FR - Choses à faire
Une vente de vêtements et accessoires de designers québécois débarque à Montréal
Ce n'est qu'une seule journée!
Discover Narcity
Get the latest and greatest stories every day in your inbox.
Alberta Premier Danielle Smith to take questions for first time since separation vote
Alberta premier to take questions after referendum
Premier Danielle Smith will take questions today for the first time since Albertans overwhelmingly rejected separation in Monday's referendum.
Smith said she voted to stay in Canada, but said she had little choice but to call the referendum to quash a burgeoning and divisive debate over Alberta's role in Confederation.
About three-quarters of voters marked an X to say yes to staying in Canada rather than holding a second, binding referendum on leaving.
Last night, Smith delivered a provincewide TV address to outline what comes next.
She says she now considers separation to be a dead issue in Alberta and there will be no more such votes as long as she is premier.
And she says separation will not be used as a tool in any future dispute with Ottawa, and Alberta will fight for its position using political avenues or the courts.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Oct. 21, 2026.
Copyright 2026, The Canadian Press. All rights reserved.
Keep reading
Show less
Group assisting long-planned review of firearms — including SKS — has yet to meet
Group assisting firearms review has yet to meet
THE CANADIAN PRESS/Jonathan Hayward
An advisory group that's supporting a federal review of firearms classification — including a look at the SKS rifle — is expected to hold its first meeting this fall, almost a year after Ottawa announced the review.
Public Safety Canada says members of the Firearms Classification Technical Advisory Group, appointed to provide expert advice to the department and the RCMP, "will be meeting later this fall."
The Liberal government has faced fresh questions about the SKS after a document filed in a U.S. court said the killer in the Tumbler Ridge, B.C., mass shooting talked about having an SKS gun.
Eighteen-year-old Jesse Van Rootselaar killed eight people in the Feb. 10 Tumbler Ridge attack before taking her own life.
The RCMP has declined to release details about firearms used in the shootings, saying its investigation is ongoing.
The SKS has been used in police killings and other high-profile shootings.
It is also commonly used in Indigenous communities to hunt for food.
Prime Minister Mark Carney recently indicated the government would look at the advice of the classification advisory group before making any decision on the status of the SKS.
Since May 2020, Ottawa has outlawed approximately 2,500 types of guns on the basis they belong only on the battlefield. It has not banned the SKS.
Gun control advocacy group PolySeSouvient has long called on the government to impose an immediate ban on new sales of the SKS, to remove from circulation modern, assault-style versions of the rifle, and to implement a voluntary buyback of older models. It calls for an exemption for Indigenous hunters who use the SKS primarily for sustenance.
In early December last year, Public Safety Minister Gary Anandasangaree said the government would "shortly be launching a comprehensive review of the firearms classification regime" with an emphasis on simplicity and consistency.
"This review will be supported by an expanded advisory group, and will involve dedicated consultations with First Nations, Inuit and Métis communities, including on the SKS, to ensure Indigenous perspectives and traditions are an active part of the process," he said in a statement.
"The review will take a broad view of the legal framework for firearms, devices, magazines and ammunition to modernize the regime and ensure Canadians' safety."
In response to questions this month from The Canadian Press, the Public Safety Department said more information on the Technical Advisory Group and on engagement activities related to the classification review will be made available "in the near term."
"Members will bring diverse technical knowledge, experience, and expert views from a wide range of perspectives," the department said.
PolySeSouvient said this week that instead of implementing a comprehensive ban on assault-style firearms and high-capacity magazines, "the government keeps announcing new consultations and panels, and each one becomes another reason to postpone actual change."
"Lives are at stake," the group told The Canadian Press. "The government needs to stop consulting and start acting, before more people are killed in mass shootings."
In a recent commentary on its website, the Canadian Shooting Sports Association said many questions remain about the Tumbler Ridge shootings, including which firearms were used, how they were obtained, and which — if any — had been seized by police previously.
"Reclassifying another firearm before answering those questions may satisfy the demand for immediate action," the commentary said. "It does not prove that banning another firearm would have prevented this mass murder."
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Oct. 21, 2026.
By Jim Bronskill | Copyright 2026, The Canadian Press. All rights reserved.
Keep reading
Show less
Young anglophones are still leaving Quebec, but at much lower rates, find researchers
Young anglophones continue to leave Quebec: study
THE CANADIAN PRESS/Jacques Boissinot
Having grown up in an English-speaking family in Montreal, Jeremy Schachter says the question of staying or leaving Quebec was a “very real” dinner-table conversation.
“So many of my friends have left. It’s just, people wonder about the future of the anglophone community,” he said.
Schachter himself moved to Toronto a year ago to join his girlfriend, who works as a social worker in the city. He is part of a long-standing movement of young English-speakers leaving Quebec to move elsewhere in Canada.
Data from the federal census shows that English-speakers are more likely to leave Quebec in favour of other provinces than French-speakers, but that the trend is slowing down.
This movement was especially strong in the 1970s and 1980s, said Simon-Pierre Lacasse, who recently wrote a paper exploring the migration of young anglophones out of Quebec.
“The ‘Anglo exodus’, as it's often referred to, is something that's really contingent to a specific period,” Lacasse told The Canadian Press.
In their research, Simon-Pierre Lacasse and student Meghan Rulli focused on young adults, who are more likely to move between provinces.
Their research paints a picture of how the rate of this migration has slowed down in recent decades.
Their research paper, published by the Quebec English-Speaking Communities Research Network, shows close to 20 per cent of English-speakers in Quebec left the province between the late 1960s and the early 1980s, with the net loss of around 121,000 anglophones in interprovincial migration between 1976 and 1981.
Between 2016 and 2021, the interprovincial anglophone migration was almost balanced, with a net loss of around 3900 anglophones in Quebec.
At the end of the most recent period, federal statistics reveal the overall English-speaking community in the province remained strong. Over 1.6 million Quebecers spoke English at home on a regular basis in 2021, according to the census.
This represents over 19 per cent of the Quebec population.
At the same time, the census numbers show that over 35 per cent of workers in the province said they regularly spoke English while on the job.
Lacasse said the numbers appear to suggest young English-speakers are better integrated in the province’s culture today than they were in the 1970s.
“To me, that was the big surprise. … If the goal is youth retention for the vitality of English-speaking communities, then maybe there is hope,” said Lacasse.
The researchers identified many “push” factors that might drive anglophones away from Quebec, including greater career opportunities elsewhere and economic concerns. Interwoven with many of these factors is the question of language.
“Language in Quebec, perhaps more than other provinces in Canada, is directly linked to identity and is politicized,” said Lacasse.
In 2022, the provincial government passed a bill that strengthened language legislation in the province. It imposed measures like French-only services for most Quebec residents and a cap on enrolment in some English-language colleges.
The bill also caused disruptions during the recent provincial election campaign after the election authority sent out French-only guides to all voters. A Superior Court judge temporarily suspended the bill’s provisions and ordered the agency to send out bilingual reminder cards to voters.
On Ki Lin, who was born in Hong Kong but moved to Montreal when they were eight years old, said they left Quebec to study at the University of Toronto mainly because they thought this was the best place to pursue their education.
Although Lin says financial concerns are keeping them in Toronto, the former Montrealer also noted having struggled to fully integrate into Quebec culture.
“There would be some people (who) would be very abrasive and very rude because my accent wasn’t the same as theirs. Or they would assume that if I had an accent, it meant that I wasn’t fluent enough to understand what they were saying,” said Lin.
The feeling that there is no space for English-speaking identities in Quebec lingers for many, said Lacasse.
“When I was living in Montreal, the overarching sentiment was that, you live here, but are you really welcome here? I don't know. It was not so clear to me,” said Schachter.
This affects not only feelings of identity and belonging, but also professional development, with some anglophones feeling that they are not welcome in francophone workspaces, found the paper.
But English-speaking Quebecers’ relationship with the French language is also generational, said Lacasse, pointing out that those born after the Quiet Revolution in the 1960s, a period of nationalist political and social reform marked by a strengthening of the French-speaking Quebec identity, were more likely to understand the importance of French within the province.
The paper also highlights that young English-speakers in Quebec are increasingly bilingual.
Speaking with The Canadian Press, Schachter expressed attachment to the French language. He said he was recently offended when a man sitting close to him at a hockey game became upset to hear the national anthem sung in French.
“Even though I wouldn't consider myself francophone … I think that's really offensive,” he said.
Lacasse added English-speakers may find it easier to move to the rest of Canada, while French-speakers may face language barriers.
Lacasse said he is curious to see what trends will appear from the 2026 census data, which is set to be released in early 2027, especially after a period of high political tensions around language in Quebec.
From their new lives in Toronto, Lin and Schachter both reminisced about Montreal and Quebec.
“I would never consider myself Québécois, really, but there's definitely something special about Quebec,” said Schachter.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Oct. 21, 2026.
By Marieke Glorieux-Stryckman | Copyright 2026, The Canadian Press. All rights reserved.
Keep reading
Show less