News roundup, 1 June 2026

- A court in BC has ruled that forcing employees back into the office can constitute "constructive dismissal" under some circumstances. The case involved an employee of a real estate development company who had been working under a flexible arrangement since returning from maternity leave in 2013; she had gone fully remote along with the rest of the office staff in 2020 when the pandemic hit, and had continue to do so with the approval of successive supervisors until the arrangement was revoked in 2023. The court concluded that a longtime remote work arrangement can become an essential term of employment, though one lawyer suggests that the court might have ruled differently had she not already been working in such a manner before 2020. The company in question has a pretty big state in commercial real estate, which might be why they're so keen to stamp out WFH.

- US Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin is threatening to pull Customs and Border Patrol officers from "sanctuary cities" that limit cooperation with immigration officials, meaning that these airports couldn't take international flights. The idea, is that these flights would be redirect such flights to other cities, presumably in red states. The FAA and others (including Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy) warn that this would lead to chaos, because the airports in more pliant cities are already near capacity and numerous flights would simply have to be cancelled. We'll have to see how much longer Mullin and Duffy can remain in the same cabinet, and who will prevail.

- Manitoba is holding a "virtual town hall", by telephone, for residents of the Southern Health Region, the epicentre of the measles outbreak in the province. The province will be cold calling residents in advance to let them know of the meeting, and then called again at the start of the event. Dr. Melissa MacKay, a professor of public health at the University of Guelph, suggests that the uptake might be higher if the event is well-advertised, so that people are less disinclined to answer a call from an unfamiliar number. I think, though, that there's a deeper problem here - the kind of people who refuse to get vaccinated are also the kind of people who aren't going to answer when "the gummint" calls.

- The CEO of WiseTech Global, a logistics software company, was speaking at an investment conference and remarked that it's "stupid to be paying $100 for labour when you can pay $2 for the AI". Once his comments leaked to the public, this landed very poorly given that his company had already announced that it would be eliminating 30% of its global workforce, representing some 2,000 jobs. Predictably, this lead to threats of violence against him and his family; while I don't endorse that (certainly not bringing his family into the matter) nobody should be surprised at this.

- The Great American State Fair, an event organized by Trump-backed nonprofit Freedom 250, has announced a musical lineup. Almost immediately afterwards, several of the musicians on the bill, including country singer Martina McBride, rapper Young MC, and glam metal band Poison cancelled saying that they didn't realize it was a partisan event. Now it's easy to be a bit cynical about the supposed naïveté of these people, but several of them allege that there was an element of bait-and-switch; the name sounds innocent enough (many of these artists have played at numerous actual state fairs) and some claim that they were never told it was a Trump-affiliated event. On the other hand, it would be fair to ask if there was any plausible way that an event in DC celebrating the 250th anniversary of US independance would not have the Mango Mussolini's fingerprints on it. In any case, those who were hoping to get a breath of nostalgia at the event needn't despair - Vanilla Ice as well as Milli Vanilli (or rather, Fab Morvan and some other dude, Rob Pilatus having died in 1998) have both said that they will be playing. In in the case of Milli Vanilli, though, the people who did the actual singing on the recordings have also made it clear that they will not be there. Yes, for those who thought nothing could be more fake than Milli Vanilli, there's now a fake Milli Vanilli. In any case, the whole thing might well be cancelled anyway.

News roundup, 6 Jan 2025

- A new poll from Angus Reid puts the Liberals at 16% support nationally, considerably behind the NDP at 21%. Some are predicting that this will finally lead to Trudeau's resignation and perhaps a prorogation of Parliament to give the Liberals time to choose a new leader before a non-confidence vote forces an election. Tom Brodbeck thinks such a measure would be pointless and that Trudeau should go down with the ship.

- Although the Winnipeg Police Service gets more money in the city's budget than any other department, in the newest proposed budget they are only getting six new officers; this is reasonable however given the huge needs in other areas. Winnipeg Transit will be hiring 27 new staff, and 24 new firefighters will be stationed in Waverley West to deal with surging populations there. Also welcome will be eight new full time equivalents in the Urban Forestry Branch to deal with huge backlogs for tree pruning.

- Under new legislation, any business in Manitoba selling most long-bladed tools (such as machetes) is required to ask for photo ID and to keep sales records for two years. Saws, hedge trimmers, and pruning shears are exempt.

- Amazon is completely ending remote work, having previously ordered employees back three days a week in 2023. As usual, they rationalize this move with vague statements about "collaboration", while refusing to provide any data to support this claim. Of course, the real reason probably has more to do with the fact that Amazon owns 10 million ft² of commercial real estate in Seattle and would likely lose a lot of money on said real estate if they just sold it off; to be fair the impact of this would be significant and would not be limited to Amazon. It's worth noting that there is already a 10-20% default rate on mortgages in the sector regardless of the efforts of the likes of Amazon, and many fear that this will start to impact the broader economy.

- While many cetaceans are doing badly these days, orcas seem to be thriving - and are in fact expanding their range into the Arctic. Unfortunately, their success may come at the expense of belugas and narwhals.

- Ryan Wedding, who competed for Canada in the snowboarding event in the 2002 Olympics, is wanted in California for numerous crimes including murder. Authorities say the murders were commissioned by him in support of a billion dollar criminal enterprise he was running.

News roundup, 17 Sept 2024

- The federal NDP managed to squeak out a win in the Elmwood-Transcona byelection. The Liberals weren't so fortunate, losing the longtime stronghold riding of LaSalle-Émard-Verdun to the Bloc Québécois.

- At the provincial level, the Manitoba NDP is facing a bit of awkwardness after Fort Garry MLA Mark Wasyliw was expelled from the party caucus. The party's caucus chair, Riel MLA Mike Moyes, was quoted as saying that this follows revelations that one of Wasyliw's colleagues in his law practice was involved in the defense of Peter Nygard. Now it's possible that Moyes was misquoted, or misspoke himself, but if not then this is a very strange and rather troubling move - even a monster like Nygard is entitled to legal representation, and this should not be seen as a stain on the lawyer who takes the job, much less their colleagues. That said, as far back as last fall concerns were raised by the party about the amount of time Wasyliw would be able to devote to the job of representing his constituents if he remained active as a defense lawyer, and he got all pissy when denied a cabinet post last fall (even though being a cabinet minister while practicing law would have been even more difficult than being a backbencher).

- Charges have been laid against the owners of Spirit Rising House, the private, for-profit foster home provider that was giving marijuana to the kids in their care.

- Amazon is completely doing away with hybrid work. They say they fear that without such measures their corporate culture could be "diluted"; as usual, they make absolutely no mention of commercial real estate. Notably, the demand for office space in Amazon's home city of Seattle is the lowest among major American cities; I have to assume that Amazon owns a fair bit of that real estate and that this is a measure to protect their investment. To be fair, there could be real issues with a crash in that market; there could be ripple effects in the economy as REITs that specialize in these products collapse, and the decline in property values could potentially starve municipalities of revenue.