LONDON — Prince Harry and his wife Meghan have issued a warning over harassment by paparazzi photographers in Canada after agreeing to give up their royal duties to start their new life outside Britain, according to Sky News.
The warning comes after Meghan was photographed on Monday in North Hill Regional Park on Vancouver Island, carrying eight-month-old son Archie in a baby sling and walking her two dogs, Guy and Oz.
Lawyers say the pictures were taken by photographers hiding in bushes who did not obtain her consent, the BBC reported.
In addition, the Sussexes say paparazzi are permanently camped outside their home with long lenses trained at their residence, Sky said.
The North Saanich, B.C., property believed to be where Prince Harry and Meghan, Duchess of Sussex have been living while in Canada.
Kevin Light/Reuters
The couple have made some changes to the area to make it more secure. The property sits at the end of a private road, behind a gate. But since the royals moved in, a white tarp has been placed behind it to provide added privacy.
A temporary metal fence has also been erected along the edge of the property that leads down to a public beach, and a security camera and dog now keep watch.
The legal warning comes on Day One of the couple’s new life in Canada. Harry arrived in Canada early on Tuesday to join Meghan.
Harry was shown arriving on Vancouver Island by Sky News, just days after reaching an arrangement with Queen Elizabeth and senior royals that will see him and his wife Meghan leave behind their royal roles to seek an independent future.
Prince Harry has arrived in Canada to join Meghan and son Archie, after agreeing a deal to step back as senior royals.
The Duke of Sussex had earlier attended the UK-Africa investment summit in London, where he met with the prime minister.
The lack of photos has not been for want of trying. Earlier this month, Miles Arsenault, the owner and captain of Deep Cove’s Bay to Bay Charters, refused to take three people, including a cameraman out in his water taxi after he learned that his client, a Japanese television station, wanted to stake out Meghan’s address, which is secluded and best viewed from the water.
“It was a no-brainer for me to walk,” Arsenault said, despite the fact that the retired photographer only launched his water taxi business six months ago and could use the business.
“It’s just not the way that I wanted to be remembered — as carrying paparazzi around.”
Water taxi captain Miles Arsenault refused to bring a TV crew wanting to stake out where Meghan is staying.
Courtesy Miles Arsenault
Buckingham Palace and the Queen said on Saturday that Harry and Meghan would no longer be working members of the royal family. They would not use their “Royal Highness” titles and would pay their own way in life, freeing them to forge a new future in Canada and the United States.
Harry has admitted he had not wanted to step away entirely from his royal life and his military appointments, but said there was no other option.
“It brings me great sadness that it has come to this,” he said on Sunday.
American actress Meghan returned to Canada on Jan. 10 to be reunited with baby son Archie, and Harry flew out late on Monday to join her.
The Duke and Duchess of Sussex, the couple’s formal title which they will continue to use, spent six weeks in Canada at the end of last year before returning to Britain.
Earlier this month, they shocked the royal family by publicly announcing they wanted more independence, leaving the other senior members hurt and disappointed, according to royal sources.
The new arrangement, agreed following a summit held by the Queen at her Sandringham estate and attended by Harry’s father and heir-to-the-throne Prince Charles and elder brother Prince William, will come into effect this Spring.
Harry is expected to carry out some official engagements before then although it is not clear whether Meghan will be involved. She was pictured in the Sun newspaper on Tuesday, walking her dogs in a park on Vancouver Island close to where the couple have been staying in a secluded house.
In their new life, the couple will no longer receive public money and will repay the cost of refurbishing their British home in Windsor, which official figures show amounted to 2.4 million pounds ($3 million).
But certain details, such as whether the couple could continue to use the “Sussex Royal” title for their website and branding and their future security arrangements, have either not been finalized or publicly revealed.
There clearly has to be a line of delineation
Asked about who would pay for their protection, justice minister Robert Buckland said there was an issue about how public money was spent.
“Quite clearly there have already been arrangements made about how that family are going to live and how they are going to be able to get private income but there clearly has to be a line of delineation,” he told Sky News.
“I think we all want a family like that to be safe, but at the same time I think what really needs to happen is they need to understand how their lifestyle is to adapt and what their needs might be.”
VANCOUVER – Contract negotiations resume today in Vancouver in a labour dispute that has paralyzed container cargo shipping at British Columbia’s ports since Monday.
The BC Maritime Employers Association and International Longshore and Warehouse Union Local 514 are scheduled to meet for the next three days in mediated talks to try to break a deadlock in negotiations.
The union, which represents more than 700 longshore supervisors at ports, including Vancouver, Prince Rupert and Nanaimo, has been without a contract since March last year.
The latest talks come after employers locked out workers in response to what it said was “strike activity” by union members.
The start of the lockout was then followed by several days of no engagement between the two parties, prompting federal Labour Minister Steven MacKinnon to speak with leaders on both sides, asking them to restart talks.
MacKinnon had said that the talks were “progressing at an insufficient pace, indicating a concerning absence of urgency from the parties involved” — a sentiment echoed by several business groups across Canada.
In a joint letter, more than 100 organizations, including the Canadian Chamber of Commerce, Business Council of Canada and associations representing industries from automotive and fertilizer to retail and mining, urged the government to do whatever it takes to end the work stoppage.
“While we acknowledge efforts to continue with mediation, parties have not been able to come to a negotiated agreement,” the letter says. “So, the federal government must take decisive action, using every tool at its disposal to resolve this dispute and limit the damage caused by this disruption.
“We simply cannot afford to once again put Canadian businesses at risk, which in turn puts Canadian livelihoods at risk.”
In the meantime, the union says it has filed a complaint to the Canada Industrial Relations Board against the employers, alleging the association threatened to pull existing conditions out of the last contract in direct contact with its members.
“The BCMEA is trying to undermine the union by attempting to turn members against its democratically elected leadership and bargaining committee — despite the fact that the BCMEA knows full well we received a 96 per cent mandate to take job action if needed,” union president Frank Morena said in a statement.
The employers have responded by calling the complaint “another meritless claim,” adding the final offer to the union that includes a 19.2 per cent wage increase over a four-year term remains on the table.
“The final offer has been on the table for over a week and represents a fair and balanced proposal for employees, and if accepted would end this dispute,” the employers’ statement says. “The offer does not require any concessions from the union.”
The union says the offer does not address the key issue of staffing requirement at the terminals as the port introduces more automation to cargo loading and unloading, which could potentially require fewer workers to operate than older systems.
The Port of Vancouver is the largest in Canada and has seen a number of labour disruptions, including two instances involving the rail and grain storage sectors earlier this year.
A 13-day strike by another group of workers at the port last year resulted in the disruption of a significant amount of shipping and trade.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 9, 2024.
The Royal Canadian Legion says a new partnership with e-commerce giant Amazon is helping boost its veterans’ fund, and will hopefully expand its donor base in the digital world.
Since the Oct. 25 launch of its Amazon.ca storefront, the legion says it has received nearly 10,000 orders for poppies.
Online shoppers can order lapel poppies on Amazon in exchange for donations or buy items such as “We Remember” lawn signs, Remembrance Day pins and other accessories, with all proceeds going to the legion’s Poppy Trust Fund for Canadian veterans and their families.
Nujma Bond, the legion’s national spokesperson, said the organization sees this move as keeping up with modern purchasing habits.
“As the world around us evolves we have been looking at different ways to distribute poppies and to make it easier for people to access them,” she said in an interview.
“This is definitely a way to reach a wider number of Canadians of all ages. And certainly younger Canadians are much more active on the web, on social media in general, so we’re also engaging in that way.”
Al Plume, a member of a legion branch in Trenton, Ont., said the online store can also help with outreach to veterans who are far from home.
“For veterans that are overseas and are away, (or) can’t get to a store they can order them online, it’s Amazon.” Plume said.
Plume spent 35 years in the military with the Royal Engineers, and retired eight years ago. He said making sure veterans are looked after is his passion.
“I’ve seen the struggles that our veterans have had with Veterans Affairs … and that’s why I got involved, with making sure that the people get to them and help the veterans with their paperwork.”
But the message about the Amazon storefront didn’t appear to reach all of the legion’s locations, with volunteers at Branch 179 on Vancouver’s Commercial Drive saying they hadn’t heard about the online push.
Holly Paddon, the branch’s poppy campaign co-ordinator and bartender, said the Amazon partnership never came up in meetings with other legion volunteers and officials.
“I work at the legion, I work with the Vancouver poppy office and I go to the meetings for the Vancouver poppy campaign — which includes all the legions in Vancouver — and not once has this been mentioned,” she said.
Paddon said the initiative is a great idea, but she would like to have known more about it.
The legion also sells a larger collection of items at poppystore.ca.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 9, 2024.
