Canada's environment commissioner says the country is nowhere near to meeting its goal of planting two-billion trees by 2030.
The Liberals first made the massive tree-planting promise during the 2019 federal election campaign and followed through with a 10-year 3.2-billion-dollar budget for it in 2020.
However, an audit of the first two years of planting says it appears the government isn't on track to get even four per cent of the promised trees in the ground by the end of 2030.
The report found 57 per cent of respondents said they could not keep up with increasing need for help, 40 per cent reported higher levels of demand than before the pandemic and 22 per cent said demand “significantly exceeds” capacity.
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has said he stepped back from the Trudeau Foundation years ago. The charity has previously said his formal involvement ended in 2014, about a year after he was elected Liberal leader.
The RCMP has been struggling to fill its vacancies for years, with more-recent hiring and training efforts also hampered by the COVID-19 pandemic. The force has said it hopes to boost the amount of diversity in its ranks by hiring more women, visible minorities and Indigenous people.
Despite efforts of emergency responders and the civilians present, Cst. Harvinder Singh Dhami succumbed to his injuries. This tragic incident is still under investigation, more information may be provided when available.
Police learned that an altercation took place between two groups inside the SkyTrain station resulting in the victim being stabbed. Three suspects then fled the SkyTrain station onto Columbia Street. The victim and suspects are not known to each other.
The Port of Vancouver says 331 cruise ships are scheduled over the same period, potentially delivering more than one million visitors into the downtown core, with almost daily arrivals and departures at the height of the season between May and September.