Mia Rabson, The Canadian Press

New visas for international students will be slashed by more than one-third this year as the federal government tries to slow a rapid increase in temporary residents that has put immense pressure on Canada's housing system.

Immigration Minister Marc Miller announced a temporary cap on new student visas at a three-day cabinet retreat in Montreal. Affordability and housing are top items on the agenda, with a growing focus on the role record immigration has been playing in both.

The end of the road is coming for gas-powered vehicles in Canada.

New regulations being published this week by Environment Minister Steven Guilbeault will effectively end the sale of new passenger vehicles powered only by gasoline or diesel in 2035.

Guilbeault said the Electric Vehicle Availability Standard will encourage automakers to make more battery-powered cars and trucks available in Canada.

RCMP are warning about a rise in violent extremism among Canadian youth, while Jewish leaders urge community members to be diligent about security after two teenagers were arrested on terror-related charges in the last five days.

The Mounties say five Canadian youth have been arrested in terror-related cases since June.

"The RCMP is seeing a concerning trend of violent extremism and terrorist use of the internet, including amongst young persons," the Mounties said in a statement Saturday.

The federal government will appeal a recent Federal Court ruling that struck down a cabinet order underlying Ottawa's ban of some single-use plastics, Environment Minister Steven Guilbeault said Monday.

The Nov. 16 decision said Ottawa had overstepped by labelling all "plastic manufactured items" as toxic under the Canadian Environmental Protection Act.

Evidence shows "thousands" of different items in that category have different uses and chemical makeups, and there is no evidence all of them can harm human health or the environment, Justice Angela Furlanetto found. 

The New Democrats intend to back the Conservatives on a motion to pull the carbon price off all home heating until after the next election, NDP House Leader Peter Julian said Thursday.

"The reality is we need to make sure that affordability is available to all Canadians and that's why we're supporting this motion," said Julian.

The decision delivers another political blow to the Liberals, who have been scrambling for days to defend their decision to pause the carbon price on home heating oil for the next three years.

Canada's senior public health officials are urging Canadians to get an updated COVID-19 vaccine this fall following the authorization of the first shot targeting the latest variants Tuesday.

Health Canada's regulatory branch approved Moderna's new Spikevax shot, which is formulated for the XBB.1.5 lineage of the Omicron variant. 

Moderna said in a statement the first doses would be shipped to arrive in Canada on Wednesday.

Two different federal infrastructure programs have provided funding for more than 43,000 electric vehicle chargers since 2016, but fewer than one in five of them are actually operational, new data show.

The information provided by Natural Resources Canada came as Energy Minister Jonathan Wilkinson visited Quebec City Wednesday to announce another $25 million to fund 1,500 EV chargers in Quebec.

That announcement is the latest in a constant stream of EV charging announcements in local communities across Canada, as the government aims to help build 84,500 chargers by 2029.

Two years ago, Canada embarked on an odyssey to plant two billion trees in just 10 years. 

An audit of the program so far says that unless things drastically change, it won't even get one-tenth of those trees in the ground in time. 

The audit was one of five reports issued Thursday by Environment Commissioner Jerry DeMarco, who said he cannot stress enough how important it is for the government to live up to its commitment on trees.

"There is no solution to climate change and terrestrial biodiversity loss that does not include forests," DeMarco's report said.

Canada's Parliamentary budget officer said he is troubled by what he describes as the selective use of facts from his new financial analysis of carbon pricing. 

Yves Giroux said the report has to be put into context alongside the costs of all other climate policies, including doing nothing.

"There will be costs no matter what we do," Giroux said in an interview with The Canadian Press.

Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland's 2023 federal budget promises "transformative investments" in Canada's green economy as the country tries to maintain its place in the global clean tech revolution and realign its supply chains toward allies who won't use energy as a political weapon.

"Together these two great shifts represent the most significant opportunity for Canadian workers in the lifetime of anyone here today," Freeland said Tuesday in the House of Commons, according to her prepared remarks.