On Budget Eve, finance minister François-Philippe Champagne summoned the media to Saint-Tite, Quebec, where he was not just buying new shoes for the budget, in that strange Canadian tradition, but he was actually helping to make them at a shoe manufacturer, which was to symbolise the importance of investing in Canadian business. His message was that there will be no surprises in the budget, which they keep describing with the term “generational investment.” (Carney has also used “austerity,” so there’s that as well).
Meanwhile, more leaks about what’s in the budget are coming out, like the cancellation of the two billion trees programme (meaning by the time the current contracts are fulfilled, it will be about one billion trees). Or the fact that they have rejected calls to increase judges’ salaries to attract more talent to the bench. There are also going to be tax changes and updates to things like the capital cost allowances, because of course there are. Here is the updated tally of what has been promised so far. Also of note is that it looks like about $3 billion was collected in counter-tariffs in the trade war with the US before most of them were lifted—but they promised to raise $20 billion as part of their election platform.
Meanwhile, the Conservatives keep making the same demands for things that are imaginary—ending supposed “hidden taxes” which are not taxes, and in some cases are regulatory regimes either for the environment or other purposes, but they’re calling them taxes because dur, taxes are bad. But the worst canard that they have been allowed to get away with scot-free is this bullshit notion that somehow, deficits are being financed by “printed money” which is driving up inflation, which is not true at all. No money has been printed, even at the height of COVID, when the Bank of Canada did briefly engage in quantitative easing to keep liquidity in the market, but that’s not printing money, and they have been engaged in quantitative tightening for at least two years now. And even more to the point, if inflation was rampant, the Bank of Canada wouldn’t have cut interest rates again, but what are facts? And Carney, as a former central banker, should be putting a stop to this kind of thing, but he refuses, and sticks to his four prepared bullet points instead. To what end? I do not understand the reluctance to challenge this economic disinfo.
The Conservatives' budgetary demands include fiction. There are no "hidden taxes" on food. The industrial carbon price doesn't apply to agriculture. There is no "food packaging tax," and plastic regulations largely exempt food packaging. The clean fuel standard "17¢" was one scenario over time. 1/2
— Dale Smith (@journodale.bsky.social) 2025-11-03T14:31:01.939Z
And most egregious of all, nobody is printing money to pay for deficits. Nobody. There isn't even quantitative easing happening as there was during the height of the pandemic, and the Bank of Canada has been on quantitative tightening since. These are all lies that the Liberals just let fester. 2/2
— Dale Smith (@journodale.bsky.social) 2025-11-03T14:31:01.940Z
Ukraine Dispatch
Russia claims they have advanced within Pokrovsk, but Ukraine says they continue to hold them at bay. Meanwhile, Ukrainian troops have advanced near Dobropillia, reclaiming territory. Ukrainian drones have attacked a Russian petrochemical plant in Bashkortostan.
Good reads:
- Immigration policy changes are expected to be unveiled as part of the budget.
- Mélanie Joly says that the government has begun the dispute resolution process with Stellantis over their pulling out of the Brampton plant.
- Internal Documents™ show that the government claims they need the power to cancel visas on a massive scale because of fraud from India and Bangladesh.
- Briefing notes for the Secretary of State for foreign aid say that they NDP won’t be able to ask as many questions about cuts. Seriously?! That’s your takeaway?
- Changes to the EV mandate are expected to be unveiled this winter.
- A White Paper on digital sovereignty says Canadian data is subject to foreign court orders unless we control both the servers and the service provider.
- Human rights groups want the government to stop arms shipments to the UAE, as they are winding up in Sudan (in spite of the UAE claiming they’re not supplying).
- The former Bloc MP who lost by a single vote is appealing her case to the Supreme Court of Canada.
- Former Trudeau-era Cabinet minister Soraya Martinez Ferrada was elected mayor of Montreal. She’s a former child refugee from Chile, and the first racialised mayor.
- Doug Ford says that Carney asked him a couple of times to pull his Reagan ad, but he “recalls differently” whether Carney told him not to run it at all.
- David Eby says he won’t run anti-tariff ads in the US after all.
- Stewart Prest makes the point that apologising to Trump, and using it to deny the truth, only makes Trump more likely to continue to bully us.
- Colin Horgan looks at how the Conservatives have been stealing working class votes from the NDP—but also their weakness that the NDP can exploit.
Odds and ends:
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