That expiry also spells the end of insisting travellers use the ArriveCan app to input their vaccine status and test results, though the app will live on as an optional tool for customs and immigration.
It doesn’t yet deal with whether passengers must wear masks on domestic and international trains and planes because that rule is contained in a separate order issued by the minister of transport.
Two senior government sources aware of the decision confirmed the cabinet order maintaining COVID-19 border measures will not be renewed when it expires on Sept. 30.
The sources spoke to The Canadian Press on the condition they not be named because they were not authorized to speak publicly. While the Liberal cabinet did meet Thursday afternoon, cabinet approval is not required to allow the order to expire.
One of the sources said Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, before the cabinet meeting took place, signed off on the decision not to renew the rules.
The change means international travellers will no longer have to prove they are fully vaccinated against COVID-19. Under the current rule, Canadians returning to the country who aren’t vaccinated must show a negative COVID-19 test result before arriving, and undergo further testing after arrival. They also must quarantine for 14 days.
Foreigners who aren’t vaccinated are simply banned from Canada unless they fall into specific categories, such as airline or boat crew members, those who need essential medical treatment, diplomats and temporary foreign workers.
The cabinet order also spells out that vaccinated travellers will be selected for random COVID-19 testing, and requires travellers to submit their vaccine proof and test results electronically.
The only way to do that is through the ArriveCan app.
All of that will end when the clock strikes midnight on Oct. 1.
Tourism Minister Randy Boissonnault would not confirm the decision Thursday afternoon, but he said if the order is allowed to expire, that would also eliminate the only mandatory component for the ArriveCan app.
“So the mandatory piece is the vaccine piece, and because that’s how people prove it through the ArriveCan, that’s how the order is written, from what I remember,” he said on his way into the cabinet meeting.
ArriveCan has morphed into a digitized border arrival tool, and now people flying into certain airports can use it to fill out their customs and immigration form instead of the paper version.
Boissonnault said that is in keeping with the digitization of border forms in a number of countries, including Europe, and long term will make for faster, smoother border experiences.
“If we’re going to want to go from 22 million visitors in 2019, to something closer to 30 million by 2030, we’re going to have to have a digital border,” he said.
The order’s expiration also means the minister of health will no longer be able to quickly bar citizens of specific countries facing COVID-19 outbreaks from coming to Canada. That measure was used to ban people from India and certain African countries at various points, moves criticized by some as racist.
Canada’s COVID-19 border measures have been evolving since the pandemic began in March 2020.
For more than a year, Canada invoked a mandatory 14-day quarantine for all returning Canadians, and for a time required quarantine to be fully or partially completed in specific hotels.
Between March 2020 and August 2021, foreign nationals couldn’t enter Canada period with some exemptions for critical workers including airline crew, health workers, and truck drivers.
In July 2021, once all Canadian adults and teenagers could access vaccines, the government stopped requiring quarantine for fully-vaccinated Canadian travellers.
In August 2021 they opened the border to fully vaccinated Americans, and in September 2021 the border was opened to fully vaccinated citizens from all countries.
Border measures have become heavily politicized, with the Conservatives demanding Trudeau lift them all, and Leader Pierre Poilievre made ending them a key policy in his recent leadership campaign.
Deputy Conservative leader Melissa Lantsman and the party’s Quebec lieutenant, Pierre Paul-Hus, said in a joint statement Wednesday that ending the measures within weeks of Poilievre winning the leadership was convenient.
“Ever since it was introduced, the ArriveCan app has killed jobs, suffocated economies all over the country, and told visitors they weren’t welcome in Canada,” they said. “Along with unscientific vaccine mandates and mandatory random testing, ArriveCan created the longest delays ever seen at Canada’s airports.”
Delays at airports were partially blamed on ArriveCan, as some travellers who struggled to get it to work, or couldn’t or wouldn’t use it, backed up lines. However, the delays have also been blamed on labour shortages affecting everything from airport workers to security and border guards.
Dr. Zain Chagla, an infectious disease specialist, has been arguing against mandatory vaccinations and testing at the border for months. In an interview Thursday he said testing asymptomatic travellers at the border is expensive and not as useful as testing symptomatic people in the community.
He said without testing everyone, the policy won’t prevent further spread of COVID-19.
The government had long pointed to the random testing as a way to screen for the arrival of new variants but Chagla said there are also better and more convenient ways to look for those as well.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 22, 2022.
EDMONTON – RCMP say a second suspect has been arrested in the killing of an Alberta county worker.
Mounties say 28-year-old Elijah Strawberry was taken into custody Friday at a house on O’Chiese First Nation.
Colin Hough, a worker with Rocky View County, was shot and killed while on the job on a rural road east of Calgary on Aug. 6.
Another man who worked for Fortis Alberta was shot and wounded, and RCMP said the suspects fled in a Rocky View County work truck.
Police later arrested Arthur Wayne Penner, 35, and charged him with first-degree murder and attempted murder, and a warrant was issued for Strawberry’s arrest.
RCMP also said there was a $10,000 reward for information leading to the arrest of Strawberry, describing him as armed and dangerous.
Chief Supt. Roberta McKale, told a news conference in Edmonton that officers had received tips and information over the last few weeks.
“I don’t know of many members that when were stopped, fuelling up our vehicles, we weren’t keeping an eye out, looking for him,” she said.
But officers had been investigating other cases when they found Strawberry.
“Our investigators were in O’Chiese First Nation at a residence on another matter and the major crimes unit was there working another file and ended up locating him hiding in the residence,” McKale said.
While an investigation is still underway, RCMP say they’re confident both suspects in the case are in police custody.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 13, 2024.
RICHMOND, B.C. – The Integrated Homicide Investigation Team says the 26-year-old son of a man found dead on British Columbia’s Sunshine Coast has been charged with his murder.
Police say 58-year-old Henry Doyle was found badly injured on a forest service road in Egmont last September and died of his injuries.
The homicide team took over when the BC Coroners Service said the man’s death was suspicious.
It says in a statement that the BC Prosecution Service has approved one count of first-degree murder against the man’s son, Jackson Doyle.
Police say the accused will remain in custody until at least his next court appearance.
The homicide team says investigators remained committed to solving the case with the help of the community of Egmont, the RCMP on the Sunshine Coast and in Richmond, and the Vancouver Police Department.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 13, 2024.
VANCOUVER – Mediated talks between the union representing HandyDART workers in Metro Vancouver and its employer, Transdev, have broken off without an agreement following 15 hours of talks.
Joe McCann, president of Amalgamated Transit Union Local 1724, says they stayed at the bargaining table with help from a mediator until 2 a.m. Friday and made “some progress.”
However, he says the union negotiators didn’t get an offer that they could recommend to the membership.
McCann says that in some ways they are close to an agreement, but in other areas they are “miles apart.”
About 600 employees of the door-to-door transit service for people who can’t navigate the conventional transit system have been on strike since last week, pausing service for all but essential medical trips.
McCann asks HandyDART users to be “patient,” since they are trying to get not only a fair contract for workers but also a better service for customers.
He says it’s unclear when the talks will resume, but he hopes next week at the latest.
The employer, Transdev, didn’t reply to an interview request before publication.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 13, 2024.
