Nova Scotia Tories promise universal shingles vaccine program for 65 and over

MONTREAL – Quebec universities and public colleges say they should be exempt from the government’s plan to reduce the number of international students in the province, but the immigration minister says that’s unlikely.

The schools say a bill tabled last month would hurt their ability to attract top talent from around the world.

But Immigration Minister Jean-François Roberge says it’s “not reasonable” to think the government could cut the number of foreign students in Quebec without including universities and public colleges.

The bill would give the government new power to cap foreign student enrolment at Quebec schools based on region, institution and program of study.

Roberge has said the bill is necessary to prevent schools from selling Canadian citizenship, but the universities and public colleges say they aren’t the problem.

There are currently about 124,000 foreign students in Quebec, which Roberge says is a 140 per cent increase in the last decade.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 5, 2024.

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ST. JOHN’S, N.L. – A scientist has determined that the strange white blobs puzzling Newfoundland beachcombers are made of a plastic commonly found in adhesives, but the origin of the mysterious goo is still unknown.

Hilary Corlett, an Earth sciences specialist at Memorial University, collected several of the sticky globs from a beach in Arnold’s Cove, N.L., last month and gave them to a colleague for testing. The results, she said, came in late last week: it was polyvinyl acetate, often found in glue.

“It is pollution,” Corlett said in an interview Tuesday. “It’s plastic. It needs to be cleaned up.”

Members of a Newfoundland and Labrador beachcombers group on Facebook began sharing pictures of the bizarre gunk in September, asking if anyone knew what it was. Group members had many suggestions, some more helpful than others: slime moulds, whale boogers, or toutons — fried dollops of bread dough popular in Newfoundland breakfasts.

Corlett was intrigued. She studies marine microplastics and figured she had to go find a sample for herself. She said she was amazed to find about 20 of the mysterious mounds within her first few steps onto the small beach about 100 kilometres northwest of St. John’s.

“There’s a lot of them,” she said.

They smell like plastic, like “that smell when you walk into a Canadian Tire,” Corlett said. Some had imprints of rocks and pebbles, as if they’d once been liquid.

They were slimy and “quite squishy,” but still firm, she said. When ripped apart, the material had no pores.

She gave the samples to Memorial University chemistry professor Christopher Kozak, who subjected them to a barrage of tests. The goo remained intact even in temperatures beyond 180 C. Using a procedure to identify the individual elements of the substance, he determined it was polyvinyl acetate, Corlett said.

Kozak did not respond to requests for an interview.

Environment Canada said last month that preliminary tests suggested the “mystery substance” may be “plant-based.” The department did not immediately return a request for comment, but said Friday its scientists were analyzing the substance and that officials could not speculate about what it might be or where it came from.

Corlett said the testing shows the blobs are safe to touch, and she hopes there will be beach cleanup efforts to remove it.

She also hopes officials will work to determine where the substance came from, and whether there are more blobs — possibly much larger — sitting on the ocean floor.

“Understanding where it is in the ocean, I think would be something that would be a good idea,” she said. “Because I think it should be cleaned up.”

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 5, 2024.

The Canadian Press. All rights reserved.

OTTAWA – Conservative MPs want Canada’s consul general in New York to testify at a House of Commons committee again about the purchase of a new official residence in Manhattan.

Members of the House operations committee are looking into the purchase and want Tom Clark to answer more questions after new information emerged today about his involvement in the government’s purchase of the $9-million condo near Central Park.

Clark previously told the committee that he had no role whatsoever in the purchase of the condo, or the sale of the previous residence.

But reporting from Politico on Tuesday indicated Clark had raised concerns about renovations to the old residence, and its suitability.

Politico cited documents obtained through access to information, which were then shared with other media by the Conservative party.

The committee adjourned before the motion to recall Clark went to a vote but is likely to pass after all three opposition parties expressed support for the idea.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 5, 2024.

The Canadian Press. All rights reserved.