Blog

We all need to work together and stay healthy in order to beat Coronavirus (COVID-19). 

Together our community and our country can manage this crisis.

As your Member of Parliament, I want to hear from you.

I’m always eager to hear feedback from Edmonton Griesbach constituents and other Canadians.

This is all the more vital during this time of a pandemic.

Justin Trudeau and his Liberal government have put together a package of responses to the COVID-19 crisis.

These include everything from financial aid measures to emergency phone numbers and e-mail addresses. 

If you’ve reached out to the federal government during this time of crisis, how satisfied have you been with the service or help provided? It’s essential during a time of crisis that citizens get the best and most timely service from their federal government.

If you’ve got a good story, please share it with me. Write to Kerry.Diotte@parl.gc.ca.

If you had service which was less-than stellar, I’d like to hear about that too.

By sharing our experiences we can ensure that all Canadians are well-served during these trying times.

If you’ve got any other questions, concerns or comments, please send them my way.

My Edmonton office is still open and I’m here to help you. Please call ahead to arrange an appointment as we are temporarily no longer accepting walk-ins due to COVID-19. I can be reached by email at Kerry.Diotte@parl.gc.ca or by phone at (780) 495-3261.   

Please also see below for some useful contact information

You can find up-to-date information from Alberta Public Health or the Public Health Agency of Canada.

Alberta Public Health can also be reached by phone at 811. 

Employment Insurance (EI) claims related to COVID-19:

• Waived the one-week waiting period for EI benefits.
• Waived doctor’s note requirement to access EI sick benefits.

Visit their website or contact EI’s COVID-19 phone line at (833) 381-2725.

For Canadians not covered under EI benefits there is the Emergency Care Benefit:

• This program will provide up to $900 every two weeks for up to 15 weeks for Canadians who are sick, have to take care of others who are sick or children out of school.
• Applications will open in April. Phone and program website are not yet available. 
• When it opens you can sign up with a CRA My Account secure portal, a My Service Canada Account or a yet-to-be disclosed phone number.

Tax and benefit changes to help Canadians:

• A one-time special Goods and Services Tax credit (GSTC) payment in May.
• Increase to the maximum annual Canada Child Benefit (CCB) payment amounts, by $300 per child.
• Tax return date is deferred until June 1.
• Payment for taxes owed is deferred till August 31.
• A six-month interest-free moratorium on the repayment of Canada Student Loans.

Support for small businesses:

• A wage subsidy equal to 10% of wages paid during the emergency period.
• Working Capital Loan available through the Business Development Bank to help support entrepreneurs during the crisis.

Contact information for Canadians oversees and in need assistance in this emergency:

• Global Affairs Canada 24/7 Emergency Watch and Response Centre. They can be reached by email at sos@international.gc.ca or by phone at (613) 996-8885.

Help from the Government of Alberta

• Emergency Isolation Support:
  A one-time payment of $573.00 for working adult Albertans who meet the Government of Alberta’s criteria for self-isolation. Registration will be available at the alberta.ca website next week.
• Utility payment holiday: 
  Residential, farm, and small commercial customers can defer bill payments for the next 90 days. This will cover electricity and natural gas, regardless of the service provider.
• Provincial student loan holiday:
  Six-month interest-free moratorium on Alberta student loan payments.
• Emergency deferrals are available for ATB loans, lines of credit and mortgages for up to six months.

Our community’s charities are also here for you

• If you’re a senior in need, volunteers at Drive Happiness Edmonton can deliver food and medication. You can visit their website drivehappiness.ca or reach them by phone at (780) 424-5438 
• As senior centres are closing, we must also ensure the social wellbeing of our community’s seniors. Seniors’ Centre Without Walls is a great resource where people can call and interact with others from the comfort of their own home. You can register at (780) 395-2626.
• The Mustard Seed is also still serving less fortunate members of our community.

Good stories in the news

Even though we’re in the grips of an emergency, we Canadians continue to come together. I posted the links to several good news stories below.

• Glass Bookshop – located in City Centre Mall – is offering free online delivery of their books. Link.
• There’s an App for everything these days including, an Edmonton companies App that that shows where scarce goods can be found. (Reminder, there’s no need to hoard goods.) Link.
    
• Inferno Fitness Sherwood Park is offering live-streamed workout classes to clients. Link.
• Alberta distillers shift to producing hand sanitizer during outbreak Link.

Here for our community

As your Member of Parliament, I’m always here for our community.

The civic spirit of our residents and organizations makes Edmonton Griesbach the amazing place that it is.  

The events they host, are essential to the vitality of our community.

In the name of public health these events must temporarily be put on hold.

We must find other ways to come together.

Whether it’s on the internet, by phone or by good works our civic spirit continues.  

Productive meeting with Liza Bouchard, executive director of Drive Happiness seniors assisted transportation service that provided 20,000 rides annually in Edmonton using volunteer drivers.

Delivering food with Edmonton Meals On Wheels organization board member Michael Kirk.

Always enjoy meeting Africa Centre officials. The Africa Centre does a lot good work in our Edmonton community. Thanks for the productive meeting  Youth Programs Manager Emmanuel Onah  and Executive Director Sharif Haji. 

At the Ukrainian Christmas Shchedryi Vechir dinner held at Ukrainian Youth Unity Complex.

At the Edmonton Chinese Community 2020 Lunar New Year Banquet and celebration of the 90th Anniversary of the Chinese Benevolent Association.

With Christy Morin, executive director of Arts on the Avenue and also a director at Northlands.

I want to hear from you 

Email:
Kerry.Diotte@parl.gc.ca

Phone:
(780) 495-3261

Mail (postage free): 
Kerry Diotte, MP 
House of Commons
Ottawa, ON K1A 0A6

We all need to work together and stay healthy in order to beat Coronavirus (Covid-19). 

See below for some useful contact information:

Find up to date information from  Alberta Public Health or the Public Health Agency of Canada.
Alberta Public Health can also be reached by phone at 811. 

Employment Insurance (EI) claims related to COVID-19.
Phone: (833) 381-2725 
Website

For Canadians not covered under EI benefits there is the emergency care benefit.
This new program will provide  up to $900 every two weeks for up to 15 weeks for Canadians who are sick, have to take care of others who are sick or children out of school. Applications will open in April. Phone and program website not yet available. 

Contact information for Canadians oversees and  in need assistance in this emergency.
Global Affairs Canada 24/7 Emergency Watch and Response Centre.
Phone: (613) 996-8885
Email: sos@international.gc.ca

If you’re a senior in need, volunteers at Drive Happiness Edmonton can deliver food and medication. 
Phone: (780) 424-5438

As senior centres are closing, we must also ensure the social well being of our community’s seniors. Seniors’ Centre Without Walls is a great resource where people can call and interact with others from the comfort of their own home.
Phone: (780) 395-2626

“You can help the call volumes by considering visiting http://alberta.ca/covid19 for info, if you do not need a health assessment.

For health concerns unrelated to COVID-19, consider visiting http://ahs.ca/options to find out where to get the right care for your health needs.”

Kerry Diotte met in Vienna, Austria with two Members of Parliament from Ukraine
— Vadym Halaichuk and Pavlo Frolov at Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) winter meetings. 

Edmonton Griesbach Member of Parliament Kerry Diotte condemned ongoing Russian actions in the independent nation of Ukraine and said he’s glad Canada continues to assist that country in its struggle.

“Canada has strong ties with Ukraine and many descendants of Ukrainian immigrants live in the riding I represent in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada,” Diotte told delegates at the winter meeting in Vienna, Austria of the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) Parliamentary Assembly.

“As stated in the Programme of the Albanian 2020 document the ‘crisis in and around Ukraine remains the most pressing security challenge in Europe,” Diotte told delegates Feb. 20 who represented 57 nation states including Canada, the United States, the Russian Federation, Ukraine, France, Austria, Germany and the United Kingdom, among others.

Diotte attended the winter meeting as part of a small Parliamentary delegation from Canada.

“We in Canada have also consistently and firmly condemned Russia’s illegal annexation and occupation of Crimea as well as pledged ongoing support to the insurgence in eastern Ukraine,” Diotte said.

“Unfortunately, despite efforts to strengthen democracy in Ukraine and to work toward a resolution, the conflict in Donbas continues and Crimea remains occupied,” he said. “We still have work to do.

“Could the (OSCE) chairperson please elaborate on the plans to de-escalate and resolve the crisis in and around Ukraine and the strategy to make progress in 2020?” Diotte asked.

The Edmonton Member of Parliament was told at the meeting that the crisis in Ukraine will be raised by George Tsereteli, president of the OSCE Parliamentary Assembly on a visit to Moscow.

Diotte is a member of the Canadian Parliament’s Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs and International Development.

For further information contact MP Kerry Diotte’s Ottawa office at (613) 992-3821 or kerry.diotte@parl.gc.ca

Petition to Prime Minister Justin Trudeau:

I demand that you uphold the rule of law in Canada and stop the illegal blockades shutting down our country.

By KERRY DIOTTE
Member of Parliament
Edmonton Griesbach

“I don’t approve of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it.”

This famous quote sums up French philosopher Voltaire’s view on freedom of speech.

Clearly Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and his Liberals don’t share those noble sentiments.

They’ve long been criticized for spending more than $1.2 billion annually on CBC that critics feel is decidedly sympathetic to this federal government.

Grits have also been lambasted for a scheme to hand other media $600 million in cash including the ultra-Liberal-leaning Toronto Star. That creates a clear conflict of interest and endangers the sacred principle of objective reporting.

Recently the country was rocked by news the Trudeau government was planning to mandate that all media outlets be licensed. That alarmed free speech advocates including pundits and Official Opposition Conservative politicians.

The news came out of the mouth of Trudeau’s Heritage Minister Steven Guilbeault, a Quebec Member of Parliament who was, in his previous career, a militant climate-change activist.

This same man first made headlines when he climbed 340 meters up Toronto’s CN Tower in 2001 with a British activist to unfurl a banner that read: “Canada and Bush Climate Killers” referring to the then- U.S. president. Guilbeault, who was 31 years old at the time, was arrested.

His newest controversy came during a CTV interview about a report called “Canada’s Communications Future: Time To Act.”

That report was compiled by a panel of independent broadcast experts and included a recommendation that the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC) or yet another regulatory body control licensing of all companies creating “audio, audiovisual, and alphanumeric news content.”

Guilbeault was discussing media outlets and how they would be licensed based on their size when he said quite plainly: “We would ask that they have a licence, yes.”

After those plans created a firestorm, there was a quick reversal.

Within a day he was vehemently denying that was the government’s plan saying “some people were confused.” Ugh, no kidding? But who “confused” them?

When Conservative Leader Andrew Scheer led off Question Period with an attack on this “Orwellian” notion of licensing and controlling media, Trudeau was quickly back-pedalling bigtime.

Said Trudeau: “I want to be unequivocal: We will not impose licensing requirements on news organizations nor will we regulate news content.”

Given the prime minister’s previous record of being truth-challenged, Canadians could be forgiven if they’re still not convinced the Liberals won’t pull other tricks out of the bag to endanger free speech.

Don’t forget, this is the same PM who once adamantly denied there was any veracity to the blockbuster SNC-Lavalin scandal after it was first reported by the Globe and Mail. Trudeau told this Pinocchio-style, nose-grower when he said, “The allegations in the Globe story are false.” Ultimately, the parliamentary ethics commissioner ruled those allegations to be absolutely true.

Trudeau himself muddied the waters on the news medias’ licensing issue by saying he wants to make sure people in Canada have access to “diverse, high-quality and credible news.” Call me cynical, but I don’t want Justin Trudeau and his Liberals deciding what news or news outlet is credible or not.

Rex Murphy wrote a thought-provoking column in the National Post highlighting another incident that continues to draw flak from critics who see it as a shocking attack on free speech.

Murphy’s column detailed how Ezra Levant of Rebel News Network wrote a book critical of Trudeau and his Liberals and sold it during the fall election, in part by advertising it on a billboard and lawn signs.

For that, Levant was summoned by authorities and grilled by investigators from the office of the commissioner of Canada Elections alleging he’d contravened the Canada Elections Act.

Murphy wryly remarked: “For the unwary, it is a feature of publishing a book that it be advertised, and, surprisingly, even a book criticizing a government … Can anybody give the name of any other book, ever, which has been the subject of an investigation by the Commissioner of Canada Elections?”

Despite Trudeau’s dubious platitudes extolling his heart-felt support of free speech, many Canadians are still nervous about the Liberals’ intentions. Telling the truth is not their strong suit.

Remember those Liberal promises of teeny, tiny deficits and a balanced federal budget by 2019?

Do you recall Trudeau’s key campaign platform of 2015 when he said the election that year was the last one Canada would ever have under the system of first past the post?

People still remember Trudeau once famously admitted he admires China’s “basic dictatorship.” And we all know how dictatorships deal with the free press.

This issue of free speech is vitally important. It’s particularly important to me. I was a journalist for three decades and was a national director of the Canadian Association of Journalists, an organization dedicated to improving the news media and defending free speech.

But Canadians who are nervous about Liberal plans regarding free speech in the traditional media or online should know Conservatives have their back.

There’s nothing more sacred than free speech in a democracy. It’s something Canadians fought and died for and must always be defended vigorously.

(Comments? Suggestions? Contact Kerry Diotte at kerry.diotte@parl.gc.ca)

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