Afternoon front page: Carney makes Louise Arbour his choice for GG; a pre-teen is banned from Ontario nudist resorts, and more.
It’s Tuesday, May 5. Here are the top stories we’re following today.
Louise Arbour announced as Canada’s next governor general
Prime Minister Mark Carney has appointed former Supreme Court Justice Louise Arbour, who spent decades taking on war criminals and defending human rights, to serve as Canada’s next governor general. Columnist Chris Selley writes that the 79-year-old is “starting the job in a hole the government had no reason to dig.” Here’s what to know about the 31st governor general and why Canadian actress Wendy Crewson once played her in a movie?
Ontario judge bans girl from attending nudist camps
An 11-year-old Ontario girl whose mother had been taking her camping at a nude resort with her maternal grandparents for six years — unbeknownst to her father — won’t be at such places this summer after a judge granted a temporary ban against it.
Former Howard Johnson hotel at 1176 Granville Street in Vancouver, B.C., Thursday, June 26, 2025. The hotel is now an SRO with a nightclub on the ground floor. It has been the scene of numerous fires.
FIRST READING: B.C. turned a $56 million hotel into a low-barrier shelter. It’s now an unliveable biohazard
Near the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, British Columbia spent $221 million to purchase nine hotels and use them as low-barrier homeless shelters. One of those, a former 110-room Howard Johnson renamed the Luugat, was closed along with two others last fall and has now been revealed to be an unsalvageable biohazard.
Aerial view of Halifax, Nova Scotia. The city’s Stanfield International Airport saw a 15 per cent increase in passenger numbers year-over-year in March 2026.
Canadians continue to ditch U.S travel and are flocking to these 3 domestic cities instead
Domestic passengers at Canada’s eight largest airports rose by 10 per cent between March 2026 and March 2025, but three cities in particular are benefiting from fewer Canadians travelling to the U.S.
Homes in Markham, a city of 375,000 people.
Scott Stinson: How one Toronto suburb became a case study in the challenges of building new housing
What was supposed to be a straightforward plan to unlock almost $60 million in federal housing funds for Markham was met with months of public backlash, political hesitancy and procedural delays. As a result, Ottawa has withdrawn millions of those dollars over failed commitments.
“Toronto is at a turning point,” writes Anne Golden.
Toronto at the tipping point: Bringing a once-great city back from the brink
“Whereas Toronto used to top the lists of the best cities in the world to live in, we now make the list of one of the world’s most congested cities,” writes Anne Golden in Saving Toronto: 10 City Builders Tell Us How. “Toronto is increasingly described in the media as a city where you can’t afford a house, can’t get anywhere, and nothing works. Today, Toronto is at a turning point.”
Clockwise from left: the kitchen at Restaurant Pearl Morissette, raw mackerel, fava beans and brown butter at Mon Lapin, and duck and sweet gale at Tanière3. PHOTOS BY Scott Usheroff/Dominique Lafond/Audrey-Eve Beauchamp
This destination restaurant in Niagara was named Canada’s best for the second consecutive year
Daniel Hadida and Eric Robertson, chef-owners at Restaurant Pearl Morissette in Jordan Station, Ont., enjoyed being named Canada’s best restaurant of 2025 so much that they went back for seconds this year. “The attention to detail is really extraordinary,” says Jacob Richler, editor-in-chief and publisher of Canada’s 100 Best Restaurants list.