TOPIC: THE BIG SPEND
The Big Spend
Exclusive golf course books $1 million surplus, aided by federal COVID-19 relief
The Royal Ottawa Golf Club, one of the country's oldest private courses, has built a $1-million surplus thanks in large part to federal pandemic wage subsidies. It plans to use the money to offset future losses, and help repave its parking lot.
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Ottawa golf club banks an extra $1 million from federal wage subsidies | The Big Spend
The Canada emergency wage subsidy has helped businesses by supporting payrolls. But if a company ends up with a surplus, should it have to pay it back?
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COVID-19 wage subsidy helps exclusive golf club bank $1M
The Royal Ottawa Golf Club has banked a $1-million surplus from its past season, thanks mostly to federal COVID-19 subsidies for workers' wages.
The Big Spend
In Ottawa's rush to buy PPE, companies with little or no experience got some of the biggest contracts
The federal government awarded a $371-million contract to secure personal protective equipment — one of the largest medical supply deals in its history — to a small company headquartered in a house in suburban Ottawa that had no apparent prior experience in PPE procurement.
THE BIG SPEND
Trudeau government won't say who got billions of dollars in aid
When Justin Trudeau ran for office in 2015, he promised Canadians a more open and transparent government. However, an investigation by CBC News reveals the Trudeau government hasn't been entirely transparent about where billions of dollars in pandemic aid has gone.
Opinion
Government isn't making it easy to see where all that federal pandemic spending is going
Canadians need to be able to clearly assess what their tax dollars are paying for, who benefits, write Kevin Page, Shannon Smith and Jeffrey Bugg.
The Big Spend
The pandemic unexpectedly saved thousands from financial ruin. But there's a reckoning on the horizon
The COVID-19 pandemic, surprisingly, helped thousands of debt-ridden households in Atlantic Canada, and many low-wage workers found themselves actually better off than before. But the financial distress that had been expected at the beginning of the pandemic might instead come near its end.
The Big Spend
Why millions of dollars in pandemic aid is going to corporations making healthy profits
As Ottawa gives corporations billions in wage subsidies, and those companies pay out billions in dividends, it’s still unclear how many jobs are being saved.
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Some profitable corporations got pandemic support | The Big Spend
Canada's federal wage subsidy has helped businesses keep workers on the payroll, but it came at a big cost to taxpayers: over $50 billion and counting. CBC’s The Big Spend investigation raises questions about why profitable companies got the money and how much they really needed it.
The Big Spend
2 Ontario LTC operators got $157M in COVID-19 aid. They also paid $74M to shareholders
Two long-term care companies have received more than $157 million in COVID-19 relief from the federal and Ontario governments while also paying tens of millions of dollars in dividends to shareholders. Some families of residents say care hasn't improved despite the infusion of public money.
The Big Spend
As passengers pushed for refunds, Air Canada got more than $400 million for wage subsidy
Air Canada tapped into the most government support during COVID-19 out of all publicly traded companies in Canada that have so far disclosed their finances to stakeholders, a CBC News investigation found.
The Big Spend
Ottawa's COVID-19 wage subsidy for salaries — not dividends, says Freeland
Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland issued a warning to Canadian companies that have tapped into the government's wage subsidy program that the money is to be used to pay workers — not to pay for dividends or executive bonuses.
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Distillers who donated hand sanitizer say Ottawa left them out to dry | The Big Spend
Many of Canada's 250 distillers acted fast in the spring to produce thousands of litres of hand sanitizer to supply everybody from first responders to government workers for free. But their hopes of playing a long-term role supplying this essential safety product evaporated while millions of dollars' worth of foreign-made sanitizer flooded store shelves.
The Big Spend
Distillers scrambled to make hand sanitizer for free. Then the federal government moved on
Canadian alcohol distillers who pivoted early to produce hand sanitizer to keep Canadians safe from COVID-19 are crying foul as their hopes of solving longer-term supply chain issues appear to have evaporated.
The Big Spend
Indigenous tourism group paid CEO $25K bonus days after it was tasked to distribute COVID-19 relief funds
A national Indigenous tourism organization gave its CEO a $25,000 bonus days after it was selected to administer $16 million in COVID-19 funding on behalf of the federal government, according to internal records obtained by the CBC News. The group says the bonus was part of an employment package planned in advance of the stimulus.
The Big Spend
How a team of 5 managed a 'historic' boost to Canada's domestic violence shelters
Working from home, the staff of Women's Shelters Canada was able to connect with shelters and make sure each organization understood what it needed to do to be accountable for the money.
THE BIG SPEND
Mall shops got a large chunk of $26M in COVID rent money Ottawa gave Sask. businesses
Ten of Saskatchewan's malls received a combined $4 million from the federal government's emergency rent program for businesses struggling during the COVID-19 pandemic.
The Big Spend
How Ottawa is providing a financial lifeline to the oilpatch
When the oilpatch was sideswiped by a pandemic and an international oil price war earlier this year, a warning went out that the industry had been pushed onto "life support" as crude prices and company share values both plummeted.
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Some question the handling of pandemic funding for Indigenous tourism | The Big Spend
Federal government funding distributed by the Indigenous Tourism Association of Canada was supposed to help one of the country’s fastest growing sectors. But as CBC’s The Big Spend investigation found, there are complaints about how the organization handled the money.
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Small group connected women's shelters with millions in pandemic funds | The Big Spend
As worries over domestic violence grew throughout the pandemic, Ottawa allotted millions of dollars to women's shelters across the country. As part of The Big Spend, CBC News tracked that money, and found the distribution of it fell to a small, inexperienced group, which may have found a new way of supporting shelters.
The Big Spend
Ottawa has spent $240B fighting COVID-19 in just 8 months. A CBC investigation follows the money
The federal government has provided Canadians with the top-line numbers when it comes to the costs of its eight-month fight against COVID-19. But the details of exactly where the money goes are hard to come by. CBC News tracks the $240 billion in spending.
The Big Spend
Federal pandemic aid not enough to cover small Alberta businesses that were already struggling
New data shows many already-struggling businesses in Alberta have been relying on federal aid programs to get through the pandemic and in some industries more so than their counterparts in other provinces.
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Trudeau government won't say who got billions of dollars in aid
Nine months into the COVID-19 pandemic, the government has yet to reveal all the details of where billions of dollars in pandemic aid has gone. Only a few federal departments have released information about which individuals, groups or companies have received government money.
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Early days of PPE contracts were ‘the wild west’ | The Big Spend
CBC News tracked some of the billions of dollars the federal government spent on personal protective equipment during the pandemic and found the early days were tumultuous and two large contracts went to companies that seemingly had no pre-pandemic experience procuring PPE.
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Air Canada received $492 million in federal support | The Big Spend
A CBC News investigation has found that Air Canada appears to have received the most federal financial support of any publicly traded company because of the COVID-19 pandemic. It reported $492 million in wage subsidies and is lobbying for more support from the government.