Canadian members of Parliament spent a record $187.8 million in 2024, including $32 million on travel. That’s an increase of $12.7 million over 2023, according to proactively disclosed expenditure records.

The $187.8 million in taxpayer money also included $114.1 million for MP staff salaries, $39.8 million for third-party contracts and $1.9 million for hospitality expenses.

The biggest spenders

MPs spent an average of $547,000 each in the 2024 calendar year. Only 10 MPs spent more than $700,000, including four Conservatives, three Liberals, two NDP members and one Bloc Québécois MP.

The biggest spender of all was former Bloc Québécois MP Kristina Michaud, who billed taxpayers $775,000. That included $328,000 on travel, which was also more than any other parliamentarian.

Michaud, who did not seek re-election in 2025, represented the Avignon-La Mitis-Matane-Matapédia riding in southeastern Quebec. Her travel spending was $46,000 higher than Nunavut NDP MP Lori Idlout, who represents some the most remote communities in Canada.

In terms of top overall spenders, Michaud was followed by B.C. Conservative Frank Caputo at more than $769,000 and Alberta Conservative Mike Lake at nearly $745,000.

1. Kristina Michaud (Bloc Québécois, Avignon-La Mitis-Matane-Matapédia) – $775,017.54
2. Frank Caputo (Conservative, Kamloops-Thompson-Cariboo) – $769,158.93
3. Mike Lake (Conservative, Edmonton-Wetaskiwin) – $744,594.76
4. Lori Idlout (NDP, Nunavut) – $732,496.44
5. Carla Qualtrough (Liberal, Delta) – $714,287.57
6. Eric Melillo (Conservative, Kenora) – $712,662.86
7. Ron McKinnon (Liberal, Coquitlam-Port Coquitlam – $712,550.24
8. Yvonne Jones (Liberal, Labrador) – $708,441.91
9. Rachel Blaney (NDP, North Island-Powell River) – $707,762.05
10. Len Webber (Conservative, Calgary Confederation) – $704,987.11

The Victoria Day long weekend is the unofficial start to the summer driving season, and the province is reminding motorists to be courteous to those working on Saskatchewan highways this season.

“We just want people to be very mindful of everybody,” Minister of Highways David Marit said at an event Thursday. “Please drive safely out there. [Workers] have caring loved ones with them and be safe and really be cautious of the work zone and know what’s going on.”

Construction is present across the province with dozens of workers on site and hundreds more first responders on the highway.

One worker who may be on a construction site this weekend is sign truck operator Alex Pierrard.

“On the edge of the open highway, we could [be working on roads] with speeds up to 110km/hr,” he said. “When we’re there working, we ask all drivers to please slow to 60 [km/hr].”

Pierrard outlined some of the experiences he’s had over the multiple years of working in the construction industry.

“All too often we’ll see drivers fly by at full speed, sometimes far too close,” he recalled. “I’ve had scenarios where I’ve literally had to pull a colleague back because they were about to get very close with traffic.”

“Those drivers weren’t doing what we asked them to do, which is to slow down and move over to give us space,” Pierrard added.

According to provincial data, more than 180 collisions happen each year in Saskatchewan construction zones, resulting in an average of 36 injuries and one death every 12 months.

Regina Police believe many of those are preventable, adding it’s important to slow down around emergency personnel and first responders as well.

“Every time [officers] step out of that police vehicle in traffic, they’re potentially putting themselves in danger,” Acting RPS Chief Lorilee Davies told reporters. “Our officers have had close calls where motorists have not slowed down, not pulled over.”

SGI also says the possibility of collisions increases on long weekends, as there are more cars on the road.

Davies added police will be increasing patrol to watch for speeders, distracted and impaired drivers.

“We reinforce that message,” she said. “Typically, we tend to have a few more fatalities. And so just really encouraging people to follow all the safety rules.”

Pierrard just hopes he – and all others working on provincial highways – get home safe.

“Everybody that’s out on that roadway is there for a reason,” he reiterated. “Whether it’s a police officer, highway worker or tow truck operator, everybody is there to do something. And they’re just asking the people to help them get home safe.”

The ministry added speeding in active construction zones may come with hefty fines, up to triple the amount of a regular ticket.

The Saskatchewan RCMP have cancelled a dangerous person alert after police located the missing woman and armed suspect near Loon Lake.

The Saskatchewan RCMP issued a province-wide emergency alert at around 10:27 a.m. on Friday, May 16, warning the public of a dangerous person believed to be armed and possibly with the woman, reported missing on May 15.

The woman was reported missing around 11 p.m. Thursday after concerns were raised that she was being held against her will on Island Lake First Nation (Ministikwan).

The suspect, 24-year-old Michael Bouvier, was last seen on Island Lake First Nation at 11 p.m. on May 15.

“Be cautious. Do not pick up hitchhikers or approach suspicious persons. Be cautious if not in the immediate area,” RCMP said in the alert.

Area residents saw an increased police presence as officers worked to locate the woman and ensure her safety.

The Saskatchewan RCMP critical incident response team and officers from other detachments were also brought in for support.

Just after 3 p.m. Friday, the RCMP announced they located both Bouvier and the woman.

Police say the woman is safe and was assessed by paramedics, and Bouvier was taken into custody.

The RCMP said more details will be released when they become available.

The following story contains details of sexual assault

The trial of two men accused of trafficking a Bangladeshi woman to work at restaurants in small-town Saskatchewan met another delay Friday.

Defence counsel was expected to have a chance to cross-examine the complainant, a woman whose name is protected under a publication ban. Instead, the Crown revealed its key witness, former Sask. Party MLA Hugh Nerlien, planned to leave the country – permanently.

The trial, which started in September and was expected to take five days, has been plagued with delays, as the court had issues finding an appropriate Bengali translator for the complainant, with proceedings restarting this week.

On Monday, the defence filed a Jordan application, asking the judge to throw out the case for breaching the Charter rights of the accused to be tried within a reasonable time. His written decision on that application is expected to be delivered at a later date.

Now, with a key witness set to leave the country, the Crown asked to delay the defence lawyers’ cross-examination of the complainant so Nerlien can be brought in to testify before he leaves.

The defence questioned why the Crown was asking to delay proceedings once again, if the prosecutors already had a “vague notion” Nerlien might leaving the country. They said there were extenuating personal circumstances for their witness.

After a brief recess, presiding Judge Miguel Martinez agreed to bring Nerlien in early, adjourning the trial until Tuesday, with the defence expected to get an opportunity to cross-examine the complainant on Wednesday.

“Trials are sometimes dynamic and unpredictable creatures,” said Martinez, who described his role in ensuring the trial was fair for both the accused, and the Crown and complainant.

“A fair trial is not necessarily an ideal trial.”

The two accused, Mohammad Masum and Sohel Haider, were each charged on June 29, 2023, with one count of trafficking a woman to work at restaurants in Tisdale, Gull Lake and Elrose. Masum also faces three counts of sexual assault.

When the trial began in September, the woman testified Masum sexually assaulted her two weeks after she arrived to work in Tisdale, approaching her in the walk-in cooler, putting his arms around her and kissing her neck.

Later, she told court he drove her to a secluded place and had her sit in the back seat of his car, where he removed her pants and raped her.

On Wednesday, the complainant testified she was required to work up to 12 hours a day, between five and six days a week for just $1,000 a month, plus accommodations and a few meals a day.

When she was later brought to work at Bob’s Diner in Elrose, she told court she was given a room in a cold, unfinished basement, where she slept for several days on a mattress on the floor without bed sheets or pillows.

Saskatchewan’s Chief Medical Health Officer Dr. Saqib Shahab says 37 cases of measles have been reported in the province between March 14 and May 14, with the youngest case a five-month-old infant.

According to Shahab, 70 per cent of reported cases have been in pre-school and school aged children and 95 per cent of cases were in unvaccinated individuals.

Only one case has been reported in a person who had two doses of the measles vaccine.

Shahab said there has also been four hospitalizations reported as of May 16.

“Eight of the 10 new cases reported on [May 14] are in the central-west and central-east, so most of the new measles cases as well as most of the cases were either travel related or some local transmission now in southern rural parts of the province,” he said.

Shahab said the situation remains concerning but also not surprising.

“There’s some good evidence that vaccine uptake in pre-school aged and young adult populations who were not vaccinated or had not yet received both doses has increased in the last two months,” Shahab said.

However, Shahab said many families are still not accepting vaccines despite public health staff reaching out to them.

“This means that the measles outbreak will continue, hospitalizations will continue, exposure to persons at higher risk including infants under one, unvaccinated pregnant women and immune compromised who are at higher risk for severe complications will continue,” he said.

According to Shahab there is an estimated 20,000 to 30,000 people unvaccinated in the province.

The Saskatchewan Health Authority has said that with two doses, the measles vaccine is nearly 100 per cent effective, is safe and free of charge when administered by public health.

Shahab said because pharmacists generally do not vaccinate children between 12 and 18 months, which is when the measles vaccine is usually given, most Saskatchewan pharmacies are not administering measles doses but could do so if required.

“Traditionally public health clinics have been able to meet that need, when we give the flu vaccine or COVID vaccine over six weeks that is 200,000 , 300,000 vaccines given. We think another 10,000, 15,000 doses of [measles] vaccines distributed throughout the province would stop the outbreak,” he said, adding right now public health can meet that demand.

Shahab says with influenza infections on the downtick for the season, those who develop symptoms such as a fever and cough, along with red eyes and a runny nose are likely to be experiencing the start of a measles infection and should isolate immediately.

“A rash two to three days after the start of symptoms on the face starting behind the ears and on the face and moving down to cover the rest of the body confirms measles,” Shahab said.

Shahab added it is important to isolate for four days after the start of a rash.

“As we are infectious when we get measles from four days before the start of the rash to four days after, it is important to let public health know where you have been so that others at risk can be informed,” Shahab said.

According to Shahab, Canada eliminated local transmission of measles in 1998.

“Since then, the only cases we would see were individuals who had travelled to other parts of the world, came back, developed measles. There would be a quick public health investigation, they would isolate - and because overall we had a high vaccination rate and because the household and surrounding communities had a high vaccination rate, we would not see community transmission,” Shahab said.

According to the province, from 2015 to 2024 there was only two cases of measles reported in Saskatchewan.

Traffic in both directions along Highway 400 was slow moo-ving Friday due to an unusual sight as a group of cows were spotted running loose near Aurora.

“You can’t make this stuff up,” said OPP Sgt. Kerry Schmidt. “We got half a dozen cows running up and down the highway.”

Provincial police officers said the situation began mid-day when multiple cows were seen running between Highway 9 and Aurora Road, creating heavy slowdowns in both directions.

“We have about six different cows running up and down the highway,” said Schmidt. “Heavy delays approaching the scene in both directions if you’re heading to the cottage or heading out of town or heading into town.”

Officers and farmers were seen attempting to wrangle the animals using lassos and ATVs.

“[The cows] were running up and down the highway, through construction zones and across the highway,” police described.

Schmidt said police first got the call shortly before 2 p.m. after the cows escaped their enclosure believed to be somewhere around Highway 9.

There was a shooting Friday afternoon inside a gym, killing two people and injuring at least three others, Las Vegas police said.

One person died as gunfire erupted at the Las Vegas Athletic Club on the city’s west side, Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Undersheriff Andrew Walsh said.

There was no longer a threat to the public, Walsh said. Heavy police presence was seen lined along North Rainbow Boulevard.

In a social media post, police said the suspect in the shooting was confirmed dead at a local hospital. Three people who were injured were transported to local hospitals, with one in critical condition, a spokesperson with the police department said in a press conference.

Officials said they are still investigating a motive.

“They said get out, get out, get out,” Claudio Vigani, a witness who was at the gym when the shooting started, told KLAS-TV. “Then I saw the dead guy next to the machine.”

The Associated Press was not able to reach the athletic club for comment. The University Medical Center confirmed it received four patients, with one in critical condition.

The U.S. Supreme Court on Friday blocked U.S. President Donald Trump from moving forward with deportations under the 1798 Alien Enemies Act for a group of immigrants in northern Texas, siding with Venezuelans who feared they were poised for imminent removal under the sweeping wartime authority.

The decision is a significant loss for Trump, who wants to use the law to speed deportations – and avoid the kind of review normally required before removing people from the country. But the decision is also temporary and the underlying legal fight over the president’s invocation has continued simultaneously in multiple federal courts across the country.

The justices sent the case back to an appeals court to decide the underlying questions in the case, including whether the president’s move is legal and, if it is, how much notice the migrants targeted under the act should receive.

Two conservative U.S. Supreme Court justices – Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito – publicly noted their dissent.

The court’s unsigned opinion was notably pointed about how the government was handling the removals and also how U.S. District Judge James Hendrix had dealt with the case at an earlier stage.

The court pointed to another case that had reached it previously, that of the Maryland man, Kilmar Abrego Garcia, who was mistakenly removed to El Salvador. The court noted that the Trump administration has represented that it is “unable to provide for the return of an individual deported in error to a prison in El Salvador.”

Given that, the court said, “the detainees’ interests at stake are accordingly particularly weighty.”

The court added that the way the Trump administration was handling the removals did not “pass muster.” Specifically, the justices pointed to notice of only 24 hours that was “devoid of information about how to exercise due process rights to contest that removal.”

The Supreme Court sent the case back to the New Orleans-based 5th US Circuit Court of Appeals for further review, saying in its order that the appeals court erred in dismissing the detainees’ case.

“Today’s ruling effectively extends the temporary freeze that the justices put on Alien Enemies Act removals from the Northern District of Texas back on April 19,” said Steve Vladeck, CNN Supreme Court analyst and professor at Georgetown Law. “Because lower courts have blocked use of the act in every other district in which the president has sought to invoke it, that means it’s effectively pausing all removals under the act until the 5th Circuit – and, presumably, the Supreme Court itself – conclusively resolves whether they’re legal and how much process is due if so.”

The court also appeared to criticize how Hendrix, whom Trump nominated to the bench in his first term, had handled the case. Hendrix declined to halt the removals and argued in his opinion that the ACLU was attempting to rush the district court to act.

🎉 Update Completed Successfully! 🎉

We are thrilled to announce that our scheduled network update has been completed without any issues! 🚀 All our broadcast stations, streams, and websites are now fully operational and running better than ever.

What’s New?

Here’s what you can expect from this update:
✅ Improved Audio Player – No more interruptions or cutting off! Enjoy seamless streaming on our websites.
✅ Enhanced Stream Stability – Our radio streams are now more reliable than ever.
✅ Upgraded Security & Quality – Improved protection and enhanced broadcast quality for an unmatched listening experience.

Fully Operational Services:

🎵 Stations:

• Z103.5 – https://z1035.evoradio.ca/
• 979 The Cowboy – https://979thecowboy.evoradio.ca/
• 101 The Rockhound – https://101therockhound.evoradio.ca/
• Classic 88.7 The Goat – https://887thegoat.evoradio.ca/

🌐 Websites:

• EVO Radio Advertiser Access – https://advertiseraccess.evoradio.ca/
• EVO Media Corporation – https://evomcorp.com/
• DJ Spinderella – https://djspinderella.evomcorp.com/

Experiencing Issues?

While everything is running smoothly on our end, we’re here to help if you encounter any issues. If you’re having trouble with our broadcasts or websites, please report the issue to us immediately so we can address it.

📧 Contact Us:

If you have having any issues please reach out to us on our websites!

Thank you for your patience and understanding during this process. We’re committed to providing you with the best listening experience possible and appreciate your support!

🎧 Happy Listening!
The EVO Radio & EVO Media Corporation Team

We’re committed to providing our audience with a listening experience like no other! To maintain this standard, we’re excited to announce a major update to our Broadcast Network.

What’s New?

This update will bring:

• A Better Audio Player: Improved performance on our websites to resolve issues with streams cutting off.
• Enhanced Session Operations: Ensuring error-free radio streams.
• Upgraded Security & Quality: Improved protection and overall broadcast quality.

Downtime Details:

• Expected Downtime: 1 hour (we’ve allocated up to 4 hours for any unforeseen circumstances).
• Impacted Services:
  • Live Broadcasts & Website Access for these stations:
    • Z103.5 – https://z1035.evoradio.ca/
    • 979 The Cowboy – https://979thecowboy.evoradio.ca/
    • 101 The Rockhound – https://101therockhound.evoradio.ca/
    • Classic 88.7 The Goat – https://887thegoat.evoradio.ca/
  • Websites:
    • EVO Radio Advertiser Access – https://advertiseraccess.evoradio.ca/
    • EVO Media Corporation – https://evomcorp.com/
    • DJ Spinderella – https://djspinderella.evomcorp.com/
  • Third-Party Apps: Any apps relying on our live broadcasts will also be affected.

Commitment to Excellence:
During the downtime, our team will work diligently to complete the update and monitor the network to ensure peak performance. We’re committed to enhancing your listening experience to the highest standards.

Stay Updated:
Follow us on Facebook or check our websites for real-time updates:

• EVO Media Corporation: https://www.facebook.com/EVOMediaCorporation/
• Z103.5: https://www.facebook.com/YourPartyStationZ103.5
• 979 The Cowboy: https://www.facebook.com/979thecowboy/
• 101 The Rockhound: https://www.facebook.com/101TheRockhound/
• Classic 88.7 The Goat: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100093402861183

We sincerely apologize for the inconvenience and appreciate your understanding as we work to improve our services.

Thank you for your continued support,

The EVO Radio & EVO Media Corporation Team