Timmins MP hopes bill will prevent another LU crisis
Timmins-James Bay MP Charlie Angus says he wants to make sure a disaster such as the Laurentian University insolvency never happens again.
He’s introduced a private members bill in the House of Commons, since LU declared insolvency under the Companies’ Creditors Arrangement Act, a federal statute.
"Our concern is once you establish a precedent like this, it could be used in another situation,” Angus told CTV News.
His bill would ensure public institutions exhaust alternatives before declaring insolvency under the CCAA.
"Whether it’s hospitals, whether it’s universities, health care centres, that this can not be a tactic used by right-wing governments at the provincial government to undermine public investment in key institutions like what happened at Laurentian University,” he said.
Angus said administration at LU deliberately gutted programs and staff, them like ‘discarded items at a garage sale.’
Peter McInnis, of the Canadian Association of University Teachers Association, said it will take years to repair the damage.
“Just recently documents made clear that senior university administrators deliberately chose the CCAA to avoid paying out severance and pensions and to be able to conduct mass layoffs,” McInnis said.
“This was an engineered outcome to privilege the few over the many.”
Fabrice Colin, president of the Laurentian University Faculty Association, said what happened at LU caused “irreparable damage.”
“I’ve seen the lives of friends and colleagues shattered,” he said.
The second reading of the bill will happen at the end of January.
CTVNews.ca Top Stories
Quebec nurse had to clean up after husband's death in Montreal hospital
On a night she should have been mourning, a nurse from Quebec's Laurentians region says she was forced to clean up her husband after he died at a hospital in Montreal.
Cuban government apologizes to Montreal-area family after delivering wrong body
Cuba's foreign affairs minister has apologized to a Montreal-area family after they were sent the wrong body following the death of a loved one.
What is changing about Canada's capital gains tax and how does it impact me?
The federal government's proposed change to capital gains taxation is expected to increase taxes on investments and mainly affect wealthy Canadians and businesses. Here's what you need to know about the move.
'Anything to win': Trudeau says as Poilievre defends meeting protesters
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau is accusing Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre of welcoming 'the support of conspiracy theorists and extremists,' after the Conservative leader was photographed meeting with protesters, which his office has defended.
Northern Ont. lawyer who abandoned clients in child protection cases disbarred
A North Bay, Ont., lawyer who abandoned 15 clients – many of them child protection cases – has lost his licence to practise law.
Boeing's financial woes continue, while families of crash victims urge U.S. to prosecute the company
Boeing said Wednesday that it lost US$355 million on falling revenue in the first quarter, another sign of the crisis gripping the aircraft manufacturer as it faces increasing scrutiny over the safety of its planes and accusations of shoddy work from a growing number of whistleblowers.
Bank of Canada officials split on when to start cutting interest rates
Members of the Bank of Canada's governing council were split on how long the central bank should wait before it starts cutting interest rates when they met earlier this month.
Fair in Ontario, flurries in Labrador: Weather systems make for an erratic spring
"It's a bit of a complicated pattern; we've got a lot going on," said Jennifer Smith of the Meteorological Service of Canada in an interview with CTVNews.ca on Wednesday. "[As is] typical with weather, all of these things are related."
Police tangle with students in Texas and California as wave of campus protest against Gaza war grows
Police tangled with student demonstrators in Texas and California while new encampments sprouted Wednesday at Harvard and other colleges as school leaders sought ways to defuse a growing wave of pro-Palestinian protests.