Good morning. This is Chris Bilton

More than two years after paying out $4.99 million in an allegedly bogus refund, the CRA is stuck in Federal Court trying to figure out where the money went and how to get it back. The CBC’s the fifth estate and Radio-Canada obtained internal records that shed light on what happened. We’ll have more on that below.

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Leaked files reveal CRA refunded millions by mistake

(Yosri Mimouna/Radio-Canada)

More than two years after paying out $4.99 million in an allegedly bogus refund, the Canada Revenue Agency (CRA) is stuck in Federal Court trying to figure out where the money went and how to get it back. The seven-figure refund was issued through the CRA’s automated processes in the spring of 2023 to Distribution Carflex Inc., a cash-strapped body shop in the Laurentians region of Quebec.

What happened: According to internal records obtained by the CBC’s the fifth estate and Radio-Canada, the $4.99-million transaction went through automatically, as it fell just short of a $5-million threshold for manual review in this type of tax refund. The reimbursement was issued on the premise that Carflex had paid taxes on a large capital gain, but auditors later found no record of such a payment. Carflex’s owner, Yvan Drapeau, and his lawyer could not be reached for comment by email or phone, but according to documents filed in court, they have defended the transactions as valid and fought back against the CRA’s attempts to freeze its account.

Why it matters: This is the most recent example of numerous instances uncovered by the fifth estate and Radio-Canada, which show the CRA has allegedly been duped into paying large reimbursements without conducting basic checks, affecting tens of thousands of taxpayers and raising questions about the agency’s credibility with the public. Sources connected to the CRA have told the fifth estate/Radio-Canada that the government needs to hire outside experts to examine the agency’s security measures.

Despite Trump's anger, Canadian politicians won't say Ontario's anti-tariff ad was a mistake

(Mark Schiefelbein/The Associated Press; Carlos Osorio/The Canadian Press)

The Ontario government’s anti-tariff advertisement featuring Ronald Reagan appears to have struck a nerve with U.S. President Donald Trump, who first cut off trade negotiations with Canada on Thursday night over the ad, then promised to increase “the tariff on Canada” by 10 per cent on Saturday afternoon.

Reaction at home: Canadian politicians all the way from the municipal to the federal level are backing Ontario Premier Doug Ford’s approach and won’t say the ad was a mistake. The B.C. government is planning to run its own anti-tariff ads next month to defend the province’s forestry industry. However, Goldy Hyder, president and CEO of the Business Council of Canada, offered some words of caution, saying: “In a trade war, you need a general, not 13 of them. And I'm hoping the prime minister can recognize that we've got to pull our own act together here if we're going to have an opportunity to make progress.”

RBC and CIBC allow 89-year-old to drain life savings, lose $1.7M to scammers

(Michael Mcarthur/CBC)

Over six months last year, Ray Anholt, of Victoria, who recently turned 90, lost his life savings — almost $1.7 million — making him the victim of one of the largest-ever bank investigator scams reported in Canada.

What happened: The scam involved phoney bank employees, fake official letters from various government bodies and politicians, piles of cash, massive bank drafts, gold bars and couriers — but the most unbelievable part of the elaborate ordeal is that two major banks, CIBC and RBC, allowed a vulnerable senior to empty his accounts despite red flags, said Anholt’s daughter.

Why it matters: Last year alone, Canadians lost more than $643 million to bank fraud — an increase of nearly 300 per cent since 2020. As scams get increasingly sophisticated, experts say our financial institutions lag behind other countries with better protections. The federal government held consultations on proposed changes to the Bank Act last year that included looking at a "maximum liability threshold" for people who experience fraud. Details will be outlined in the upcoming federal budget, but the government unveiled some of the changes last week — and the maximum liability threshold was not mentioned.

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IN LIGHTER NEWS

Father and son discover fossilized ichthyosaur skull in B.C.'s Kiskatinaw River valley

(Tumbler Ridge Museum Foundation)

The fossilized skull of a marine reptile called an ichthyosaur is now being studied after being found in B.C.'s Kiskatinaw River valley. Local resident Kevin Geist and his son Andreas, 11, actually discovered the skull two summers ago, but initially didn’t think it was anything important until returning to check on the rock this summer. Geist’s sister-in-law Diana Hofmann sent pictures of it to the Tumbler Ridge Museum. The Kiskatinaw River has dropped to record lows after four years of drought, which means more rocks are becoming exposed there, such as this one, containing a prehistoric skull. Living in a shallow sea that covered B.C. more than 250 million years ago, the creature's skull was encased in carbonate rock from the Triassic and was most likely pushed by a glacier into the river valley after the formation of the Rocky Mountains.