Trans Canada Highway... More


Highest point on the Trans Canada Highway: photo by Brendan Lynch

Trans Canada Highway... More


Another view of Trans Canada Highway: photo by Jonny Wood

The Old Trans Canada Highway


Picture of the Old Trans Canada Highway: photo by The Black Knight

The Trans Canada Highway


The Trans Canada Highway along the US border near Edmunston city in New Brunswick: photo by Ameen Ahmed

Dalai Lama got granted with Canadian Citizenship

Dalai Lama says he is honoured to have be granted Canadian Citizen
- by Jeremy Hainsworth, Canadian Press
The Dalai Lama says he is proud to have been given honorary Canadian citizenship. He was granted the citizenship by Parliament earlier this summer, a move which drew criticism from China. "Wherever I go, it creates some inconvenience," he told a news conference at Vancouver city hall. "I'm sorry. I hope it's not my mistake." Only two other people have been granted honorary Canadian citizenship: South African leader Nelson Mandela and Swedish diplomat Raoul Wallenberg, who saved Jews from extermination during the Second World War. The leader of the world's Tibetan Buddhists arrived in Vancouver on Thursday for the inauguration of the Dalai Lama Centre for Peace and Education.

He said Vancouver was chosen as the site of the centre, the world's first to bear his name, as its multi-ethnic and multiracial population gives it harmony. "This is purely educational, not political," he said of the centre. The Dalai Lama said religious institutions have lost their power and that moral and ethical guidance is now provided through education. "We have to live together. We must educate in this respect," he said. He said human beings must become more peaceful through the promotion of human values and religious harmony. "This is the basis of the future," he said. "It's in everybody's interest." The Dalai Lama was welcomed to Vancouver by Mayor Sam Sullivan. "Thank you for blessing us with your presence," Sullivan said. "Vancouver is very honoured that you would consider us the only city in the world for an institution with your name on it."

B.C. Health Care Company Fires Locals to Hire Outside Canada

British Columbia Health Care Company fires locals to hire outside Canada. Union asks federal Conservative immigration minister to investigate, put visa approvals on hold. The federal Conservative government has been asked to investigate two B.C. health companies working in tandem to fire unionized local workers and replace them with low-wage workers from countries such as the Philippines, Colombia, India and South Korea.

The British Columbia Government and Service Employees' Union (BCGEU/NUPGE) has written to Monte Solberg, the federal cabinet minister for citizenship and immigration, asking him to investigate the activities of Park Place Seniors Living Ltd. of Vancouver, owner of the Windsor Manor long-term care facility in Kelowna, and AdvoCare Health Services Ltd., based in Kelowna. "We find it highly inappropriate that Canadian employers are using federal and provincial immigration programs to gut existing pay and benefit standards for Canadian workers," George Heyman, BCGEU president, says in a letter to Solberg. "It is equally disturbing that these same employers would exploit foreign workers by paying them significantly less than Canadian workers for doing the same work," he adds.