Toronto, Ontario, Canada (AHN) – Canada’s TMX Group would no longer merge with the London Stock Exchange Group.

TMX Group Chief Executive Officer Tom Kloet announced on Wednesday the cancellation of the proposed merger because of the failure to get achieve a two thirds majority vote of the TMX board for Thursday.

LSE Chief Executive Xavier Rolet said he was disappointed with the Toronto Stock Exchange’s decision since majority of the LSE board favored the merger.

Kloet added that TMX will instead study a $50 million per share offer from the Maple Group Acquisition Corporation, which is made up of 13 Canadian financial institutions and pension funds. The Maple bid is conditional on the TMX-LSE merger not pushing through.

Following the decision to cancel the merger, TMX said it will pay LSE a termination fee of $10.3 million and another $29.8 million if the Maple merger is completed.

Despite the cancellation of the LSE merger, Kloet said TMX’s business remains strong and will enjoy continued success.

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Ottawa, Ontario, Canada (AHN) – Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper unveiled on Wednesday a slightly larger cabinet with 39 new members. In the last Tory-led minority government, Harper had 38 ministers.

The new cabinet is made up mostly of old faces in new assignments. But Harper also appointed nine new faces to the cabinet. They include: Bernard Valcourt, a Brian Mulroney-era minister who was tapped to head the Atlantic Canada Opportunities Agency; Peter Penashue, the first Innu MP, who got the post Minister for Intergovernmental Affairs; and Bal Gosal, an immigrant from India who is now Minister of State for Sport

As expected, Finance Minister Jim Flaherty and Citizenship and Immigration Minister Jason Kenney kept their respective jobs.

John Baird was given the portfolio of Foreign Affairs, while Tony Clement now heads the Treasury Board. Also back to the cabinet is former Foreign Affairs Minister Maxine Bernier, now as Minister of State for Small Business. Bernier was sacked three years ago for leaving NATO documents at the home of his girlfriend.

Three Tories who lost their MP bids were back in Parliament’s upper house after Harper appointed as senators Larry Smith, Fabian Manning and Josee Verner.

It was also political payback time for Harper, who now enjoys a majority government because of the seats given to the party by Toronto voters. To show his gratitude, Harper appointed former Toronto investment banker Joe Oliver as Natural Resources Minister.

Harper said he combined his cabinet with veteran politicians and new faces to make a winning team. He compared his cabinet to a hockey team that taps senior players and new talent who hold a lot of promise.

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Ottawa, Ontario, Canada (AHN) – A day before Canada’s House of Commons tackles the federal budget proposal, the minority Conservative Party received a boost from a poll that shows the Harper government continues to enjoy public support.

The Canadian government is under threat from two fronts – the federal budget and two breaches of ethics complaints – which could trigger a spring election. However, the survey showed that even if the political opposition manages to oust the administration from power with either tool, the Tories would likely bounce back.

According to the Ipsos Reid survey conducted from March 11 to 15, 63 percent of survey respondents said their main criterion in voting for a party and its leaders would be one that could provide Canada an honest, open and trustworthy government. Another 37 percent said they would cast their ballot for a party that could ensure Canada’s continued economic recovery.

The poll also found that 28 percent of the respondents picked the Conservatives as the party that would provide Canada an honest, open and trustworthy government. Only 22 percent picked the New Democratic Party based on the same criterion, 15 percent pointed to the Liberals and 7 percent the Bloc Quebecois.

Darrell Bricker, president of Ipsos Reid, said that while the Liberals correctly picked honest government as their platform to battle the Tories in a possible no-confidence vote by Friday, the party failed to foresee that voters do not view them as the best party to provide honest and trustworthy governance.

Bricker opined that the Liberals are still bugged by the Adscam sponsorship scandal that hit the Chretien government several years ago. Liberal-friendly advertising firms in Quebec got funds for work that was questionable or ghost projects. There was also evidence of kickbacks among the ad firms that contributed to the Liberals.

The political opposition, in a bid to wrest power from the Tories, is leaving no stones unturned. According to reports, the Liberals have secured a plane, wrapped their campaign buses with signs of imminent victory in Parliament and launched an attack ad on the Tories. Similarly, the NDP put up election-style billboards in Montreal.

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Ottawa, Ontario, Canada (AHN) – While many government purchases are often overpriced because of corrupt practices, Canada’s planned purchase of F-35 fighter jets is underpriced by $12 billion. However, the opposition is using the underpricing to hit the Harper government.

Ottawa estimates the total cost of purchasing the stealth fighters over 30 years will be only $9 billion, plus another $7 billion spread over 20 years for maintenance. However, Parliamentary Budget Officer Kevin Page reckoned the total cost would actually reach almost $30 billion.

Page attributed the discrepancy to the Department of Defense’s failure to include cost of set-up and logistics and to correctly estimate amounts for maintenance, and failure to calculate lifespan to 30 years for maintenance.

The Liberal Party, seizing Page’s report as an opportunity to hit the Tories, said the party would cancel the F-35 contract if they won the next election. The Liberals had been gearing to trigger a spring election by planning to reject the Conservative Party’s federal budget proposal and possibly pushing for a no-confidence motion because of the Tories’ alleged breach of House ethics.

The Liberals said the wrong estimates of the F-35 jets price is another proof that the Tories often mislead Canadians and Parliament, following two similar accusations over an alleged doctored report by International Cooperation Minister Bev Oda and non-disclosure of details of corporate tax rate cuts.

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Edmonton, Alberta, Canada (AHN) – Canadian Industry Minister Tony Clement said Wednesday that Ottawa is determined to reverse a decision of the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission that favored usage-based billing for small Internet providers.

Clement said at a University of Alberta forum that the federal government asked the CRTC to review its decision and if the regulatory agency insists on retaining the ruling, Ottawa will overrule the commission.

The minister explained the move is part of the federal government’s policy to promote competition and choice. Clement said competition and choice cannot prosper if major carriers could force its business model on smaller service providers.

If Ottawa is insistent on reversing the CRTC decision, the former chairwoman of the regulatory agency is equally as staunch in defending the independence of the commission. Francois Bertrand, current president of the Federation of Quebec Chambers of Commerce, said that Ottawa’s decision is based on getting votes.

Bertrand, who said she was disturbed by Ottawa’s stand, has business interest in Quebecor, the owner of cable Internet provider Videotron, which favors usage-based billing.

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Rolling the dice. : An article from: Canada and the World Backgrounder

Feature Story, Nepal (AHN) – Last September, American couple Haydn Hilling and his wife Edvige desperately wanted to take home their adopted Nepali child, Kailash. Though the American couple that hails from Louisiana spent more than one-and-a-half years getting the necessary paperwork required for the adoption, the process has come to a standstill following the United States’ decision to halt adoptions of abandoned children from Nepal.

The U.S. administration halted the adoption of Nepali children due to growing allegations of child trafficking and falsification of documents, often in connivance with government authorities.

A joint statement issued by the U.S. Department of State and the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services in the first week of August said the step was taken to protect the rights and interests of Nepali children and their families after field visits to orphanages and police departments showed that documents describing children up for adoption as abandoned were often unreliable.

Another 10 countries–Canada, Denmark, Germany, France, Norway, Sweden, Switzerland, Spain, Italy, and the United Kingdom–have also halted inter-country adoptions from Nepal.

According to Nepal’s Ministry of Women, Children and Social Welfare, new rules were put in place last December and some stern measures have been added to the process.

“The Hague Secretariat also wants the smooth resumption of child adoption here,” chief of the ministry’s legal section, Sher Jung Karki said. The new set of policies allows local placement agencies to charge US$5,000 to adopting parents, while the government charges US$3,000.

Any foreign placement agency must set up a liaison office in Nepal and pay the government US$10,000 that will be handed over to an organization working for the welfare of children. Subsequently, the process of inter-country adoption of street children is subject to widespread abuses, the government has banned the adoption effective from Jan. 5.

The new policy also allows Nobel laureates, heads of states/governments, foreign ministers, celebrities, or a couple with an annual income of over US$300,000 to become foster parents, while others cannot.

Largely, a vulnerable adoption process that had been taking place in Nepal since several years has compelled the US government more alerted and posed a ban. That was the reason that they could not adopted two – year – old Kailash which made them running from pillar to post that their call will be heard.

Now the list is long. As many as 56 American families are facing heartbreak due to the US Government decision to ban child adoption from Nepal until Nepal’s legal provision ensures that adopted children were not fraud and claim genuine.

These desperate 56 parents have instituted an alliance and had registered a petition in US Congress. “We respectfully request that the Right Honorable members of the US Senate and House petition the Department of State and USCIS within the Department of Homeland Security to assist the “Nepal Pipeline families” in obtaining visas to bring their children home immediately,” the petition reads.

In response to the petition, 14,398 letters and emails were sent far to support their campaign. Moreover they have internet campaign through blog, http://theywaitnepal.blogspot.com/. One can find the photos of to be adopted Nepali child and their US mother. “These families are struggling to bring home their legally adopted children who are stuck in Nepal awaiting visas that will allow them to enter the US,” they write in their blog.

Many anxious parents are waiting in the US also. Many are stranded since August, 2010.

It seems that child adoption in Nepal has been turned into a profitable business as dozens of websites and privately organizations have claimed that there were many advantages of adopting children from Nepal. “There are many advantages for adopting from Nepal. Even though Nepal is an economically poor country, children are cared for very well with few incidences of abuse or neglect. If you like the idea of adopting a baby or toddler, it would be an excellent country to consider,” claims, adoptionark.

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Long Beach, CA, United States (AHN) – Boeing is cutting hundreds of workers from its C-17 plant in Long Beach by next year.

The company is reducing the workforce by 900 positions following a decrease in orders from the government.

The plant regularly produces 14 airplanes but will only make 10 by next year.

Chicago-based Boeing has been working to increase international sales of the aircraft, an airlifter used by the U.S. Defense Department and NATO that was first manufactured 17 years ago.

Last November, the White House announced that it had reached an agreement with India to purchase 10 of the planes. There are currently 19 C-17s in operation overseas, including four in Canada and six in the United Kingdom.

“Reducing the number of C-17 s we delivery every year — and doing that with a smaller workforce — will allow us to keep the production line open beyond 2012, ” Bob Ciesla, C-17 program manager, told the Long Beach Press-Telegram.

Mayor Bob Foster said in a statement to the Long Beach Post, “We will continue our efforts to support Boeing in generating additional orders to preserve the thousands of jobs that remain, and our Workforce Investment Board will commit resources to assist affected employees.”

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Toronto, Ontario, Canada (AHN) – Canadian clothing store Fairweather Limited filed a $250-million trademark lawsuit against U.S. discount retailer Target. Fairweather claimed it owns the right to use the name Target in Canada.

In its Monday filing with a Federal Court, Fairweather sought an injunction to stop Target from using the name in Canada where it had been running the Target Apparel clothing store in Toronto since 2005. The firm owns the Canadian rights to the name for 10 years after it purchased assets of the bankrupt BiWay, whose former owner Dylex Limited registered the trademark in 1981.

Target announced last week its entry up north after the company purchased Zellers stores from Hudson’s Bay last week.

Fairweather said Target’s entry into Canada would be bad for its business because of the similarity of the store name and loss of control over its trademark and reputation. The U.S. retailer is known for designer fashion collaborations at discount chain prices.

Target said it plans to use the same name, slogan, branding and logo in its Canadian operations and insisted there is nothing that prevents the company from using the name and branding elements in Canada.

In preparation for its entry into Canada, Target named Tony Fisher as president of Target Canada. Fisher has been with Target in 1999 in different executive posts. Until his promotion, Fisher was vice president of merchandise operations, which involved providing shoppers enhanced in-store experience using technology and service.

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