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Rick Clarke of the Nova Scotia Federation of Labour says that Nova Scotia Premier Rodney MacDonald is distorting facts around the issue of allowing health care workers and their unions to strike. Premier Rodney MacDonald and his government are attempting to win support for their proposed ban on health care strikes in the province. "The premier is trying to mislead the public by suggesting in the media that eight provinces have banned health care strikes. This is simply false. Only three provinces have done so and for him to suggest otherwise is a desperate attempt to distort the facts," says Clarke. At issue is the ability for health care workers to strike, and in what manner. The Nova Scotia Federation of Labour says the issue has become one-sided and that under closer examination, "Seven provinces in Canada continue to allow health care workers to strike. The eight provinces the premier is talking about have so-called 'essential services' legislation, which is nowhere near the same thing."
According to the Canadian Auto Workers union, the automotive trade balance is on track to set a record deficit this year. This is the finding of a study conducted by the CAW. Entitled Canada's Deteriorating Automotive Trade Performance, the CAW report penned by Jim Stanford shows cumulative data that auto exports and imports so far this year will leave Canada with a trade deficit nearing $8 billion. Currently Canada's largest portion of the trade deficit comes with Japan. Korea and China also account for lop-sided trade deficits. Imports from China for instance have risen by over 1200 per cent over the past ten years. Canadian Auto Workers union is looking to more attention paid to various free trade agreements and their impact on the Canadian auto sector. At present, Canada is involved with yet another free trade agreement, this time with Korea.
The Scotiabank reported today that their third quarter results are nearly a record. Income over the quarter amounted to $1,032 million versus $936 million the same period last year. This quarter's earnings are down slightly from quarter two due to the force of lower interest and loan loss recoveries. Shareholders will be happy, as earnings per share have increased 10% to $1.02 from $0.93 in the same period a year ago. Rick Waugh, Scotiabank President and CEO said of the third quarter results, "This performance underscores our diversification and ability to invest in long-term growth initiatives while continuing Scotiabank's record of achieving strong quarterly results."
Totally rejecting the claims by the U.S. government against BC's lumber industry, the B.C. Lumber Trade Council is ready to battle over softwood lumber once again. The U.S. government is moving to file for arbitration over the claim that Canada is failing to comply with the agreed terms of the 2006 Softwood Lumber Agreement. John Allan who is the President of the Lumber Trade Council rejects this outright by saying the claims being made are without merit. "We categorically reject the claims against the British Columbia industry. We have reviewed the negotiating history, our submissions on early drafts, and the final language of the Agreement. From these reviews we have concluded that we are in full compliance."
Volkswagen Canada is announcing that in July total sales were up almost 3 per cent. Total new vehicle units sold were 3,347. Leading the way with its best ever sales month was the City Jetta. Volkswagen Canada is enjoying a YTD sales increase of over 21 per cent. With 130 Volkswagen retailers in Canada, Volkswagen was able to sell 22,850 new units in the past twelve months. Volkswagen Canada Inc is based in Ajax Ontario. VW is Europe's largest automaker.
The average Canadian house price is set to rise by another 9.5% nationally. This is one of the findings from a report issued by Royal LePage Real Estate Services. The report also found that Canada's national average house price is forecast to exceed $300,000 for the very first time. Total home real estate sale transactions are also projected to rise sharply and finish 2007 with 522,306 unit sales. Phil Soper, president and CEO of Royal LePage Real Estate Services says, "The momentum from the year's extraordinary start spilled into the second quarter, compounding typically busy spring market activity and stimulating solid price appreciations in almost all regions of the country. These conditions will certainly be an impetus characterizing Canada's real estate market through to year's end." The energy boom in Alberta continued to have an impact on the housing market. Sales are still up, but the runaway prices that have characterized Calgary and Edmonton for the past eighteen months have started to ease.
A new survey finds that law firms enjoying a boom in business. Amongst those polled, 69% of lawyers responded that business was up and their law firms were undertaking more projects and cases that they did last year. By contrast only 6% of law firms reported a drop in business. Showing the growth in litigation, commercial real estate, and intellectual property were creating high demand for law services, 26% of those surveyed said their law firm business was experiencing "significant increases" over last year. These findings are from a survey conducted the law staffing service Robert Half Legal. The survey was conducted by an independent research firm and includes responses from 150 lawyers among the largest law firms in both the United States and Canada. Respondents to the survey reported a minimum of three years working in the legal system.
The high Canadian dollar is having little affect on Ontario's manufacturing sector and overall housing market according to a report by RE/MAX Ontario-Atlantic Canada. Demand continues to remain high for real estate across Ontario. Only Windsor did not report an increase in real estate value. In the first five months of 2007, Timmins had the largest increase in demand for residential properties. Sudbury, Haliburton and Collingwood also posted double digit growth. Executive Vice President and Regional Director of RE/MAX Ontario-Atlantic Canada, Michael Polzler said, "While an overall healthy economy has supported home-buying activity, consumer confidence in the future of housing has taken markets to the next level. Given current momentum, we expect demand for housing to continue throughout the traditionally slower summer months and shatter existing records for sales and/or price in many markets by year-end."
Emgold Mining Corporation is announcing that it has entered into an agreement with M Partners Inc. to act as its exclusive lead agent in connection with a brokered private placement offering on a best efforts basis to raise gross proceeds of up to $10,000,000 through the offer and sale of units of the Company. The Company will issue up to 50 million units at a price of $0.20 per Unit. Each Unit will comprise one common share and one share purchase warrant. Each warrant will entitle the holder to purchase one additional common share for a period of 24 months from closing at an exercise of $0.35 per share. The Agent will receive a cash fee equal to 8% of the aggregate gross proceeds of the Offering and compensation warrants exercisable to acquire that number of units that is equal to 8% of the total number of units sold in the Offering, at an exercise price of $0.20 per unit for a period of 18 months from closing.
The Supreme Court of Canada has decided that collective bargaining rights of workers are protected by the 1982 Charter of Rights and Freedoms. They also found that collective bargaining rights are a fundamental aspect of Canadian society that predate the Charter. This decision comes after a 6-1 ruling stemming from a 2002 case in British Columbia where the Liberal government of premier Gordon Campbell effectively cancelled the contracts of thousands of health care workers. This resulted in the layoffs of hundreds of workers outside the normal collective bargaining process. The Supreme court has ruled that the B.C. Liberal party and their legislation violated a standing section of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms. The violation was over Section 2 of the Charter which protects Canadians and their freedom of association. The Supreme Court also went on to reject earlier Supreme Court decisions that excluded collective bargaining from the Charter's protection saying those decisions do not withstand principled scrutiny.
Vancouver was the scene of comprehensive testing conducted by the Canada Border Services Agency, U.S. Customs and Border Protection, and both public and private partners to ensure the movement of trade should a border emergency arise. Together they worked on finding ways to improve needed communications between government agencies and the overall business community around national security and trade. Public Safety Minister Stockwell Day said of the tests, "Ensuring the smooth flow of nearly $2 billion worth of goods and services that cross the Canada-U.S. border daily is vital. This exercise is a direct result of the $24 million Canada's New Government dedicated to business resumption planning earlier this year." Representatives worked on scenarios that have a potential to disrupt our major land border crossings and marine ports. U.S. Customs and Border Protection Commissioner W. Ralph Basham said, "This exercise shows how our two countries and the private sector can collaborate to minimize the impact of an emergency. The more thoughtful consideration we give now to worst-case scenarios, the better prepared we will be in the future to lessen damage, including to international trade."
For those concerned about the potential impacts arising from the U.S. housing and subprime mortgage market and how that will affect Canadian markets can rest a little easier today. The CIBC World Markets' latest Canadian Portfolio Strategy Outlook report finds that the rise in global energy and base metal prices will outweigh any negative impact felt by the $100 billion meltdown in U.S. subprime mortgage markets. The TSX rises and falls more on the impact of global growth due to its resource and energy base. The continued increases in energy and metal prices have thus far improved the overall outlook for the TSX. Further good news comes as the subprime market represents less than five per cent of new mortgages in Canada but over 20 per cent in the U.S. Chief Strategist and Chief Economist at CIBC World Markets Jeff Rubin says, "While we expect to see further distress in both the U.S. housing market and the subprime mortgage market, there is little if any evidence of broad contagion effects in financial markets. Corporate spreads remain tight by any historic benchmark while option volatility on the S&P; 500 is only a fraction of that seen during last year's panic attack over the U.S. Federal Reserve's tightening."
Honda Canada is reporting that they have set a March sales record with 15,169 units sold by its Honda and Acura company divisions. This record comes as sales were up a full eight per cent over this time last year. Acura was the hotter of the two with an increase in sales of twelve per cent. The highest increases auto units for Honda were by the Honda CR-V and the Honda Pilot. The CR-V saw sales rise by seventy-five percent! The Fit hatchback also set a March sales record. For Acura their new MDX had record sales for the month of March with an overall increase in sales of eighty-five per cent. Honda who claims to attract some twenty million customers annually has manufacturing plants in Alliston Ontario. A new plant also in Alliston is set to open some time in 2008. The Honda Ridgeline and Civic are built at the existing manufacturing plants.
Today the Alberta Federation of Labour is using a plea for Alberta farmworkers to be extended basic employment rights and protections. This was spurred on by the farmworker tradgedy in BC where three farmworkers died in a traffic accident. Gil McGowan the AFL President says that the issue must be dealth with now in order that they may avoid future tragedies in the farm industry. McGowan says that Alberta farmworkers enjoy even less protection than their counterparts do in BC. "Alberta farmworkers have no basic employment protections such as minimum wage, limits on hours of work, rest breaks, overtime or statuary holiday pay. They enjoy no health and safety protection, nor do they qualify for WCB when they get injured." "It is unconscionable that the only time attention is paid to the plight of farmworkers is in the aftermath of tragedies like the recent fatal traffic accident in BC or the death of Kevan Chandler on a farm near Black Diamond last June," says McGowan.
SES Research in a new poll have found that American citizens are supportive of increased co-operation with Canada when it comes to border security. This co-operation also extends to an intergrated energy policy and anti-terror measures. SES President Nikita Nanos says of the poll, "More than eight of ten Americans support greater co-operation with Canada on border security, anti-terrorism measures and having an integrated energy policy.". The SES poll shows American support for greater co-operation with Canada cut across all regions of the US. In contrast, Canada, in particular Quebecers, while they are still supportive of co-operation with the US, were found to be more likely to have less overall support for co-operation. Emerging Canadian energy dominance played a strong part in the high support felt by Americans. In their rush to remove themselves from their long dependence on Middle East oil and everything that comes with it, nearly 90% of Americans found an integrated energy policy as very important. Canadians were only slightly less enthusiastic of this development at 85% support.
In its annual report on the retail industry and consumer spending in Quebec and Canada, the Conseil québécois du commerce de détail -Retail Council of Quebec, found that retails sales grew in 2006, and that is expected to continue in the rest of 2007. In 2006 retail sales for both Quebec and the rest of Canada showed overall growth. In Quebec, retail sales increased by nearly 4% (3.7%) while reaching $86.3 billion overall. For the rest of Canada, sales increased by almost 5% (4.6%), to a total $384.8 billion. Together this was the eleventh consecutive year that retail sales increased in Canada. It was positive factors such as low interest rates, stable inflation and decent job creation levels that kept consumers' confidence level high throughout the year. However as compared to 2005, growth was slightly down.
According to a new report entitled Mission Possible: Successful Canadian Cities, which was released today by The Conference Board of Canada, the future prosperity of Canada as a whole will rest on the success of its major cities. With Eighty per cent of Canadians living largely in urban areas, and more than half living in ten major cities, where two-thirds of Canada's new jobs were created in the past decade, have neither the power nor the resources to compete globally against other city-regions for investment and human talent. "For Canada to achieve sustainable prosperity in a world of fundamental and relentless change, we must ensure that our cities can realize their potential," said Anne Golden, President and CEO of the Conference Board. "Ignoring cities' needs and treating them all the same won't get us there." Canada's major cities and their municipal governments of are caught in a kind of fiscal bind. While bearing costs of services offloaded by federal and provincial governments, they are finding that their share of overall government revenues in Canada is insufficient to meet demands. Right now municipal governments obtain less than twelve per cent of the revenue pie and this share is declining. In order for these cities to succeed, they need greater access to taxes that increase with economic growth.
RBC Financial Group's latest RRSP poll has found that sixty-one per-cent of Canadians rate the amount of savings necessary for a comfortable retirement as an extremely important consideration in deciding when they should retire. Fifty-four per cent of the poll respondents said they find health care requirements an extremely important consideration, while forty per cent of all respondents rated both planning where they will live once retired and planning what they would do in retirement as very important. Surprisingly when those polled were asked how much money they will need to retire rich, forty per cent of Canadians said "it's not about the money."
The Metro Toronto Convention Centre has announced that it has succeeded in mounting its first large-scale Zero Waste convention, representing an historic first within the convention and trade show industry. The MTCC pioneered the concept of holding large green meetings and conventions that successfully avoid adding to the existing landfill burden by recycling everything they generate. To meet its self-imposed "Zero Waste Challenge", the MTCC partnered with the international Professional Convention Management Association, whose 51st Annual Meeting was held January 7-10th at the MTCC, and long-time MTCC supplier Turtle Island Recycling. The PCMA convention involved more than 3,100 top people from the meeting and convention industry from across North America and represented the MTCC's and Toronto's biggest opportunity to showcase itself as a convention destination of choice. It was the first time in the PCMA's 50-year history that the event was held outside of the United States. It is considered one of the prestige meetings in the convention industry, representing more than $18 billion in annual buying power, and typically leads to significant future meeting business in the host city.
Ottawa is seeing a local green energy company put a by-product of decomposing garbage to good use in generating clean, renewable energy. PowerTrail Inc. completed the commissioning of a 5 megawatt (MW) Landfill Gas to Energy Facility at the City of Ottawa-owned Trail Road Landfill this week. The facility will generate enough electricity to power up to 5,000 Ottawa homes. The City of Ottawa, which owns the landfill, will also benefit, saving $2 million in needed upgrades and repairs to the existing gas collection system at the site, and another $200,000 annually in operating and maintenance costs. The City will also receive a royalty payment estimated at $150,000 per year for the use of the gas by the generating plant. Rosemarie T. Leclair, President and CEO of the Hydro Ottawa Group of Companies, said the project uses proven technology to turn landfill gas - a natural byproduct of the decomposition process into a valuable resource, green electricity. "Previously, this gas was being burned off in a flare, with no additional value to area residents. Now it will be used to power Ottawa homes."
Any immediate increase in the minimum wage to $10 per hour would hit some business sectors harder than others, according to a recent survey. A majority of members of the Ontario Chamber of Commerce registered their opposition to the idea in the survey. While only a small majority of the 2124 respondents were opposed to an immediate increase in the minimum wage to $10, business owners in areas such as agriculture, retail, restaurant and food services, and tourism and hospitality indicated that this sudden adjustment would have a significant negative effect on their businesses. "Businesses in Ontario are not just concerned about the bottom line," explains Len Crispino, President and CEO of the Ontario Chamber of Commerce. "While we do not want our province to prosper on the backs of cheap labour we must find the right balance in order to protect Ontario's position in a competitive global marketplace."
Wedgewood Hotel and Spa in Vancouver, British Columbia has entered into an agreement with Planktos Inc. to purchase sufficient carbon credits to make the Wedgewood 'Carbon Neutral' and zero out all its CO2 emissions. Each Planktos carbon credit represents one tonne of CO2 that has been removed from the air and sequestered - put away - for a long, long time. Planktos produces these credits by restoring vital ecosystems on land and in the sea. The entire Wedgewood Hotel operation has been estimated to generate approximately 500 tonnes of CO2 annually based upon its total energy consumption, and the Wedgewood has contracted to purchase 5,000 tonnes of carbon credits or a 10-year supply.
The next generation of Canadian women are more likely to succeed in the future because they now have role models, Canada's Most Powerful Women: Top 100 award winners, says Women's Executive Network Founder Pamela Jeffery. Women between the ages of 20-39 may apply on-line at www.wxnetwork.com by March 2, 2007 to participate in the program as protégées. The first program of its kind in the world, WXNWisdom II will offer successful applicants a year of mentoring, classroom instruction and peer networking beginning in April in Vancouver, Calgary, Toronto, Ottawa, Montréal and Halifax. Each protégée will meet with her mentor four times during the year and receive 20 hours of classroom instruction focused on career development and leadership. There is an annual fee for the program of $1,600 to cover the costs of instructors and program materials. Bursaries are available for 10 worthy applicants based on financial need, to cover program fees.
Strong demand will drive steady price increases in the Vancouver condo market through the rest of the decade, according to new data released today by Genworth Financial Canada, a subsidiary of Genworth Financial, Inc. Genworth's Metropolitan Condominium Outlook report forecasts Vancouver condo price growth to remain steady through to the end of the decade. The data compiled in the Metropolitan Condominium Outlook by Genworth shows that over the next four years, Vancouver condo demand is expected to slow to balance with supply, although a correction is not expected. After seeing price growth averaging 17.1 per cent in 2006, Vancouver condos will rise about 6.2 per cent this year and average 4.4 per cent annual growth through 2010.
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