All good points, thanks George (nice to see you again) and Chris. Anything away from 'normal' stores (overseas or in a theatre not vastly equipped with uniform stores) will result in variations of insignia and uniform. The query really only applied to RCAF rather than Canadians in the RAF (who would generally be subject to RAF regulations save the point above).
So it seems that officially, according to RCAF regs they werent worn and probably not within canada where cloth versions were plentiful, but those in the UK or elsewhere probably (certainly) did, due in part because of what was locally available.