Tag: canada

Canadian YouTuber builds ‘Flock-like’ camera to exclusively track police vehicles, gets a visit from police — officers visit his home to express privacy concerns

A YouTuber has received an unexpected visit from the police over an automatic license plate recognition (ALPR) camera he built to specifically track police cars, using the same technology law enforcement has infamously used to track ordinary citizens. In a video posted to his channel on October 7, Anthony Sistilli says two police officers showed up at his doorstep on September 20th to ask questions about the device, asking what his intentions were with the project.

Sistilli, a Canadian software engineer and YouTuber, pointed out the irony of the officers’ concerns, explaining that they mirror the privacy concerns of ordinary citizens who are growing increasingly weary of the recent spike in blanket surveillance brought about by a mass installation of ALPR cameras. Flock Safety, a U.S. public safety technology company, recently scaled its centralized national surveillance network to over 120,000 cameras operating across 49 states, according to the company, capturing billions of vehicle scans every month.

The development sparked widespread public backlash, with critics arguing that Flock has quietly built a massive government surveillance dragnet without a public vote or federal oversight, since any police department on the network can search across state lines. Security researchers later discovered the network included 335,701 Flock cameras and created a “Flock Surveillance Map,” exposing their locations.

Similar ALPR camera surveillance networks exist in Canada, where Sistilli resides, prompting him to build his own device, but this time, encoded to exclusively track police cars. He detailed the build in several TikTok videos, describing it as “a personal Flock surveillance camera to Flock the Flockers.” He then posted a video of himself using the device in real life. The video brought Peel Regional Police, the local law enforcement serving Sistilli’s city, Brampton, Ontario, to his doorstep two weeks later.

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‘No More Pipelines’ law is unconstitutional: Alberta Court

Ottawa’s controversial “No More Pipelines” law has suffered another constitutional defeat, with Alberta’s highest court ruling 4–1 on Friday that the legislation still oversteps federal authority despite attempts to fix it.

“Yet another big win for Alberta,” Premier Danielle Smith declared Friday on social media.

The legislation, introduced through Bill C-69 in 2019, governs federal environmental assessments of major infrastructure and resource projects, including mines and pipelines.

The Alberta Court of Appeal first found the law unconstitutional in 2022. The Supreme Court of Canada largely agreed in a 5–2 ruling in 2023, rejecting its designated projects scheme while upholding provisions governing federal projects.

Ottawa amended the legislation in 2024, but Alberta challenged the changes, arguing they failed to address the Supreme Court’s concerns.

Friday’s ruling found that Ottawa could still use limited federal interests to regulate entire provincial projects, exceeding its constitutional authority. The majority also rejected using federal responsibilities toward Indigenous peoples to justify broader regulation.

Justice Kevin Feehan dissented, finding that Ottawa’s amendments sufficiently addressed the Supreme Court’s concerns.

Smith urged Prime Minister Mark Carney’s government to accept the ruling rather than pursue another appeal.

“The Alberta Court of Appeal just ruled that C-69 remains largely unconstitutional,” she said.

“I’m calling on the Federal Government to accept this ruling, refrain from yet another appeal, and immediately work with Alberta and the other provinces to clean up this flawed Trudeau-era legislation once and for all so it no longer inhibits economic development in our country.”

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Liberals accused of feeding bill details to CBC and Globe before MPs

Conservative and NDP MPs are accusing the Liberal government of giving journalists advance details of legislation before parliamentarians could examine it, alleging the leaks undermine parliamentary scrutiny.

As reported by Blacklock’s Reporter, NDP MP Don Davies joined Conservative Opposition House Leader Andrew Scheer in condemning disclosures about Bill C-40, which would make the Defence Investment Agency a Crown corporation.

The government tabled the bill Tuesday. A day earlier, the Globe and Mail reported the planned change, citing three unnamed sources. CBC published a similar report that evening, citing two federal sources.

Both outlets said their sources were not authorized to speak publicly. The Prime Minister’s Office told the Globe it would not comment on legislation before it was tabled.

Davies, who represents Vancouver Kingsway, argued that the reports contained substantive details unavailable to MPs and beyond what the bill’s title disclosed on the order paper.

He accused the government of repeatedly using unauthorized disclosures to influence public debate, saying leaks become a parliamentary privilege issue when legislation is already on notice, but MPs have yet to see it.

Davies said parliamentarians must defend their right to receive legislative details before journalists do.

Scheer also raised the matter in the Commons, arguing that leaking provisions of Bill C-40 showed contempt for Parliament.

“The House must stand up for its rights,” Scheer said, criticizing a government he accused of treating Parliament as “a mere speed bump.”

The objections concern opposition allegations of a breach of parliamentary privilege. The supplied report does not identify a Speaker’s ruling on the matter.

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Carney’s little conflict of interest

Prime Minister Mark Carney is facing conflict-of-interest allegations over his $2-billion heat pump rebate program, following revelations about past investments in manufacturers that could benefit from the subsidies.

Conservative MPs have questioned whether his former ties to Brookfield and related businesses create a conflict, much like other government initiatives launched since Carney took office. The available disclosures on the matter do not technically establish that Carney designed the program to benefit those companies, but the connection seems obvious to critics.

Prime Minister Mark Carney is facing conflict-of-interest allegations over his $2-billion heat pump rebate program after ethics filings revealed past investments in manufacturers that could benefit from the taxpayer-funded subsidies.

“How is that not corrupt?” Conservative MP John Brassard, chair of the Commons ethics committee, demanded in the House of Commons on Thursday.

“The conflict of interest is so blatantly obvious, but what’s surprising is the Prime Minister’s not even hiding it anymore,” Brassard said.

Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre also accused Carney of directing taxpayer money toward Brookfield-connected businesses while speaking to reporters on Parliament Hill before question period.

“The Prime Minister just finished announcing he’s going to take $2 billion out of the pockets of Canadians and give it to companies like those owned by Brookfield,” Poilievre said.

He argued Canadians should decide for themselves whether to purchase heat pumps rather than have Ottawa redistribute their money.

The rebates, however, are intended for homeowners rather than direct corporate grants, although manufacturers and installers could benefit from increased demand.

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Canada bleeds 110,000 jobs in two months as unemployment hits 6.5%—Alberta spared

Canada shed 68,000 jobs in September, bringing losses over the past two months to 110,000 as unemployment climbed to 6.5 per cent, according to Statistics Canada.

The latest Labour Force Survey, released Friday, showed the second consecutive month of employment declines, following 42,000 jobs lost in August.

The September figures were far worse than economists expected. Forecasters had anticipated 9,200 new jobs, missing the actual result by more than 77,000 positions.

Full-time employment fell by 35,000 positions, while part-time employment declined by 33,000.

Public sector employment dropped by 70,000 positions, its fourth consecutive monthly decline, while self-employment fell by 23,000. Private sector employment was little changed.

Young Canadians were among the hardest hit, accounting for 48,000 job losses in September. Another 50,000 young people left the labour force, leaving the youth unemployment rate relatively unchanged at 13 per cent.

Women aged 25 to 54 also lost 28,000 jobs, pushing their unemployment rate to 5.3 per cent.

Quebec recorded the largest provincial decline, shedding 49,000 jobs, followed by British Columbia with 20,000. Alberta bucked the trend, adding 23,000 positions.

Canada’s labour force participation rate fell to 64.8 per cent, its lowest level since December 1997, excluding the pandemic. Statistics Canada attributed much of the longer-term decline to population aging.

Finding employment has also become more difficult. Just 30.6 per cent of Canadians unemployed in August found work in September, compared with 32.8 per cent a year earlier.

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Canada Slams Brakes On Euthanasia For Mental Illness Indefinitely, Then Votes Down Tory Bill To Ban It Outright

Canada will not extend medically assisted death to people whose only condition is mental illness, Justice Minister Sean Fraser announced Wednesday, as CP24 reports. The Liberals will table legislation this fall to make the exclusion indefinite, although the bill is still being drafted and has no date.

“Canada has made a decision not to move forward with the expansion that is scheduled in the Criminal Code of medical assistance in dying in circumstances where mental illness is the sole basis,” Fraser told reporters on Parliament Hill. The expansion is set to take effect in March 2027, after the Trudeau government delayed it in 2024 until after the next federal election.

Fraser said the decision reflects the direction of a special joint parliamentary committee, which heard from more than three dozen witnesses and reported in June. He cited “very real concerns about people who live in communities with inadequate access to mental-health services” and testimony on “a lack of consensus when mental illness is irremediable.” He said the government had only “very, very recently finally formalized its position,” more than three months after the report, and that it was not “based on where we believe the politics is going to land.”

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2SLGBTQIA+ Activists Demand a WHOPPING $450 MILLION in Taxpayer Funding from Canadian Government to Expand LGBTQ Agenda

A coalition of more than 40 LGBTQ advocacy organizations descended on Parliament Hill in Ottawa on Tuesday, demanding that Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney’s government commit a staggering $450 million ($350 million US) in taxpayer funding over the next five years to expand the country’s federal LGBTQ action plan.

That’s $450 million in Canadian dollars, equivalent to roughly $325 million in U.S. currency, that activists want Ottawa to commit to their expanding programs and initiatives.

According to NOW Toronto, approximately 45 LGBTQ, human rights, feminist, and labor organizations participated in what organizers described as the largest-ever Queer Day of Action on Parliament Hill on October 6.

Organizers branded the lobby day the largest-ever “Queer day” on the Hill. The money would renew and expand the federal 2SLGBTQI+ Action Plan before it expires in March 2027. That plan was launched by Justin Trudeau in August 2022 with $100 million over five years, about $70 million US, a massive 350% increase over the original allocation.

The day was organized by Queer Momentum, Rainbow Railroad, Egale Canada, Pride at Work Canada, Fierté Canada Pride, and Dignity Network Canada, with more than 40 allied groups in tow, according to a CNW release from the Society of Queer Momentum.

Delegates spent the day in meetings with MPs, senators, and ministers’ offices, then closed with a reception in the Senate co-hosted by the Canadian Pride Caucus. NOW Toronto reported the coalition’s line as “double down, not back down.”

The coalition also wants Canada to expand its international LGBTQ advocacy programs.

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Assisted Suicide in Canada: Beware the Slippery Slope

verywhere that assisted suicide has been legalized, critics have warned that, however tight the initial restrictions limiting the use of this so-called process may at first be, its legalization could become the beginning of a slippery slope. Canada was not the first country to legalize assisted suicide. But Canada is presently the poster child for what the slippery slope looks like. Although Canada’s Criminal Code, which governs this procedure, originally required two witnesses to the application it was subsequently amended to require only one. For those who are curious as to where the slippery slope can ultimately lead, a recent case has spelled this out quite clearly: it leads to a criminal investigation.

The term assisted suicide is an oxymoron. Unless one dies of illness, old age, or accident, there are only two ways by which a life may be ended, both of which are defined by agency. If one dies by one’s own hand, then it is a suicide; if by the hand of another, then it is a homicide. But reality is not that simple. Since the assisted suicide process in its various forms was introduced, both the morality and legality of the matter turn on one thing: the patient’s consent. The public is divided on the morality of the process, but the one thing that the public and the law are not divided about is the issue of consent. Everything depends on the patient’s desire and ability to give consent. That is the issue at the heart of the criminal investigation.

Brigitte Stegemann — affectionately known by her family as “GG” — was an eighty-three-year-old grandmother from a devout Christian family. For twelve years, her namesake granddaughter, Brigitte Kranendonk, was GG’s medical advocate and also had Power of Attorney. For the last two years of her life, GG was a resident of a nursing home in the town of Belleville, Ontario. Towards the end of her life, she had some issues in understanding what people were saying to her, in part because she was deaf in one ear as well as partially deaf in the other, and also due to cognitive decline. But her granddaughter Brigitte was always capable of clearly communicating with her even through a medical mask. Therefore, during the two years that GG had been a resident of the home, staff had constantly consulted with her on all matters of care. About five months before her death, GG was diagnosed with terminal stage-four stomach cancer. The possibility of assisted suicide was then raised with Brigitte present, and it was determined that GG did not want to go that route due to her Christian faith.

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Canada’s MAiD Program Was About to Euthanize a Woman for This Insane Reason

Opponents of government-backed assisted suicide have rightly argued that the program always, invariably, leads to a slippery slope of government-backed euthanasia. Those opponents have been proven right time and again, but no more so than with Canada’s Medical Assistance in Dying (MAiD) program. Hailed as a compassionate death for people with terminal illnesses like cancer, it was meant to ease suffering.

Instead, it’s killing more people than U.S. gun deaths and outpacing euthanized animals, including people with treatable diseases like hyperparathyroidism or mental health issues, veterans, the poor and homeless, and even infants and children. The vast majority of victims are white, affluent Canadians because if you can’t tax the rich to death, you can always put them down like dogs, we suppose.

A Canadian woman’s euthanasia request was recently approved, and the reason is as ridiculous as it is scary: she could no longer cook for her family. That’s it. She wasn’t terminal. She wasn’t actively dying. She just couldn’t cook, and the state okayed euthanasia.

Top Canadian doctors are raising alarm bells over the country’s seemingly quick approval for assisted dying requests, after one elderly woman was accepted based on the fact that she lost the ability to cook meals for her family.

Doctors Gary Rodin and Madeline Li from the University of Toronto shared mounting fears among Canada‘s healthcare professionals over increasing cases of euthanasia approvals. 

The psychiatry professors said they aren’t opposed to legalized medical assistance in dying, but stressed that Canadian law does not require healthcare professionals to guide patients toward seeking alternative help. 

In an opinion piece in the New York Times, the doctors said that the procedure is intended to provide a ‘dignified’ last resort, typically for those who are terminally ill. 

But, in recent years, ‘too many people are receiving the procedure without the opportunity for careful reflection about it with a health provider,’ Rodin and Li wrote. 

‘In some cases, patients are being approved who should not be,’ they added, citing mounting reports of euthanasia being approved for patients claiming loneliness or poverty.

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Trump’s Other War

As the midterm election draws near, a number of Republicans in tough races are distancing themselves from President Trump’s war. The war is unpopular because it has inflicted economic pain on the already-suffering American people.

No, I am not talking about the Iran War. I am talking about President Trump’s tariff war.

The Tax Foundation estimates that, since he returned to the White House, President Trump has imposed tariffs on about 54 percent of imported goods.

Contrary to the claims of power-hungry politicians and corporatists seeking protection from overseas competitors, the financial burden of tariffs falls on American businesses and consumers, not foreign exporters. Tariffs are a tax on Americans.

President Trump’s tariffs have been estimated to impose an over 800 dollars tax on the average American household this year.

Tariff defenders claim tariffs boost domestic industries, thus strengthening the US economy. The truth is, while tariffs may benefit some industries that have major competition from abroad, tariffs harm American businesses, like farms, that rely on exports for a substantial share of revenue. Additionally, countries often respond to increased tariffs on goods exported to the US by raising tariffs on imports from the US.

High tariffs also hurt businesses that rely on importing raw materials and parts necessary to make their products.

According to a survey of 4,150 registered voters conducted by the Cato Institute and Morning Consult, 74 percent of Americans view tariffs as a factor in the price increases that continue to bedevil American families, while 53 percent of Americans understand that tariffs weaken the US economy.

The survey’s most disheartening result — at least for President Trump and Republicans preparing to face the voters in less than a month — is that 49 percent of Americans say President Trump’s tariffs have made their lives worse.

President Trump launched his tariff war without receiving approval from Congress, even though Article One of the Constitution gives Congress, not the president, the power “to lay and collect” taxes. In order to get around the Constitution, President Trump claimed that federal laws giving the president emergency powers give him the authority to impose tariffs and thus increase taxes on the American people.

President Trump’s claim regarding his authority to impose tariffs without authorization from Congress was struck down by the Supreme Court. Then, instead of taking the opportunity the court gave him to end his tariff war, President Trump simply found new justifications to impose tariffs.

One of President Trump’s latest tariff targets is Canada. The Canadian government responded to President Trump’s tariffs by imposing tariffs on US goods. President Trump then responded by forbidding the importation of a long list of Canadian goods. Once again President Trump acted without getting authorization from Congress.

President Trump’s tariffs have raised prices for American consumers, increased production costs for many American businesses that rely on imported materials and goods, and hurt farmers and other export-reliant business.

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