In the news today: PM meeting cabinet today; election reforms could remix regions

Here is a roundup of stories from The Canadian Press designed to bring you up to speed…

Carney meeting with new cabinet today

Prime Minister Mark Carney is set to meet with his new cabinet this morning.

The meeting is scheduled to take place at 10 a.m. on Parliament Hill.

Carney shook up his cabinet Tuesday by moving some key players into new positions and promoting 24 new faces in a move meant to signal change at the top.

While some members of his team were prominent figures in former prime minister Justin Trudeau’s government — including Dominic LeBlanc, Mélanie Joly, Chrystia Freeland and François-Philippe Champagne — Carney froze out other prominent members of his predecessor’s cabinet.

Electoral reform could stop regional sweeps

A change to Canada’s electoral system would have delivered a very different House of Commons this year — one without the monolithic regional strongholds held by both major federal parties — according to an analysis for The Canadian Press.

One seasoned political observer in Alberta says shattering those party fortresses could help take some of the steam out of efforts to ramp up separatist sentiment.

Halifax-based MQO Research took poll-level results from last month’s election and ran them through Brazil’s proportional representation model, assigning seats in each province based on the popular vote.

Under such a system — and according to the votes Canadians cast using the existing process — Alberta wouldn’t be as solidly blue, Nova Scotia wouldn’t be overwhelmingly red, and the NDP wouldn’t be losing official party status in the House of Commons.

Opioid rules harmed B.C. cancer patients: study

Rule changes designed to reduce opioid overdose deaths in British Columbia in 2016 inadvertently harmed cancer and palliative-care patients by reducing their access to pain killers, a new study has found.

The study, published this week in the Canadian Medical Association Journal, describes the impact of a practice standard issued by the College of Physicians and Surgeons of B.C. that June, about two months after the province declared a public health emergency over opioid deaths.

The rule changes were designed to mitigate prescription drug misuse, including the over-prescribing of opioids among patients with chronic non-cancer-related pain.

The rules weren’t meant for cancer and palliative-care patients, but lead author Dimitra Panagiotoglou said there was a “spillover” effect as doctors applied “aggressive tapering” of the painkillers.

Hockey players’ sexual assault trial continues

A woman who alleges she was sexually assaulted by five former members of Canada’s world junior hockey team is expected to face more questions from prosecutors today.

Defence lawyers finished cross-examining the woman Tuesday, and the Crown now has the opportunity to follow up on any topics raised in that process.

This will be the woman’s ninth day on the stand. She cannot be identified under a standard publication ban.

Michael McLeod, Carter Hart, Alex Formenton, Dillon Dube, and Callan Foote have pleaded not guilty to sexual assault.

Emissions rise in Ontario’s electricity system

Ontario’s electricity is now being produced with the highest percentage of greenhouse-gas-emitting power since coal plants were operating in the province.

The Independent Electricity System Operator recently posted its 2024 year in review, which contains a breakdown of how much electricity was produced from various sources.

It shows that last year 16 per cent of the electricity in Ontario’s grid was produced by natural gas, making it 84 per cent emissions free – down from 87 per cent the year before and down from a high of 96 per cent in 2017.

The last time Ontario’s electricity was produced with at least 16 per cent of emitting power was in 2012, when the province still had coal-fired generation.

Nuclear led the way in 2024, with 51 per cent of Ontario’s electricity generated by those plants, and about 24 per cent came from hydro power.

Cobie Smulders finally gets her superpowers in ‘Super Team Canada’

When Cobie Smulders began working on “Super Team Canada” two years ago, she didn’t expect the goofy cartoon to align so perfectly with the current political landscape.

Billed as Crave’s first adult animated series, the half-hour comedy follows six overlooked Canadian superheroes who are called into action after the world’s top heroes are taken out. In the premiere, the U.S. president and other global leaders laugh at the Canadian prime minister’s claim that his country has caped crusaders of its own.

The plot now plays like a cheeky metaphor for Canada pushing back against U.S. economic attacks and “51st state” jabs from U.S. President Donald Trump.

“It is funny timing,” Vancouver-born Smulders says while in Toronto last week.

“For me, I’ve always had a very strong sense of Canadian pride in my life. I live in the United States right now, but my heart is still in Vancouver,” adds the L.A.-based actor.

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This report by The Canadian Press was first published May 14, 2025

The Canadian Press