Your Singhs today (Alberta edition)

Regular readers of this ever-lengthening series will know that we usually try to post photos of the perps of the smuggling, extortion and murders for which Canada's Sikh community has become notorious. But the people who committed this particular crime are still at large, so we'll being with a picture of the victim.

Birinder Singh, aged 22, was shot to death earlier this month on  Highway 2, south of Edmonton AB, near Township Road 490, south of Leduc.

According to the RCMP (who have not yet got their man) three friends were headed to the mountains on the afternoon of 14 March when a pickup truck pulled up beside their Honda Civic.

Witnesses saw the truck pull up beside a car and then speed off. According to the two survivors of the shooting, a person in the truck made a hand gesture toward them, something resembling a peace sign. The meaning would depend on the colour of the person making the gesture.

The witnesses said their friend and Mr Singh, who was driving the car, waved back. How many fingers they used is not known. Moments later, someone in the truck opened fire and a bullet struck Mr Singh in the neck. The friends took control of the steering wheel and pulled the car over to the side of the highway. There Mr Singh died in the vehicle from loss of blood. 

According to the friends, Mr Singh moved three years ago from India to... wait for it... Brampton ON, on an international student visa. He studied business administration at the Singh School of Truck Driving before relocating to Edmonton in October. Since then, the business administration student worked in construction, installing siding. He was on his way to see the Canadian Rockies for the first time when he was killed. 

Sergeant Preston of the Yukonf said investigators located the truck, a Grey 2022 Ford F-150, last week but the suspect remains at large as the Mounties continue their search for a suspect and a motive.

Here's a related news flash. CTV News reports that, to the surprise of no-one, Karen Hogan, Canada's Auditor General, found reforms to the international student program "fell short" on improving integrity, including only investigating a small number of "potentially problematic" cases flagged by post-secondary institutions. 

Her report, released this morning, found that out of 153,324 potentially non-compliant students reported by schools to Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada (IRCC) in 2023 and 2024, the government only had the ability to investigate about 2000 a year, or 4057 in total. 

Within those investigations, the AG’s report found that 1654 students did not respond to IRCC's two inquiries. And... spoiler alert... "the department took limited action to confirm non‑compliance beyond contacting the student for more information."

Speaking to the meeja after submitting her report to the Liberal government to be filed and forgotten, reporters on Parliament Hill on Monday, the Auditor General said it's "concerning" to see the IRCC’s lack of action. "I think they’re just not acting on the information they have," Ms Hogan said. "And I would expect them to do that. They have the powers and the tools. They just need to use them."

If the IRCC did what Ms Hogan suggests, Marx Carnage's Liberal government would be in danger of losing as many as 24 seats -- notably in Brampton, Surrey BC and Edmonton -- in the House of Commons. So don't expect any such action until there are reliable reports of sub-zero temperatures in Hades.

Canada's CTV - all the news that fits

Canada's Auditor General, responsible for oversight of the federal government's operations, released some reports today which shone some harsh light on the substandard performances and "challenges" faced by a number of government departments and agencies. Here are six of the AG's findings.

A — Half of the 16 million people who called federal call centres last year couldn't get through. Instead of giving callers the option of waiting, some centres sent them back to the automated phone system, directed them to a website or told them to call back later.

B — Even after having to pay a fine of C$550,000 (nearly $410,000 in real money) for a Labour Code conviction related to the death of three Mounties five years ago, the Royal Canadian Mounted Police is unsure if all of its officers have access to the rifles and body armour needed to respond to an active shooter. Apparently Canada's national police force mismanaged the purchase, distribution and ongoing maintenance of semi-automatic rifles known as carbines.

C — Canada’s refugee-determination system is unable to process claims on time despite reforms introduced seven years ago. The "asylum-seeker" (= illegal border crosser) caseload faces a mounting backlog, with a processing system that has chronic delays and lax criminality checks. The AG projects that if the number of new asylum claimants remains steady at around 50,000 per year (!), by 2024 the wait time for decisions will increase to five years, more than double what it is now.

D — The Canadian sales-tax system failed to keep up with the rapidly evolving digital marketplace, with the result that C169 million of Goods and Service Tax on foreign products and services sold in Canada in 2017 went uncollected. In addition, the federal government could not assess and collect all sales taxes on e-commerce transactions.

E — Public funds might be supporting partisan advertising due to a lack of adequate controls. Only government advertising valued at $500,000 or more is reviewed by an independent body, even though less expensive campaigns could represent a risk of partisanship. [No kidding. Ed.]

F — The National Museum of Science and Technology houses a large portion of its collection in leased storage facilities, along with many objects that have yet to be assessed or catalogued. Poor conditions in these spaces pose risks of deterioration, damage and theft.

Walt has not attempted to rank these items in order of importance, but readers will certainly guess which one I think is most significant. I think most Canadians would agree that Canada's porous border -- 50,000 illegals crossing every year, with the RCMP able to do no more than carry their bags and direct them towards the welfare office -- is the problem most in need of immediate attention.

My question for today: Which two (only) did Canada's CTV News think worthy of inclusion in its midday TV newscast? Answer: A & B. Maybe there wasn't enough time for the others, although nearly five minutes was devoted to the latest baby produced by the British royals. Funny though. Item C was mentioned prominently in other lamestream media, even the state-owned Canadian Broadcorping Castration (CBC).

In "Auditor General report more evidence of a Liberal government more taken with grand visions than actual governing", Postmedia's John Ivison writes:

In at least two cases, the problems are less a matter of neglect than the direct consequence of weak and wrong-headed decisions. Let's take the report in order of egregiousness — from clown-car policy to the merely careless. It will come as no surprise that the Liberal government's inept handling of the asylum seeker issue has had an effect similar to closing Highway 401 in rush-hour: system gridlock....

While there is clearly a bureaucratic logjam, the real blame lies in government policy. The Liberals created the problem because getting tough with refugees was not on-brand — even when it became clear that the lax Canadian system was being played by economic migrants flying into the U.S. from countries like Nigeria.

John Ivison was once a regular panelist on CTV's Sunday morning Question Period snorefest. No more. Comments like Mr Ivison's clearly do not fit the liberal narrative. And liberal bias is just as much the foundation of CTV's editorial policies as those of the CBC. The difference is that the CBC gets paid directly by the Liberal government, whereas CTV does not. But wait... The recent federal budget set aside some C$650 million for subsidies to Canada's struggling "independent" media. Guess which media will be at the head of the line.