Unintentional flinch gets your message across

Oscar Moments: The night emotion won, for better and worse

Also streaming: “How to Survive a Pandemic” and “When We Were Bullies” on Crave, “Revenge of the Black Best Friend” and “Topline” on CBC Gem.

A timeline of key events in the SNC-Lavalin affair

OTTAWA - A chronology of key developments in the SNC-Lavalin controversy, according to public documents, reports and testimony to the House of Commons justice committee:

Feb. 19, 2015 - The RCMP lays corruption and fraud charges against Montreal-based engineering and construction firm SNC-Lavalin over business dealings in Libya. SNC-Lavalin says the charges are without merit.

March 27, 2018 - The Liberals table a budget bill allowing for "remediation agreements," plea-bargain-like deals for corporations to avoid criminal proceedings by making reparations for bad behaviour. SNC-Lavalin lobbied for such a provision in Canadian law.

Sept. 4 - The Public Prosecution Service rejects SNC-Lavalin's request to negotiate a remediation agreement. Justice Minister Jody Wilson-Raybould is informed of the decision.

Manitoba-bred Brachetto stakes his claim as King’s Plate favourite

For the first time in memory, a Manitoba-bred could be one of the favourites for Canada’s most prestigious horse race, the $1-million King’s Plate for three-year-olds, to be run Aug. 15 at Woodbine in Ontario.

Last Saturday, Brachetto, bred by longtime Manitoba owner-breeder Dr. Ross McKague, won the $150,000 Marine Stakes (G3) as the longest shot on the board, beating two heavily favoured rivals and vaulting himself into the Plate favourite conversation for the mile-and-a-quarter classic.

Brachetto is a son of multiple Grade 1 winner Vekoma, who stands for $100,000 at Spendthrift Farm in Kentucky. He is out of McKague’s mare Colorino, who earned more than $200,000 on the track and has now produced nine winners from nine foals.

McKague has owned a racehorse for 52 years. He has bred them for 50. He has a barn’s worth of horses that could have been somebody, and a lifetime of reasons why they weren’t. Last Saturday afternoon at Woodbine, standing on a patch of grass under the trees in the winner’s enclosure of a graded stakes for the first time in his life, the 79-year-old finally got the one that was.

Election won't stall EI review, minister says

OTTAWA - A planned review of the sprawling and antiquated employment insurance system will go ahead even if the country is plunged into a federal election campaign, Employment Minister Carla Qualtrough says.

Qualtrough said consultations will start next month on how the decades-old system can be modernized after its shortcomings were exposed by the COVID-19 pandemic.

But looming over the consultation call is an anticipated federal election that labour and business groups have worried would kibosh the long-sought review.

Speaking to The Canadian Press, Qualtrough said departmental officials will start consultations and keep them going even during an election campaign.

Mourinho’s return to Real Madrid a classic rebound

Not quite a month ago, nearly two million people lined the streets of Madrid to see the World Cup paraded by the Spanish national team. It might as well have been another lifetime.

By the time the Plaza de Cibeles was swept up and sprayed down, the country’s attention had shifted to the only thing — or person — it seemed anyone wanted to be talking about: José Mourinho.

And they haven’t stopped talking about him. He hasn’t let them.

On June 11, the same day the World Cup kicked off in Mexico City, Mourinho was appointed head coach of Real Madrid for a second time. In his initial stint at the sport’s biggest club, which had ended 13 years prior, he’d won the Copa del Rey his first season, La Liga in his second and nothing in his third.

Coalition dismayed after U of M decides not to establish master’s in speech-language pathology

A new coalition representing students who stutter, speak with a lisp and struggle with other speech challenges is decrying the University of Manitoba’s decision to shelve plans to train in-demand clinicians.

U of M recently scrapped a proposal to establish a master of speech-language pathology — a program that exists only outside the province.

“It’s hard to provide the support that students deserve and support teachers and school teams and families with our large caseloads,” said Allison Sexton, a speech-language pathologist who works in the public education sector.

Sexton is one of the organizers behind a campaign that is ramping up ahead of back-to-school season to raise awareness about a chronic shortage of experts in her field and related wait lists.