Provincial and Territorial Update – August 9, 2026
An overview on Provincial and Territorial updates for the week of August 9, 2026. Written by Wes McLean.
New Brunswick
- A Progressive Conservative MLA has confirmed he used artificial intelligence to prepare a speech he delivered — complete with AI prompts — to the New Brunswick Legislature. A clip of the most obvious AI moments of the speech has been shared on Reddit, Instagram, and other social media platforms. And Bill Oliver, the MLA for Kings Centre, says he’s learned a lesson. “During the spring session of the legislature, I employed AI to help prepare speaking notes,” Oliver said of the incident.
- Just over a decade after Saint John was overtaken by Moncton as New Brunswick’s largest city, Fredericton may have closed in to push Saint John to third on the population podium. Since 2022, Saint John has had the slowest increase in population compared with the province’s two other major cities, Fredericton and Moncton. “It’s not something that keeps me up at night,” said Donna Reardon, mayor of the city on the Bay of Fundy that for more than 225 years was home to more people than any other place in the province.
- Taxpayers in three New Brunswick municipalities paid double or triple the normal cost of elected councils after provincial supervisors were appointed to replace councils that collapsed following multiple resignations. The communities of Strait Shores, Sunbury-York South and Miramichi River Valley each had a supervisor appointed by the Local Governance Commission last year to replace their mayors and councillors after multiple resignations left councils without enough members to govern.
- More than 100 fees for inspections and licensing in New Brunswick will jump up on Saturday, spelling higher costs for residents and businesses. Increases apply to vehicle registrations, plumbing, electrical and elevator inspections, liquor licensing, and justice system fees. The province expects the increases to generate an additional $45 million a year in revenue. Increases related to motor vehicles alone will bring in more than $13 million more. Among them are fees for passenger vehicle registrations, which will go up by $5 to $15, depending on the vehicle’s weight.
Nova Scotia
- Nova Scotia’s Public Works Minister Fred Tilley says the province plans to ban children under 14 from riding electric scooters and bikes this fall. Tilley says the age restriction is part of a slate of changes that will be made to the province’s Traffic Safety Act. “We are seeing an increase in e-scooters [and] the technology on bicycles and cars is changing on the daily, which allows these conveyances to move faster,” Tilley told reporters Thursday.
- A new poll suggests most Nova Scotians do not want the province to permit private development in provincial parks and protected areas. According to an online survey commissioned by the Ecology Action Centre, nearly 80 per cent of respondents were opposed to things like golf courses, hotels and spas being built in legally protected areas. Just under 60 per cent of respondents were “completely opposed” to allowing development, compared with four per cent who fully supported it.
- The man behind the company seeking to restart petroleum exploration off the coast of Nova Scotia says his outfit’s most recent request for an extension to post a deposit is not an indication the project is in trouble. Inceptio Oil and Gas Ltd. secured two offshore exploration licences this spring with a bid of $210 million. As part of the requirement, the company must post a work deposit of $52 million. On Thursday, it was announced that the provincial and federal energy ministers signed off on a second extension for the company to post that bond. Inceptio now has until late October. The original requirement was for the bond to come within 30 days of the licences being granted.
- The Nova Scotia government returned $5 million in federal funding earmarked for land protection because it did not spend it, and it made no measurable progress in reducing greenhouse gas emissions in the last year. Those are some of the details in the most recent provincial update on progress to achieve goals related to addressing climate change, released last week. Opposition leaders say what’s in the report is just as concerning as what is not.
Prince Edward Island
- The Liberal Party of Prince Edward Island will hold a convention to find its next leader on Oct. 25. Robert Mitchell resigned as leader on July 15, just days after losing a byelection in Cornwall-Meadowbank. Mitchell came in second to Green Party candidate Tayte Willows. It was his second byelection loss after failing to capture the seat in Georgetown-Pownal on Dec. 8. The district was won by current Progressive Conservative MLA Brendan Curran. Katie Morello, president of the P.E.I. Liberal Party, called the timing for the convention “very compressed,” but said party members wanted to hold one before the end of the year, and before MLAs return to the provincial legislature for the fall sitting in November.
- A contribution from the federal government will give Kinkora the opportunity to grow by expanding the P.E.I. community’s water and sewer lines to allow for more homes. Ottawa is providing more than $620,000 for the project, with the majority of the funding focused on the lines that will allow for the expansion of a subdivision at Johnston Lane. Some money will also go toward a future apartment complex, which the municipality intends to reserve for seniors, at the edge of the subdivision. Mayor Robert Duffy said the project will give those who have left Kinkora the chance to come back.
- The P.E.I. government’s announcement that it would fund MRIs at a private clinic isn’t sitting well with the Official Opposition. The province announced Tuesday that it would pay for Islanders’ MRI scans if they’re referred to the Summerside Diagnostic Imaging Centre. The move is aimed at reducing lengthy wait times for the procedure. Gord McNeilly, the health critic for the Opposition Liberal Party, said that while patients will get better access to MRI scans through the partnership, private businesses profiting from health care is not a way to sustain the system.
- A new 60-bed long-term care home will open in Summerside in a few years, the P.E.I. government announced Tuesday. Expected to open in spring 2029, a company called Enhanced Living will operate the private facility while the province will provide $7.4 million each year over the next three decades for infrastructure costs and operations. Samantha Gaudet, director of nursing at Enhanced Living, said the company is confident it can staff the facility in order to help keep seniors in their community.
Newfoundland and Labrador
- Conservative leader Pierre Poilievre says he and his party want Newfoundlanders and Labradorians to see more out of the national shipbuilding strategy. Poilievre has been on a multi-day visit to Newfoundland and Labrador this week. In a press conference at the Alt Hotel in St. John’s on Thursday morning, he started by reiterating messages on affordability and included a formal call to see the federal government extend the current suspension of the federal excise tax on fuel.
- A family member of a long-term care resident in central N.L. who was photographed in a vulnerable state says the nurse she believes was responsible should have faced a stronger penalty. “They should never get a licence back, that’s for sure,” said Sheila Reid. “There should be more to it than what [it] was. To me, that’s a slap on the wrist.” In 2022, the health authority informed Reid that a photo was taken of her cousin, Reg Regular. She was his next of kin.
- British oil company BP says it withdrew from the proposed Bay du Nord offshore oil project off the east coast of Newfoundland to free up some money. The company published its second-quarter financials on Tuesday, saying the period was marked by deep disruptions in the global energy market. It nonetheless posted profits of $3.9-billion, more than double its second-quarter profits last year.
- The unemployment rate went down almost everywhere in the country last month except Newfoundland and Labrador. The rate in Canada is at its lowest in two years – 6.4 per cent. In this province, unemployment shot up to 9.3 per cent in July from 8.2 in June. The only other province which saw an increase was Quebec, but only a slight one. All other sub-federal jurisdictions experienced a reduction. As for the cities surveyed, unemployment in St. John’s remains at 7.0, lower than Moncton but higher than Halifax, Saint John and Fredericton.
Quebec
- Premier Christine Fréchette is downplaying a poll showing her party slipping and says she believes the approaching election campaign will be a three-way race. And, contrary to her Conservative and Parti Québecois opponents, she has no plans to campaign on a promise to cut taxes. “The poll I prefer is how I am being greeted on the ground,” Fréchette told reporters. “People are satisfied and happy to see the orientations we have taken. I think Quebecers see themselves in what we are doing.
- Quebec’s premier says U.S. products will remain off the shelves of its government-run liquor stores, regardless of reports that Canada is readying to meet some U.S. demands, including rolling back its ban on American alcohol.
According to a Friday statement from Premier Christine Fréchette’s office, in the context of the current trade war, it is essential to defend Quebec’s economic interests. The premier’s office says the removal of U.S. alcohol from Société des alcools du Québec (SAQ) shelves will remain in effect “until an agreement that we deem fair has been negotiated.” - An association representing Quebec construction companies is asking the political parties to make building housing a priority ahead of the provincial elections this fall. On Thursday, the Association des professionnels de la construction et de l’habitation du Québec (APCHQ) released over two dozen recommendations which they say will increase housing supply and improve affordability in the province.
- Parti Québécois Leader Paul St-Pierre Plamondon on Thursday accused Premier Christine Fréchette of trying to buy votes by indulging in massive pre-electoral spending over the summer. But Fréchette fired back that the last thing Quebec needs, given the economic uncertainty, is a PQ government, and the independence referendum it is proposing to hold should it take office. Emerging for the first time from summer breaks, St-Pierre Plamondon and Fréchette wasted no time cranking up the election hostilities in what is shaping up as a battle in the regions for nationalist votes.
Ontario
- Ontario Premier Doug Ford has written to Prime Minister Mark Carney asking him to extend the federal gas excise tax holiday until at least the end of the year. “As President Trump threatens additional 50 per cent tariffs … and as Canadians continue to grapple with the cost of housing, grocery prices and everyday household expenses, now is not the time to re-introduce the federal fuel excise tax on gasoline and diesel,” Ford wrote in the letter. In April, Carney temporarily removed the 10-cent federal excise tax on a litre of gas and four cents per litre on diesel until Sept. 7, which is Labour Day.
- Recent opinion polling suggests the Ontario Liberals may be righting the ship after years of heavy defeats to Doug Ford’s Progressive Conservatives as the race to take the helm of the party’s future begins to heat up. In a Liaison Strategies poll published at the end of July, the Ontario Liberal Party held a lead at 33 per cent compared to the PC’s 29 per cent, with Ford’s specific approval rating at only 24 per cent.
- The Ontario Green Party is calling on the provincial government to pause all new artificial intelligence (AI) data centres until more is known about their impact on the environment, energy grid, people’s health and jobs. Green Party Leader Mike Schreiner, also the MPP for Guelph, held a news conference at Queen’s Park on Thursday and said new data centres are being approved across the province “without community consultation or safeguards to keep people and the environment safe.” “There are also serious concerns about who actually benefits from the construction of these AI data centres,” he said, adding he believes corporations are benefiting from local water meant for communities.
- The Ontario government is putting several large public agencies under the microscope, launching reviews that will look at efficiency and productivity. The announcement today from Treasury Board President Peter Bethlenfalvy comes as government spending has been under increased scrutiny recently, due to Toronto-area Progressive Conservative caucus members billing thousands in Toronto hotel stays. Premier Doug Ford has said he told them to pay back “every single penny,” but Bethlenfalvy today could not say if that has happened. Bethlenfalvy says the province is reviewing eight agencies starting this summer with an eye to ensuring their spending is sustainable.
Manitoba
- Manitoba’s health minister says there’s no easy fix to long wait times at emergency departments. Half of all patients in Winnipeg emergency departments were waiting four hours and 19 minutes or longer before getting treatment in June, according to the most recent monthly wait time report numbers. One in 10 patients had to wait 12 hours and 18 minutes or longer to be seen. Uzoma Asagwara said during a news conference Friday that long waits are a big, national challenge that will take time to solve.
- Authorized pharmacists in Manitoba now have the power to prescribe birth control, the province’s health minister announced Friday. Pharmacists who have completed approved training can do assessments and provide patients with several eligible prescription contraceptive options, including oral pills, hormonal patches, vaginal rings and intramuscular injections. People who choose to get intramuscular birth control injections can have them administered by a pharmacist, the province said in a news release.
- Two fire chiefs in southwestern Manitoba are concerned about proposed changes to leadership at their halls, but a third says he supports the idea. The rural municipality of Prairie Lakes, south of Brandon, has three fire stations in Ninette, Belmont and Dunrea. Each station, staffed by volunteer firefighters, currently has its own chief. If the RM’s council approves a new bylaw, there could be one chief to oversee operations at all three by the beginning of next year. “We are in no way trying to get rid of a fire department,” said Reeve Darren Seymour. “What we’re trying to do is just amalgamate the three separate entities into one.”
- Winnipeg police are going to resume their crackdown on open drug use and trafficking — but this time, they will work with community outreach teams to help people in need, police Chief Gene Bowers says. “The marked difference you’re going to see will be the addition of the community outreach teams working with uniform officers to provide connections to resources and services or to assist those in need right there, right at the time,” Bowers said at a news conference Thursday. Stepped-up enforcement in areas where there are concerns about crime and social disorder will begin Friday and continue until November, when the initiative will be reassessed, he said.
Saskatchewan
- While Ontario is experiencing its worst wildfire season, Saskatchewan is breathing a sigh of relief. This is a stark contrast compared with last summer, when the province was ravaged by major blazes. Saskatchewan residents were on high alert as spring approached, an understandable reaction after fires in that province and Manitoba fires made up more than half of Canada’s burned land last year. This year is shaping up to be different. The Canadian Interagency Forest Fire Centre says Saskatchewan has recorded 315 wildfires as of Thursday. The province had counted 447 wildfires as of Aug. 6, 2025.
- People were displaced after an affordable housing complex on Wascana Street in Regina was damaged in a fire in 2024. The building wasn’t repaired; rather, it was demolished, and the lot has sat vacant. On Thursday, advocates for people struggling to find stable housing gathered on the empty lot as they called for action to address homelessness. “It’s time for somebody to wake up out there and say, ‘Listen, we have an issue in our city, let’s start working on it,’” said Tyaaron Sangwais, who is a volunteer at a growing encampment in a core-area park known as Pepsi Park.
- The Canadian Taxpayers Federation (CTF) says Saskatchewan Premier Scott Moe and members of his cabinet should have driven to and from last year’s Saskatchewan Urban Municipalities Association (SUMA) convention instead of billing taxpayers $17,401 for two round-trip, private flights. “We think that this is disrespectful to taxpayers to spend thousands of dollars on two flights that could have been a drive,” said Gage Haubrich, the CTF’s prairie director. According to documents obtained by the CTF through freedom of information requests, the Saskatchewan government chartered two private planes for round-trip flights from Regina to Saskatoon to attend the SUMA convention in April 2025.
- People living with cystic fibrosis (CF) in Saskatchewan now have access to a new medication that can be life-changing. CF is a genetic disease that damages the lungs and digestive system. There is no cure. According to the Canadian Cystic Fibrosis Registry, there are more than 4,500 CF patients in Canada, including almost 150 in Saskatchewan. Devina Griffith said she started learning about it when her daughter Baylor was born, and found a big need for personal involvement. “It came to light how inaccessible some medications were and what needed to be done for patients with cystic fibrosis,” Griffith said. “And what it was, is having people raising their voices.”
Alberta
- While the question about Alberta’s future place in Canada has dominated discussions about the province’s October referendum so far, there are another nine questions on the ballot that so far have been subject to little public debate. They were announced two months before Premier Danielle Smith said a 10th question on separatism was being added. Five of the nine questions deal with issues of immigration reform — including whether the province should have increased control over immigration and whether it should be able to withhold health care, education and other social services from people who aren’t Canadian citizens, permanent residents or who have an “Alberta-approved immigration status.”
- The company whose truck was in a fatal crash in Brandon, Man., in May — after it had its safety permit pulled in Manitoba — now can’t operate from Alberta, the province said Thursday. Conquer Transportation is one of the 20 unsafe carriers “eliminated” in Alberta since October, Alberta Transportation Minister Devin Dreeshen said Thursday. “We are trying to clean up the industry,” Dreeshen told CBC. “It’s the bad actors that are giving the industry a black eye.” Police say a Conquer truck driver went through a stop sign at a Brandon intersection and hit an SUV on May 27, killing a 49-year-old woman in the Manitoba city 200 kilometres west of Winnipeg.
- A lawyer accused of misappropriating money is appealing a judge’s decision to temporarily remove him as the trustee of an account belonging to a First Nation in northern Alberta. Rupert Meneen, the chief of the Tallcree First Nation near Fort Vermilion, has been suing Jeff Rath and his legal company over the lawyer’s administration of the First Nation’s trust account. The legal battle between the First Nation and Rath, one of the leaders of the separatist movement in Alberta, has been going on for years. The First Nation received more than $50 million from the federal government in an agricultural benefits claim settlement in 2017 and hired Rath to put the money in a trust.
- Some Alberta medical clinics are taking a wait-and-see approach to the province’s new program that lets patients bypass their doctor and privately book diagnostic imaging tests. And those who run the machines are skeptical the province’s plan will work at all. “The fact is we do not have enough [medical radiation technologists] in Alberta to support the number of diagnostic imaging exams that are being asked of us right now,” says Gina McRae, the Alberta provincial manager for the Canadian Association of Medical Radiation Technologists. Premier Danielle Smith’s government has changed the rules to allow patients to book their own tests and pay up front rather than needing a doctor’s referral. The program started last Friday.
British Columbia
- B.C. Premier David Eby says the entire province is now under a state of emergency as crews grapple with dozens of out-of-control wildfires that have forced thousands of people to evacuate. All 12,000 residents of the District of Summerland were ordered to leave their homes late last night as the Bald Range wildfire advanced quickly on the community. Close to 22,000 people are under evacuation orders across B.C. as of this afternoon, while another roughly 9,700 people have been told they should prepare to evacuate at a moment’s notice.
- Asking rents in British Columbia continue to fall, sliding by 4.5 per cent year over year in July, according to a new report. The latest monthly analysis from Rentals.ca and Urbanation, which is based on asking rents across the former’s listings network, pegged the provincial average for all property types at $2,384. Asking rents for purpose-built and condo apartments showed a more moderate 4.1 per cent dip year-over-year to $2,357 — ranging from $2,080 for a one-bedroom to $3,265 for a three-bedroom. That makes B.C. the second most expensive market in Canada, behind Nova Scotia, according to the report. In Vancouver, average rent for apartments and condos was down 4.5 per cent from last year, to $2,677, and down nearly 20 per cent from its peak in August 2023.
- The province has announced that B.C. Hydro is buying a gas-fired power generation facility near Campbell River on Vancouver Island. The province says the purchase of the Island Generation facility will ensure the long-term reliability of power on the Island. B.C. Energy Minister Adrian Dix said the facility is currently used for about 15 days during peak energy use, usually in winter, and the province intends to keep it that way. “British Columbia’s economy is growing,” said Dix. “Securing Island Generation will help ensure we have capacity to support that growth.”
- Two months into her leadership of the B.C. Conservatives, Kerry-Lynne Findlay has begun laying out her program, starting with her first priorities if she should take office as premier. “I would like to do a core review of our fiscal situation, because the last NDP budget was what I call a no-hope budget,” Findlay told Black Press last week. “We are in debt. It was presented with a deficit, and we’ve had a downgrading of our credit rating since the budget. We need … to get out of that as quickly as possible.” Findlay emphasized that she has stuck with Kamloops MLA Peter Milobar as the party’s finance critic despite their unhappy clash over his wife and another family member having paid positions with the local Indigenous band.
Northwest Territories
- Students in the Northwest Territories are missing school more than one day every week on average, which means by the time students finish high school, some would be three years behind, according to an annual territorial report. The report, released late last month, shows that numbers are worse in smaller communities, with Tłı̨chǫ communities seeing attendance as low as 35 per cent in secondary grades. “In smaller communities, schools may face additional challenges related to staffing shortages, access to specialized supports, and limited local services,” Agata Gutkowska, a spokesperson for the education department, told CBC News in an emailed statement.
Yukon
- Up to 100 single-family homes in the Kwanlin Dün First Nation could undergo energy retrofits by the end of next year. Yukon MP Brendan Hanley, Yukon Energy Minister Ted Laking and Kwanlin Dün First Nation Chief Sean Smith announced up to $29.8 million in funding for retrofits in the McIntyre subdivision in Whitehorse at a press conference Friday morning. The funding includes up to $12.5 million from the Canada Greener Affordable Housing program, $10 million from Natural Resources Canada and more than $7 million from Yukon Energy Mines and Resources, according to a press release.
Nunavut
- Nunavut hunters are set to receive a tenfold increase to the Baffin Island caribou harvest, in spite of warnings from the territory’s wildlife management board that it could pose an “unusual and largely unprecedented” level of risk. In a July 23 decision released late last week, Nunavut Environment Minister Brian Koonoo agreed to increase the total allowable harvest of the Baffin Island caribou for the 2026 season, which started July 1, from 550 caribou to 6,000. That number will go up by 125 caribou each year up to a maximum of 6,500 caribou, though that could change once a formal “basic needs level” is established. That’s a baseline that ensures Inuit have first right of access to harvest.