Canada's big banks are cutting credit lines of struggling energy companies, heaping more financial strain on an industry battered by the collapse in oil prices.
Bank of Nova Scotia, Royal Bank of Canada and National Bank of Canada are among those reducing credit lines as the lenders complete their semi-annual review of borrowing limits in the hard-hit energy sector.
Justin Trudeau has told his senior lieutenants to draw up plans to make the Energy East pipeline and the Trans Mountain expansion in British Columbia a reality.
The prime minister has been convinced by his finance minister, Bill Morneau, and other influential voices around the cabinet table that the pipelines have to be built to achieve the ambitious economic growth targets his government has set.
But the problem for the Liberals is that this conviction has to be conveyed subtly to a public that has decidedly mixed views on oilsands expansion and pipelines.
The story has an air of inevitability. A rise in online communication has led to a inexorable decline of mail. Our local post offices, squeezed by the digital era, will soon be quaint outposts of a bygone era. What’s left to do but end door-to-door mail delivery, lay off postal workers, and hand over what remains to private companies?
Gordon Laxer has just written a new book titled After the Sands: Energy and Ecological Security for Canadians. In it, the founding director of the Parkland Institute and long-time Council of Canadians Board member, argues for the need to plan beyond the tar sands, which he refers to as the Sands.
VICTORIA – The Wilderness Committee is celebrating an announcement by the BC Environmental Assessment Office (EAO) late yesterday afternoon, which terminated the assessment for the proposed Raven Coal Mine in the Comox Valley on Vancouver Island.
OTTAWA - The chairman of Canada's Ecofiscal Commission has a message for Brad Wall as the Saskatchewan premier and high-profile carbon-tax opponent embarks on his third straight majority mandate.
"If you have a stated goal to reduce greenhouse gas emissions — and Saskatchewan does — the most cost-effective way to do it is carbon pricing. Period," says Chris Ragan, the McGill University economist who acts as the non-partisan commission's chief spokesman.
A dispute between the elected and non-elected hereditary chiefs of the Lax Kw’alaams Band over the Pacific NorthWest LNG project on Lelu Island in Prince Rupert is raising potentially thorny legal and political questions.
When First Nations have both hereditary governance and elected chiefs and band councils, who ultimately represents the people on land-use issues off reserve?
Until recently, the Lax Kw’alaams appeared to be unified in its opposition to the Pacific NorthWest LNG project.
Beijing has high hopes for the new Trudeau government.
On October 20th, 2015, Prime Minister-elect Justin Trudeau received a congratulatory call from China’s ambassador Luo Zhaohui. The next day, the state-run China Daily newspaper celebrated “improved prospects for a Free Trade Agreement with China” under Canada’s new Liberal government. A week later Premier Li Keqiang himself picked up the phone.
Both the Trudeau Liberals in Ottawa and the Wynne Government at Queen's Park in Toronto have been making noises of late on the subject of Basic Income. The last Ontario Budget, in fact, declared an intention to carry out a pilot project in a community still to be announced. While no clear details are yet available, it is very likely that we will soon be dealing with a practical initiative that we will have to respond to. We will have to consider how we view the possibility of the Liberals moving in the direction of a Basic Income system.
Gordon Laxer has just written a new book titled After the Sands: Energy and Ecological Security for Canadians. In it, the founding director of the Parkland Institute and long-time Council of Canadians Board member, argues for the need to plan beyond the tar sands, which he refers to as the Sands.
