 Here’s what you need to know to get the day started: | | | B.C., Ontario vow to crack down on diploma mill schools exploiting international students | | |  | Selina Robinson, B.C.'s minister of post-secondary education and future skills, pictured at a July press conference, says B.C. will announce measures next week aimed at cracking down on private post-secondary institutions. (Ethan Cairns/The Canadian Press) | | | B.C. and Ontario are vowing to crack down on private post-secondary institutions that are accused of exploiting international students, after the federal government announced Monday it will cap the number of student permits issued in the next two years.
Federal Immigration Minister Marc Miller announced the government will reduce the number of student visas by 35 per cent for 2024, stating the goal is in part to target private institutions he described as "the diploma equivalent of puppy mills."
Each province and territory will be allotted a portion of the total student visas, distributed according to population, and in some provinces, permits will be reduced about 50 per cent.
Speaking with CBC's Power and Politics, Miller pointed to B.C. and Ontario in particular as areas where private institutions are giving out what he called "fake" degrees. He said these institutions have "exploded in the last couple years" and federal and provincial governments need to get it under control.
B.C. Post-Secondary Education and Future Skills Minister Selina Robinson said her government is working on "a suite of actions" to be announced next week that will "significantly increase quality standards in international education."
Speaking with CBC Radio's BC Today, Robinson said B.C. has more than 250 private post-secondary institutions, and she has been "appalled" by some of their actions, including recruiting students with false promises of in-class instruction and guaranteed housing.
Jill Dunlop, Ontario's minister of colleges and universities, said in a statement that the province is also working with the federal government on ways to crack down on practices like predatory recruitment.
"We know some bad actors are taking advantage of these students with false promises of guaranteed employment, residency, and Canadian citizenship," she said. | | | | | Some of the best from the 2024 Close-up Photographer of the Year | | |  | (Csaba Daróczi) | | | | Sometimes it helps to get really close to something to get a good view. The Close-up Photographer of the Year contest saw more than 12,000 submissions from 67 countries. The overall winner, seen here, is titled The Bird of the Forest. Hungarian photographer Csaba Daróczi said the photo was captured by putting a Go Pro camera into a hollowed-out tree stump. See more photos from the contest here. | | | | | | | | | In brief | | | A judge will hear lawyers' arguments today on whether the actions of a London, Ont., man convicted of running over and killing four members of a Muslim family and injuring another meet the legal definition of an act of terrorism. Nathaniel Veltman was convicted in November of four counts of first-degree murder and one count of attempted murder in the truck attack on the Afzaals on June 6, 2021. Yumnah Afzaal, 15, her parents — Madiha Salman, 44, and Salman Afzaal, 46 — were killed, as was family matriarch Talat Afzaal, 74. A boy who was nine years old at the time survived, and was among dozens of people who gave victim impact statements earlier this month when the convicted killer's sentencing hearing began. Justice Renee Pomerance will determine whether or not the attack constituted terrorist activity, as the Crown has alleged. The convicted killer's lawyer, Christopher Hicks, said he will argue against the terrorism designation. Earlier this month, Hicks told CBC News the 23-year-old's fragile mental state made it impossible for him to form the intent to carry out the attacks to achieve any specific political end. Read the full story here.
Canada Post is selling off its IT and logistics departments, a move business experts say is an essential first step in saving a Crown corporation that lost more than half a billion dollars in 2022. "Canada Post is disappearing before our eyes," said Ian Lee, a business professor at Carleton University in Ottawa who has researched the decline of Canada Post. "They're starting to restructure because they're starting to finally face that reality." Last week, Canada Post announced it will sell its in-house IT business, Innovapost, to Deloitte Canada. As part of the outsourcing deal, Canada Post will maintain an IT leadership team while most of Innovapost's 750-person workforce is absorbed by Deloitte. That announcement came a week after Canada Post said it would be selling its 3,000-person logistics company. Canada Post declined CBC's requests for an interview and instead provided a written statement. "For the last two years, Canada Post has been executing a comprehensive transformation plan focused on serving the changing needs of Canadians and Canadian businesses," Canada Post spokesperson Janick Cormier wrote. Selling off or outsourcing parts of Canada Post's operations won't be enough to save it, Lee said. In the third quarter of 2023, the company lost a $290 million. Read the full story here.
Three people are dead and four others were rushed to hospital in critical condition after a helicopter crash north of Terrace, B.C., on Monday afternoon. Northern Escape Heli-Skiing confirmed the deaths in a statement Monday evening, saying the company wants to express its condolences to those affected by the crash. "The guests who ski with us and the staff who work with us each season are part of our family," the company's president John Forrest said. "It is impossible to put into words the profound grief that we feel and the sorrow that our guests and our staff share. We hope you will respect the privacy of those impacted at this extremely difficult time." B.C. Emergency Health Services said it was notified of the crash at about 4:15 p.m. PT, and paramedics were sent to the scene with three air ambulances and five ground ambulances. The four critically injured patients were taken to hospital in Terrace. Read the full story here.
A federal humanitarian program to bring migrants from the Caribbean and South America to Canada has reached capacity less than two months after its launch, prompting criticism about what one man is calling the Canadian government's "inequitable" response to immigration from certain countries. Ottawa resident Nixon Valere, 54, was ecstatic when the federal government announced in October that it would open the door to 11,000 people from Colombia, Venezuela and Haiti who have immediate family members living in Canada, either as citizens or permanent residents. The program was officially launched the following month. For years, Valere has wanted to bring his six brothers and their children to join the rest of his family in Canada from Haiti because it's a dangerous and even deadly place to live, he said. His family has spent thousands of dollars and many hours uploading all the necessary paperwork, only to have each application returned as "incomplete" by the Canadian government, he said. To make matters worse, there's no chance for him to upload any missing documents because the program closed after reaching capacity at the end of December. Read the full story here.
While Republicans have drawn more attention in this 2024 U.S. presidential primary season, some Democrats will be nervously watching Tuesday's results in New Hampshire. Especially President Joe Biden. He faces an early enthusiasm test, in a year where few Democrats were enthused about him running, and where victory in November will hinge on turnout. Now a three-term congressman is hoping to upstage the president through a renegade campaign based on his argument that the party needs a Biden backup. If Dean Phillips of Minnesota pulls off an upset in New Hampshire, he says: "It's a whole new race. And a whole new day." The polls show no evidence of an imminent upset, but it's a weird year: Biden isn't actually on the ballot in New Hampshire, amid a fight between the Democratic National Committee and the state over plans to strip it of its first-in-the-nation primary status. So Biden allies have launched a campaign to stave off the embarrassment of defeat, even if this primary is not officially sanctioned by the national party and won't mean delegates for the winner. Read more on this story here.
Norman Jewison, the acclaimed and versatile Canadian-born director whose Hollywood films ranged from Doris Day comedies to social dramas, has died at age 97. Jewison died "peacefully" Saturday, publicist Jeff Sanderson confirmed to CBC News. Additional details were not immediately available. The frequent Oscar nominee and Toronto native was known for stirring up controversy with his introspective films, addressing civil rights issues and religion in works such as In the Heat of the Night and the film adaptations of Fiddler on the Roof and Jesus Christ Superstar. "I have tended to show humanity as fallible, sensitive, befuddled, misled but redeemable, rather than mindless, relentlessly violent," he wrote in his 2004 industry-themed autobiography, This Terrible Business Has Been Good to Me. "I want people to recognize themselves in the movies I make. I don't enjoy no-brainer action movies." Read more on Jewison's life and career here.
Now here's some good news to start your Tuesday: Yulia Veretenny had been trying to convince her parents to come to Newfoundland from Ukraine since the war started in 2022, but they resisted until Veretenny told them about the old clock in Carbonear, N.L., that needed fixing. Watch the story here. | | |  | After Siakam trade, what's next for the Raptors? | The Toronto Raptors said goodbye to fan-favourite Pascal Siakam. What does the end of the 2019 championship era mean for the struggling team?
Listen to today's episode | | | Today in history: January 23 | | | 1845: The U.S. Congress passes an act setting the first Tuesday after the first Monday in November every four years as the date for the presidential election.
1949: Fire destroys much of Regina's public transit system. Thirty-eight buses and streetcars were destroyed in the fire at the city's transit barns.
1991: Renowned Canadian literary scholar Northrop Frye dies in Toronto at age 78. As a teacher, Margaret Atwood, Dennis Leary and Jay Macpherson were among his students. He wrote more than 20 books, including 1947’s Fearful Symmetry, which brought him international recognition.
1995: After a 10-year battle, Guy Paul Morin is acquitted of the 1984 sex-slaying of his nine-year-old neighbour, Christine Jessop of Queensville, Ont. The Ontario Court of Appeal cleared Morin on the basis of new DNA evidence. He was acquitted at his first trial, but a Crown appeal led to a retrial and conviction. Following an inquiry, the province awarded Morin and his parents $1.25 million in compensation in 1997. | | | (With files from CBC News, The Canadian Press, The Associated Press and Reuters) | | | | |  | CBC NEWS APP | The most convenient way to get your news
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