In the news today: Girl, 6, missing near Burns Lake, B.C. is safe

Here is a roundup of stories from The Canadian Press designed to bring you up to speed…

Girl, 6, missing near Burns Lake, B.C. is safe

A 6-year-old girl who had been missing from her community in north-central British Columbia since Thursday has been found safe.

Resources from across the province were enlisted in the search to find the child who lives in a small community not far from Burns Lake.

The girl, who is on the autism spectrum and non-verbal, was found on Sunday night around 6 p.m.

Police say she was in a forested area that had already been searched between her home and the First Nation band office.

They say searchers believe she was likely moving around during the time she was missing, so she may not have been in the area when it was first searched.

Here’s what else we’re watching…

Missing Manitoba boy, 6, found dead

A six-year-old boy from northeastern Manitoba who had been missing since last Wednesday has been found dead.

Shamattawa RCMP say Johnson Redhead was found dead in a marshy area around 7:45 p.m. Sunday.

RCMP say Redhead’s body was found about 3.5 kilometres from his school on the remote First Nation.

Police have said he was at school Wednesday morning but didn’t make it to class after a breakfast program.

In addition to the RCMP, search and rescue teams from Winnipeg travelled to Shamattawa to look for Redhead.

Trudeau to meet with Haiti’s prime minister

Justin Trudeau will turn his focus to the ongoing crises in Haiti as he speaks with some world leaders Monday ahead of the 78th meeting of the United Nations General Assembly.

The prime minister will meet with the Caribbean country’s acting Prime Minister Garry Conille before delivering remarks at a high-level meeting for a UN advisory group for Haiti.

Conille stepped into his role earlier this year after former Prime Minister Ariel Henry was forced out amid surging unrest and violence by criminal gangs that had overrun much of Haiti’s capital.

Later Monday, Trudeau is scheduled to have a much different type of conversation while making his guest debut on CBS’s “The Late Show with Stephen Colbert.”

Trudeau arrived in New York on Sunday where he delivered remarks to the Summit of the Future, telling leaders they had a choice to stick their heads in the sand or come together to confront global challenges.

Court to hear appeal of challenge to pronoun law

Saskatchewan’s Appeal Court is set to hear arguments over the next two days about a provincial law that requires parental consent when children under 16 want to change their names or pronouns at school.

A judge ruled earlier this year a challenge of the law could continue, even though the government invoked the notwithstanding clause to override certain Charter rights.

The province has asked the Court of Appeal to quash that ruling, arguing use of the notwithstanding clause should end the legal dispute.

Lawyers for UR Pride, an LGBTQ+ group that brought forward the challenge, argue the law causes irreparable harm to gender diverse youth and the case should go forward.

They also say the law forces youth to come out or be misgendered and misnamed at school.

Hospital-to-LTC law to be tested in Ontario court

A new charter challenge set to get underway on Monday will test the constitutionality of a controversial Ontario law that allows hospitals to place discharged patients into long-term care homes not of their choosing or face a $400-per-day charge if they refuse.

The Advocacy Centre for the Elderly and the Ontario Health Coalition argues the law, known as the More Bed Better Care Act or Bill 7, violates the Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

The province disagrees.

One core item the court will address is whether the new law has fulfilled its purpose by improving the flow of patients. Documents filed with court reveal the two sides have reached different conclusions on that question.

Premier Doug Ford’s government rammed Bill 7 through the legislature within days in September 2022, bypassing public hearings.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 23, 2024.

The Canadian Press