COVID-19 quarantine exemption for Costco CEO shouldn't have happened, Ottawa says

Friday, October 16, 2020 – by John McHutchion

Here’s what you need to know to get the day started:

COVID-19 quarantine exemption for Costco CEO shouldn't have happened, Ottawa says

The U.S. CEO of Costco was granted a special exemption from Canada's mandatory 14-day COVID-19 quarantine to attend the openings of the grocery chain's newest outlets, a CBC News investigation has learned.

Craig Jelinek and another top company executive, Joe Portera, travelled to Canada aboard a private Gulfstream jet in late August for a three-day store inspection blitz that took them to Ontario, Quebec and Alberta.

The pair first touched down at Ottawa International Airport on Aug. 25 — the same day that the billionaire CEO of Wisconsin-based Uline Inc. and two of her senior executives were granted similar quarantine exemptions after arriving in Toronto by private jet.

In both cases, the executives were allowed to enter the country and skip the two-week self-isolation period on the grounds that they were "essential" workers — decisions that the federal government now characterizes as mistakes made by front-line Canada Border Services Agency (CBSA) officers.

Public Safety Minister Bill Blair, who oversees the CBSA, vowed to fix the problem after a Sept. 16 CBC News report documenting the quarantine-free visit that the Uline executives made to the company's warehouse in Milton, Ont. He declined a request for an interview about the Costco exemptions and the steps that he has since taken.

"Their travel was deemed to be essential when it should not have been," Blair's office wrote in an email response to questions this week about the grocery store visits. "Decisions on admissibility are made by border services officers (BSOs) based on the information provided to them."

A CBSA spokesperson confirmed that Jelinek and Portera, Costco's executive vice-president, were not eligible for quarantine exemptions and should not have been allowed into Canada. "A subsequent review of the information concluded that the travel of the Costco executives should have been categorized as discretionary and entry denied under the travel restrictions in place at the time," she wrote in an emailed statement.

Conservative MP Shannon Stubbs, the Opposition critic for Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness, said Blair and the government need to be more transparent about what decisions are being made at the border and why — especially given that more than a million Canadians have been forced to self-isolate after returning home from abroad, according to the CBSA.

More on this issue

Dark skies, starry night

(Pavel Mikheyev/Reuters)

The Milky Way is seen over a turanga tree along the Ili River in the Almaty Region of Kazakhstan in this photo taken Oct. 14.

In brief

If your washing machine is on the blink and you're looking for appliance repair, be wary — new evidence reveals that you can't always trust Google when it comes to finding a reliable local appliance repair person. A months-long investigation by CBC's Marketplace found questionable business practices such as fake Google Maps addresses and bogus company names are plaguing the appliance repair industry. In some areas, as many as 50 per cent of the local appliance repair companies returned in a Google Maps search appeared to be fake. Fake company names and locations change all the time, so a phoney company listing that appears on Google Maps one day may be gone the next, the investigation found. Experts in online searching question why Google hasn't been doing more to combat fraudulent map listings. "I think it decreases consumer trust in how to find businesses," said Mike Blumenthal, a U.S. search engine consultant and Google Maps local search expert. "It is well within Google's capability to aggressively monitor and shut down fake businesses." Read more on this story here.

Some applicants for the new Canada Recovery Benefit (CRB) say the process has been deeply frustrating, and they still don't know when or if they'll get the money. CBC News has received at least three dozen complaints about access to the benefit. "I've never felt this hopeless," said Hajar Pittman, a Brampton, Ont., mother of two toddlers. She was on maternity leave when the pandemic hit. She was laid off from her job in the airline industry in June and collected the Canada Emergency Response Benefit (CERB) — the benefit replaced by the CRB — throughout the summer. Pittman said that when she first tried to apply for the new benefit on Monday, she got an error message telling her she was ineligible without explaining why. It took hours of phone calls with the Canada Revenue Agency, she said, before a CRA agent suggested that the fact she collected parental leave benefits might be causing confusion in the CRB process. Pittman said she has now requested a letter from Service Canada clarifying her status. Read more about the issues with the new benefit applications.

Last month's throne speech promised "further support for industries that have been the hardest hit, including travel," and the federal government's consultations on support for the air sector apparently were due to start this week. While demands for government aid to the air travel sector have been building for months, WestJet's regional retreat will drive those demands to a new level, writes CBC Parliamentary bureau reporter Aaron Wherry. For the federal government, the case for doing something to prop up airlines and airports might be stronger than the case for doing nothing. But even if the government wants — or needs — to intervene, it still has to work out a way to do so that it can defend politically. Read more analysis here.

Quebec is currently halfway through a 28-day partial lockdown. Along with the ban on social gatherings, bars and restaurant dining rooms have been closed, as have gyms and movie theatres. In at least one measurement, the current partial lockdown is yielding the desired results. Quebec's Rt, which tracks the number of people a single person is likely to infect, has dropped back below one, said Université de Montréal epidemiologist Hélène Carabin. But, like most other health experts, Carabin acknowledged that lockdowns, even partial ones, entail serious collateral damage to the economy and to people's mental health. In order to avoid the need for disruptive lockdowns, some are suggesting that more restrictions be kept in place after the current wave subsides, as opposed to returning to the level of freedom enjoyed in the summer. Read more on Quebec's lockdown measures here.

After a cacophonous debacle in the first presidential debate, U.S. voters were given a chance on Thursday to watch, without interruption, the candidates vying for high office. Donald Trump and Joe Biden participated in separate town halls on competing U.S. television networks, allowing viewers to judge them in isolation. The bizarre scene was triggered by an unusual turn of events, featuring a dispute over the debate format precipitated by Trump's COVID-19 diagnosis. As CBC Washington correspondent Alexander Panetta writes, it gave the front-runner, Biden, a chance to speak at unimpeded length in a way he simply couldn't in the first, insult-heavy, idea-light showdown with Trump. Read more analysis of last night's town halls here.

Now for some good news to start your Friday: Nathan Hrushkin and his father have hiked through the Drumheller, Alta., area for years. The Calgary boy has always loved dinosaurs, so it's natural that the 12-year-old is an aspiring paleontologist. This summer, while hiking with his father through Horseshoe Canyon in the Badlands region, Nathan made a discovery that would excite even the most seasoned paleontologist. "When I looked at it, it was very, very obviously a bone. It looked like a bone you'd see in a TV show," Nathan said. They sent photos of the partially exposed bone to the Royal Tyrrell Museum in Drumheller, which confirmed that it came from a young hadrosaur, otherwise known as a duck-billed dinosaur. François Therrien, a paleontologist at the museum, said a discovery like this in Horseshoe Canyon is uncommon. "It represents a gap about 69 million years ago, when we don't know what type of dinosaurs lived around here," Therrien said. "So now, the discovery that Nathan made is of great significance because it fills those gaps." Read more about Nathan's find here.

The problems pile up for Alberta

This week, the Alberta government announced cuts to the province's health service, including up to 11,000 layoffs. While all of Canada's provinces have taken an economic hit because of COVID-19, Alberta in particular has been clobbered. Oil and gas revenues have tanked — liquor sales are projected to bring in more than bitumen royalties from the oilsands this fiscal year. And support for United Conservative Party Premier Jason Kenney is down, too. According to a late summer poll, he's got the second lowest approval rating of all the premiers in the country.

Today, CBC's Carolyn Dunn on how Alberta is faring and how Kenney plans to bounce the province back.
Listen to today's episode

Today in history: Oct. 16

1962: The Cuban missile crisis begins as U.S. President John Kennedy is informed of bases in Cuba equipped with Soviet missiles.

1970: Ottawa invokes the War Measures Act following the kidnapping of British Trade Commissioner James Cross and Quebec Labour Minister Pierre Laporte. It was the first use of the 1914 statute during a domestic crisis. The act gave the federal cabinet emergency powers allowing it to govern by decree.

1984: Anglican Bishop Desmond Tutu is named the winner of the Nobel Peace Prize for his non-violent struggle against apartheid in South Africa.

2003: The leaders of Canada's two conservative parties, Stephen Harper of the Canadian Alliance and Peter MacKay of the Progressive Conservatives, unveil a historic deal to merge their parties.