Latest news with #Taxpayers
CTV News
10 hours ago
- Automotive
- CTV News
‘It's a huge cost': City stops free courtesy tows during snow clearing operations
The city has stopped offering free courtesy tows for residents who don't move their vehicles during snow clearing. In an annual report on snow clearing operations, the city's public works department noted it did not provide any courtesy tows last year. It cited a significant drop in the number of calls to move vehicles impeding snow clearing. The policy has been in place since 2013. It gave a measure of grace to Winnipeggers who – unwittingly or otherwise – violated city residential parking bans. Rather than issuing a ticket and a tow to an impound lot, the city would provide free 'courtesy tows' and simply move the vehicle to another street at no cost to the owner. 'Although courtesy towing has been the practice, it is not a requirement by city bylaw or policy and has not shown significant operation efficiencies,' the report reads. 'Courtesy towing during residential parking bans is currently not planned to resume.' That's welcome news to Coun. Janice Lukes (Waverley West), the chair of the public works committee. 'It's a huge cost. Why should taxpayers who actually abide by the rules be paying… that for people that aren't adhering to the rules?' she told reporters Thursday. Lukes has pushed against the practice, noting in 2021 alone, courtesy tows cost the city more than $930,000. She said with no courtesy tows last year, those who don't move their vehicles would receive a ticket and crews would have to plow around them. 'Maybe what we do is we increase the fee for the ticket if you don't move your vehicle, because it's really important in a winter city to move your vehicle so we can clean the streets,' she said. Lukes said increased ticket fees would be discussed at the upcoming committee meeting on July 3. Last year the city went $14.4 million over its snow clearing budget of $40.5 million. This year, the city has budgeted $45.7 million. According to the public works department, an average year of snow clearing costs $53.1 million but can range as low as $41 million or as high as $91.5 million.
CTV News
4 days ago
- Business
- CTV News
Top public servants unanimously opposed ‘big bang' pay switchover for public service
Alex Benay, Associate Deputy Minister at Public Services and Procurement Canada, speaks during a news conference at the National Press Theatre in Ottawa, on Tuesday, July 9, 2024. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Justin Tang OTTAWA — A top federal official says fixing the payroll problems caused by Phoenix cost taxpayers more than $5 billion — and they'll keep paying extra to run two public service payroll platforms at once as Ottawa weans itself off the problem-plagued system. Alex Benay, associate deputy minister at Public Services and Procurement Canada, says the alternative to running the Phoenix system in tandem with its replacement, Dayforce, would have been worse. The other option, he says, was a 'big bang' deployment that would have switched roughly 350,000 public servants from the old system to the new Dayforce system all at once. That's what happened when the federal government introduced Phoenix, which led to nearly a decade of mispayments for public servants and major lawsuits. Benay says taxpayers likely spent about $5.1 billion to process a backlog of Phoenix errors that caused some public servants to be mispaid — or sometimes not paid at all. While he doesn't have a cost estimate for the switch to Dayforce, Benay adds senior government officials agreed not to repeat the mistakes of nine years ago when Phoenix was brought online. This report by The Canadian Press was first published June 23, 2025. Kyle Duggan, The Canadian Press
Yahoo
10-06-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
In the news today: AG report on company behind ArriveCan out today
In the news today: AG report on company behind ArriveCan out today Here is a roundup of stories from The Canadian Press designed to bring you up to speed... AG report on company behind ArriveCan out today The latest probe into the company behind the controversial ArriveCan app is among four reports being released today by Canada's auditor general. Karen Hogan looked into all contracts awarded and payments made to GC Strategies for its work on the app to determine whether they were in line with government policy and whether the government got value for taxpayers' money. In September, the House of Commons unanimously agreed to ask Hogan to look into the contracts and her report is set to be tabled in the House around 10 a.m. ET. ADVERTISEMENT As of March 2024, GC Strategies — a two-man team which last week was banned from entering into contracts or real property agreements with the federal government for seven years — had received $100 million in federal government contracts since 2011. Hogan's previous report on the app's development found it did not deliver the best value to taxpayers and concluded that three federal departments disregarded federal policies, controls and transparency in the contracting process. Here's what else we're watching... Panthers rout Oilers 6-1, lead Cup final 2-1 Taking advantage of the Edmonton Oilers' worst performance in several weeks, the defending Florida Panthers pounced on mistakes to win 6-1 in a rout Monday and take a 2-1 series lead in the Stanley Cup final. Brad Marchand became the oldest player to score in each of the first three games of a final, while Sam Bennett added his NHL playoff-leading 14th goal after making a big hit on Edmonton's Vasily Podkolzin that contributed to the turnover to spring him on a breakaway. ADVERTISEMENT Marchand and Bennett have combined to score eight goals for Florida, which was dominant in just about every way. And it was not just Bennett and Marchand. Carter Verhaeghe and Sam Reinhart each got his first goal of the series, Aaron Ekblad scored to chase Skinner, and Evan Rodrigues added the exclamation point in the waning minutes. At the other end of the ice, Sergei Bobrovsky earned the 'Bobby! Bobby!' chants from a fired up Florida crowd. The two-time Vezina Trophy-winning goaltender known as 'Bob' was on his game for the very few quality chances the discombobulated Oilers mustered, making 32 saves. Australia sends help to battle Canadian wildfires As wildfires continue to burn from northwest Ontario to British Columbia, Canada is getting help from near and far, and very far. Southern Highlands - New South Wales Rural Fire Service in Australia says a 96-personnel-strong Australian contingent of firefighters and specialists have deployed to Canada for five weeks. ADVERTISEMENT The service says the deployment is in response to a request from the Canadian Interagency Forest Fire Centre. Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese says in a tweet that, "When our mates need help, Australia is there." A post on social media platform X from the official account for the Australian High Commissioner to Canada, Kate Logan, says the crews "are on their way to support their Canadian colleagues battle wildfires in Alberta." Submissions continue at hockey players' trial Defence lawyers for five former members of Canada's world junior hockey team are set to continue their final submissions to the judge presiding over the players' sexual assault trial today. Court heard submissions Monday for lawyers representing Michael McLeod and Carter Hart, and counsel for the remaining three accused will get a turn before prosecutors present their submissions. ADVERTISEMENT McLeod's lawyer, David Humphrey, argued the complainant has presented an "entirely unbelievable and unreliable" version of the events at the heart of the trial. McLeod, Hart and their former teammates Alex Formenton, Dillon Dube and Callan Foote have pleaded not guilty to sexual assault. The charges relate to an encounter with a woman in a London, Ont., hotel room in June 2018, at a time when many of the team's members were in town for events celebrating their championship win. Cleanup rules hurting Alberta renewables: report A report says new cleanup rules for renewable energy sites are hurting the competitiveness of Alberta's industry. Business Renewables Centre-Canada analyzed the reclamation security requirements for renewables in 27 jurisdictions and found Alberta's are now the most costly. Under a code of practice for solar and wind projects published last week, the Alberta government says operators must provide an estimate for the cost of dismantling turbines and panels, removing underground concrete infrastructure, hauling waste away, replanting vegetation and other items. A 30-per-cent security is required upfront, rising to 60 per cent after 15 years to ensure there is enough money for proper cleanup at the sites' end of life. BRC-Canada says Alberta's upfront security requirement is unusually high and the rules don't take into account the salvage value of the concrete and metals that could be sold to recoup cleanup expenses. This report by The Canadian Press was first published June 10, 2025. The Canadian Press
Times
19-05-2025
- Business
- Times
Civil servants using work laptops to watch porn and place bets
Civil servants working from home have used their official laptops to visit pornography and gambling sites. In the past six months at least 16 attempts were made to view pornography or visit bookmakers online using devices funded by Scottish taxpayers, records show. The figures were obtained by the Scottish Conservatives under freedom of information law and first reported by the Scottish Mail on Sunday. Since November, there have been six attempts to access Pornhub, six for Betfair and four for Paddy Power on Scottish government devices. Officials said Netflix use was so prolific that discovering how many times it had been viewed would not be cost-effective. The revelations come after Michael Matheson, then an SNP minister, chalked up an £11,000 bill on his
Fox News
15-05-2025
- Politics
- Fox News
Otterbein's Cookies celebrates National Chocolate Chip Day
All times eastern Making Money with Charles Payne FOX News Radio Live Channel Coverage WATCH LIVE: Tomi Lahren says Dem leaders are asleep while taxpayers pay the price
