Dr. Bonnie Henry, B.C.’s provincial health officer, and Adrian Dix, Minister of Health, have issued the following statement regarding a new variant of concern (VOC), Omicron:

People in health-care facilities on Vancouver Island are benefiting from stable, consistent and supportive patient care as support service workers and services previously contracted out return in-house as Island Health employees, after almost 20 years of these services being contracted to private companies.

Local governments will have the opportunity to apply for the third round of the Province’s Poverty Reduction Planning and Action Program grants to help develop local strategies and solutions to address poverty.

Katrine Conroy, Minister of Forests, Lands, Natural Resource Operations and Rural Development, and Ravi Kahlon, Minister of Jobs, Economic Recovery and Innovation, have issued the following joint statement in response to the U.S. Department of Commerce’s final determination in its second administrative review regarding countervailing and anti-dumping duties applied to Canada’s softwood lumber exports to the United States:

British Columbians and employers will learn the economic value of apprenticeships, thanks to a study funded by the B.C. government and the Canadian Apprenticeship Forum - Forum Canadien sur l’Apprentissage (CAF-FCA).