Winnipeg Free Press

Winnipeg Free Press (Newspaper) - January 27, 2025, Winnipeg, Manitoba MONDAY JANUARY 27, 2025 ● ASSOCIATE EDITOR, NEWS: STACEY THIDRICKSON 204-697-7292 ● CITY.DESK@FREEPRESS.MB.CA ● WINNIPEGFREEPRESS.COM SECTION B CONNECT WITH WINNIPEG’S NO. 1 NEWS SOURCE ▼ CITY ● BUSINESS More than 200 National Microbiology employees’ contracts won’t be renewed Federal cost cutting hits local lab jobs T HE federal government isn’t re- newing the contracts of more than 200 employees at the Nation- al Microbiology Laboratory in Winni- peg amid “many” job losses across the country, their union told the Free Press. Opened in 1999, the Arlington Street facility — Canada’s highest-security lab — stores and researches deadly pathogens, such as Ebola, in addition to other work to track and prevent the spread of infectious diseases. “The department is not renewing the term agreements of many employees, and this includes the over 200 at the lab,” Shimen Fayad, national president of the Union of Health and Environ- ment Workers, wrote in an email. Union members were told the Public Health Agency of Canada’s decision stemmed from a “lack of funding,” she said. Fayad said the JC Wilt Infectious Dis- eases Research Centre, located nearby on Logan Avenue, has also been affect- ed, but exact numbers at that facility were not yet known. The federal government promoted the JC Wilt facility as a hub for HIV and AIDS research in Canada when it opened in 2014 to complement the NML’s work. Questions are being asked about what the situation means for remaining lab employees in Winnipeg. “The union is concerned of increased workload on employees,” Fayad wrote. She said the Winnipeg-based employ- ees whose contracts are not being re- newed had one to two years and six to 14 years of experience. In mid-November, more than 50 em- ployees received letters informing them their terms would not be ex- tended. “The local union was not advised of this and members were clearly upset,” Fayad wrote. The number of affected employees has since increased, according to the union. Fayad said most terms will not be ex- tended past March 31. PHAC did not confirm how many contracts are not being renewed. The agency received “time-limited” funding for “surge support” in response to the COVID-19 pandemic, spokesman Mark Johnson said. “As this temporary funding winds down, the agency is responsibly man- aging resources to ensure a sustainable operational footprint moving forward,” he wrote in an email. “In this context, management noti- fied employees that the contracts of current PHAC term employees will end in accordance with their current end dates. “PHAC will continue to deliver on its role of promoting health, preventing and controlling chronic diseases and injuries, preventing and controlling in- fectious disease and preparing for and responding to public health emergen- cies.” Fayad said PHAC set up a database, which is used by recruiting managers, that employees can voluntarily sign up to while they look for new positions. The National Microbiology Labora- tory had 783 employees as of early December, the vast majority of them in Winnipeg, Johnson said. NML also has main sites in Guelph, Ont., and Saint-Hyacinthe, Que. Fayad said UHEW represents about 400 employees at the NML and JC Wilt research centre in Winnipeg. The NML in Winnipeg is Canada’s only Level 4 virology facility. The work of its multiple divisions includes track- ing and testing bacterial diseases such as tuberculosis, investigating food- borne disease outbreaks and assessing the impact of flu and other viral infec- tions in Canada. Public Health Agency of Canada had 4,251 employees across Canada in 2024, up from 2,379 before the start of the pandemic, Treasury Board figures showed. Earlier this month, Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada an- nounced plans to cut roughly 3,300 jobs over the next three years. Last year, the Public Health Agency of Canada defended security protocols at the National Microbiology Labora- tory in Winnipeg, after the firings of husband-and-wife scientists Keding Cheng and Xiangguo Qiu sparked con- cerns about Chinese espionage. Their security clearances were re- voked in 2019 and it emerged last year they were fired in 2021. Declassified documents from the Canadian Security Intelligence Ser- vice said the couple shared confidential scientific information with China and posed a credible threat to Canada’s eco- nomic security. The documents said Qiu hid her con- nections with China and was associated with Chinese “talent programs.” chris.kitching@freepress.mb.ca CHRIS KITCHING MIKE DEAL / FREE PRESS FILES The National Microbiology Lab on Arlington Street is Canada’s highest-security lab. Top court agrees to hear province’s appeal against man acquitted in Derksen case MANITOBA’S highest court has grant- ed the province the right to appeal a 2024 decision that ruled the man ac- quitted of killing Candace Derksen after spending a decade behind bars could continue to sue the provincial government and City of Winnipeg. Mark Grant’s lawyers first filed the lawsuit in 2019, seeking $8.5 million for wrongful conviction and imprisonment from the province, its attorney general and the City of Winnipeg. The statement of claim has been amended twice. The province has twice moved to have his claim struck in the Court of King’s Bench, first filing a motion alleging it fails to disclose a reasonable cause of action or is an abuse of process, which was ruled against in 2023, before it again sought to strike the claim under the same grounds in 2024. A decision last year by a King’s Bench judge ruled some of the issues raised by Grant’s suit, including DNA evidence, should be put to a civil court judge. The judge struck out other por- tions of the claim. Provincial government lawyers then filed a motion to appeal the 2024 deci- sion in the Court of Appeal. Court of Appeal Justice Marc Monnin, in a writ- ten decision issued Friday, granted the latest provincial government motion. The province argued Grant’s lawsuit is seeking to re-litigate a legal issue and is therefore an abuse of process. That issue is that the appeal court previously found DNA evidence suffi- cient enough for the province to base its decision to prosecute Grant in his first trial — though the evidence was even- tually ruled unreliable at his second trial in a lower court. The province argued Grant’s al- legations that the government lacked reasonable and probable cause to pros- ecute him can’t be proved as they’re in- consistent with the appeal court’s prior findings. “I am satisfied that the grounds of appeal raised by the provincial defend- ants are of sufficient importance to merit the attention of a full panel of this court,” said Monnin. “The issue of whether there is a rea- sonable cause of action is an issue that can determine the outcome of the pro- ceedings and bring it to an early con- clusion without the necessity of what will likely be a long, drawn-out trial.” A panel of three Court of Appeal jus- tices will hear the province’s full argu- ments at a later date. Derksen, 13, disappeared while walk- ing home from school to her Elmwood residence on Nov. 30, 1984. Despite an intensive search, it was six weeks before Derksen’s frozen and bound body was found inside an indus- trial storage shed on the other side of the Nairn Avenue overpass from her route home. No one was arrested for decades, but in 2007, Winnipeg police arrested Grant, saying his DNA was found on twine used to bind Derksen’s limbs. Grant was found guilty of second-de- gree murder, but the Manitoba Court of Appeal ordered a new trial partly due to shortcomings of the DNA evidence. Manitoba Justice appealed that de- cision to the Supreme Court, but the country’s highest court upheld the or- der for a new trial. In 2017, Grant was acquitted when a Queen’s Bench (now King’s Bench) judge determined the DNA evidence was unreliable and had no value. erik.pindera@freepress.mb.ca ERIK PINDERA SUPPLIED PHOTOS A police video screen capture shows Mark Grant being interviewed in the 1984 killing of Candace Derksen. Grant was found guilty but was later acquitted when a Queen’s Bench (now King’s Bench) judge determined the DNA evidence was unreliable and had no value. TWO ARRESTED IN STOLEN VEHICLE INVESTIGATION TWO men were arrested in a stolen- vehicle investigation thanks to GPS tracking inside the vehicle. Camrose Police Service in Alberta contacted the Winnipeg Police Service about a stolen vehicle, a 2025 Dodge Ram, with Alberta licence plates which GPS tracking showed was in the 1300 block of Pembina Highway. Winnipeg police located the vehicle and arrested two suspects, one of whom was wanted on an outstanding arrest warrant. A 30-year-old man from Winnipeg and a 25-year-old man from Calgary were arrested on Jan. 25 at about 12:19 p.m. Both suspects were detained in custody. SHOPLIFTERS ARMED WITH GUN, KNIFE IN SEPARATE INCIDENTS POLICE are looking for a man accused of shoplifting while armed with a knife. The suspect allegedly wielded the knife and lunged at a security guard and store loss prevention officer in order to flee the store without paying. It happened in the 600 block of Notre Dame Avenue at about 5:13 p.m. Jan. 22, and on Sunday, the Winnipeg Police Service released surveillance images of the suspect. He’s accused of lunging with a knife at a 21-year-old and a 24-year-old. Both men retreated and weren’t phys- ically injured. The suspect is described as a male in his 20s, about 5-8 tall with a slim build, short dark hair and glasses. In a separate incident Friday night, a 29-year-old woman was arrested and is accused of robbing at gunpoint a business in the 1500 block of Logan Avenue at approximately 10:25 p.m. She allegedly pulled the handgun when a 23-year-old victim confronted her and asked her to return the stolen items. Police later reviewed surveillance footage and tracked down a suspect. Sabrina Bignell, 29, was charged with robbery, possession of a weapon, carrying a concealed weapon and failing to comply with conditions of a release order. She was detained in custody. — staff BRIEFS Candace Derksen’s body was found inside a storage shed six weeks after her disappearance. She was 13 at the time. ;