OTTAWA —
As Canadian passengers aboard the Grand Princess cruise ship wait for a chartered plane to take them back to Canada from Oakland, Calif., Canadian health officials are warning Canadians to avoid travelling on all cruise ships in order to prevent the spread of COVID-19.
In a press conference Monday, Chief Public Health Officer Dr. Theresa Tam said, while she had previously “asked Canadians to think twice about going on cruise ships,” now the message is unequivocal.
“Today the Public Health Agency of Canada is recommending that Canadians avoid all cruise ship travel due to COVID-19.”
The update comes as Canada prepares to repatriate 237 Canadians aboard a cruise ship set to dock in California on Monday.
Tam pointed out that six of Canada’s confirmed cases are connected to individuals from the first leg of the Grand Princess’ voyage, which occurred between Feb. 11 and Feb 21.
“The virus can spread quickly onboard cruise ships, due to the close contact between passengers,” she said.
Since the novel coronavirus started spreading in late December, Canada has had 72 confirmed and presumptive cases: 34 in Ontario, 27 in British Columbia, four in Quebec, and seven in Alberta.
“Most of Canada’s cases include travellers from an affected area, or their close contacts,” Tam said. B.C. is investigating several cases that have spread in the community among individuals with no known contact to travellers.
The federal government announced Sunday that it would be chartering a plane to transport Canadians from the Grand Princess after it docks. There are approximately 3,500 people on board the vessel. The ship had previously been forbidden from docking in San Francisco due to evidence that it was linked to existing cases.
On Friday, the U.S. government confirmed that 21 people on the ship had tested positive for the virus, including 19 crew members.
“We have been working in close collaboration with our American partners to ensure the return of our Canadians as quickly and as safely as possible,” said Foreign Affairs Minister Francois-Philippe Champagne.
He said that after the Grand Princess docks, Canadians will be examined prior to boarding the plane.
“If they exhibit symptoms, they will not be allowed to board,” he said.
Health Minister Patty Hajdu added that Canadians who cannot get on the plane “will be cared for by the U.S. healthcare system, and our consular services will remain in close contact throughout the duration of their illness.”
The plane will transport the rest of the Canadian passengers to the Canadian Forces Base in Trenton, Ont., where they will be in a 14-day quarantine, “out of an abundance of caution.”
The cruise line will be assuming the cost of the plane charter, Champagne said.
Speaking to CNN on Sunday, Keane Li said that his parents, who are on the cruise ship, have described it to him as a “plush prison.”
Michael Zrobin, a Canadian aboard the ship, told CTV News Channel on Sunday that, although they’ve been receiving updates on the situation from the ship’s captain, they haven’t been told the nationalities of the two passengers who tested positive for the virus.
Another passenger, Urbain Vanier, told CTV News Channel he had been monitoring his temperature “ever since we’ve been on this cruise.”
As the cruise ship passengers prepare to come home, federal health officials say they are also asking premiers to notify them of any shortages in supplies or issues they are facing in tackling COVID-19 in their own provinces, ahead of Friday’s upcoming first ministers meeting in Ottawa.
Hajdu said that “some provinces are indicating that they have deficits,” though she did not provide specifics.
“We have said all along that we will be there as the federal government to support them with the resources they need,” she added, “whether those are financial resources, or practical resources … kits, personal protective equipment.”
The most recent new cases announced in Ontario on Monday are all travel-related, health officials said. One patient, a man in his 50s, recently travelled to Germany and the other two cases are a man in his 80s and a woman in her 70s who were recently in Iran. All are in self-isolation.
When asked why no sterner warnings regarding travel on cruise lines had been delivered before Monday, Tam said that officials are “constantly learning” as the virus spreads.
“The global situation changed quite rapidly, even from the time of the Diamond Princess cruise ship to now,” she explained.
The Diamond Princess is a cruise ship that became an early breeding ground for the virus. It was put under quarantine by Japanese officials for two weeks in February while it was docked outside of Yokohama, Japan. More than 700 people on the ship contracted the virus.
American passengers on board the Grand Princess will be taken to quarantine facilities in California after they get off of the ship, but it was not immediately clear what would happen to international passengers who are not Canadian.
CALGARY – MEG Energy says it earned $167 million in its third quarter, down from $249 million during the same quarter last year.
The company says revenues for the quarter were $1.27 billion, down from $1.44 billion during the third quarter of 2023.
Diluted earnings per share were 62 cents, down from 86 cents a year earlier.
MEG Energy says it successfully completed its debt reduction strategy, reducing its net debt to US$478 million by the end of September, down from US$634 million during the prior quarter.
President and CEO Darlene Gates said moving forward all the company’s free cash flow will be returned to shareholders through expanded share buybacks and a quarterly base dividend.
The company says its capital expenditures for the quarter increased to $141 million from $83 million a year earlier, mainly due to higher planned field development activity, as well as moderate capacity growth projects.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 5, 2024.
Premier David Eby is proposing an all-party committee investigate mistakes made during the British Columbia election vote tally, including an uncounted ballot box and unreported votes in three-quarters of the province’s 93 ridings.
The proposal comes after B.C.’s chief electoral officer blamed extreme weather, long working hours and a new voting system for human errors behind the mistakes in last month’s count, though none were large enough to change the initial results.
Anton Boegman says the agency is already investigating the mistakes to “identify key lessons learned” to improve training, change processes or make recommendations for legislative change.
He says the uncounted ballot box containing about 861 votes in Prince George-Mackenzie was never lost, and was always securely in the custody of election officials.
Boegman says a failure in five districts to properly report a small number of out-of-district votes, meanwhile, rippled through to the counts in 69 ridings.
Eby says the NDP will propose that a committee examine the systems used and steps taken by Elections BC, then recommend improvements in future elections.
“I look forward to working with all MLAs to uphold our shared commitment to free and fair elections, the foundation of our democracy,” he said in a statement Tuesday, after a news conference by Boegman.
Boegman said if an independent review does occur, “Elections BC will, of course, fully participate in that process.”
He said the mistakes came to light when a “discrepancy” of 14 votes was noticed in the riding of Surrey-Guildford, spurring a review that increased the number of unreported votes there to 28.
Surrey-Guildford was the closest race in the election and the NDP victory there gave Eby a one-seat majority. The discovery reduced the NDP’s victory margin from 27 to 21, pending the outcome of a judicial review that was previously triggered because the race was so close.
The mistakes in Surrey-Guildford resulted in a provincewide audit that found the other errors, Boegman said.
“These mistakes were a result of human error. Our elections rely on the work of over 17,000 election officials from communities across the province,” he said.
“Election officials were working 14 hours or more on voting days and on final voting day in particular faced extremely challenging weather conditions in many parts of the province.
“These conditions likely contributed to these mistakes,” he said.
B.C.’s “vote anywhere” model also played a role in the errors, said Boegman, who said he had issued an order to correct the results in the affected ridings.
Boegman said the uncounted Prince George-Mackenzie ballot box was used on the first day of advance voting. Election officials later discovered a vote hadn’t been tabulated, so they retabulated the ballots but mistakenly omitted the box of first-day votes, only including ballots from the second day.
Boegman said the issues discovered in the provincewide audit will be “fully documented” in his report to the legislature on the provincial election, the first held using electronic tabulators.
He said he was confident election officials found all “anomalies.”
B.C. Conservative Party Leader John Rustad had said on Monday that the errors were “an unprecedented failure by the very institution responsible for ensuring the fairness and accuracy of our elections.”
Rustad said he was not disputing the outcomes as judicial recounts continue, but said “it’s clear that mistakes like these severely undermine public trust in our electoral process.”
Rustad called for an “independent review” to make sure the errors never happen again.
Boegman, who said the election required fewer than half the number of workers under the old paper-based system, said results for the election would be returned in 90 of the province’s 93 ridings on Tuesday.
Full judicial recounts will be held in Surrey-Guildford and Kelowna-Centre, while a partial recount of the uncounted box will take place in Prince George-Mackenzie.
Boegman said out-of-district voting had been a part of B.C.’s elections for many decades, and explained how thousands of voters utilized the province’s vote-by-phone system, calling it a “very secure model” for people with disabilities.
“I think this is a unique and very important part of our elections, providing accessibility to British Columbians,” he said. “They have unparalleled access to the ballot box that is not found in other jurisdictions in Canada.”
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 5, 2024.
WINNIPEG – A public memorial honouring former judge, senator and chair of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission into residential schools, Murray Sinclair, is set to take place in Winnipeg on Sunday.
The event, which is being organized by the federal and Manitoba governments, will be at Canada Life Centre, home of the NHL’s Winnipeg Jets.
Sinclair died Monday in a Winnipeg hospital at the age of 73.
A teepee and a sacred fire were set up outside the Manitoba legislature for people to pay their respects hours after news of his death became public. The province has said it will remain open to the public until Sinclair’s funeral.
Sinclair’s family continues to invite people to visit the sacred fire and offer tobacco.
The family thanked the public for sharing words of love and support as tributes poured in this week.
“The significance of Mazina Giizhik’s (the One Who Speaks of Pictures in the Sky) impact and reach cannot be overstated,” the family said in a statement on Tuesday, noting Sinclair’s traditional Anishinaabe name.
“He touched many lives and impacted thousands of people.”
They encourage the public to celebrate his life and journey home.
A visitation for extended family, friends and community is also scheduled to take place Wednesday morning.
Leaders from across Canada shared their memories of Sinclair.
Premier Wab Kinew called Sinclair one of the key architects of the era of reconciliation.
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said Sinclair was a teacher, a guide and a friend who helped the country navigate tough realities.
Sinclair was the first Indigenous judge in Manitoba — the second in Canada.
He served as co-chair of the Aboriginal Justice Inquiry of Manitoba to examine whether the justice system was failing Indigenous people after the murder of Helen Betty Osborne and the police shooting death of First Nations leader J.J. Harper.
In leading the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, he participated in hundreds of hearings across Canada and heard testimony from thousands of residential school survivors.
The commissioners released their widely influential final report in 2015, which described what took place at the institutions as cultural genocide and included 94 calls to action.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 5, 2024.
