World Report - May 20: Tuesday's top stories in 10 minutes

Episode Date: May 20, 2025

Canada Post workers poised to walk off the job on Friday morning. Inflation slows to 1.7 per cent in April.Canada and international allies face backlash from Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who says "European countries" should be more like US President Donald Trump. Toronto Police to re-investigate 2015 drowning of two men from the Tyendinaga Mohawk Territory. Trump Administration sends 68 "self-deported" immigrations back to Honduras and Colombia on a US government-funded flight.Researchers say long waits for hip and knee replacements in Canada could be eliminated.  

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This is World Report. Good morning. I'm Marcia Young. Canada Post is once again on the verge of shutting down. Cup W represents 55,000 workers. The union says members are ready to walk off the job Friday morning. As Georgie Smyth reports, that would extend the job action that started before Christmas last year. We didn't take that decision lightly to go out onto the picket line. Kate Holowariak is the president at Canadian Union of Postal Workers Victoria.

She says her members want to lock in a collective agreement with Canada Post and end the months of back and forth talks. Canada Post walked away from the table again last week. I think that's about the third time through this process that they've walked away from the table. And they also indicated that they may change our working conditions. The two parties had been working under a collective agreement that was extended after job action before Christmas last year. It expires on Friday. John Hamilton is a spokesperson for Canada Post. He says a report released last week shows the service needs an overhaul.

We need to be making a number of changes, starting with negotiating agreements that reflect the realities of 2025. Ian Lee is an associate professor at the Sprott School of Business and says acting on the report's recommendations could mean big disruptions too. Restructuring means making Canada Post much, much smaller. This means layoffs of thousands and thousands of workers. Both sides say they still hope to return to the bargaining table, but if no agreement is reached, operations including mail and parcel delivery could shut down by the end

of the week. Georgie Smythe, CBC News, Vancouver. Canada's inflation rate cooled in April. New data released by Statistics Canada this morning shows a sharp decline to 1.7% last month from 2.3% in March. The removal of the consumer carbon tax is a main driver. Prices at gas pumps were down by about 18 percent year over year. Energy prices also fell by nearly 13 percent. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is

pushing back against Canada and other countries who have been calling for Israel to stop its military offensive in Gaza and allow more aid into the Palestinian territory. Netanyahu is calling their public statement a huge prize for Hamas. He says all European leaders should follow US President Donald Trump's example in supporting Israel. Janice McGregor is in our Parliamentary Bureau and Janice, remind us exactly what Canada and these other countries said yesterday. Marcia, Canada's latest positions on this came in the form of two joint statements with other allies. First, the statement from the leaders of Canada, the United Kingdom and France that strongly

oppose the expansion of Israel's military operations in Gaza and called the level of human suffering there intolerable, condemning as wholly inadequate Israel's move over the weekend to allow in only a basic quantity of food aid. Separately, foreign ministers from 22 countries as well as EU aid groups were also condemning Israel's new model for delivering aid into Gaza, noting that the UN doesn't believe it's going to be effective and move the food at the speed and scale required. It also said that humanitarian aid should never be politicized while Palestinian territory

must not be reduced or subjected to demographic change. Now, the Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs, that's a Canadian group supportive of Israel, said the fact that Hamas had applauded the joint statement spoke volumes about its misguided premise. It said that the position that Canada was taking with its allies gives Hamas incentive to continue rejecting a negotiated agreement. It is early days for the Carney government and people are watching to see if there will be a shift in policy on the Middle East. What is being said so far? Well, in her first media scrum after becoming foreign minister last Wednesday, Anita Onnen said that Canada wouldn't allow the continued use of food as a political tool, but she upset Jewish groups by also not acknowledging that it was the Hamas attack on Israel in 2023

that started the war. When Mark Kearney met Israel's president on the sidelines of the Pope's inaugural mass at the Vatican on Sunday, the readout from that meeting was clear that Kearney had reiterated the need for Hamas to release all hostages and lay down all its weapons. Thank you, Janice. You're welcome. The CBC's Janice McGregor in Ottawa. Multiple explosions rocked southern Gaza this morning. Israel's military says it has struck more than 650 Hamas targets over the past week.

Part of its new operation aimed at eliminating Hamas' military capabilities. Local medical workers say more than 500 people have been killed in the past eight days. Ceasefire talks are still going in Doha. This morning, Qatar's prime minister said the talks have led nowhere because the parties have fundamental differences. Police have reopened the case of two men who drowned off the shores of Lake Ontario ten years ago. New evidence disproved theories from the initial investigation. As Nicole Williams tells us, the two men's families are hoping this will finally bring them justice. Nothing's the same as it was before.

Ten years ago, Jenny Wanamaker lost her brother, 26-year-old Maddie Fairman. He had gone out spearfishing on the Bay of Quinty with his friend Tyler Maracle, both of Tyendinaga Mohawk territory about halfway from Ottawa to Toronto. They said they were going out for probably an hour. But neither made it home. Their bodies found in the waters nearly two weeks later by some fishers. Their boat discovered at the bottom of the bay, connected to a net full of rotting fish that had belonged to someone else. Police believe the two had cut the net and tried to haul in the fish, overloading their boat, causing it to sink and the two men to drown. Ontario's Chief Coroner Dr. Dirk Hyart now says that's wrong.

We don't actually know what happened. That's because of new evidence from an investigation by the Aboriginal People's Television Network. They put Maracle's boat through a series of tests, including loading it with more than twice the weight of fish police say was in the net at the time. It never sank. Follow-up tests by the coroner's office confirmed the results. Now Ontario Provincial Police order the case be reopened, but this time by Toronto police, a relief to the families who have lived the last decade in anguish. Tammy Maracle was Tyler's mom. We don't enjoy life anymore

because she enjoyed life with him. Nicole Williams, CBC News, Tyendenaga, Ontario. The Trump administration is pushing ahead to substantially increase deportations life with him. Nicole Williams, CBC News, Tyendinaga, Ontario. The Trump administration is pushing ahead to substantially increase deportations. For the first time yesterday, it sent nearly 70 immigrants back to Honduras and Colombia on a government-funded flight. Washington calls these voluntary deportations. This man says he had already planned to return to Honduras, so this was a good way to save money. People who took part in the deportation program were given $1,000 debit cards, and they were told they would one day be allowed to apply for legal entry into the U.S. Canadians could be getting hip and knee replacement surgeries faster.

That is what new research published by the Canadian Medical Association Journal suggests. And as Christine Birek tells us, experts say it could happen without an increase in funding or new operating rooms. We have all the resources there. We have the people. We have the funding. Dr. David Urbach, head of surgery at Women's College Hospital in Toronto, co-authored the study. Using data from over 17,000 procedures in Ontario, researchers simulated wait times by region. They found prolonged wait times for hip and knee replacements could be eliminated by replacing referrals

with a single wait list that sends patients to the next available specialist for consultation and the surgery. We could actually get everybody who needs a joint replacement, we can get them to surgery quickly. All we have to do is reorganize how patients flow through the system. Data shows centralized waitlists in one region led to 90% of patients having their consultation and surgery in about six months rather than a year. But it means surgeons would largely give up control of their own waitlists. Getting patients through the system

is certainly a lot more important than having the pride of a longer waitlist. Dr. Ulafemi Ayeni is head of the Canadian Orthopedic Association. He says surgeons are open to change. But I think without surgeon input or patient input into these systems then you may have a muted response as to what is truly adopted in the future. If it's shown to be effective I support any measure that actually reduces wait times. 56 year old Tina Moffat spent over a year in agonizing pain awaiting hip surgery. Change takes time, but she says too many

patients can't get their surgeries fast enough. Christine Birak, CBC News, Binbrook, Ontario. That is the latest national and international news from World Report. If you like the World Report podcast, please follow us and tell a friend. It helps spread the word. I'm Marcia Young.