National
Canadian mayor has bank account garnished after standing up to LGBT activists
From LifeSiteNews
The garnishment was issued by the court and delivered to the CIBC in Emo, which is the only bank in that community.
LGBT activists aren’t used to politicians refusing to do what they say. That’s why Mayor Harold McQuaker of Emo, Ontario—population 1,200—has become a source of their ire.
As I reported previously, in 2020 Emo’s town council voted not to issue a “Pride Proclamation” or fly the LGBT flag. The town hall doesn’t even have a flagpole. In response, Borderland Pride sued the town, and last month the Ontario Human Rights Commission ordered the township to pay the LGBT group $10,000, and McQuaker was ordered to personally pay $5,000 and take a re-education class called “Human Rights 101.”
The town council has yet to vote on whether to pay the fine or appeal, but McQuaker told the Toronto Sun that he would not be “extorted” and thus would not be paying the fine, attending the re-education classes, or sanctioning “Drag Queen Story Hour” in the local library—one of the events Borderland Pride is calling for.
In response, Borderland Pride went around the mayor and requested that $5,000 be taken directly from his bank account. The request granted, they went on a victory lap on social media. “Sure, sex is great, but have you ever garnished your mayor’s bank account after he publicly refused to comply with a Tribunal’s order to pay damages?” the group posted on Facebook. The “damages,” of course, were the mayor declining to proactively endorse their ideology.
“Mayor McQuaker’s comments in the Toronto Sun and other media were very clear that he did not respect nor intend to comply with the Tribunal’s orders,” Borderland Pride told the Sun. “Consequently, it was apparent he would not voluntarily make payment of the damages ordered. We took immediate action to garnish his bank account. The garnishment was issued by the court and delivered to the CIBC in Emo, which is the only bank in that community.”
“There is no hearing or application to issue a notice of garnishment – it is a service provided at the court counter or online once a person has an order for the payment of money,” Borderland Pride stated. “Orders of the Tribunal can be enforced in the same manner as any civil judgment for the payment of money. We intend to ensure the Tribunal’s orders are complied with.” Joe Warmington of the Toronto Sun sounded the alarm:
Cancel culture is cancelling this mayor and digging into his personal savings too. On a weak premise that there is discrimination of LGBT people there, the enforcement is harsher than most violent criminals receive. It seems like a heavy-handed, undemocratic move, not to mention a violation of personal finances, and cruel and unusual punishment. It’s also a slippery slope. The state using legal instruments to take from one person and give to others amounts to communism and authoritarianism that should scare every citizen. First, we saw government and banks freezing accounts of pandemic lockdown protesters, seizing donations to crowdfunding sites, and now in woke Canada comes word they can raid bank accounts, too.
Despite Borderland Pride’s insistence that they are mere enforcers of tolerance, their Facebook page features post after post mocking those who object to the fact that their mayor and their community is being bullied. It also includes images like this:
The meaning of that picture is pretty clear—and just imagine if the roles were reversed. What would Borderland Pride say if a Christian posted a photo of a steamroller with a cross on it, chasing screaming people labeled “LGBT values” and “same-sex ‘marriage’” on it? I think we know. They would say that it was threatening and inappropriate. Yet a rainbow steamroller crushing screaming people labeled “Traditional Family” and “Christian values” and “Sanctity of marriage” is just fine. This isn’t just a double standard—it is a new standard, where the values of LGBT activists take precedence over those of everyone else.
Borderland Pride’s celebratory posts about garnishing the bank account of a 77-year-old great-grandfather tell us precisely who they are—many of the posts and comments from LGBT activists are frankly too vile to publish (suffice it to say they refer to performing sex acts in public). Canada is also getting a good look at the agenda of LGBT activists once again. They do not want “tolerance,” or to “live and let live”—they want their flag hanging from government buildings, politicians obediently proclaiming a celebration of their activities, and drag queens in local libraries.
It was never about tolerance.
“The unifying theme that enables the Liberal party to maintain its hold over Canada is persistent anti-Americanism…I hope Canadians finally mature, acknowledge that we are neither superior nor inferior to the United States, and abandon our collective national inferiority complex.” Conrad Black quotes a friend.
Canadian media have almost always been reflexively anti-American. Fair enough. Abandoned by Britain they needed to push back. But the real fear of being consumed by the rebel colonies to the south has morphed into a fear of Donald Trump reminding Canada that it has been riding first class while paying economy.
Bashing noisy, bumptious America has always been good business if you owned a Canadian newspaper or television/radio network. The performative worship of Canadian leaders who cocked a snook at the Yankees led, in recent times, to the open-mouthed support for the fatuous Trudeaupian line of monarchs. As Ray Davies sang, “each one a dedicated follower of fashion.”
Since Pierre “The Bold” Trudeau succeeded Lester Pearson and ascended to the throne of the Family Compact in 1968, Canadian policy from Viet Nam to Trump has become “What are the Americans doing? Then let’s do the opposite”. Sample of spite: CBS TV pulled a controversial 60 Minutes news story —but it aired in Canada after being leaked by pissed-off CBS employees.
Yes, there was the brief Harper interregnum when Canada actually fought a military campaign alongside the U.S. in Afghanistan. But mostly it was Jean “Golf Balls” Chretien sitting out the Iraq War.
Alas, all good things must end. Or at least pause. People were starting to notice that Justy was a Chinese trusty, his Montreal riding campaign funded by hundreds of Chinese “businessman” from far away. The tragi-comic Trudeuapian succession hit a speed bump with Mark Carney being brought in to domesticate Canada in manner satisfactory to Brookfield and the EU.
But no one is betting the Libs won’t turn to a third generation of Quebec fashionistas— in the form of another Trudeau progeny— when all else fails.
As usual caustic Conrad Black sums up Canada best. With Quebec and Alberta talking separation he quotes a friend on the state of the nation. “What exists instead is a Liberal Party that manages — often quite poorly — the finances of a collection of provinces and territories, while relying on its media apparatus to shape and safeguard its narrative. It resembles a hedge fund supported by an image consulting firm.” (Insert your convict felon/ anglo wannabe reference here.)
There is no doubt that, as 2025 skulks out, the “image-consulting firm” painting rosy pictures of the Laurentian Elite is in for a a challenge. Justin thought using Trump as his pretext could achieve peace by buying up the lads and lasses of the fourth estate. It worked with Covid and the Truckers Convoy as the column writers/ panel hosts dutifully wrote it like he called it (even as the international press chided Trudeau.).
But even those good times didn’t last, forcing the Libs to do a presto-chango before Justin could lead them to a catastrophic defeat in the spring election. Once more, faced with Trump’s aggressive posture toward trade with Canada, the press closed ranks over Elbows Up, portraying CPC leader Pierre Poilievre as Dick Dastardly.
But new polling shows that the burst of enthusiasm for more Liberal pantomime is wearing thin. The new “new” trade deal promised with Trump has dissipated. The threat to private home ownership in B.C. by government’s indigenous land concessions has sent a chill through the middle class. The NDP fainting goats who bought Elbows Up are headed back to Crazytown, likely under Avi Lewis.
Now, at last, the reckoning promised by the Conservatives’ 20-point lead in polling this time last year may be at hand. While the diehards will go their graves mumbling land acknowledgements and 32 pronouns, there is hope that the under 60s— who emphatically support the Tories— will force change.
What change? Tristan Hopper in the National Post suggests that one place to start reforming the jalopy of Canadian government is in the oceans of money lavished on cause-related political leeches. Seeing the Bondi Beach slaughter by ISIS radicals many now question how long before Toronto or Montreal experiences a similar tragedy at the hands of jihadis who are lavishly supported by tax money.
Yes, not all Muslims in the West are terrorists. But almost all terrorists in the West are Muslim. Hate-spewing Hamas groupies from college faculty are regularly allowed major intersections with police protection as they promise to wipe out infidels. Till now it’s been poor form to even mention, let alone criticize, this pantomime.
Withdrawing financial aid to these groups and their academic fellow travellers would immediately rob these brigands of their impact. The cries of despair from cutting the cord would also expose those in the Commons who have coddled these vipers with grants and ministries.
Similar hacking at the slush money aimed at every other form of leftist posing— from trans to indigenous to illegal immigrants— would also mark the end of free money. Of course there will be caterwauling from the Elizabeth May Free Lunch crew. But with the threat of Canada coming apart with Quebec and Alberta/ Saskatchewan headed for the door those usual dissenting voices will be muted.
Only one thing stands in the way of this culling. That is PM Mark Carney coercing one more MP to cross the floor to his party, cementing its majority status for up to four more years. While the At Issue panels slap their flippers in glee at Poilievre’s demise, the rest of the nation will be less enthralled with the new realities of censorship, trade and housing.
As Stephen Punwasi states. “People in Canada can’t afford homes & prices can’t fall because debt was securitized with widespread fraud—so taxpayers will subsidize foreign speculation. It’s like they hired the mayor of Vancouver to run housing. Oh—they did, eh? Kids, run.”
Bruce Dowbiggin @dowbboy is the editor of Not The Public Broadcaster A two-time winner of the Gemini Award as Canada’s top television sports broadcaster, his 2025 book Deal With It: The Trades That Stunned The NHL And Changed Hockey is now available on Amazon. Inexact Science: The Six Most Compelling Draft Years In NHL History, his previous book with his son Evan, was voted the seventh-best professional hockey book of all time by bookauthority.org . His new poetry collection In Other Words is available via brucedowbigginbooks.ca and on Kindle books at https://www.amazon.ca/dp/1069802700
From the Fraser Institute
By Tegan Hill
Last Friday, less than a week before Christmas, the Smith government quietly released the final report from its Alberta Next Panel, which assessed Alberta’s role in Canada. Among other things, the panel recommends that the federal government transfer some of its tax revenue to provincial governments so they can assume more control over the delivery of provincial services. Based on Canada’s experience in the 1990s, this plan could deliver real benefits for Albertans and all Canadians.
Federations such as Canada typically work best when governments stick to their constitutional lanes. Indeed, one of the benefits of being a federalist country is that different levels of government assume responsibility for programs they’re best suited to deliver. For example, it’s logical that the federal government handle national defence, while provincial governments are typically best positioned to understand and address the unique health-care and education needs of their citizens.
But there’s currently a mismatch between the share of taxes the provinces collect and the cost of delivering provincial responsibilities (e.g. health care, education, childcare, and social services). As such, Ottawa uses transfers—including the Canada Health Transfer (CHT)—to financially support the provinces in their areas of responsibility. But these funds come with conditions.
Consider health care. To receive CHT payments from Ottawa, provinces must abide by the Canada Health Act, which effectively prevents the provinces from experimenting with new ways of delivering and financing health care—including policies that are successful in other universal health-care countries. Given Canada’s health-care system is one of the developed world’s most expensive universal systems, yet Canadians face some of the longest wait times for physicians and worst access to medical technology (e.g. MRIs) and hospital beds, these restrictions limit badly needed innovation and hurt patients.
To give the provinces more flexibility, the Alberta Next Panel suggests the federal government shift tax points (and transfer GST) to the provinces to better align provincial revenues with provincial responsibilities while eliminating “strings” attached to such federal transfers. In other words, Ottawa would transfer a portion of its tax revenues from the federal income tax and federal sales tax to the provincial government so they have funds to experiment with what works best for their citizens, without conditions on how that money can be used.
According to the Alberta Next Panel poll, at least in Alberta, a majority of citizens support this type of provincial autonomy in delivering provincial programs—and again, it’s paid off before.
In the 1990s, amid a fiscal crisis (greater in scale, but not dissimilar to the one Ottawa faces today), the federal government reduced welfare and social assistance transfers to the provinces while simultaneously removing most of the “strings” attached to these dollars. These reforms allowed the provinces to introduce work incentives, for example, which would have previously triggered a reduction in federal transfers. The change to federal transfers sparked a wave of reforms as the provinces experimented with new ways to improve their welfare programs, and ultimately led to significant innovation that reduced welfare dependency from a high of 3.1 million in 1994 to a low of 1.6 million in 2008, while also reducing government spending on social assistance.
The Smith government’s Alberta Next Panel wants the federal government to transfer some of its tax revenues to the provinces and reduce restrictions on provincial program delivery. As Canada’s experience in the 1990s shows, this could spur real innovation that ultimately improves services for Albertans and all Canadians.
Tegan Hill
Director, Alberta Policy, Fraser Institute
Ottawa’s Newly Released Defence Plan Crosses a Dangerous Line
All 12 Vaccinated vs. Unvaccinated Studies Found the Same Thing: Unvaccinated Children Are Far Healthier
Carney Floor Crossing Raises Counterintelligence Questions aimed at China, Former Senior Mountie Argues
Ottawa is still dodging the China interference threat
-
Digital ID1 day agoCanadian government launches trial version of digital ID for certain licenses, permits
-
Alberta1 day agoAlberta Next Panel calls to reform how Canada works
-
International1 day agoGeorgia county admits illegally certifying 315k ballots in 2020 presidential election
-
Agriculture2 days agoEnd Supply Management—For the Sake of Canadian Consumers
-
Business1 day agoThe “Disruptor-in-Chief” places Canada in the crosshairs
-
Artificial Intelligence1 day agoUK Police Pilot AI System to Track “Suspicious” Driver Journeys
-
Energy1 day ago‘The electric story is over’
-
International1 day agoWorld-leading biochemist debunks evolutionary theory