Weekend Briefing: everything you need to know about the Premiers meeting
1. What the Premiers agreed on...
Prolonged negotiations between Canadian provincial and territorial leaders in Whitehorse have resulted in a new deal on inter-provincial trade.
But while the deal is meant to cover most goods and services, it's unclear how significant the Canadian free-trade agreement (CFTA) is until more information is released.
The agreement in principle reached by the 13 Premiers this week at the annual summer Council of the Federation talks replaces the 23-year old agreement on internal trade.
Speaking of trade, B.C., Ontario and Quebec managed to reach a deal to make grapes a little "freer."
Premiers were also unanimous in calling for a meeting with Prime Minister Justin Trudeau this fall to negotiate a new health accord.
2. ... and what they didn't totally agree on.
There's no consensus among Premiers about how to respond to Justin Trudeau's comments this week about carbon pricing.
The Prime Minister said: "we're going to make sure there is a strong price on carbon right across the country and we're hoping that the provinces are going to be able to do that in a way for themselves,"
The general message coming from the Premiers seems to be: we'll meet your emissions reductions targets. Just don't tell us how to do it.
3. Terms of reference for MMIW inquiry revealed.
The upcoming national inquiry into Canada's missing and murdered Indigenous women will focus on violence prevention, according to a draft document obtained by CBC News.
A draft of the terms of reference says five commissioners will be given the broad mandate to identify systemic causes of violence and recommend "concrete action" to help end violence against Indigenous women and girls. The draft does not include specifics about timing or length of inquiry.
Canada's Premiers reacted cautiously, but supportively, to the proposed terms of reference, but some expressed concern at the slow pace of progress on the file, the possibility of duplicating earlier inquiries or slowing work already underway to prevent more women from becoming victims.
4. Canada will contribute to the effort to retake Mosul.
The United States and France appear on the verge of taking a more active role in liberating Iraq's second largest city, Mosul, from the Islamic State, and Canada will support the effort by deploying an army field hospital and medical staff.
Defence Minister Harjit Sajjan said this week that Canada will add an extra medical unit to its current special forces training and assistance mission.
The Role 2 hospital has limited bed space, but will be able to provide emergency care and evacuation for casualties coming back from the fight for Mosul.
We also learned this week that Canadian troops have been thrust into a leadership position with one of NATO's framework battalions in the Baltic states largely because the French have been tied down with military operations at home.
But a series of government, defence and diplomatic sources told CBC News that — until just recently — many discussions at NATO involved France joining the U.S., Britain and Germany as a lead nation in the combat unit, whose purpose is to deter Russian expansionism in eastern Europe.
Speaking of NATO, a certain U.S. presidential candidate doesn't seem to be a fan. But the Prime Minister won't say much about that.
5. Meanwhile south of the border...
Donald Trump is now officially the Republican nominee. But you've probably heard plenty about that already.
The Democratic convention is taking place next week in Philadelphia.
6. Yazidi survivors plead for help.
MPs were told this week to do more to help Yazidi survivors of genocide.
Advocates argued that Canada couldn't rely on a "flawed" refugee identification system led by the United Nations.
The House of Commons immigration committee also heard horrific accounts of torture, rape, murder and enslavement as witnesses offered emotional testimony about atrocities carried out by the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS).
MPs are holding three days of committee hearings called "Immigration Measures for the Protection of Vulnerable Groups."
7. Diplomatic shuffle: Canada's faces abroad change.
Foreign Affairs Minister Stéphane Dion announced this week the appointment of more than two dozen new ambassadors.
Several Harper-era appointments were replaced, including Gordon Campbell who will leave London and be replaced by former top bureaucrat Janice Charette, and Vivian Bercovici, a former policy adviser who served in the same Ontario Progressive Conservative government as then Foreign Affairs Minister John Baird, is being replaced in Israel by Canada's outgoing ambassador in Afghanistan, Deborah Lyons.
Some high-profile diplomats will remain in their positions, including Lawrence Cannon, a former Conservative cabinet minister and the current ambassador to France.
8. Federal government's tech support agency struggles... again.
Problems with Shared Services Canada could delay Statistics Canada's release of "mission critical" information required by the Bank of Canada, Department of Finance and commercial banks, according to a report.
The document, submitted to Canada's chief statistician Wayne Smith, is one among more than a dozen reports, drafted at Smith's request from all of his directors general.
The memos, obtained by CBC News under access to information laws, detail how yet another federal ministry is embroiled in a dispute with SSC over services standards, red tape, billing and the capacity of IT infrastructure to keep up with departmental demands.
The minister responsible for the federal government's troubled tech support agency, Judy Foote, said she's convinced Shared Services Canada will eventually function as it is supposed to.
9. List of problems with the federal government's Phoenix pay system continues to grow.
Not only have 80-thousand federal workers had problems with their pay, but the Phoenix system also breached the privacy of federal employees, more than once.
Newly released documents show senior officials were warned as early as Jan. 18 that the new Phoenix system has a flaw that allows widespread access to employees' personnel records, including social insurance numbers.
The Prime Minister has now tasked the clerk of the Privy Council to oversee efforts to fix the system.
10. New powers for the Parliamentary Budget Officer
After being approached by officials in the Prime Minister's Office this spring, the Parliamentary Budget Officer has released draft legislation that would expand and empower the watchdog.
New statutes would provide the PBO with greater powers to request documents from the government, including information that might have otherwise been excluded from disclosure as a cabinet confidence.
All things that would make former PBO Kevin Page happy.