Carol Thomson, Saskatoon Media Group

On Sunday, the Battlefords RCMP Gang Task Force executed two search warrants at homes in North Battleford as part of a drug trafficking investigation. From these warrants, officers seized about 1,700 grams of meth, 28,000 illegal cigarettes, five firearms, ammunition, and other drug trafficking paraphernalia.

Last Sunday night Prince Albert RCMP responded to an attempted break and enter on Cote Drive in the RM of Buckland and ended up with damages to a police vehicle after it was rammed several times, followed a few hours later by an arrest.

Canada’s Health Minister has signed two agreements alongside Saskatchewan’s Health Ministers which means over a half-billion dollars in federal funding to improve health care. Minister Mark Holland says close to $391 million over three years will support the Working Together agreement  It’s for improving access to family health services and acute and urgent care.

It was a volley of statistics during Question Period Wednesday. With the Saskatchewan Association of Rural Municipalities convention in Regina this week, the Official Opposition touched on jobs in rural Saskatchewan during Question Period. 

Jobs and Economy Critic, Aleana Young stated that since the Premier came into power, 40,600 jobs have been lost and 860 businesses have closed in rural Saskatchewan.

The provincial government has unveiled a strategy to increase business investment to further advance the goal of reaching $16 billion in private capital investment annually. Trade and Export Development Minister Jeremy Harrison told a business crowd that private capital investment in Saskatchewan rose by nearly 25 per cent last year and is forecast to increase by over 14 per cent this year, and the goal is that the new Investment Attraction Strategy will help build on that momentum.

During Question Period on Tuesday, the Minister responsible for SaskPower was asked why he was at the tourist sites of Arc de Triomphe and Napoleon’s tomb in Paris, when he was supposed to be touring pavilions at the World Nuclear Expo which would have been about an hour’s drive away.

The first-degree murder trial with Greg Fertuck charged in the death of his estranged wife Sheree, who went missing, has now ended. She was last seen leaving her farmyard east of Kenaston in December of 2015, and then her truck, keys, coat and a cell phone were found at a local gravel pit near Kenaston where she worked.

The first degree murder trial for 70-year-old Greg Fertuck is on again, scheduled in Saskatoon Court of King’s Bench through next Wednesday, the 28th. His estranged wife Sheree went missing in 2015, and although her body hasn’t been found, her truck, keys, coat and cell phone were located at a gravel pit near Kenaston.

Fertuck was charged in June of 2019. Last fall, Justice Richard Danyliuk made the decision that the evidence from the Mr. Big Sting is admissible. A Mr. Big Sting is when undercover police pose as criminals and befriend a suspect, trying to get a confession.

The first degree murder trial for 70-year-old Greg Fertuck is on again, scheduled in Saskatoon Court of King’s Bench through next Wednesday, the 28th. His estranged wife Sheree went missing in 2015, and although her body hasn’t been found, her truck, keys, coat and cell phone were located at a gravel pit near Kenaston.

Fertuck was charged in June of 2019. Last fall, Justice Richard Danyliuk made the decision that the evidence from the Mr. Big Sting is admissible. A Mr. Big Sting is when undercover police pose as criminals and befriend a suspect, trying to get a confession.

The Canadian Federation of Independent Business says the federal government has collected $2.5 billion in carbon tax revenue since 2019 from small and medium-sized businesses in Saskatchewan, Alberta, Manitoba, and Ontario but hasn’t seen the 10 per cent rebate it promised. The rebate is for these particular provinces because these are the provinces which have a carbon tax because their environmental actions don’t meet the federal government’s threshold.