National
Paul Wells on PM Trudeau’s cabinet shake up

Rechie Valdez teared up a bit taking her oath. It was nice.
Posted with permission from Substack author Paul Wells
The army you have
Exciting new combinations of Liberals and syllables
I skipped almost the entire cabinet-shuffle business on Wednesday. I think I’ve mostly managed to avoid getting jaded in this job, but there are days, boy howdy. Welcome, Minister Blah Blah Blah to the crucial office of Provision, Preparedness, Children and Popular Song. Congratulations, hug your kids. Next.
Then here was Rechie Valdez’s voice catching as she took the oaths (one for entry into the Council of the Elders and the other to join the Resonant Circle of the One, or whatever) and for just a minute, boredom took a holiday. The people who do these jobs should be emotional about them. Optimism is a good thing. Small businesses are definitely on the list of things worth caring about. Go get ’em, minister.
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A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of days like this. During the 2021 campaign, when things were going badly, the official line out of the Trudeau brain trust was that the prime minister “doesn’t do shakeups.” And yet here’s one now. What’s changed?
There are always two ready answers to such a question. For one, the world has changed, as it always does. Previous shuffles addressed the astonishing 2016 votes for Brexit and Trump, and the less epochal but still significant election of Doug Ford as Ontario premier in 2018. In late 2021, when Trudeau was randomly firing one of the most experienced ministers in his cabinet, it might still have been possible to believe the PM’s third term in office wouldn’t be dominated by Russia, China, and the knock-on effects from a sharp increase in immigration. The misplaced optimism of that bygone era 20 months ago can no longer be maintained.
Second, the electoral context has changed. “We have all the time in the world before the next election” has become “We sure don’t,” and the readers who get cross when I link to horse-race polls are going to hate clicking on this.
I guess this shuffle is designed to address the Poilievre threat? Kind of? Listlessly? A year ago Trudeau was already getting advice to make sharp, noticeable changes in his team, message and style. (Yes, I just linked to myself.) Today he put Sean Fraser in charge of Housing and Marc Miller in charge of Immigration. Those might be the two most encouraging moves among dozens, both for Liberals who hope “good communicators” won’t turn out to be a sad joke, and for citizens who hope strong administrators might, even if only occasionally, be put in charge of challenging files.
The rest of the day’s news is puzzling. Seamus O’Regan to Labour? I thought the boss liked him. Pablo Rodriguez to Transport would seem to be yet another case of ministerial burnout on all those Web Giant-Killer bills that have become the torment of a succession of Heritage ministers. Pascale St.-Onge replaces him on the censorship ‘n’ subsidies beat, ringing a new variation on the eternal question: Why do they call it Canadian Heritage if only ministers from Quebec are allowed to do the job?
Gary Anandasangaree at Crown-Indigenous Relations and Arif Virani as Minister of Justice and Attorney-General are two cases of rookie ministers promoted to tough jobs. I’ve heard good things about both of them. Both have relevant committee and parliamentary-secretary experience. Virani was Jody Wilson-Raybould’s parliamentary secretary; she seems not to have kept many fond memories. (In her memoir she calls him one of the “talking heads” who were sent out “to make comments that evidence has now shown were not accurate or right.” In general, Trudeau, a non-lawyer mostly counselled by non-lawyers, seems to be chronically unsure why he should have a justice minister or what they are good for.)
Freeland, Guilbeault, Champagne and Joly remain in their previous jobs, evidence of their clout. On the other hand, I maintain that Rodriguez’s being shuffled was evidence of his clout. By now it’s clear that Freeland writes her own rules: she does the work she wants to do, to varying degrees of success, and nobody in this government can make her do anything else. Her fate is bound up with the prime minister’s. Probably neither of them expected it, but the stability of the tandem is now part of Trudeauworld’s game physics.
Cabinet shuffles defy confident prediction, or should. Will Jean-Yves Duclos make a difference as Public Services and Procurement Minister? He should. He’s a detail man in a detail job. But ministers are rarely better than they are permitted to be by circumstances and by the circle around the PM. Duclos will shine if this government wants to buy stuff, and not if it doesn’t.
That 2021 bit of campaign spin wasn’t entirely false. In some ways this prime minister really doesn’t do shakeups. He keeps his chief of staff, his indispensable deputy, his own way of thinking and talking about his government. Everything else swirls around. He came to office promising real change. Increasingly what’s real is what doesn’t change.
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Health
COVID mask mandates return to some hospitals in eastern Canada

From LifeSiteNews
New Brunswick Horizon Health Network requires masks in emergency rooms and patient areas despite data showing just 26 COVID cases reported in a month and no hospitalizations.
Some hospitals in eastern Canada resumed mandatory masking mandates, citing the COVID-19 virus as a reason.
In a recent statement, New Brunswick Horizon Health Network said the “continuous use of medical-grade face masks” will now be mandatory for all staff and visitors in emergency rooms and in patient areas.
According to Horizon Health Network spokesperson Merita MacMillan, as per media reports, the return of the mandatory mask mandate was due to COVID.
“We can confirm that there are COVID-19 outbreak units in chronic care at Horizon’s The Moncton Hospital (TMH), transitional care at Saint John Regional Hospital (SJRH), and a surgical unit at the Dr. Everett Chalmers Regional Hospital (DECRH) (Fredericton),” MacMillan said.
The data from the New Brunswick government shows that there were only 26 cases of COVID reported from June 29 to July 26, but no hospitalizations or deaths.
The mandatory face mask policy states that masks must be worn at all times; however, masks are not required for cafeterias, lobbies, or hallways.
Horizon Health Network runs about 12 hospitals and over 100 medical facilities throughout New Brunswick.
Mandatory face mask polices were common in Canada, and all over the world, for years during the COVID crisis, despite over 170 studies showing they were not effective in stopping the spread of COVID and were in fact harmful, especially to children.
Indeed, a recent study showed that COVID masking policies left children less able to differentiate people’s emotions behind facial expressions.
Many Canadian doctors who spoke out against COVID mask mandates, lockdowns, and the experimental mRNA injections were censured by their medical boards.
COVID-19
New report exposes Canada’s Covid policy failures and rising unexplained deaths

The Justice Centre for Constitutional Freedoms has released a new report, “Post-Covid Canada: The rise in unexpected deaths,” which analyzes recent Statistics Canada data on causes of death during and after the era of Covid lockdowns and vaccine mandates. The report raises urgent concerns about the accuracy of Covid death reports, the harmful impacts of lockdowns and vaccine mandates, and the ongoing trend of unexplained deaths in Canada.
Canadians died at an alarming rate between 2020 and 2024. While public health officials and politicians claim that Covid was the cause, the data shows that Covid death statistics were inflated and that thousands of Canadians died due to lockdowns, vaccine mandates, and their downstream effects.
The report’s key findings include:
1. “Excess” or “unexpected” deaths were much higher in 2022, after lockdowns and after most Canadians had been injected with a Covid vaccine, than during the first two years of Covid. In Canada, there were 14,950 unexpected deaths in 2020, 13,510 unexpected deaths in 2021, and 31,370 unexpected deaths in 2022.
2. Covid deaths increased after the rollout of Covid vaccines. By the end of 2021, more than 80 percent of Canadians were fully vaccinated for Covid. In 2022, however, Covid deaths increased to an all-time high of 19,906 – a 22 percent increase over 2020 Covid deaths.
3. Up to 10,000 statistically expected deaths among seniors in 2020 and 2021 were misclassified as Covid deaths. Meanwhile, in 2020 and 2021, Statistics Canada reported 690 fewer deaths from respiratory and pulmonary disease; 3,270 fewer deaths from respiratory infections and lung disease; 6,100 fewer deaths from vascular and other dementia diseases; and 1,000 fewer deaths from Parkinson’s, Alzheimer’s, and other degenerative diseases of the nervous system. The data is clear: deaths that would otherwise have been attributed to these illnesses were attributed to Covid.
4. Deaths from causes linked to lockdowns, such as drug overdoses, alcohol-related illnesses, hypertension, and delayed medical procedures and diagnoses, increased significantly during lockdowns.
5. Increasingly, Statistics Canada is attributing deaths to “unknown causes.” For instance, among Canadians under age 45 who died in 2022, more than 15 percent have not been assigned a cause of death.
Benjamin Klassen, Research and Education Coordinator at the Justice Centre and lead author of the report, stated, “This report shows that Canadians were seriously misled about Covid and about the safety and effectiveness of government lockdowns and vaccine mandates. Governments not only failed to protect lives but also contributed to thousands of preventable deaths with their freedom-violating policies.”
“Despite assurances that government policies would save lives,” he added, “the data reveals the opposite: lockdowns, delayed healthcare, and rushed vaccine mandates all appear to have significantly contributed to high numbers of additional and unexpected deaths from causes other than Covid. Higher death rates in Canada have continued to rise – especially evident among young Canadians.”
Three key recommendations flow from the report’s findings:
1. Provide timely and accurate death data. Statistics Canada and governments must address chronic reporting delays at the provincial and federal levels.
2. Investigate harms caused by Covid lockdowns and vaccines. Canadians deserve an independent and transparent inquiry into the short-term and long-term harms caused by government responses to Covid.
3. Protect freedom of expression for professionals. Canadian professionals need legislation that prohibits colleges of physicians and surgeons and other professional regulatory bodies from censoring and punishing professionals who express dissenting views on public health issues.
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