Your forecast
Mainly cloudy, with a 30 per cent chance of flurries early this morning. Wind becoming northwest at 20 km/h gusting to 40 this morning. High 6 C, wind chill -7 this morning. UV index 5 or moderate.
What’s happening today
The Bank of Canada is widely expected to keep its benchmark interest rate unchanged at 2.25 per cent when it announces its latest decision later this morning. The Canadian Press reports.
People make their way past the Bank of Canada building in downtown Ottawa on Tuesday. (Sean Kilpatrick / The Canadian Press)
Today’s must-read
Manitoba may impose billion-dollar fines on tech companies that violate a proposed ban on social media and AI chatbots for youths under the age of 16.
“The enforcement is going to have to include a fine framework and they’re going to be bigger fines than you’ve ever seen in Manitoba before,” Premier Wab Kinew said Tuesday. “Probably, with some numbers that have B’s in them.”
Kinew took questions after announcing Saturday that Manitoba would be the first Canadian province to ban social media for youth.
Manitoba Premier Wab Kinew said enforcement for a youth-social-media ban will include “bigger fines than you’ve ever seen in Manitoba before.” (Mike Deal / Free Press)
The fines need to be huge to deter big tech platforms that rake in billions of dollars at the expense of targeted youth, Kinew said at an unrelated event.
“In my mind, we have to set the fines at a level that we’ve never seen in this province before,” he said.
Companies such as Meta Platforms, Inc, which owns Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp, Messenger and Threads, will spend more money on data centres this year than the entire size of Manitoba’s economy, he said. Carol Sanders has the story.
On the bright side
Derek McLennan looks forward to having a bigger kitchen.
The 34-year-old, who has cerebral palsy and uses a wheelchair, has volunteered for Manitoba Possible since he was 18. Before that, he used the non-profit organization’s many services.
By fall, he’ll have a new and spacious accessible community kitchen in which he can hold supper clubs, which he does twice a month.
The renovated kitchen will feature accessible appliances and height-adjusted counters and tables for people who use wheelchairs. There will be plenty of room for social events hosted by the organization. Nicole Buffie has more here.
McLennan looks forward to using Manitoba Possible’s new, accessible community kitchen. (Nicole Buffie / Free Press)
On this date
On April 29, 1953: The Winnipeg Free Press reported a “peace offensive” in eastern Europe was accompanied by bigger signs of war preparation than ever behind the Iron Curtain. In Ottawa, Liberal MP for Qu’Appelle Austin Edward Dewar resigned his seat in Parliament after reading a statement denying any wrongdoing in dealings with a friend who held government contracts in Saskatchewan.
Today’s front page
Get the full story: Read today’s e-edition of the Free Press.
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