AI safety advocates say bill a good ‘first step’ on regulation, but more needed

The federal government’s proposed online safety legislation is a good start on regulating artificial intelligence chatbots — but more work will be needed to protect Canadians from their potential harms, a pair of advocates say.

Bill C-34, introduced earlier this month in the House of Commons, would regulate the companies behind AI chatbots by imposing on them a duty to act “responsibly.”

It includes measures to lower the risk of chatbots communicating harmful content and would put in place crisis intervention protocols for cases involving self-harm, suicide or violence.

Wyatt Tessari L’Allié, founder of Artificial Intelligence Governance and Safety Canada, said the bill’s effectiveness depends on how the details are worked out.

‘This is nuts’: The hard-fought race to build Canada’s next submarine fleet

From a massive ad blitz featuring Canadian broadcast icon Peter Mansbridge to a cabinet minister calling on shipbuilders to cough up a car plant, the brief race to replace Canada’s aging submarine fleet turned heads in more ways than one.

More than words: Military-Indigenous reconciliation event aims to build bridges between past and future

Bagpipes and traditional Indigenous drums played as one Saturday morning at the Canadian Forces Base in Winnipeg for the first Indigenous Reconciliation Gathering.

Ahead of National Indigenous Peoples Day Sunday, the Canadian Armed Forces hosted a full day of programming focused on bridging the gap between the military and Indigenous communities.

“What we really want to do is we want to move away from words,” said Lt. Col. Josh Van Tine. “There’s a lot of talk about reconciliation, but actions are harder to find, and we want to move beyond words and move to actions. We hope that people see we’re serious about it.”

The event is based on the Truth and Reconciliation Commission’s 57th call to action, which is to provide education to public servants on the history of Indigenous people.

Confronting the scourge of polio

From 1928 to 1953, polio epidemics occurred in Manitoba every three to five years. The pain for the young victims was often excruciating. The vast majority of children recovered, yet many experienced lifelong disabilities from the disease.

Rise in female chiefs ‘a beautiful resurgence’

BRANDON — One month after Birdtail Sioux First Nation member Tréchelle Bunn was elected chief of her community, she was described on the Matriarch Movement podcast as a woman “who truly embodies what this movement is all about.”

“At just 25 years old, Tréchelle is making history while balancing law school, community leadership and national advocacy,” wrote podcast host and founder Shayla Oulette Stonechild. “Her journey reminds us that the next generation isn’t just preparing to lead — they are leading.”

Bunn was the first woman and youngest person to be elected chief of the First Nation in western Manitoba. It was a historic moment in her community and part of a larger story of the changing role of women in First Nations today.

Assembly of First Nations National Chief Cindy Woodhouse Nepinak noted earlier this year that a record number of female chiefs — 164 — were leading First Nations across the country.

Sask. Métis village grapples with child abductions, North-West Rebellion

Major events and big personalities can overshadow the lives of ordinary people, but even the youngest and seemingly least important members of a society can help shape communities.

In Treat Them as Buffalo, Blair Palmer Yoxall has portrayed various characters in a Métis village in 1885 Saskatchewan through the life of a 12-year-old boy named Nikosis (Niko) Eriksen and his interactions with relatives and friends in the context of a community crisis and Louis Riel’s rebellion.

Yoxall is an Alberta Métis writer and poet with a master of arts in English in Indigenous literature and westerns. His fiction has won a range of prizes and landed on a number of short lists. His prose and poetry pieces have appeared in Glass Buffalo, the Fiddlehead and Carving Space: The Indigenous Voices Awards Anthology. Treat Them as Buffalo is his first novel.

The novel follows Nikosis (Cree for “my son”) as he attempts to sort out the events occurring in his home community, Lac-aux-Trois-Pistoles, Sask., in 1885. Several boys, including Niko’s cousin, have disappeared from the town, with some reappearing mutilated or dead. Niko’s mother, grandmother and aunt try to protect him, while other women in the community attempt to find their missing sons and grandsons. Meanwhile, a fierce fighting woman named Kate McCannon seeks to resolve the situation, offering to help with the search and rescue operations.

Stopping AI ‘slop shots’ in modern politics

Welcome to the new frontier of AI campaign advertising. It is real, even if the content it produces is not.

How Canada can continue to lead on news policy

As a proud Dane, I have long admired the warm relations and respect between my country and our close, like-minded friends in Canada.

At the end of the Second World War, British Prime Minister Winston Churchill wanted to stop the Red Army’s westward advance. The 1st Canadian Parachute Battalion was sent to do the job. Canadian troops encountered the Red Army in Wismar, located on Germany’s Baltic coast. The Canadians effectively blocked a Soviet advance into the Kingdom of Denmark — while that was long ago, it will never be forgotten.

We share a 3,000 km border, which has not been without controversy, but the issue has always been based on good humour and friendship. From 1973 to 2022, we “fought” over Hans Island, which is located between Ellesmere Island and Greenland and measures just 1.2 square kilometres. We were, however, able to resolve the dispute not with weapons, but with whiskey.

For many years, I was CEO of JP/Politiken Media Group, one of the largest media companies in the Nordics. As the employer of 3,000 people, I had a responsibility to ensure the long-term sustainability of the Danish news media ecosystem. Now, as CEO of WAN-IFRA (World Association of News Publishers), that responsibility is global, and it is one I take very seriously.

Manitoba appoints Canada’s first judge of reconciliation

The Manitoba government has appointed provincial court Judge Jerilee Ryle as associate chief judge of reconciliation, the first appointment of its kind in Canada.

Ryle perfect choice for Manitoba’s first associate chief judge for reconciliation

Judge Jerilee Ryle is more qualified than the majority of Manitoba judges on the issue of how to best serve Indigenous peoples in Manitoba’s justice system.

Inuit could pursue foreign partners if relationship with Ottawa sours: ITK leader

OTTAWA - Canada's national Inuit organization is calling on the federal government to be better partners, saying Canada must respect Inuit rights to governance and self-determination.

Inuit Tapiriit Kanatami wrapped up a two-day Arctic sovereignty conference in Ottawa on Friday.

In a statement following the summit, ITK says it firmly rejects what it calls "outdated, colonial approaches to Arctic policy that repeat Canada’s past mistakes of marginalizing" Inuit.

"We call on the federal government to partner with Inuit in advancing a more ambitious vision for its Arctic territory by prioritizing improved coordination with Inuit rights holders in decision-making, and the investments in the infrastructure and services needed to create prosperity and bring the entirety of Inuit Nunangat into the rest of the country," ITK said in a statement.

World Refugee Day marked with celebration, reflection

The strength, courage and resilience of Manitoba refugees who have fled conflicts around the world were recognized as World Refugee Day was celebrated Thursday at Central Park downtown.

Newcomers of all backgrounds shared their stories and showcased their cultures.

Parwana Fasihi told her story to a crowd of people, detailing how her family fled Afghanistan with some clothes when the Taliban retook control of the country in 2021.

“It was a day that all the dreams, all the hope and all the plans I had for my future changed in one moment,” said Fasihi afterwards in an interview.

210 years of resistance: the Métis at Seven Oaks

This battle, which took place in present-day Winnipeg, was part of the Pemmican War, which saw several altercations between the Hudson’s Bay and North West companies as they fought for domination of the fur trade between 1812 and 1821.

Smith tells First Nations chiefs to ‘check themselves’ over treason accusation

Alberta Premier Danielle Smith said Wednesday that a group of Indigenous chiefs need to "check themselves," after they accused her of potential treasonous activity for calling a separation vote.

The Assembly of Treaty Chiefs, representing First Nations across Alberta, unanimously voted this week to ask RCMP to look into whether the province's fall referendum amounts to criminal treason by Smith and her United Conservative Party.

The chiefs, in a news release, said organizing the vote is an intentional treaty violation and that Smith's government is ignoring serious risks to Canada's sovereignty.

They said that when their treaties were signed, the RCMP — then the North West Mounted Police — committed to ensuring the safety of First Nations, while the Crown promised goodwill in exchange for sharing the land.

Conservative MP’s bill on intimate partner violence becomes law

OTTAWA - Canada will take a harder stance on intimate partner violence after a Conservative MP’s private member’s bill became law Wednesday.

The Criminal Code will soon be updated to allow the killer of an intimate partner to be charged with first-degree murder regardless of whether the act was premeditated.

Bill C-225, which received royal assent in Parliament on Wednesday, will make first-degree murder applicable to killings that happen as part of a pattern of coercive or controlling conduct.

Frank Caputo, Conservative MP for Kamloops-Thomson-Nicola, put forward the private member's bill.

One of Canada’s most prominent MAID providers reflects on divisive decade

TORONTO - Dr. Ellen Wiebe has never been one to shy away from risk.

It started with the very first patient she provided with a medically assisted death: Hanne Schafer, a 66-year-old Calgary psychologist diagnosed with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis three months before retiring in 2013.

MAID was three years away from legalization, but Schafer was quickly losing her ability to talk, walk, eat and drink and wanted the procedure as soon as she could get it. On Feb. 29, 2016, a judge approved her request, more than three months before MAID would become legal on June 17.

The next hurdle was finding a doctor prepared to do it, recalls Schafer’s husband Daniel Laurin. He credits Wiebe with helping his late wife when no one else would: "It was a very humane thing to do.”

Committee majority recommends against MAID for mental illness, four senators object

OTTAWA - A parliamentary committee is calling on the federal government to indefinitely exclude people with mental illness from becoming eligible for medical assistance in dying, after a process that some of the committee's members decried as flawed and biased.

Conservative and Liberal members of Parliament on the committee co-signed that single recommendation in a report Wednesday that included a number of dissenting opinions.

People with a mental illness as their sole underlying condition are set to become eligible to apply for medical assistance in dying, or MAID, next March.

The committee of MPs and senators was tasked with studying whether the country is ready for that to happen.

Potash ‘test shipment’ planned for Churchill

The owner of Manitoba’s sole potash mine plans to send its first shipment to Europe via the Port of Churchill this fall.

Upwards of 200 tonnes of potash will travel to the Port of Antwerp-Bruges in Belgium, said Daymon Guillas, president of the Potash Agri Development Corporation of Manitoba (PADCOM).

From there, it’ll be taken to a client in France.

“This is a test shipment,” said Guillas, who declined to give the customer’s name.

Justice minister says he will review MAID committee testimony before making decision

OTTAWA - Justice Minister Sean Fraser says he will take time over the summer to review the work of a committee tasked with determining whether Canada is ready to allow people with mental illness access to medically assisted dying.

Committee co-chair Marcus Powlowski said last week the report would be presented to Parliament on Wednesday to ensure it's in the government's hands before the House of Commons takes its summer break.

Fraser said Tuesday he will consider more than the committee's conclusions and recommendations.

"Importantly to me, I'm also going to be reviewing the witness testimony upon which those recommendations were based," he said.

MPs urge action to undercut ‘manosphere’ by tackling anti-women ideology

OTTAWA - MPs are calling on the government to tackle the rise of antifeminist ideology by funding programs that undercut the "manosphere" of online influencers who blame women for men's problems.

The House of Commons status of women committee tabled a report Tuesday warning "antifeminist ideologies are becoming increasingly prominent in Canada and internationally."

The committee says boys and young men who are isolated or struggling to find their place in society are being presented with extreme content online that glorifies dominating and dehumanizing women and amplifies gender-based violence.

At a news conference on Parliament Hill, Conservative MP Dominique Vien, the committee's chair, told reporters witnesses who spoke to the committee struggled to identify a single reason for the rise in antifeminism.

Minister says ‘lost Canadians’ must prove link to Canada in each generation

OTTAWA - Immigration Minister Lena Diab says having a Canadian ancestor does not guarantee someone is eligible for Canadian citizenship.

Diab was pushed in question period Tuesday by Conservative immigration critic Michelle Rempel Garner to state how many people got proof of citizenship under the new citizenship-by-descent law using inaccurate documents.

An unknown number of people who received citizenship certificates under the new law received letters from the federal government over the weekend demanding that they surrender them. A statement from the Immigration Department says "a limited number" of people received these letters.

A spokesperson from Diab's office later said "a few dozen" surrender letters have been issued.