For the first time in more than 40 years, Parliament Hill will not be the centre of Canada Day celebrations on July 1.
Instead, the main stage will be set up behind the Château Laurier at Major’s Hill Park, where revellers will still have a view of the Parliament Buildings, but primarily the back of the East Block and the Library of Parliament.
The party is shifting because Centre Block is getting a massive facelift and restoration, and the staging and construction is eating up almost half of the front lawn of Parliament Hill. Already, a large fence stretching across the width of the lawn limits the view.
The white area on this aerial image shows how much of the front lawn of Parliament is affected by the construction project. (Google Maps/Laury Dubé/Radio-Canada)
“We can tell you today that there will be no stage on Parliament Hill for Canada Day celebrations in 2020,” Canadian Heritage spokesperson Amélie Desmarais confirmed in French in an email to Radio-Canada.
Revellers will still have access to the Hill on Canada Day, but the lion’s share of the planned events will be moved to Major’s Hill Park.
The space between the fence and Wellington Street will remain accessible to the public, according to Public Service and Procurement Canada (PSPC), not only for Canada Day, but for activities throughout the year such as the Northern Lights sound and light show, Yoga on the Hill and the changing of the guard.
Workers build forms on the front lawn of Parliament Hill in February 2020. (Stéphane Leclerc/Radio-Canada)
“PSPC and Canadian Heritage are working together to ensure that Parliament Hill remains one of the iconic sites where visitors can come and celebrate Canada Day,” said PSPC spokesperson Michèle LaRose.
Work to renovate Centre Block began last year after MPs moved to a temporarily location in the West Block in 2018. According to PSPC, the front lawn of Parliament Hill will remain partially inaccessible for at least 10 years.
That’s not to say the big party will be banished to Major’s Hill Park for the entire time: according to PSPC and Heritage Canada, the situation will be reassessed each year.
Minister of Canadian Heritage Steven Guilbeault says ongoing construction on Parliament Hill means most Canada Day events will take place this year at Major’s Hill Park. 0:34
Squeezing in more MPs
Meanwhile, the experts overseeing the massive restoration of Centre Block have to find out a way to cram more than 100 additional MPs into the House of Commons without compromising its architectural heritage.
A House of Commons committee Tuesday heard updates on the ongoing overhaul of Centre Block, which began more than a year ago and could last until well into the 2030s.
It needs to take into account that by 2060, the number of MPs Canada will require for its population will grow from 338 today to more than 460, if each one is to represent roughly the same number of people.
People celebrate on the Hill on July 1, 2014. (Chris Wattie/REUTERS)
There are three options for renovating the chamber. Two would keep it in its existing space but use different furniture and
configurations, while the third would require expanding the room inside the historic building.
Rob Wright, assistant deputy minister at PSPC, said the current chamber could hold about 420 MPs, but would likely mean the heritage wooden desks that seat MPs in pairs would have to be done away with in exchange for smaller seats, and maybe no desks at all. British MPs sit on long benches with no desks.
Expanding the chamber could increase capacity to more than 500 seats, using the existing heritage furniture, but would also cost a lot, he said.
Many MPs listening to the report were frustrated by a lack of detail about potential expenses. More than $770 million in contracts have already been awarded for the building, but there remains no overall cost estimate.
OTTAWA – The Federal Court of Appeal has dismissed a bid by the Prince Edward Island Potato Board to overturn a 2021 decision by the federal agriculture minister to declare the entire province as “a place infested with potato wart.”
That order prohibited the export of seed potatoes from the Island to prevent the spread of the soil-borne fungus, which deforms potatoes and makes them impossible to sell.
The board had argued in Federal Court that the decision was unreasonable because there was insufficient evidence to establish that P.E.I. was infested with the fungus.
In April 2023, the Federal Court dismissed the board’s application for a judicial review, saying the order was reasonable because the Canadian Food Inspection Agency said regulatory measures had failed to prevent the transmission of potato wart to unregulated fields.
On Tuesday, the Appeal Court dismissed the board’s appeal, saying the lower court had selected the correct reasonableness standard to review the minister’s order.
As well, it found the lower court was correct in accepting the minister’s view that the province was “infested” because the department had detected potato wart on 35 occasions in P.E.I.’s three counties since 2000.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 5, 2024.
FREDERICTON – New Brunswick health officials are urging parents to get their children vaccinated against measles after the number of cases of the disease in a recent outbreak has more than doubled since Friday.
Sean Hatchard, spokesman for the Health Department, says measles cases in the Fredericton and the upper Saint John River Valley area have risen from five on Friday to 12 as of Tuesday morning.
Hatchard says other suspected cases are under investigation, but he did not say how and where the outbreak of the disease began.
He says data from the 2023-24 school year show that about 10 per cent of students were not completely immunized against the disease.
In response to the outbreak, Horizon Health Network is hosting measles vaccine clinics on Wednesday and Friday.
The measles virus is transmitted through the air or by direct contact with nasal or throat secretions of an infected person, and can be more severe in adults and infants.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 5, 2024.
PALM BEACH, Fla. (AP) — Donald Trump is refusing to say how he voted on Florida’s abortion measure — and getting testy about it.
The former president was asked twice after casting his ballot in Palm Beach, Florida, on Tuesday about a question that the state’s voters are considering. If approved, it would prevent state lawmakers from passing any law that penalizes, prohibits, delays or restricts abortion until fetal viability — which doctors say is sometime after 21 weeks.
If it’s rejected, the state’s restrictive six-week abortion law would stand.
The first time he was asked, Trump avoided answering. He said instead of the issue that he did “a great job bringing it back to the states.” That was a reference to the former president having appointed three conservative justices to the U.S. Supreme Court who helped overturn the landmark Roe v. Wade decision in 2022.
Pressed a second time, Trump snapped at a reporter, saying “you should stop talking about it.”
Trump had previously indicated that he would back the measure — but then changed his mind and said he would vote against it.
In August, Trump said he thought Florida’s ban was a mistake, saying on Fox News Channel, “I think six weeks, you need more time.” But then he said, “at the same time, the Democrats are radical” while repeating false claims he has frequently made about late-term abortions.
In addition to Florida, voters in eight other states are deciding whether their state constitutions should guarantee a right to abortion, weighing ballot measures that are expected to spur turnout for a range of crucial races.
Passing certain amendments in Arizona, Missouri, Nebraska and South Dakota likely would lead to undoing bans or restrictions that currently block varying levels of abortion access to more than 7 million women of childbearing age who live in those states.
