By Canadian Press

In the news today, Aug. 28

Aug 28, 2019 | 2:16 AM

Six stories in the news for Wednesday, Aug. 28

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FIRST INTERIOR SHOTS OF HMS TERROR RELEASED

Parks Canada has released the first pictures from inside the HMS Terror, one of the two ships in the doomed Franklin Expedition. The pictures show a vessel amazingly shipshape despite more than 170 years beneath the Arctic seas. Parks Canada archaeologist Ryan Harris says a robotic camera showed everything from neatly stacked plates to chamberpots to scientific instruments still in their cases. He says the camera was able to peer into the private quarters of the ships officers. The Terror and its sister ship the Erebus set out from England in 1845 in search of the Northwest Passage. Neither Sir John Franklin nor his 129 were ever heard from again. But with a blend of Inuit oral history and systematic, high-tech surveys, the Erebus was found in 2014 and the Terror two years later.

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CITIES ASK PARTIES TO FILL HOUSING-PLAN GAPS

Canada’s cities are asking federal parties to add more than $500 million a year to the national government’s decade-long housing strategy. The Federation of Canadian Municipalities says the measures are needed to fill gaps in the plan over its remaining eight years, to make renting more affordable and keep people from going homeless. Among the requests are a new fund to help seniors pay for refits so they can stay in their homes longer, another to help build more housing for urban Indigenous people, and a separate program to pay for units for homeless people with mental illnesses. Cities are also asking parties to consider a combination of subsidies and tax credits for owners of aging rental buildings to pay for upgrades and maintain the apartments as low-cost units. The measures in the platform being made public today would cost about $580 million a year over the remaining eight years of the existing housing strategy.

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GIRLS AND WOMEN BECOMING MORE INVOLVED IN B.C. GANGS

Girls and women are not immune from gang violence in British Columbia’s Lower Mainland. Females often become involved as girlfriends, but experts say they’re increasingly active participants, carrying guns and drugs or providing their names for houses, cars, credit cards and phones. While females sometimes mistakenly believe they’re safe from gunfire, several have been killed over the years. Now, prevention programs are targeting girls and women to keep them out of gangs. Vancouver police Detectives Sandy Avelar and Anisha Parhar have started a program called Her Time that educates girls about the dangers of the gang lifestyle. Parhar says females are often assumed to be naive bystanders or helpless victims, but some girls and women are more deeply involved than they’re letting on.

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CLOSING ARGUMENTS TODAY FOR GERMAN TOURIST SHOOTING

Closing arguments are scheduled today in the trial of a youth accused of shooting a German tourist in the head on a highway west of Calgary. The teen from the Stoney Nakoda First Nation, who cannot be identified because he was 16 at the time, faces several charges that include aggravated assault. Court heard that Horst Stewin was driving a black SUV through the First Nation with his family last summer, when someone in a passing car shot him. The car veered off the highway and crashed into some trees. Stewin survived but is paralyzed on his right side, gets confused and has memory issues. Other people in the car identified the shooter as the youth, who had been sitting in the back seat, but Stewin’s wife testified the shot came from a man in the front of the vehicle.

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CANADIAN SENTENCED IN CUBA WAS SET UP: LAWYER

A Canadian man sentenced to 10 years in a Cuban prison says he is innocent, and his lawyer says his client was likely set up following a night of partying in a seaside town outside the popular resort destination of Varadero. Benjamin Tomlin, 46, was arrested in August 2018 and charged with having sex with a 15-year-old. The age of consent in Cuba is 16. Tomlin’s Canadian lawyer, Ricardo Alcolado Perez, said the legal proceedings were plagued with irregularities. None of the witnesses in the case — including the minor with whom he is accused of having sexual relations —identified Tomlin in court, Alcolado Perez said. Tomlin’s sister, Caroline Simpson of Montreal, said he has not received adequate consular services because of staffing shortages due to the mysterious “Havana syndrome” that has sickened employees at the Canadian and U.S. embassies.

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RESEARCHERS CALL FOR CALORIE LABELLING ON ALCOHOL

A study suggests the average Canadian drinker receives more than one-tenth of their daily recommended calories from alcoholic beverages, but you wouldn’t know it from looking at the label. Researchers at University of Victoria looked at Statistics Canada data on alcohol sales and consumption between 2015-2016 to calculate how many calories Canadians consume from booze. The study, originally published in the Canadian Journal of Dietetic Practice and Research in February, estimates the average Canadian drinker consumes 250 calories from alcohol per day — the equivalent of a grab bag of chips.

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ALSO IN THE NEWS:

— MP Kent Hehr will announced funding for the preservation of Indigenous languages in Calgary and surrounding area.

— Manitoba political leaders take part in a 50-minute televised debate today in Winnipeg.

— The trial continues today in Vancouver for Andrew Berry, who is charged with second-degree murder in the death of his two daughters.

— Minister of Economic Development Ranj Pillai and Philippines Secretary of Labour and Employment Silvestre H. Bello will make a labour and immigration announcement today in Whitehorse.

The Canadian Press