Good morning,
These are the top stories:
The PMO is using a Liberal database to vet candidates for judicial appointments
The Liberalist database was designed to be used for partisan purposes – but the Prime Minister’s Office is using the tool to look into whether would-be judges have supported the Liberal Party. Confidential documents obtained by The Globe show the results of database checks on the applicants, which indicated things like the years in which applicants were members of the Liberal Party of Canada and whether they were a “supporter” of the party.
The Liberalist tool was designed to be used for helping Liberal candidates track and reach supporters during elections. However, it’s also being used to evaluate candidates already vetted by the judicial advisory committees put in place by the Trudeau government as a move toward greater independence in the appointment process.
A spokesperson for Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said it is “normal and appropriate” for the government to be ready to answer questions on the “political activities and affiliations of government appointees.”
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Elections Canada has issued a fresh warning to tech giants over political ads
Facebook, Google and other platforms will need to comply with new election laws or face possible investigation or prosecution, according to new guidelines released by Elections Canada.
As part of an effort to counter malicious influence efforts by anonymous individuals, including foreign actors, the independent agency has spelled out enforcement plans. The rules:
- Platforms that sell space for ads on other websites will still have to maintain a public registry stating who paid for them.
- Platforms that don’t sell any election ads, as Google announced, will still have legal obligations, including monitoring their sites for violations.
The guidelines follow a warning from Canada’s spy agency that “it is very likely that Canadian voters will encounter foreign cyber interference ahead of, and during, the 2019 general election.”
As flooding wreaks havoc on Quebec and New Brunswick, questions linger on prevention
Houses and roads are flooded around Fredericton, New Brunswick. (Courtesy Ken Galbraith/Canadian Armed Forces/DND/Handout)Ken Galbraith/DND/Reuters
Around 2,800 homes have been affected by flooding in Quebec, with more than 1,400 people forced from their homes. And while water levels are expected to peak today, flooding risks remain high across the southern part of the province.
In New Brunswick, water levels are expected to rise in the days ahead, and road closings could isolate some homes for five days or more.
One key way to help prepare for these incidents is detailed flood maps offering cartographic depictions of areas that are likely to see high water levels under certain conditions. But most Canadians don’t have access to the maps, which provide information to protect property or avoid building in certain areas to begin with.
PEI voters handed the PCs a rare minority government, with the Greens coming in second
The Greens failed to come out on top, but their nine-seat count is the party’s best-ever showing in provincial politics. And it means Prince Edward Island will see its first minority government since the 1800s.
The Progressive Conservatives nabbed 12 seats, with the Liberals relegated to third place with just five. Fourteen seats are needed for a majority.
PMO says letter congratulating a group advocating Tibetan unity with China is a fake
A letter purporting to be from Prime Minister Justin Trudeau welcoming members to a newly formed group promoting ties between Tibet and China is a hoax, the primer minister’s office said Tuesday.
The letter, circulated on social media, was dated April 17, days before the Saturday inauguration gala for the Tibetan Association of Canada. Online video of the gala shows that provincial Ontario Progressive Conservative Vincent Ke and Toronto city councillor Jim Karygiannis attended the event.
One year after the Toronto van attack: Residents gather to remember – and move forward
A message written in Korean says that the victims of last year's van attack will not be forgotten. (Fred Lum/The Globe and Mail)Fred Lum
“They are with us here, still making the choice they always made – to rejoice,” the city’s poet laureate told a hushed auditorium as a bell rang for each of the 10 who died in last April’s Yonge Street attack. Outside in North York’s Mel Lastman Square, people gathered to paint pictures and write messages in coloured chalk on the pavement.
Marcus Gee writes: “It was touching, fitting and altogether appropriate – and yet, in some sense, unnecessary. Toronto has rebounded brilliantly from this evil event. … the most important thing that city dwellers can do after a thing like this is simply to get on with life. In North York, that is just what they are doing.”
A win-some, lose-some night in Toronto playoff action
Toronto fans gather outside Scotiabank Arena to cheer on the Leafs and Raptors. (Christopher Katsarov/The Canadian Press)Christopher Katsarov/The Canadian Press
The Toronto Raptors have advanced to the second round of the NBA playoffs, after easily beating the Orlando Magic 115-96. And they made franchise history, winning four straight playoff games for the first time to win the series in five games. “This series was a proper five-game kicking, the sort unseen in Raptors’ history,” Cathal Kelly writes. “It wasn’t just its brevity. It was its brutality.” Next up for the Raps will be the Philadelphia 76ers.
Things didn’t go so smoothly for the Toronto Maple Leafs, who lost to the Boston Bruins in a Game 7 for the third time in seven years. The Bruins’ fourth line scored two goals while the third line added another en route to a 5-1 drubbing in Boston. The loss means no Canadian teams are left in the NHL playoffs. Cathal Kelly writes that the Leafs do one thing at a league-best level – get perspective, which is a funny way of explaining that performing poorly at hockey can be a moral victory.
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ALSO ON OUR RADAR
The death toll from the Easter suicide bombings in Sri Lanka rose to 359, police said Wednesday, as the country’s leaders vowed to overhaul the security apparatus amid a series of intelligence lapses before the attacks. U.S. Ambassador Alaina Teplitz, meanwhile, told reporters that “clearly there was some failure in the system.” Sri Lanka’s leaders have said some of the country’s security units were aware before Easter of possible attacks, but did not share those warnings widely.
Myanmar’s top court has rejected the appeal of two journalists sentenced to seven years in jail over their reporting on the persecution of Rohingya Muslims. Reuters reporters Wa Lone, 33, and Kyaw Soe Oo, 29, were arrested in December of 2017 for breaking the Official Secrets Act. The case has drawn strong rebukes from the international community as UN investigators call for genocide charges against military officials over their deadly attacks against the Rohingya.
MORNING MARKETS
Stocks mixed
Global shares took a step back on Wednesday as signals that China has put broader stimulus on hold offset positive results from Credit Suisse, which kicked off the earnings season for European investment banks. Tokyo’s Nikkei was down 0.2 per cent, while Hong Kong’s Hang Seng was down 0.5 per cent. The Shanghai Composite was marginally positive. In Europe, London’s FTSE 100 was down 0.2 per cent at about 6:40 a.m. ET, while Germany’s DAX was up 0.8 per cent and the Paris CAC 40 was up slightly. New York futures were up. The Canadian dollar was at 74.33 US cents.
WHAT EVERYONE’S TALKING ABOUT
The push is on to reinvent American capitalism
Lawrence Martin: “If capitalism is to be overhauled in the United States, Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren are the great hopes. Individually, neither might be able to win the nomination. But if they worked as a team, one could get the other over the finish line.” (for subscribers)
How boomers are stealing from babies
Peter Shawn Taylor: “They may not be able to feed themselves, or even speak or roll over right now—and they certainly can’t vote—but these adorable little droolers will one day be handed a bill for every one of our collective mistakes and indulgences. Given the size and shape of this future burden, we ought to consider their absence from electoral debate to be a national, intergenerational embarrassment.”
If you don’t want to ditch meat for health reasons, do it to avoid pandemics
Paul Shapiro: “As African swine fever decimates China’s pork industry, Canada has issued strict new rules on what livestock can be fed. But still, fears linger: Are regulations, serving as consumers’ last line of defence, strong enough to minimize the risk to public health? When humanity crams vast numbers of animals together in overcrowded and often unsanitary conditions, are outbreaks of major diseases just an occupational hazard?” Paul Shapiro is the author of Clean Meat: How Growing Meat Without Animals Will Revolutionize Dinner and the World.
TODAY’S EDITORIAL CARTOON
(Brian Gable/The Globe and Mail)Brian Gable/The Globe and Mail
LIVING BETTER
The hulking, unstoppable Avengers: Endgame is genius, but of an evil and shockingly boring variety
Barry Hertz offers this two-star review of the buzzed-about 22nd film in the Marvel Cinematic Universe: “The 181-minute epic is furiously smart and frequently witty. There are instances of indelible delight and glimpses of technical excellence,” he writes. But Endgame “is, in a very real way that is wholly absent of irony, as much an evil genius as its own central villain.” (for subscribers)
MOMENT IN TIME
Hughes Commission report is released
The Mount Cashel orphanage in St. John's is seen in a 1989 photo. (Andrew Vaughan/The Canadian Press)ANDREW VAUGHAN/The Canadian Press
April 24, 1992: The top official in Newfoundland’s Justice Department knew what was happening at Mount Cashel Boys’ Home. So did the chief of provincial police. For years, boys were being physically and sexually abused in the St. John’s orphanage, run by the Christian Brothers, a Catholic lay order. A detective uncovered evidence of this in 1975, but was told to remove references to sexual abuse from his reports. The deputy justice minister, in turn, kept the reports hidden in his personal filing cabinet. No charges were laid. Two abusers were allowed to leave the province, while others remained in charge of Mount Cashel. The story stayed hidden until 1989, when a call to a radio station prompted police to reopen the file. A royal commission, led by retired judge Samuel Hughes, was struck to investigate government and police mishandling of the 1975 investigation. Hughes interviewed more than 200 witnesses and released a public report in April, 1992. The cover-up, he concluded, was a “response by co-religionists of the alleged offenders to what was perceived as a challenge to the faith and morals of their religious community.” Nine Christian Brothers were eventually convicted of assault-related crimes. More than 100 survivors have received some sort of compensation. – Mark Rendell
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Arik Ligeti