NightOwl

The vote has prompted increased scrutiny of links between the majority ABC party and the natural gas industry. In a Wednesday thread on X/Twitter, Mihai Cirstea, a doctoral student at the University of British Columbia noted that Montague had a half-hour meeting in December with FortisBC lobbyist Gurpreet Vinning. Vinning is also listed as attending mayor Sim's inauguration, Cirstea noted.

"Montague does nothing – barely works, doesn't attend events, doesn't write motions, doesn't live in Vancouver – but suddenly found it a very high priority to make sure we can re-introduce gas heating in new builds," he wrote.

At least one of the councillors who voted for the amendments to reverse the city's ban, Mike Klassen, holds investments in Fortis, according to his financial disclosure records. ABC councillor Lisa Dominato also holds investments in gas utilities Fortis and Enbridge; however, she broke ranks with her party and voted against the amendments.

The Liberal government has promised to “solve” the country’s housing woes. But critics say it continues to offer major incentives to for-profit developers, including tax breaks and cheap financing, while steering clear of regulating the housing market.

Ricardo Tranjan, a political economist and senior researcher with the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives, said it “isn’t surprising” to see developers gain this level of access.

“It’s power politics, and the industry has more influence,” Tranjan said. “While the minister has never bothered to sit down with and listen to the many tenants on rent strikes, he is winning and dining with corporate landlords.”

In fact, a new bill introduced by the Liberal government will end the public disclosure of such events before they happen, and afterward will only name their city and province and not their venue name and postal code—thus ending media exposés of such “cash for access” fundraisers.

Archive: [ https://archive.is/n5388 ]

The company said this was mainly due to orders from the German army using funds from a 100-billion-euro special fund created after the invasion of Ukraine to bolster the country's armed forces.

The German company also said it had received an order from the Ukrainian government for the construction of an ammunition factory in Ukraine.