Tausi Insider

Construction workers on the top floor of the Time and Space condominium project in Toronto on Oct. 11. Fred Lum/Tausi Insider Canada’s federal housing agency is lending billions of dollars to boost construction of rental homes without routinely disclosing the recipients of the money or where the units are being built, shrouding in secrecy a program designed to address the country’s housing shortfall by providing developers with low-cost financing. The Rental Construction Financing Initiative is one of Ottawa’s major efforts to boost home construction. It was announced in 2016 with $2.5-billion in funding, which has grown to more than $25-billion, making it the largest program in the government’s National Housing Strategy, a bundle of different initiatives intended to improve access to affordable units. RCFI is administered by the Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation, which as of this summer had committed to $13.6-billion in loans through the program. The developers receiving the m...

A pumpjack works at an oil and gas installation near Cremona, Alta. on Oct. 29, 2016. The Alberta government is considering a controversial plan that would provide incentives to oil and gas companies to clean up their wells. The Canadian Press The Alberta government is considering a controversial plan that would provide incentives to oil and gas companies to clean up their wells, but critics say it amounts to a royalty giveaway that would essentially compensate industry for work it is mandated to do. Alberta Energy Minister Peter Guthrie told Tausi Insider this week that details of a new site liability program haven’t yet been finalized, but the government is looking at something along the lines of the RStar program – an idea Danielle Smith floated to the United Conservative Party government before she became Alberta premier. Ms. Smith laid out the details in a July, 2021, letter to then-energy minister Sonya Savage, when Ms. Smith was president of the Alberta Enterprise Group, a non...

Julie Maranda, the chief medical officer at Accenture, took the Digital Transformation Executive MBA at McMaster’s DeGroote School of Business in Hamilton because she wanted to gain skills that increased her digital literacy. Christinne Muschi/THE GLOBE AND MAIL To help her decide where to do her MBA, Julie Maranda made an elaborate spreadsheet, taking into consideration cost, time, prerequisites and a slew of other factors, including what skills future business leaders need to stay relevant. The Digital Transformation Executive MBA (EMBA) through McMaster’s DeGroote School of Business in Hamilton won out because Ms. Maranda, who is the chief medical officer at consulting firm Accenture, says she needed to go beyond the traditional leadership teachings of an MBA and to tap into the skills that were outside her comfort zone. “Being in health care in particular, the reason for me to go back to school at my age was because I really felt that as a leader, I needed to up my digital litera...

TD Bank Group says it paused the MyMoney lending program it recently launched with Canada Post. Andrew Vaughan/The Canadian Press TD Bank Group TD-T says it paused the MyMoney lending program it recently launched with Canada Post after it detected suspicious activity on its system. Spokeswoman Amy Thompson says processing was affected when the bank’s security system noticed “early warning signs of irregular activities” and the bank decided to pause the program to investigate. She says it is disappointing that “bad actors” tried to take advantage of the lending program, officially launched Oct. 12, that is meant to expand access to loans through the partnership with Canada Post. Thompson says the bank, which is in charge of running the program, hopes to reopen applications as soon as it feels it is appropriate. The program, offering loans of between $1,000 and $30,000 at variable interest rates currently ranging from about 10 and 20 per cent, is designed to fill a gap between payday l...

Meta Platforms’ META-Q Oversight Board recommended on Tuesday that the company revamp its system exempting high-profile users from its rules, saying the practice privileged the powerful and allowed business interests to influence content decisions. The arrangement, called cross-check, adds a layer of enforcement review for millions of Facebook and Instagram accounts belonging to celebrities, politicians and other influential users, allowing them extra leeway to post content that violates the company’s policies. Cross-check “prioritizes users of commercial value to Meta and as structured does not meet Meta’s human rights responsibilities and company values,” Oversight Board director Thomas Hughes said in a statement announcing the decision. The board had been reviewing the cross-check program since last year, when whistleblower Frances Haugen exposed the extent of the system by leaking internal company documents to the Wall Street Journal. Those documents revealed that the program was...

Dozens of migrant workers in Vancouver have allegedly been defrauded of thousands of dollars by an immigration consultant who promised the workers permanent residency through a federal immigration program that the workers say did not exist. The alleged scam is now the subject of a potential class-action suit that is making its way through the B.C. court system. The lawsuit contends that the actions of the alleged perpetrator of the scam were not only financially ruinous for the workers – most of them migrants from Mexico – but resulted in some of them unknowingly working without visas while waiting for their work permits to be processed. This meant that they were losing their opportunity to apply for genuine immigration status in Canada. The Vancouver-based immigration consultant who is being accused by workers of fraud, Liza Lucion, was indefinitely suspended by the College of Immigration and Citizenship Consultants (CICC) – the regulatory body for immigration consultants – this pas...

Dozens of migrant workers in Vancouver have allegedly been defrauded of thousands of dollars by an immigration consultant who promised the workers permanent residency through a federal immigration program that the workers say did not exist. The alleged scam is now the subject of a potential class-action suit that is making its way through the B.C. court system. The lawsuit contends that the actions of the alleged perpetrator of the scam were not only financially ruinous for the workers – most of them migrants from Mexico – but resulted in some of them unknowingly working without visas while waiting for their work permits to be processed. This meant that they were losing their opportunity to apply for genuine immigration status in Canada. The Vancouver-based immigration consultant who is being accused by workers of fraud, Liza Lucion, was indefinitely suspended by the College of Immigration and Citizenship Consultants (CICC) – the regulatory body for immigration consultants – this pas...

U.S. President Joe Biden speaks in Phoenix, Ariz., on Dec. 6. Ross D. Franklin/The Associated Press President Joe Biden’s administration on Thursday announced the infusion of nearly $36 billion to shore up a financially troubled union pension plan, preventing severe cuts to the retirement incomes of about 350,000 Teamster workers and retirees across the United States. “It’s about everything you worked for … it’s about finding a dignified retirement,” Biden said. “Thanks to today’s announcement, hundreds of thousands of Americans can feel that sense of dignity again, knowing that they’re providing for their families and their future.” The money for the Central States Pension Fund is the largest amount of federal aid provided for a pension plan, the Biden administration said. It comes from the American Rescue Plan, a $1.9 trillion coronavirus relief package that he signed into law in 2021. “This matters,” Biden said. “This matters for workers … This matters for their spouses, this matt...

There’s still plenty of good news in the tech sector, despite the recent barrage of bad headlines. The Technology Fast 50 program, presented by Deloitte, celebrates the supersonic growth seen by Canada’s tech world in recent years. Meet two Canadian companies that are changing the tech world For 25 years, the Technology Fast 50 program has ranked the three-year revenue growth of 50 Canadian tech companies in a broad range of sectors from real estate to health care, to finance and semiconductors. Each of the winners saw growth of more than 400% in the past three years, with Nobul Corp., a real estate marketplace site for agents and hopeful home buyers, grabbing the top spot with an eye-popping 72,944% growth rate. To be eligible for the program, companies must be headquartered in Canada; invest a minimum of 5% of gross revenue in research and development; own proprietary technology sold to customers in products or services that contribute to a majority of the company’s operating reven...

Alberta’s New Democrat Opposition wants public consultations on a government plan that would subsidize oil and gas companies to fulfil legal commitments to clean up old wells, a major proponent of which has been working directly in Premier Danielle Smith’s office for months. “The fox has entered the henhouse,” said energy critic Kathleen Ganley. Ganley said that it appears the United Conservative government has already made up its mind to bring in the RStar program, despite criticism from an array of outside experts, rural municipalities and internal government analysts. “All indications are the government has made their decision,” Ganley said. “There should be public consultations.” Under RStar, companies would earn valuable credits for remediating old wells even though the obligation to clean up a well is part of the licence to drill it. That credit could be sold or applied against revenue earned from new production to reduce provincial royalties. Alberta Energy spokesman Scott Joh...

Canada’s temporary ban on home purchases by foreign buyers will likely force some newcomers who would have otherwise bought a home to become renters. Fred Lum/Tausi Insider Canada’s temporary ban on home purchases by foreign buyers is likely to add demand to an already overheated rental market, some housing experts say. As of the start of this year, federal rules aimed at making homes more affordable for Canadians prevent many temporary residents from buying residential property in urban areas. The new law, in effect for the next two years, will likely deflect some foreign demand for housing to the rental market, as the country continues to welcome record levels of newcomers, analysts say. “At the margins, this is adding to the pressure in the rental market, there is no question about it,” said Benjamin Tal, deputy chief economist of CIBC World Markets. Most temporary residents rent during their first few years settling in Canada, Mr. Tal said. But the rules will likely force some ne...