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Censorship Industrial Complex

Canada’s New Greenwashing Rules Could Hamper Climate Action – Grady Semmens

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From Energy Now 

By Grady Semmens

Also added to the mix was the ability for private citizens to lodge complaints with the Competition Bureau (starting June 20, 2025) and placing the onus on companies to prove their claims – effectively making defendants guilty of greenwashing until they can prove their information is valid.

The Government of Canada’s new rules to crack down on greenwashing will likely hamper new energy projects, including those designed to cut greenhouse gas emissions, according to experts who say they pose significant legal risk and create uncertainty for how industries across the country can communicate their plans for reaching net-zero emissions by 2050.

The legislation came into effect on June 20 as part of an omnibus package of economic policies known as Bill C-59. The package contained long-awaited tax credits for carbon capture and storage (CCS) development, sparking positive investment decisions for several new CCS projects over the summer. However, C-59 also included significant amendments to the Competition Act that require companies to more fully substantiate statements about their management of environmental and social issues – with a particular focus on claims related to climate change activity.

The crux of the concern about the anti-greenwashing laws lies in the call for companies to use an ‘internationally recognized methodology’ to report on business interests such as their decarbonization efforts. The government failed to provide guidance for what methodologies meet this standard. At the same time, massive penalties (up to three per cent of a firm’s annual gross global revenues) were introduced for companies found to be making misleading claims. Also added to the mix was the ability for private citizens to lodge complaints with the Competition Bureau (starting June 20, 2025) and placing the onus on companies to prove their claims – effectively making defendants guilty of greenwashing until they can prove their information is valid.

Response to the amendments by Canada’s energy sector was swift and dramatic. Almost immediately, the Pathways Alliance – a partnership of Canada’s largest oil sands producers that are pursuing one of the world’s largest CCS projects – gutted its website and its social media channels have gone quiet. Many energy, mining and other resource-based companies have followed suit, resulting it what some are now calling a ‘greenhushing’ that goes counter to years of admirable progress in corporate transparency and reporting on the management of environmental, social and governance (ESG) issues.

“The federal government implementing a law, without consultation, which intrinsically infringes on the ability to participate in open discussions on some of the most important issues facing the country today should be a serious concern for all Canadians,” says Lisa Baiton, president and CEO of the Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers.

Looking beyond its impact on public discourse, Baiton says the legislation also creates new roadblocks for developing critical infrastructure to help meet Canada’s climate change commitments.

“The federal government’s approach to these amendments has introduced a new level of complexity and risk for those looking to invest in Canada. The amendments to the Competition Act will make it more difficult for proponents to speak to Canadians and gain public support for their projects, particularly for those focused on reducing emissions.”

One of the country’s top environmental lawyers agrees, adding that Competition Bureau rules apply far beyond websites and sustainability reports, also encompassing the detailed plans and evidence required in regulatory applications for projects.

“Canadian regulatory processes are already protracted, and I think there will be more delays and complications for project approvals as environmental impact assessments will face an additional layer of scrutiny,” said Conor Chell, a partner and national leader of ESG legal risk and disclosure with KPMG, at a recent seminar on the impacts of C-59 on Canadian industry.

The Competition Bureau was gathering public feedback until September 27 on the new greenwashing provisions that it says will be used to provide further guidance for how the rules will be enforced. Industry players hope the consultation will result in greater clarity on what methodologies for environmental reporting the government prefers, along with details on how the bureau’s complaints tribunal will determine which complaints are in the public interest to investigate.

“Companies face a high risk of being unfairly and unnecessarily targeted and pulled into long, drawn out legal proceedings in defence of reasonable statements. Without clear guidance as to how the Competition Bureau plans to handle such frivolous and vexatious claims, this will have a chilling effect on companies’ disclosure and participation in climate and environmental policy discussions,” Baiton wrote in CAPP’s Sept. 5 feedback submission.

In the meantime, Canadian companies are figuring out how to continue reporting on their ESG performance without placing themselves at undue risk of legal action. In its latest corporate social responsibility report published earlier this month, Cenovus Energy chose to omit information on greenhouse gas emissions and other environmental subjects, while continuing to report on topics including workplace safety, engagement with Indigenous communities, and its progress on meeting equity, diversity and inclusion targets in its workforce.

“Given this uncertainty, we made the difficult decision to defer publication of information about our recent environmental performance and plans. I’d like to be very clear that this does not change our commitment to advancing our environmental work. We firmly stand by the actions we’re taking, the accuracy of our reporting and the information we’ve shared to date about our environmental performance. And, to the extent the Competition Bureau can provide clarity through specific guidance about how these changes to the Competition Act will be interpreted and applied, that will help guide our future communications about the environmental work we are doing,” Cenovus’ CEO Jon McKenzie states in his opening message to the report.

With anti-greenwashing regulations being adopted and/or strengthened in many countries, KPMG’s Conor Chell recommends companies revisit their targets and performance metrics for key environmental issues to ensure they are realistic and are backed up by accurate and consistent data.

“Canada now has some of the strongest anti-greenwashing legislation, but it is something that is growing globally, and companies will face it in other jurisdictions,”  Chell said. “Going forward, as important as it will be for the good work to continue, it will be equally important to ensure that companies are thoroughly assessing and substantiating their environmental and social claims, so they can withstand the additional scrutiny that is now required.”


Grady Semmens is a writer and communications consultant specializing in energy, sustainability and ESG reporting.

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Censorship Industrial Complex

Is free speech over in the UK? Government censorship reaches frightening new levels

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From LifeSiteNews

By Frank Wright

Instead of changing policies which threaten the collapse of Western civilization, the liberal-global governments prefer to make public opposition to their politics a crime.

The UK’s crackdown on free speech continues, with two online platforms withdrawing over censorship concerns – whilst liberal-critical speakers are banned from entering Britain, and even arrested on arrival.

Following the introduction of laws which could see online platforms fined millions of pounds, free speech social media company Gab and video sharing platform Bitchute have withdrawn their services from UK users.

As Reclaim the Net, a UK-based online freedom campaign group, said on March 28:

“The British government has begun aggressively extending its censorship regime beyond its borders, invoking the sweeping powers granted by the Online Safety Act 2023 to demand compliance from foreign-based platforms.”

Bitchute withdrew its services from UK users “over online censorship laws,” as the Free Speech Union reported on April 10. Gab’s statement, published on its UK domain, said the company was acting to protect British users from being jailed for posting on its platform:

After receiving yet another demand from the UK’s speech police, Ofcom, Gab has made the decision to block the entire United Kingdom from accessing our website.

This latest email from Ofcom ordered us to disclose information about our users and operations. We know where this leads: compelled censorship and British citizens thrown in jail for ‘hate speech.’ We refuse to comply with this tyranny.

The UK government claims its laws support “online safety” – but as Reclaim the Net explains, “critics argue … the term … is being used as a smokescreen for state-sanctioned thought control.”

The future of information in Britain looks bleak, as one UK commentator said, promising a “TV version” of the internet – sterilized by UK government media watchdog Ofcom:

“Unless the White House really forces Britain to do it, Ofcom will not be abolished, because the mainstream parties approve of it and no party that doesn’t will be allowed anywhere near power.”

Millennial Woes concludes that there is likely a “hit list” of further online platforms to be taken down in order, beginning with video outlets Odysee and Rumble, the messenger service Telegram, then the free speech publisher Substack – and on to Elon Musk’s X.

“If allowed to continue in its current mode, Ofcom will take down the platforms it wants to, then tame the others by hook or by crook. The Internet in Britain will be a homogenised, redacted farce – a pathetic ‘TV version’ of what people in more civilised countries have.”

Cambridge professor arrested

The charge of “state-sanctioned thought control” is reinforced by the arrest – on Good Friday –-of a Palestinian Christian and Cambridge University professor at London’s Heathrow Airport. The reason for Professor Makram Khoury-Machool’s detention was that he has spoken out against Israel’s war in Gaza, as reports from the UK said.

 

“Keir Starmer’s long and intensifying war on pro-Palestine, anti-genocide speech through the misuse of the Terrorism Act … has continued to escalate,” noted UK outlet Skwawkbox, which covers stories such as this – neglected by the mainstream press “because it doesn’t fit their agenda.”

Professor Khoury, whose speech was criminalized under anti-terror laws, had in the past co-founded an anti-extremism institute in 2016 at Cambridge University.

British left-populist George Galloway responded on X (formerly Twitter), saying the arrest of this “gentle, devout moderate academic father” suggests that the “government has declared war on its own citizens, that liberty is dead in this land, and that Britain is no longer a safe country.”

Galloway’s warning of “It can happen to you. And it will” came a day after reports that a French philosopher noted for his outspoken criticism of mass migration had been banned from entering the UK.

French anti-migration speaker banned

Renaud Camus is the author of The Great Replacement – coining a term now used to describe the liberal-global policy of the replacement of Western populations via mass immigration.

The “great replacement” is routinely “debunked” by the ruling elite as a “conspiracy theory.” As Camus once said to Britain’s Matt Goodwin, “How can it be debunked when it is evident in every street?”

 

He was due to speak at a “remigration conference” in England on April 26. Organized by the nationalist Homeland Party, it is dedicated to the discussion of policies similar to those now being enacted by the Trump administration.

According to the Daily Telegraph, Camus was denied entry to the UK by government order.

In an email seen by The Telegraph, the Home Office informed Mr Camus that he had been denied the electronic travel authorisation (ETA) needed to enter Britain.

‘Your presence in the UK is not considered to be conducive to the public good,’ the email read.

The Telegraph reports that Mr Camus, “who is gay and has advocated for non-violence,” supplied one convincing explanation for his treatment:

[He] told The Telegraph that ‘of all the European governments guilty’ of allowing unchecked migration, ‘the British government is one of the guiltiest’.

‘No wonder it does not want me to speak,’ Mr Camus added.

The fact the British government is banning speakers who promote policies now being enacted with widespread support in the United States has not only provoked criticism – it may derail UK/U.S. trade negotiations.

Days ago, Vice President JD Vance warned UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer that Britain will get no deal with the U.S. over tariffs if its “hate speech” laws remain in place.

“Sir Keir Starmer must embrace Donald Trump’s agenda by repealing hate speech laws in order to get a trade deal over the line, a Washington source has told The Independent.”

A “Washington source” told the UK-based Independent, “No free speech, no deal. It is as simple as that.”

Vance has been a stern critic of British and European moves towards increasing censorship and the suppression of freedom of opinion, describing it in his February Munich speech as a “threat” to democracy “from within” Western Europe – and one which is led by its liberal-globalist governments.

Vance is reportedly “obsessed by the fall of Western civilisation,” The Independent’s Washington source explained. It is clear that Vance believes that this fall is very much a threat created by the political decisions of governments like Starmer’s.

The use of “hate speech” and “anti-terrorism” laws in these cases shows how the UK state-sanctioned suppression of speech affects anyone – from the left, right, or from the Christian faith – who criticizes the policies of the government.

These are not fringe extremist views, but those held by increasing numbers of ordinary people in Britain and throughout the Western world. Instead of changing policies which threaten the collapse of Western civilization, the liberal-global governments prefer to make public opposition to their politics a crime.

In the case of the British state, its hardline stance to defend its idea of democracy from free speech is now threatening its economic future. The politics and laws celebrated as the guarantee of safety increasingly resemble a form of extremism which will not tolerate debate.

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‘Great Reset’ champion Klaus Schwab resigns from WEF

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From LifeSiteNews

By Jonathon Van Maren

Schwab’s World Economic Forum became a globalist hub for population control, radical climate agenda, and transhuman ideology under his decades-long leadership.

Klaus Schwab, founder of the World Economic Forum and the face of the NGO’s elitist annual get-together in Davos, Switzerland, has resigned as chair of WEF. 

Over the decades, but especially over the past several years, the WEF’s Davos annual symposium has become a lightning rod for conservative criticism due to the agendas being pushed there by the elites. As the Associated Press noted: 

Widely regarded as a cheerleader for globalization, the WEF’s Davos gathering has in recent years drawn criticism from opponents on both left and right as an elitist talking shop detached from lives of ordinary people. 

While WEF itself had no formal power, the annual Davos meeting brought together many of the world’s wealthiest and most influential figures, contributing to Schwab’s personal worth and influence.

Schwab’s resignation on April 20 was announced by the Geneva-based WEF on April 21, but did not indicate why the 88-year-old was resigning. “Following my recent announcement, and as I enter my 88th year, I have decided to step down from the position of Chair and as a member of the Board of Trustees, with immediate effect,” Schwab said in a brief statement. He gave no indication of what he plans to do next. 

Schwab founded the World Economic Forum – originally the European Management Forum – in 1971, and its initial mission was to assist European business leaders in competing with American business and to learn from U.S. models and innovation. However, the mission soon expanded to the development of a global economic agenda.  

Schwab detailed his own agenda in several books, including The Fourth Industrial Revolution (2016), in which he described the rise of a new industrial era in which technologies such artificial intelligence, gene editing, and advanced robotics would blur the lines between the digital, physical, and biological worlds. Schwab wrote: 

We stand on the brink of a technological revolution that will fundamentally alter the way we live, work, and relate to one another. In its scale, scope, and complexity, the transformation will be unlike anything humankind has experienced before. We do not yet know just how it will unfold, but one thing is clear: the response to it must be integrated and comprehensive, involving all stakeholders of the global polity, from the public and private sectors to academia and civil society …

The Fourth Industrial Revolution, finally, will change not only what we do but also who we are. It will affect our identity and all the issues associated with it: our sense of privacy, our notions of ownership, our consumption patterns, the time we devote to work and leisure, and how we develop our careers, cultivate our skills, meet people, and nurture relationships. It is already changing our health and leading to a “quantified” self, and sooner than we think it may lead to human augmentation.

How? Microchips implanted into humans, for one. Schwab was a tech optimist who appeared to heartily welcome transhumanism; in a 2016 interview with France 24 discussing his book, he stated:  

And then you have the microchip, which will be implanted, probably within the next ten years, first to open your car, your home, or to do your passport, your payments, and then it will be in your body to monitor your health.

In 2020, mere months into the pandemic, Schwab published COVID-19: The Great Reset, in which he detailed his view of the opportunity presented by the growing global crisis. According to Schwab, the crisis was an opportunity for a global reset that included “stakeholder capitalism,” in which corporations could integrate social and environmental goals into their operations, especially working toward “net-zero emissions” and a massive transition to green energy, and “harnessing” the Fourth Industrial Revolution, including artificial intelligence and automation. 

Much of Schwab’s personal wealth came from running the World Economic Forum; as chairman, he earned an annual salary of 1 million Swiss francs (approximately $1 million USD), and the WEF was supported financially through membership fees from over 1,000 companies worldwide as well as significant contributions from organizations such as the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. Vice Chairman Peter Brabeck-Letmathe is now serving as interim chairman until his replacement has been selected. 

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Jonathon’s writings have been translated into more than six languages and in addition to LifeSiteNews, has been published in the National PostNational ReviewFirst Things, The Federalist, The American Conservative, The Stream, the Jewish Independent, the Hamilton SpectatorReformed Perspective Magazine, and LifeNews, among others. He is a contributing editor to The European Conservative.

His insights have been featured on CTV, Global News, and the CBC, as well as over twenty radio stations. He regularly speaks on a variety of social issues at universities, high schools, churches, and other functions in Canada, the United States, and Europe.

He is the author of The Culture WarSeeing is Believing: Why Our Culture Must Face the Victims of AbortionPatriots: The Untold Story of Ireland’s Pro-Life MovementPrairie Lion: The Life and Times of Ted Byfield, and co-author of A Guide to Discussing Assisted Suicide with Blaise Alleyne.

Jonathon serves as the communications director for the Canadian Centre for Bio-Ethical Reform.

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