National
Free expression trial of Amy Hamm nears its end
News release from the Justice Centre for Constitutional Freedoms
The Justice Centre for Constitutional Freedoms is providing lawyers for British Columbia nurse Amy Hamm, whose disciplinary hearings will conclude on March 18-19, 2024. Oral arguments, beginning at 10:00 a.m. PT, will conclude the hearing before the three-person Disciplinary Committee of the British Columbia College of Nurses and Midwives in Vancouver. Lawyers will also answer any questions the panel may have following the submissions. The public is invited to view the proceedings online.
The prosecution of Amy Hamm over the off-duty expression of her opinions dates back to September 2020, when she co-sponsored a billboard featuring the words, “I ♥ JK Rowling” – a reference to the famous British author who, in 2019, came to the defense of a British woman whose employment contract was terminated after expressing “gender critical views.”
Two complaints by members of the public to the College about Ms. Hamm’s involvement with the billboard led to an investigation. That resulted in a 332-page report on Ms. Hamm’s activities, including a collection of her tweets, podcast transcripts and articles she had authored on the topic of gender identity and its conflict with women’s rights and the safeguarding of children.
The charge against Ms. Hamm reads, “Between approximately July 2018 and March 2021, you made discriminatory and derogatory statements regarding transgender people, while identifying yourself as a nurse or nurse educator. These statements were made across various online platforms, including but not limited to, podcasts, videos, published writings and social media.” The hearing began on September 21, 2022, and the panel heard 20 days of testimony, including approximately five days of challenges to the expert evidence provided by Ms. Hamm.
Much of the hearings to date has concentrated on the qualification, testimony and questioning of expert witnesses for both sides. The College presented as experts Dr. Elizabeth Saewyc and Dr. Greta Bauer, who argued that statements made by J. K. Rowling were “transphobic” and, by extension, so were Ms. Hamm’s. In Ms. Hamm’s defense, her legal team presented experts Dr. James Cantor, Dr. Kathleen Stock and Dr. Linda Blade.
As stated in their February 19, 2024, written submissions to the Committee, Ms. Hamm’s lawyers argue that:
- There is no evidence of breach of standards or bylaws, nor a case for a finding of unprofessional conduct;
- Her statements do not have a sufficient nexus to her status as a nurse to warrant regulatory interference;
- Her speech is reasonable and scientifically supportable;
- There is social value to her speech;
- Her advocacy is conducted in good faith, including to affect political change;
- She believes in the truth of her statements;
- There is no evidence of “discrimination” or “harm;”
- The infringement of her Charter right to freedom of expression, belief and opinion cannot be justified on a proportionate balancing against the objectives of the College.”
Lisa Bildy, lawyer for Amy Hamm, stated, “A key issue in this case is whether professionals can express criticism of gender identity ideology or other political issues in the public square without being subject to regulatory discipline. We argue that the College has allowed itself and its disciplinary process to become participants in a public and political controversy on which it should not be taking a side. The College should enforce high standards of performance for nurses and midwives when caring for their patients, and otherwise refrain from taking sides on political, cultural and moral issues that are debated in the public square. The College has lost its way.”
Daily Caller
Canada Pivots From ‘Diversity Is Our Strength,’ Locks Down Border Fearing Migrant Influx
From the Daily Caller News Foundation
Canadian officials are bracing for a possible migrant influx into their country because of President-elect Donald Trump’s election victory in the U.S., marking a major pivot in policy compared to Trump’s first White House term.
Canada’s Liberal Party-led government appears to be taking a much more hawkish approach to illegal immigration and the possibility of a surge in asylum seekers, according to the New York Times. The Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) — the country’s law enforcement arm that patrols the border — is preparing to beef up its immigration enforcement capabilities by hiring more staff, adding more vehicles and creating more processing facilities.
RCMP would use the extra vehicles to help patrol the U.S.-Canada border and utilize newly-established facilities to detain and process arriving migrants, according to the New York Times.
The preparations up north come as Trump — who just won election to a second, non-consecutive term to the White House — has vowed to conduct the largest deportation operation in the country’s history. He is set to re-occupy the Oval Office in January, where he will get to work on his hardline immigration enforcement agenda.
Canadian officials have spoken about the possibility of a migrant surge into their country early on since Trump’s victory.
“We started planning because we knew that there were a lot of people in the United States who will fear to be deported, and if that happens, they won’t wait for the Trump administration to seize power, it’s more likely that they will attempt to cross into Canada from now in the next few weeks until he takes on power,” RCMP spokesperson Sgt. Charles Poirier said on CTV News earlier in November.
Trudeau’s government did not have the same response to Trump’s first-term crackdown on illegal migrants.
“To those fleeing persecution, terror & war, Canadians will welcome you, regardless of your faith. Diversity is our strength #WelcomeToCanada,” the Canadian prime minister posted on social media on Jan. 28, 2017, just days after Trump was sworn into office.
However, in the years since Trudeau made these public overtures, the Canadian government has recognized the need to change course. The change in policy is largely reflective of less tolerance in the country for mass migration, public opinion surveys have shown.
“To be clear: all newcomers are valued in Canada,” Marc Miller, Canada’s immigration minister, said during a September speech in Ottawa before announcing the rollout of immigration enforcement measures. “But we also need to recognize that this can impact communities, such as the increases in unemployment amongst youth and newcomers.”
“We are introducing changes to further recalibrate international student, foreign worker and permanent resident volumes. That work has already started,” Miller continued.
In addition to beefing up its border infrastructure, Canadian officials also plan to make use out of an international agreement that will allow them to send asylum seekers back into the U.S., according to the New York Times. The “safe third country” agreement — which the Trump administration heavily enforced onto Mexico at that time — designates both the U.S. and Canada as safe countries for asylum requestors, meaning a migrant that arrived in the U.S. must first seek asylum there before attempting to do so in Canada.
“We expect that agreement to continue to be fully enforced,” Miller told reporters earlier.
The RCMP did not immediately respond to a request for comment from the Daily Caller News Foundation.
Business
Canada’s department of government efficiency: A blueprint
From the Canadian Taxpayers Federation
Average compensation for a federal bureaucrat is $125,300. Cutting back the bureaucracy to population growth would save taxpayers $9 billion every year
Dumb government spending doesn’t stop at the 49th parallel.
U.S. President-elect Donald Trump announced the creation of a Department of Government Efficiency, with a mandate to “dismantle government bureaucracy, slash excess regulations, cut wasteful expenditures, and restructure federal agencies.”
Those marching orders sure would sound good in a prime minister’s mandate letter to a finance minister. And here’s the blueprint they should follow.
Begin with crazy research Canadian taxpayers are forced to subsidize.
The Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council spends $1 billion a year supporting “research and research training in the social sciences and humanities.”
Here’s a little taste of the reports it funds with your tax dollars:
- Gender Politics in Peruvian Rock Music ($20,000)
- Cart-ography: tracking the birth, life and death of an urban grocery cart, from work product to work tool ($105,000)
- My Paw in Yours: Dead Pets and Transcendence of Species Divides in Experimental Art-Making Practice ($17,500)
- Playing for Pleasure: The Affective Experience of Sexual and Erotic Video Games ($50,000)
And that’s just the tip of the iceberg.
Parks Canada put Mr. Magoo in charge of its hunting operations. It spent four years and $10,000 capturing a single bullfrog and dropped $800,000 hunting 84 deer on a B.C. Island. How can a simple hunt cost $10,000 per deer?
Well, hunting gets more expensive when instead of your grandpa’s old rifle, you use prohibited semi-automatic weapons, instead of a box of shells, you get a crate of ammo, and instead of your buddy’s old pickup, you rent a helicopter for $67,000.
Or how about the $8-million barn at Rideau Hall. Or $12,500 live senior citizen sex story shows. Or the $8,800 sex toy show in Germany. Or the millions wasted producing government podcasts no one listens to.
Then there’s government officials living high on the hog.
Governor General Mary Simon spent $71,000 on limo services in Iceland. Bureaucrats spend $76,000 a month renting art. Global Affairs Canada spends $51,000 on booze a month.
Now, the big stuff.
The size and cost of the government is out of control. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau hired 108,000 new bureaucrats. That’s a 42 per cent increase in less than a decade.
Had the bureaucracy only increased with population growth, there would be 72,491 fewer bureaucrats today.
Average compensation for a federal bureaucrat is $125,300. Cutting back the bureaucracy to population growth would save taxpayers $9 billion every year.
It’s time to stop rewarding failure with bonuses.
The feds dished out $1.5 billion in bonuses since 2015.
And the bonuses flow despite federal departments only managing to hit half of their performance targets once in the past five years.
Government executives overseeing ArriveSCAM took $340,000 in bonuses.
The Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation rubberstamped $102 million in bonuses amid the worst housing crisis in Canadian history.
The Bank of Canada printed $20 million in bonus cheques in 2022, as inflation reached a 40-year high.
The CBC dished out $132 million in bonuses since 2015.
The next thing on the chopping block? Corporate welfare.
Trudeau put taxpayers on the hook for $30 billion in subsidies to multinational corporations like Honda,Volkswagen, Stellantis and Northvolt.
Federal corporate subsidies totalled $11.2 billion in 2022 alone.
Shutting down the federal government’s seven regional development agencies would save taxpayers an estimated $1.5 billion annually.
True efficiency would also mean eliminating failing government operations altogether. The feds should sell any Crown corporation that can, or should, be left to the private sector.
Here are a few examples.
The CBC, which takes more than $1 billion from taxpayers annually.
Canada Post, which lost $1.2 billion in the last two years and forecasts “larger, unsustainable losses in future years.”
VIA Rail, took $1.8 billion in taxpayer cash during the past five years just to cover operating losses.
The bad news for taxpayers is we pay too much tax because the government wastes too money. The list of wasteful spending in this article is far from exhaustive.
Other examples include the multi-billion dollar gun confiscation that police officers say won’t work, the $25-billion equalization scheme and taxpayer-funded media bailouts, among others.
The good news is a champion of taxpayers could make massive cuts and barely anyone outside the Ottawa bubble would notice.
This is the blueprint to slash Ottawa’s wasteful, bloated bureaucracy. All we need now is a prime minister with the guts to pick up the scissors.
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