Ford also announced on Wednesday that the province’s flawed double-blue licence plates will be scrapped.
“I’m not putting any more resources to this,” the premier told reporters.
In Canada
Ford also said on Wednesday that he was rejecting a request from one of the province’s local medical officers of health for more autonomy, in terms of gradually lifting the restrictions in place to manage and contain COVID-19.
“The answer is no,” Ford said in his daily press conference, when asked by iPolitics about the letter sent to him by Kingston, Frontenac, Lennox and Addington medical officer Kieran Moore — which was signed, jointly, by the warden of Lennox and Addington, the warden of Frontenac, and the mayor of Kingston.
Federal ministers faced questions from opposition MPs on Wednesday on all parts of Ottawa’s COVID-19 response during a weekly in-person gathering in the House of Commons, including on eligibility requirements for Canadian businesses to access federal support.
Ontario removed a hurdle for doctors making trips to the province’s long-term care homes to diagnose patients for COVID-19 by promising to compensate them as they would at a hospital.
The Ontario Medical Association told members in one of its special coronavirus email updates that doctors deployed to test patients for COVID-19 at long-term care homes will now be paid the same amount they would receive for conducting testing at COVID-19 assessment centres.
Opposition MPs say the federal government’s announcement of a $252 million aid package for the agriculture sector falls short of addressing the needs of financially hurting cattle and hog producers.
In a teleconference meeting of the House agriculture committee Tuesday night, MPs pressed for more help for the sector, saying the funding isn’t enough to sustain these producers and that the program relies heavily on farmers increasing their borrowing capacity. They also noted that nearly half of the aid is rehashed from existing agriculture funding.
The Trudeau government has made another multimillion-dollar investment into the development of the F-35 stealth fighter jet, even as it considers a new extension to the $19-billion competition to replace Canada’s aging fleet of CF-18s. Canada made the annual F-35 payment to the U.S. military last week, spending US$70.1 million to remain one of nine partner countries in the project.
The Canadian Press has the details.
Two federal opposition party leaders say Ottawa should simply let the country’s struggling oil and gas industry wither and die.
Green Party parliamentary leader Elizabeth May says governments around the world should use the pandemic as an opportunity to reorganize the energy mix and find other jobs for Albertans working in the sector. Meanwhile, Bloc Québécois Leader Yves-François Blanchet said Alberta’s “tar sands” are “condemned” and federal funds should be directed at supporting renewable energy sources instead.
Just over 71 per cent of businesses owned by women, Indigenous people, visible minorities, immigrants and persons with disabilities have reported a high drop in demand, reports a new survey — six per cent higher than the national average.
The joint online survey by Statistics Canada and the Canadian Chamber of Commerce on business conditions during COVID-19, conducted from April 3 to 24 and reaching representatives from more than 12,600 businesses, also found that nearly 35 per cent of these businesses experienced a 50 per cent or more decrease in revenue, compared to the national average of 26.2 per cent.
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