Vancouver home sales down 3.8% in Sept. as lower rates fail to entice buyers: board

TORONTO – BMO Financial Group says it has named Kristin Milchanowski to the newly created role of chief artificial intelligence and data officer.

The bank says Milchanowski will oversee several areas including AI, analytics and robotics strategies, as well as data management and data governance across the bank.

Chief technology officer Steve Tennyson says in a statement that Milchanowski will look to use AI to differentiate BMO’s digital offerings from its competitors.

BMO says Milchanowski comes to the role from EY, where she was a global innovation partner focused on AI, high-process computing and quantum technologies. It says she is also an AI associate fellow of the University of Oxford.

The Bank of Canada says the financial sector has been investing in AI to improve customer service, enhance compliance and risk management, and better assess credit and liquidity risk.

However, the central bank has warned that the trend could lead to operational risks including through reliance on a few third-party service providers and potential hallucinations and biases from predictive AI.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Oct. 2, 2024.

Companies in this story: (TSX:BMO)

The Canadian Press. All rights reserved.

EDMONTON – Albertans won’t be able to buy alcohol from grocery and convenience stores after all.

It’s something the provincial government has been exploring since late last year, and the province says it has decided not to move forward in order to protect private retailers.

The government says the decision comes after a committee of elected officials consulted with industry representatives, liquor store owners and experts.

It says if grocery and convenience stores were able to enter the alcohol retail market, there would be liquor store closures, job losses and decreased product variety.

Earlier this year, grocery and corner stores in Ontario were allowed to start selling beer, wine and canned alcoholic drinks in competition with provincially owned Liquor Control Board of Ontario stores.

Service Alberta Minister Dale Nally says maintaining the status quo will allow the estimated 1,600 privately-owned liquor stores in the province to stay successful.

“Alberta’s private liquor model is a jewel in the crown and allows small businesses to thrive while providing a wide variety of products and services,” Nally said in a news release.

Scott Sinclair, the legislature member for Lesser Slave Lake, was on the committee involved in the decision.

While allowing grocery and convenience stores to sell alcohol would be convenient for consumers, he said, it would have a “detrimental effect” on the existing private alcohol retail industry.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Oct. 2, 2024.

The Canadian Press. All rights reserved.

Jacob Hoggard wrapped up his testimony in his sexual assault trial Wednesday morning after the Crown cross-examined him on apparent gaps in his memory.

Hoggard has pleaded not guilty and denied raping, choking and hitting his accuser after his band Hedley performed at a concert eight years ago.

The ex-lead singer of the band told a jury this week that he and the complainant had a consensual one-night stand after flirting and kissing during a bonfire after-party following the Kirkland Lake, Ont., show.

Prosecutor Peter Keen tried to poke holes in Hoggard’s description of the night during cross-examination late Tuesday and early Wednesday.

He established that Hoggard doesn’t have a clear memory of the beginning of the sexual activity in his hotel room, whether there could have been attempted anal sex, as the complainant alleged, and whether Hoggard may have asked to urinate on the woman.

In the woman’s earlier testimony, she described feeling disgusted when, she said, Hoggard joined her in the shower following the alleged rape and asked if he could urinate on her. She said she told him no, but he did it anyway.

Hoggard has said the opposite happened. He said Tuesday that after the two engaged in oral sex in the bathtub, he asked her to urinate on him and she did so.

Keen tried to suggest to Hoggard that the urination would have been “much more in keeping with a coercive sexual encounter,” but defence lawyer Megan Savard objected.

“To suggest that certain types of sexual acts are inherently less consensual I think is highly problematic,” she said.

The prosecutor tried to rephrase the question but Savard rose for a second time.

“I’m going to object again, perhaps on behalf of every person in society who has any kind of fringe sexual practice,” she said. “I think this is an offensive line of questioning.”

Keen concluded his questions not long after that.

In her re-examination, Savard got several answers from Hoggard about his usual practices during sex. She asked whether he had any memory of actually urinating on the complainant.

“I would remember her letting me do that,” he said.

She also revisited the question of anal sex, and whether Hoggard would have attempted it prior to vaginal intercourse as the complainant said took place.

“I never do that first,” he said.

After Hoggard’s testimony, the lighting operator for the Hedley concert, Jeremy Van Delft, was called as a witness.

While Hoggard had told court he went straight from the concert to the hotel to build the bonfire, Van Delft said the band and crew, including Hoggard, went to a bar after the show before returning to the hotel.

At the bonfire, he said he saw Hoggard and a woman speaking, and at the end of the night he saw the two of them walking back toward the hotel together.

Van Delft said he saw them enter Hoggard’s hotel room via an interior hallway, and at least two other members of the crew or band were in the hallway at the same time.

The complainant had given a similar description of their entry into the room, while Hoggard had said he remembered entering through the room’s patio doors.

Savard’s co-counsel Kally Ho also asked Van Delft about common practice when it came to transporting the band back and forth, a job someone known as the “runner” would do.

The complainant had described entering a van outside the venue, along with members of the band and some teenage girls, in order to get to the bonfire after-party. Van Delft said it would have been “unlikely” and “unprofessional of the runner” to allow an unescorted fan inside the same vehicle as the band.

The defence was expected to call another crew member as a witness on Wednesday afternoon.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Oct. 2, 2024.