Beginning on Monday (October 12), Canadians can apply for the Canada Recovery Benefit (CRB), the federal government’s year-long replacement for the Canada Emergency Recovery Benefit (CERB).

CRB provides income support for people who are have either lost their employment or self-employment income (or have had it significantly reduced) because of the COVID-19 pandemic. This includes gig workers, freelancers, and other self-employed people who do not qualify for regular Employment Insurance (EI) benefits.

If you’re eligible for CRB, you’ll receive $1,000 for a two-week period, equivalent to $2,000 a month — the same amount under CERB. However, unlike CERB, the federal government will be applying a 10 per cent withholding tax, so you’ll actually receive $900 for a two-week period, or $1,800 a month.

Also unlike CERB, where you applied once every month, you have to apply for CRB for every two-week period you need it, up to a maximum of 13 two-week periods (26 weeks). The first two-week period is September 27 to October 10, 2020, and the final one is September 12 to September 25, 2021. See the end of this story for all the two-week periods and application dates.

You apply on the Monday following the two-week period for which you want to apply for CRB — so you’re applying retroactively for the benefit. For the first two-week period September 27th to October 10th, you apply on Monday, October 12th.

The easiest way to apply is online through the Canada Revenue Agency (CRA) My Account. If you’ve already registered with CRA for direct deposit, you’ll get your payment in three to five business days; if you don’t have direct deposit, you’ll get a cheque in 10 to 12 business days.

Some of the eligibility criteria for CRB are similar to CERB: you have to reside in Canada, be at least 15 years old, have a valid Social Insurance Number (SIN), and have earned at least $5,000 in either 2019, 2020, or in the 12 months before the date you apply. The $5,000 can be a combination of gross employment income, net self-employment income (after deducting expenses), and maternity and parental benefits.

You can’t apply for CRB if you’re eligible for EI benefits, or if you’ve received any of the following benefits: Canada Recovery Sickness Benefit (CRSB), Canada Recovery Caregiving Benefit (CRCB), short-term disability benefits, workers’ compensation benefits, EI benefits, or Québec Parental Insurance Plan (QPIP) benefits.

You also can’t voluntarily quit your job or voluntarily reduce the hours you are working to apply for CRB, and you have to continue looking for work — whether employment or self-employment — while you’re receiving CRB. If you turned down what CRA calls “reasonable work” during the two-week period you’re applying for (CRA doesn’t define “reasonable”), you automatically lose eligibility for five periods (10 weeks) of CRB and can’t apply again until those 10 weeks are up.

The good news is that you can continue to earn employment or self-employment income while you’re receiving CRB, as long as you don’t earn more than half of what your average weekly income was before your job was affected by the pandemic.

For example, if your average weekly income in 2019 was $500, you can’t earn more than 50 per cent of that amount in the two-week period you are receiving CRB. So, if your average weekly income was $500, that means you can’t earn more than $250 in the two-week period you’re receiving CRB and still qualify to receive it.

You can calculate your average weekly income using the previous 12 months before you applied for CRB, during 2020, or during 2019. When you’re calculating your average weekly income, don’t include any COVID-19 emergency benefits you received (such as CERB), student loans or bursaries, maternity and parental benefits from EI, or pensions.

While you can continue to earn up to 50 per cent of your previous average weekly income while on CRB, keep an eye on how it affects your net income in the calendar year. If you earn more than $38,000 in net income during the year, you’ll have to pay back 50 cents of CRB for every dollar of net income that exceeds that amount. Your net income includes any CERB, CRSB, or CRCB benefits you have received in the calendar year, but it does not include CRB.

For example, if your net income was $40,000 in 2020 and you received $6,000 in CRB benefits in 2020, you’ll have to pay back $1,000 of your CRB benefits (half of the amount of your net income over $38,000). The repayment will be due at the same time as your income tax return for the year, and late payments will be charged interest.

As mentioned, CRA will withhold 10 per cent tax from each CRB payment. Depending on your income, you may need to pay more or less tax when you file your income tax return. In any case, you must report any CRB payments that you receive as income when you file your personal income tax return. The CRA will provide you with a T4A tax information slip at tax time for the amount you received in all CRA-administered COVID-19 benefits, including CERB and CRB.

For more information about CRB, including eligibility and how to apply, visit canada.ca/en/revenue-agency/services/benefits/recovery-benefit.html.

CRB two-week periods and when to apply

You can apply for any of these two-week periods, but only up to a maximum of 13 periods total (26 weeks).

With Ontario reporting a record surge of 939 new COVID-19 cases on the eve of the Thanksgiving weekend, the Ontario government is urging everyone to limit trips outside of home and to avoid non-essential travel.

The government is asking Ontarians to only leave home for essential purposes such as work (where it is not possible to work from home), school, grocery shopping, medical appointments, and outdoor healthy physical activity, and to only travel to other regions in the province — especially from higher transmission to lower transmission areas — when essential.

The province also announced additional public health restrictions in Toronto, Peel, and Ottawa — the three regions of the province with 612 of the new cases — including no indoor food or drink service at bars and restaurants and the closure of gyms, casinos, movie theatres, performance venues, and more for at least the next 28 days.

Premier Doug Ford made the announcement at a media conference at Queen’s Park on Friday (October 9), along with health minister Christine Elliott, finance minister Rod Phillips, Ontario’s chief medical officer of health Dr. David Williams, and Adalsteinn Brown, dean of the Dalla Lana School of Public Health at the University of Toronto.

“In the last week, the pandemic has picked up speed at an alarming rate,” Ford said. “The situation today is extremely serious. On September 1st, we had just over 110 new cases. Five weeks later, today, we’re at 939 new cases.”

“As we post record testing numbers, the percentage of people testing positive is rising too quickly, with some communities showing as high as a 10 per cent positivity. The virus is starting to spread to older people. The number of contacts for every confirmed case has exploded, sometimes in the thousands. All trends are going in the wrong direction. Left unchecked, we risk worst-case scenarios first seen in Italy and New York City.”

Ford warned of the potential of the virus to spread again in long-term care homes, “something we must avoid at all costs”. He said there has been already been a 250 per cent increase in the number of hospitalizations and the number of people in intensive care units, and that the number of admissions to ICUs will more than triple in less than 30 days if current trends continue — overwhelming Ontario’s hospitals.

“We have to do everything possible to prevent widespread lockdowns, and we cannot go back to Stage 1,” Ford said. “We need to keep our schools open and protect our long-term care homes — that’s our top priority, nothing matters more.”

Ford said his cabinet reviewed the recommendations of Ontario’s top public health officials during an emergency meeting this morning, and accepted all of them.

Effective at 12:01 a.m. on Saturday (October 10), Toronto, Ottawa, and Peel will be in a “modified Stage 2” with the following measures in place:

• Reducing limits for all social gatherings and organized public events to a maximum of 10 people indoors and 25 people outdoors where physical distancing can be maintained. The two limits may not be combined for an indoor-outdoor event.
• Prohibiting indoor food and drink service in restaurants, bars and other food and drink establishments, including nightclubs and food court areas in malls.
• Closing of: indoor gyms and fitness centres (i.e., exercise classes and weight and exercise rooms); casinos, bingo halls and other gaming establishments; indoor cinemas; performing arts centres and venues; spectator areas in racing venues; interactive exhibits or exhibits with high risk of personal contact in museums, galleries, zoos, science centres, landmarks, etc.
• Prohibiting personal care services where face coverings must be removed for the service (e.g. makeup application, beard trimming).
• Reducing the capacity limits for: tour and guide services to 10 people indoors and 25 people outdoors; real estate open houses to 10 people indoors, where physical distancing can be maintained; in-person teaching and instruction (e.g. cooking class) to 10 people indoors and 25 people outdoors, with exemptions for schools, child care centres, universities, colleges of applied arts and technology, private career colleges, the Ontario Police College, etc.; and meeting and event spaces to 10 people indoors and 25 people outdoors.
• Limiting indoor team sports to training sessions (no games or scrimmages). A decision has not been made on outdoor team sports.

Schools, child care centres, and places of worship will remain open in these communities but must continue to follow the public health measures in place. Before-school and after-school programs will also be exempt from these new restrictions.

Given the extraordinary costs associated with these functions, wedding receptions scheduled for this weekend may proceed under existing public health rules. Effective Tuesday (October 13) at 12:01 a.m., updated public health measures will apply to wedding receptions, including new gathering limits of 10 people indoors and 25 people outdoors at event spaces.

The measures in Toronto, Peel, and Ottawa will remain in effect for 28 days, after which they will be reviewed by Ontario’s top public health officials.

“I can’t stress enough how difficult, how painful, it was to make this decision,” Ford said. “My heart just breaks for these folks, and I understand what this decision means to each and every one of you. I can tell you, I didn’t sleep last night. Believe me, this weighs heavy on me, making this decision. I know what this will do to businesses who are already struggling.”

Ford then addressed business owners and workers directly, saying he would do “everything in my power” to support them.

In addition to the federal government’s package of economic supports announced earlier today (including rent subsidies directed to business owners, the extension of the wage subsidy program, and additional funds for business loans), Ford announced $300 million in provincial funding to support small businesses in the affected regions with their fixed costs over the next 28 days, including waiving provincial and municipal property tax bills and hydro and natural gas bills.

AUDIO: Ontario Premier Doug Ford announces additional financial support for businesses

Ford’s media conference followed a media briefing earlier in the afternoon where Adalsteinn Brown, Dr. Williams, and Dr. Dirk Huyer (Ontario’s chief coroner and executive lead of COVID-19 teting) provided details on the rationale behind the new restrictions.

At that briefing, Brown said the positivity rate in older populations is now at 1.4 per cent, more than three times the rate in early August. He said hospitalizations have gone up by 250 per cent over the past three weeks and Ontario ICU occupancy is predicted to exceed the threshold where the health care system can maintain scheduled surgeries and other acute care services, even in best-case scenarios.

Williams said that the positivity rate in Toronto, Peel, and Ottawa is significantly higher than in other areas of the province. With community transmission now reaching 25 per cent, testing and contact tracing is no longer sufficient to identify and control the spread. The latest reports from public health units show the number of contacts for confirmed cases has reached as high as 100 people, which makes it very difficult to trace and isolate these cases.

Huyer said the intention of the new measures in Toronto, Peel, and Ottawa is to prevent the potential spread of the virus in long-term care homes and schools. He said the virus is primarily spreading where people gather inside, in close proximity and without wearing masks, such as a group of friends getting together inside a restaurant — despite restaurant owners and employees following proper protocols.

Brown and Williams said there is not much evidence of transmission within schools among staff and students, that most of the cases in schools are a result of infected people from the community coming into the schools.

Williams said there are no travel restrictions in place between other regions of the province and Toronto, Peel, and Ottawa and other regions of the province, but travel to and from the “hot zones” is discouraged. He said public health officials will be closely monitoring the situation in regions adjacent to Toronto, Peel, and Ottawa, and that measures could be extended to these other regions if required.

Finally, Williams said he is waiting for recommendations from the Public Health Measures Table on public health guidance on how to safely celebrate Halloween.

On Friday (October 9), Peterborough Public Health announced the launch of a new online COVID-19 data tracker tool at localcovidtracker.ca.

The interactive graphical tool provides current COVID-19 information for the Peterborough area, as well as some historical data. The tool will be updated with the most recent data by 5 p.m. each day.

“This COVID-19 tracker allows residents to sort local data by different filters, such as time frame and type of outbreak,” says Jane Hoffmeyer, the health unit’s manager of foundational standards whose team developed the tool. “It also uses charts and other graphics to visualize the data, making it easier to understand how the pandemic is affecting us locally.”

Neighbouring health units are also offering similar interactive graphical tools for COVID-19 data.

The Haliburton, Kawartha, Pine Ridge District Health Unit recently launched a COVID-19 Dashboard — replacing its previous static reports.

Hastings Prince Edward Public Health has offered a similar interactive graphical tool for some time.

The Peterborough tool includes local data on cases (new, active, and resolved), sources of exposure, hospitalizations, and outbreak information for long-term care, retirement homes, and schools.

Here’s an update on COVID-19 cases in Ontario as well as in the greater Kawarthas region.

Today, Ontario is reporting another record increase of 939 new COVID-19 cases today — an increase of 142 over the previous record of 797 set yesterday.

As has been the case for weeks, most of the new cases are in Toronto (336), and Peel (150), and Ottawa (126), with smaller increases in York (68), Halton (59), Hamilton (40), Durham (32), Simcoe-Muskoka (28), Middlesex-London (24), Windsor-Essex (18), Wellington-Dufferin-Guelph (16), Waterloo (13), and Niagara (10). The remaining 21 public health units are reporting 5 or fewer cases, with 9 reporting no cases at all.

Of today’s cases, 53% are among people under the age of 40. The positivity rate has decreased by 0.1% to 2% (this means that 2% of the tests that were performed on October 8 were positive for COVID-19). With 724 more cases resolved, the percentage of resolved cases has decreased by 0.1% to 85%.

There are 5 new deaths, with an additional 19 people hospitalized since yesterday, for a total of 225, but with no change in patients admitted to ICUs or on ventilators. A total of 44,914 tests were completed yesterday, and the backlog of tests under investigation has increased by 55 to 58,173.

The number of new cases in Ontario schools today is 52, a decrease of 48 from yesterday, with 32 student cases, 9 staff cases, and 15 cases among unidentified individuals. There are 20 new cases in licensed child care settings, an increase of 14 from yesterday, with 9 cases among children and 11 cases among staff.

In the greater Kawarthas region, there is 1 new case to report in Hastings and Prince Edward counties; however, an additional case has been resolved so the number of active cases remains at 6. There are no new cases in Peterborough, with an additional 2 cases resolved. There are no new cases in Kawartha Lakes, Northumberland, or Haliburton, with no change in resolved cases.

None of the new cases in Ontario schools and child care settings are in the greater Kawarthas region.

There are currently 13 active cases in the greater Kawarthas region, including 4 in Peterborough, 6 in Hastings and Prince Edward counties, 1 in Kawartha Lakes, 1 in Northumberland, and 1 in Haliburton.

Since the pandemic began in the greater Kawarthas region, there have been 131 confirmed positive cases in the Peterborough area (125 resolved with 2 deaths), 183 in the City of Kawartha Lakes (163 resolved with 32 deaths), 45 in Northumberland County (43 resolved with 1 death), 18 in Haliburton County (17 resolved with no deaths), and 61 in Hastings and Prince Edward counties (49 resolved with 5 deaths). The most recent death was reported in Northumberland on September 8.

Province-wide, there have been 56,742 confirmed cases, an increase of 797 from yesterday, with 49,032 (85% of all cases) resolved, an increase of 724. There have been 2,997 deaths, an increase of 5 from yesterday, with 1,956 deaths in long-term care homes, a increase of 2 from yesterday. An additional 19 people have been hospitalized, with no change in ICU or ventilated patients. A total of 4,306,025 tests have been completed, an increase of 44,914 from yesterday, with 58,173 tests under investigation, an increase of 55 from yesterday.

This report is based on data supplied by the province’s integrated Public Health Information System (iPHIS), as well as any additional information supplied by health units. This information is at least 24 hours old, so it is not real-time data. Note that each health unit reports the information in a different way.

Peterborough Public Health

Peterborough Public Health’s service area is the City and County of Peterborough and the Hiawatha and Curve Lake First Nations.

The health unit provides daily reports, including on weekends.

Confirmed positive: 131 (no change)
Active cases: 4 (decrease of 2)
Deaths: 2 (no change)
Resolved: 125 (increase of 2)
Total tests completed: Over 31,700 (increase of 200)
Institutional outbreaks: Fairhaven (no change)

Haliburton, Kawartha, Pine Ridge District Health Unit

The Haliburton, Kawartha, Pine Ridge District Health Unit’s service area is the City of Kawartha Lakes, Northumberland County, and Haliburton County.

The health unit provides reports from Monday to Friday, excluding statutory holidays.

Confirmed positive: 246, including 183 in Kawartha Lakes, 45 in Northumberland, 18 in Haliburton (no change)
Probable cases: 0 (no change)
Hospitalizations (total to date): 15 (no change)
Deaths: 33 (no change)
Resolved: 223, including 163 in Kawartha Lakes, 43 in Northumberland, 17 in Haliburton (no change)
Active cases: 3, including 1 in Kawartha Lakes, 1 in Northumberland, 1 in Haliburton (no change)
Institutional outbreaks: None (no change)

Hastings Prince Edward Public Health

Hastings Prince Edward Public Health’s service area is Hastings County (including Bancroft) and Prince Edward County.

The health unit provides reports from Monday to Friday, excluding statutory holidays.

Confirmed positive: 61 (increase of 1)
Active cases: 6 (no change)
Deaths: 5 (no change)
Hospitalized: 0 (no change)
Hospitalized and in ICU: 0 (no change)
Hospitalized and in ICU on ventilator: 0 (no change)
Recovered: 50 (increase of 1)
Total tests completed: 41,342 (no change)
Institutional outbreaks: None (no change)

Province of Ontario

Confirmed positive: 57,681 (increase of 939)
Resolved: 49,032 (increase of 724, 85% of all cases)
Hospitalized: 225 (increase of 19)
Hospitalized and in ICU: 47 (no change)
Hospitalized and in ICU on ventilator: 29 (no change)
Deaths: 2,997 (increase of 5)
Deaths of residents in long-term care homes: 1,956 (increase of 2)
Total tests completed: 4,306,025 (increase of 44,914)
Tests under investigation: 58,173 (increase of 55)

For more information about COVID-19 in Ontario, visit covid-19.ontario.ca.

This story has been updated with daily numbers from the Peterborough Public Health and Haliburton, Kawartha, Pine Ridge District Health Unit.