Veterans purged from military for sexual orientation lay wreath at Montreal ceremony

OTTAWA – An echoing peal of cannon fire signalled the start of a moment of silence Monday in St. John’s, N.L., and throngs of people along the city’s two main downtown streets fell quiet and bowed their heads.

Across Canada, dignitaries marked Remembrance Day by laying wreaths at ceremonies, schoolchildren sang in the late fall chill and veterans recalled the horrors of battle.

Canadians gathered in cities and towns to honour the sacrifice of men and women in uniform who gave their lives in service of the country’s values and principles.

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and Gov. Gen. Mary Simon paid their respects in a ceremony at the National War Memorial in Ottawa.

They were joined by this year’s Silver Cross Mother, Maureen Anderson of New Brunswick, whose two sons served in Afghanistan.

Sgt. Ron Anderson and Sgt. Ryan Anderson each died after a battle with post-traumatic stress disorder. Their mother represented all the mothers left behind by service members killed in the line of duty.

The mournful sound of the Last Post was heard at cenotaphs and monuments as Canadians took a moment at 11 a.m. to pay silent respects to the fallen.

“Throughout our history, the men and women of the Canadian Armed Forces have kept our country safe,” Trudeau said in a social media post before the Ottawa ceremony.

“Some returned home from the battlefield and were never the same. Others never returned at all. It is a debt we can never repay, and one we will never forget.”

Veterans Affairs Canada estimates the current Canadian war veteran population at 7,300 people — 6,142 men and 1,158 women — based on 2021 census data.

Royal Canadian Legion president Berkley Lawrence, 70, said the day gives people a “chance to remember what happened, how we get our freedom today.”

It was the first Remembrance Day in St. John’s to be held at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier. The soldier fought and died in France during the First World War, and was reinterred in Newfoundland this year.

Sculptor Morgan MacDonald, who made the bronze forget-me-not flowers that decorate the tomb, said it was an honour to be given such important work.

Joanne Geddes, district commander of the Nova Scotia and Nunavut legions, said she was touched to see how many people of all ages turned up despite wind and rain at the cenotaph in Halifax’s Grand Parade.

Hearing the bands play and the cannons ring out brought on chills, Geddes said. “I get goosebumps. I well up. It’s emotional in a good way, in a sad way.”

Paul Baiden, who served during the Cold War era, said he was thinking of mates from aircraft carrier HMCS Bonaventure “and everybody, basically, that lost their lives.”

“Every day my group gets smaller,” he said in Ottawa as a tear formed in his eye. “From our crew … there’s maybe 20 of us left.”

In the national capital, the sunny sky turned grey and light rain fell, matching the solemn mood.

Ninety-eight-year-old John Preece, who was a private in the Second World War, said it is difficult to explain what it’s like to be in combat. “When you face somebody shooting at you, and you don’t even know them and they don’t know you. And it’s not very nice, and that’s all I can say. It’s really a terrible scene.”

John Young, a retired chief warrant officer, asked that Canadians think of troops in Latvia who have left behind spouses and children — and all the high school and kindergarten graduations they will miss.

“This is the commitment that people who wear the uniform have agreed to willingly,” said Young, 66.

“I reflect on my own mother. I have no idea of the angst that she went through when both my brother and I were deployed at the same time. In her later years, she said, ‘I didn’t sleep when you guys were gone.'”

Each cannon boom from a 21-gun salute set off a wave of car alarms in Montreal during a ceremony held in English, French and occasionally Mohawk.

Matthew Krisko-MacCormack brought a photo of his grandfather, First World War veteran Joseph MacCormack. He said he was thinking of people like his grandfather, who left his small P.E.I. farming community to defend home and country, and who later died as a result of injuries he suffered overseas.

Honorary Lt.-Gen. Richard Rohmer helped lead ceremonies at the Ontario Veterans’ Memorial outside Queen’s Park in Toronto.

The 100-year-old Rohmer told the crowd about his role helping to end the Second World War as a reconnaissance fighter pilot, taking out a key bridge in the Netherlands that trapped German forces in May 1945.

Unable to cross the river, the Germans surrendered, he recalled.

“I’m just lucky to be alive.”

In Edmonton, an 11-piece pipe band’s rendition of “Highland Cathedral” echoed through city hall.

Remembrance Day “is not just about speeches,” said Lt.-Col. Bryn Wright, commanding officer of the Loyal Edmonton Regiment.

“It’s about reflection on where we came from and what our history is, and it’s about remembering those who served and fell and remembering those who continue to serve.”

Neil Dancer, a retired corporal who spent time in Afghanistan with the 3rd Battalion of Princess Patricia’s Canadian Light Infantry, said he was heartened to see a lot of young people turn out Monday in Victoria.

Military service has taken a toll on Dancer, but he looks ahead to better days. “I have my challenges with mental health, like a lot of veterans do, but I can’t complain. I have a lot of friends who are in worse situations and shape than I am.”

Among those gathered at the Victory Square Cenotaph in Vancouver was Percival Smith, 101, a veteran of the British Merchant Navy who said he was “all over the place” during the Second World War.

“I went in as a boy at 17 and came out as a man at 22,” he said. “The world was quite different.”

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 11, 2024.

— With files from Sarah Smellie in St. John’s, N.L., Lyndsay Armstrong in Halifax, Morgan Lowrie in Montreal, Liam Casey in Toronto, Kyle Duggan and David Baxter in Ottawa, Aaron Sousa in Edmonton, Darryl Greer in Vancouver and Dirk Meissner in Victoria

Note to readers: This is a corrected story. An earlier version identified Richard Rohmer as a former lieutenant governor.

The exterior of police stations will soon look different in Surrey, B.C.

New signs have been ordered to reflect a transfer of policing responsibility to the municipal Surrey Police Service from the RCMP, after six years of planning and political turmoil.

On Nov. 29, the municipal service becomes the police force of jurisdiction in British Columbia’s second most populous municipality, while the Mounties take on what’s expected to be a years-long supporting role.

But there’s still no formal agreement on how responsibilities will be split between the two forces with less than three weeks to go before the transition becomes official.

Surrey Police Chief Norm Lipinski said Friday that meetings between his office and the RCMP happen multiple times a week as they work out the finer points of the deal, which he is confident will be signed “in a matter of days.”

“We’re putting those pieces together to get us to a place where public safety is not going to be compromised in Surrey, I’m very, very confident about that. It will not be compromised. There’s enough overlap, there’s enough people, there’s enough equipment,” he said.

The head of the RCMP’s union said its officers are committed to public safety in Surrey, but members are anxious about being so close to the handover without a clear understanding of what their jobs will look like.

Brian Sauvé, president of the National Police Federation, said RCMP members haven’t been told what’s going to happen after the transition and since each police service has its own policies and procedures there could be challenges.

“I think, generally speaking, (people are feeling) anxious, uncertain, concerned, knot in stomach, if you will. Mainly because nobody knows what’s happening,” he said.

Lipinski would not go into specifics about the agreement that is being worked on, but said the two forces are essentially dividing up Surrey geographically with the RCMP responsible for some areas and the Surrey Police Service in charge of others.

“We will start with geography and certain areas, and they will start with their geography. Then what happens is, as we build up and they scale down, we take over more of their geography. We’ve got a plan for that. It makes total sense,” he said.

Lipinski said the Surrey Police Service has 455 members and will need 785 to take over from the RCMP completely. He said he expects it to take another two to three years to get the force up to full strength.

While policing in Surrey has been managed by the RCMP, Surrey Police Service officers have been working alongside them since 2021 while a dispute over the transition played out in municipal and provincial politics.

In November 2018, after winning his third term as mayor of Surrey, Doug McCallum put forward a motion at his first council meeting to create a municipal police force in the community of nearly 600,000 people 35 kilometres southeast of Vancouver.

By 2021 the first officers had been deployed. But the next year Brenda Locke defeated McCallum to become the new mayor, promising to reverse the transition and putting her on a collision course with Public Safety Minister Mike Farnworth, who continued to support the power transfer.

The dispute was often heated, with Farnworth accusing the city of playing games and Locke accusing the minister of bullying and misogyny.

Locke declined a request to be interviewed for this story.

In the end, Farnworth used his authority to force the city to move forward with the Surrey Police Service, and the municipality lost a bid to have the decision reversed by the B.C. Supreme Court.

Sauvé said that legally the Mounties can’t work under a municipal police force, a situation commonly referred to as “red under blue,” which is why having an agreement on responsibilities is so important.

He said there would be “no shame” in the Nov. 29 deadline being pushed back to give both sides more time.

“What does Nov. 30 look like? I think the City of Surrey is going to be safe. The membership of the RCMP will do their job,” he said.

“How that looks, and the nitty gritty of what that looks like, obviously, I’m very, very curious to see the details. And it has been underwhelming with respect to how much has been relayed to us,” he said.

Lipinski said he is confident things will be ready for Nov. 29.

He said “there’s nothing super onerous about having two chains of command” and while there may be “unforeseen circumstances” he’s optimistic the two sides will be able to work through them.

“There will not be any public safety risk, and there will be business continuity as we move forward and as we evolve. And, of course, there will be things that you have to do thereafter because you didn’t have the time to do it before,” he said.

“It’s like building a house, and sometimes you move in and you have to do some of the other elements, such as painting and so forth and so on. But it’s there. The structure is there and we’re ready to go.”

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 11, 2024.

VANCOUVER – The federal government is urging both sides in the British Columbia port dispute to return to the table after Saturday’s collapse of mediated talks to end the lockout at container terminals that has entered its second week.

A statement issued by the office of federal Labour Minister Steven MacKinnon on Monday said both the port employers and the union representing more than 700 longshore supervisors “must understand the urgency of the situation.”

The statement also urged both sides to “do the work necessary to reach an agreement.”

“Canadians are counting on them,” the statement from MacKinnon’s office said.

The lockout at B.C. container terminals including those in Vancouver — Canada’s largest port — began last week after the BC Maritime Employers Association said members of International Longshore and Warehouse Union Ship and Dock Foremen Local 514 began strike activity in response to a “final offer” from employers.

The union said the plan was only for an overtime ban and a refusal to implement automation technology, calling the provincewide lockout a reckless overreaction.

On Saturday, the two sides began what was scheduled to be up to three days of mediated talks, after MacKinnon spoke to both sides and said on social media that there was a “concerning lack of urgency” to resolve the dispute.

But the union said the talks lasted “less than one hour” Saturday without resolution, accusing the employers of cutting them off.

The employers denied ending the talks, saying the mediator concluded the discussions after “there was no progress made” in talks conducted separately with the association and the union.

“The BCMEA went into the meeting with open minds and seeking to achieve a negotiated settlement at the bargaining table,” a statement from the employers said.

“In a sincere effort to bring these drawn-out negotiations to a close, the BCMEA provided a competitive offer to ILWU Local 514 … the offer did not require any concessions from the union and, if accepted, would have ended this dispute.”

The employers said the offer includes a 19.2 per cent wage increase over a four-year term along with an average lump sum payment of $21,000 per qualified worker, but the union said it did not address staffing levels given the advent of port automation technology in terminals such as DP World’s Centerm in Vancouver.

After talks broke off, the union accused the employers of “showing flagrant disregard for the seriousness of their lockout.”

Local 514 president Frank Morena said in a statement on Saturday that the union is “calling on the actual individual employers who run the terminals to order their bargaining agent — the BCMEA — to get back to the table.”

“We believe the individual employers who actually run the terminals need to step up and order their bargaining agent to get back to the table and start negotiations and stop the confrontation,” Morena said.

No further talks are currently scheduled.

According to the Canada Labour Code, the labour minister or either party in a dispute can request a mediator to “make recommendations for settlement of the dispute or the difference.”

In addition, Section 107 of the Code gives the minister additional powers to take action that “seem likely to maintain or secure industrial peace and to promote conditions favourable to the settlement of industrial disputes,” and could direct the Canada Industrial Relations Board “to do such things as the Minister deems necessary.”

Liam McHugh-Russell, assistant professor at Schulich School of Law at Dalhousie University, said Section 107 “is very vague about what it allows a minister to do.”

“All it says is that the minister can refer a problem and a solution to the Labour Board. They can ask the Labour Board to try and solve the problem,” he said.

“Maybe the minister will try to do that. It remains to be seen.”

The other option if mediated talks fail — beyond the parties reaching a solution on their own — would be a legislated return to work, which would be an exception to the normal way labour negotiations operate under the Labour Code.

Parliament is not scheduled to sit this week and will return on Nov. 18.

The labour strife at B.C. ports is happening at the same time another dispute is disrupting Montreal, Canada’s second-largest port.

The employers there locked out almost 1,200 workers on Sunday night after a “final” offer was not accepted, greatly reducing operations.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 11, 2024.