The Ontario Provincial Police are investigating a company that received more than $40-million from the Ontario government, including from a skills training fund that the province’s Auditor-General found was granting money in ways that were unfair and unaccountable.

The force confirmed Monday that its anti-rackets branch has launched an investigation into the company, Keel Digital Solutions, which owns an online counselling platform called Get A-Head.

“The OPP Anti-Rackets Branch has completed its review and will be proceeding with an investigation. At this time, we cannot release any details or speculate on how long the investigation will take,” OPP spokeswoman Gosia Puzio said in an e-mail on Monday.

Mohammad Abdou’s phone began buzzing the moment FIFA announced the full 2026 World Cup schedule, revealing that Egypt will have one match in Vancouver and two in nearby Seattle.

As director of the Association of Egyptians in Vancouver, Mr. Abdou is in many group chats connecting hundreds of members of the country’s diaspora. Throughout Saturday, they exchanged screenshots about the news, as they discussed which opponents Egypt will be facing and whether it would be possible to get tickets.

The Ontario government gave $1-million from its controversial Skills Development Fund to a company headed by an entrepreneur who had been penalized by the province’s securities regulator for issuing misleading press releases.

Ontario Premier Doug Ford has repeatedly defended the Skills Development Fund, saying it is retraining workers and creating jobs. But government documents show some of the money awarded to the company, Connex Telecommunications Inc., was for staff to test a call-centre chatbot, prompting opposition critics to question why taxpayers are subsidizing a system to replace human workers.

Ontario’s Labour Minister told a business audience that he takes full responsibility for a controversial skills-training fund, after a prominent construction union leader whose organization received tens of millions from the program called attacks on the government ridiculous.

David Piccini has been on the defensive for weeks about the $2.5-billion Skills Development Fund, a marquee program of the Ford government that gives money to unions, employers and other organizations to retrain workers. An October report from the province’s Auditor-General found that the distribution of $1.3-billion in grants under the program was “not fair, transparent or accountable,” and raised concerns about the use of lobbyists to secure funding.

The Ontario government spent a record $112-million on advertising in its last fiscal year with the most money directed toward a U.S. media campaign as the threat of tariffs loomed, a new report from the province’s Auditor-General reveals.

The “U.S. Partnerships” campaign cost $40.1-million and ran on American TV, and in print and digital media, with $33-million spent on prime-time spots on CNN, Fox and other large U.S. networks, according to the 2025 annual report from Ontario Auditor-General Shelley Spence released on Tuesday.

The company at the centre of a political storm related to Ontario’s Skills Development Fund says it was still receiving money from the program last month, even while the province subjected it to a forensic audit that the government has since forwarded to the OPP.

In an interview with The Globe and Mail, Jay Fischbach, the chief operating officer of Keel Digital Solutions, the company in question, said it has been receiving payments of about $240,000 a month, including in October, from the Skills Development Fund.

Ontario NDP Leader Marit Stiles was ejected from the provincial legislature on Wednesday after refusing to withdraw her assertion that Premier Doug Ford leads a “corrupt government” for its handling of a $2.5-billion fund for training programs.

In Question Period at Queen’s Park, Ms. Stiles was asking about Ontario’s Skills Development Fund, which has been at the centre of a month-long controversy over revelations that less-qualified organizations received millions of dollars in grants, some after their leadership made large donations to the governing Progressive Conservatives or hired lobbyists with connections to the government.

A company under police review for alleged irregularities with Ontario government contracts released an audio recording on Tuesday that it says supports its claim that Premier Doug Ford’s government is trying to make the firm a “scapegoat” to deflect a controversy over its worker training fund.

Keel Digital Solutions released an 18-second audio clip from what it said was a July 22 discussion between CEO Rob Godfrey and a senior auditor conducting a forensic audit.

An Ontario company under police review for alleged “suspicious activity” related to provincial funding is accusing Premier Doug Ford’s government of blurring facts to dodge accountability over a controversial worker-training fund.

In a statement Monday, Keel Digital Solutions demanded the government provide a copy of the full forensic audit of the company that it referred to the Ontario Provincial Police. Keel operates an artificial-intelligence-driven virtual mental-health counselling platform for students and police officers.

The Ontario Provincial Police’s anti-rackets branch is looking into a company that has received more than $40-million from the provincial government, in order to determine whether to launch a criminal investigation.

The force confirmed on Friday that the government had referred “suspicious activity” related to transfer payments to the company, an online counselling platform called Get A-Head.

The Doug Ford government says it has sent the Ontario Provincial Police the results of a forensic audit scrutinizing a company that received about $40-million from the province – including millions from a controversial worker-training fund.

The Office of the Premier also said the government is reviewing all payments made to the company and could take further action.