Canada

Hi There! I'm new to Lemmy! I'm from Cape Breton Island and want to connect with other Cape Bretoners. Let's here from you all.

Liberal Party members have chosen former central banker Mark Carney to be their new leader and the next prime minister of Canada.

Carney secured enough votes in the first round of voting to win the job, party president Sachit Mehra announced.

B.C. unlikely to follow Ontario's lead in slapping surcharge on power exports, premier says

"We're working with other premiers and with the federal government on how we can support the Team Canada approach with no-tariff responses," he said on March 5 about the possibility of B.C. imposing its own surcharges. [...]

Eby also said he is working on "contingency planning" should things escalate.

For example, he noted the impacts of Elon Musk's DOGE — Department of Government Efficiency — on B.C.'s power partners.

B.C.'s power grid is connected to the United States through the Bonneville Power Administration, an agency within the U.S. Department of Energy that both buys from and sells to British Columbia, as needed.

The agency is down hundreds of positions following mass firings by the Trump administration. [...]

Eby and Harrison both said B.C. has been hindered in the past because Alberta has its own regulatory scheme for managing power, focused around private providers, while B.C.'s grid relies on the publicly-owned B.C. Hydro.

But with increased interest in interprovincial trade, Eby said progress was being made on harmonizing standards to allow power to flow more freely across the Rockies, something Harrison applauded.

Eby also said similar conversations were happening with Yukon, where the barriers are more about geography and a lack of infrastructure rather than politics. [...]

B.C. has also announced plans to rapidly increase its own power supply both through the finalization of the Site C dam and the fast-tracking of several wind power projects across the province.

Shifting geopolitics, climate change, and U.S. President Donald Trump's volatility have highlighted the urgency for Canada to secure its Arctic. Mike Armstrong reports from Chisasibi, Que., on how the Canadian military is training for the bone-chilling challenges of sub-Arctic warfare.

Surcharge will generate up to $400K per day to be used for worker, business supports: province

Ontario is imposing a 25 per cent surcharge on all U.S.-bound electricity as part of its retaliatory measures against U.S. President Donald Trump's tariffs on Canadian goods.

The new levy took effect Monday and will add about $10 per megawatt-hour to the cost of power heading south, the province says. It will generate an estimated $300,000 to $400,000 per day, money that will be used to support workers and businesses hit by U.S. tariffs.

Linked National Post on purpose. Given their bias I believe they'd present the worst case scenario.

E: Apparently the article is from 2016 so the cost is likely higher today.

Summary:

Concerns About Social Media: The author draws parallels between concerns that led to discussions about banning TikTok in the U.S. and the current state of X (formerly Twitter).

X as a Threat: The author argues that X, under Elon Musk's ownership, poses a threat to Canadian democracy.

Increased Racism and Misinformation: The platform is described as having become more racist and a source of increasing misinformation since Musk's acquisition.

Content Moderation: Musk's leadership is criticized for gutting content moderation, unbanning alt-right figures, and turning the platform into a partisan propaganda machine.

"Free Speech Absolutism": Musk's defense of his actions using "free speech absolutism" is dismissed as untenable.

Canadian Law: Canadian freedom of expression law is noted to be more robust than that of the U.S., allowing for reasonable limits on speech.

Foreign Influence: The author suggests that X's current conduct would not be tolerated if it were aligned with a government like China.

Musk and Trump: Musk's close ties to Donald Trump and the potential for pro-Trump propaganda targeting Canadian voters are highlighted as a specific threat.

Echoes of the Broadcasting Act: The author draws a parallel to the Broadcasting Act of 1958, which restricted foreign ownership of broadcasters to protect Canadian discourse.

Message to Social Media Companies: Banning X would send a message to other social media companies about their responsibilities to Canadians.

Call to Action: The author urges the current Prime Minister to ban X before the next election.

Trump's annexation comments: Notes Trump's comments about annexing Canada.

X as an Anti-Canadian Propaganda Machine: Concludes that X should be treated as a real threat.

Trump has been making Canada out to be a dangerous place with a weak border but too many Canadians are victims of gun violence. Our government officials and media need to start reporting each time American guns are being used in crime. What do you think?

We cannot overlook the likelihood that these Palestinian solidarity encampments were labelled security threats because of the relentless pressures on university administrators exerted by Zionist politicians and pro-Zionist government officials to characterize any criticism of Israel as threatening to the "safety" of Jewish students and faculty. Such pressures have been well-documented in the cases of the Universities of Alberta and Calgary, and are exhibited in many of the submissions to the House of Commons Standing Committee on Justice and Human Rights' investigation of "antisemitism" on Canadian campuses (May 2024). Notably, the committee's December 2024 report recommended, among other measures, that universities adopt the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance definition of antisemitism which encompasses anti-Zionism or criticism of the state of Israel.

Renters in Manitoba are experiencing astronomical rent hikes above the provincial allowable rent increase guidelines – and it’s completely legal. In 2022, the average rent increase was 9.8%, but documented increases have been as high as 30%, 50% and 126% during the affordability crisis. Renters, meanwhile, will tell you that, yes, water is wet. And landlords have been allowed to work this system for years.

Renters need stronger rent regulations to stop landlords from using AGIs as a loophole to hike rents. We need fairness for tenants.

The reality is that the next federal election will not save us, and regardless of what you think of my writing, you certainly know this deep down. Even a Carney reprieve is unlikely to stave off an even more rabid Conservative party in the next election after this one. But if we aren’t clear-eyed about what is happening, then we sure as hell cannot see where we’re going. And to have a banker, a CEO’s man in the office of Prime Minister, it is going to bring with it a world of challenges that near certainly will pave the road for someone worse than Poilievre.

Outgoing Prime Minister Justin Trudeau addresses supporters in his final speech as Liberal leader soon before Canadians find out who the party has chosen as its new leader.

Through laughter, Lori Brem tells the story of the meeting that brought her brother Jonathan Hooker, a New Zealand resident, and her Uncle Darryl Flett from northern Manitoba together for the first time.

The three relatives met in Texas in November 2024. Brem, a resident of China Spring, Texas, and Hooker, of Mount Maunganui, New Zealand, share the same birth father and Flett is their uncle.

Brem and Hooker are survivors of the Sixties Scoop, where First Nations, Métis and Inuit children were removed from their homes and placed with non-Indigenous foster or adoptive parents between 1951 and 1991, and lost their cultural identities as a result.

Brem was taken from Swan River, Man., along with her siblings. Hooker was taken from Moose Lake, Man.

Archived

In January, a public inquiry into foreign election interference raised concerns about the threat of hostile nations, such as China and Russia, meddling in Canada’s democracy.

While these worries are well founded, Canadians should be equally concerned about the threat posed by our southern neighbour and erstwhile closest ally, the United States, whose tech companies control nearly all our digital public infrastructure, and whose leaders are increasingly aligned with a second Donald Trump administration which poses a direct threat to Canadian sovereignty.

[...]

Throughout most of their history, the major social media platforms have generally reflected this democratic spirit, including strong attitudes toward freedom of expression and a general reticence against appearing politically partisan.

Increasing authoritarianism in the U.S.

But that era is now at an end and Canadians need to be clear-eyed about the danger that American social media platforms will abuse their enormous power and influence to undermine Canadian democracy.