In early December 2024, 40-year-old French sailor Charlie Dalin had Antarctica and icebergs to starboard, and behind him lurked a monstrous storm, barreling across the great swath of the Southern Ocean like an atmospheric bowling ball. It packed 60-knot winds and unruly 30-foot waves, living up to its nickname as the Sailor’s Graveyard. Here at the bottom of the globe, too far from rescue and pinned against the great White Continent while leading the Vendée Globe sailing race, Dalin had two choices. The first could cost him the lead, the second his life.
As one would expect from the most successful singlehanded ocean racer of his generation, Dalin went for broke, strapped himself into the pneumatic seat inside his boat’s cramped cockpit and hurled himself along the iceberg’s edge at 20-plus knots.
The environment outside his 60-foot projectile would have brought mere mortals to their knees in prayer, but as the wind shrieked and sharp waves pounded the underside of his carbon-fiber vessel, Dalin was in his element. He was confident his boat would endure the beating and the autopilot would steer it over, under, and through the oceanic minefield.
Consider doing the Dakar Rally, in a self-driving car, at full throttle, day and night, for days on end. Hardly any sleep, eating sporadically, always a wary eye on the weather, but in this case you’re surrounded by water with nobody around for possibly hundreds of miles. That gives a sense of the long, lonely and often stressful stretches of the Vendée Globe, considered the most grueling, nonstop, single-handed race in sailing history. By the end of the race, many of the boats look like they’ve been through a war.
After Jérémie Beyou finished the Vendée Globe in fourth place, Paul Meilhat arrives in Les Sables d’Olonne soon after in fifth, with Nico Lunven sixth on Friday evening, and now Thomas Ruyant arriving in seventh early on Saturday morning.
Without an ETA, travellers could be turned away and sent back to Canada, says Wayne Smith, the director of the Institute for Hospitality and Tourism Research at Toronto Metropolitan University. (Jane Robertson/CBC)
Starting today, Canadians with short-term travel plans to England, Wales, Scotland or Northern Ireland will need an electronic travel authorization — or an ETA.
Travellers planning to visit the United Kingdom for less than six months will be asked to submit information such as their passport details, dates of travel and modes of transportation, which will be reviewed by authorities.
The digital pre-screening is new for Canadians flying to the U.K., but a similar system has been in place since 2016 for people from several other countries who travel by air to Canada.
It's "kind of like doing a pre-approval for a credit card," said Wayne Smith, the director of the Institute for Hospitality and Tourism Research at Toronto Metropolitan University.
'It allows all the governments to be more interconnected and talking to one another and sharing information,' says Wayne Smith. (CBC)
The system will run applicants' information through a worldwide database before granting approval, Smith told CBC P.E.I.'s Island Morning.
"It allows all the governments to be more interconnected and talking to one another and sharing information," he said.
"It creates a much more secure security blanket for everyone involved."
A growing trend
Electronic travel authorizations are becoming more common around the world.
"This will be prevalent globally in a few years," Smith said.
Twenty-seven countries in the EU are expected to launch a similar system by the end of this year. Smith said he fully expects to see ETAs implemented in the U.S. during Donald Trump's presidency, too.
The new ETA requirement to travel to the U.K. isn't the first of its kind. This country has had a similar requirement for people from several other countries flying into Canada since 2016. (Jeff J. Mitchell/Getty Images)
The system is meant to assist with concerns about immigration and refugee status, he said.
"You could check if someone has, for example, gone to three different countries and claimed refugee status. Or you can check… if they've come and actually been denied visas in other places before, if people have overstayed their visas in other countries," Smith said.
"All those things will now be... caught before the person even leaves their home country."
'The price of travelling'
The application costs £10, or about $18 Cdn. But there's no guarantee those prices will remain at that level. Since tourists are the ones paying the application fees, Smith said politicians can easily raise the costs.
"Once they're in the system and they're paying for the system, all of a sudden I could see those things rising quite dramatically," he said.
"People wouldn't necessarily blink at paying $50 for that — it's the price of travelling."
Another possibility Smith said wouldn't surprise him is that the fees could take on dynamic pricing, with certain times of the year being more expensive to travel than others.
"I have a 78-year-old mother that hates technology in every single way, and so something like this would be a real barrier to her travelling," he said.
"All these things can be very frustrating to a lot of people and make travel inaccessible."
Smith said travel agents are making a comeback, and helping people submit their ETA applications is another service they could offer.
A word of advice
Approvals for ETA applications can take as little as 10 minutes, said Smith, but that doesn't mean people should take the risk of waiting for their flight to land before submitting their application.
Without the authorization, travellers could be turned away and sent back to the country they came from, he said.
"I would highly recommend anyone do this multiple weeks before you go, just like any other visas," Smith said. "Make sure you have everything, that you have copies of things, that you take a screenshot of your approval."
Once an authorization has been approved, it will last for two years and can be used as many times as desired during that time.
Demand for critical minerals can be reduced by 58 percent by 2050 through the use of new technologies, circular economy strategies and increased recycling.
The Saudi Arabia-backed league announced on Wednesday that Scott O'Neil, a longtime sports and entertainment executive, is taking over immediately as CEO for Norman, the architect of the league that launched three years ago and forever changed the face of professional golf.
Norman, 69, acknowledged last month that he would be replaced and told Sports Illustrated in October his contract expires in August. Beyond that, it is unknown whether Norman will have a role with LIV.
Norman's role the next seven months is not known, with the league saying only that the Palm Beach Gardens resident "will remain involved with LIV Golf."
Norman was announced as the CEO in October 2021 and named commissioner of the league in 2022. He lured several marquee names away from the PGA Tour to join the breakaway league, including Jupiter's Brooks Koepka and Dustin Johnson; Phil Mickelson, Bryson DeChambeau, Cameron Smith and Jon Rahm, by offering contracts reported to exceed $100 million. That money was paid by LIV's financial backers, Saudi Arabia's Public Investment Fund.
"When we launched LIV Golf, there was no one that made more sense to lead the organization other than Greg Norman," LIV board Chairman Yasir Al-Rumayyan said in a statement. "I thank him for everything he has done to establish, launch and grow our league. He has been instrumental to LIV’s success.”
Two-time major winner and the reigning Masters champion, Jon Rahm and LIV Golf Commissioner and CEO Greg Norman shake hands during a LIV Golf announcement at the Park Hyatt New York on Dec. 7, 2023 in New York, New York. (Photo by Scott Taetsch/LIV Golf)
O’Neil has more than 25 years of experience in leading and managing global sports and entertainment brands. He most recently was CEO of Merlin Entertainments for two years, overseeing one of the biggest operators of theme parks and resorts, including Legoland. He stepped down at the end of 2023. He formerly was the CEO of Harris Blitzer Sports & Entertainment, which owns the Philadelphia 76ers and New Jersey Devils.
“The opportunity to lead a global sports league is a dream come true," O’Neil said in a statement. “LIV Golf is the world’s first global golf league and, with the best teams and players competing around the world, it represents sports entertainment at the highest level.
“What LIV Golf has achieved in just three years is remarkable – the game has been infused with a long overdue bolt of energy and innovation with the team model, players have increased freedom and rights, fans are getting the access they have always wanted, and the game has been brought to new markets that have been desperate for elite golf for decades."
LIV Golf, PGA Tour continue negotiations
O'Neil joins LIV Golf, which is headquartered in West Palm Beach, as the league and the PGA Tour continue their negotiations. PGA Tour Commissioner Jay Monahan and Al-Rumayyan, head of Saudi's PIF, announced in June 2023 that the two tours had reached a "framework agreement" to combine commercial businesses and rights into a new for-profit company. Negotiations are in their 20th month despite an original deadline of Dec. 31, 2023.
Norman congratulated O'Neil in a statement.
"He is exactly the type of experienced professional who understands the unique and powerful combination of entertainment and sports that LIV Golf exemplifies," he said. "The league will be in very good hands with him at the helm.”
The two-time major winner and Hall of Famer then sounded like a man who is completely stepping aside.
“I started this journey more than 30 years ago, knowing in my heart and mind that the game of golf and its professional players were undervalued, delivering a product that felt stagnant. With LIV Golf, we changed the game forever …
“I couldn’t be prouder of what we’ve accomplished or more pleased with where the league stands today. I’m excited to pass the baton of day-to-day management and continue to help do what I can to grow LIV Golf. LONG LIV GOLF!”
Tom D'Angelo is a senior sports columnist and reporter for The Palm Beach Post. He can be reached at tdangelo@pbpost.com.
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While politicians argue over corporate climate action, Canadian companies are recognizing the risks of climate change and are taking steps to address them—but their progress is being slowed by a lack of investor leadership.
Companies that delay on addressing the risk stand to suffer significant losses from climate change—to the tune of 7% of corporate earnings annually by 2035, “an impact akin to COVID-19-level disruptions every two years”—finds a recent report by the World Economic Forum (WEF). Telecommunications, utilities, and energy sectors face the highest risk of fixed asset losses from climate hazards like extreme heat, which are becoming more severe as natural systems approach “tipping points.”
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“Consider factories losing their water supply, data centres which struggle to cool, offices under water or fields hit by floods and drought,” writes [pdf] the WEF, describing the potential fallout.
Already, losses from climate change have mounted to US$3.6 trillion since 2000 and stand to become much worse, especially if companies don’t plan for it, the WEF adds [pdf] in a separate report. “Climate inaction could cost far more than global action” as avoided losses pay back transition costs five or six times over. While many companies recognize these risks, “most are insufficiently prepared.” They must embed climate risks into their strategies and “ramp up scenario thinking” to prepare for a 3°C world.
But skirting the corporate world, politicians question whether environmental, social, and governance (ESG) standards have a place in driving company decisions. Conservative politicians in the United States have argued that ESG standards distort the “free market,” prompting some companies to roll back their climate commitments under political pressure.
Similar rhetoric is surfacing in Canada, where Conservative Party leader Pierre Poilievre dismissed ESG ideologies as “garbage.” Poilievre—who is no fan of the WEF—said he instead supports “free enterprise economics where businesses get ahead by having the best product, not by having the best lobbyists,” wrote alt-right newsletter True North.
The arguments about corporate climate accountability come as companies await new sustainability and climate reporting guidelines, expected this month from the Canadian Sustainability Standards Board (CSSB).
Some research indicates that companies are onboard with ESG policies and are concerned about climate risks to their bottom lines—even if, as WEF writes, they “seem to underestimate these financial losses and overestimate the cost of action.”
Lawyer Rima Ramchandani, co-head of Torys LLP’s capital markets practice, told the Globe and Mail that anti-ESG sentiments will not likely cause companies to change their approach on “how they prudently and responsibly manage and oversee risks.” She added, however, that “because of the politicization, some companies are choosing to be more cautious about what they say.”
A recent report by Torys found that 95% of companies publish reports connected to their sustainability, ESG, climate action, or transition goals. Among them, 69% say they are reporting in accordance with the international benchmark—the Taskforce on Climate-related Financial Disclosures—that is the expected basis for the upcoming CSSB rules.
Also published recently was the Globe’s “Board Games” ranking of corporate governance practices at Canada’s largest companies. Of 215 companies considered, only 15 received zero points for climate policies. At the same time, only 21 got a full score.
But the Board Games are neither universal nor a signal of real climate action. RBC received full marks for its climate criteria for the ranking, but a lineup of critics like Environmental Defence Canada take issue with RBC being the “largest financier of fossil fuels in Canada.” The bank is also the focus of an inquiry by the federal Competition Bureau for misleading advertising about its climate commitments.
Still, the data show a disconnect between the politicization of climate and ESG policies, and the attitude of companies themselves, that—at least on paper—are less conflicted about taking steps to avoid climate losses.
Yet, companies continue to drag their feet, Transition Accelerator CEO Dan Wicklum told last month’s Sustainable Finance Forum in Ottawa. He attributed the slow progress to a lack of investor leadership on climate action.
“Companies do what boards tell them to,” said Wicklum, “and boards do what shareholders tell them to.”
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Vendée Globe
