‘Hateful and mean’: LGBTQ+ advocates slam Sask. Party’s proposed change room policy

VANCOUVER – Polls are now open in British Columbia, where voters in today’s provincial election face a choice that would have been unthinkable just a few months ago.

The B.C. Conservatives, whose party won less than two per cent of the vote last election, stand on the brink of forming government or, at least, becoming the official Opposition, with Leader John Rustad challenging New Democrat incumbent David Eby to be premier.

Rustad’s unlikely rise came after he was thrown out of the Opposition, then known as the BC Liberals, joined the Conservatives as leader, and steered them to a level of popularity that led to the collapse of his old party, now called BC United — all in just two years.

Mike McDonald, co-host of the Hotel Pacifico podcast on B.C. politics and a former chief of staff for then-premier Christy Clark, said he was expecting a “very close, nail-biter” election.

“We saw that in 2017, where the fate of British Columbia’s government was decided on one seat in the Comox Valley that was won by (the NDP by) 189 votes,” he said.

“The real message here for British Columbians is, if you want to see a particular outcome in this election, you’ve got to get out … and vote.”

More than a million already had, even before polls opened. The advance voting record was smashed, with more than 28 per cent of all registered electors voting early, potentially putting the province on track for a big final turnout.

Many of those who vote today will face a soggy election day, with the south and central coasts of B.C. being drenched by an atmospheric river weather system that is also bringing high winds and the threat of flooding. In the north, the first big snowfalls of the season are expected.

McDonald said the inclement weather in some of the province’s largest population centres may play a role if the race between the NDP and the B.C. Conservatives is as close as polls indicate.

“So that would favour the voter base that’s more resolved, that’s more committed, more motivated to turn out to the polls,” McDonald said.

He said there had never been a B.C. election where more than two million people voted, a milestone that could be breached this year.

“That can be a good sign for the opposition (Conservatives), but we also have to look at the fact that people are turning out because they don’t want the Conservatives,” he said. “It’s a much more polarizing election this time, and that may be inducing NDP voters to get out as well.”

It has been a strikingly negative campaign.

Eby, who has depicted Rustad and some of his candidates as extremists and conspiracy theorists, said Friday that he had “left nothing on the table,” and had “no regrets about the campaign.”

Rustad, who did not make himself available to reporters in the final days of the campaign, has called Eby a serial liar.

“The 2024 B.C. election mirrors the same nasty polarization seen in the U.S. presidential campaign, with the B.C. NDP spending most of its time attacking Conservative candidates over indefensible racist and sexist remarks,” said Jeanette Ashe, a political science faculty member at Douglas College. “This left little room for the B.C. NDP to address the real issues BCers care about, like affordable housing and health care.”

But on several fronts, the NDP and the Conservative platforms have overlapped.

Both are pledging tax breaks, with Eby promising a cut worth $1,000 for most households and the Conservatives promising the “Rustad Rebate,” which would eventually make up to $3,000 a month in rent or mortgage payments tax deductible.

Eby says he’ll scrap the provincial carbon tax if the federal government drops its requirement for the tax, and will instead shift the burden to “big polluters,” while Rustad says he’ll scrap the carbon tax completely.

And both parties say they support a greater emphasis on involuntary care to deal with the province’s overlapping crises of homelessness, mental health and addictions.

Green Party Leader Sonia Furstenau has said there is little to separate the two main election contenders, citing involuntary care and their stances on the fossil fuel industry.

Her party, which is hoping to retain a presence in the legislature where it currently has two members, is promising a “windfall profits tax” on oil and gas companies, as well as investment in infrastructure and climate action.

On one matter, all three parties converge: their platforms would result in big first-year increases to the deficit, pushing it to about $9.6 billion under the NDP and Green plans, and near $11 billion under the Conservatives.

Regardless of the election outcome, it has been a stunning rise for B.C. Conservatives and Rustad, brought about in large part by the Shakespearean fall of Official Opposition Leader Kevin Falcon of BC United, who pushed the self-destruct button on his own party less than two months ago.

Falcon had thrown Rustad out of the party in 2022 over his online backing for a climate-change skeptic. But it was Falcon who paid the price.

BC United support cratered following a disastrous name change from the BC Liberals that Falcon had championed, and in late August Falcon stood beside Rustad and ended United’s campaign in order to avoid vote splitting.

That triggered fury from some United legislators who went on to run as Independents, either snubbed or unwilling to join the B.C. Conservatives. If they win, those Independents could hold the balance of power if the election is close.

Ultimately, McDonald said the 2024 B.C. election would be remembered for the “shakeup” of the province’s right-leaning political landscape.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Oct. 19, 2024.

Montreal skateboarders are rallying to protect a Do-It-Yourself skatepark known as Project 45 from what the city has said are plans to redevelop the space but skaters fear are plans to demolish what makes it unique.

Skateboarders say they built Project 45 themselves more than a decade ago in the borough of Villeray–Saint-Michel–Parc-Extension on land belonging to the city of Montreal but with the blessing of Le TAZ, a nearby indoor skatepark.

Skateboarder Marie-Pier Hamelin says skaters have recently learned the city plans to demolish the skatepark and rebuild it, but the city has told a different story.

The City of Montreal has not responded to The Canadian Press’s requests for comment, but told other media outlets this week that the plan is not to demolish Project 45 but redevelop its infrastructure, which it says has reached the end of its life and does not meet municipal safety standards.

Hamelin launched an online petition to preserve the skatepark in early October and has gathered about 6,000 signatures so far.

She says skateboarders welcome investment from the city to restore and expand the skatepark but want to preserve the unique space cherished by the skater community.

Skaters are gathering at the skatepark this afternoon to show their support for Project 45 and put pressure on the City of Montreal.

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OTTAWA – Canada isn’t ruling out expelling additional diplomats from India, Foreign Affairs Minister Mélanie Joly suggested Friday following bombshell allegations that Indian diplomats in Toronto, Ottawa and Vancouver were involved in state-sponsored violence targeting Canadian citizens.

Canada expelled the Indian high commissioner and five other diplomats on Monday and when asked at a news conference in Montreal Friday if any more expulsions would follow Joly did not say no.

“They’re clearly on notice,” she said.

The minister said that Canada will not tolerate any foreign diplomats that put the lives of Canadians at risk.

A year ago Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said Canada had clear evidence that Indian agents were connected to the murder of Sikh leader Hardeep Singh Nijjar in British Columbia in June 2023. The allegations suggest India is trying to snuff out a movement to create an independent Sikh state in India known as Khalistan.

On Oct. 14, RCMP Commissioner Mike Duheme rocked the diplomatic relationship further, saying the national police force had launched a special investigative unit last February to investigate multiple cases of extortion, coercion and violence, including murder, linked to agents of the Indian government.

In more than a dozen cases, Canadian citizens were warned about threats to their personal safety and Duheme said the national police force was speaking out to try and disrupt what it deemed a serious threat to public safety.

The six diplomats expelled are persons of interest in the cases, with allegations that diplomats used their position to collect information on Canadians in the pro-Khalistan movement and then pass that on to criminal gangs who targeted the individuals directly.

India has denied the allegations and expelled six Canadian diplomats from New Delhi in return.

Joly said Friday the allegations were extraordinary in Canada.

“That level of transnational repression cannot happen on Canadian soil,” she said. “We’ve seen it elsewhere in Europe, Russia has done that in Germany and the U.K., but we needed to stand firm on this issue.”

The allegations will be studied in more detail by the House of Commons national security committee following a vote by the committee Friday. Joly and Duheme will both be asked to appear, as will Public Safety Minister Dominic LeBlanc

NDP MP Alistair MacGregor, who put forward the motion to launch the study, said the fact the RCMP came out with such “explosive revelations” underscores how serious the situation is.

“The RCMP made a point that they were doing this because some individuals in Canada had their lives directly in danger and the threat reached such a level they felt compelled to ignore the traditional way of going through the judicial process and make these accusations public,” he said.

Canada’s allegations were followed Thursday by charges announced by the U.S. Justice Department against an Indian government employee who is accused in an alleged foiled plot to kill a Sikh separatist leader living in New York City.

U.S. authorities say Vikash Yadav directed the New York plot from India. He faces murder-for-hire charges in a planned killing that prosecutors have previously said was meant to precede a string of other politically motivated murders in the United States and Canada.

The Indian government didn’t immediately provide comment on the U.S. charge.

American-Canadian lawyer Gurpatwant Singh Pannun, a lawyer and dual Canadian and U.S. citizen, said in a statement that he was the target of the alleged murder plot in New York. He said he was targeted because he is a lawyer for Sikhs for Justice and was helping to organize votes in a non-binding referendum on the creation of an independent Sikh state.

Nijjar helped organize a similar referendum in B.C. prior to his death.

The House committee Friday also voted to call Brampton Mayor Patrick Brown to testify, as well as other candidates from the 2022 Conservative leadership contest. A report released in June by the National Security and Intelligence Committee of Parliamentarians (NSICOP) contains a redacted paragraph that details alleged Indian interference in a Conservative leadership contest. A specific year is not mentioned.

The Conservatives have said they have been given no information about any such interference.

The committee is also now considering a second NDP motion calling for all party leaders to apply for a top-secret security clearance within 30 days, along with a Conservative amendment to demand Prime Minister Justin Trudeau release the names of parliamentarians listed in top-secret documents as being engaged in or at-risk of foreign interference.

At the foreign interference inquiry this week Trudeau said Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre refused to get the clearance that would allow him to access the names of Conservatives from those documents, while Poilievre accused Trudeau of lying and demanded he make all the names public.

Trudeau acknowledged the documents include the names of members of other parties, including the Liberals, but said if Poilievre doesn’t get the clearance that is needed to know who is at risk he can’t take any steps to prevent or limit the impact.

Manitoba Conservative MP Raquel Dancho told the committee that Poilievre getting a briefing would be a “gag order” against criticizing the government on foreign interference.

“We can put this to bed, it’s rapidly devolving into some McCarthy witch-hunt as a result of the prime minister’s actions and we can clear this up today by releasing the names,” Dancho said.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Oct. 18, 2024.