By Chris Brown

Update from the PM

Canada in a position to build a stronger, more resilient country coming out of pandemic: PM

Jul 8, 2020 | 9:45 AM

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau says by building a bridge for Canadians through the global COVID-19 pandemic the Liberal government has put the country in a position to build a stronger and more resilient Canada.

“Today Canada has one of the most ambitious and comprehensive plans to counter the economic impacts of this pandemic,” Trudeau said, adding Finance Minister Bill Morneau is to provide a fiscal snapshot on the country’s economic situation later today.

When the pandemic first hit, Trudeau said, a lot of people lost their jobs overnight they didn’t know how they were going to feed their families or pay their bills and the federal government had two choices.

“We could sit back and let Canadians fend for themselves and hope it would all be over soon. Or we could swiftly and substantially choose to support Canadians. We chose to support Canadians. As we measure the cost of helping Canadians we shouldn’t forget that the cost of doing nothing would have been far more to both our health care and our economy.”

Trudeau pointed to increased financial support to vulnerable groups like seniors and students, and providing loans to businesses that helped them manage costs and rehire employees as measures the government took. He said nearly 11 million Canadians have been helped by the Canada Emergency Response Benefit or the Canada Emergency Wage Subsidy.

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“Our government took on debt to reduce the amount Canadians themselves had to take on,” Trudeau said.

He added the road to recovery will not be an easy one. Some sectors will bounce back more quickly than others, some people will be able to find work but others won’t right away, he said.

“As we move through this recovery phase Canadians can count on us to always be in their corner,” Trudeau said.

The situation is stabilizing across Canada with the number of cases, hospitalizations and deaths declining because Canadians did their part and followed public health instructions, Trudeau said.

“But we still have to be very careful. Things can change quickly,” he added, saying there are still hotspots in some parts of the country, including in long-term care facilities and agriculture operations.

A fuller update on public health modeling is to be released later today.

The government held a two-day virtual cabinet retreat this week, where the government talked about concrete steps to battle systemic racism.

He said cabinet has put together a workplan that will develop strong policies that will help eliminate barriers faced by Indigenous peoples, racialized people and persons with disabilities.

Modernizing policing structures, improving access to capital and better protection for temporary foreign workers are some of the tasks stemming from the meeting.

As of Wednesday morning, Canada had 106,167 confirmed cases and 8,711 deaths. There have been 69,883 recovered cases in Canada and 3,020,172 Canadians tested.

In Alberta, there are 8,436 cases and 157 deaths. A total of 493,935 tests have been completed in Alberta. There are 620 active cases in Alberta.